It is interesting as well in that he didn’t try to remake the apostles, most of whom where fisherman, before he gave them the call, which was that he would make them fishers of men. He was talking about the call, rather than changing their basic personalities, their status in society as it was then, their educational levels, having some personality training or anything like that. Similarly, in Paul writing in Timothy 1, in verse 8 and other verses in that chapter are all referring to the call to intercessory prayer and this call doesn’t seem to require situational changes or specific situation requirements other than believing before it is implemented.
What I want to do then, is see that, even if it involves going against the grain for me, to expand my personal grid in prayer. Maybe things are going so well for me, that I feel I am almost insulting God by asking for more things, since I have been receiving so much. I better keep quiet, before God finds out how much I have, and tries to get me to be a little bit more humble, and takes some of it away. If one of your friends says, I’m good for a bike ride, a hike or a swim today, there is more than one thing your friend will go along with this day
Then the truth is, if I get a million dollars and get over that hill, I still want to get any number of things after this. Even when I have the million dollars in my hand as the answer to my request for one million dollars, there might be so many things that relate to having this million dollars that I might also want to pray about now. The Bible itself can be seen as a teacher of this as well. I ask God for a special verse from the Bible and He gives me the one verse among thousands, but is this really going to be the only verse God is ever going to want to give me? There could be other related verses to the issue or problem I am dealing with, but how interesting it is that the verse God gives me so relates. I could be dealing with any number of problems, issues or even sins, but that shouldn’t make me feel like I should constrict my prayers accordingly. Guilt might be following me, I might be a former substance abuser, steroids, alcohol, etc, and if I feel that I could ever get past these problems I could only ask God for small things, either in substance or in number, after all I haven’t been to good for a long time. I still want to construct a personal prayer grid where I am considering a larger number of things, bringing any number of things into the prayer relationship, and follow through on forming and maintaining a more comprehensive grid, a grid that could include asking for things or about things that are rather far fetched, too just to keeping your prayer grid more in tune with the idea of expansion, both in the personal and intercessory sides. And never forget to bring in thanksgiving at earlier points and at intermittent points in the answer you are receiving. Thank your way through the situation. For example, I was searching for a good book and now I find I am reading a great 1,000 page book. Stop and thank God after every 100 pages of the book, don't wait until you finish it. Don't thank God at the end of the year for a great year, keep thanking him all through that great year as its happening.
In intercessory prayers, you are sharing in some of the qualities God is demonstrating to you as you mention these qualities in the prayer of thanksgiving. You are being generous, thoughtful, considerate, interested, concerning, watching and caring, and all those good things that God has been for you as you pray for others in matters of intercession. Maybe in praying for say the European contingent and thereby interceding for these people, I am also being generous, and I am sharing in the same trait God is showing me that I had recognized to God in the prayer of thanksgiving. So I am relating to those same qualities of God within my own intercessions. If I pray for a sunny day so I can go to the beach, this prayer also might affect other people that also want to go to the beach, some of whom may not believe in prayer but my belief is working for them even though they do not know this. The answer to my prayer, although I may have never really been thinking of them, might also help others in a rather unintended fashion. Prayer itself can do much more than the thinking I can put into it. If I do prayer for numerous people in a foreign country, I can't possibly hold in my thoughts just what is happening to all the given individuals in this country, yet without this exceptional thinking, my prayer can reach into deeply to each individual there. This is an example of God taking a relatively narrowly focused prayer intention, and expanding it for others.
If someone has the gift of healing and prayers for a sick person, they can't possibly think into all the medical aspects of the case, even if they had the full medical knowledge, even that is limited based on how much we are advancing presently in medical knowledge. Even with exceptional gifts of the Spirit, I can't possibly think into a situation to the extent that God can work it. In Paul's letters it says, " He will give you abundantly above what you could ask or even think." Here this verse from Paul's letters is talking about asking and even the thinking involved within the asking. This thinking, although good and necessary, is going to be limited and God goes way and abundantly above our thinking process that goes into our asking. So there is no absolute need to have all our thoughts down pat before we ask God about something. No matter how much thinking we put into our prayers, God is going to give far above what our thinking on the matter is and we can't match into that by thinking more. So the Nike credo in part applies to prayer, Just Do It.
Here is an example of an overlap in the prayer grids of intercessory and personal prayer for myself.
Zechariah 10.1 " Ask rain from the Lord, in the season of the spring rain, from the Lord who makes the clouds, who gives showers of rain to you, the vegetation of the fields to everyone."
I might say then to God, prosper the whole city or country, so that I can have prosperity. I ask for my friend to win the lottery, so I can have 10,000 of this as per our prior agreement. In any event, there is some overlap. The prosperity of the city or country, can relate to my own prosperity and at times affect me directly. Nationwide prices of 5 dollars a gallon for petrol, will affect me personally if I am driving a car as well.
Yes, I can be a prayer specialist, but I can still can and will bring my prayers into any number of arenas. You have a chance to pray for so many things. It costs a dollar for a lottery ticket but I can have just about an unlimited amount of prayer tickets for free.
One example where you see this is some of the sports, where in the finals or the big game, the World Series or the college football championship games, you see people's hands folded in prayer. Is this really that important that it is worth praying about to the non sports fan? But then again, when the local team wins, it seems to lift the spirits of the whole town. One personal example that was interesting was several years ago when the Mets tied the Pittsburgh Pirates and had a one game playoff to make the playoffs. I drove down Northern Blvd to Shea Stadium and it was a sunny early afternoon and somebody yells to me from a car, are you going to the Met game. I was glad to just get a ticket, I ended up in the upper deck, behind the foul pole in left field. About the fifth inning, I was looking at the foul pole as Ricky Henderson got up, and by then he was somewhat in the twilight of his career, and I said a prayer that he would hit a home run and it would hit the foul pole right in front of me, and I knew hitting the pole counted as a home run. The crowd of course was very partisan and was a bit wild, which added to the momentum that early afternoon sun. He got a hit but didn’t hit the foul pole. The Mets won the one game playoff and made the playoffs, The next game was against the Cincy Reds in the playoffs, and I was watching it on TV when Henderson hit a home run hitting that very foul pole in the spot I was looking at when I said the prayer, I felt it was almost as if God was saying hello as the odds of hitting a foul pole home run are low and while it does happen, it isn't to often. So, my far fetched prayer was answered a couple of at bats latter in the next game.
Realistically then, I am never going to be able to dock my boat and say, I’m finished with all or most of my prayers, The call is to perennial prayer in both the personal and intercessory prayer efforts and I should be making efforts in both directions with my prayers. With intercessory prayer, I can even pray into the far reaches of the future, for future years, future generations. The mystical power of intercessory prayer is alive for the future. God as the God of variety is ready to handle any variety of prayers. I can extend the logic of how intercessory prayer is so expansive in that look at so many things, people and issues that are out there that lend itself to intercession, and relate it to my own prayers for myself, and that I shouldn’t just stop at persistence but include and combine persistence with a degree of expansion in what is possible within my own life’s view. With thanksgiving, I can reflect on the very qualities God has demonstrated to me in the past, qualities that I can believe I’ll see from God for right now in the present and again and again into the future. I can look for the answered prayer and see how it now relates, both to the practical aspects of my life that might involve this, and the fresh evidence of God’s qualities found in the answer. I am not only relating to God's answer alone but I am also relating to the qualities He is demonstrating to me in the specifics of his answer.
Author Resource:-
I am currently writing in varied areas including on the Christian faith.
![[Valid RSS feed]](http://www.christian-article-bank.com/images/icon_Rss.png "XML Feed For RSS"){kind=icon}
Category Rss Feed
Print This Article
Add To Favorites