Blogs

written by Michael McBane

Do you think Jesus prays for you? How do you think Jesus prays for you or others?  The word tells us that He ever lives to intercede for us. In this hour and in the hours that set before us this is important to know deeply. This is important to understand so that it is woven into our understanding and therefore it has the possibility of transforming us into an active partnership that mirrors the relationship Jesus has with His Father. 

Knowing this deeply allows grace to reach within us and we know mercy. Because of this our language will change. Our obligation as a Christ follower is to reflect Him. We cannot do this if we do not know Him specifically in and by the way He loves. The way He loves if we truly know it, not only changes us because we are loved but it changes us because we can give our life to love. Giving our life to love requires us to think through a heart that turned the universe inside out as the Father gave His Son so that many sons and daughters would know Him as He is. Giving our life gives us the ability to see with and through a redemptive lens. There is a lot of smoke damage in how we interact with each other and this world, which fogs our ability to engage with a purity that comes from being loved by God and allowing that love to challenge everything about who we are. Everything.

There are some that have departed from spiritual life with a numbness and they have done so for various reasons. The negative external signs of life are accumulating so fast that it is hard to walk with reason at times. We can witness the increase of tension and the mounting waves that will soon breach the breaker walls and bring a wide scale failure across humanity. Here we can focus on man and join in the chorus that detaches from any ability to see and live from God’s perspective or we can pull away and gain our wisdom from waiting on the Lord. The later may presently lack extreme attractiveness because it is labor some and it may force us to see things that we have desired to bury away. We simply do not want to contend with the potential of what may be approaching in the way of contention. To some this feels exaggerated and they wish to defuse it by ignoring life so they detach from it. There are some who think there is little they can do to change things so they turn away from the negative but they then fail to see that the levee is about to break and the water is creeping over their shoes.

This is fact, prayer is the language that God gave to us to implement the ignition of His Kingdom manifesting on this earth. Because we fail at times to view the entirety of life and living from the perspective that God has we lack the ability to see as we stumble in our interpretation of time.

Then there are some as a friend pointed out to me who signed up and served actively for 30 plus years. They have seen much and at times the labor has not been fruitful. They have pulled away and will not emerge until they hear the Father speak it is time. I pray that the wisdom that they carry is received.

There is a frailty rsting upon man today, the ice is thin that we walk upon as we cross the paths of each others life and there is little to will one to over look difference. We transgress needlessly in relationship. We cling to what we should have seen as the provision of a previous season. It is hard to  transfer life from one season to another. Especially when one has invested so much to accomplish life in a season that is no longer relevant. That does not mean that it did not hold purpose or value but that for many reasons time has moved on. There are things that many have pursued with a faithful vigor, things that have not brought the return that they were meant to bring. Here it may be the time to allow the Lord to shift the intent and strategy of life. Let us not see these things as wholesale failures but understand that there are times when to build it requires many who are willing to work in a unison of purpose. It is unfortunate that the culture that has emerged has taken away from the heart to live with that type of vision.

I am always taken by the immediacy of the disciples when Jesus came to them and said, follow Me. They did not hesitate, they dropped what was in their hands and followed. I do think this is a present word to the church that we must allow the Lord to cultivate in us. How so, we must ask Him to do this in us in prayer. Give us this heart and understanding Lord.  An example, before Jesus asked these men such a question He went to the Father. Jesus heard the Father and followed that first in prayer. Jesus prayed with His Father to cultivate the hearts of the men He was sent to ask to follow Him. Do we see this?

It is time to prepare but perhaps not in the way that some have projected. You can have storehouses of much but be ill prepared because you have not gathered the spiritual oil that God asked us to retain. Wisdom would say, trim our wicks. Hence our flesh will more then likely be inclined towards self preservation. That is the concern I have with many of the things that call themselves spiritual Joseph's. They appear to be inclusive and the spirit of Joseph was to preserve a nation. I would rather have the oil that lights the lamp of God preparing for His return then earthly provision. But I think it would be prudent if God wills to have both.

We are told to prepare the way of the Lord and we must break this down to it simplest base. We are to prepare the way of the Lord not what we feel may accommodate us in this preparation. That may seem contradictory, is God not relational? Yes, without doubt but the fruit of that relationship will be much greater if we allow the Lord to identify that which we should do. As we can learn to pray with the Lord we will learn it may not be the obvious that God directs us towards. But because few have had their senses trained to discern good and evil they often misapply the wisdom of the Lord. Even many who have trained themselves will disregard the still discernment that warns us or asks us to not go there because convenience is served easily. Training to discern is not merely the ability to hear or see but to understand the time and seasons of life and to allow the Holy Spirit to apply the overlays of God’s will to our plans. Even when we have already thought we have directives to go one way and then the Lord shifts to go what may seem to be an opposite direction. Let us ask, do we always need a reason to justify the change that God demands? We must be mature to adjust with trust. To wrangle over the whys may not be prudent. Our ways are not His and He has the ability to see from the beginning to the end. And from this perspective He will alter direction to retain HIs purpose.

We must learn to transfer our understanding and thoughts to a place that we interpret life from the perspective of the Father through the purpose of redemption. We must as Christians learn to live from this place and allow our mindsets to shift. Seeing life from this vantage point will challenge much that we have taken for granted as the ways of God. From here we ask for applicable wisdom and discernment.

My reason for sharing much of what I have here thus far is to establish a greater understanding that allows us to gravitate to an wakening that retains a discipline and matures us quickly to a way of life. It is prudent that we learn to adapt to the ways of God as never before.

When we allow the presence of the Lord to carry us rather then attempt to be carriers of His presence we are more able to see how Jesus prays. Jesus sees the beginning through the end. He knows our failures and the things that subject us to failure but He also knows how to redeem us in all things. So when He prays He sees the good, bad and ugly but He prays that the wheels of restorative redemption move into place. 

Let me bring a present example. Much of our culture in Christianity has allowed the external events and perceptions to guide their perceptions concerning our President. I am often guilty. How does Jesus pray for President Obama? So much of what we may see or feel could be accurate in perception but Jesus sees beyond this and it is a fact that God raises up one and put another out of office for His purpose. So how do we as Christ followers correspond to this. We pray with Christ. We see Him pray and repeat His prayer. Partnership. Don't take it for granted that you know how to pray, listen and watch. We must not become familiar to what we think God will say because of what we heard Him say previously.

Let us ask God to teach us to pray with Him.