Praying to God Almighty, the eternal Spirit, the Creator of heaven and of earth and all that dwells therein, is no light matter. To address the living God in any way or form that does not correspond to God’s will and prescription is nothing but vanity made up of wind and noise.
“The LORD knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity.” (Psalm 94:11)
Yet man, in his presumptuous sinful nature, is not at all shy or ashamed to make overtly thoughtless requests of God, and offer up little more than empty acknowledgement. Some men are quick to say a thing or two that might possibly contain words of praise, (if there was any real intent to do so), but, in the end, the evident purpose of the prayer was more so in terminating it in a hearty ‘amen’. Others wax with eloquence, and a tone of reverence, in a way that sounds as well rehearsed as a bit character in a Shakespearean play who has but one chance to shine in the one and only scene to which he shall appear. And then there are the vain repetitions of the ultra-religious, whether they count beads or read from a devotional book of prayer, it matters not; God does not hear vanity.
“And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily, I say unto you, they have their reward. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.” (Mat. 6:5-7)
Certainly, God is aware that wind and sound are coming from the voice or thoughts of one of His creatures, but for God to regard the thoughts of man as lightly directed towards Him is not possible.
The doctrine of prayer is wide, deep and rich; and it is so very glorious that God, by His Word, has given us the privilege of being able to know how to communicate with Him! It is truly the greatest thing that a Christian person can do — commune with God. We need look no further than Scripture to see the greatness of communing with God. We think of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, walking and talking with God; or Noah as he was preparing an ark of salvation, of which God Himself closed the door and sealed it off from the destruction of the waters to come; or Moses, first at the burning bush at the foot of Horeb, and then after the Exodus at the top of Sinai when he received the commandments of God; then there are all the Patriarchs – Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; the Prophets, and the Psalmists. There are so many examples of God’s infinite mercy and condescension towards His creation. And for us as New Testament Christians, the gift of prayer is the very same gift from the very same God who loves His creation as He loves His own Son.
As wide and deep as this doctrine is, here are three elements to prayer that Scripture teaches is essential for prayer to be heard by God. The first element might seem obvious, but it must be first and foremost in the heart of a man’s thoughts. A man must realize whom it is that he is approaching. Moses was going to approach the burning bush in curiosity, to see if he could find a reason for why it was not burned up; he approached in haste and inquisition, then God spoke to him and said, “Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. Moreover, He said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face; for he was afraid to look upon God.” (Exod. 3:5,6) Isaiah experienced the same thing when he realized in whose presence he was, “Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips: for mine eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts.” (Isa. 6:5)
Our Lord emphasized this acknowledgement of God in His instruction to his disciples as to how to pray. He told them, “Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask him. After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.” (Mat. 6:8,9) In other words, we should never go straight to God with our needs and start uttering our supplications. Rather, we should be reverent, take off our shoes as it were, and realize who it is that we are requesting an audience with. This is our Father, “the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” This is the one who created us! Without God we would not exist, and without Him as our Father we would be eternally damned to hell. Accordingly, let’s pay attention and realize not only who He is, to what extent our feeble minds are able according to the grace of which God has blessed us, but also let us realize who we are.
The apostle Paul puts it this way in Romans 12:3, “For I say through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.” The Psalmist puts it even more bluntly, “But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and despised of the people.” (Psalm 22:6) So we certainly should not be a boastful people. For we are created beings, and God created us; and it’s only by His mercy that we live, breathe, and think; we have nothing to boast of.
However, we are also not to be so low as to grovel before God, for He is our Father. And part of realizing who we are, is realizing the position of which God has given to us; we are His adopted Children. And God views us as precious as His very own Son, in who’s image He is making us, and of whose righteousness we wear, and the blood of the Lord of glory that was shed to make this possible. Therefore, it is for this fact that the apostle in Hebrews chapter 4 says, “Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.” We are children of God; let us not approach our Father as a worm. Just let us not think of ourselves outside of His mercy as being anything greater than a worm. This is the teaching.
A second element of prayer, that is essential in order for a Christian to be heard of God, is to be in the Spirit. “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints. (Eph. 6:18) Unless a man is in the Spirit, there is no possibility of being in God’s presence. The Lord Jesus Himself said, “God is a Spirit: and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” (John 4:24)
Now this is something that needs some explanation. I have heard people say that walking in the Spirit is a command, and this is completely false! And works sanctification is the natural result of this wrong thinking. No, when the apostle Paul speaks, in Galatians verse 16, “This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.”, and again in verse 25, “ If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit.”, he is not commanding the Christian to do something, he is exhorting them to realize something that is factual; and this is the fact that a Christian is a “new creation”(2Cor.5:17). He says in verse 18, “But if ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law.”
A Christian is led by the Holy Spirit, but what does this mean? It means that the Christian is now living his life in a way that he was not able to before. Godly things that were once a conflict and a chore to him are now a pleasure, and those worldly pleasures contrary to the Christian life have become sour and unappealing to him. Therefore, when the apostle exhorts us to “walk in the Spirit”, what he is saying is: I “…beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love, endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” (Eph.4:1-3) To put it in another way, we are exhorted to live a life that is worthy of the name Christian. So, walking in the Spirit is how we live outwardly that which God has done inwardly in our souls. But, being in the Spirit – this is what is true of us when we are walking in the Spirit; and when we are in the Spirit then God’s will is effectual in all our actions.
The contrary to this is ‘grieving the Spirit’. The apostle Paul covers this in the same 4th chapter of Ephesians. In his exhortation to Christian people he warns, “And grieve not the holy Spirit of God,” (verse 30). How does this happen? It happens when a Christian lives unto Himself. The Holy Spirit is described as a dove, and doves are sensitive; and when a Christian lives in an unworthy manner of the Spirit, the Spirit withdraws Himself from the Christian and leaves him all alone in a sense. Of course, a Christian can never be void of the Spirit; Scripture is clear that all that are in Christ are eternally safe and that the Spirit dwells in him, but the extent and the power by which the Spirit dwells in the Christian can fluctuate. When the Spirit withdraws, the man is weakened, and when the Spirit draws nigh, the man is strengthened. So, the question becomes this: how does a Christian know when he is in the Spirit?
We know that we are in the Spirit when we have an irresistible urge to communicate with God. When we are simply going about our day and all of a sudden, we withdraw ourselves to a place where we can pour out our souls to our Father. We pour it out in praise, “Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.”, and we ask of Him to strengthen us for His glory in all things, and also in specifics. This is the most certain way to know that we are in the Spirit. Being in the Spirit is not something that can be forced – it is natural. It is who we are, it is who God made us when we were ‘born of the Spirit’; it is the fact that God is conforming us to the image of His beloved Son. As the apostle Paul puts it in Philippians 1:6 “Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ:” In other words, when we are in the Spirit, our old man is dead, and our new man is alive in Christ; we have used the power that God the Holy Spirit has provided for us to mortify the deeds of our flesh; and by doing this the Holy Spirit is not grieved, or restrained, by the remnants of our sinful flesh or by our listening to the suggestions of the devil. And God is pleased to empower us in His Spirit to do those things which please Him; and we are very pleased to do them. It is this pleasure of doing God’s will that tells us as Christian people that we are indeed in the Spirit.
A third essential aspect of prayer, which logically follows the first two of which we have just discussed, is acknowledging the Lord Jesus Christ; who He is, what He did on the cross, and our need of Him as our Saviour. He is the Son of God. He is one with the Father, the King of kings and the Lord of lords. He is the Prince of Peace, and it is only by His invitation, into the throne room, by which we have access to His Father. How could any man conceive of walking past the son of an earthly king without honouring the heir to the throne, who is standing right there between the door and the king? That king would not hear you, and he might possibly have you punished for your impunity. Well, how much the more then, would God the Father reject someone who attempts to come to Him without honour being paid to the One whose blood has made it possible for someone to even set a spiritual foot within the gates of His kingdom?
Christ Jesus is not only the prince, but He is also our high priest, “Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them.” (Heb.7:25) Without the help of our Lord there is no way, (I mean this with reverence), that God the Father can know our sufferings. Only the second eternal Person of the Godhead knows what it is to be a man; this is why He is able to intercede for us with His Father, “For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” (Heb 4:15)
It is so important to our prayer life to know these very facts. It is being in the Spirit by which we are able to enter into the throne room of grace. God the Spirit makes intercession to God the Son, “Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.” (Rom. 8:26,27). And then God the Son makes intercession for us to God the Father; and it is the will of the Father which will “be done in earth, as it is in heaven.” (Mat. 6:10)
As Christians it is vital for us to acknowledge the Triune God, for this is our commandment of the Lord Himself, to “love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength:” (Mar. 12:30) An essential element of our love for God is communicating with Him, and we communicate in a close and personal way when we pray to Him.
God is three persons; Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We must always honour this fact; it is the distinguishing mark of our Christian faith that separates us from all the heathen religions in the world. If we are true worshippers of the God of Scripture then we have no right to ignore one person of God over the others. When we pray, let us pray as Scripture teaches us, as the Lord taught His disciples to pray. In our Lord’s example of prayer, we see all of these elements. Firstly, the disciple asked the Lord to teach them to pray – this shows that they were in the Spirit. Secondly, they honoured God the Father, “Hallowed be thy name”, and thirdly, the Son is acknowledged as being essential, “thy kingdom come”. For the ‘Gospel of Christ’ is the kingdom of God.
After these three essential aspects of worshipping the Holy Blessed Trinity, the supplications are made, “Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.” (Matthew 6:11-13)
May we always be mindful that God the Father is our Creator. May we be led by the Spirit to go to him, through our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, knowing that “his strength is made perfect in our weakness.” (2 Cor. 12:9)
Scripture Alone 