Premier Prayer Guide (2) Adoration Prayer

Premier Prayer Guide (2) - Adoration Prayer

In this series of blogs I am thinking about how the Lord's Prayer, as Jesus' response to His disciples request to be taught how to pray (Luke 11:1f), is so much more than just a prayer to say and is an outline of what prayer involves.   In the last blog I looked at Abba prayer and now I would like to consider Adoration prayer, which is what we are entering into in the words, 'Hallowed be your Name', the second line of the Lord's Prayer (See Matthew 6:9).

The Lord's Prayer teaches us of this important adoration aspect of prayer. Before we seek the advancement of God's kingdom on earth and before we start asking God for His help, we need to take some time to adore the Holy One in the contemplation of His Name  and in worship, praise and thanksgiving.

God's Name is more than just an 'identification tag', like our names might be today. In biblical thought God's Name is the revelation of who He is and what He does (cf. 1 Sam. 25:25 for this understanding of what a name signifies). Some have said that the Old Testament contains about 16 names for God, all revealing various truths about Him. (See the list below).

Every revelation of God's Name is holy and is to be hallowed, treated as high, lifted up and holy, worthy to be revered and adored. Isaiah 6:3 tells of how the seraphim in heaven worship and adore God's Holy Name crying:

"Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory".

Revelation 4:8 reveals that the same repeated heavenly adoration continues:

'And the four living creatures, ..... day and night they never cease to say, "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!" ' (ESV)

In prayer we join in with this heavenly chorus of perpetual adoration of God.

This threefold repetition of holy emphasizes that holiness is the main characteristic of God's being. This word 'holy' (qadosh in Hebrew, hagios in Greek) refers to the idea of separation, or that God is set apart and high above all that He has made. Though God draws near and is imminent, He is also 'high and lifted up' in transcendence. Isaiah 'saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up' (Isaiah 6:1) and the seraphim are adoring this lofty set apartness of God.

Isaiah 57:15 says:

'For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy:"I dwell in the high and holy place .....'(ESV)

One possible way to enter the heavenly chorus of adoration might be to use the names of God revealed in Scripture.

Here are some of God's revealed names in the Old Testament for us to use as we take some time in adoration prayer. *

* El Shaddai (Lord God Almighty, All Sufficient One, speaks of God's power and provision, Genesis 17:1)
* El Elyon (The Most High God, speaks of the exaltation of God, Genesis 14:18)
* Adonai (Lord, Master, speaks of the Lordship of God, Genesis 15:2)
* Yahweh (Lord, Jehovah, YHWH, God's special Name of promise, covenant and salvation, Genesis 2:4; Exodus 3:14; 6:3)
* Jehovah Nissi (The Lord My Banner, speaks of God as the flag of encouragement, hope and focus in the battles of life, Exodus 17:15)
* Jehovah-Raah (The Lord My Shepherd, speaks of the intimacy, care and friendship of God, Psalm 23:1)
* Jehovah Rapha (The Lord That Heals, speaks of God our healer and restorer, Exodus 15:26)
* Jehovah Shammah (The Lord Is There, speaks of God not abandoning Jerusalem but abiding and restoring, Ezekiel 48:35)
* Jehovah Tsidkenu (The Lord Our Righteousness, speaks of God straightening out our relationship with Himself, Jeremiah 23:6)
* Jehovah Mekoddishkem (The Lord Who Sanctifies You, speaks of God setting us apart for Himself, Exodus 31:13)
* El Olam (The Everlasting God, speaks of the eternity of God, Genesis 21:33)
* Elohim (God, speaks of the plurality of God as majestic Creator and hints of the Trinity, Genesis 1:1)
* Qanna (Jealous, speaks of God's zeal for His people as His exclusive bride, Exodus 20:5)
* Jehovah Jireh (The Lord Will Provide, speaks of God as the provider of the substitute sacrifice, Genesis 22:14)
* Jehovah Shalom (The Lord Is Peace, speaks of God as giver of completeness, Judges 6:24)
* Jehovah Sabaoth (The Lord of Hosts, The Lord of Armies, speaks of God as mighty and victorious over all attacks, 1 Samuel 1:3)

We could also use God's names revealed in the New Testament as we adore and revere Him.

* Father (The source of all fatherhood, good and generous to all, Ephesians 3:14-15; Matthew 7:11)
* Jesus (Our Saviour, Matthew 1:21)
* Holy Spirit (Our Helper, Ephesians 1:13; John 14:16)

(*I adapted this list of God's names from the article on God's Names at https://www.blueletterbible.org/study/misc/name_god.cfm)

Premier Prayer Guide (1) Abba Prayer

Prayer is possibly our most important activity and the main way to make progress in our lives in the Lord. Through prayer we tap into the beyond imagining resources of heaven (See Ephesians 3:20). But prayer is also possibly our biggest challenge and might be for some our most neglected opportunity. I find myself regularly repenting of my lack of sustained, decent praying. I am always wanting to learn more about how to pray and I repeatedly find myself being led back to the Lord's Prayer as the resource for an effective prayer life. The Lord's Prayer was Jesus' response to His disciples request to be taught how to pray (Luke 11:1f). The Lord's Prayer is so much more than just a prayer to say. This simple outline of what prayer involves is a rich and helpful guide to our praying.   In the next few blogs I would like to share some thoughts on the four big ways of praying that Jesus teaches us in the Lord's Prayer. We will look at Abba prayer, Adoration Prayer, Advancing Prayer and Asking Prayer.

Abba Prayer

Today lets take a quick look at Abba Prayer as revealed in the first line of the Lord's Prayer.

Jesus said, 'Pray then like this:

Our Father in heaven'
(Matthew 6:9).

Jesus is here teaching us that prayer begins as an intimate relationship with God 'our Father'.

This is in contrast to a meaningless, repetitive, mere 'heaping up empty phrases'. Prayer is so much more relational than just saying 'many words' (Matthew 6:7).

When we pray, we relate to a 'Father who knows what we need before we ask him'.
(Matthew 6:8).

This prayer relationship with our Father is not meant to be a sort of religious performance to be 'seen by others' (Matthew 6:5). In fact the heart of prayer begins in a 'secret' intimacy with 'your Father' as you find a place of solitude to be with Him (Matthew 6:6).

This does not mean that prayer is a totally private thing just for me and my God. In one sense all prayer is personal but never totally private. The Father is never only my Father. All prayer is really a 'family' thing for we are praying to 'OUR Father'. Even when I get alone geographically with the Father, I have spiritual access to Him as part of His huge community of believers 'who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ' (1 Corinthians 1:2. See also Ephesians 2:18). What I am saying is that praying people are Church people and on a regular basis they will express this spiritual family belonging by gathering with brothers and sisters in Christ to pray together in addition to their alone times of prayer (See Matthew 18:20; Acts 2:42).

For some people the name 'Father' may be a bit of a challenge because their earthly father was not a good reflection of the 'heavenly' Father. It is important to realize that God is the first and finest Father, the originator of all fatherhood (Ephesians 3:14-15). Prayer relates to the perfectly good 'heavenly' Father.

That our Father is 'in heaven' also refers to the fact that He is not restricted in any earthly sense and is everywhere present in the unseen realm of spiritual reality (which is heaven).

This personal spiritual intimacy with God as 'Father' is not possible without the re-creative and enabling work of God's Spirit. In John's Gospel we are taught that those who believe in Jesus, in the sense of receiving him, are born of God and become His children. The Apostle Paul teaches about a work of God's Spirit who adopts us into God's family and enables us to pray and call God 'Abba, Father.' Abba is an ancient Aramaic word meaning something like our word Dad. (See John 1:12-13; 3:6-8; Romans 8:15).

Having believed and received Jesus and with the help of God's Holy Spirit within us we can enter into Abba prayer.

One way of enjoying our relationship with 'our Father' could be to slowly and reflectively repeat the simple prayer, 'Abba, I am one of your beloved children'. As we quietly say this little prayer to our Father we can recall the amazing revelation that we are His 'beloved children' (Ephesians 5:1. Here the word 'beloved' is used as a translation of the Greek word 'agapetos' which means dearly loved, much loved.)

Prayer is grounded in this wonderful reality of the love of God 'our Father in heaven'.

Why desire the gift of prophecy?

Why desire the gift of prophecy?

In 1 Corinthians 14:1, the Apostle Paul says, ‘Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy’ (ESV).

The question is, why is the gift of prophecy so special?

In trying to answer this question, let me share a few thoughts about the New Testament gift of prophecy.

1. The Apostle Paul writes about the New Testament gift of prophecy as a lower level of prophetic revelation. It is not at all on the same high and perfect level of inspiration as the Prophetic and Apostolic writings of the Bible. As we will see, the New Testament gift of prophecy is not perfect but “in part” (1 Corinthians 13:9) and it needs to be tested and evaluated by the Scriptures, which are on a much higher level of inspiration and are perfect (See 1 Corinthians14:29, 37-38; 1 Thessalonians 5:20-22;  2 Timothy 3:15-17; Psalm 19:7; Romans 7:12).

We occasionally hear people who speak in a rather disparaging way about Bible teaching and then rave about a prophetic word that was given. Though some Bible preaching is below standard, we do need to beware of thinking that prophetic words are somehow better or more powerful than the Scriptures. In fact the exact opposite is true. It is the written “law of the Lord” that is “perfect” and always able to “revive the soul” (Psalm 19:7).

2. As was noted above, the gift of prophecy must be submitted to the words of Scripture.

1 Corinthians 14:37-38 says:

‘37 If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the Lord. 38 If anyone does not recognize this, he is not recognized. ‘(ESV)

As a foundational Apostle of Christ (1 Corinthians 15:8-10), Paul was given God’s special ‘grace’ to write Scripture. His letters were recognized and included in the Bible as ‘a command of the Lord’. 1 Corinthians 14:37-38 spells out the need for people who move in the prophetic gifts to ‘acknowledge’ and ‘recognize’ the Scriptures. If such prophetic people don’t do this and if their prophecies are therefore inconsistent with the teaching of the Bible, then they are to be ‘not recognized’ and their prophecies not accepted.

3. The gift of prophecy is not perfect but is “in part”.

1 Corinthians 13:9 says:

“For we know in part and we prophesy in part.” (ESV)

As has been said, the Scriptures are ‘perfect’, not ‘in part’, but prophecies today are only partially right and that is why they need to be evaluated. So when we hear someone share a prophetic word, we need to listen for the good ‘part’, as it were. The person sharing the prophetic word may indulge in a bit of preaching or commentary that gets added to the ‘part’ that was given as a gift from God and occasionally, there may even be bits of the sharing that are ‘evil’ which must be rejected. This leads us to the next point.

4. Prophetic words must be carefully evaluated and the good parts kept.

1 Corinthians 14:29 says:

‘Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others weigh what is said.’ (ESV)

1 Thessalonians 5:20-22 says:

‘20 Do not despise prophecies, 21 but test everything; hold fast what is good. 22 Abstain from every form of evil.’ (ESV)

Most of the time, I think that we can leave this evaluating to the individual. I don’t think that church leaders need to give a comment on the value of every prophetic word that gets shared. If something ‘evil’ gets said, then a correction would be in order.

This evaluating must also be done in a loving context. This is why 1 Corinthians 13, the love chapter, is between 1 Corinthians 12 and 1 Corinthians 14, the gifts chapters. If we do not encourage a loving environment in our church meetings, people will be too scared to share anything for fear of being corrected. My point is that we so value the gift of prophecy that we encourage people to have a go and share a word. If they get it a bit wrong, we just lovingly let it go (and say nothing). If they happen to get it badly wrong, we lovingly correct the error without making people too scared to ever have a go again.

5. This gift of prophecy is available to all Christians in the New Covenant

1 Cor. 14:31 says:

‘For you can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and all be encouraged.’ (ESV)

This not to say that all will have a prophetic motivation or a prophetic ministry or even operate regularly in a prophetic sphere of ministry. The three big lists of gifts in the New Testament speak of spiritual gifts in three main ways. Romans 12:6-8 speaks about motivational gifts as the gifts we have and that God by his grace has given to us in a constituted way. Ephesians 4:11-12 is about the ministry gifts that we become. This passage is about leadership ministry gifts and different spheres of ministry for all God’s people.  1 Corinthians 12:7-11 is about manifestation gifts, the gifts we seek, which are given situationally and are not constituted. It is these manifestation gifts of prophecy that are available to all believers in Jesus. God can use any one of us to manifest a gift of prophecy in a given situation as needed.

6. The gift of prophecy is to be eagerly desired.

1 Cor. 14:1 says:

‘Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.’ (ESV)

1 Cor. 14:39 says:

‘So, my brothers, earnestly desire to prophesy…’ (ESV)

It is not just a case of saying, ‘If God wants me to manifest this gift, He will give it to me.’ Some who are theoretically accepting of the spiritual gift of prophecy are actually not very keen to ever actually share a prophetic word. We need to move from a passive intellectual acceptance of the possibility of prophetic gifts to a passionate seeking that we ‘may prophesy’. Come to church asking God to give you a word of prophecy.

7. The gift of prophecy is not to be despised.

1 Thessalonians 5:20 says:

‘Do not despise prophecies.’ (ESV)

This seems to be the opposite extreme from those who value prophecies over Scripture. It may be because prophecy is only ‘in part’ and lower than the perfection of the Bible that some ‘despise prophecies’ as too simple or too obvious. For example, if someone shared a prophetic word about how God loves us, a person who despises prophecy may think that it is so obvious because the Bible tells us this. It may however be very encouraging for someone to be assured of God’s love.

8.  The gift of prophecy is to be desired because it is very useful in building up, lifting up and cheering up.

1 Corinthians 14:3 says:

‘The one who prophesies speaks to people for their upbuilding and encouragement and consolation.’ (ESV)

This is the normal function of the gift of prophecy: to build up, encourage and comfort. This gift of prophecy may occasionally be corrective or directive, but this would be exceptional and therefore must be handled with much more care. In our church I feel that people can be given freedom to share words that build up, lift up and cheer up, but words that correct or direct may not be shared without first running it by an Elder. This is because a word of correction or direction that is wrong could do some serious damage!