Sermon nuggets Weds Oct 8
Theme: Hope
Verses- John 16:23 In that day you will no longer ask me anything. I tell you the truth, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name.
24 Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete.
25 "Though I have been speaking figuratively, a time is coming when I will no longer use this kind of language but will tell you plainly about my Father.
26 In that day you will ask in my name. I am not saying that I will ask the Father on your behalf.
27 No, the Father himself loves you because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God.
28 I came from the Father and entered the world; now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father."
A Time of Prayer
Certainly people have prayed from the beginning of time. Prayer is talking to God. Many people, Christian and non-Christian have let their thoughts and requests be known to God. But real communication with the Lord is not possible without our sins being forgiven. Our sins cannot be forgiven unless we have placed our faith in Jesus Christ to save us. That did not happen without His going to the cross. The connection we have with God is the righteousness granted to us by Christ’s death, burial and resurrection, but the gift of the Holy Spirit allows us to pray in a different way.
When Jesus tells His disciples they can ask the Father in Jesus’ name, it is not a formula that we recite, but by the means and authority we have being God’s child because of the blood of Jesus Christ has been shed to forgive us our sins.
An interesting phrase, “In that day you will no longer ask me anything.” Did He mean He was not going to be physically around to talk to because He would have ascended unto His Father?
I believe Jesus is telling His disciples and us that the barrier between a Holy God Father and sinful man has been broken. Just like the veil in the temple was torn in two. We are no longer separated from the Father but can come into his presence because of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
Until that time people have not asked anything in the authority of Jesus Christ. But now we have this privilege. Some people misuse this verse thinking God is like a Santa Claus at Christmas appealing to our materialistic and human wants. The fact that the Holy Spirit now dwells within helps us understand the significance of how were should pray.
Rom 8:26-27 says, “In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will.”
To pray with the intercession of the Spirit and in the authority of Jesus Christ means that we are praying according to the will of the Father, not according to our own whims and wishes. When we delight ourselves in the Lord, He will give us the delights of our hearts. He is the object of our delight and to desire things that are not according to His will is not in the Spirit. But now we seek the mind of the Lord by the Spirit and let our requests and petitions be known to God and can come boldly before the throne.
Jesus says there is prayer that unites us with the Father in the name and authority of Christ. We have privilege of presence of God working in our lives. Not just in the lives of the world in general sense, but specifically with you and me as followers of Christ. What a blessing.
Three reasons are given for their enablement to ask in the name of Jesus: 1) The Father's love for them. 2) Their love for Jesus. 3) Their belief that Jesus came from God. These three factors will prompt them to petition the Father "in Jesus' name ," to ask as Jesus would ask. Their transformation into people who think like Jesus begins with the Father's love for them, and this love will be more fully understandable after they see how He has given up his Son. Already, they have loved Jesus and have believed in His divine origination.
When people ask about prayer, the best advice I can give is, when Jesus taught the disciples to pray He instructed them to pray to the Father who is in Heaven. When He met with them in the upper room he once again said we have access before the Father and can ask whatever we will. Because the Father loves the Son so now we have been granted this wonderful privilege of being in the presence of our creator!
How offensive it must be to think He delights in the thought we must go through “saints” or other sinners. We can come in no other way and to no one else than the Holy One of God, Jesus Christ.
Pastor Dale
