Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving; Withal praying also for us.
—Colossians 4:2-3
Nothing can give us a higher experience of the likeness of God than the power of pouring out our hearts to God in prayer for those around us. Nothing can so closely link us to Jesus Christ, the great Intercessor, and give us the experience of His power and Spirit resting on us, as the yielding of our lives to the work of bringing the great redemption into the hearts and lives of our fellowmen. There is nothing in which we will know more of the powerful working of the Holy Spirit than the prayer breathed by Him into our hearts, “Abba, Father” (Mark 14:36), in all the fullness of meaning that it had for Christ at Gethsemane.
Nothing can so help us to prove the power and faithfulness of God to His Word as when we reach out in intercession to the multitudes, either in the church of Christ or in the darkness of heathenism. As we pour out our souls before God with the one persistent plea that He will open the windows of heaven and send down His abundant blessings, God will be glorified, our souls will reach their highest destiny, and God’s kingdom will come.
Nothing will help us to understand and experience the living unity of the body of Christ, and the irresistible power that it can exert, so much as uniting with God’s children in the persistent plea that God “shalt arise, and have mercy upon Zion” (Psalm 102:13), and will make her a “light to them that sit in darkness” (Luke 1:79). My brothers and sisters in Christ, how little we realize what we are losing by not living in fervent intercession! Think of what we will gain for ourselves and for the world if we allow God’s Spirit, as a Spirit of grace and of supplication, to master our whole beings!
In heaven, Christ lives to pray. (See Hebrews 7:25.) His whole fellowship with His Father is prayer—an asking and receiving of the fullness of the Spirit for His people. God delights in nothing so much as prayer. Will we not learn to believe that the highest blessings of heaven will be unfolded to us as we pray more?
Blessed Father, pour down the Spirit of supplication and intercession on Your people, for Jesus Christ’s sake. Amen.