Praying in the Spirit
I had the good fortune of watching the Narnia film , and one of my favourite moments is when the children are all playing hide and seek and you see them running around the house, and Lucy enters through the wardrobe. You see her pushing aside all those fur coats and enters into another world. She has removing herself from the physical world into a new dimension, not just something similar but something totally new. Well prayer is like that. It acknowledges that there is a wardrobe that needs to be entered into and that there is a spiritual world with spiritual realties. The wardrobe in the film is about about entry into a new realm, prayer is communicating with God. But prayer like people comes in many shapes and sizes.
You can have short people, long people, public people, old people, young people, funny people, boring people, people you like, people you love, people you don’t like, people who are a pain in the neck, people who make you laugh, people who make you fall asleep, people who make you feel alive and people who make you feel like the world’s about to end.
Also with prayer there are all kinds of prayer.
Private prayer,
individual prayer,
corporate prayer,
long prayers,
short prayers,
standing prayers,
sitting down prayers,
The prayer of faith,
the prayer of asking,
the prayer of intercession,
the prayer of repentance,
the prayer of adoration,
the prayer of thanksgiving,
out-loud prayer,
silent prayer,
prayer with others,
laying on your face prayers,
standing on your feet prayer,
while you walk prayers,
while you drive prayers,
one word prayers,
many word prayers,
prayers when your car doesn’t work,
prayers when your kids drive you up the walls,
prayers when your dog won’t come back,
Prayers about your computer when it crashes for the third time in 5 minutes.
Prayers when your at the end of where you can cope,
prayers when life is out of control
and prayers when you have no words left to say.
And a reading of the Bible will tell you how important prayer is.
It was when Jesus came out of the water praying that the Holy Spirit came upon him
It was in a prayer meeting that he New Testament church was birthed. (Acts 1:14)
It was through prayer that the good news of Jesus was spread (Acts 6:4)
It was through prayer that people became Christians and entered into a relationship with Jesus.
Jesus went from place to prayer, and in between cast out devils, healed the sick and raised with the dead. He lived in constant communication with the Father. We all know that prayer is essential, without it we are treading water – without it we are another business trying to do good works, without it we are a house without foundations, without it we are wasting our time as individuals and as a church.
Yet how many times do we hear Christians say “Please pray for me I think I’m praying too much.” NEVER
I am sure if I was to do a survey and ask 2 questions – do you feel you pray enough, do you feel you happy with your prayer life.” Everyone would – except for those who had fallen asleep. I won’t try it to see who has fallen asleep. We would??
Yet I have not come here to send us on a big guilt trip – if so I would be the first one in the queue. Let us lay aside any feelings of guilt any feelings of inadequacy. Look around you – the challenges you face in prayer are likely exactly the same as all those around you. You are not on your own. We are in this together. Friends when we look at the Bible we know that prayer is vital – we know that personal prayer is essential – we know that with it we hold the key to GOD’s kingdom spreading we hold the key to transformed lives. As yet I haven’t seen the Dublin room overflowing with prayers – The knee pieces on our trousers look very healthy they don’t look as if they have been over kneeled on. I believe the Lord wants to speak to each one of us today about our prayer-life, but he does not come with a big stick but with open arms urging us to come into his presence. And I confess that having spent time in preparing this I have felt convicted.
We want to be more faithful, we want to see the Lord use us, we want to be part of God’s great missionary enterprise, we want to be involved in HIS plans for this world, we don’t want to be some half bit piece on the side-lines, but in on the battle. Friends if you want more of God, if you want a deeper walk and to better know his will then I’d ask you to join me in reading Psalm 42 together as 1 body.
Before I continue I would like us to read together Psalm 42 – and after this will leave a few moments of silence where you can say sorry to the Lord, and confess to him anything that you want to.
READ PSALM 42 TOGETHER
The Holy Spirit knows that we find prayer hard. If you turn with me to our passage in Romans, Paul reminds us how the whole of the universe is groaning, infected by sin, but not only the whole of creation is groaning, we are groaning to. Life is a hard struggle, we are weak, we fail, we let others down and so often we do not know what to pray for. But we have a helper – the Holy Spirit.
We’ve looked briefly at prayer, I know want us to think about the role of the Spirit, and then I will link the two together so we can understand what it means to pray in the Spirit.
The Spirit has been sent as our enabler
The Christian life is not a life in our own. The one word which seems to best sum up the work of the Spirit is enabler. The Spirit enables us to come into God’s presence, the Spirit enables us to live freely, the Spirit enables our transformation into Christ and the Spirit enables us to experience God’s presence. When the disciples were around they had Jesus he was with them, ate with them, taught them, cried with them, showed them how to heal, how to deliver demons.
But before he left he said “I will send the Counsellor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, who will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.” “
A simple way of looking at it is the Spirit is given that we might grow to our full potential in Christ.
The Christian life is a life of faith in a living Jesus
We do not become a Christian by doing good or working hard, or trying ones best, we become a Christian by faith in the Lord Jesus. The Christian life is a life of faith. So the essence of prayer is not about working hard, long hours on cold floors, the essence of prayer is Father, The first word in the Lord’s prayer shows that prayer is about coming to our Father with the Holy Spirit , and allowing the Spirit to help us learn from him. We can beat ourselves up over prayer, the Devil would have us believe that because we do not pray God will smite us down. The world would have us believe that prayer is useless and we should just get on and do stuff. And our own bodies doubt whether we are achieving anything at all. To all these things we say a NO – Lord help me. As Christ said to Thomas “Stop doubting and believe. No, the essence of prayer is coming in Faith to our Father, But not on our own. We don’t come on our own – when we become a Christian we are given the HOLY Spirit and when we pray we must pray with the Holy Spirit in faith. Faith that the Spirit will reveal the Fathers will to us. Faith that the Spirit is with us when we pray and faith to call out to him.
The Spirit is our enabler The Lord wants to use us, but he wants us to get to know the Holy Spirit.
We come now to praying in the Spirit well. In Ephesians Paul says and pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayer. There are 2 things that change the occasions and the prayers and one thing that is constant the need to pray in the Spirit – I want to share a picture with you I felt the Lord gave me to describe this
Picture of a TWO LEGGED MAN. – We do not live synchronised lives.
- Walking with 2 legs, they are operating together
- Often we are like 1 leg walking – we are seeking to step forward to move on in life but we are making it incredibly hard work, we get worn out we get frustrated. We are not designed to survive on 1 leg. In fact I may be proven wrong but tell me any animal that is designed to live on 1 leg. We can make some progress forward using “wisdom” but it can all go horribly wrong. But this is one choice we face. Of course the alternative is to call upon the other leg as our enabler. To move us on, and move us forward – praying in the Spirit is using that other leg. It is calling upon God to speak into our lives and into others lives to help them move forward in their relationship with Him and in their mission for him.
1 legged – praying without the spirit – often praying outside the will of God
2 legged – praying with the spirit – praying in the will of God
In Romans – Paul tells us how we are living in a 1 legged world – things aren’t as they supposed to be. We mess up, there are times we do not know how to move forward. The Spirit enters in as the 2nd leg. He prays for us with groans that we cannot interpret. And because the Spirit knows Gods will he can help us move forward but we need to get to know him.
When we read God’s word in the Spirit it becomes his living word in the same way when we pray in the Spirit we are able to discern the Fathers will
You see the Lord wants us to live a joined together life. He wants us to bring our days before him. “Pray in the SPIRIT on all occasions”. Not just when folk are sick, or when things are desperate but on all occasions. The Spirit wants to reveal God’s will for us in the different situations we encounter. He was given to teach us all things. As we see from Romans he was given to teach us what to pray when we do not know what to pray.
Praying in tongues is another way we can pray in the Spirit. The Bible reminds us that tongues have been primarily given for personally building us up. And is a special language which helps us communicate with the Lord – a spiritual language “deep calling out to deep”.
Here is where I feel my own personal journey is just beginning – sometimes you get to a place where you feel out of your depth. Where you can only share as much as the Lord has revealed. But I wanted to give some testimony – I want to leave you with some sense of what I am talking about, something to hold on to – so I want to share some words from Paul Cho who pastors the largest church in the world.
“The Holy Spirit can bless you when you read the Scriptures. The Holy Spirit can direct you as you witness for Christ. The Holy Spirit can anoint you as you preach and teach the Word of God. But if you want to have an intimate communion with the Holy Spirit you need to pray.
I first realized this truth in the early days of my ministry. I tried so hard to lead people to Christ, but with few results. As I was in prayer, the Lord spoke to my heart, "How many quail would Israel have caught if they had gone quail hunting in the wilderness?" I responded, "Lord, not too many." "How did the quail get caught?" the Lord continued to ask me. I then realized that God sent the wind which brought the quail. The Lord was trying to show me the difference between chasing souls without the Holy Spirit’s strategy and working in cooperation with the Holy Spirit. Then the Lord said something to me that totally changed my life, "You must get to know and work with the Holy Spirit !’’
I knew I was born again. I knew I was filled with the Hole Spirit. Yet, I had always thought of the Holy Spirit as an experience and not as a personality. However, getting to know the Hole Spirit would require my spending time talking with Him and letting Him talk to me. This fellowship with the Holy Spirit brought me into every major change in my ministry.
In fact, every major people that I teach in Korea and around the world did not come a theological book, but it came from genuine and intimate fellowship with the Holy Spirit in prayer. In my personal life, fellowship with the Holy Spirit has made all difference in the world. I could not live without that sweet communion with His presence that I have become so familiar with
In the morning, I can sense His freshness come over my heart and I have the strength to go through the challenges of that day knowing that in every situation I will be completely victorious
I have also discovered that I am not smart enough to solve the thousands of problems that come to me regularly. Yet, I can just say to the Holy Spirit, "Sweet Spirit, please let me tell You about the problem I have. I know You know the mind of God and You already have the answer." With assurance, I then await the answer from the Holy Spirit.
Discovering throughout these many years that the Holy Spirit renews me spiritually, mentally and physically, I have seen that
Daily communion with the Holy Spirit is a necessity.”
Two themes
PRESENT EVERY PART OF YOUR LIFE TO GOD’S SPIRIT
Come before him with an individual or situation or simply yourself
LISTEN AND DISCERN
This is not about blank minds hoping for something to happen. Lord what would you have me do? Discerning God’s impression – picture, Bible verse, you or someone else. Learning to see what the Spirit sees, hear how he hears, feel what he feels. If mind wanders – Sprit keep me straight. Whatever you sense God saying should be tested against the Bible. Do this with your Bible with you. As we said earlier the Spirit grasps the situation we are in, he prays within us to the Father
HABITUAL
Not necessarily one time – this is about living a habit about every single day, in every situation. Can we do it starting tomorrow no, but each day we can take a step forward. It might be every time we step into the bathroom, every time we get a drink, but something we carry with us.
Maybe you don’t yet know this risen Jesus, and you need to start this journey of faith, and start walking with Him and the Holy Spirit
Maybe you know Jesus and have his Spirit but need to be refilled by His Spirit – we need to have that sense of God’s presence that knowledge of Christ. You are operating with 1 leg.
Maybe you are filled with the Spirit but are no necessarily praying in the Spirit. The whole of your life is not yet laid before him and asking the Spirit to give you the Fathers will for the situations and people you will be facing. You have a 2nd leg but you’re not allowing it to move freely. You are limping somewhat
Friends this is where I cannot pray for each one of you – but I want to allow some time for the Lord to speak to you, to help you discern where you are, and for you to ask the Holy Spirit to help move you on to where you need to be.
Time for you and God this is not time to think about others, this is time for you to listen to the Spirit to pray. Need to put on a worship CD.
If you feel that you have received something from the Spirit and want to use that to encourage others then it would be great if you could come forward and share that today.
Lord we don’t want to do this on our own. You have given us your Holy Spirit that lives in us, we want to discern your will for our families, our children, our jobs, we want to live transformed lives for you in all these areas, but we can only do this with the Holy Spirit. Lord help us to pray in the Spirit laying all things before us – Lord we want to get to know him more, we want you to work through him to reach us.
