The Ministry of Intercession: A Plea for More Prayer — John Shaqi
The Ministry of Intercession: A Plea for More PrayerMurray, Andrew
Religion
The Ministry of Intercession: A Plea for More Prayer
Murray, Andrew
Intercessory prayer -- Christianity
Feebleness in prayer is the mark of disease. Impotence to walk is, in
the Christian, as in the natural life, a terrible proof of some evil in
the system that needs a physician. The lack of power to walk joyfully in
the new and living way that leads to the Father and the throne of grace
is specially grievous. Christ is the great Physician, who comes to
every Bethesda where impotent folk are gathered, and speaks out his
loving, searching question, Wilt thou be made whole? For all who are
still clinging to their hope in the pool, or are looking for some man to
put them in, who are hoping, in course of time, somehow to be helped by
just continuing in the use of the ordinary means of grace, His question
points to a better way. He offers them healing in a way of power they
have never understood. And to all who are willing to confess, not only
their own impotence, but their failure to find any man to help them, His
question brings the sure and certain hope of a near deliverance. We have
seen that our weakness in prayer is part of a life smitten with
spiritual impotence. Let us listen to our Lord as He offers to restore
our spiritual strength, to fit us for walking like healthy, strong men
in all the ways of the Lord, and so be fit rightly to fill our place in
the great work of intercession. As we see what the wholeness is He
offers, how He gives it, and what He asks of us, we shall be prepared
for giving a willing answer to His question.
WHAT THE HEALTH THAT JESUS OFFERS.
I might mention many marks of spiritual health. Our text leads us to
take one,--walking. Jesus said to the sick man, Rise and walk, and with
that restored him to his place among men in full health and vigour, able
to take his part in all the work of life. It is a wonderfully suggestive
picture of the restoration of spiritual health. To the healthy, walking
is a pleasure; to the sick, a burden, if not an impossibility. How many
Christians there are to whom, like the maimed and the halt and the lame
and the impotent, movement and progress in God's way is indeed an effort
and a weariness. Christ comes to say, and with the word He gives the
power, Rise and walk.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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