Legal Prayer

Then Abraham approached him and said

Genesis 18:23

The thought of intercessory prayer had never occurred to me until listening to a sermon by Timothy Keller about priesthood. Of course my main problem was that I didn't realize that intercessory prayer is basically acting like a lawyer for someone. That makes more sense to me.

You gather your evidence, and present it to the Judge.

Now I know that Jesus is doing this for every believer, that is what the book of Hebrews is all about. But I had not thought about that being my job as a believer. And yet, right there in Revelations 1 I read God "made us a kingdom of priests".

The job of a priest is to present a legal case for the accused.

So I took this idea, and I practiced it, with a friend whom I am mad with. I presented the case to God, in a way I had not before, asking that wrath would not descend on him (not God's primarily, but mine). I have never had an experience like that before. I not only felt the presence of God as I prayed, I felt closer, more understanding, about my friends experience.

Amen.