220531 Partnering with God in Prayer

Prayer has to do with the entire man. Prayer takes in man in his whole being, mind, soul and body. It takes the whole man to pray, and prayer affects the entire man in its gracious results. As the whole nature of man enters into prayer, so also all that belongs to man is the beneficiary of prayer. All of man receives benefits in prayer. The whole man must be given to God in praying. The largest results in praying come to him who gives himself, all of himself, all that belongs to himself, to God. This is the secret of full consecration, and this is a condition of successful praying, and the sort of praying which brings the largest fruits. The men of olden times who wrought well in prayer, who brought the largest things to pass, who moved God to do great things, were those who were entirely given over to God in their praying. God wants, and must have, all that there is in man in answering his prayers. He must have whole-hearted men through whom to work out His purposes and plans concerning men. God must have men in their entirety. No double-minded man need apply. No vacillating man can be used. No man with a divided allegiance to God, and the world and self, can do the praying that is needed. Holiness is wholeness, and so God wants holy men, men whole-hearted and true, for His service and for the work of praying. ³And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ´ These are the sort of men God wants for leaders of the hosts of Israel, and these are the kind out of which the praying class is formed

E M Bounds the Essentials of prayer

1 Thessalonians 5:17–18 (NASB95) — 17 pray without ceasing;

5:17. Continual prayer is not prayer that prevails without any interruption, but prayer that continues whenever possible. The adverb for continually (adialeiptōs, also in 1:3) was used in Greek of a hacking cough. Paul was speaking of maintaining continuous fellowship with God as much as possible in the midst of daily living in which concentration is frequently broken.[1]

As one abides in the Lord, on a consistent and persistent and eventually even the pattern of life of abiding in the Lord. In short occupation with a person of the Lord Jesus Christ. What does that look like?

Maybe it is indescribably except for those who have been brought to that glorious abode in the Lord.

Of course, your prayers are going to be without ceasing. No, your not waiting for the weekly prayer meeting or even the time of day of day to enter and to exit prayer.

There is not a time you begin your prayer, but each prayer is but a continuation of the prayer you’ve just prayed.

And when it comes to a crisis, there too is no beginning of the prayer you simply direct the conversation to another area of concern all the while you are thanking God, you are praising his name confessing.

The disciples prayer brings the attitude of partnership into one’s relationship with the Lord which prayer becomes a necessary component.

The Lord has a divine council. These spiritual beings that are classified as Elohim. Spiritual in nature but each consisting of personality. These beings are rational, thinking and sensing beings which includes determination of choice.

We find the Lord with His council in Psalm 82

Psalm 82:1 (NASB95) — 1 God takes His stand in His own congregation; He judges in the midst of the rulers.

The Hebrew term for God is

אֱלֹהִים [ʾelohiym/el·o·heem/] n

Take notice that in this verse not only is Elohim is used for God as Elohim takes his stand in His own congregation but who is Elohim in the midst of?

Elohim

Elohim the term used for God therefore does not literally mean God as we think of God all mighty, but at times it does refer to spiritual beings created by God.

These are those that God chose to be his council.

1 Kings 22:19–23 (NASB95) — 19 Micaiah said, “Therefore, hear the word of the Lord. I saw the Lord sitting on His throne, and all the host of heaven standing by Him on His right and on His left. 20 “The Lord said, ‘Who will entice Ahab to go up and fall at Ramoth-gilead?’ And one said this while another said that. 21 “Then a spirit came forward and stood before the Lord and said, ‘I will entice him.’ 22 “The Lord said to him, ‘How?’ And he said, ‘I will go out and be a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.’ Then He said, ‘You are to entice him and also prevail. Go and do so.’ 23 “Now therefore, behold, the Lord has put a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; and the Lord has proclaimed disaster against you.”

You have a question.

That question is.

Why does God need a council?

The answer is simple.

He doesn’t. But he chooses to have one. And by having one and for each of the ones who stand within that council is privileged to speak to the Lord and to use his mind which God had created in Him to participate in God’s plan for the ages.

I bring this up for it is prayer that gives little old you and little old me the power to affect all of human history. In so giving us the privilege of prayer, we have direct access to the throne room of God. being the family of God, we are even close to God than his divine council.

Hebrews 3:12–14 (NASB95) — 12 Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. 13 But encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our assurance firm until the end,

3581 μέτοχος (metochos), ου (ou), ὁ (ho): n.masc. [BAGD adj.]; ≡ Str 3353; TDNT 2.830—LN 34.8 companion, partner, sharer in (Lk 5:7; Heb 1:9; 3:1, 14; 6:4; 12:8+)[2]

Our prayers are seen as the pleasant aroma of incense as they are lifted up to our God in heaven. It is not just any prayer but those that are lifted up in the spirit. Prayers of the righteous man that goes before God. Prayers from the heart that is abiding in the Lord.

Note that when God’s council was saying this and saying that that God did not use all of there suggestion but the one who came forward with the plan of putting a spirit of deception within the people and it was the God approved the plan.

Could God just revealed and executed his own plan.

Of course but he gave this one particular spirit the opportunity to exercise the God given wisdom to lift back up to God.

That is what we do in our prayers.

Let us look at the patriarch Abraham for a moment.

Abraham has just been visited by three men who were in reality angels. One was the messenger of the Lord, the preincarnate Jesus Christ. After revealing the fact that Sarah Abraham’s wife was to give birth to a child within the year. This is when Sarah laughed and was called out by the Lord.

The men got up and started their journey to Sodom.

Genesis 18:17–19 (NASB95) — 17 The Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, 18 since Abraham will surely become a great and mighty nation, and in him all the nations of the earth will be blessed? 19 “For I have chosen him, so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lordmay bring upon Abraham what He has spoken about him.”

The record of God’s word lets us in on the thinking of the Lord the mind of Christ as he asks the rhetorical question in consideration to opening the door to allow Abraham to participate in the outcome of the decadent nation of Sodom.

Genesis 18:20–22 (NASB95) — 20 And the Lord said, “The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, and their sin is exceedingly grave. 21 “I will go down now, and see if they have done entirely according to its outcry, which has come to Me; and if not, I will know.” 22 Then the men turned away from there and went toward Sodom, while Abraham was still standing before the Lord.

This demonstrates a success and a failure in prayer.

First what does Abraham do?

Genesis 18:23 (NASB95) — 23 Abraham came near

Remember we said that Prayer is relational.

And though it is relational and though one is in the family of God and even Abraham being a prophet and the father of a nation and a blessing of nations, nonetheless there is a protocol to approach the sovereignty of the universe.

WE do no approach God on our own terms but God’s terms

This is why it is called proseuchmai prayer for we do not forget who it is that we are speaking to.

When it came to priests entering the Holy place in the tabernacle they had to wash their hands and feet.

When the people came to meet and worship God at the mountain they had to wash up.

James 4:7–10 (NASB95) — 7 Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. 9 Be miserable and mourn and weep; let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy to gloom. 10 Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.

And this is what Abraham did when you drew near to the Lord.

Abraham was struggling with the fact that he did not know how many righteous there must have been in Sodom and he wanted on the basis of the righteous. God understood the Judgment against sin. But as a patriarch and as a blessing that Abraham was to be he prayed for Sodom.

The failure came when Abraham stopped at 10. Surely there was 10 in Sodom but there were not.

What would have happened if Abraham prayed on the basis of one righteous?

None the less it there was boldness in the prayer that he prayed as it was with Moses praying for the people of Israel.

Numbers 14:13–19 (NASB95) — 13 But Moses said to the Lord, “Then the Egyptians will hear of it, for by Your strength You brought up this people from their midst, 14 and they will tell it to the inhabitants of this land. They have heard that You, O Lord, are in the midst of this people, for You, O Lord, are seen eye to eye, while Your cloud stands over them; and You go before them in a pillar of cloud by day and in a pillar of fire by night. 15 “Now if You slay this people as one man, then the nations who have heard of Your fame will say, 16 ‘Because the Lord could not bring this people into the land which He promised them by oath, therefore He slaughtered them in the wilderness.’ 17 “But now, I pray, let the power of the Lord be great, just as You have declared, 18 ‘The Lord is slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression; but He will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generations.’ 19 “Pardon, I pray, the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of Your lovingkindness, just as You also have forgiven this people, from Egypt even until now.”

In each case and others that the man of God intercedes for the sinners for those who are outside.

Perhaps when we think of people more as victims to satanic stumbling blocks we might be more apt to pray for the sinners that God would open the eyes of the heart rather than reacting to the injustice that one may have face.

Prayer is like Esther coming in to see the king bringing with her, her own petition before the king.

Esther 5:1-14

18 in everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

The life style of the Child of God makes prayer a habit not due to necessity but it is as we our prayers become a declaration of our dependency upon God but it is also a command which we follow. As a middle or passive voice it is prayer that is active upon us as it becomes an output of our spiritual growth. IN abiding in the Lord praying becomes as natural as breathing and not be becomes unnatural.

1 Thessalonians 5:18 (NASB95) — 18 in everything give thanks; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

In everything give thanks (ἐν παντι εὐχαριστειτε [en panti eucharisteite]). There is a silver lining to every cloud. God is with us whatever befalls us. It is God’s will that we find joy in prayer in Christ Jesus in every condition of life.[3]

While we have the imperatives in the last two verses now we are dealing with the circumstances.

πᾶςa

In every circumstance on ever occasion we are to prayer we are to pray.

What are the occasions?

Adoration

Confession

Thanksgiving

Supplication

The Continuance of prayer becomes the action of the watcher on the wall.

One of the actions of a reconnaissance team or a forward observer is the one who is on the ground marking the target. The one marking the target is close up and personal with the target that he is marking.

As prayer warriors we are on the ground and in prayer we are marking the target in our intercession for others.

There is a persistency in prayer. It is not for ours to evaluate where the prayers impact or the timing of the impact. In faith we know that God is faithful he is perfect knowledge, and he is good.

Remember that prayers do not dictate over the Sovereignty of God or his timing. Man’s will in prayer does not supersede God’s will.

Ours is to prayer in the spirit

And what God does with the prayer is according to God’s good pleasure.

Luke 18:1–8 (NASB95) — 1 Now He was telling them a parable to show that at all times they ought to pray and not to lose heart,

In the Lord’s teaching parable the Lord is instructing on the subject of persistent prayer.

2 saying, “In a certain city there was a judge who did not fear God and did not respect man. 3 “There was a widow in that city, and she kept coming to him, saying, ‘Give me legal protection from my opponent.’ 4 “For a while he was unwilling; but afterward he said to himself, ‘Even though I do not fear God nor respect man, 5 yet because this widow bothers me, I will give her legal protection, otherwise by continually coming she will wear me out.’ ” 6 And the Lord said, “Hear what the unrighteous judge said; 7 now, will not God bring about justice for His elect who cry to Him day and night, and will He delay long over them? 8 “I tell you that He will bring about justice for them quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?”

IN this parable we find the consistency in prayer, and though there is silence coming from the throne room of heaven none the less we continue with our prayers.

It is easy to throw up a prayer and hope God hears us and answers quickly as a desperate plea. But the faithful will continue to address God until the matter is delt with.

Paul in his own petition continually addressed God about his own throne in the flesh which God then had deal directly with Paul to say that he was not going to do. That freed Paul up from praying that prayer and moving on to something else.

In the parable not only will the justice that the widow prayed for be answered but so will she be rewarded in her faithfulness in prayer.

Point of Application

In this world which we live where the wicked is prospering and the boundaries of evil are broken down, we pray against the evil. The unrighteous would want the believer to be discouraged to give up losing faith and stop praying, But prayer may be the only resource against the foe that we have. Not only will the Lord deal with the wickedness in his time but there is also reward for those who participated in prayer in faith.

In Luke 21:29 Jesus deals with the His return in the last days. And regardless of the timing of the rapture the Church will experience the growing pains as the stage is being set for the final closing Call.

Luke 21:29–36 (NASB95) — 29 Then He told them a parable: “Behold the fig tree and all the trees; 30 as soon as they put forth leaves, you see it and know for yourselves that summer is now near. 31 “So you also, when you see these things happening, recognize that the kingdom of God is near. 32 “Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all things take place. 33 “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will not pass away. 34 “Be on guard, so that your hearts will not be weighted down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of life, and that day will not come on you suddenly like a trap;

Why is it that dissipation and drunkenness is addressed here? This is escapism from the reality of life. We are not to be drunk with wine but be filled with the Holy Spirit.

35 for it will come upon all those who dwell on the face of all the earth. 36 “But keep on the alert at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are about to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.”

The continual connectivity with the person of the Lord is the acknowledgment within our own hearts of the one who will never leave us nor forsake us. As we are entering into the storm and the waves are threatening to take us under, we are not overtaken, we know who it is that is in our boat.

As we are dealing with the surrounding circumstances in life, as wickedness is closing in on all sides and as sometimes the Lord seems so quiet and far away, it is once again that the evil one seeks that the believer be discouraged and turn away from addressing High command who is overall.

Romans 12:9–21 (NASB95) — 9 Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil; cling to what is good. 10 Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor; 11 not lagging behind in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord; 12 rejoicing in hope, persevering in tribulation, devoted to prayer

Here we are to be devoted to prayer

68.68 προσκαρτερέωa; προσκαρτέρησις, εως f: to continue to do something with intense effort, with the possible implication of despite difficulty—‘to devote oneself to, to keep on, to persist in.’[4]

When read the book of Acts and the forming of the early church take notice of how often those of that church would devote themselves to prayer.

Acts 1:14 (NASB95) — 14 These all with one mind were continually devoting themselves to prayer, along with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers.

You may be frustrated because you have no outward tangible ministry. None that one might take notice to or even one that you cannot see the immediate results. All of us regardless fall into the ministry of Prayer. And though your prayers may not be immediately answered, in fact you may rarely see a prayer answered but none the less you remain obedient and the prayers that you answer will have impact. The prayers of paul and that early church we will learn just how it impacted our lives some two thousand years later.

Ephesians 6:18 (NASB95) — 18 With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints,

The context of this passage is Spiritual warfare. Where the well motivated believer is not in defense but his relationship with the Lord and as the prayers of the righteous man accomplishes much the Christian warrior is taking it to the enemy.

We are the watchers upon the wall, and we are those on the ground carrying out the ground war through prayers.

Here is the position by which we are to prayer

In the spirit

It is the abiding influence calling upon our relationship within the family of God in which we are to prayer. Which takes us the point of not being drunk with wine but be filled with he spirit

At all seasons (ἐν παντι καιρῳ [en panti kairōi]). “On every occasion.” Prayer is needed in this fight. The full armor of God is necessary, but so is prayer.

“Satan trembles when he sees

The weakest saint upon his knees.”[5]

Sometimes I believe that the Lord will bring a warrior to his knees through the circumstances in life to call Him or her to the position of strength.

Remember Pearl harbor. America was reluctant to join the war against evil until Japanese attacked perle harbor. There is a lot of conspiracy theories that Rosivelt knew that the attack was coming and allowed it. I don’t know about that but I do believe that God allows the attack against the believer even to the church in order to provoke prayer.

2 Corinthians 12:10 (NASB95) — 10 Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.

Colossians 4:2 (NASB95) — 2 Devote yourselves to prayer, keeping alert in it with an attitude of thanksgiving;

Again the intense effort in doing and that doing is our dedication to prayer in connection to keeping alert.

1 Peter 5:8 (NASB95) — 8 Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

Praying continually keeps the believer in the spirit which is his wall of fire.

The attitude of thanksgiving may be hard at times. For at all times means on every occasion and in every circumstance

Depending on the length of your stay in the adversity one may get weary in waiting for the answer in prayer.

1 Peter 4:7 (NASB95) — 7 The end of all things is near; therefore, be of sound judgment and sober spirit for the purpose of prayer.

Comittement to prayer coming into the storm.

1 Peter 1:13 (NASB95) — 13 Therefore, prepare your minds for action, keep sober in spirit, fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

[1]Constable, T. L. (1985). 1 Thessalonians. In J. F. Walvoord & R. B. Zuck (Eds.), The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures (Vol. 2, pp. 708–709). Victor Books. [2]Swanson, J. (1997). In Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Greek (New Testament) (electronic ed.). Logos Research Systems, Inc. [3]Robertson, A. T. (1933). Word Pictures in the New Testament (1 Th 5:18). Broadman Press. [4]Louw, J. P., & Nida, E. A. (1996). In Greek-English lexicon of the New Testament: based on semantic domains (electronic ed. of the 2nd edition., Vol. 1, p. 662). United Bible Societies. [5]Robertson, A. T. (1933). Word Pictures in the New Testament (Eph 6:18). Broadman Press.