Jesus’ cross gives us access to God in prayer

This begins my series on the cross of Christ and prayer.

Prayer is more than asking God for things; it’s praising God, for who he is and what he’s done for us. God, the universal creator & ruler of the universe, deserves to be thanked and praised (Ps 24:1-6; Ps 100; 148; 149; 150; Rev 4:8-11).

Sin is, in part, refusing to honour and praise God in this way. This shows itself in two ways. Self-reliance makes us prayer-less; we depend on ourselves and praise ourselves for our achievements, instead of God (Gen 11:4; Dan 4:30; Rev 18). Or, in our desire for a safe, tameable, controllable god, we create idols, and pray to them instead of the one, true, powerful, creator God (Rom 1:18-23).

Rejecting God means he rejects us. If we ignore God, he will ignore us. Most people assume God will look after them because he’s a ‘loving’ God – by which they mean he’s an amoral source of goodies, who’ll give them whatever they want, whenever they want it. That’s not God – that’s Santa Claus. If we live our lives merrily ignoring God and relying on our own resources, then, when our resources fail us, we run to God as a last resort, crying out “oh God, help me!” – why should he? Is 1:11-15a; Jer 7:9-11, 16; 11:9-11, 13-14; 14:10-12.

Yes, God is a loving God, and he doesn’t hold our sin against us. But we must let him demonstrate his love his own way – not in a way we find comfortable. The cross of Christ is God’s love dealing with his own holiness and wrath against our rejection of him.

Because of the cross, we can be confident God is not angry with us, but is pleased with us. If we trust Jesus, we can talk to God, any time, any place, and know that he is glad to hear us. The cross of Christ gives us confidence to pray to God (Heb 4:15-16; 10:19-22; 1 John 3:19-24).

Prayer is a deeply Triune event. The Holy Spirit draws us to trust Jesus (Rom 8:9; 1 Cor 12:3; 1 Pet 1:2). Jesus makes us right with the Father and gives us access to him (Matt 11:27; John 14:6). When we trust Jesus through the Spirit, God adopts us as his sons – we have the status of Sons of God and the right to address God as Father (Matt 6:9; 7:9-11; Rom 8:14-15; Gal 3:26-27; 4:6). Prayer is a normal and natural outworking of our new relationship with God – as normal and natural as having a chat with our folks.

Comments

The different distractions of secularity and spirituality

There has been a lot of discussion about the recent 'vibe shift' away from radical atheism back towards an openness to the supernatural. I don't think this new spirituality is necessarily an openness to the unique claims of Christ. It will more probably replace one set of commonly-accepted misunderstandings about Jesus with another. Under radical atheism, people dismissed the Biblical claims about Jesus' resurrection because they 'knew' that it was impossible. Jesus hadn't really died. He just passed out (after being beaten and whipped and crucified) and then woke up in the tomb (and rolled away the stone himself and overcame several guards). Or the disciples hallucinated that they saw him (even though Jewish beliefs of the time didn't expect one person to rise possessing eternal life himself; they expected a general resurrection at the end of time - see John 11:24 ). Or something else. The so-called 'explanations' of Jesus' non-resurrectio...

Barfights in the public square

Everything in the public square seems to be increasingly conflicted. We seem to be operating with less and less shared values. It feels like we're less and less sure of what holds us together as a 'society.' A retreat into 'tribes' both drives this social fragmentation and is a result of it. Post-modern scepticism towards metanarratives, which has now become culturally normal, significantly contributes to this fragmentation. If we no longer believe that objective truth, independent of our individual or tribal perspectives, exists, we will no longer believe we can appeal to that objective reality as common ground for debate. All we will do is exert power to magnify ourselves and punish those who disagree with us. Because we believe that our cause is right, we will always think of ourselves as the victim of other people's aggression. Therefore, as Stephen McAlpine says, we will always think we're punching "up." We'll valorise ourselves as the ...

Wax and Wright on the definition of "mission"

Trevin Wax has written a clear, simple, and charitable introduction to a debate about the nature and boundaries of the kinds of Christian activities that validly should be called "mission." In brief: Should we use a broad definition, where "mission" encompasses all the various purposes which God calls Christians and the church in general to perform, e.g. being ethical at work; general acts of care and charity; standing against systematic oppression and working towards justice instead? If so, "evangelism" is only one part of the church's mission - a central, necessary, and irreplaceable part, but only one part nonetheless. The latter kinds of activities don't save anyone for eternity, but they do genuine good in this world which please God. And that kind of good makes a real difference in many parts of the world which have not benefited from the kind of Christian moral transformation which the West benefited from - the kind of moral transformation...

Multicultural Ministry Matters

Search This Blog