1. Please pray with me. May the words of my mouth and the meditation of our hearts be pleasing in Your sight, O Lord, our Rock, and our Redeemer. Amen. The message from God’s Word as we continue our sermon series on the Lord’s Prayer is taken from John 17 and Romans 8. It’s entitled, “Who Should Pray?” Dear brothers and sisters in Christ.
2. Before we get into why anyone should pray or what prayer should look like, it is appropriate for us to contemplate the question: Who prays? Or, to put it more personally, should I pray? After all, what gives us the right? If you think about it, prayer is quite presumptuous. We’re talking about approaching the almighty God of creation! He is perfect in holiness and righteousness and can’t abide sinners in his perfect presence. So, on what basis do you presume to go before him with your needs, wants, and cares? Who do you think you are, going before God in prayer?
3. There are two dangers that arise when it comes to this sort of questioning on prayer. The first is that we take such questions too lightly. We are presumptuous in thinking we have the right to go before God. To use William Placher’s phrase, too many are guilty of the domestication of transcendence. (William Placher, The Domestication of Transcendence: How Modern Thinking about God Went Wrong (Louisville, Westminster John Knox Press, 1996). We treat God as being too familiar, our buddy who wants to do us a favor, or worse, a genie who must grant our wishes.
4. Eugene Peterson corrects such flippancy with his delightful anecdote, “One of the indignities to which pastors are routinely subjected is to be approached, as a group of people are gathering for a meeting or a meal, with the request, “Reverend, get things started for us with a little prayer, will ya?” It would be wonderful if we would counter by shouting William McNamara’s fantasized response, “I will not! There are not little prayers! Prayer enters the lion’s den, brings us before the holy where it is uncertain whether we will come back alive or sane, for it is a fearful thing to fall in the hands of a living God.” (Eugene Peterson, Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity (Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 1987). 46.
5. Yes, prayer enters the lion’s den. No sinner can presume to come before God on their own. But, this gets us to the second danger which I encounter as a pastor a great deal. It comes when people say, “I’m too sinful to pray. God wouldn’t listen to someone like me.” This is a lie that Satan pours into a guilty conscience in an effort to keep a smoldering wick from the invigorating flames of mercy.
6. To be sure, sinners can’t approach the Holy One on their own. But—and here is precisely the joy and power of prayer—we don’t! Prayer isn’t a conversation God is open to having with us based on our worthiness. It’s a gift from Jesus, who himself, along with the Holy Spirit, prays for you, and now invites you to join him with your prayers and supplications before the throne of your listening, gracious Father. You can pray because Jesus prays for you.
7. First, we will look at GOD IN PRAYER—I still can’t get over the fact that Jesus prays. It seems odd to say it. After all, prayers are directed towards God. Jesus is God. So, how in the world would it be that God prays? We get a beautiful peek into the way the three persons of the Trinity relate to one another, and the way they deal with us, when the Holy Spirit pulls back the curtain and shows us that, right now, God the Son prays to God the Father. In John 17, just before Christ is to be betrayed into the hands of sinners, he prays. He prays for his apostles and the ministry they will carry forth. Then, Jesus prays for his church: “I do not ask for these [the apostles] only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word” (John 17:20). Here we’ll find our Lord praying to our Father for our unity so that, through us, the world might know that the Father sent the Son in love. Later, we’ll find Jesus praying for those who are responsible for his death when he cries, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do!” (Luke 23:34).
8. We can see throughout the New Testament that this is the very sort of prayer Jesus prays for us. The Apostle Paul promises, “Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us” (Rom. 8:34). The author of Hebrews also points out, “Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them” (Heb. 7:25). Jesus is before the Father making intercession for you. Jesus prays for you!
9. This is part of Jesus’s great priestly work for the people of God. In the Old Testament, the priests had the job to offer up sacrifices to God and to pray on behalf of the people. Because Christ has given his life as the perfect sacrifice, he enters the throne room of heaven. And, since his sacrifice was made on our behalf, he goes before the Father to intercede for us. It is as if Christ points toward us with his nail-pierced hands and says, “Father, forgive her, forgive him. I have paid for their sins.” Christ prays to his Father for you. But, he won’t stop there. He who prays for you invites you to join him!
10. Second, when we think about who should pray, we learn WHAT A FRIEND WE HAVE IN JESUS—Jesus is your great High Priest. He is also your King who rules over you. Such a title can be awfully intimidating. On first blush, upon hearing that we have Jesus as our monarch, we might begin to identify ourselves as his subjects or even servants. Though there are places in Scripture that will use such language, the Lord Jesus informs us that there is a deeper level to this relationship. He calls us friends! “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you” (John 15:13–15). Jesus calls us royal friends and then connects this title to our prayers: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide so that whatever you ask the Father in my name he may give it to you” (John 15:16). John Kleinig says, “In the ancient world, the person who was closest to the king, his personal confidant and advisor, was called the friend of the king.” (John Kleinig, Grace Upon Grace: Spirituality for Today (St. Louis, Concordia Publishing House, 2008). 154.
11. In baptism, Christ, your great High Priest, has cleansed you with his blood, giving you access to the Father. By calling you his friend, the Lord brings you in as a confidant and advisor, telling you God’s will and inviting you to present your prayers and petitions before the Father in his name. There’s more. On our own, we are sinners who have no business entering into God’s holy presence. But, being baptized into Christ, we are made priests through His blood and friends through his promise. Even with all this, our faith can waver, and we find ourselves utterly weak. So, Christ Jesus gives us the Holy Spirit to help us in prayer, and—get this—to even pray for us!
12. St. Paul writes to the Romans, “Likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (Rom. 8:26). The Holy Spirit is at work interceding for us in our needs and in our weaknesses, even driving us to pray! “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Rom. 8:15). Through Christ, you have been adopted into the family of God and have been given the Holy Spirit, who both prays for you and teaches you to pray to the Father!
13. So, who should pray? Dear saint, you should! You can! Though we never presume upon prayer as a right that we have as sinners, we shouldn’t be prevented from praying. After all, Christ Jesus shed His blood in order to give you access to God. He is your High Priest who prays for you and makes you a priest. You are a baptized, royal friend of the Lord who is brought into the Father’s confidence. And, you are an adopted child of God who has been given the Holy Spirit who leads you to pray and even prays on your behalf! All of this, God has done so that you will pray! Amen. Now the peace of God that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, until life everlasting. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment