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Pastor David Mitchell
All right, cool. Okay, everybody. I want to first say Happy Mother's Day. This is a wonderful day of celebration, and I'm going to be speaking to you today about the tenth and greatest lesson on prayer, and I say that because this comes from a
Bible study with ten lessons on prayer, and this is the tenth one that I'm going to talk about today because it's right in the area in Romans chapter 8 where we are.
We're going verse by verse through the book of Romans, and we find ourselves right at verse 24, and this tenth great lesson on prayer is found right here, so that's what
I'm going to teach about. The other nine are awesome teachings in the Word of God about prayer.
We won't have time to talk about those right now in this series, but maybe another day, but so glad to have you guys with us today, and so here are the ten lessons, and you can kind of see how they follow along with the different teachings in the
Bible on prayer, and that tenth one is the one we're going to be talking about. It's found in Romans 8, 24 through 28.
We may, probably won't get time today to jump out into John 15, but as we move on, we probably will jump into there before we finish this topic.
Won't get there today, I don't think, but hey, there's the best mom in the world. Now listen, I'm controlling the technology, so I get to say that.
I know all of you guys have your moms, and your wives are moms, and everyone has wonderful moms today, but this is my mom,
Joy Mitchell, and I want to say Happy Mother's Day to her, and there she is with all of the daughters and other moms in the
Mitchell family, and she's, she and I went to the
World Series when Texas Rangers won a while back, and can you tell my mom likes to get places early?
We're the first ones there, and there she is with one of the great grandbabies. I can't tell which one.
They all look so similar when they're first born, but Happy Mother's Day to you, my dear mom,
Joy Mitchell, and now at our church services, we always, at this time, we'll have one of our children, or two of them usually, pass out roses to all the moms, so all you guys out there, this is our gesture to you.
I wish we could actually hand you a rose today, but can't do that, but we love you just as much as if we had done it, and so Happy Mother's Day to everyone.
Now, I'm not one too much to preach topical, you know, sermons oriented towards celebration, so I hope you'll forgive me, but I'm just not too much into that, so we're going to continue our study through the word, but I do know that the moms in our congregation today all around this country, you've sacrificed so much to bring life into this world, and to nurture, and to disciple.
You're the first line of discipleship for every human being that's born into this world, and the
Lord Jesus has equipped you to do that so well, and we love all of you, so all right, so Happy Mother's Day.
Okay, so let's review a little bit. Where we just finished in Romans chapter 8 was around verse 23, and a couple of verses right in there.
What was so fascinating to me was that I found right in the middle of chapter 8 of Romans a verse or two that had to do with the rapture of the church, and the second coming.
Now, I'm not a person who breaks fellowship over different beliefs on the end times at all.
I think that's ridiculous because more and more light will be shed on that as we get closer to the events, and get into the events, and we'll all come to more agreement on that as time goes by.
I know friends that won't even use the word rapture because they say it's not in the Bible. It wasn't taught until the 1800s or whatever.
The point is, you know what I mean when I say the rapture of the church. It is a concept.
It's a theological concept, and it is something—if you want to use biblical terminology, it's the gathering.
It's where the Lord sends the angels and gathers his elect from the four corners and from everywhere, and brings us to himself at the second coming, and that's what it is.
So whether you want to call it that or not, it doesn't bother me to use the word rapture because think how rapturous that will be when we find ourselves together, and we'll be the park meadows slash tradeway quadrant of heaven.
We'll all be right there together with all of our loved ones and with the Lord Jesus Christ. Just kidding there, but I mean, you know, we will recognize one another.
We'll be there, and you know, I think the very first thing we'll all be saying is, wow, it just actually happened. It actually happened, and it's going to be an amazing event.
Well, this speaks of it here in verse 23. Notice where it says, we groan within ourselves waiting for the adoption to wit the redemption of our body.
That redemption of the body is the rapture, and so it speaks of it right here in this chapter.
Now, what's interesting, this great lesson on prayer that's just about to come up is in the context of this, and we have to ask ourselves the reason why is that.
I mean, one thing I am big, big, big on is studying everything in context, because that is so weak in our country today.
People love to do little topical sermons, pull a little snippet out, stick it up there, and give a speech for 20 minutes.
I don't like that. I'm not saying there aren't some awesome preachers out there, because there are, but there's an awful lot of preachers who have been trained in their seminaries just to do topical lessons and please people's ears, and I know that's out there, too.
So, I like to get the context. Now, in this lesson we're about to see on prayer, it loses so much of its meaning if you don't understand it's in the context of this passage right before it on the end times, the second coming, and the rapture.
That is a time when we're going to go through much tribulation, and if you want to really understand what makes prayer happen among human beings, it's tribulation.
Listen, when things are going great, we pray less. You have to admit that. When we're in trouble, we pray more, and we pray more fervently.
You have to admit that. We're all that way, and so this is a very important context, and let's review just a little bit before we move into our lesson on prayer.
So, last time we saw that the church is found throughout the book of Revelation, contrary to what some of these hyper -Calvinist—I'm sorry, hyper—we talked about that in Sunday school—these hyper -dispensationalists who have invented a whole system to try to place the rapture at the front end of the seven -year tribulation period.
The Bible doesn't put it there. Daniel didn't put it there. Jesus didn't put it there. Paul didn't put it there.
Peter doesn't put it there. Only these books that you read put it there, and to do that, they have to contrive some other things.
There are only two resurrections listed in the Scripture, the first and the second resurrection. We've already taught on that here, and you've been with us for the most part on that lesson, and so the first resurrection happens at the end of the church age, and that resurrection has to happen at the second coming, and the rapture cannot precede that resurrection.
Paul taught us that very clearly. We go up immediately with them, but not before them, so that puts the time period on the rapture is at the second coming, after the resurrection, not seven years prior to all that.
So we've talked about all that, and if you don't agree with it, that's great. My job is not to get you to agree, but to get you to study, and someone did that for me, praise the
Lord, I don't know, more than a decade ago. Just ask me two questions. Brother David, would you be honest and answer how many last trumps can there be, because that's when the rapture happens, and secondly, would you consider putting
Jesus' chronology in Matthew chapter 24 as more important and more authoritative than the books you've read, and boy, that bothered me, because I had never studied this on my own, didn't have that much interest in it, and boy, for the next year or two,
I studied this, and I saw that the Bible taught something totally different than what my mentors had taught me, and my wonderful brother
Otis changed his mind on it before he went to be with the Lord, and no longer believed it that way.
He believed that the rapture happens with the second coming. I believe Rocky Freeman would have changed his mind if he'd lived long enough, but he died pretty young.
But I'll leave it up to you to do your studies on this, but one of the things that proponents of the pre -tribulation rapture believe is that the church is not found in the book of Revelation beyond chapter four, and it's one of their big pillars, and the truth is that pillar falls so easily it's like it's made out of cardboard, because all you have to do is look at the context and look throughout the book of Revelation, and you see the church all the way to the end.
It's just there. The word church may not be there, but neither is the word rapture there. It doesn't mean the concept isn't there, and it is there, and we found that last
Sunday. We studied through that. Now, the church is called up to meet
Jesus as part of the first resurrection. We've talked about that, and that resurrection happens at the end of the church age, not in the middle of the seven -year tribulation period, not at the beginning of the seven year, but the end of the seven years, which is also the end of the church age.
Contrary to popular belief, the church age ends at the end of the seven -year tribulation period when
Jesus Christ returns at his second coming, and we've seen evidence of this all through the
New Testament. Last Sunday, for example, in 2 Timothy 3, 1 through 5, where it speaks of talking about perilous times will come,
Paul is teaching the young preacher, Timothy, how to live and how to preach and how to pastor in the time in which perilous times will come.
In other words, the last times. How do we know that? Because every generation, including
Paul's, believed that the second coming would happen in their lifetime. It's the great hope of the church, and it has been every generation for 2 ,000 years, and Paul believed it.
He was preparing Timothy for it. He was preparing the entire church to be ready to go through tribulation and trouble, and he was comforting their hearts time and time again through 1
Timothy and 1 Thessalonians and in Corinthians and all through the Scripture.
Paul was always getting the church ready, getting the bride ready for this great event. In 2 Timothy 4, 1,
I charge thee therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ. So here we see Paul giving a charge to this young preacher, and look what he starts it with.
The time period he places this in, he will judge the living and the dead at his appearing and at his kingdom.
See, that puts it right at the first resurrection, and he's telling Timothy, look, the first resurrection is coming.
You need to be ready. There's going to be trouble before that. You need to be ready for that, and I'm charging you to do the following, and he goes on and tells him to preach the
Word. Be ready, in season and out. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all patience and doctrine because this time is coming.
Paul felt like he was in that time. We feel like we're in that time. We, to be honest, we have seen more things happen that have to happen than Paul had seen, and we've given examples of that in recent messages.
He says, for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine. Now, if that is a sign of the end times, we're there, ladies and gentlemen, because now you have people that when people preach sound doctrine, they're ridiculed for it, and that's pretty much been true throughout, but I tell you what, it's like Jesus said.
It's not that some of these signs haven't been around, but it's like a woman who is having birth pains.
They get closer together and stronger and stronger until the baby's born. That's how you interpret these signs.
Well, we also looked at a synopsis last Sunday of chapter 1 through 14 in the book of Revelation, and these proponents of the pre -tribulation rapture try to say that the church disappears in chapter 4.
Revelation is no longer in the book, and the Jewish material. The problem with that is if you just read the book of Revelation, you see that it's not true, so one of the great pillars of their theory falls right there, and a couple of Sundays ago, we sort of demolished another one of their pillars, the one where it says
God's not willing for us to go through wrath, and they say that wrath equals tribulation and trouble, which it doesn't.
In fact, in the context in which that verse is found, wrath means hell because it's a contrast of going to heaven, which is in the same verse, so that one just falls and you thump it like a marshmallow.
It's not a pillar of anything, but now when you go and you look at this,
Revelation is in fact a book written to the church, and the church is the bride of Christ.
She's found throughout the book. Here's some examples, and some of these I didn't even get to last Sunday, but I'm going to give it by way of review a couple of these things because they're just amazing to see.
Look at Revelation 1 .1. Who is the entire book of Revelation written to? And you say the people they're written to aren't going to be on the earth when this happens, then what's the use of the book?
The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave unto Him, so God the Father gave this revelation to Jesus, who gave it to John, who gave it to us, right?
And why? To show unto His servants. Could that be the church?
Well, He gave it to John. Okay. Things which must shortly come to pass.
Now, don't misinterpret that. It doesn't mean that when John was the penman of this, almost 2 ,000 years ago, that the
Holy Spirit was telling him it's going to happen any minute now because shortly means quickly or in haste and come to pass, in the
Greek means to cause to be. So what this means is that when these things begin to happen, they happen quickly.
When this happens, it happens quickly. It didn't mean it's going to happen in John's lifetime, but isn't it interesting how the
Holy Spirit wrote it in such a way that all of us could interpret that it might happen in our generation?
Why? Because it's the great hope of every generation not to have to die physically. Don't you think that's a great hope?
Every generation had that hope. We certainly have it. We have a better hope of it than John did and then
Paul had, I think. So he goes on and he says, these things will happen, come to pass, and he sent and signified it by his angel unto
John. And then verse 4 says, John, to the seven churches.
And then these folks say, well, this book's not, you know, the church is not found in the book of Revelation, past chapter 4. The whole book is written to the church.
And those seven churches symbolize, the number seven being perfect, symbolize all churches throughout the church age.
All right, so he wrote this to the churches saying, grace and peace. What are we going to need if we have to go through trouble? We're going to need grace and peace from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness and the first begotten of the dead and the prince of the kings of the earth, unto him that loved us.
Now, who is us and washed us? Who is us from our sins?
Who is our in his own blood? Who is it that's washed by the blood of the lamb? Do you not think the church is included in that?
I'm not saying that the Old Testament saints weren't washed by the same blood. They were, but so is the church.
So are the Gentiles, not just the Jews. This is not just Jewish material. So obviously the book is written to the church.
He goes on and says, and hath made us kings and priests unto God. Who out here would not admit we've always said that's the church.
God made us kings and priests unto God. This is written to the church, and the book is obviously written to the church, which is washed from its sins in his own blood.
Second point is this. So the church is found throughout the book of Revelation.
Secondly, it spoke of an appearance of Jesus Christ, which included everyone seeing him, not some secret coming prior to his actual coming.
Look at this. When Revelation 1 -7, behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see him.
That doesn't sound like this pre -tribulation rapture that's invisible and no one knows about it except supposedly the church.
That's not mentioned anywhere in the Bible. You don't find that anywhere. It's a concept of human beings and seminaries and theologians, but it's not in the
Bible because Jesus himself said clearly, and so does John record this in Revelation, that when he does come,
Jesus said, I'll come like the lightning from the east to the west, and John here says every eye will see him, and they also which pierced him, and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him.
Even so, amen. So it's not a secret coming seven years prior to his actual coming. In fact,
Jesus warned of false prophets in the last days who would say that I came in secret and I'm out in the desert or I'm in some inner room.
He said don't believe them, and Paul said those who teach doctrines like that harm and do damage to the church.
Paul said that. Now, number three, John the human penman of Revelation said that he is our brother and companion in tribulation.
Why would he say that if we're not going to be in tribulation or have tribulation? So John claimed in Revelation 1 -9,
I, John, who also am a brother and companion in tribulation and in the kingdom, and look at this.
So that moves forward into the thousand -year millennial kingdom, but look at this, and in the patience of Christ, that's the church age.
So he's our companion in tribulation. The church is definitely there. Now, number four, the so -called trumpet in chapter 4 -1 where they say this picture is the rapture and you don't see the church anymore, it is not called, it is not really a trumpet.
It represents, it doesn't represent the rapture. Actually, what it was was a voice, not a trumpet, and it was loud like a trumpet, but it was not a trumpet, okay, and it's not the rapture, but rather a very specifically and clearly a revelation of things to come given only to the apostle
John. This is not the church going up. This was John getting a sight tour, sightseeing tour of the heavenlies and being told things that would come upon the earth, right?
So in Revelation 4 -1, it says, after this, I looked, and behold, a door was opened in heaven, and the first voice which
I heard was as it were a trumpet. That doesn't say it's a trumpet. The Bible itself tells you it's allegorical, as it were a trumpet.
In other words, it's loud like a trumpet talking. It says, I heard this voice talking. Ladies and gentlemen, trumpets don't talk, okay?
So I heard this voice loud like a trumpet talking with me, which said, come up hither, and I will show thee things which must come to be hereafter.
Now they'll say, well, that's the rapture. Come up hither. That's the rapture. No, that's John being told to come up, and I'm going to tell you things to come, and the same exact phrase of this trumpet as a voice is found in chapter 1, and they didn't say that was the rapture.
So the thing just crumbles. It's just very, very bad interpretation of Scripture, and it's obviously designed to prove a preconceived theory.
Revelation 4 -2 says, and immediately I was in the Spirit. John, not the church. John was in the
Spirit, and behold, a throne was set in heaven, and one sat on the throne. And verse 9 says, and they sung a new song, saying thou art worthy to take the book and to open the seals thereof, for thou was slain and has redeemed us.
Who's the us? To God by thy blood out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation.
See, that's not just the Jews. That's every Gentile nation in the world and the Jews. It's the church, all right?
Now that's in chapter 5, and they said the church is not found beyond chapter 4. It's in all their books. Go read it.
It's a lie, all right? That's plain and simple. It's a lie, and I don't believe these men hate God, or I really think they were deceived.
I think they love the Lord. Many of them, I'll bet, will change their mind before these times come to pass.
Now from chapter 5 on, they say this is Jewish material. It is not
Jewish literature, but it's for both Jews and the Gentiles, all people, and the church as well, and we see that in Revelation chapter 5, which is beyond chapter 4, by the way, and verse 9.
So the church is found in Revelation 5, even though they say it's not found after chapter 4.
It's found in chapter 5. Guess what? He goes on and says, and he has made us unto our
God, kings and priests, and we shall reign. Who is that? That's the church. That's chapter 5.
What about this? The church is found in chapter 6. They said it doesn't, you won't see the church past chapter 4.
To me, I have a problem when people don't tell the truth. I have a problem. I don't care how logical they are.
I have a problem with their conclusion. Revelation 6, 9, and when he had opened the fifth seal,
I saw unto the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God and for the testimony which they held, and they cried out loud, saying,
How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?
Now look at this. These are people in the heavenlies looking down at the earth and seeing the tribulation period and asking
God, How long will you wait before you send your son? They're killing our brothers. Now what does the word brother mean?
Is that like Jewish or does that mean like a church brother? Well, usually it means a church person, a member of the church, a brother or sister in Christ.
Look what it says. White robes are given to them. So apparently they were there and they died.
So not all of them will die because many of us have been instructed to go find a place to leave the cities and go into the mountains and hide.
Not all Christians and Jews will be martyred. Many will be found in caves and hidden right up until the
Lord comes for us, and that's my plan anyway. I hope that's the Lord's plan for me and my family, but if we have to die, what is that?
Jesus said, Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. I'm not going to fear that either. Now white robes are given to these people, to every one of them, and we know from later in the book of Revelation that it's the church that receives these white robes.
So here's the church in Revelation 6. Until their fellow servants also and their brethren, that's the church, that shall be killed as they were shall be fulfilled.
So the church continues to be in all seven of the years, even in the last three and a half years, and if they're found, they will be killed.
And all of this is in Matthew 24. We're not going to go back over this. We already covered it, where Jesus said these things would happen.
He said, After the tribulation of those days will I send my angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together his elect.
What does that sound like? After the tribulation, Jesus says. So we've seen all this. Now here's seventh thing.
Guess what? The church is found in chapter 12, way beyond chapter 4. Revelation 12 .10,
he says, The accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before the Lord day and night, and they overcame him by the blood of the
Lamb. Who does that sound like? Now I know that's Jew and Gentile, but it's people who've been covered by the blood. That's the church, all right, overcome by the blood of the
Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they love not their lives unto the death. So they are in the tribulation being killed, and this is coming from heaven as a vision given
John to be told to us. Guess what? The church is found in Revelation chapter 18.
It says in 18 .24, And in her was found the blood of the prophets and of the saints.
Who are the saints, ladies and gentlemen? Who are the saints? And of all that were slain upon the earth.
And guess what? The church is found in Revelation 19. And after these things I heard a great voice of much people in heaven saying,
Hallelujah, salvation, glory, and honor, and power unto the Lord. For true and righteous are his judgments, for he has judged the great whore, that's the world system, which did corrupt the earth with her fornication and hath avenged the blood of his servants at her hand.
God's servants are still being killed, and we've already demonstrated this is not just Jewish servants. It's both
Jews and Gentiles. Let us be glad and rejoice and give honor to him for the marriage of the what?
The lamb? Oh, well, isn't it the church that's the bride of Christ? This is in chapter 19, and they say the church is not found anywhere after chapter 4.
And you've read those books, and you just, if you're like me, just accepted it because you weren't interested in the topic, and you went on to study other stuff.
And for years I taught this incorrectly, but as I start reading the scriptures, I find out, wow, man, they wrote a book about it, teach it in the seminaries, and it's not the truth.
So it goes here, and it says that the marriage of the lamb has come, and his wife has made herself ready.
What is it that made the church? Now you think about the modern church right now, okay?
She's more ready now than she was before the coronavirus hit. Why? Because tribulation brings us to the
Lord, right? So as the only thing I can think of that would ever bring the modern church anywhere near making herself, and by the way, it's the active voice in Greek, not passive, so this is not positional righteousness, just talking about experiential righteousness.
The only thing, like Brother Bill in Sunday School said, we need to try to live more like Christ. That's our responsibility.
The only thing that would make this weak church ever be able to do that, I think, is tribulation, and to say that we're not here during the tribulation says we won't make ourselves ready.
That's my own interpretation. Now here's the tenth point. Within the epistles of Paul, and we covered some of this, the writings of Peter and John, again and again, we're exhorted as Christians who could be here during the end times to remember, we're exhorted to remember, number one, that we're saved.
I mean, they can't kill the body, but they can't kill our soul. Why would they be telling us this if we weren't being prepared for something?
And remember, they thought their generation would see these things happen. Number two, we're told about our eternal security.
Why do we need to be reminded of that? Well, if you're going to go through tribulation and possibly be killed physically, it'd be nice to know you don't lose your salvation, right?
And we're told about our inheritance in heaven. Why? Because we need to be looking forward to that to be able to go through tribulation just like Jesus looked forward to it to suffer the cross.
He's our example. And to remain steadfast and unmovable, always abounding in the work of the
Lord because our labor is not in vain. All these things are put in the context of Paul, Peter, John preparing the church for the end times.
It's found in all these verses and a lot of these we've already studied. Let me just end with a couple of them, though.
Look at this one in Philippians chapter 1 verse 6, being confident of this very thing that he which has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.
Doesn't that sound like the second coming? Why was that written to us if we're not going to be here? For to me to live is
Christ and die is gain. Why does Paul keep exhorting us that we need to remember not to fear death if we're not going to go through tribulation?
And then towards the end of this passage, stand fast. Why do we need to stand fast right now?
We don't have to worry about it. Nobody persecutes us in America. I mean, I know the church is persecuted in other parts of the world, but listen, we just walk down the street singing hymns if we want to.
We don't need to stand fast, but we're going to need to learn to stand fast, so why would he give this to us if we don't need it?
Stand fast in one spirit with one mind, striving together for the faith of the gospel, and in nothing be terrified by your adversaries.
That doesn't even seem to fit the American church right now, but it will. It will. For unto you it is given on behalf of Jesus Christ not only to believe but to suffer.
That pillar that this pre -wrath rapture thing stands on that God will not take his people through wrath is ridiculous.
It says so clearly in the scripture that it is a gift given to us on behalf of Christ, not only that we believe in him.
You see, the fact we believe—we talked about this in Sunday school—it is a gift from the Holy Spirit to us.
We didn't do it. It's something we received. We couldn't do it. We didn't want to do it. We just received it because he turned the lights on.
Just like that's a gift, to suffer for him is also a gift if we're called to do that. And look at this, 2
Thessalonians 1 -4, so that we ourselves glory in you and the churches of God for your patience and faith in all your persecutions and tribulations that you endure, and to you who are trouble, rest with us when?
When the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels. What is the context of that?
See, people don't teach it this way nowadays, but the context is the second coming which Paul was preparing the people in his generation for, and he's preparing us for it because we're going to go through the tribulation that happens before it.
And look what it says. It says you're going to be persecuted. You're going to have tribulation. You're going to need to endure it, and you're going to be troubled.
All of us are troubled when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, when he shall come to be glorified in his saints and to be admired in all them that believe, because our testimony among you was believed in that day.
Now listen, context is so clear. When is this happening? It is written to the church as if we will be here at the time
Jesus comes back. 2 Thessalonians 2 verse 1, Now we beseech you, brethren, by the coming of the
Lord Jesus Christ and by the gathering together unto him, that you be not soon shaken in mind or troubled.
Why do we need these warnings? Second, I'm sorry, in Revelation chapter 2, And unto the angel of the church at Smyrna write,
I know your works. I know your tribulation. So God has already allowed the church to go through tribulation.
Why would any group propose that he would not allow us to go through tribulation now?
Using one verse that says he won't let us go through wrath, and in that verse it says, but to be saved and go to heaven.
The wrath there means hell. Yes, he's not going to let us go to hell. That's how he encourages us.
But it doesn't say he won't let us go through tribulation. The church has already done it and will in the future. I know thy works, tribulation, poverty, but thou art rich spiritually.
Fear none of those things which you will suffer. Look at that. This is in the early chapters of Revelation, which was written to the church.
We already proved that. Behold, the devil shall cast some of you in prison. Oh, well, how's that going to happen if you're already in heaven?
You know, if I were the devil and I wanted to spill the blood of millions of Christians and Jews, I would come up with a lie that would say, hey, don't prepare for this because you won't even be here.
That's exactly what he did, and then sadly used theologians to do it in seminaries. Very sad.
Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer. Behold, the devil will cast some of you in prison that you may be tried, and you shall have tribulation ten days.
This is written to the church. And be thou faithful unto death, and I will give you a crown of life.
He that has an ear to hear, let him hear what the Spirit says, not what these books say, what the
Holy Spirit says unto the churches. He that overcometh, what does that mean?
Do you really feel that you have to be this huge overcomer to live in America right now as a Christian? Now, I know we suffer things in our families.
We have death of loved ones. We're in the cursed world, and we do have to overcome, but we don't have to overcome like our brothers and sisters in Fox's Book of Martyrs, which if you haven't read, you should read it.
It's this thick, but you won't lay it down until you finish it. He that has an ear to hear, let him hear what the
Spirit says unto the churches. He that overcometh shall not be hurt by the second death.
Even though you may die, you won't ever suffer real death, which is separation from God.
Who should overcome? The church. This whole thing is written to the church. How long does this tribulation last?
Well, look up there in verse 10. You will have tribulation ten days. Now, do you think the tribulation period lasts only ten days, or do you think that's metaphorical?
All right, so let's think about this. It's just like when John saw the
Lamb, he looked into his eyes and he saw the seven Spirits of God. That doesn't mean there are seven Holy Spirits.
Seven is the number of perfection, and so it's the Holy Spirit, the perfect, complete
Holy Spirit. When he looked at the throne of God, he saw the same seven Spirits, so the Holy Spirit connects the
Father to the Son and to us. It doesn't mean there are seven of them. It's allegorical use of numbers, and when we study
Bible numerology, guess what the number seven means? You will have tribulation—I'm sorry, the number ten means.
Sorry about that. You will have tribulation ten days. Be thou faithful unto the death.
What does it mean? Well, ten in Hebrew looks like that because the numbers are actually depicted by letters, and that letter is the yod, and it means ten, and all of Jewish letters are pictographs, but it means the hand of God.
It's a picture of a hand. It's the hand of God, and when they see that letter, they think of the hand of God or a fist or power, the power of God.
Now, the word for ten is esher, and that word means divine order, completed cycle, or measure, whether for good or evil, blessing or judgment.
An example would be the tenth part represents the whole of the tithe, so the number ten represents the whole of something or the completion of something, and so think about that.
When you say tribulation ten days, it means you're going to go through the complete whole tribulation.
You're going to see the hand of God. Now, it's interesting if you look at this word in the
Hebrew and you break each letter down like Dr. Byron Golden, my dear friend, loves to do. He's studied
Hebrew, and he loves Hebrew, and he'll look at the very letters of the words, and because it's symbolic and pictographic as a language, you can learn things even from the letters.
So, this word here for ten, the first letter, of course, they go from the right back to the left, so it means literally to see or to have discernment.
The second letter means literally God's Spirit, and the third letter means to humble yourself.
It's like a man bent over praying is what the letter looks like. It's a pictograph of a humble man, a penitent man praying, bending over in prayer.
So, here you see that this ten represents being able to have discernment and to see
God's Spirit humble the church. I think that's pretty cool. I don't know about you, but my mentor,
Dr. Freeman, wrote a book on Bible numerology. That's how I know some of this stuff, but I mean, listen, every dot of the eye, every cross the
T in the Bible was meaningful. Think about this. There were ten generations of people who lived before the flood, and every one of them went through the flood, including the elect.
Noah and his sons went through it, too. Now, God protected them, right? Brought them out through the other side, and God has not told us
He would protect all of us physically through that, but He has said, I will protect you spiritually, and of them
I will lose nothing, Jesus said, but will raise it up in the end. So, we're all going to make it through the tribulation, too, one way or the other, but the tribulation leads to a new beginning, and that's the millennial kingdom, just like the flood did.
So, the church will go through the complete, the whole, that's what the number ten means, the whole of the tribulation period, and the result will be that she shall make herself ready for the marriage, dressed in white.
Now, that is the background, that is the backdrop for perhaps the greatest lesson on prayer found in the whole
Bible, and it's right here that Romans 8 23 talked about the rapture, and Romans 8 24 going through 28 talks about this concept of prayer.
It is powerful. It's wonderful. I will introduce it to you. I don't know how many Sundays we may talk about this, but Revelation chapter 8 verse 22, just to go back a little bit and see where we just were, it says we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain.
That's because of the curse, not just humans, but all the entire earth, entire universe fell into the curse, and Jesus, excuse me, according to John 3 16,
Jesus died on the cross to put God's cosmos, the orderly arrangement of his creation, back in order, and when he was resurrected, that was sealed and done.
When he comes back at the second coming, it will become de facto, and as we move into the thousand -year millennial kingdom with Jesus reigning, the lion will lay down with the lamb.
It's going to return to near Garden of Eden similarity there because of what
Jesus has done, but this is talking about how before he comes, there is a groaning of even the rocks and trees and the water and the animals, but then in verse 24, it talks about us.
We are saved by hope, but hope that is seen is not hope. Now, this number,
I'm sorry, it was 23 that talks about us. Let me go back one. 23 talks about us.
We're the first fruits. We have the first fruits of the Spirit. We know we're saved. We know our soul and spirit is saved, but our body is not.
The old man is still with us, and therefore, we groan because this treasure, this new man unified and tied together with the
Holy Spirit that lives in us lives within an earthen vessel, which means we mess up still, and we don't like it, so we groan, but that's the existence that God the
Father ordained that we would go through this life. It is his best and only plan, and therefore, it must be the best plan because it's the only plan, and God is pleased with it, so that's just how it is.
Don't beat up on yourself too much when you sin because he told us this was his will that we have this treasure in earthen vessels.
What we need to do is go back and study that two familiar verse, 1 John 1 -9, and agree with God that we've sinned and realize that it is right for him, and he'll do it every time to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, and we get up and go again.
That's our existence here, but that's why we groan. We don't like it that way. We wish we were perfect, and we mess up still, but that, listen, the church is waiting, groaning, but waiting for the adoption and the redemption of the body.
That's the rapture because when that rapture happens, ladies and gentlemen, all of that old man is going to fall off of us, and you won't know the weight.
I won't know the weight of that, what that'll feel like when that weight falls off till it happens, but we will have nothing pulling against God or us.
Everything will be in unity with the Lord at that point. That's going to be an amazing day, and that's what the
Bible talks about right before this lesson on prayer. Now, immediately before the lesson on prayer comes these two verses.
First, verse 24, for we are saved by hope, but hope that is seen is not hope.
Now, we have to understand the word hope is a slightly different word than the word for faith and belief in the New Testament, but it's a synonym.
So, we're basically talking about faith here, and you also have to remember that the
English word hope has changed. The Greek word for hope has not changed. The English word for hope used to mean what the
Greek word means now, and here's what it means, a joyful expectation of a certain future event.
That's what hope is supposed to mean, but in English, we've reversed the meaning. Now, it's like, I hope the Cowboys win next year, but they probably won't.
So, it's a negative word. So, I don't like using it. I would rather read it this way, for we are saved by a joyful expectation of a future event.
That's what faith is. We're saved by that, but hope that is seen is not hope.
Now, I want you to stop and think with me a minute. The Lord is setting up this teaching on prayer, and what
He is saying to us is that if it's faith, if we live in a church age, that the predominant aspect of it is that it is a faith -based walk, not a sight -based walk, like the
Old Testament was, then that means it is not by sight. It's by faith, and if it were seen, it would no longer be faith.
Do you see that at the first part of verse 24? If you could see it with your physical eyes, that's not faith.
So, hope or faith is different than sight, and in this verse and many verses in the
Bible, it's opposed to each other. They're like opposites. For what a man sees why does he yet hope for it, right?
So, you don't have to have hope or faith if you can see it. Now, this is immediately before this amazing passage on prayer.
Look at the next one. But if we hope for that which we don't see, now what would that be, by the way?
I'm going to stop a minute and get you to send out in your chat some things that you can't see.
What could this be talking about? Send some chats out there, and Dave, if I'm too dumb to find them, you can pop them up there and let me see some of the ideas.
So, stick it in your chat. Tell me what some of these things are. Let's see.
Jesus in the clouds. Jesus returning. Very good. New body.
That's good, but think about this. The things in the heavenlies right now, like the elders that are there, the angels that are in heaven, the throne of God, and the
Shekinah glory, the Lamb of God is at the right hand of God in heaven. Those are things we can't see, right?
But they're more powerful and more real than the things we see. In fact, if you looked at the molecules and the atoms in the chair you're sitting on right now, you would realize, and Brother Bill loves to talk about this, he's a physicist, that there is more nothingness in that than there is something.
If you looked at the relative space between the nucleus of an atom and the electrons orbiting around it, it's mostly just space.
So, you wonder, well, how do we sit on it? Well, God made it where we can, but the things that are in the heavenlies are eternal.
The things that are here pass away and melt away. So, if we hope for the things we can't see, the things of the heavenlies, the return of Christ, our gathering together, all of these are things we understand by faith, not by sight, and the fact that we live forever with the
Lord, all of these things, then look what it says, we patiently wait for it.
If we hope for the things we can't see, then we patiently wait for it.
So, now, what we see here, then, is until we are chained in the air at the rapture, the church age is predominantly an age of walking by faith as contrasted with walking by sight.
The modern church doesn't get that. The modern church thinks you need to see a miracle every
Sunday in church, or God's not real, and yet when they asked Jesus, show us a miracle, what did he tell them?
He said, you evil and adulterous generation, I'm not going to show you a sign. The only sign you're going to see is
I'm going to come out of the grave in three days, and they saw that sign, and that's the same sign we get to see, right?
But it's not, the church is not something where God does major setting aside of the laws of physics things every
Sunday, but we expect to see that because we want to walk by sight because it doesn't take much faith to do that.
Now, I, yes, I admonish the modern church to get over that. Hebrews 1 .1
says, now, faith is the substance of things hoped for, and look at this, the evidence of things not seen.
That's what faith is, and this passage says we're saved by faith, but faith that is seen is not faith.
Stuff you see, that's no longer faith. For what a man sees, why does he yet have faith for it, right?
So we're being exhorted to live by faith, not by sight. John 20 .27 says, then said he to Thomas.
This is when Thomas didn't believe Jesus had been resurrected from the dead. Jesus says to Thomas, look, reach your finger here and put it in the scar in my hand, all right?
Reach hither your hand and put it in the scar in my side and be not faithless but believing, and what did
Thomas do? He answered and said to him, my Lord and my God, as if he never put his finger in the hand or his hand in the side.
He just had faith all of a sudden, but look what Jesus said. Jesus said to him,
Thomas, because you have seen me, you have believed, blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed.
That's us. That's us. That's the church age, all right? We believe as surely as Thomas did but totally without sight.
Now, I understand God put his creation all around us. We have a faith that's based on facts, no doubt.
Even the proofs of the resurrection are amazing. We talked about that on Passover Sunday.
So, I understand that, but still, we live by faith. Matthew 12, 38, then certain of the scribes and the
Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign of thee. But he answered and said,
Jesus said to them, an evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, and there shall no sign be given to it but the sign of the prophet
Jonas, for Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly. So shall the
Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth. Think about that. It is a faith -based church age that we live in.
Hebrews 1, 1 through 3. Look what it says. Things don't work the way they used to. So many people in the modern church want to hang on to what they call the apostolic age, and yet it was an age that passed away when the apostles died, but they don't get that.
But the Bible shows clearly things have changed now. God, who once upon a time in the old days, sundry times, and in many manners used to speak to us in time past by the prophets, by all that they could do, tell the future, vision, do miraculous events, that's how he used to speak to us, right?
But has in the, now here the word hath in these last days is a contrast. In these last days he has already spoken in the
Greek unto us by his Son, whom he has appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds, who being the brightness of his glory in the express image of his person and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had made himself, and when he had by himself purged our sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.
And the apostle Paul talked about when the perfect has come, that is the whole of the
Bible, it's in the neuter tense, it's not a person, it's not the coming of Jesus, it is in fact the putting together of the whole
Bible that some of these things would cease and pass away. We have people who wrote 250 years after Christ on commentaries on 1
Corinthians and 2 Corinthians and talking about speaking in tongues, where they said we cannot easily speak to this for it no longer happens in the church today.
All that history is available, but people don't want to look at it. But listen, we are not an age of sight, we're an age of faith.
Now does that mean I don't believe God does miraculous healings? We've had plenty of those in our church.
We see them often. That's not what I'm saying. I'm just saying God's method of doing it has changed a little bit because he no longer uses
David Mitchell's hand to put on the forehand of a person and I heal them. God heals them.
That's even better. That's even better. And that's how it works in an age of faith, not by sight, where you can give
David all the credit and glory for lying down on the body of a person who was dead and then that person rises up.
That was an apostle who did that and the people surrounding the apostles. And why?
To authenticate their message. Guess what? Their message is authenticated now. Now my future daughter -in -law,
Julia, is reading a book on prayer, and it's not a 150 -year -old book, but I picked it up and started looking at it, and I really think it's a great book.
I'm going to read the whole thing all the way to the back cover. It's by a New York preacher named Timothy Keller, and so it's really interesting.
In his book on prayer, he has a chapter called What Is Prayer? Well, he had quoted
Jonathan Edwards, some of my favorite people to read. These are over 150 years, right?
Jonathan Edwards, John Calvin, John Owen, which is amazing to read the things about his life, the things he wrote, and he was quoting these men in his books about their thoughts on what
Calvin called the divinitatis sensum.
Now that's Latin, and what it means is the sense that the existence of deity exists in every human being.
Why is it that all humans have this sense that there is a greater power, whether they call him
Jesus or God? They sense there is a God, and that's what this Latin phrase means when these old saints were talking about it, and so this was being spoken about in the book, and he says many theologians believe that this is the reason prayer is so prevalent within the human race, and he pointed out in his book that there was a study that was done.
I've got it footnoted down there at the bottom that 30 percent of atheists say they pray sometimes.
Why would they do that? Because they have this divinitatis sensum within them.
God put within all humans the knowledge that there is a greater being and the need for that greater being.
Now Keller said this, with all this in view, we can define prayer as a personal communicative response to the knowledge of God, the knowledge that God is.
All human beings have some knowledge of God available to them. This is true. Romans chapter 1 demonstrates that.
At some level, they have an innate sense that they need something or someone who is on a higher plane and infinitely greater than they are.
Prayer is seeking to respond and connect to that being and reality, even if it's no more than calling out into the air for help, he says.
Now, he didn't stop there, and I love this. Here's what he said.
However, because our definition understands prayer as a response to the knowledge of God, it means that prayer is profoundly altered by the amount and accuracy of knowledge of God that we have.
Now, you think about that thought. That is a great thought. That's why I'm going to read this book all the way to the end. I don't know how many books on prayer
I picked up and read three chapters and just dumped them. This man's got some things to say. I'm going to read the whole book, but think about that right there.
I understand pagans pray. I understand the American Indians prayed. I understand that Hindus pray,
Buddhists pray, Jews pray, Christians pray. I understand that man has this innate thing within them that they need to realize there is a greater power and all that, but Keller says the fact is this is based on the knowledge of God.
So, if we have more knowledge of God, it changes the praying, and it absolutely does.
While everyone may have a census, the Benetatus Calvin observed that we all refashion that sense of deity to fit our own interests and desires.
Now, here's where we start to think about the church. See, the church, if we're not in the Word much, then to us, prayer is not that different than the prayer of a pagan.
It's not that different because we're just molding this idea of God into our own desire for what we want
God to be, and we're treating Him like we want Him to be, not how the Bible says He is, and then we pray for our own interests and desires.
We just pray to get things, and Calvin went on to say all Christians do that unless through the
Spirit and the Scripture, Spirit and Scripture, our view of God is corrected and clarified.
Now, for Keller to quote Calvin, I would have to say that means he agrees with him on this, wouldn't you?
Well, that's good because he's correct, and he's also in agreement with Jesus Christ. Look at this.
Jesus answered, Verily, verily, truly, truly, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and of the
Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, you shall ask what you will, and it shall be done to you.
That's prayer, right? Now, verse 5, the word water, all through New Testament Scripture, is an allegorical concept of the
Word of God. So, it takes, Jesus said, it takes the Word of God, and it takes the Holy Spirit to be saved.
It also takes the Word of God and the Holy Spirit to grow in our conception and knowledge of God, and as we grow in that, our prayers change.
The way we pray changes. Our very understanding of how to communicate with the Creator of the universe changes as we know
Him more and more. As the Word of God and the Holy Spirit teach us more and more about the mind of God, we pray differently than we did when we were baby
Christians, all right? So, water and Spirit, the Word of God and the Spirit is what this is talking about. We see this from Ephesians 5, 25,
Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify and cleanse the church with the washing of the water by the
Word. So, the water is a picture of the Word of God, which washes us, and Brother Bill Nichols was talking about that in the adult
Bible class earlier this morning. Some of you guys got to hear that, how he's talking about how the
Word of God itself cleanses us and causes us to be more like Jesus, and that's exactly what it's talking about.
So, we have to have the Word of God and the Holy Spirit to be saved, but we also have to have that to know God better and better, that He might present to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.
You see, it's the Word of God and the washing of that Word of God that makes us different day by day.
In fact, I will tell you this, the holiness of a Christian is directly proportional to the amount of Bible he's in. I believe that.
Marriage is the most intimate of human relationships, and Jesus uses physical marriage of a man and a woman to what it's like to be saved and to grow in that relationship.
Now, think about it. Our relationship with God is pictured by this human relationship, and in a marriage, communication is what builds the relationship.
Knowing the person is what enriches the communication. I can communicate with Charlotte better now than I could when
I first met her, 14 years old. I was only 42 right now. I think
I was 17, but we've been together since that time, and we communicate better now because we know each other better, but look at this.
It's like a cycle because not only that, but the communication continues to build the knowledge of the person still more deeply.
So, knowledge of the person causes us to be able to communicate better, but further communication causes us to know each other still more, and this is true of us and the
Lord too. Now, think about it. How does God speak to us? He speaks to us by the water and the
Spirit. He speaks to us through His Word, and His Holy Spirit brings that alive.
It's a living book, and God speaks to us, and every time you pick up a passage, you learn something new.
God is speaking to us, but how do we speak to Him? Through prayer, but it needs to be a two -way conversation, and a lot of Christians are not in the
Word very much, so they think it's more important to talk to God than it is for God to talk to them. I think that's backwards, and what do you think is more important?
I think prayer is extremely important, but I think it's ultimately of importance that I hear from God, that I hear
Him teaching me about Him and myself, and then I can respond with prayer and speak back, but I don't even know what to say until He informs me.
Think about that a minute, because we're headed that direction on this lesson on prayer. Now, Romans 8 24 says this thing about, but if we hope for what we see not, then we wait for it.
It talks about how hope is not the same as sight and all that. All right, now this is the context in which today's lesson is found.
The most profound lesson on prayer found within all the pages of the
Holy Bible is in the context of the church is a walk of faith, not sight.
It's in that context, yet most of us pray to get things or see miracles.
Things and seeing, you see that that's different than faith.
In fact, if you can see it and get it and hold it, it's not faith, but it's in this context.
Now, think about it. I certainly am not saying that we will not see miracles and get answered prayers.
Our little country church at Park Meadows has seen its share of miraculous answered prayers. I've got one couple,
Raymond and Sharon Bland, they've had so many miraculous answered prayers. Somebody needs to write a book about their life, right?
And it continues, just continues, just continues, and that's just one of many examples. So, I'm not saying that we don't see
God doing miraculous healings. We do, but we see God doing it, not men like the apostles and surrounding people did while God was authenticating their message.
That message has long since been authenticated, and when that which is perfect, the canonization of the whole
Bible, where every church had the whole of the Word of God, those things began to cease, and you can study the church history and you see it.
Some of the greatest church historians have said there have been outbreakings of what they call modern tongue speaking and things like that, and it was generally surrounded with also false doctrine and other things like that.
That's not necessarily the genuine thing that was happening in the first century. So, that's a whole other study, and there's another thing
I don't break fellowship with at all, but it's certainly open to study. Now, answered prayer, though it often manifests itself in the world of the seen, originates not on the earth, but from the world of the unseen, from the heavenlies.
That is the great lesson that we're going to find in this lesson on prayer, and we've got to adjust some things to realize this.
Listen, we think prayer originates with us. We're the ones doing the praying, we think.
We pray, and God is now obligated to answer the prayers of all of us. Well, what if you're praying for rain because you're a farmer, and I'm praying for pretty weather so I can go play golf?
Who's God going to answer? You or me? You say, well, He likes the farmer more than the golfer. That's worldly.
I don't know. He's answered my prayers for pretty weather lots of times. You see my point? To say that the prayers originate from us is a really shallow understanding of how prayer works, and this passage is going to teach us exactly the mechanics of true biblical reality prayer.
It originates not on the earth, but from the heavenlies. So, that tells you, and it tells me, we're not even the originators of genuine prayer, and by the way, this kind of prayer always gets answered.
Think about that. It always gets answered in the affirmative. Our human prayers that originate with us often get answered.
No, don't they? We have to admit that. We have to admit that, but Jesus never had a prayer that wasn't answered.
Even when He prayed to avoid the cross, He said, nevertheless, thy will be done, not mine, and that prayer was answered because He had the fullness of the
Spirit without measure, and sometimes we pray in the flesh. We have the Spirit by measure, the
Bible teaches, and He's given each of us a different measure of the Holy Spirit, different gifts. We don't all have the same, and therefore, sometimes we drift off in the flesh, and we don't pray like this passage is going to teach us to pray.
This is amazing. I'm just able to lay it out before you today, and I knew that would be the case, but we're going to get into it.
Therefore, hope, in other words, faith, which is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen in Hebrews 11 .1,
is the key to answered prayer. Now, let's look at the mechanics of prayer, and we'll get you something to think about before you adjourn today.
So, Romans 8 .26, here is the passage. It says this, likewise. Now, what does that word mean?
It has to refer back to the previous verses. Well, what are the previous verses talking about? The rapture, the second coming of the church, things that we accept by faith.
It's talking about that faith is not seen, and if it is seen, it's not faith.
Likewise, like those things that we just talked about together, the Spirit also helps our infirmities.
Let me ask you this, can you see the Holy Spirit? Can you see the Father? Because the Bible teaches
He is a pure Spirit being who's not even in a place, and that He's outside space and time.
He promotes Himself into space and time through His Holy Spirit and through Jesus, but the
Father is the I Am. He's always present tense. He's not on the timeline with us, but He can come in and be with us.
That's why the Bible says Jesus is God with us. That's how God does this. Now, think about this for a minute.
You can't see the Father. You cannot see the Holy Spirit, and yet it's the Holy Spirit that helps us with our infirmities, and you're going to see this talking about our infirmities with regard to prayer.
Why are we so weak and incapable in our prayer lives? Well, God tells us we are right here, and so we have to have the help of the
Spirit, but the question is what does the Holy Spirit do, and how does this work? What are the mechanics of it?
It says, for we know not what we ought to pray for. That's what it said. We don't even know what to pray for.
Usually, we just pray for stuff we want, right? We want to get stuff, and that's not what prayer is, okay?
I know we've been taught that it is, but this passage isn't teaching that that's what it is, but that's a contrast word.
We don't know what to pray for, so we pray for the wrong stuff, but here's how to get it right.
The Spirit himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered, and he that searcheth the hearts, notice that's plural.
It's your heart and the Father's heart, knoweth what is in the mind of the
Spirit. That's the Spirit of the Father. He's a pure spirit being because it's speaking of the Holy Spirit, knows the mind of the
Spirit, the Father, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.
Now, let me ask you a question. Do you think that if you could pray a prayer totally and 100 % within God's will that it would be answered?
Jesus answered that. He said if you pray in faith, it'll always be answered, right? If you pray for this mountain to be moved in the ocean and you believe it'll be answered, but how many of you have seen that happen and done that yet?
See, so apparently we pray differently than these mechanics, and we've got to learn what this means, and we've got to embrace it, and look at this verse so often used out of context, and we know that all things work together for good to them that love
God and to them who are the called according to his purpose. Why is that verse found in that context of all places?
Because things work together for good for us because God is sovereign, and he's our daddy, our
Abba, and because he shows us how to pray for the right things and get prayers answered where he wants his power to flow into this world, into time and space, through and with us and around us, and that's going to cause things to work together for good for those of us who love the
Lord, who are called according to his purpose right there in this passage on prayer. Isn't that something? So let's look at the mechanics just for a second.
We're out of time, unfortunately. We have a great place to pick this up next time. Likewise, the
Spirit also helps our infirmities, for we don't know what we should pray for as we ought to pray, but the
Spirit himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now, let's look at the first phrase, and that's all we'll have time for today.
You're fortunate we're not just talking about one word in the phrase, right? That's what people are thinking right now.
Okay, so likewise, the Spirit helps our infirmities. What does this mean, infirmities?
It literally means our feebleness. It comes from two little Greek words. One of them is the word ah, which simply makes whatever word's connected to it turn negative.
It puts it in the negative, and the other word is thanos, which means strength, and you put the ah in front of it, it means the lack of strength.
So likewise, the Spirit, like what? Well, like the fact that faith is not by sight, like the fact that the
Lord's coming back and the rapture is happening and all these things of faith. Like that, the Spirit also helps our lack of ability, our weakness, our feebleness, our total lack of strength and spiritual knowledge.
Now, how can we pray in God's will if we lack all of that, and yet we so think we boldly come before the throne of grace in our own flesh?
That's not what that passage means either, all right? So the Spirit, the
Holy Spirit has to help our infirmities, help our weakness, our lack of strength, our lack of spiritual knowledge.
And then it says, for we know not what we should pray for as we ought. The word ought in the
Greek means for things that are necessary and needful. So we don't even know what the necessary things are for us to pray for in our own lives.
We don't have a clue. We're feeble, we lack spiritual strength and knowledge, and we don't know what's needful because we don't know the future.
And here we're going to come to God and just, I need this, and I need that, and I need that, and by the way, I love you, and that's our prayer life.
There's a lot more to it than that. Likewise refers to the hope of being not being sight but faith, and true prayer does not originate from the seen world but from the unseen world.
The word help in the Greek literally means to take hold of in turn together, to take hold of something together.
So here we see that the Holy Spirit, when it says He helps our weaknesses and our lack of strength, is
He takes hold of our hand, and together we bring a petition before the Father who is in a place that's not a place, and He takes these prayers, and we're going to see as we get into this,
He translates our feeble language with a finite number of words and adjectives into an infinite language and gives it to an infinite being in a way that the
Father perfectly receives it. Now that's what prayer is. Now it's going to get better than that, so don't miss next
Sunday, the Lord willing, as we continue. Dave, I am out of time, having too much fun to quit, but I'm going to turn it over to you.