Rich Andrews came to large group last Friday. For those of you who weren't there, he's a pastor at BlueRoute Vineyard Church and was speaking about intercession.
Actually, he wasn't just speaking about it, he was living it. Intercession is going between or on behalf of someone else- in this case, praying to God on behalf of others. It's a basic idea that many of us understand without ever using the word. But to Pastor Rich this was more than an idea he was suggesting. Earlier in the week he had practiced it by coming on campus and praying for us and Swarthmore, listening for what God wanted to tell us. Intercession, he explained, is really just selflessly loving people- getting up early in the morning to pray for a friend, for example; giving God a "platform to speak from."
So selfless love drives us to intercede. When we understand that praying for people is fundamentally connected to seeing God work in their lives, we can be like Moses, holding up his hands for hours so that the Israelites won the battle (Exodus 17:11). We are learning to be like Jesus who died for us and gained a position of intercession for us before God. When we intercede we listen for God's voice so that we pray His will for people, and this prayer is one that is *always* answered.
Rich pointed out some important things we must do as we begin to intercede: confess our sins individually, confess our sins in groups, and begin our periods of intercession with adoration, praise, and worship. It makes sense that we can only pray for other people if we are right with God ourselves.
And when we are interceding, the more people praying together, the better! As adding two waves multiplies the effect, so bringing people together multiplies the power of intercession. No, we don't have to change the name of large group to "love shack" (the name of Rich's college LG......). But we must influence each other to love through prayer, whether that means encouraging each other to set aside times of daily prayer, or even writing prayers that we prayed today and posting them on this blog.
God wants us to learn to hear his voice. If we are going to be successful in all our goals for outreach, our cookies and jam :), we have to learn to hear from Him and pray His will for others.
Some questions to think about:
When are you most able to listen to God's voice?
What are the barriers limiting your intercession?
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