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Prayer
Deblyn:
Thank-you, and the Lord bless you, too!
Jeff:
--- Quote from: Extol on November 21, 2015, 09:17:38 AM ---Hi Jeff,
The other day I was listening to the 2007 conference and Ray was talking about patience...how we as humans always want to be somewhere we're not, or be in a better situation than we are in. We want to be out of debt NOW, we want to get a raise NOW, we want our children to be well-mannered NOW, rather than working towards these things.
The debt example was a good one for me. I've been able to pay off a good chunk of our debt this year, and I have been looking forward to when it is all paid off. It is a nice goal to have, but the problem is when I think too much about it and plan too far ahead, I get impatient. I just want the debt gone NOW. I may plan to have all my debts paid in, say, 18 months, but the fact is, I have no idea what our situation will be then. I might lose my job, we might have an expensive family emergency, etc. The only thing I can do is take it one day at a time, one week at a time, one month at a time, and pay what God allows me to pay, and thank Him for it...hopefully while learning patience and lessons about financial responsibility.
You mentioned that verse about praying ceaselessly in 1 Thessalonians 5. Have you been doing the two things sandwiched around that? Verse 16: Rejoice evermore. Verse 18: In every thing give thanks.
We always tend to think of thanksgiving as giving thanks for the good things, but we need to give thanks in EVERY thing. I need to thank God for my debts (and other problems), and you need to thank God for the thorn in your side. And in the midst of your suffering, I hope you can Rejoice in the knowledge that it will not always be there. :)
Behold, the eye of the LORD is upon them that fear him, upon them that hope in his mercy;
To deliver their soul from death, and to keep them alive in famine.
Our soul waiteth for the LORD: he is our help and shield.
For our heart shall rejoice in him, because we have trusted in his holy name.
Let thy mercy, O LORD, be upon us, according as we hope in thee.
Psalm 33:18-22.
--- End quote ---
Hi All,
Assuming that I'm talking about real prayer - in God's eyes...
Ray taught John 6:44 (and another verse John 12:32 where it's even more emphatic) with regard to the word "draw" - (as is translated in the KJV) but first written in the Scriptures as (GK helkō), where Ray, inspired by God, chose to use the word "drag" when writing about certain topics.
Ray uses the word drag when he taught about "repentance, forgiveness, knowing Christ, faith, understanding the Truth", and I believe everything under the sun. Truly, all things Spirit.
I was thinking about this very thing with regard to prayer for a while now but haven't come up with anything in my search of this site.
Are we ever "dragged" to prayer? Has Ray taught this? Ray mentioned somewhere (in an audio) that he would get excited when he felt compelled to pray, because it meant that God wanted to show him something. It certainly would mean that Ray was drawn (even caused or at least open) to understanding the Truth and the experience he was given - but it's hard to imagine Ray needing to be dragged to anything, regarding God's Truth.
My goal is to better understand this - when I "feel" the urge to pray - is God doing that (is there Scripture to support that)? Is it possible that my urge to pray is coming from my lack of patience, understanding, or my self-centered nature?. I suspect that the answer to this is easily understood.
Does anyone know, if in Ray's teaching, he's mentioned God's leading us to prayer (dragging us to pray?)
Again, that seems an obvious yes, but I'm wrong a lot.
Happy "spending quality time with those you love and some who you may only marginally tolerate". I really do hope you're all enjoying this time of year with whatever pleasant things the Lord brings to you. :)
Kat:
Hi Jeff, that is a thought provoking question. At first I could not found where Ray spoke on this directly, but then I found where this is covered indirectly. God is sovereign... this falls right in there with no free will at all, so yes even with our prayers they too are caused.
But our circumstances can vary greatly, causing each of us to have our own individual situation, therefore our prayers, though caused I would say are personalized to us. How we pray, what we pray for, is an individual thing and is developed in us according to God's will.
You were saying Ray used the word of us being "dragged" to Christ, and I have seen where that is true for some, but again I think this is an individual thing. I didn't feel dragged, certainly drawn, but I was so fed up with religion and the church, I welcomed these truths with open arms. I mean I'm just saying I believe that all of our experiences are distinct to each of us, as to what God is working in us.
Anyway here is a place that I feel covers the idea you was wondering about... "God's leading us to prayer."
http://bible-truths.com/lake15-B.html ---------------------
Here is a blanket statement of Scripture that proves Jesus did no more have a "free will" than anyone else does:
"Then answered Jesus and said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, The Son CAN DO NOTHING OF HIMSELF, but what He sees the Father do: for what things so ever He does, these also does the Son likewise" (John 5:19).
Do you know of one Scripture that contradicts this verse in John 5:19? If you don’t then you must admit that Jesus could not do anything by a supposed "free will" which is said to have the ability to act independently of God.
But wait, there’s more:
Jesus plainly had a will, but the Father willed that Jesus would bring His will into line with that of His Father. The Father would not allow Jesus to give up the good fight of faith. It pleased God to bruise His Son for our salvation,
"Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief: When you shall make His soul an offering for sin…" (Isa. 53:10).
God said that He would "make" the soul of Jesus an offering for sin. God doing the "making" is the CAUSE. Therefore, Jesus was not free to run from the cross. God inspired Jesus [caused] Him to pray. And God caused Jesus to pray that His Father’s will, would be done, not His Own will. It was a real battle for a few hours. The will of Jesus cried out for another way other than to drink the cup and go to the cross. Hour after hour He poured out His heart to His Father. And hour after hour His Father propped Him up so that He would not and could not give in to His flesh.
God MADE Jesus go through that spiritual battle of His will, but never for a second was the plan of God in jeopardy! God had clearly prophesied the positive outcome of this battle hundreds of years before its actual occurrence. And absolutely nothing in the history of the universe has ever thwarted God’s plan, purpose or intention.
The Father inspired [caused, made] Jesus state time after time, "Not My will but Thine, Not My will but Thine, NOT MY WILL BUT THINE"!!
It was the very words of His Father that Jesus prayed. Those words that came out of the mouth of Jesus first came out of the heart of His Father, and God’s Words never ever return to Him void.
"So shall My word be that goes forth out of My mouth [and into the mouth of Jesus]: it shall NOT RETURN UNTO ME [as when Jesus prayed back those same words to His Father] VOID, but it SHALL ACCOMPLISH that which I please, and IT SHALL PROSPER in the thing whereto I sent it" (Isa. 55:11).
As I have said a hundred times to my detractors, your argument is not with me, but with God and His Word.
I will show you from Scripture that the thoughts, words, works, and deeds of Jesus were only those things that came directly from His Father, not from some phantom "free will" of His own.
And so the very words that Jesus prayed that night in the garden were the very words of His Father, and the words of His Father of the purpose for which they were sent. But then again, "Lord, who has believed our report?"
When there is a conflict between wills regarding the bringing about of that which pleases God, whose will is it that will always win out? Is it possible for man’s will to thwart the will and intention of God? Does man possess such a God-defying power? Can man with his illusionary free will, will against and contrary to the predetermined plan and intention of God Almighty? No! No, he can’t. And yes, we do have a Scripture on that:
"For it is GOD which works in you both TO WILL and TO DO of His good pleasure" (Phil. 2:13).
When our very own Lord cried out in agony to His Father because His flesh did not want to go through the crucifixion necessary because of the sin of the world, whose will prevailed?
"And He said, Abba, Father, all things are possible unto you; take away this cup from Me: nevertheless not what I will, but what YOU WILL"
And He comes and finds them sleeping…"
"And again He went away and prayed, and spoke the same words. And when He returned, He found them asleep again…"
"And He comes the third time…" (Mark 14:36-41).
Now then, what was the outcome of this heart-wrenching prayer and request of our Lord to His Father? Was the will of our Lord free to override the will of His Father? Or did not Jesus recognize that it was His Father’s will that would prevail and that His will was not free to think or do contrary to His Father’s intentions? Answer:
"And he came the third time, and said unto them, Sleep on now, and take your rest: it is enough, the hour IS COME; behold, the Son of man is betrayed [is being betrayed] into the hands of sinners… and when they had crucified Him…" (Mark 14:41 & 15:24).
Clearly: It "pleased" God to crucify Jesus, and it was God Who "worked in His Son both TO WILL and TO DO of His Father’s good pleasure" (Phil. 2:13).
v
The very second that something causes one’s will to do something that the person himself had not planned by an uncaused will or a will that was not influenced in any way, he ceases to have a free will. A will made to think or do anything is not free, and it is senseless to argue anything to the contrary. There is not a Scripture in the bible that presents us with a person willing something or making a choice for which there was no cause. And "caused" wills and "caused" choices are not free.
v
When God’s time came to release Israel from bondage, we read this:
"And it came to pass in process of time, that the king of Egypt died: and the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God had respect unto them" (Ex. 2:23-25).
And just what "caused" Israel to "cry unto God?" Their own free will? No. "Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried…" There is always a cause, but it is never man’s fabled free will.
v
God and the Scriptures allow no place for any reality of man having his OWN WILL that is FREE from the sovereignty of God’s operations of all.
No, it was "the hand of the LORD" that caused Israel to first say they would obey and later decide to not obey. It was "the hand of the LORD" that caused Joseph’s brothers to hate him, sell him into slavery, and then later to bow down to him. It was "the hand of the LORD" that put Samson and the Philistine woman together, but as with these and hundreds of more dealings by "the hand of the Lord" mentioned in Scripture, they "KNEW NOT THAT IT WAS OF THE LORD."
Do you "know NOT" that
all that you have said and done today, "was OF THE LORD?"
Most of humanity is born, lives, does evil and good, then dies, and "KNEW NOT THAT IT WAS OF THE LORD."
In Part C of this series, I will show you a statement where God Himself tells us that when He uses someone for His purpose, the one being used thinks that he himself is planning and carrying out the desires of his own heart and is making the choices of his own will; whereas God tells us that it is HE and not the one being used that is in totally control of everything, and that the one being used is totally unaware that he is being used like an inanimate object that doesn’t even have a brain!
Yes, God tells us that this is how He operates in ALL THE INHABITANTS OF THE EARTH! A few have been aware of God’s operation of all, down through the centuries; most however, have not. I will share these Scriptures with you next time. Robots? Nay, we are but clay (albeit ‘fearfully and wonderfully made’ clay, Psalm 139:14) in the hands of the Master Potter.
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mercy, peace and love
Kat
Jeff:
Kat,
Yes, that's perfect. If nothing we do is of our own will, then obviously prayer has to fall in under that too. God tells us to pray.
When I read what you posted of Ray's teaching I found something that's never crossed my mind before:
Jesus prayed to His Father to take away what Jesus knew was coming. It would seem that God wanted Jesus to pray for God to change His mind and allow Jesus to avoid the suffering He knew He faced. I've always - only - thought that it was the human weakness in Jesus that caused Him to ask for something He knew He would never receive. He had to have known that God never changes His mind but He prayed for it anyway. It had to have been for our benefit that He did that.
Psalm 25:4 "Shew me thy ways, O LORD; teach me thy paths"
It may be that Jesus' humanity had a part in what He was asking for, I would think He was afraid, but in the end it was God who drew Jesus to pray for it anyway.
Thanks Kat.
lilitalienboi16:
--- Quote from: Jeff on December 24, 2015, 06:13:31 PM ---Kat,
Yes, that's perfect. If nothing we do is of our own will, then obviously prayer has to fall in under that too. God tells us to pray.
When I read what you posted of Ray's teaching I found something that's never crossed my mind before:
Jesus prayed to His Father to take away what Jesus knew was coming. It would seem that God wanted Jesus to pray for God to change His mind and allow Jesus to avoid the suffering He knew He faced. I've always - only - thought that it was the human weakness in Jesus that caused Him to ask for something He knew He would never receive. He had to have known that God never changes His mind but He prayed for it anyway. It had to have been for our benefit that He did that.
Psalm 25:4 "Shew me thy ways, O LORD; teach me thy paths"
It may be that Jesus' humanity had a part in what He was asking for, I would think He was afraid, but in the end it was God who drew Jesus to pray for it anyway.
Thanks Kat.
--- End quote ---
Yes, Jesus prayed out loud and not for His own sake but for our sake.
John 11:41-43
41 Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid. And Jesus lifted up his eyes, and said, Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me.
42 And I knew that thou hearest me always: but because of the people which stand by I said it, that they may believe that thou hast sent me.
43 And when he thus had spoken, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth.
1 Corinthians 10:11 Now all these things happened unto them for examples: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.
God bless,
Alex
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