When it comes to our service to the Lord, nothing is of more importance than our heart attitude towards Him. We can be doing everything quite wrongly, but simply because we have a heart that desires to follow after Him, He will see to it that the rest comes in order eventually. Surely, it is more important that we are going in the right direction than whether we are here or there on that road. Further is always better, but the one will produce the other, after a while.
We can all too easily become enamored by forms and models. It was the prophet Ezekiel that indicted the house of Israel, saying that their hearts weren’t in what they were singing. “Behold, you are to them like a sensual song by one who has a beautiful voice and plays well on an instrument; for they hear your words but they do not practice them.” Ezekiel 33:32.
It is the honor of those who are pursuing the place of prayer that they respect and reverence the duty God has entrusted to them. Intercessors have the sacred honor in the Lord of standing between the living and the dead, of coming between God and another and making a case for them. It is important to never overlook this as a light thing, or to forget the great need.
In the days of His flesh, He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the One able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His piety (reverence).
Hebrews 5:17
Jesus stood before the people of His day, and interceded for us all the while destroying the works of the devil. His reverence, his piety, caught the attention of heaven. The worst thing for an intercessor is not to take this walk of faith seriously, to not take into account every detail of his or her life. By definition, he must be “spotless” in the blood, and in obedience to the Spirit, if he is to have a voice before the throne. You do not have authority to bind what binds you!
But, rather, Jesus considered the joy set before Him of greater worth than avoiding the cross. But, Jesus didn’t let anything of the enemy into Himself (John 14:30). But, rather, He stood in purity, in intercession and supplication, until finally, upon Calvary, He knew knew that it was finished, and His work on Earth was complete.
The place of prayer is the sweetest place in Him, yet, with the weight of the burdens God grants us, it can be the absolute most crushing place. What an honor to give one’s very life in the love of the Father within us. And, though we may not all be called to this place, as men like Rees Howells were in the Second World War, it is the reverence that will commend us to the Father, and see that our intercession is heard.
Surely, history turns on the back of the intercessors, for better or for ill, and if God even hears the cries of the sinners and the unjust, how much more will He answer us to call out to Him day and night (Luke 18:6).
The Kingdom of God is at hand, and every time we stretch forth ourselves in faith on behalf of another, the world changes. And every time we don’t, it doesn’t. It isn’t ever about us, and, if isn’t ours to give, it isn’t. If we are in the will of God, then to raise the dead or to take a nap, the pay is the same. But, when the love of the Father arises within us, and faith comes alive in our hearts, mountains will move, and the Red Sea will split.
God has not changed, and if He listened to Elijah, He will hear us when we cry.
Since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God.
2 Corinthians 7:1
