Prayer – Light from the Word

Understanding How to Pray

(Luke 11:1-4; Matt. 6:9-13)

When the disciples asked the Lord to teach them how to pray, the Lord opened widely the doors of heavens and made certain the entrance of all who desired to come to Him in prayer. The prayer the Lord taught the disciples starts by saying, “Our Father Who is in heaven.” The prayer is directed to the Father. When we enter His presence, we draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in good time for every need (Heb. 4:16). We must enter His courts with praise, revering His name; proclaiming the Gospel to all nations (“Your kingdom come”) and desiring His will to be effective in every aspect of life “on earth ( in my life) as it is in heaven.” The prayer then is directed to the basic necessity of life- our daily bread -food sufficient to sustain us.

In Proverbs 30:8-9 Agur prays, “Give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me lest I be full and deny You and say, Who is the Lord? Or lest I be poor and steal, and so profane the name of my God.” This wonderful prayer is a prayer of contentment with a spiritual sense of obedience and the pursuit of holiness. Paul said, “Godliness accompanied with contentment is great and abundant gain, for we bought nothing into the world, and obviously we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing with these we shall be content” (I Tim. 6:6b-8).

YAHSHUA said, “Give us this day our daily bread”. Not tomorrow’s, but only today’s; that is, supply the means for our sustenance “One day at the time”. He said, “Do not worry and be anxious, saying, what are we going to have to eat? Or, what are we going to have to drink? Or, what are we going to have to wear? So do not worry or be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will have worries and anxieties of its own. Sufficient for each day is its own trouble” (Matt. 619, 31, 34). Having our needs supplied one day at the time encourages us to a renewed desire to seek Him to be the provider of our basic needs. And as the Bread of life YAHSHUA satisfies every spiritual need of the soul as well. We should desire Him daily as we desire bread to satisfy our physical needs. He said, “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and then all these things taken together will be given you besides” (Matt. 6: 31).

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Can You Tarry with Me Through the Night

The place- a garden; the occasion- YAHSHUA’S coming trial and death. After the Passover supper, they headed to the place where they customed to go- the Garden of Gethsemane. While He went a little further, leaving the apostles a stone’s throw, taking Peter, James and John with Him, He knelt down and prayed. This time, was not only to pray, but to agonize His last hours before He would be betrayed into the hands of the Jewish authorities and ultimately into the Romans’ hands. The Garden of Gethsemane was witnessing the suffering of Messiah on His way to deliver mankind from the hands and power of Satan. I just wonder if that was the same or approximate location of the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve first sinned. The first scene was the fall of men and a sentence given them and to the serpent. It was then that God gave Adam and Eve the promise of salvation, and to the serpent He uttered its destination saying, Because you have done this, you are cursed above all animals and above every living thing of the field; upon your belly you shall go, and you shall eat dust all the days of your life; and I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her Offspring; He will bruise and tread your head underfoot, and you will lie in wait and bruise His heel (Gen. 3:15). He began to be struck with terror and amazement and deeply troubled and depressed. He then said to them, My soul is exceedingly sad so that it almost kills Me! Remain here and keep awake and be watching, and going a little farther, He fell on the ground and kept praying, that if it were possible the [fatal] hour might pass from Him; He said, Abba, Father, everything is possible for You, Take away this cup from Me; yet, not what I will, but what You will (Mark 14:32-36). The disciples, not understanding the urgency of the moment, were overwhelmed with fatigue and fell asleep, leaving Him alone agonizing. Three times YAHSHUA woke them up to pray and warned them to watch and pray, but of no avail, until the time came for the betrayer to come with a band of guards from the Jewish authorities to arrest Him.

At the Garden of Gethsemane, Satan was bruising YAHSHUA’S heel, while the disciples slept, powerlessly, for not remaining in prayer, as they were told. YAHSHUA’S words, “Abba, take away this cup from Me; yet, not my will, but what You will” shows the extent of temptation He was going through alone. That was the opportune time for Satan to come back to tempt Him. At the beginning of YAHSHUA’s ministry, He spent forty days and forty nights at the wilderness, and when at the end when He felt hungry, Satan came to tempt Him. According to Luke, Satan left YAHSHUA after he ended every temptation, until another more opportune and favorable time (4:13). The opportune and favorable time had come to Gethsemane Garden, when the devil showed up to tempt YAHSHUA once again, at the point of His weakness. YAHSHUA aware of it, warned the disciples to be in prayer. But when He returned to them three times, He found them sleeping. That’s when YAHSHUA asked a very solemn question worthy to consider: Have you not the strength to keep awake and watch with Me for one hour? Keep awake and watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak (Mark 14:37-38). YAHSHUA continued agonizing, but the disciples continued sleeping, not taking into consideration the severity of the moment that YAHSHUA was going through. They heard the words YAHSHUA expressed to them; but their hearts were far from sharing the Savior’s pain in their lack of understanding. The third time when YAHSHUA found them sleeping instead of going back to praying, He then said, It is enough. The hour has come. The son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinful men; get up, let us be going! See My betrayer is at hand! (Mark 14:41).

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Prayer, the Key to Open Heaven’s Door (part 2)

YAHSHUA cried again with a loud voice and gave up His spirit; and at once the curtain of the sanctuary of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom (Matt. 27:50-51). Before the death of the Son of God no one, with the exception of the High Priest and once a year, could enter the Holy of Holies of the temple. The sanctuary of the temple was designated for the presence of the holiness of God alone. The High priest performed the duty of burning incense to atone his and the sins of the people by sprinkling the blood of a sacrificial animal on the mercy seat of the ark (Lev. 16:2). The Holy of Holies was separated by a veil to provide a barrier between God and man; between His holiness and the sinfulness of man. The tear of the veil or curtain is of great significance for all who profess to be a believer in YAHSHUA, for it provided access to all men to enter the presence of God, as the writer of Hebrews said, We have full confidence to enter into the [Holy of] Holies [by the power and virtue] in the blood of YAHSHUA…Let us all come forward and draw near with true hearts in unqualified assurance and absolute conviction engendered by faith, having our hearts sprinkled and purified from a guilty conscience and our bodies cleansed with pure water (Heb. 10:19-20, 22). When we pray, the Holy Spirit comes to our aid and bears us up in our weakness; for we do not know what prayer to offer nor how to offer it worthily as we ought, but the Spirit Himself goes to meet our supplication and pleads in our behalf with unspeakable yearnings and groaning too deep for utterance (Rom. 8: 26). When we enter the presence of God, we do so with the help of the Holy Spirit. We enter heaven in the name of YAHSHUA by the power of His blood. We must be reminded every time we enter the presence of God, that that privilege cost His son’s life. When we pray in His name we are acknowledging His sacrifice for us and that it is only by His name that we can come to the presence of God. When we pray in YAHSHUA’S name, we are presenting all that He is. YAHSHUA said that the Father will grant whatever we ask in YAHSHUA’S name (John 15:16b; 16:23 b). But the believer must dwell in YAHSHUA and His words must remain and continue to live in his hearts for whatever he/she asks to be done or given them (John 15:7).

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Prayer, the Key to Open Heaven’s Door (part 1)

David experienced the presence of God when he prayed. He, more than anyone we read about often sought the Lord, for his life was a life of trouble. Persecuted by King Saul until Saul died, he was a fugitive without means and position that entitled his deliverance from the king, the most powerful man in the country. But David was a king in God’s eyes waiting for the right time to be crowned so. He was also a fugitive from his son Absalom, who tried to take his throne. But David sought the Lord and called on His name. When we read his prayers in the book of Psalms it confirms that he had a relationship with God. When he committed sins of adultery and homicide he returned to God in repentance and grief of soul. He prayed, Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and guilt and cleanse me and make me wholly pure from my sin, for I am conscious of my transgressions and I acknowledge them; my sin is ever before me. Against You, You only, have I sinned and done that which is evil in Your sight, so that You are justified in Your sentence and faultless in You judgment… create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me (Psalm 51). And again, I acknowledge my sin to You, and my iniquity I did not hide… then You forgave me the guilt and the iniquity of my sin (Psalm 32); I waited patiently and expectantly for the Lord; and He inclined to me and heard my cry…He has put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many shall see and fear and put their trust in the Lord (Psalm 40: 1, 3); my sacrifice to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, such O God, You will not despise (Psalm 51: 17). When we admit our sins to Him, heaven acknowledges and forgiveness flows to us; when we praise Him angels join us in worship to God. David acknowledged the answers to his prayers, and it encouraged and helped others to know that God is faithful and He is a loving God.

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Going to the Courts of Heaven

(Job 23: 2-7; Esther 5; Zachariah 3)

“Divine justice is available to every believer”

The high priest, Joshua was found before the Lord in the courts of heaven with Satan standing at his right hand to be his adversary and to accuse him. Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, a representation of his sins. Satan well knew about Joshua and readily stood by his side to bring accusation against him. But the Lord rebuked Satan and forgave Joshua’s sins. He said, “Behold, I have caused your iniquity to pass from you, and I will clothe you with rich apparel. If you will walk in My ways and keep My charge, then also you shall rule My house and have charge of My courts and I will give you access [to My presence] and places to walk among these who stand here” (Zachariah 3). Satan had legal issues against the high priest Joshua, due to his life of sin. He never rests until he fulfills his evil desire to kill and destroy God’s people. YAHSHUA said that the devil had come to kill and destroy, but He had come to give life abundantly. After forgiving Joshua, the Lord dressed Him in the robe of righteousness and warned him to walk in obedience in order to continue in his position of serving Him. The high priest was set free from the devil’s accusations after the Lord forgave him. This experience is not unique only to Joshua; through our life’s journey on earth we too have walked in disobedience to the Lord, causing an open door for Satan to have his way against us. But John, in his first epistle, assured us that if we confess our sins, God is faithful to forgive and purify us. And as He did for Joshua He will do for us too.

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You Who Seek God

(Psalms 69:30-33)

Man, without God is lost in his corrupted mind and heart, without direction as one blind in the midst of chaos. Created in God’s image, he chose to give it up to go his own way, or the way of the serpent- the devil, to the point of discrediting the very existence of God. When Adam heard the news through his wife, he didn’t seek God for answers. He decided to eat the forbidden fruit with her. Man then lost the image of God. They hid themselves, instead. Feeling ugly and guilty for the decision they had made, then in the awareness of their nakedness, they were ashamed. Hiding from God was their solution to their problem of committing the first sin. Sin that separated them from the Creator, Who often came to the garden to talk to them. Their action of disobedience broke their relationship with God; they no longer had Him to visit them. Separated from the glory of God, Adam and Eve were kicked out of the Garden of Eden, never to enter it again. They suffered two separations: from God and from the beautiful place, the Garden of Eden, where they lived. It must have been a place like heaven, free from sin and misery it causes. Free from weeds, bugs that destroy; a soil that was perfect and easy to manage, where Adam and Eve benefitted from for their sustenance. Who would like to change it? Satan did. The enemy of humankind had one goal in mind: to destroy men’s relationship with God and take them under his control. As a result, we all became a fallen race from that time on and needing to return to God for our spiritual, physical and mental restorations, through a relationship with Him. You see, God longs to have fellowship with us; He longs to bless us; He longs for us to call on Him in times of trouble. The Psalmist said, Test and see that the Lord is good! Blessed is the man who hopes in Him (Ps. 34:8).

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The Upstairs Room

It was close to YAHSHUA’S last Passover, when He sent two of His disciples to a definite place to prepare it for His last Passover Super with them. He said, to them, go into the city, and a man carrying an [earthen] jar or pitcher of water will meet you; follow him. And whatever [house] he enters, say to the master of the house, The Teacher says: Where is My guest room, where I may eat the Passover with My disciples? And he will show you a large upper room, furnished and ready; there prepare for us (Mark 14:13-15). He had come to the end of His earthly ministry and needed a time alone with those called apostles to warn and to teach them and to prepare them for the ministry He was leaving behind for them to continue. That was the time and place when YAHSHUA, alone with His disciples, ministered to them by washing their feet; the time when He constituted the new covenant of His blood; the time when He gave a new commandment- to love one another as He loved them; that was the time and the place where He uttered His priestly prayer for them and for us. There were many disciples who followed Him, but He chose only twelve to be His messengers. These were the ones He explained the meaning of the parables to, who experienced a deep relationship with Him as His friends, who experienced the mount of transfiguration, and who witnessed His anguish at the Gethsemane Garden in the crucial moment of His decision. The last words from YAHSHUA to His disciples were printed in their hearts to change yesterdays and today’s world. Peter’s life was changed from a coward to a courageous outspoken man for the sake of the message he was given to tell; The doubtful Thomas died as a martyr in India for obedience to go and preach to all the world the message of salvation. John died on the Patmos Island, after they tried to kill him by putting him a caldron with boiling water. All died as martyrs for their Messiah. Nothing would stop these disciples from taking a stand for their Master, after the upper room experience.

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Hezekiah Prayed

Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, saying, I beseech You, O Lord, remember now how I have walked before You in faithfulness and truth and with a whole heart and have done what is good in Your sight. And Hezekiah wept bitterly (II Kings 20:2-3).

The Bible registers King Hezekiah as a good king. He walked in the way of the Lord. He did right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that David his [forefather] had done. He removed the high places, broke the images, but down the Asherim, and broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until them the Israelites had burned incense to it; but he called it Nehushtan [a bronze trifle]. He trusted in the Lord and was confident in the Lord, the God of Israel; so that neither after him nor before him was any one of all the kings of Judah like him. For he clung and held fast to the Lord and ceased not to follow Him, but kept His commandments, as the Lord commanded Moses; and the Lord was with Hezekiah; he prospered wherever he went…( II Kings 18:3-7a).

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Prayer, a Salve for Every Hurt

Prayer, empowered by faith, is the vehicle that takes our needs to the courts of heaven. YAHSHUA’S sacrifice for mankind was complete when He, at the time of expiring, caused the curtain of the temple to be torn in two from top to bottom (Matt. 27:51a). With that, YAHSHUA was reconciliating mankind to God. No more sacrifice of an animal was necessary by a high priest on behalf of the people. YAHSHUA fulfilled the Law and its demands on the altar of the cross. And how much more surely shall the blood of Messiah, who by virtue of [His] eternal Spirit has offered Himself as an unblemished sacrifice to God, purify our consciences from dead works and lifeless observances to serve the living God? (Heb. 9:14). Because of Him, heaven will be open and God’s courts will be always ready to receive those who come to Him in sincerity of heart, presenting their needs.

YAHSHUA, as our High Priest acts on our behalf in time of our needs. The Bible tells us that The Holy Spirit comes to our aid and bears us up in our weakness; for we do not know what prayer to offer nor how to offer it worthily as we ought, but the Spirit Himself goes to meet our supplication and pleads in our behalf with unspeakable yearning and groaning too deep for utterance…The Holy Spirit intercedes and pleads in behalf of the saints according to and in harmony with God (Rom. 8:26, 27b). In a beautiful harmony of agreement, the trinity performs the act of mercy and grace toward mankind. YAHSHUA’S sacrifice of love extends to us His people, for He understands the pains and hurts we suffer in our life-time on earth. Prayer is the bridge that connects us to the heavenly Father. If only we could perceive what is happening in heaven when we pray, we would spend more time in communion with our heavenly Father. Lives are touched, lives are changed and many times we do not even know the results of our many prayers. Before His ordeal, YAHSHUA prayed for us. A priestly prayer that salve flows from it every time we read it. It brings us comfort and a sense of His love towards us even after so many years.

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The Writing on the Wall – God Warns the World

MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHASIN- NUMBERED, NUMBERED, WEIGHED, DIVISIONS (Daniel 5:25). The interpretation of the matter: MENE, God has numbered the days of your kingship and brought them to an end; TEKEL, You are weighed in the balance and are found wanting; PERES, Your kingdom and your kingship are divided (Dan. 5:26-28).

God, in His mercy will always warn before His judgment falls on people. Belshazzar, the son of Nebuchadnezzar, although having witnessed the ordeal his father went through for not honoring God, did not take to heart to have a change of heart toward Him. So, he was found wanting and deserving of judgment, which took place that same night. That same night, he was killed, and Babylon was conquered by the Persians and the Medes; his kingdom was divided as the message was interpreted by Daniel (Dan. 5:28,30).

The writing on the wall is an indication that God had had enough of men’s evil behavior. Here, the judgment is directed to King Belshazzar, although, the country felt the impact of being taken by Persia and the Medes. In other times, judgments were directed to the nations, not specifically to a person. The only specific persons were individuals who were saved from the judgments. Take for examples the city of Sodom and Gomorrah, when fire and brimstone showered the cities and only Lot and his family were saved, and in the days of Noah, only Noah and his family were saved from the universal flood, when the entire world went under water, after being warned for 120 years. We are at the time when confusion has taken over; when truth is thrown down on the streets, when evil is good and good is evil. A delusion of errors has taken the minds of many to believe a lie, even those who profess faith in YAHSHUA has been taken with them.

YAHSHUA warned us in Luke 21:34-36 the following: take heed to yourselves and be on your guard, lest your hearts be overburdened and depressed with the giddiness and headache and nausea of self-indulgence, drunkenness, and worldly worries and cares pertaining to this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap or a noose; for it will come upon all who live upon the face of the entire earth. Keep awake then and watch at all times, praying that you may have the full strength and ability and be accounted worthy to escape all these things that will take place, and to stand in the presence of the Son of Man. These are the days we are living in now. These are the days YAHSHUA warned us then. That’s where we are prophetically. He instructed us to take heed, to be on our guard, and to keep watching and praying at all times. The specific prayer is that we will be worthy to escape all that will happen and be worthy to be found in His presence (rapture). These are times of great distresses and uncertainties, worldwide. We have been warned, but have not taken to heart to understand the signs of the time. Like Belshazzar, we will be found wanting, if we do not amend our ways, not to be suffering the consequence.

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