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I am using readings from the 49 Week Bible Challenge as the basis for these devotions. I encourage you to join me in this discipline. Today’s readings are Luke 23; Leviticus 23; 2 Kings 23; Job 1.
Job 1:1-5
There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned away from evil. 2 There were born to him seven sons and three daughters. 3 He possessed 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, and 500 female donkeys, and very many servants, so that this man was the greatest of all the people of the east. 4 His sons used to go and hold a feast in the house of each one on his day, and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. 5 And when the days of the feast had run their course, Job would send and consecrate them, and he would rise early in the morning and offer burnt offerings according to the number of them all. For Job said, “It may be that my children have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts.” Thus Job did continually.
Pastor Keith Aschenbeck made a presentation about intercessory prayer at a recent gathering of pastors of circuit 31 of the Texas District LCMS. His doctoral work centered around this issue and as he shared his discoveries we were all engaged. Some had challenging questions. Is prayer a means of grace? Does prayer have power? Do we change God’s will by our prayers? Can we simply pray for someone’s forgiveness without praying that they repent?
That last question got the most conversation. Pastor Aschenbeck’s conviction is that intercessory prayer is much about praying for someone’s forgiveness. His biblical examples were telling.
- Job praying for his family – interceding for them for forgiveness.
- Jesus praying from the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
- Jesus telling the paralytic, “Your sins are forgiven.”
His personal examples of people’s practice of intercessory prayer were compelling.
- I notice how I look at people…you see it, the spiritual struggle and try to be in tune with that but also try to be more open to people.
- How can I show these people…how can I try to see people like God would see them, as Jesus would see these people? He died for them too. How can I be that person that brings God to them?
But the breakthrough came for me when we prayed an intercessory prayer for a specific person. The idea of this prayer was not to be a “fix this person” kind of prayer, but rather a prayer for that person’s forgiveness and all that entails.
Here is the prayer. Pray it, filling in the blank with the name of a person. See what happens is you.
An Intercessory Prayer
Based on Paul’s words from Ephesians 3:14-21
Holy and Almighty God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You are slow to anger and abound in love and mercy.
For this reason, I kneel before you Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name. I pray that out of your glorious riches you may strengthen __name__ with power through your Spirit in his/her inner being, so that Christ may dwell in his/her heart through faith.
Grant, O Lord, forgiveness to ___name___. Wash him/her with the blood of your Son Jesus Christ. Cover him/her with the robe of my Lord’s holiness. Fill his/her heart with the refreshing water of life that he/she would no longer thirst for righteousness. Overflow his/her cup with joy that he/she would know the peace that passes all understanding.
And I pray that ___name____, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge–that he/she may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all I ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within me, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever! Amen.
When I prayed that prayer, I realized it was praying that he/she was somehow fixed by that prayer, rather than that the one for whom I was praying would simply experience forgiveness. That prayer changed me. I pray that God will forgive the one for whom I prayed. For where there is forgiveness of sins, there is life and salvation.
David Bahn - Reflections 
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