Daily Devotion – June 8, 2020 – Jim Alger
Romans 8:26
“The Spirt helps us in our weakness, for we do not know how to pray or we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”
I remember being taught to pray as a child. I must have been 5 or 6 years old.
My great aunt was putting me to bed. We were down in the cities visiting their home for a few days. We called her Auntie Brown.
As she was tucking me in, Auntie Brown, asked me, “Do you pray before you go to bed?” I asked, “What’s that?”
That night she taught me how to pray. I have never missed a night since. What a legacy for one woman to leave to a child.
I expect the Spirit of God reached down and led that woman to teach me, in my weakness, how to pray. And as I mumbled and fumbled my way through life, the Spirit interceded for me before the Throne of Grace and made me beloved in the eyes of God.
There is a kind of audacity in children that Jesus seemed to like. The child never questions his right to stand before the Throne and say his peace. Jesus said, “Unless you become as little children, you cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”
The call of God to us is to pray with courage, understanding that the Spirit intercedes for us before the Throne. The call of God to us is to take the part of the Spirit and intercede for others, even asking the impossible. We live in troubled times. May we have the courage for Jesus’ sake, to ask the impossible against impossible odds.
Heavenly Father, give us the courage, in our weakness, to pray for others, strengthened by the power of the Spirit. Amen.
