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A prayer of faith by God’s people

prayer of faith by God's people

I think that I somehow do not fall into the category of one who will be hated because I follow Jesus. I am reminded today that Jesus said it and that the Psalms actually has a prayer that specifically touches on this point. Half way through the prayer there is a declaration of confidence and maybe a prophecy of sorts that the “haters” will eventually lose.

May everyone who hates Zion
    be defeated and driven back.
May they all be like grass growing on the housetops,
    which dries up before it can grow;
   no one gathers it up
    or carries it away in bundles.
No one who passes by will say,
    “May the Lord bless you!
    We bless you in the name of the Lord. – Psalm 129:5-8  GNT

I find myself, out of a trained practice, to bless everyone, even my enemies. I have been told that I should not be doing this and maybe this Psalm is confirming this.

Some take offence at the prayer the psalmist made against the enemies of Israel, yet there is really no basis for such offence. “It is striking in this case at least how mild these imprecations are. The psalmist is not asking that those who have harmed Israel be sent to hell, or even that they experience the same sufferings they have inflicted on others. He asks only that they and their designs might not prosper.” – Boice

Isaiah has a consuming prayer from a different perspective.

Why don’t you tear the sky open and come down? The mountains would see you and shake with fear. They would tremble like water boiling over a hot fire. Come and reveal your power to your enemies, and make the nations tremble at your presence! – Isaiah 64:1-2  GNT

He seemed to know that it would require the tearing of the sky for God to fulfill His plan for the world. I think the good news is that God actually answered this prayer through Jesus.  He has destroyed the barrier between heaven and earth. Today, God has given me access to all of His riches and ressources and I am invited to take them, by faith, through prayer.

“People are merely “amusing themselves” by asking for the patience which a famine or a persecution would call for if, in the meantime, the weather and every other inconvenience sets them grumbling. One must learn to walk before one can run. So here. We – or at least I – shall not be able to adore God on the highest occasions if we have learned no habit of doing so on the lowest. At best, our faith and reason will tell us that He is adorable, but we shall not have found Him so, no have “tasted and seen.” Any patch of sunlight in a wood will show you something about the sun which you could never get from reading books on astronomy. These pure and spontaneous pleasures are “patches of Godlight” in the woods of our experience.” – C.S. Lewis, Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer

 

 

 

 

Talk with God, my prayers are heard

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There was a song that we sang in youth group on Friday nights that would come out of the core of my being. It is hardly sung these days, but when it is, it still rocks my soul.

As a deer longs for a stream of cool water,
    so I long for you, O God. – Psalm 42:1 GNT

Thirst is the second strongest bodily desire after the need for air. That is where I was at in my journey of discovering and expressing my love for Jesus. I discovered that I could worship Him anytime, anyplace because of the Holy Spirit who was within me.

It was part of David being honest that makes the prayer so real. He goes on…

Why am I so sad?
    Why am I so troubled?
I will put my hope in God,
    and once again I will praise him,
    my savior and my God.

Here in exile my heart is breaking,
    and so I turn my thoughts to him.
He has sent waves of sorrow over my soul;
    chaos roars at me like a flood,
    like waterfalls thundering down to the Jordan
    from Mount Hermon and Mount Mizar.
May the Lord show his constant love during the day,
    so that I may have a song at night,
    a prayer to the God of my life. – Psalm 42:5-8 GNT

In other words – “I know it is foolish to be down, but I am.” What about the expression he uses at the end – “a prayer to the God of my life.” God’s love never fails and His ear is ready to hear.

The intimacy that exist here is real.

While I slept, my heart was awake.

I dreamed my lover knocked at the door.

Let me come in, my darling,

    my sweetheart, my dove.
My head is wet with dew,
    and my hair is damp from the mist. – Song of Solomon 5:2 GNT

 

I have seen God delighting and joying over me. I am just as important to Him as a lover is to their loved one. He longs to hear my voice – why is it so easy to forget to pray? He reaches out to me but I am too busy. I am His dove that He wants to hold and speak gently to, but I struggle and keep trying to fly away.

Jesus time of prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane was given a different perspective from the author of the Book of Hebrews.

In his life on earth Jesus made his prayers and requests with loud cries and tears to God, who could save him from death. Because he was humble and devoted, God heard him. But even though he was God’s Son, he learned through his sufferings to be obedient. When he was made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all those who obey him – Hebrews 5:7-9 GNT

Jesus came to pray that night as a high priest – He is interceding – standing between me and God and praying on my behalf. The following day, like the high priest practiced, He will offer a sacrifice for sin. Rather than an animal, He would offer Himself.

Jesus prayed and God heard Him – not because of His loud cries, or even because of the quantity of tears – He heard Him because He was humble and faithful. Rather than demanding, He prayed for the will of God to take place. He learned to be obedient, not that He was disobedient, but rather that I might have a model, an example, of what it looks like to learn obedience in suffering.

The reason became clear – He was made perfect three days later and the source of eternal salvation. So when I pray, I pray as a child of God who is talking to His Father in heaven. That is where I begin my prayer – with the confidence that God hears them for Jesus’ sake – Jesus intercedes for me. So I do not worry if they are passionate enough, or articulate, whether they come as cries or with tears, they are heard because of Jesus. I pray humbly and faithfully as Jesus did.

“Our prayer must be in full, grateful awareness that our access to God, as Father is a free gift won by the costly sacrifice of Jesus the True Son, and then enacted in us by the Holy Spirit who helps us know inwardly that we are his children. To pray in Jesus’ name is not meant to be a magic formula, as if the pronunciation of the words coerce God’s power or mechanically taps into supernatural forces. Jesus’ name is shorthand for his divine person and saving work. To come to the Father in Jesus’ name, not our own, is to come fully cognizant that we are being heard because of the costly grace in which we stand. This is the one principle of prayer that makes it possible to be heard by God even though no one can follow all the other guidelines and ‘rules’ as we should” – Timothy Keller