small group
When We Cannot Pray
By Linda Rex
May 19, 2024, Day of Pentecost | Easter—One of the reasons people give for not being a Christ follower is that they do not believe they could ever be a person of prayer. Our understanding of prayer and all that it involves is often influenced by the way in which we were raised. I personally could never talk to God using “thee” and “thou” because this manner of prayer seems distant and disconnected from God. Others find this language quite helpful and needful. Our exposure to people who pray a certain way may also cause us to believe prayer is something we never want to do or never could do well.
Over the years, the Lord has helped me to come to a deeper understanding of what it means to pray. I have learned that prayer, when it starts with me and is about me, is often a self-centered or dictating monologue, where I tell God what he should do and what I want or expect from him. This is not what prayer is meant to be. As Jesus taught us to pray, our conversations with God are to revolve around Jesus Christ, the will of our heavenly Father, and his kingdom purposes being worked out here on earth by his Spirit. Prayer recognizes and confesses the love of God for us, and his care and provision for us each day.
As we come in the cycle of the Christian calendar to this day of Pentecost, we are reminded of the precious gift given to all—the Holy Spirit. The Spirit awakens us to faith in Christ, draws us together into spiritual community, the Body of Christ or the Church, wherever and however it gathers in the name of Jesus and worships God in Spirit and in truth. As believers are united with Christ by the Spirit, they participate in the inner fellowship of Father and Son in the Spirit.
In our New Testament passage, Romans 8:22–27, we are reminded that being swept up into the inner life and love of the Trinity means we participate in their fellowship with one another. This is where prayer begins—not within ourselves, but within the face-to-face relationship of our Father and his Son in the Spirit. Jesus gives us the things of the Father in the Spirit. And our response through prayer and worship is given to the Father by Jesus in the Spirit. We open ourselves up to the Spirit and remain in a position of listening and humble openness. Doing this, we know in our own spirit the desires of our Father and are moved to pray in agreement with God’s will.
The apostle Paul reminds us that all of creation longs for the transformation of all God’s children, for then creation will be restored to God’s original design. Our longing for heaven and all its glories is an expression of our own yearning for restoration and renewal. We long to be what God always meant us to be—beloved children living in union and communion with God—whether we realize it or not. The agonies and sufferings that go with our current existence, whether personal or global, are all a part of the process of what Paul describes as spiritual pregnancy. Birth pangs come unexpectedly and last however long it takes for the birth of the child. God has been working for millennia to bring his children home to himself. He is never in a hurry, it seems. We may wish he would hurry up. But he will bring us all, in his good time, to the glory he always designed us to share in.
The union and communion evident within the inner relations of Father, Son, and Spirit are fundamental to our understanding of what it means for us to pray. Even though each member of the Trinity is unique, the Persons of the Trinity are so well united that each one knows the other’s thoughts and intents. This is how the Spirit knows the mind, heart and will of our heavenly Father. And our Father knows the mind, heart, and will of Jesus and of the Spirit. And Jesus is one with his Father and one with the Spirit. It is this deep, whole knowing we are brought into through Jesus in the Spirit. This is God’s design for every human being—that we each participate in this deep knowing and being known.
We so often trivialize prayer into a brief formula or ritual. And there are times when prayer seems to be impossible or difficult. We may know it is something we should do, but our prayers seem only to reach the ceiling. It is important to remember that prayer begins within the Triune life and love where we are held, accepted, and beloved. Jesus prays for us. The Spirit intercedes for us. When we cannot come up with the words, it is God through Jesus in the Spirit living in us, who prays in our place and on our behalf.
This is why even written prayers or prayers from a common prayer book can be so powerful. It is our own spirit communing with God through Jesus by the Spirit which is central to prayer. Having a prayer partner, or a small group, who is Spirit-filled and Spirit-led, can be very helpful in enabling us to commune with God in prayer. I’m grateful to my friend Paula, who has faithfully prayed with me each week for many years. Our weekly prayer time has helped me to weather the dry seasons in my relationship with God, and to grow spiritually as we faced life challenges and difficulties together. It takes a willingness to be vulnerable, patient and understanding of each other’s differences, and the grace of God’s Spirit to come together with others to pray. But it is well worth it.
One day we will realize that prayer is nothing more than close, intimate conversation with Someone who knows us thoroughly and loves us completely. We will see that often the best prayers are when we are listening and responding to God’s concern for his world and others. Our hearts will warm as we hear the voice of God’s Spirit speaking Jesus’ “Abba, Father” in our spirit, reminding us we are beloved, forgiven and accepted. We will understand that God has always been reaching out to us, sharing himself with us through Jesus in the Spirit, and including us in his life and love. And all the things we have made prayer into will fall away as we meet our Lord face-to-face in glory. How we, and all God’s creation, long for that day!
Thank you, Father, for your desire to have us be your beloved children, who live in close, loving fellowship with you through your Son in the Spirit. Teach us to pray, Lord. Enable us to listen more than speak, to hear your affirmations of your love and grace, and to allow your Spirit to lead us as we pray. Thank you, Jesus, for bringing us into the center of your Triune life and love. In your name and by your Spirit, we pray. Amen.
“For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. For in hope we have been saved, but hope that is seen is not hope; for who hopes for what he already sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, with perseverance we wait eagerly for it. In the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.” Romans 8:22–27 NASB
[Printable copy: https://lifeinthetrinity.blog/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/olitwhen-we-cannot-pray.pdf ]
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Manifest in Us
By Linda Rex
April 28, 2024, 5th Sunday | Easter—Do you know what love looks like? Do you know what it feels like to be loved with self-giving, sacrificial, other-centered love?
According to the apostle John, we should be experiencing this kind of love when we encounter those who profess to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. This is especially true in our covenant relationships, small group gatherings, and spiritual communities. In our New Testament passage for this Sunday, 1 John 4:7–21, the apostle explains how he and those who shared in his apostolic ministry had personally seen and experienced this kind of love in the person of Jesus Christ. As God in human flesh, Jesus personified this love which is particularly found within the Father, Son, Spirit Triune fellowship.
Apart from our participation in Christ, we are unable to love one another in this way. No, it is not until we receive God’s love as a gift, that we are able to offer other-centered, sacrificial, self-giving love to others. John stresses the importance of loving one another, that in doing so, we will show those around us who God is as love. We become living testimonies of the love of God poured out in us and for us in Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit. The abiding of God in us, and therefore, us abiding in God, is an essential part of our being able to love others in a way that is a true reflection of the divine love between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
The gospel reading for this Sunday, John 15:1–8, is where Jesus uses the image of a vine, its branches, and a vinedresser, to talk about our direct connection with himself in the Spirit. Abiding, then, becomes more than just staying in one place. Rather, we find it is a dynamic state of rest (if that possible) in which we as believers are always drawing upon the source of our being, in Christ, and are always growing into the fullness of what we were meant to be, in Christ, coming to the place where we blossom and produce fruit which will last. This drawing from and pouring out is a way of being which reflects the inner relations of the Father, Son, Spirit fellowship, where each pours into and receives from the other, overflowing love.
When we look at our fellowship with one another, especially within the body of Christ, the Church as a whole, we don’t often see or experience this type of pouring into and receiving from that reflects the divine love and life. In the Triune life and love, there is authenticity, transparency, truth, purity, affection, kindness, giving—all things which too often, we are missing in our interactions with one another. The result of not living true to our design to be image-bearers of God in Christ is fear, the dread of punishment. This fear, which isolates us and damages our relationships, is a kind of punishment in itself, for it blinds us to the reality of the love poured out for us in Christ, which frees us from such fear.
As the body of Christ, we want to be living out the truth of who we are as those made in the image of God to reflect his likeness. In order for us to love God and love others, which we cannot do on our own, we need to receive first the love of God shed abroad in our hearts by the heavenly Spirit. We need to attend to Jesus Christ, all he has done for us in his incarnation, his life, his death, resurrection, and ascension. In Christ, we see our heavenly Father and his great love. As the apostle John shows us, the whole Trinity is involved in our salvation—God is love and loves each and every one of us profoundly. Making the effort to focus on this love, to sit at Jesus’ feet as Mary did and learn of him, is one way in which we open ourselves up to God’s love.
Gathering with others who are believers to worship, pray, serve, give, help, study the Word of God, hear and share the gospel, opens us up so the Holy Spirit can begin to pour God’s love into us. We understand that humans are broken and not every fellowship recognizes what it means to participate in Christ’s life and love in this way. But as we allow the Spirit to lead us, we will find others who are abiding in Christ, and together we can grow into a fellowship where God’s love finds full expression.
Dear Father, Jesus, Spirit, thank you for loving us so profoundly and unselfishly. Thank you for living in us and with us. Grant us the grace to see, recognize, and receive your love. And in receiving your great love, grant us the grace to love others in the same way as you have loved us, through Jesus and by your Spirit, for your glory, Father. Amen.
“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit. We have seen and testify that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this, love is perfected with us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; because as He is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love. We love, because He first loved us. If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also.” 1 John 4:7–21 NASB
“I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in Me, he is thrown away as a branch and dries up; and they gather them, and cast them into the fire and they are burned. If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.” John 15:1–8 NASB
Recommended reading: What if Jesus Meets Us in the Good, Bad, and Messy? by Greg Williams and Mark Mounts [Grace Communion International publication].
[Printable copy: https://lifeinthetrinity.blog/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/olitmanifest-in-us.pdf ]
[More devotionals may be found at https://lifeinthetrinity.blog ]
[Subscribe to Our Life in the Trinity YouTube channel at https://www.youtube.com/@ourlifeinthetrinity ]
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