SAYING AMEN

How do you end your prayers? You say "Amen," of course. We all do. Why do we do that? That is not how prayers end in the Bible. And while many of us know the verily, so be it, meaning of the word, I don't believe that is the real reason we end our prayers with"amen."

I believe we have a need to conclude our prayers, or rather to solemnize a conclusion to a prayer. Especially with petition, we are saying "This is what I need."

I think it is worth considering the amen of all your prayers. What would be the amen of your life? What is your ultimate need and longing? We may say, "I need this job because . . . " or "I need to be healed so that . . ." What needs do you have that are ends in themselves?

Suppose you tasted the most wonderful food you have ever eaten? And because it was so wonderful you told a friend about it. But the friend asked, "What will eating that get you?" The friend doesn't get it, does he? Psalm 34:8 calls us to "Taste and see that the Lord is good."

Let me push this picture a little further. Can you imagine falling in love? The two of you decide to get married. But someone at work asks, "Why do you want to marry him? What will that get you?" What would you answer?

And suppose before you were married he was shipped off to Afghanistan? From a letter you learn that he will skype you tomorrow morning at 5:00 A.M. You are thrilled about it and can hardly wait to go to bed tonight so you can get up and talk to him in the morning. But your friend at work asks why you would want to miss sleep just to talk. This is a harder picture for some of you because when you fall in love you fall for a sinner who will disappoint you as you will him. But we are waiting to be wed to the ultimate bridegroom. There will be no disappointment with Him.

What is your ultimate reason, your final "so that?" That is what I would call your ultimate amen. final amen of our lives is intricately connected to the embrace of God that we enjoy in prayer, more even than what you may ask in desperate prayer.  Revelation 3:14 speaks to this. Jesus said, "These are the words of the amen." This statement may be synonymous with His declaration, "I am the alpha and omega." Part of what Jesus was saying is that all things begin and end with Him. To say He is your Amen is to say He is your everything and He alone fulfills your deepest longing.

PRAYING GOD'S GLORY

In 2 Cor. 4:17 Paul says our earthly suffering is working for us an eternal weight of glory. This statement gives us an interesting insight into the word, "glory.” The Bible's use of words for the glory of God actually change the meaning of the words in at least four languages. The Greek word translated in 2 Corinthians 4 is "doxa." We take the word doxology from doxa. But before the Bible was put into Greek the word only meant importance in the opinion of people as trite as popularity. Our English word glory comes to us from the Latin word gloria. It too originally held the shallow meaning of the Greek word. The Hebrew word for glory was much more substantial. It reflected the reality of God. Its root meant weighty or significant. Anywhere we find the glory of the Lord people and even the earth is shaken by the weight of His significance.

The use of doxa for this Hebrew word in the Greek Old Testament, increased the power of the word infinitely. The word went from a trend to an earthquake or a thunderstorm. Or it might be better to call it a divine lightning storm. Even though the word began as weighty, it describes the shikina glory that settled on the mercy seat in the tabernacle. It was the glory that shown on Moses' face when he left the presence of God. And the glory of the Lamb is what will light the holy city described in Revelation 21. Our words in English Latin Greek and even Hebrew have come to mean unapproachable splendor. So we can sing "shining in the light of his glory."

If you truly come into the presence of God in prayer you will be overwhelmed by the recognition that God's glory is brighter than your darkness. His weight is greater than your needs or wants. If you have experienced the lightening storm of God's presence, nothing else can be as significant in your life. In His presence our prayers will be shaken by His Glory.

Let me point out three facets praying the glory of God.

The first thing that may come to your mind is praise. Praising His Glory

Isaiah 42:12 equates glorifying God with declaring his praises. We glorify God in praise. This can be in private as well as public worship. It can also be in witness of his glory to people we come in contact with each day.

Praying God's glory includes Praying for His Glory.

One of the most stunning examples of this is found in John 12:27-28. Jesus begins this passage by grieving over His coming sorrow. "Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'? But for this purpose I have come to this hour." Instead, Jesus simply prays, "Father, glorify your name." At that a voice came from heaven saying, "I have glorified it and will glorify it again." Some of the crowd said it thundered. Others thought an angel had spoken to Jesus. He said that the voice had come for them not Him. God answered by glorifying His name as Jesus asked.

Finally, you pray His glory by Praying for His Glory Through You.

God is working His glory in us. When you begin to catch a glimpse of the glory of God, you realize how preposterous that is. How could Almighty God gain any glory from me? Well, if we return to 2 Corinthians 4:17 we see again that through the light and temporary troubles that we face God is working an eternal weight of glory."

O God, may it be so! By Your power bring it about.

INTERCEDING FOR OUR CHILDREN

I slipped into her room knowing where I was going but not absolutely sure I would not step on a noisy toy in the dark. I knelt by her bed and with my eyes adjusting to the darkness I could see her peaceful face asleep against the White linen pillow slip. Waves of wonder, thankfulness and incredible hope washed over me. But I was not there to revel in sentiment. I was there to pray. What was I to pray for my precious daughter?

As I pen these words she is no longer seven or eight. Those years have long since fled. She now has a seven year old of her own that she, and I too, pray for every day. In later years my daughter admitted that she sometimes was not quite asleep when I came in to pray. But she pretended so she could hear me pray for her.

I don't remember all that I asked of God for my children. But I do know this. The trials they faced, the temptations they had to overcome were much worse than I ever dreamed. And that should inform what I pray for my granddaughter, what we pray for our children. Does anyone one believe the uncertainty of our future has decreased in these days?

I think the most important thing I can do is simply pray, not knowing what to pray for. We are thrown in desperation onto God's intercession for our children. There are a number children, mostly family members, for whom I am making a concerted effort to lift in prayer every day of their lives. I am convinced that I need God to intercede for them. I can't know what they will face. But I am also confident that He will be sufficient whatever the enemy throws their way.

When I began this post I had several things in mind to suggest we pray for our children. I pray for them to have a hold on truth in a world that has replaced certainty for desire and inclinations. I pray they will be delivered from temptation that will come crashing down upon them. And I will ask that they be used in ways that I cannot imagine. But I will have to trust specifics to God. I cry out for our Lord to intercede in their lives.

INTERCEDING AGAINST JUDGMENT

Many are saying America and possibly most of the world is under the imminent judgment of God in these days. I am reminded of God's judgment upon Sodom and Gomorrah. God said the outcry against Sodom was great. People were crying out to him in oppression and suffering. God could not be a God of compassion and not judge the selfishness, wickedness, prejudice and violence we have turned to today. And yet as He was preparing to rain fire down upon Sodom the Lord invited Abraham to intercede for the city. If God is making you aware of imminent judgment, He is inviting you to intercede in prayer. Do you sense the urgency to intercede in prayer even if you are not sure how to do that? Interestingly enough Abraham came to some principles that will help us pray in these days.

First, Abraham appealed to God's love for righteousness. "Will not the judge of all the earth do what is right?" We need to pray for churches and believers and people who seek righteousness in high places in our society. They may be our only hope against immediate judgment. This week one of the most prominent pastors in America stepped down from his pulpit because of moral failure. I saw several Face Book posts on it. I made a comment on one of them. "If you were our enemy, who would you attack?" But while I had respected this man, I had never prayed for him. God forgive me.

Another principal that Abraham discovered was the intercession of the gospel. Some of you are skeptical of Abraham's understanding of the gospel. But he grasped a core principle in his interaction with the LORD over Sodom. The Lord loves righteousness so much that He was willing to spare the wicked because of the righteousness of the righteous. How does that relate to the gospel? That is its very heart. The only reason any of us are spared from immediate and final judgment is that God has imputed to us the righteousness of Jesus Christ. He alone is truly righteous. He is our only righteousness. He is our only hope. Interceding in the face of judgment must be based upon the spread of the gospel. Many of us in these days sense an urgency to pray for unreached and unengaged people groups in the world. That is intercession for the gospel. Are you praying and giving and going and sending so the gospel will be available to all who Jesus died to save?

Today, I believe there is another facet of interceding in the face of judgment. That is crying out to God for His supernatural hand in our ministry to hurting people. The first major judgment of God was a mercy on the world because of what we had become. God saw that the thoughts and intents of the heart of man were only evil continually. (Gen. 6:5) I do not know what kind of judgment God is preparing to send. We may well be preparing to taste the 7 bowls of God’s wrath upon the earth. But the Bible speaks of another kind of judgment that is in many ways worse. This is the judgment of what we become. In Romans 1 Paul says that God gives men over to the perversions and corruption of our hearts. 2 Timothy 3 says that in the last days people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud arrogant, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. These are days in which we need to pray for God to use us to heal in the face of incredible wickedness all around and within us.

Father, we cry out for Your mighty hand upon us as we seek to be righteous, as we spread the gospel and as we show compassion to a hurting world.

PRAYING FOR PERSONAL TRANSFORMATION

I recently listened to a powerful sermon on missions by Tim Keller.  sermons.redeemer.com/missions He drew his text from the prayer of Jesus in John 17. When he came to verses 16-19 where Jesus prayed that His followers be sanctified, Tim Keller asked the question, “What did Jesus put in the hands of the first disciples as He sent them out to change the world?” Did they have manuals on evangelism, or church planting, or even preaching? They did not. They had one thing, holiness. And they turned the world upside down. Surely the Lord’s holiness is something we need to pray for.

How do we pray for His such transformation in our lives? If we take the Lord’s prayer for our guide in this, we might begin with forgiveness.

And forgive us our debts,

As we forgive our debtors.

None of us is holy before God. We need the Holiness of Jesus imputed into our lives.

Forgiveness also has another side. A major part of transformation into the likeness of Christ is developing forgiveness in our hearts for others. We need to exercise prayers of forgiveness for those who have wronged us. You can pray for God to forgive people who have harmed you. Have you ever prayed like Stephen while he was being stoned,

“Lord, do not charge them with this sin.”

How could you ever pray such a prayer for those who hate you and are harming you? I have trouble praying that prayer for people who love and annoy me. Stephen saw Jesus seated on the right hand of God. If you had such a vision of the majesty of our Lord, you might be able to pray as he did. Hebrews 11:27 tells us Moses endured as seeing Him who is invisible. 1 John 3:2 tells us we will be like Jesus when He returns for we will see Him as He is. We get a glimpse of His face as we spend time with Him in prayer and we are made more and more like Jesus.

In fact, for holiness we need to start earlier in the Lord’s prayer than His word on forgiveness. As Jesus modeled, we need to begin with worship and praise.

“Hallowed be your name.”

As we grow in fellowship with Him we will expand our praise more and more. Such praise gives us a clearer and clearer vision of the glory and majesty of our Lord. And it naturally leads to submission to His will.

Your kingdom come,

your will be done,

   on earth as it is in heaven.

Holiness is not simply the absence of sin. It is growing obedience that rejoices in His will. 

PRAYING IN A WORSHIP SERVCE

How do you pray in a formal worship service? Of course you want to join your heart to prayers that are prayed out loud as part of the service. You need to remind yourself to connect with those prayers. And you need to pour yourself into the praises being sung. This too may need to be intentional.

However, that is not all the praying you need to do in a worship service. Every time you enter a worship service you need to ask God to help you hear His voice. One of my life-scriptures is Matthew 23:1-12. In those verses Jesus said none of us were to be called Rabbi or instructor “because we have one instructor, the Christ.” This is more than a call for humility in preachers. This is a reminder that if we learn from or are stirred by a preacher, it is to be Christ Jesus Himself speaking through him. There are a number of barriers to hearing from God in a worship service. The greatest of them are in our own hearts. But whatever the barriers, we can ask God to speak to us.

For many years  I began worship services by inviting people to ask God to speak to them and let them hear His voice. I have usually added words like, “I do not believe it offends God for you to pray, ‘God if you are real, let me hear your voice.’”

I have also asked people to pray the same prayer for the persons seated on either side of them. You may not know exactly what that person needs, but God knows just what they need to hear from Him. I have also suggested that it would not be impossible for some to pray for everyone in the room, or if it were a large congregation, it would not be impossible to pray for many people all around them during the service. I am aware that many preachers have told us to pray only for ourselves in a worship service. We understand that they wanted us not to be distracted from our own needs or sins by praying for other people. However, I believe we are most likely to hear God’s voice if we are praying throughout the service.

PRAYING IN SUFFERING

How do you pray when you are suffering? The first thing we pray is, "Lord, deliver me! I am hurting." And I know that it could never be God's will for me to hurt. However in the Garden before the cross Jesus prayed, "Father, take this cup from me. But not my will but Your will be done." I am so thankful that it was God's will for Him to suffer. He was bruised for my inequities. He was wounded for my transgressions. Has it ever occurred to that your suffering may be the thing God will use to bring someone God loves to His grace?

You have heard the statement, "We are the Lord's hands and feet." We are His hands. And when others see the nail marks in our lives, like His disciple, Thomas, they may come to Him as their Lord and their God.

I agree that we should pray for God to deliver us from pain. But we also need to be willing for God to use our heartache, our suffering our loss and failure. When we suffer we need to pray for Jesus to be glorified in our pain. And we can pray for God to use our suffering to bring about His glorious will in someone else's life.

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