Praying in the Name
Praying in the Name
The starting point in learning how to pray is to make two key acknowledgments: 1) we don’t know how to pray, and 2) the Holy Spirit does.
That’s the essence of Paul’s instruction in Romans 8:26-27: “…we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us.” And, “…the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”
This is something that Himmie and I are learning together. It’s a way of praying that is like conversation with another person. The Holy Spirit wants to us to participate with him in his intercession for us. It is praying with God, not just to God. When we do, we discover our prayers more frequently line up with the will of God. We intercede with the Spirit “according to the will of God.”
Awakened Ears
It begins with listening. In the mornings, after you get your coffee, allow the Lord to awaken your ears. We’re learning that practice.
Morning by morning he awakens; he awakens my ear to hear as those who are taught (Is. 50:4).
“Quick to hear, slow to speak” (Jam. 1:19), I believe, applies to prayer. Aren’t we generally quick to speak and slow to hear?
God, awaken our ears to hear.
In the Name
Now, as our hearing system is starting up, we need to find the place of prayer. And, in the Bible, that place is called “the name.”
I would like to ask you to set aside this article for a minute, and get out your Bible and read 2 Chronicles 6. It’s Solomon’s prayer of dedicating the temple. As you read, notice how many times he refers to “the name.” (Go ahead, I’ll wait for you… OK, you’re back.)
Solomon’s temple was a house built for God’s name. I counted 11 references to “the name.” Look at vs. 18-20, for instance:
Yet give attention to your servant’s prayer and his plea for mercy, O LORD my God. Hear the cry and the prayer that your servant is praying in your presence. May your eyes be open toward this temple day and night, this place of which you said you would put your Name there. May you hear the prayer your servant prays toward this place (NIV). (Underline added)
You could say the teleological reason for the temple was that it was to be a place for praying in God’s name.
According to this passage, if we pray toward this place where God has put his name:
there is forgiveness and reconciliation (vs. 22-23),
there is restoration when attacked by enemies (vs. 24-25),
even destructive weather is allayed (vs. 26-27),
famine, blights, plagues, and pandemics are averted (vs. 28-31),
outsiders come from afar and are brought to the Lord (vs. 32-33),
there is victory when God sends you to attack your enemies (vs. 34-35), and
those who were carried away as captives are returned (vs. 36-38).
Astounding! Wouldn’t you say it would be beneficial to learn how to stand in that place when we pray? Certainly repentance and forgiveness is involved in this kind of praying, but let’s focus on the place where we stand when we pray.
Jehoshaphat Prayed in the Name
A hundred years after Solomon dedicated the temple as a place for the name, his great-great grandson, Jehoshaphat remembered Solomon’s prayer when he was being attacked by a great horde.
If disaster comes upon us, the sword, judgment, or pestilence, or famine, we will stand before this house and before you - for your name is in this house - and cry out to you in our affliction, and you will hear and save (2 Chron. 20:9). (Underline added)
There was not a physical temple out there on the battlefield, but there was a spiritual place, like a temple, that they moved into. And, sure enough, God confounded their enemies. It’s a phenomenal story! The lesson is that it’s not how long you pray, but where you stand when you pray.
What Does It Mean?
How do we access that place? What does it mean to pray in the name? It’s more than just ending your prayers with the formula “in Jesus’ name.”
I believe it means at least three things. Praying in the name is:
praying in his authority,
praying in his character, and
praying in his presence.
Praying in his authority
Jesus, because of his obedient death, has been given a name that is above every other name. It has greater authority than any other authority in the world!
Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name (Phil. 2:9).
If you go out as a citizen and try to arrest a shop lifter, he has every right to ask, “who do you think you are?” And he’s not obligated to do what you say. But if you are part of the police force, with a star and everything, it’s another matter.
God gives us his name, his authority, and tells us to ask. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it (John 14:14). Amazing!
Praying in his character
But he doesn’t want you to misuse his name. We don’t have carte blanche privileges. We must exercise this incredible authorization in harmony with his character. “In his name” is “in his character.”
In his high priestly prayer, Jesus said, “I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me…” (John 17:6). And, “While I was with them, I kept them (his disciples) in your name… I have guarded them” (vs. 12). He manifested his character to them, and taught them to begin to manifest his character in their lives.
In Bible times, a name often represented characteristics of the one named. “Abraham" meant “exalted father,” which is who he was. “Jacob” meant “supplanter,” which was who he was. He supplanted his older brother as his father’s heir.
Jesus’ name is who he is. It represents his characteristics, his manner. As we learn to pray in his name, we must pray representatively of him. We are servants of his in our prayers. We learn to pray with his compassion, with his wisdom. and even with his anger. We learn to love what he loves and even to hate what he hates.
Praying in his presence
Back to Jehoshaphat and 2 Chron. 20. In verse 9 (NIV), he prayed, “… we will stand in your presence before this temple that bears your name.” The ark in the physical temple was called the ark of his presence. The place of his name is the place of his presence.
Jesus corroborates: “For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them" (Mt. 18:20). When God gathers us into the place where his authority and character converge, count on his presence to be there as well. Now you are in the place to pray in his name.
Not Only Priests, but Kings
One last thought about a responsibility we have when we corporately gather in his name. New Covenant believers are priests and kings. We’re not Levitical priests, but rather priests of the order of Jesus, our high priest, which is the order of Melchizedek, a priest and king (Heb. 7:1). Peter calls us a royal priesthood (1 Pet. 2:9).
In creation, God created man to have dominion over the earth (Gen. 1:28). In the New Testament, our King Jesus invites us to reign with him, to be involved in his administration. And this happens through praying in his name.
Church is not meant to be just a place to hear preaching and teaching. There is intercessory work to do as we gather. As we learn to pray in his name - in his authority, in his character and in his presence - in smaller settings, I believe our larger gatherings will become times of history-shaping prayer.
Praying in Wales
A fascinating example of history-shaping prayer took place in September of 1940 when Germany’s Goering made his bold attempt to gain mastery of the air in preparation for the invasion of England. Here’s the story as told in the biography of Rees Howells, the Welsh intercessor of the early 1900s, and his fellow intercessors at the Bible College of Wales.
Mr. Churchill, in his War Memoirs, cites September 15 as “the culminating date” in that Battle of the Air. He tells how he visited the Operations Room of the RAF that day and watched as the enemy squadrons poured over and ours went up to meet them, until the moment came when he asked the Air Marshal, “What other reserves have we?” “There are none,” he answered, and reported afterwards how grave Mr. Churchill looked, “and well I might,” added Mr. Churchill. Then another five minutes passed, and “it appeared that the enemy were going home. The shifting of the discs on the table showed a continuous eastward movement of German bombers and fighters. No new attack appeared. In another ten minutes the action was ended.” There seemed no reason why the Luftwaffe should have turned for home, just at the moment when victory was in their grasp.
After the war, Air Chief Marshal Lord Dowding, Commander-in-Chief of Fighter Command in the Battle of Britain, made this significant comment: “Even during the battle one realized from day to day how much external support was coming in. At the end of the battle one had the sort of feeling that there had been some special Divine intervention to alter some sequence of events which would have otherwise occurred.”
I’m sure there were many who were praying for England during those days that we’ll never know about. But at this little Welsh Bible College there were some that we do know about. Revival had come to this campus three years before. “An awful sense of God’s nearness began to pervade over the whole college. There was a solemn expectancy. . . . God was there.” (Sounds like the recent Asbury revival!)
And then, “We prayed last night [September 11] that London would be defended and that the enemy would fail to break through, and God answered prayer.” God allowed them to share in his authority and to bind a powerful military force.
Oh God, teach us to acknowledge that we don’t know how to pray, to enter into your authority as kings, to enter into your character as disciples, and into your presence as people of the presence.
Teach us to pray in the name.
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