When we sit down to pray, it is easy for us to pray for the urgent needs of ours and others. When we do that, we run the risk of allowing the tyranny of the urgent to take over our prayer life, too. That would be most unfortunate. If anything, our time of prayer should help us to break away from the tyranny of the urgent and reorient ourselves around what is important as we direct our eyes to God and His will for our lives. So, we have been thinking about what we should be praying for by looking at Jesus’ teaching on what we should pray for (in the Lord’s Prayer) and His example (in His Highly Priestly Prayer). Starting today, we want to reflect on some of Paul’s prayers, which appear in His letters. The first one we would like to reflect on is in Rom. 15:5-6: “May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” In this prayer, Paul addresses God as “the God of endurance and encouragement.” This is not a familiar expression to us. Why is Paul addressing God in this way here? We can see why when we read the previous verse: “For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” The Bible is the story of God’s redemption through Jesus Christ (“what we are to believe concerning God). But the Bible also contains instructions regarding how we are to live as God’s people (“what duty God requires of man”). It is not easy to meet God’s holy standard; it is, in fact, impossible. That is why Jesus had to come and meet it for us. This does not mean we don’t have to live by the standard and follow the instructions. Jesus did not get rid of the standard; He changed the reason for our obedience—not to earn our salvation but to demonstrate our (already won) salvation in Jesus Christ. Jesus also changed the motivation: not out of fear of God’s punishment but out of gratitude and love for God. Even so, we still need endurance and encouragement to properly receive and apply the instructions for the high standard of Christian living.
Read MoreThe final petition Jesus prayed in His High Priestly Prayer is, “Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world” (v. 24). In this final petition, Jesus prays for our translation to heaven. By “where I am,” Jesus did not mean the upper room where He was eating the Passover meal with His disciples. We know He was speaking of heaven because He wanted His disciples (and us!) to be “...where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world.” How appropriate it is that this is the final petition of His High Priestly Prayer! All that He has prayed for in this prayer culminates in this final petition.
Read MoreThe next petition in Jesus’ High Priestly Prayer: “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (John 17:20-21). For whom was Jesus praying this? Not just for His disciples that were with Him but “also for those who will believe in me through their word....” This was why Jesus prayed earlier that His Father not take His disciples out of the world and keep them from the evil one (v. 15). This was why Jesus sent them into the world (v. 18). We can say that “those who will believe in me” refer to all Christians. This means that Jesus prayed this prayer for us. And it is because precisely Jesus prayed this prayer that we are here as God’s people.
Read MoreHere is another petition from the Lord’s High Priestly Prayer: “Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth” (John 17:17). To sanctify is to make holy. Whereas justification declares us to be righteous in the tribunal of God once for all, sanctification makes us holy in character throughout our life more and more. Regarding this petition, Matthew Henry says, “The next thing he prayed for them was that they might be sanctified; not only kept from evil [v. 15], but made good.” He goes on to say what this petition is asking for: “[1.] ‘Confirm the work of sanctification in them, strengthen their faith, inflame their good affections, rivet their good resolutions.’ [2.] ‘Carry on that good work in them, and continue it; let the light shine more and more.’ [3.] ‘Complete it, crown it with the perfection of holiness; sanctify them throughout and to the end.’”
Read MoreThe petition we want to reflect on today is John 17:15: “I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one.” We can say that this petition is a temporary one—in the sense that it is only until the end of this world, or until we die. Jesus did not come to keep us in this world of change and decay forever. This world was never meant to be our eternal abode. Even if Adam did not fall in sin, this world under the Second Law of Thermodynamics would have been eventually replaced by a new heaven and a new earth. He came into this world so that He might rescue us and bring us to His eternal abode. So, when Jesus was about to finish His work of redemption through His death and resurrection, He told His disciples, “In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also” (John 14:2-3).
Read MoreToday, we will reflect on the next petition Jesus prays in His High Priestly prayer: “Holy Father, keep them in your name, which you have given me, that they may be one, even as we are one” (v. 11). Jesus asks His Father to “keep them” in His name. Who is He praying this for? “Them” refers to His disciples and His chosen people (cf., John 10:16). So, in v. 9, Jesus said, “I am praying for them. I am not praying for the world but for those whom you have given me, for they are yours.” Again, we see a glimpse of the covenant of redemption: in it, God gave to His Son a people from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation to be redeemed through His saving work.
Read MoreWe are reflecting on what we should be praying for. We have gone over the petitions of the Lord’s Prayer. Starting today, let’s review Jesus’ High Priestly prayer in John 17 and learn about what we should pray for from what Jesus prayed. The first is, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you...” (v. 2). Here, we have a glimpse of what the theologians call “the covenant of redemption.” This is the covenant that was made between the three Persons of the Trinity before the foundation of the world regarding our salvation. In it, God the Father designated the Son as the Redeemer of His people and promised to Him, upon the condition of perfect obedience, 1) the redemption of His people and 2) the Holy Spirit so He could pour out the Holy Spirit upon His people to apply His redemption to them. As you can see, it was a covenant of works, which was reflected in God’s covenant with Adam (which is called “the covenant of life”). Jesus alludes to the covenant of redemption when He says a couple of verses later, “I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do [in the covenant of redemption]. And now, Father, glorify me in your own presence with the glory that I had with you before the world existed [as you promised in the covenant of redemption]” (vs. 4-5).
Read MoreToday, let’s deal with the last petition of the Lord’s Prayer: “...and deliver us from evil.” This petition makes perfect sense: there is much evil in this fallen world. There are unexpected and somewhat expected natural disasters that bring much and sudden destruction to communities and all the people in them indiscriminately. There are many social/systemic evils—all kinds of discrimination and violence against those, who do not belong to a particular group. And many individual evils are committed among people—from horrible crimes like murder and rape to the hurtful and cruel things we say and do against one another out of jealousy, hatred, and unprovoked malice. There are mass shootings and there are tragic accidents due to our and other people’s negligence. We may be a victim of horrific evil simply because we are at the wrong place at the wrong time. This should humble us to pray, “Deliver us from evil!”
Read MoreThe petition we will deal with today is, “Lead us not into temptation....” Some may ask why Jesus taught us to pray this prayer. James says, “Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am being tempted by God,’ for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one” (James 1:13). If God does not tempt anyone, why should we ask God not to lead us into temptation? Isn’t this like a child begging his loving parents everyday, “Please don't hate me”? Interestingly, the Greek word for “temptation” can be translated also as “test/trial” (Gal. 4:14; Heb. 3:8). Whereas the Bible clearly states that God does not tempt, it also says that God did test Abraham (Gen. 22:1, LXX) as well as the Israelites in the wilderness (Deut. 8:2). Should we change this petition to say, “Lead us not into test”? God’s testing is not easy: it was not easy for Abraham to sacrifice his beloved son, Isaac, as a test; it was not easy for Israel to wander through the wilderness for forty years.
Read MoreToday, we will consider the fifth petition: “...forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors” (Matt. 6:12). This petition implies many things about our relationship with God. The first is that we have a relationship with God. If we did not have any relationship with Him, we would not owe any debt to Him. But what kind of relationship do we have with God that we should have debts to be forgiven? This petition implies that we have certain obligations to God. This is so because God is our Creator: all that we are and all that we have are from Him. God made us and granted us many gifts so that we might glorify Him, just as a symphony “glorifies” its composer. We are God’s stewards, entrusted with many blessings from God—life, abilities, talents, and resources. There will come a day when everyone will have to give an account to God of all that he has done with what He entrusted to him.
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