Prayer series 3. Prayer with Jesus Heb 7:11-25; Ps 69:1-18; John 17:20-26
Audio:https://www.daleappleby.net/index.php/mp3-sermons/51-recent-sermons/961-3-prayer-with-jesus
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tv3LQQTkQn8
Introduction
In the first sermon of this series I emphasised that we know prayer is central to the spiritual life of a Christian because it was first central to the life of Jesus. Through praying for God’s righteous kingdom to come to come on earth as it is in heaven (Matt 6:10, 33), both our lives and the lives of others become more like the character of Christ. And since to have a family in the likeness of his Son was why God created the world, prayer is at the centre of all of God’s purposes. I continued with a Christ-centred approach to prayer last week by explaining that praying is all about being united with the fellowship the Son of God enjoys with his own heavenly Father. It’s easy to imagine the experiences Jesus enjoyed in prayer when on earth, but it’s much harder for us to grasp Jesus ongoing heavenly prayer life. I think this is because we struggle to comprehend that even as glorified (John 17:5) the Lord is still a real human being. Jesus is praying intensely in heaven because we his people stand in need of his prayers, and he is praying for us today.
A “natural” way of understanding thinks of prayer as something we do and that “God” listens to our prayers and answers with a “Yes” or “No”. But this way of thinking about prayer leaves out the mediatorship of Jesus between us and God, (1 Tim 2:5). A Christ-centred way of thinking about prayer involves a call to pray in unity with Jesus own praying.
Prayer and the Image of God
People in all cultures pray, and even a sizeable proportion of atheists and agnostics pray (www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/pray-me/201309/do-atheists-pray). We were created to be praying beings, and there’s no higher spiritual action than the prayers of a child of God to a loving heavenly Father. Prayer is a natural and indispensable expression of what it means to be in the image of God. Since Jesus is the perfect image of God (Col 2:15) his life is always saturated with prayer. To be fully human is to fully pray. All Christians believe that God has a good plan for us, but far fewer live as if this plan is outworked through prayer.
Even if sin had never entered the world God would have revealed his plans through prayer, but the catastrophic effects of evil means prayer now involves intercession. In intercessory prayer for the needs of others we stand as a bridge between them and God. At the heart of intercession is identification, the deeper our identification with the needs of others the more powerful our intercession. This means Jesus’ whole life is an act of intercession, he was and still is the perfect Intercessor. The New Testament has a consistent approach to Jesus as Intercessor.
Jesus’ Intercession
In the context of speaking of the many troubles, persecutions and deprivations Christians are exposed to in following Christ, Paul speaks of Jesus at the right hand of God interceding for us (Rom 8:33-35). It is in the context of the human need for a priesthood sympathetic to weakness (Heb 5:2) that Hebrews testifies that Jesus “is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.” (7:25). It is the inner life of Jesus that makes him the perfect intercessor. Christ is fully empathetic with our needs because he has never forgotten his own experiences of being misunderstood, rejected, abused and crucified. He remembers his own earthly sufferings, cries and tears brought before God in prayer (Heb 5:7), and seeing our struggles is moved to bring our needs to the Father in the strength of his perfected healed humanity.
Christ is the perfect intercessor because he is close to the heart of the Father whose will it is to heal and save. John testifies of this relationship, “No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is close to the heart of the Father, He has made him known.” (John 1:18). Jesus’ prayers are always heard and answered by the Father because he prays the desires of his Father’s heart (John 11:41-42). In complete unity with the Father (John 17:9,11,15,17,20,24) Jesus’ life is a prayer continually offered up before the face of the Father on our behalf (Heb 6:19-20; 7:25; 9:24-25; 1 John 1:1-2). That at the heart of the ministry of the exalted Saviour in heaven is prayer is an incredible truth which can mightily stimulate our own praying and impart enormous security about salvation. The scriptures abundantly testify to these things.
Isaiah says prophetically of the triumphant work of the cross, “he made intercession for transgressors” (Isa 53:12), and we know this prayer of Jesus’ for Peter was answered, “‘Satan has asked to sift all of you as wheat. 32 But I have prayed for you, Simon, that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.’” (Luke 23:31-32). If Christ could stand at the tomb of Lazarus and testify, ““Father, I thank you that you have heard me. 42 And I know that you always hear me” (John 11:41), and Lazarus was raised from the dead, then his heavenly prayers for us are most certainly answered. His promise is unquestionably true for you and me, ““I give them (my sheep) eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. 29 My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand. 30 I and the Father are one.”” (John 10:28-30). The author of Hebrews testifies of Christ’s prayers on earth, “Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence.” (5:7). His intercessions were heard, not simply for himself, but for us. The indestructible life of Jesus interceding in heaven gives his praying unlimited authority (Heb 7:16) so we are completely secure in him (Rom 8:31-39).
Praying “In the Name” of Jesus
One of the most distinctive Christian practices is to pray “in the name of Jesus”. Jesus repeatedly promises in John’s Gospel that whatever we ask “in my name” will be granted (14:13, 14; 15:16; 16:23, 24, 26). Since in scripture “name” stands for character, to ask “in the name of Jesus” is to ask in the sphere of his presence and power. The “name” of Jesus concentrates all God’s love for his people; to be able to pray in Christ’s name is to bring requests based on Jesus’ honour and merits before God. Paul is quite definite about this as the manner of Christian praying, “For no matter how many promises God has made, they are ‘Yes’ in Christ. And so through him the ‘Amen’ is spoken by us to the glory of God.” (2 Cor 1:20). Through Jesus’ prayers to a Holy Righteous “Father” (John 17:6, 11, 25) we have been baptised into the eternal love between the Father and the Son. This brings an unbounded sense of completeness. We mustn’t however have a wrong image of Jesus at prayer.
It’s not as though all the action is in heaven while we are down here on earth. The Bible teaches that we are spiritually “seated with Christ in the heavenly places” (Eph 2:6; Col 3:1-3). As we walk with the Lord our prayer lives are being progressively united with the prayer life of Christ. This is a powerful spiritual truth of which there is a very dramatic picture in the book of Revelation.
“And when he (the Lamb) had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each holding a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints…..And another angel came and stood at the altar with a golden censer, and he was given much incense to offer with the prayers of all the saints on the golden altar before the throne, 4 and the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, rose before God from the hand of the angel. 5 Then the angel took the incense burner and filled it with fire from the altar and threw it on the earth, and there were peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning, and an earthquake.” (5:8; 8:3-5). The prayers of God’s people impact the structure of history, they have apocalyptic influence, when we pray nothing can be the same again. There’s a famous line from the English poet Tennyson, “More things are wrought by prayer Than this world dreams of” This sort of impact doesn’t however happen automatically, it’s profoundly related to why the Father always listened and answered the prayers of his Son.
The earthly intercessions of Christians which arise as sweet-smelling incense before God in heaven share in the powerful sacrifice of Christ for the lost. As Paul exhorts the Ephesians, “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children. 2 And walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” (Eph 5:1-2). It is when our hearts are filled with the love of Christ for others and are outpoured for them in prayer that the kingdom of God begins to come on earth as it is in heaven. Unity with the heart-felt prayers of Jesus can transform the hardest of situation.
Two Salvation Army officers set out to start a new work, only to meet with failure and opposition. Frustrated and worn out they appealed to General William Booth to close the mission. He sent back a telegram with two words on it, all in capitals, “TRY TEARS.” They followed his advice through broken hearted prayer and witnessed a mighty revival. When our own hearts weep for the lost in prayer (Phil 3:18) we too will see revival. But we can’t switch on these profound things in the strength of our own spirituality, we need Jesus to help us.
Praying to Jesus
The New Testament offers examples of prayer to Jesus in situations of great distress. When Stephen is being stoned to death, when Paul pleads with the Lord for the removal of his painful thorn in the flesh, when the tiny persecuted Church in Revelation is threatened with annihilation, prayers are made to Jesus (Acts 7:60; 2 Cor 12:8; Rev 22:20 cf.1 Cor 1:2; 16:22). Here is a contemporary example of prayer to Jesus. When Al Qaida terrorists took over flight 93 on 9/11 with a plan to fly it into the White House one of the passengers was a devout Christian named Todd Beamer. On board he called a telephone company service centre asked for prayer then led other passengers to say the Lord’s Prayer and the 23rd Psalm. But before he led them in rushing the hijackers and foiling their plan, he was heard to say, “Jesus help me.” There can never be a more profound and powerful prayer than, “Jesus help me.” The God who made us in his image and likeness perfected in Christ (Col 1:15), the Lord who even NOW is praying for you, will never fail to answer such a prayer.
Conclusion
Through the prayers of Jesus and our prayers in him, God is remaking his image in humanity and constructing a new creation (2 Cor 5:17). This means the general prayerlessness of the Church is a denial of the glory of the image of God revealed in Christ (Col 1:15). The call of God is for all of us to grow more in union with the sacrificial intercessions of Christ, the more this happens the more the world will be saved. If sinners won’t weep, pray, mourn over their sin and turn to God, in Christ we can do all that on their behalf. This is the glory and honour of praying with Jesus.