Nottingham connected
Faith & Spirituality
27
PRAYER- THY KINGDOM COME
By Densel Davy (LLM) Reader
The nine days after Ascension Day [10 th May 2018
], until the eve of Pentecost are observed as days of
prayer and preparation for the celebration of the
outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The Thy Kingdom
Come Global Prayer Movement invites us to pray
with Christians from around the world during
these nine days, on their theme: Changed Lives -
Changing Lives, as we pray afresh for the coming of
the Holy Spirt at Pentecost.
But what is prayer?
Unlimited joy, health, money, relationships, love,
youth: everything we ever wanted – all these can be
ours; according to a best-selling self-help book. Think
positively about acquiring something, it claims, and
you shall have it. Is that what prayer and intercession is
about? Like a divine shopping list?
‘Dear God, we pray for this for him, and that for her,
this for me and that for the other.’
True intercession is not a wish list. It grows out of our
relationship with our heavenly Father and our love for
one another. We pray because we love, not merely to
acquire things.
Jesus Prayed all the time. He would find a quiet place
and pray to His Father. Jesus showed us, by example
that praying was a very important part of our spiritual
journey of faith.
In Matthew 6: 6-13, Jesus tells his followers this: ‘Your
Father already knows what you need before you ask
him. This, then, is how you should pray:
Our Father in heaven:
May your holy name be honoured;
may your Kingdom come;
may your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give
us today the food we need.
Forgive us the wrongs we have done,
as we forgive the wrongs that others have done to us.
Do not bring us to hard testing,
but keep us safe from the Evil One.’
But, is it a case of just saying the words that the Lord
has given us or is there something deeper that we
should know?
grace, the power of the Holy Spirit to change lives, we
need to hoist our sails with an expectant belief in our
prayers for ourselves and in our intercessions for others.
We need an expectant belief in Prayer.
On that mountain top in Galilee as the Lord ascended
into heaven, the apostles stood there looking into the
sky. They were experiencing a deep sense of lost. Their
leader and spiritual guide had gone. What now. They
needed those angels to remind them that this was not
the end of their story.
In their journey of faith with the Lord, Jesus had
equipped them with all that was needed to change
the world; he taught them to pray, to share the Good
News, to bring hope to broken relationships and lives.
But, they could not begin to do all that if they down
tools and look to the sky for the Lord’s return.
It’s as if the angels were saying to the apostles you will
be of no earthly use to the mission on God if you just
stand there looking into heaven.
The Day of Pentecost. On this day, a miracle occurred:
Suddenly there was a noise from the sky which
sounded like a strong wind blowing, and it filled the
whole house where they were sitting. Then they saw
what looked like tongues of fire which spread out and
touched each person there. They were all filled with the
Holy Spirit and began to talk in other languages, as the
Spirit enabled them to speak.
What difference should this event make to our lives?
Well, on this same day the promised gift of the Holy
Spirit was given to the Church. It is this force, the Holy
Spirit, that has powered the Church all these two
thousand years, kept it going, fed us and supernaturally
strengthened us.
Many, in fact, think of Pentecost as the birth day of the
Church, because it was on that day that we received
the promised gift that has made it all possible. Jesus
said in John 14:26 “But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit,
whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you
all things and will remind you of everything I have
said to you.”
When our church started out on our journey with
Partnership for Missional Church, we were given an
image of a sailing boat being powered by the wind. For
the boat to move forward, its sail had to be hoisted to
attract the wind. Its direction wasn’t in a straight line,
but its general direction was towards the sunrise. I pray that each of us will experience that invisible and
sometimes visible, sustaining force of the Holy Spirit,
giving us the energy to carry on, helping us to flourish,
reminding us to pray with expectant belief that the
Lord is listening, showing us people of peace and
helping us to see where God is at work in our lives and
in the lives of the people around us.
If you and I want the experience the power of God’s Thy Kingdom Come, Thy will be done. Amen