Intercessory Prayer

I believe in the power of prayer. When the noise of the world is set aside for a moment or two and someone lifts me and my need into God's presence in prayer, it has an immediate impact on me. When I sit silently in the company of God, deepening my sense of my belonging to God, it changes the way I move through the rest of the day. When a friend on the other side of the globe thinks of me and prays for me, even though I do not know it, I believe that something happens. It might not be measurable. It might not register on any scientific device or show up in any double-blind study, but I give my heart and life over to the proposition that prayer makes a difference.

Yet, as a person of prayer, as an individual whose life and career revolve around prayer and who pursues daily a deeper relationship with the risen Jesus, I underestimate the power of Christ's intercession on my behalf. I come to Jesus and ask for aid, forgiveness, miracle on a regular basis, but I have yet to truly internalize the belief that the Son of God intercedes on my behalf--on our behalf--without end. Sunday's reading from Hebrews 7 reminds me that I'm missing something.

Reflecting a priestly perspective that is born out of Second Temple Judaism, the author writes, "Consequently [Jesus] is able for all time to save those who approach God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them." The author is making a comparison between Jesus and the high priests of the temple. The former, blameless and pure, approaches God on his own merit, while the latter must offer sacrifices on his own behalf before entering God's presence. The former lasts forever, while the latter must be reinstituted on a regular basis and only enters God's sanctuary once a year. That kind of intercession isn't the same thing as, "How might I pray for you today?" It's more direct, more immediate, more encompassing. It is constant, intimate, and complete. It is the "pray without ceasing" that Paul invites us to pursue made perfect and complete in Christ.

I believe in the power of prayer, but I quickly confess that I don't know exactly how it works. I had a conversation earlier this week with someone who wanted to run by me his theory on how prayer is effective. He described how much more effective a prayer to help find lost keys is than a prayer for world peace, and he acknowledged that it is easier to affect one person than all the people on earth. Not wanting to take that image too far but wanting to give it a little space to run in my own mind, I responded by admitting that my own prayers seem to have a bigger effect on me than on other people.

When I pray to find my keys and I find them, a few things take place. First, the act of praying may allow some space, some release of anxiety, that helps me become more effective in my quest to find my keys. That's a psychological effect, which I accept. Second, the act of praying may actually invite God to intervene in my mental processes, guide my search, and help me discover what had been hidden. I think I can buy that, too. Third, some might claim that the act of praying supernaturally relocated my keys to a new place where I might find them or, in another way, some might believe that the physical object was spiritually hidden until a prayer brought it back fully into this physical reality. I don't accept either of those. Finally, the act of praying may help me identify what was always going to happen--what would happen whether I offered a prayer or even acknowledged the power of prayer--as an act of God. You might find your keys without prayer, and I might find my keys with prayer, and, even if neither experience was cosmically different, my prayer places a religious context upon it that has a meaningful impact on me. My prayers were answered. I give credit to God. I am grateful. My relationship with God is strengthened.

To think of Christ interceding on our behalf not to grant us the particular things that we need nor to change God's mind about what would otherwise happen to us but to escort us into God's presence and make our identity, our needs, our lives completely and totally inhabiting God has power. It may not help me find my keys, but it lets me know that my key-lostness is already brought into God's presence as powerfully as if I begin my search with the Great Litany. Jesus is always interceding on my behalf. My life is in God's presence. There is power in that--not only psychological power when I remember it but power beyond my remembering and knowing.