We have begun a series of messages on the very vital subject of Prayer and particularly on the model prayer that Jesus taught his disciples.
In our first session we talked about the goal of our series and that was to discover how we can be more effective and disciplined in our prayer life by using the model prayer Jesus taught His disciples as found in Matt. 6:9-13. By using this prayer as a model our prayers are ordered according to God’s direction and as a result we are not praying without purpose or order. This also helps us to keep our minds from wandering to other things while we are praying! We also talked about when we should pray and about the importance of praying regularily, early in the morning and at all times
In our last session we talked about What is Jesus’ role in our prayer life and what it means to pray to God the Father in Jesus’ Name.
One important reason that we mentioned in that message was that “To pray in Jesus Name means that we are have access to the Father not in our own righteousness, not our own worth, goodness or good works but through the righteousness of Jesus and therefore we are able to come in His presence with boldness and without fear, without shame, and without guilt. The devil would tempt us in making us think that we are unworthy that we failed God so many times that we do not deserve God’s mercy and fellowship, that God does not love us etc. but As we approach God in the Name of Jesus we are implying that through the blood of Jesus we are able to come with boldness into His presence:“
We list six other reasons, you can find the whole sermon on my blog at: KenKorol.wordpress.com
This morning we will be speaking about the Holy Spirit’s role in our prayer life.
Shall we begin by committing this time to the Lord in prayer:
As we begin this message I would like to invite you to proclaim God’s Word together with me. Remember that God’s Word is living and very powerful and as we proclaim it preferably out loud, faith is growing in our hearts.
We read in Romans 10: 17 that “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.” The more you hear yourself declaring God’s Word the more you will believe it and thus the truths you proclaim will eventually become a reality in your life. Furthermore as we proclaim God’s Word in faith it becomes a mighty weapon against the enemy.
In our last session we proclaimed Eph. 2:18: “Now all of us can come to the Father through the same Holy Spirit because of what Christ has done for us.”
From the above verse we observed that every member of the Trinity is involved in our prayer life. The Father sitting on the throne, the Son sitting at His right hand as mediator and intercessor whom through His blood we have access to the Father, the Holy Spirit in our hearts receiving blessings and burdens from the Father and imparting them to us, teaching and empowering us, interceding for us and through us and ushering us into God the Father’s presence where the Father is waiting with His arms of love wide open to receive us and to welcome us with joy into His presence.
This week we will proclaim together Rom. 8:26, 27. I will read it first then we can proclaim it together: “And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words. And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God’s own will.”
We will now mention some ways the Holy Spirit helps us with as we pray:
(1) From the above verse we see that The Holy Spirit in us helps us to pray in our weakness. We need therefore to acknowledge our ignorance, our weakness, our limitations and our total dependence on Him. He reveals to us what is the will of the Father and what is the burden of the Father’s heart. He gives us anointing and power and energizes our prayers, He gives us ability to feel a little of God’s emotions for example, His love and His joy, He gives us power to do the works of God, for example to cast out demons and to heal the sick.
(2) From the above verse where it states, “But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groaning that cannot be expressed with words,” this also can denote speaking in other tongues! We do not know what to pray for and how to pray but the Holy Spirit is giving us utterance in a language that we do not understand as we yield our tongue to Him. When we do this we are certain that we are praying according to the will of God. Those who are baptized in the Holy Spirit speak in other tongues as the initial evidence but they can receive the gift of tongues at that same time or at a later time. Since God has given us such a wonderful gift, we should use it as often as we can, but at the same time may we see also the importance of praying also with our understanding. We read in 1Corinthians 14,2,14-15,“For if you have the ability to speak in tongues, you will be talking only to God, since people won’t be able to understand you. You will be speaking by the power of the Spirit, but it will all be mysterious.”1 Corinthians 14:2 NLT“For if I pray in tongues, my spirit is praying, but I don’t understand what I am saying. Well then, what shall I do? I will pray in the spirit, and I will also pray in words I understand. I will sing in the spirit, and I will also sing in words I understand.” (1 Corinthians 14:14-15 NLT). Whether we pray in tongues or with our understanding we should always pray with the Holy Spirit energizing and empowering our praying!
Smith Wigglesworth gave his testimony of what singing and praying in the Holy Spirit meant to him:
“It is a wonderful thing to pray in the Spirit and to sing in the Spirit, praying in tongues and singing in tongues as the Spirit of God gives you utterance. I never get out of bed in the morning without having communion with God in the Spirit. It is the most wonderful thing on earth. It is most lovely to be in the Spirit when you are dressing and you come out to the world and the world has no effect on you. You begin the day like that and you will be conscious of the guidance of the Spirit right through the day.”
I can also testify to this in my own personal prayer life and to the wonderful help, strength and inspiration the Holy Spirit gives to me as I daily pray in other tongues
The Holy Spirit can lay a burden on our hearts to pray for something, sometimes we may know it is for some person we know but we may not know what the need is or it may just be a burden of prayer for something Or somebody but we may not be given to know what it is. When the Holy Spirit gives us such a burden it is necessary for us to pray in the Spirit until the burden lifts.
Smith Wigglesworth gave an example of this in the life of Willie Burton who was a missionary in the Congo and while there became very sick, he said and I quote:
“He took fever and went down to death. They said; “He has preached his last; what shall we do?” All their hopes seemed to be blighted, and there they stood, with broken hearts, wondering what was going to take place. They left him for dead; but, in a moment, without any signal, he stood right in the midst of them; and they could not understand it. The explanation he gave was this, that, when he came to himself, he realized a warmth going right through his body; and there wasn’t one thing wrong with him. How did it come about? It was a mystery until he went to London and was telling the people how he was left for dead, and then was raised up. A lady came up and asked for a private conversation with him, and arranged a time. She asked, “Do you keep a diary?” He answered, “Yes.” She told him, “It happened on a certain day that I went to pray; and as soon as I knelt, I had you on my mind. The Spirit of the Lord took hold of me and prayed through me in an unknown tongue. A vision came before me in which I saw you laid out helpless; and I cried out in the unknown tongue till I saw you rise up and go out of that room.” She had kept a note of the time and when he turned to his diary he found that it was exactly the time when he was raised up.
Oh! How we need to be sensitive and obedient to the Holy Spirit’s promptings so that God can use us to pray for the burdens that are on His heart as we obey Him in praying for all saints!
(3) The work that the Holy Spirit has in our praying is very important, therefore we must not ignore Him! We need to acknowledge Him as our helper and welcome Him in our prayer time . We read in Jude 20,
“Building yourselves up on your most holy faith praying in the Holy Spirit.” and in Eph. 6:18, “Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Holy Spirit.” In John 14:16 Jesus calls the Holy Spirit our “Helper.”
Wikipedia informs us that “In the Greek the word for “helper” is “Paraclete”. Paraclete comes from the Greek word paráklētos, that can signify “one who consoles or comforts, one who encourages or uplifts; hence refreshes, and/or one who intercedes on our behalf as an advocate in court”) The word for paraclete originally signified “called to one’s side”.” (Wikipedia)
The Amplified Bible translates this rich word in the following way, “And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Comforter (Counselor, Helper, Intercessor, Advocate, Strengthener, and Standby), that He may remain with you forever.” (John 14:16 AMP)
(4) The Holy Spirit also convicts us of any unconfessed sin that may be in our life:“And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment-John 16:8). If unconfessed sin is there then it is important for us to immediately bring it to the light (that means that we do not pretend that it is not there and try to hide it but name the sin and forsake it) and then bring it to the blood of Jesus for cleansing and forgiveness. God’s Word says in Psalms 66:18: “If I had cherished sin in my heart the Lord would not have listened,”God’s Word also says in 1John 1:7-8: “ But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
(5) As we acknowledge the Holy Spirit in our prayer life and spend time waiting and listenIng to His voice He will lead us to needs that we should pray for and how to pray for them.Therefore it is important to take time and receive direction before and perhaps even during and after our prayer time to see whether there was anything more He would have us to pray for.
Oh! How we need to thank God for the Holy Spirit and for the way He helps us in our prayer life.