RickJW

Not in so many words, but, I do often ask that God give His spirit to others, to help them increase their faith, and to make use of prayer. I would be praying that they would realize the benefits available to them through God, and that they would come to live Godly lives. While we are saved through the grace of God alone, we need to go beyond that, and live in a way that honors Jesus and His sacrifice for us.

By understanding Christ's love for us, we can apply that to our love for others, as we try to follow the second great commandment. Knowing that Jesus loves us helps keep us going through difficult times, the times when we need to pray and turn over our problems to the Lord. Christ's love for us will never die, and will increase with out limit as we ask for it.

Paul prays for the Ephesians' hearts, or inner men, to be strengthened, so that they may grow and mature in their christianity. We would, and should, pray this prayer in much the same way today for our fellow christians. Paul prays that Christ dwell in the believer's hearts for much the same reason that he asks for strenghtening of their inner man. While Christ does dwell in all persons hearts, it is up to the individual to surrender control to him, which we do in varying degrees. Paul is praying that the indwelling spirit and the inner man be given more control, and the sinful nature be pushed down.

The Holy Spirit is like a forgiving father to us, over and over in Scripture we find sin being forgiven - 'big' sins too, like David's. While we can come to God as our 'Daddy' for all our needs, He also requires our respect, as does our earthly father. We need assurance of salvation, otherwise we have no hope, nothing to look forward to. We receive this assurance through our faith in God and acceptance of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross.

To mortify or put to death the deeds of the flesh by the Spirit, is to give ourselves over to Christ through the Holy Spirit. We let Christ abide within us, become our guide, and we cast aside our sinful nature. I cannot imagine any one being able to completely give themselves over to Christ, becoming absolutely sin-free, and still able to exist within our normal mainstream society. To be led by the Spirit and to put to death our sinful nature takes great faith, like that of Abraham. We have to give ourselves over to the Spirit to start this process, then I imagine it becomes like a snowball rolling down a mountain, growing to gigantic proportions as we let the Spirit have more and more control.

Many people believe that for man to sin is inevitable - some of Paul's writings say that 'I do not do that which I want to do, and I do that which I do not want to do'. Especially in light of Christ's teaching that the mere thought of adultrey, or murder, is sin, would make it nearly impossible to live life perfectly without sin. This is the whole reason that God sent Jesus, as sacrifice to atone for our sins, so yes, this 'defeatist attitude' is taught by scripture.

I believe that every human being has the Holy Spirit within, from birth, even before conception and birth. This Spirit may be forced down, in a deep sleep or hibernation, when the person has given himself over to his sinful nature. We must hunger and thirst for righteousness in order to awaken the Spirit within us, it takes dedication and work from us to keep ourselves full of the Spirit - we must study the Word of God, and strive to lead a Christ-like life.

Galatians 5:22-23 tells us what it is to set our minds on the Spirit: "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control." If we keep these things and Christ in our thoughts constantly, our mind is set on the Spirit. On the other hand, if we start thinking thoughts of hatred, sexual immorality, adultery, then we are setting our minds towards the sinful. Those of us who desire, who 'hunger and thirst for righteousness' will need to exert will power to keep on the right track, as we are tempted by Satan at every turn. We will always have the Holy Spirit with us, ready to help us when we call out to Him. For us to live righteously then, will require our will power, as well as prayer - there will be ups and downs as we grow in our christianity.

As natural man, we are not capable of the obedience to the law that God requires of us. The weak link here is our sinful nature, everything else has served God's purpose perfectly. Our salvation comes only by the grace of God because of our faith in Christ and our acceptance of the substitutionary sacrifice of the Son as ransom for our sin.

While many of us profess to believe, and do believe in Christ and the resurrection, it happened a very long time ago we think. We are a generation of 'seeing is believing', and have a very hard time to believe in something that we have not experienced ourselves. We are scientists, bent on seeing, touching, feeling before we will assent to the existence of anything. So, to believe that we have this great God-given power, it must be revealed to us in some manner that we can relate to. It is there in front of us at all times - just as the disciples had the few loaves and some fish right in front of them, yet they still asked if they should send the people into the villages to buy food. One way to develop this faith in ourselves is through our prayers, both for ourselves and for others. I think that we need to ask God to 'open the eyes of our hearts' - both our own hearts, and the hearts of others that we pray for.

We, as mortal men, would not have the Christian hope that we have now, if we thought of God as 'poverty-stricken'. A poverty-stricken God is not something that I can even think about, consider the feeding of five thousand by Jesus, with but a few loaves and a couple of fishes - even with little, God has plenty for all. The promise of a 'glorious inheritance' motivates us to want to do good, to please God - this seems to be an easy one to get twisted around, if we think of this inheritance in the way we are conditioned to, that is the wealth accumulated by our parents or grandparents, rather than the spiritual inheritance that we can have in Christ. I would pray that others know this inheritance by examining the blessings that they have now, which are a small fore-taste of the blessings to come with eternal live at God's hand.

My Hope has changed me in that I no longer work as a slave to my possessions. I have set my sights beyond this earthly existence, beyond accumulating meaningless 'things' or 'stuff' here, and to 'laying up treasure in heaven'. People with little or meager hope focus on the negatives in their lives, the slightest thing that does not go their way becomes a huge mountain that they can not get beyond. When I see friends or acquaintences acting like this, I take a moment to thank God for the blessings that I do have now, and for those blessings yet to come. As I am growing in my Christianity, I also try to include those that I see acting like they have no hope in my prayers.

Paul prays to give thanks for the Ephesians, for them being believers in Christ, he gives thanks that God has given them faith and therefore saving grace. Paul asks that God further reveal himself to them, to strengthen their faith. With or without this kind of prayer, people could, and would, still come to know God, however, this kind of prayer will help to strengthen them in their faith. This kind of prayer is very important because the people prayed for may get revelations beyond those they would otherwise experience.

I beleive that Paul was talking about both himself, and the universal Adam - all men, before death in the flesh. As long as we are physically alive in the flesh, there is always some sinful nature left in us. Remember that Christ taught us that not only actual physical adultry is a sin, but just thinking lustfully about another person was adultry in the heart, and just as much of a sin. Is is possible for any person alive in the flesh to be sin-free as Christ was? I do not think that we reach that state until we physically die and are judged worthy by Jesus Himself.

The doctrine of total depravity, in Scripture, teaches that, while there may be some good in man, he is given over to his sinful nature - even the good that he may do comes from questionable motives. We, particularly in the American culture, would like to believe that we are basically good, with a little badness thrown in. Scripture tells us the opposite. Even the American ideal of raising one's self up by his own bootstraps is not in keeping with God's teaching through scripture, that we are powerless to do anything without God.

The law defines what is bad behaviour, what is despised by God. The law does not help us to overcome our apparent desire to do bad things. The knowledge of what is right and what is wrong in God's eyes does not empower us to do good or to live a righteous life of our own volition. While the law defines for us good and bad, we still revert to our tendency to succumb to sinful passions. As long as we are 'first Adams' we cannot rise above this sinful nature, we must be reborn in Christ Jesus so that our sinful nature is put to death on the cross with Christ, and our new self rises from Christ's grave.

I don't think that the appearance of angels to strengthen and help Jesus was a special treatment from God on behalf of His Son. Angels appeared many times in the Old Testament and New Testament, and I believe that they continue to come to the aid of man.

I believe that God was pleased when Jesus prayed 'not my will, but yours...'. As Dr Ralph states in the lesson text, we need to make our will known to God, as well as to ourselves, before we acknowledge that 'not my will, but yours be done'. In this 'requirement' God is trying to have us be sure of what our will is. Our 'free-will' is one of God's great gifts to man, He wants us to exercise this gift, however we also need to recognize the limitations, or consequences, if we fail to pair the gift of free-will with the gift of wisdom. Thus, we should not be passive or uncaring about things that we pray for, but, rather, be passionate and confident that our desires will match up with God's will.

While before the law was handed down through Moses we did not have names for sin, the actions prohibited by the ten commandments were detrimental to ourselves. As Dr Ralph says in the lesson, "When we are blissfully ignorant of our sins, that doesn't keep them from being wrong or harmful to ourselves and others." The law puts sinful actions in the spotlight, it does not make a certain action harmful or sinful. For example, the is no law that says we cannot hold our hand over a candle flame, still, it is harmful to the flesh. It is in man's nature to want to do that which is forbidden. This goes back to the original sin and the fall of man. By being forbidden to eat from the tree in Eden, made that fruit all the more desireable.

Flesh, as Paul uses the word in Romans chapters 7 and 8 is used to denote the natural man, the first Adam, and his tendency towards sin. Our 'flesh' has a natural tendency to succumb to temptation and fall into sin.

Jesus prays this prayer as He starts to feel the weight of what is about to happen to Him. For the first time in His mortal life, Jesus seems to be asking something for Himself. We must bear in mind that Jesus is not only Jesus, but part of the Triune God. Consider that He not only feels the dread of a very unpleasant death that is about to come to Him as the one that is about to endure those hours of torture, but also as the Father and the Spirit of that person. Because Jesus is part of the Trinity, He is said to pray this prayer three times in the other gospels - perhaps once as Jesus, once as the Father, and once as the Holy Spirit.

Jesus knows that His disciples will be tempted, to deny that they are His followers, to take revenge on them that come to arrest Him, and in other ways, as His life on earth is about to be ended. He asks that they pray for the same reason that He is about to pray, that they may receive strength from God the Father. The fact that they fell asleep during, or instead of, praying shows that they did not pray diligently. In the Lord's Prayer, we pray that 'thy will be done', acknowledging that while we may be able to convince God to make 'minor course adjustments' from time to time - such as when Abraham prayed on behalf of Lot and his family - we cannot affect the overall plan that God has in store for His creation. Jesus needed some 'alone time' with His Father on this crucial night. Both Jesus and God needed strength, as Jesus was about to give up His own life, and God about to give up His only Son's life, as redeeming sacrifice for people that had let Him down over and over again, and would continue to do so, as we, indeed, continue to do unto this very day.

Nehemiah has a very good position with the king, which he could easily put in jeopardy. On a whim, the king could either grant Nehemiah's wish, or dismiss, even kill, him. The quick 'arrow prayer' is a continuation of Nehemiah's prayers over the last four months.

Both Nehemiah and Ester were in very precarious positions to try to get their kings to change their policy towards the Jews. They could easily have been killed for their requests of the king, or they could have success. Both used prayer, lots of persistent prayer, to engage God's help. Indeed, God placed each of them in strategic positions, but it was up to each of them to 'pick up the ball' and run with it. Both could have had, I imagine, rather nice lives, in the grace of the kings, however, they chose to have the grace of God, that they could 'lay up treasures in heaven' for eternity, rather than live a few years in earthy comforts. God still places persons in positions where they can make a difference to this day. We all can make differences, if not on such a scale as Nehemiah, Ester, or Daniel; we can still affect our community, church, family, or even just one other person.

The basis of Nehemiah's appeal is that God has restored some of the Israelites to their home in Jerusalem, because they have repented of their sins and are now trying to live in the Law. God has redeemed them, but the work is incomplete, since they are still living under oppression from the Samaritans, under the authority of Artaxerxes, King of the Persian Empire. His arguement stems from this incompleteness, that the Jews should not be forced to live under oppression in their home land. In this prayer of intercession, Nehemiah takes the sins of the Jewish people upon himself - a picture of Jesus Christ who will sonn take the sins of all mankind upon Himself. In praying for others, we must take on responsibility for their sins, if our prayer is to be successful.