Hi everyone from Colac, where we have recently stepped into full-time ministry after 3  ½ years of being part-time interim. A combination of shifting home and a virus locking my home computer into safe mode has denied me the latest contributions to the discussion on intercession, so I’m logging on through the equipment in the office at Colac. Thanks Rowland for stirring the pot, and I hope this casserole of a few personal reflections throws some positive light into the mystery, even if it may have lost its currency as the discussion topic has shifted onto Easter themes.

Prayer is not difficult. It’s actually so easy we can do it with our eyes shut!

But understanding prayer is a totally different matter, where it’s better to take God more seriously than we take ourselves.

Questions naturally arise:

Are we capable of understanding the entire scope of God’s mind and methods? Answer: No.

Is God likely to ever answer our prayers with: “How impressive, I hadn’t thought of that!” Or: “I’m sorry, but are you sure we’ve been introduced?”

Answer: No, unless we are trying to building our empires instead of extending his Lordship.

I find it helps to recall a Westminster Confession tenet: “Our chief role is to glorify God and enjoy him forever,” and to seek God’s wisdom in expressing prayer that engages and enriches the thoughts and emotions of those we are praying for and/or with. “Lord how can we most readily embrace your perspective and your power within and beyond this scenario, so we may increasingly allow your nature to flow through us and allow your glory to more clearly seen. Help us to be open and obedient to you, as you perfect your strength within or in spite of our weakness, so our joy may be full as you have promised.”

God’s existence is not imprisoned within our intellectual understanding, our personal rituals or our emotional responses to his activity. Apart from our capacity to remember or to dream, our being confined within space and time can prompt some confusion about God.

With no beginning or end, God’s dimension of derivative existence transcends our frame of reference. I vividly recall discussing this with my son, now an adult, who has always been a lateral thinker. The best parallel we could come up with is that, like a television newsroom with background screens showing all other channels and footage that is being checked for quality and impact before being broadcast, God can see without confusion the processes and end results of any choices we face, or of impending events that don’t need our conscious input.

And he constantly works to make our lives reflect his beauty and blessing for others as well as for us. (Rom 8:28) God has the freedom to work within us, through us, around us or in spite of us as he seeks to extend his acceptance, forgiveness, fulfilment and Lordship into the lives of those who don’t yet know him, yet he does not violate the free will of those who consciously don’t want him around.

The old covenant included responsibility within revealed knowledge. The new covenant, centred on the word becoming flesh – a process that must continue within every generation – has often been hijacked by sophistry that is more Hellenistic than biblical. (I’m kicking against my own Greek heritage here!) This sophistry tends to view knowledge as an abstract intellectual issue, which allows Christianity to become sectionalised instead of becoming integrated through the permeating power and presence of God’s Spirit.

Ministry often stretches us way beyond areas of our personal spiritual giftedness, but it’s an adventure worth exploring. Part of the adventure is to discover how many ways God is using us, fulfilling Jesus’ promise (John 7:38) that his Spirit would flow through us as rivers (ie in more ways than we can be aware of or need to be aware of, lest our curiosity or pride may interfere) of living water. We are on the front line in a spiritual battle against the constant swirl of evil’s trinity of fear, pride and indifference, and prayer absorbs us within a refreshing dimension of fellowship with God that empowers us to keep winning this battle.

Prayer is not merely pouring out phrases that conform to our theological taste, prejudice or practice; it reflects a love relationship that pedantic details can’t encompass. As pastors, we are privileged to discover how God calls his people to participate with him in doing things that human explanations can’t satisfactorily cover.

Those among us who feel called to ministry of constantly changing in phone booths, and the sensation of a cape fluttering behind us as we fly through one victory after another, will quickly recognise humbling facts such as people in our churches who we can’t minister to, and that some people are more gifted in areas of ministry than our egos may wish for them.

One of those areas of ministry may well be intercession, even though praying for others is something we are all called to do (1Tim 2:1.) People with intercessory gifts can pray at great length (without looking at their watches) and often see specific answers – almost as if they have a black belt in praying!

Intercession is more of a priestly “heartline” than a personal “hotline,” as we open ourselves for God to reveal his glory, love, resources, perspective and timing in relation to others’ needs. To intercede is to embody the Holy Spirit’s activity in pleading on behalf of those who lack the spiritual, physical, emotional or financial resources to experience victorious life in Christ. The intensity of this can take us into some of the deep emotions of those we pray for, so we need to cast our burdens on the Lord in bearing each other’s burdens. (Gal 6:1-2)

Intercession introduces us to deeper levels of spiritual or conscious insight as God reveals visions of his present or planned activity. This may lead us into previously unknown accuracy in our articulation or discernment of a particular need; we may begin to pray in an unknown tongue or with sighs too deep for words alone. (Rom 8:26)

Intercession explores the fellowship of Christ’s sufferings (Phil 3:10.) His heart aches for those who don’t yet know him, for other believers in pain and distress, and for the turmoil that is always breaking out – because a defeated enemy is exploiting people or events as he clamours for attention like most bad losers do. Intercession reminds us that God calls us and equips us to do what is humanly impossible, for it opens us to God’s activity.

Intercession is not to be taken lightly, as it can absorb much of our time and emotion. Time discipline in other areas of life is an essential part of developing this ministry.

Jesus’ ministry is a constant example of miraculous ways of meeting people’s needs. Though he continues this today in hospitals and other medical agencies around the world, he loves to consciously involve his people within everyday events. As God uses us to do things that cannot be explained in natural means, faith is a big factor (Matt 13:58). Yet faith must be fresh, and rely on the revealed nature of God in scripture, rather than on trying to relive past methods or sensations, or on our needing to understand every detail.

Miracles and healing opportunities must connect with the desire of people who suffer. Jesus often asked people if they wished to be healed (e.g. John 5:6.) Because God is absolute love, and he seeks for us more than the best that we can see, we need to remember:

God likes to add some mystery to his actions.

Miracles do not replace natural means or common sense;

Those with this gift have no power of themselves;

A gifted person is a channel, not a commander of God.

Some people have a definite, powerful ministry in healing and in special healing services. Calling for elders to anoint the sick in homes or hospitals releases this ministry within the church. We can all pray confidently for healing (James 5:14-15) as we focus on God’s freedom to bring healing within the timing and methods he chooses.

But as we pray for healing, God should be our focus, rather than our levels of faith or understanding. Those who are not instantly healed need to be reassured of God’s love for them, as it is cruel to blame them for lack of faith. Fr Francis McNutt’s book “Healing” (Ave Maria Press,) observes many reasons beyond lack of faith, including:

Lack of spiritual authority within the person who prays,

The sick person may be holding on to unconfessed sins.

The illness is a tool to reach someone else who may never respond to the gospel otherwise.

Someone else is to be God’s agent of healing,

Blaming demonic activity when it is not the cause,

Ignoring demonic activity,

God wants to take the person to be with him forever, an absolute and permanent healing.

Refusal to co-operate with, or being too dependent on, medical expertise,

The sickness is a tool to build character and new perspective in the sick person.

Joni Earekson-Tada illustrates how God raises up a ministry that takes a personal disaster (in her case a diving accident that left her paralysed) and expresses levels of compassion, credibility and relevance that a testimony of miraculous healing may never fully convey. Her story combines McNutt’s third and last reasons for healing which may be delayed or seem to be denied.

Our pastoral interaction can be a painful yet privileged journey into the lives of similarly inspiring people who face odds that might well overwhelm us. Interceding with them and for them is a foretaste of being lost in wonder, love and grace, as Wesley’s beautiful old hymn describes.

God continue to assure and puzzle us with the depths of his grace, wisdom and trust.