Praying for Others is a Blessed Task

Think of the many times you have been asked or moved to pray for someone, or to pray for peace throughout the world. Or to pray for those who are dying. Or to pray for the ones who have no helper. Or to pray for those who are alone. Or to pray for the weak and hungry. Or to pray for our country, or the countries of the world. Or, how often have you been in a struggle with life yourself, and felt like you needed the prayers of others to see you through? Prayer for ourselves and others can become an overwhelming task. Not because we lack the compassion or even motivation, but because there are simply so many needs. 

Sometimes we see the storms gathering in our own or others’ lives, and are keenly aware of the pain, suffering, sadness, grief, and worry that seem to overshadow the joy of life. At such times of darkness, our natural response is prayer. We ask the Holy One to intervene and halt the storm, part the clouds, and let the light shine through. Yet, because the needs are so great, we feel helpless to pray for all those who have asked for our prayers, much less all those who are in need of prayer, and we wonder if others will offer their prayers for us.
 

But still we must find the strength and time to pray -- for others and for ourselves.  And also to listen to God in our hearts. 

When we pray for others, the God of love takes our offering and blesses our love. The God of love hears our heart and blesses those we love. The God of love lifts the needs from our heart and takes them into the heart of heaven. And we, we stand amazed, at the miracles that unfold.

A Process for Praying for Others

1. Sit quietly and center yourself in the present moment.
2. Slowly say the name of the person you are praying for.
3. As you read imagine the name floating into your heart.
4. Bring your awareness to being in the presence of God.
5. Open your heart and ask God to bless the one who you are praying for and help them in their lives.

6. Thank God for the time you’ve spent together and for listening and answering you in your prayers.

We Are Called to Intercessory Prayer -- Steadfastly Praying for Others

The Bible has many cases of people standing up for others before God.

The most striking example is Abraham. He took the initiative to step forward before God on behalf of his neighbors in Sodom and its area. He cared enough to do it, even though he knew how thoroughly wicked Sodom was, and knew how furious God was about it (which explains why he was so careful in speaking to God about it). Moses also stepped in when God was angry, standing in the gap in the most literal sense : offering his own life for that of his nation. (Thankfully, God didn't take him up on the offer.)

It was part of the role of a prophet not just to speak what God speaks, but to speak with God for the people of Israel. A fine example is the exchange between the prophet Habakkuk and God, where the prophet asks for God to act against injustice, but God replies about a coming doom. Isaiah prayed with King Hezekiah to save the nation from defeat and destruction at the hands of Assyria, and the armies were suddenly turned back (see Isaiah ch. 36-39).

The master builder Nehemiah prayed to God to bring about the rebuilding of Jerusalem and of his people. As they took their concerns to God, the key motivation behind these giants of faith was compassion. They loved the people, the culture, the faith with a love like God's love, and it burned in them so much that they dared to take on God on their behalf. Unlike the gods of the lore of most other lands, this God did not zap them with lightning or turn them into half-beasts. God listened to their cries -- not by ignoring the wrongdoings which got the divine wrath kindled in the first place, but by saving at least some of the people and bringing them back to where they belonged.

The New Testament has its cases of intercessory prayer. Jesus was the prime example of an intercessor. He interceded in prayer for God to bless and protect His followers. At the cross, He prayed, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Indeed, His whole life, His whole reason for being born, was to be a living intercession, a giving of His life to span the rift caused by our rebellion against God.

Others followed Jesus' example. Stephen's last words were an intercession on behalf of those who were killing him. Paul prayed constantly for the struggling young church, for character, behavior, witness, and wisdom. It is Paul's regular intercession for the church and its people which sets the usual pattern for our own intercessory prayers. And Epaphras was the 'prayer wrestler' for the church in Colossae.

Even at its earliest, the young church was praying for people : for safe travel, praying that people might know Christ through other peoples' witness, praying for healing and health, for rescue, for wisdom, for childbirth, for spiritual growth, for marriages -- asking God to bring benefit or blessing to people other than themselves. The others were not always beloved; they prayed for their political leaders, some of whom were out to kill them. But they knew their God was merciful and was intimately involved with what was going on in the world. And they knew they were called by God to share in that involvement.

Pray for Our Sunday School Teachers -- They are Following in the Footsteps of Jesus!

Pray for our Sunday School teachers.  They are following in the footsteps fo Jesus.  JESUS Was a Teacher, and Jesus Guides Our Teachers!  They are the backbone of any church family!


Jesus Christ Our Lord referred to Himself as "Teacher" and He was given that title by other people more than any other designation. (“Rabbi”)This is no doubt due to the fact that while He was here bodily on earth, Jesus spent more of His time teaching than He did in any other activity.

In fact, His teaching was a CENTRAL part of His ministry! In other words, when Jesus taught He wasn't just biding time. He wasn't just treading water until the time came for Him to go to the cross. No-He was fulfilling one of the main purposes of His life. You see, Jesus didn't just come to DIE FOR us. He also came to TEACH us how to LIVE.

The gospel writers were very clear in stating this. For example, our text from Matthew 7 tells us how Jesus began His earthly ministry in the synagogue when it says, "...the crowds were amazed at His teaching, because He taught as one Who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law."

So teaching the Word is a blessed event, following in the footsteps of our Lord Jesus.You see, since His followers learned Jesus could be trusted as a TEACHER, after the cross and the resurrection they decided to put their trust in Him as their SAVIOR. Jesus' teaching ministry is central to what He came to do. It was central then and it is central now. And that means that when we teach the Bible in Sunday School each week we are following in our Master's footsteps. We are carrying on His teaching ministry for Him in this time,.

Plus, we are obeying Jesus' command! Do you remember the words of His Great Commission to us? In Matthew 28 it records Jesus' own words when He said, "Go ye therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit AND TEACHING THEM to obey everything I have commanded you." Then, Jesus went on to say what? "And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."

And this final phrase should remind us that, when someone accepts the call to teach a Sunday School class Jesus is literally with them-that when a teacher asks Jesus to guide and empower him or her to obey His command and teach His word-He does! And when that happens in essence Jesus CONTINUES to teach, as He indwells that person through His Holy Spirit. He teaches through our teachers! He works to change the world through our Sunday School.

Mustard Seed Faith and Prayer

Jesus taught, "…I tell you the truth, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you" (Matthew 17:20).

2 Corinthians 10:4-5 tells us, "The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ."

The power of prayer is not the result of the person praying. Rather, the power resides in the God who is being prayed to. 1 John 5:14-15 tells us, "This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us - whatever we ask - we know that we have what we asked of him."

 God answers prayers that are in agreement with His will. His answers are not always yes, but are always in our best interest. When our desires line up with His will, we will come to understand that in time. When we pray passionately and purposefully, according to God's will, God responds powerfully!

Wesley on Prayer: An Act of Devotion and Love

John Wesley on Prayer


"God's command to "pray without ceasing" is founded on the necessity we have of his grace to preserve the life of God in the soul, which can no more subsist one moment without it, than the body can without air. "

On Pleasing God: "We have no other object than his love, and the desire of pleasing Him."

"All that a Christian does, even in eating and sleeping, is prayer, when it is done in simplicity, according to the order of God, without either adding to or diminishing from it by his own choice."

"In souls filled with love, the desire to please God is a continual prayer. "

"As the furious hate which the devil bears us is termed the roaring of a lion, so our vehement love may be termed crying after God."

"God only requires of his adult children, that their hearts be truly purified, and that they offer him continually the wishes and vows that naturally spring from perfect love. For these desires, being the genuine fruits of love, are the most perfect prayers that can spring from it."

From A Plain Account of Christian Perfection, as believed and taught by the Reverend Mr. John Wesley, from the year 1725, to the year 1777.

E. M. Bounds on the Power of Prayer

The great author and Methodist clergyman E.  M. Bounds wrote wonderfully of the power of prayer.
Edward McKendree Bounds (1835-1913), Methodist minister and devotional writer, born in Shelby County, Missouri. Studied law and was admitted to the bar at twenty-one years. After practicing law for three years, began preaching for the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. At the time of his pastorate at Brunswick, Misouri, war was declared, and he was made a prisonar of war for refusing to take the oath of allegiance to the Federal Government. After release he served as chaplain of the Fifth Missouri regiment [for the Confederate Army] until the close of the war, when captured and held as prisoner at Nashville, Tennessee. After the war ended, Bounds served as pastor of churches in Tennessee, Alabama, and St. Louis, Missouri.... Spent the last seventeen years of his life with his family in Washington, Georgia, writing his 'Spiritual Life Books.'"

Here is some of the wisdom that God gave E. M. Bounds that I pass on to you.

"We are constantly on a stretch, if not on a strain, to devise new methods, new plans, new organizations to advance the Church and secure enlargement and efficiency for the gospel. This trend of the day has a tendency to lose sight of the man or sink the man in the plan or organization. God's plan is to make much of the man, far more of him than of anything else. Men are God's method. The Church is looking for better methods; God is looking for better men. "There was a man sent from God whose name was John." The dispensation that heralded and prepared the way for Christ was bound up in that man John. "Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given."

"The world's salvation comes out of that cradled Son. When Paul appeals to the personal character of the men who rooted the gospel in the world, he solves the mystery of their success. The glory and efficiency of the gospel is staked on the men who proclaim it. When God declares that "the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him," he declares the necessity of men and his dependence on them as a channel through which to exert his power upon the world. This vital, urgent truth is one that this age of machinery is apt to forget. The forgetting of it is as baneful on the work of God as would be the striking of the sun from his sphere. Darkness, confusion, and death would ensue.


"What the Church needs to-day is not more machinery or better, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men whom the Holy Ghost can use -- men of prayer, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Ghost does not flow through methods, but through men. He does not come on machinery, but on men. He does not anoint plans, but men -- men of prayer."

These words are just as true today as when the faithful minister first wrote them.  And when he says men, I will add women, for God works through both genders in mighty ways when we surrender to His will and pray from the heart.  The most powerful position is when we are on our knees iu prayer.  Amen. Amen!