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I find it interesting to compare our learned concepts of God and how
we react towards events, with what the bible actually says about His
character and how bible people of faith reacted to Jesus.
How do we react to our perception of whether God is hearing our prayers?
Does He seem to have favourites, and how do we react to
what we perceive? How do we react if we're told God may not grant 'our'
request as against someone else's, because of His sovereign will?
Perhaps we could consider what James has to say about fervent prayer
in Chapter 5 of his letter.
These questions came to mind as I was meditating recently on the passage
in Matthew, Chapter 15, where a Canaanite woman came asking Jesus to heal
her daughter. It was an eye-opener for me, to see what it said about faith
towards God and prayer.
Let's first of all read Matthew 15, verses 22 - 28...
Mat 15:22-28 And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out
and was crying, "Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter
is severely oppressed by a demon."
But he did not answer her a word.
That's the section of scripture. Now let's see what we can learn from it.
Perception No. 1. - God is not hearing our prayers.
When the story opens the woman is crying out to Jesus for her daughter to
be healed and Jesus ignores her and carries on walking!
How do we react today if we pray and we feel that our prayers are not
being heard; that they are not getting above the ceiling; or that we
don't know how we ought to pray?
Often we let doubt and unbelief enter our minds and heart because 'the
heavens are like brass', and so we don't press in tennaciously, and we
may even stop praying. But what did this woman do?
She kept pressing in to Jesus and she kept on asking, - "Help me"!
Perception No. 2. - It's not God's will to help.
Next the disciples come to Jesus and tell Him to send her away. This
protracted hue and cry isn't good for the image. We've got a
reputation for compassion and for healing and this doesn't look good!
But Jesus effectively tells her - 'I haven't been sent to you. It's not
the Father's will for me to help you. I was only sent to help Israelites'.
What would we do if were told that, 'God may not want to heal us; it may
not be according to His will'? Or, 'God isn't healing in this age'?
Some might let doubt and unbelief pervade their thinking and affect
their faith so that they may not be fervent in prayer and press in and
they may even stop praying about the problem entirely. But what did
this woman do? And remember she wasn't told that it 'might' not
be God's will - she was told it definitely wasn't God's will to heal her
daughter at that time! Well, effectively she said to Jesus,
"I've got a real problem here - Help me"!
Then came the third kind of obstacle that one might perceive...
Perception No. 3. - You are not worthy to be helped.
The next comment from Jesus tells her that one should not take
something that's meant for one person and give it to another, especially
when they don't qualify!
How would we react to this? What do we do if it's suggested,
for instance, that our sins separate us from God so we cannot expect
Him to help us every time?
We might well let doubt take over and give up fighting
for our blessing to be manifested; and we may even stop praying.
But this woman kept on pressing in to Jesus. She in effect said,
"You're the Messiah. You're the Saviour of Israel, the chosen people,
and I'm not trying to take anything from them. But, you're also the
Saviour of the world; and in there I qualify"! Or she may have thought
about one of Jesus' physical miracles and said to herself, "When you
fed the five thousand, all those of Israel were fed, but there were twelve
baskets left over"! And she kept pressing forward for a blessing.
And Jesus said...
Mat 15:28 "O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for
you as you desire."
And her daughter was healed instantly.
This true story was put in the bible to show us how we should
react when Satan or anyone else tries to take away our blessings.
We should resist and fight to press in to Jesus for whatever we
are asking of Him.
Perhaps a good definition of this kind of faith, which Jesus
commended in this woman, might be....
Faith - a tennacious, fighting belief that
Jesus will do every good thing that we ask of Him.
And 'effectual fervent prayer' could maybe be defined this way....
Effectual Fervent Prayer - Prayer built on the
foundation of a tennacious, fighting belief that Jesus will do
every good thing that we ask of Him.
So let's all exhibit that kind of faith; The faith this woman had and which
Jesus has placed within us, since we all have the same faith of Jesus that the
Apostles were given!
2 Pet 1:1 Simon Peter, a bondservant and apostle of Jesus Christ,
to those who have obtained like precious faith with us by the
righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ:
And let's "press in" to receive God's promises; for a promise is a debt to
be paid.
2 Cor 1:19-20 For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached
among you by us; by me and Silas and Timothy; was not yes and no,
but in Him was, yes! For all the promises of God in Him
are yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God by us.
We know God always has our best interests at heart, and always does His part,
in fact has already done it; but we can either -
Let's take the limits off!
Now moving on to other scriptures we note that James had a lot to say about effective
prayer. We can camp on James, Chapter 5, verses 13-16 for a while, for instance, and
check out what he had to say there!
Jam 5:13 Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing
songs of praise. 14 Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church
to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. 15 And the prayer
offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they
have sinned, they will be forgiven. 16 Therefore confess your sins to each other and
pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is
powerful and effective.
First we see that James tells us we should always have an attitude of 'prayer and
thanksgiving' towards God. This is only right knowing how much God loves us and
has done for bus and knowing that He lives in us and will never leave us. But in
terms of prayer James tells us that if anyone is sick they should call on the elders
in the Church to pray for them.
Now you will know that God has given ALL believers the authority to heal the
sick. This is shown in Matthew, Chapter 10, verse 8 as an example.
Mat 10:8 Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without
paying; give without pay.
Obviously then James is referring to believers/Christians who are not walking in this
gift that Jesus has given them. So, since they are not able to exhibit this gift Jesus
tells them to call on the elders who should be walking in the Spirit and who can show
them the way!
And what does James say the elders will do?
James says that they will pray for them (In the name of the Lord) and anoint them with
oil (In the name of the Lord) and this prayer offered in faith WILL make the sick person
well!
Jesus expects the elders in the Church to be men and women of faith who walk in the
Spirit and exhibit the gifts that He has given to the believers, including healing!
You will notice that James also says that 'The Lord will raise him up'. This illustrates
the point that the power is the Lord's but the authority is ours. We have to command
it to happen. Peter in giving healing to the crippled begger at the gate commanded -
"In the name of Jesus, stand up and walk".
Peter did not beg and plead and ask God if it
was according to His will and He was in a good mood and there was an 'R' in the month,
could He look down on His poor pitiful servants and in His mercy and sovereignty deign
to bring a healing touch to this poor crippled man! - That is NOT what Jesus
told us to do!! He said that we were sent in the same manner that He was sent, and He
commanded diseases to go and demons to come out of people.
The other thing that WILL happen is that "If they have sinned, they will be forgiven".
This is the only conditional statement in the passage and yet it's an absolute conditional!
If you've sinned you WILL be forgiven. If you haven't sinned presumably you don't need to
be forgiven! But if you have sinned just tell of this and God will forgive you and you
will be healed. The prayer of the righteous man/woman will avail much. Of course you know
that as a Christian you are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus? !
God has promised us a lot in His word. We have to believe Him and follow the promptings
of Holy Spirit as He leads us to acheive them! We are unlikely to achieve 100%, at first,
but we should just realize that Jesus showed what a human being perfectly surrendered to
following Holy Spirit could do - we typically have some growing to do to reach His maturity!
So let's be believers who actually believe, and "press in" to grow in faith and receive
God's promises.
Best wishes for grace and the peace of Jesus.
Attlee.
Paul's Thorn In The Flesh.
Click Here.
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