Alright, Romans chapter 8. Romans 8 verse 26, Paul says,
Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities. For we know
not what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself
maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the
Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the
will of God. Paul begins saying likewise,
the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities. He's been declaring to us things
the Spirit of God does for us. He began the chapter declaring
how in regeneration through the gospel, the Holy Spirit frees
us. frees us from our flesh and frees
us from the law. He said the law of the spirit
of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and
death. And because He does that, the first verse is true. So then,
there's no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus who
walk not after the flesh but after the Holy Spirit of God.
We walk after Him. He freed us, creating a new person
in us, a new man in us, and we walk after Him. He declared the
good news in verse 9 and 10 that you're not in the flesh, but
in the spirit. Actually, in the spirit, if so
be that the spirit of God dwell in you. And if Christ be in you,
the body is dead because of sin. Our flesh never profits us anything. But that also means something
else. Before God, our flesh is dead. It's died. The body's died
in Christ. It's been destroyed in Christ.
So God's not even paying it any attention. But the Spirit is
life because of righteousness. That means you wouldn't have
life if you weren't righteous. Where there's righteousness,
there's life. It's the opposite of sin and death. And then Paul
declared that in this warfare between our old man and our new
man, it's not our flesh that's going to help us, it's the Spirit
of God that quickens us. That's how we're going to overcome
our flesh by the Spirit of God quickening us and mortifying
our flesh. Look at verse 13. For if you
live after the flesh, you shall die. But if ye through the Spirit
do mortify the deeds of the body, you shall live. See, God the
Holy Spirit is a person. He's one of the three persons
in the Godhead. And He's a person. He does this
for His people, in His people. He's God. And then the Spirit
of God strengthens us by bearing witness in our heart that we
are the sons of God. He says, verse 14, as many as
are led of the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For
you've not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but
you've received the spirit of adoption whereby we cry, Abba,
Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness
with our spirit that we are of the children of God. The Holy
Spirit beares witness with that new spirit He's given within
that we are the children of God. This is how we're strengthened.
This is how we know where He is. Then Paul said the Holy Spirit
teaches us to suffer with Christ, that we might be glorified with
Christ. He gives us the first fruits of the Spirit. All the
fruit we have came from the Holy Spirit within us. Faith, love,
regeneration, I mean repentance, long-suffering, all the patience,
hope, everything comes from the Spirit of God. And so having
given all these different things the Spirit of God does, Paul
said, likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities for we
know not what to pray, what we should pray for as we ought.
Every believer in whom the Spirit of God abides prays to God. That's a given. but we pray because
the Spirit of God is within us. The first thing the Lord Jesus
used to bear witness to Ananias that the Apostle Paul had indeed
been born of God was He said, Behold, he prayeth. Ananias said,
I'm not going to that man. That man's killing people. He
hates our religion. He hates you, Lord. He's got
letters to kill us. The Lord said, Behold, he prayeth. Ananias said, He's born of God
then. No man prays, really truly prays until he's born of God. Our substitute shed his precious
blood for his people and he's come and he's given us the witness
in our heart and he's told us, he's given us access into the
holiest of holies, into the presence of God. We can come boldly into
God's presence. Not by an earthly priest. Listen
to me now. We don't need an earthly priest.
If you read the Gospel, you read the Scripture, it tells us Christ
is made by His blood. He's made all His people kings
and priests unto God. We can come to God now without
an earthly high priest. Because we have a high priest
over the house of God, Jesus Christ our Lord. He's the one
that the priest pictured, Christ. And now we have Christ, and He's
our High Priest. We need no other vicar. We have
no other vicar. Christ is our only High Priest.
We come to God in Him. You don't let a man tell you,
you've got to come through Him before you can come to God. Don't
ever let that happen. But, though we can come to Him,
and though we have the Spirit in ourselves, we're so weak,
we don't even know what we should pray for. We have to have the
Spirit to make us pray, and we don't know what we should pray
for. We know not what to pray for.
We know we're welcome, but we just don't know what to pray
for. You ever been there, believer? If you're born of God, I know
you have, because this is where we're always brought to. At times,
our spirit's under such a heavy load that we simply cannot pray
or we don't even know what to pray. That's just how it is. But we read here the Spirit is
our Helper. And that's our subject, the Spirit
our Helper. The Spirit of God helps His people
to pray by making intercession for us according to the will
of God. I want to show you the help that
the Holy Spirit gives, the prayer He puts in our heart, and the
end of those prayers. First of all, let's consider
the help the Holy Spirit gives. Verse 26, Likewise the Spirit
also helpeth our infirmities. For we know not what we should
pray for as we ought, but the Spirit itself maketh intercession
for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. What does He mean
by infirmities? He helps our infirmities. That
word means weaknesses. Weaknesses. We have, because
of sin, many weaknesses, we are nothing but weakness because
of sin. We have physical weaknesses and
we have spiritual weaknesses. All God's regenerated people
are full of infirmities due to our sinful flesh. That's what
we're full of. We're totally weak and without
strength in ourselves, in our flesh. And due to sin we have
physical sicknesses, pain, different physical sicknesses. We have
mental sickness. There's a real thing as mental
sickness. People have it. We have spiritual conflict. We
suffer slander and poverty and persecution. These are all infirmities,
spoken of as infirmities in the Scripture. The Apostle Paul spoke
of his infirmities as reproaches, necessities. Those things he
had to have in life that were necessary. That caused him much
weakness. Persecutions, distresses for
Christ's sake. When you suffer for those infirmities,
we don't know what we should pray for. When you're in the
midst of infirmity, you do not know what to pray for. Some believers
are weak in faith. Paul said they think themselves
better, stronger than their brethren, and they judge their brethren.
That's a weak brother. And it's all because they physically
have done something outwardly that their brethren don't do.
And so, sometimes we get to thinking we're strong and, oh, we do this
and you don't do that, and we judge you for not doing that,
and that's a weak brother, weak in the face. Paul said to the
stronger brethren, those who know that everything we do is
filthy rags, we can't judge one another, we can't look down our
nose on one another, that's a brother who's strong. He knows Christ
is all and only his righteousness. And he said, now you that are
strong, bear the weakness of those weak. He said, him that's
weak in the faith, receive ye, but not to doubtful disputation,
never doubt one another. That's like what we heard this
morning. If we know anything at all about God's graciousness
to us and how we doubt, how could we doubt our brethren? So you receive Him. You receive
Him. Due to our firmities, we know
not what to pray for as we ought. All these things make it so that
we know not what to pray for. It's not only in times of trouble
that we don't know what to pray for. We know in times of trouble
we don't know, but it's not only in times of trouble that we don't
know what to pray for. We are sinners by nature and
without the Spirit of God teaching us, we never know what we should
pray for as we are. Never. But apart from the Holy
Spirit, when we're in these troubles and we get particularly in some
kind of weakness that is just extra burdensome to us, unless
the Spirit teaches us, we don't know what to pray for. We're
prone to ask God to remove the trouble. Aren't we? That's what
we all... We don't have to have the Spirit
of God for that. That's like the knee-jerk reaction. Lord,
take this off of me. Well, God gave it to you. He
didn't give it to you for no reason. He gives it to us for
a purpose. For a purpose. Go to 2 Corinthians
12. You're very familiar with this.
Paul had a thorn in the flesh. But you remember God gave him
that thorn in the flesh and He gave it to him for a reason.
It was for Paul's good. 2 Corinthians 12, 7, look at
this, "...lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance
of the revelations." God had given Paul an abundance of revelations. He taught him much in the truth. He saw things men have not seen.
And therefore, to keep him from being exalted, God gave him great
infirmities. Thorn in the flesh. And he says,
because of that there was given to me a thorn in the flesh. It
was given to me. God gave it to him. A messenger
of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. See,
there was a reason for it. But what did Paul do? We don't
know what to pray as we ought, do we? What did he pray for?
For this thing, I besought the Lord three times that it might
depart from me. That wasn't God's will. He didn't
know God's will, did he? That wasn't God's will to take
it from him. He prayed amiss. God gave that thorn to humble
him. God gave that thorn to keep him
from being exalted. He gave him that thorn to teach
Paul to depend on the Lord and not on himself. You ever consider
that's why the trial has been given to you? That's why God
gives us these trials. To bring us to see our total,
thorough weakness. We prayed for Him to remove it
or we won't. Sometimes He's not going to remove it. not until
he reached that purpose, that end. Christ knows we're dust,
brethren. He was and is touched with the
feeling of our infirmities. Our Lord Jesus Christ bore our
sicknesses and our infirmities, all of them. For God's elect,
He bore all the sicknesses and all the infirmities of His people
when He bore the sin that causes them. That's how come He was able to
just walk up to a man and say, I will be thou whole. What gave
Him that power? He was going to the cross to
pay for the sin that caused it. That's what we're supposed to
learn from that. That's how He had the power to heal. He was
going to the cross. It was the surety to bear the
sin that caused it and put that sin away. And He put it away
successfully. He made intercession for us and
therefore right now Christ continues to make intercession for us.
Christ our High Priest, how does He make intercession for us?
Well, one way He does it is by sending the Holy Spirit of God
who is the Comforter and the Spirit of God makes intercession
for us. He comes and overcomes our infirmities. And so the scripture says, seeing
then that we have a great high priest that's passed into the
heavens. We have a great high priest that's passed into the
heavens, Jesus, the Son of God. Hold fast your profession. If
you profess to believe this gospel and to know Christ, don't let
it go. Hold it fast. We have a high priest in glory.
He knows what you're troubled about. And He alone knows it. And He can help you. So go to
Him. Listen. He says, We have not
a high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our
infirmities, but was in all points tempted like as we are yet without
sin. Let us therefore come boldly.
Come knowing your welcome to the throne of grace that we may
obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. See, the
reason we have the Spirit to help our infirmities is because
Christ knows our infirmities. He's born of them. He's been
touched with them personally. And He's touched when He sees
one of His own touched with them now. So come to Him. But now
look, secondly, our text declares that the Holy Spirit helpeth.
He teaches us what we should pray. Verse 26, the Holy Spirit
helpeth our infirmities. The Spirit itself maketh intercession
for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. The Spirit helps
our infirmities by bringing to remembrance our God and His sovereign
power over all so that our hearts are settled. We get soul when
troubles come and we're all this way. Don't try to act like you're
stronger than your brother or something like that. Every one
of us are this way. When troubles come, it's trouble. God knows how much trouble to
put on you to make it trouble to you specifically. So when
it comes, it's going to be trouble to you. And when it does, we
become shaken, we think the world is just in free fall and everything
just happening out of order and we're going to be lost. And the
Spirit of God comes and reminds you God's sovereign. He's got
everything under control. He's working all this together
right here for you good, every bit of it. He knows what He's
doing. He's working it for His people,
just for His people. He's doing it all on purpose.
And He applies to our hearts the promises of the gospel. He
reminds us that Christ shed His blood for His elect. He reminds
you that we're redeemed by Christ. He reminds you that Christ, when
He died, He purchased His people. We're bought with a price, the
price of Christ's precious blood, and we belong to Christ. Nobody's
going to pluck us out of His hand. And the Spirit of God comes
and reminds us of that in the midst of our troubles. He's going
to use the gospel, He's going to use your brethren, He's going
to use... This is what we're here for. This is what Paul means. You that are strong, bear the
infirmities of the weak. When we're the weak and we're
tossed and we're in trouble, he's going to provide you a strong
brother that's settled to tell you these things and comfort
your heart. And the Spirit of God is going
to apply them to your heart and settle you. Settle you. So the Spirit of God sheds abroad
the love of God in our hearts. That's the first way. He overcomes
our infirmities by shedding the love of God abroad in our hearts.
Before we can hear the Spirit of God teach us what to pray,
we're going to have to be settled, sat down, our mouth shut, quit
running around like a chicken with our head cut off, thinking
the sky is falling. We're going to have to be sat
down and made to hear what God has to say. Right? That's what
he does. Now look. Paul says, "...the
Spirit itself maketh intercession for us." It means he teaches
us what to pray. He says there, "...the Spirit
maketh intercession for us, for we know not what to pray as we
ought." That's what it means. The Spirit makes intercession
for us. He teaches us in our hearts what to pray. What to
pray. You remember when the Lord Jesus
sent out His preachers? Go to Matthew 10. This will illustrate what Paul
is saying about the Spirit teaching us to pray. That's not the only
thing the Spirit teaches us. But look here at Matthew 10.
This will illustrate it. Matthew 10, 19. When the Lord
sent out His preachers, He warned His preachers at the end. He
warns His preachers now. Because you preach Christ and
have crucified, men are going to deliver you up to the councils,
to the civil councils to be tried, in courts of law, what have you.
That happened to the early apostles. That's going to happen again
to God's preachers. It has in the past. It's going to happen
again. It's just a matter of time. It's going to happen again.
But look here. You should be brought, verse
18, you should be brought before governors and kings for my sake,
for a testimony against them. and the Gentile, those that know
not God. But when they deliver you up, take no thought how or
what you shall speak, for it shall be given you in that same
hour what you shall speak. For it's not ye that speak, it's
not your wisdom, it's not your strength, it's not your ability,
but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you. See that? And likewise, Paul is saying,
when we're brought to the place... Well, take for instance, Apostle
Paul. When he was dead in sins, he saw all of Tarsus, he had
letters, he was on his way to Damascus to kill believers, and
Christ arrested him. Christ knocked him off his high
horse, literally into the dust and blinded him. And all he could
do was hear the voice of God. And that's the best thing that
happened to us. He blinds us from our religion being sight.
and makes it where all we can do is hear God speak. And that's
what he did to Paul. And when he did, he taught, the
Spirit came in and taught Paul what to pray. Because he had
never prayed before. When your children were born
and never spoken, you had to teach them, didn't you? The Spirit
of God had to teach Paul what to pray. And he came in and taught
him what to pray. Well, he says to you and me,
when we're brought to see how helpless we are all the time,
to see that we don't know what to pray. The Spirit of God enters
in and He teaches us what to pray. Just like when His preachers
would be brought and brought before kings and councils for
Christ's sake and they didn't know what to say. Christ said
the Spirit will enter in and He'll teach you what to say.
He'll give you the words to speak. And that's what Paul says happened
here. He enters in, He gives you the words to speak. He sprinkles
your heart from an evil conscience. All over again, just like He
did in the first hour. He has to purge your conscience
and clear out all that trash so that you can actually now
have some communion with God and speak. And He turns us from
making our prayer to be simply to consume it upon our lust.
Left to ourselves, that's how we pray. Everything we pray for
left to ourselves is just for our fleshly lust. Something that's
going to benefit us. That's all we want by nature.
That's the sin of our flesh. He's got to turn you from that
to want what God wants. And He's going to show you need.
He's going to stir us up to pray aright. And He's going to put
the right words in our mouth. Or in our, let me say this, in
our heart. He says there are groanings that
cannot be uttered. Now you hear what He's saying? He's
not saying He's going to put fancy pretty words in your mouth
and they're going to come out so eloquent and pretty. No, He's
going to put the right words in your heart and you're going
to groan and not even be able to speak a word. Christ taught us that God hears
our prayer because of our importunity. Do you remember that? Remember
that parable where he said the man's sitting on the door and
he's got guests, he's got nothing to feed them, he's got no bread
and he's knocking on his neighbor's door and the neighbor's gone
to sleep and the neighbor will get up. He doesn't get up because
he's his friend, he comes out because of his opportunity. He's
helpless, he needs help. Christ is telling us that's how
God's going to hear you when you're helpless. And so, importunate prayer is
heart prayer. It's groanings that can't be
put into words. It's the prayer that the Holy
Spirit puts in our hearts. Hannah prayed fervent prayer. She prayed importunate prayer. She could not have a child. And
for godly reasons, she wanted a child. And God put it in her
heart to pray aright. And she prayed aright. How do
you know she prayed aright? God heard her and gave her what
she prayed for. He gave her a son. But she didn't
speak a word. She didn't speak a word. Let's go back to 2 Corinthians
12. I want you to see this. Paul tells us when he prayed
amiss, he said the Holy Spirit taught him to pray aright. Taught
him to pray. Taught him not to pray for the
thorn to be removed. Taught him to depend on God's
grace to bear it. Taught him to thank God for the
thorn. Look at 2 Corinthians 12, 9. And he said unto me, how
do you think God said this to Paul? He said it through the
Holy Spirit. He spoke it in his heart. He
put it in his heart to know the truth. And he said, my grace
is sufficient for thee. For my strength is made perfect
in weakness. So then Paul begins to speak
a rite. He begins to pray a rite. What did he say? Most gladly
therefore I will rather glory in my infirmities that the power
of Christ may rest upon me. If I'm going to be made weak
so that Christ rests upon me and I have the power of Christ
resting upon me, I'll be happy to be made weak. That's what
Paul said. And he says, therefore I take pleasure in infirmities
and reproaches and necessities and persecution and distresses
for Christ's sake. Was it just that he enjoyed that
pain of those things? No. That's not what he's saying. He says, because when I'm weak,
then I'm strong. That's why I take pleasure in
my weaknesses, because that's when I see that Christ is the
power, God's grace is the power that sustains me. So the Spirit
taught Paul not to pray for the thorn to be removed, taught him
to pray for God's grace, and to thank God for the thorn, and
to thank God for the grace. You see that? So, here's one
thing we can learn from our text, brethren. Don't ever copy this
world's religion. And certainly don't copy their
manner of prayer. Whatever you do, prayer in religion
is a show in the flesh. Christ said, when thou prayest,
thou shall not be as the hypocrites are. They love to pray standing
in the synagogues. They love to pray when everybody
is in the synagogue in a congregation like this. They love to stand
up and pray. And they love to stand in the corner of the streets.
Why? That they may be seen of men. And He says, listen to this,
verily I say unto you, they have their reward. He is saying, that's
all they are going to get. That's it. That's what they wanted.
That was their reward to be seen of men. God said, I'm not going
to hear them. I'm not going to answer them.
I'm not going to give them anything. That's all they're going to get
is just being seen of men. That's it. But thou, when thou
prayest, enter thy closet. And when thou shut the door,
pray to the Father which is in secret. And thy Father which
seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. You can pray in
your closet in the middle of Times Square. You understand? You can enter
your closet and pray in the middle, surrounded by a multitude. And the Lord that sees in secret,
the Lord that sees the heart, it's in the heart where you pray. And the Lord that sees the heart.
will reward thee openly." But when you pray, he said also,
don't use vain repetitions as the heathen do. You know, the
whole bead rubbing thing and just repeating prayer and prayer
and prayer. You go to the wailing wall and
they're bowing up and down and up and down and up and down and
they think God's answering them. No, God ain't answering them.
They just got dizzy from bowing up and down and up and down.
You bow up and down enough, you'll get dizzy. You'll think something,
you'll think you're on a drug. He says, don't vainly repeat
things. Why? He said, your Father knows
what things you have need of before you ask Him. Get this
now. Don't miss this point. Prayer
is God teaching us to submit to Him and His will. That's what
prayer is. It's not us getting God to do
our will. That's not what prayer is. This
world says, oh, we got prayer captains lined up, prayer warriors
lined up, we're going to all get together and we're going
to all pray and we're going to get God to do what we want Him
to do. No, you're not. You might get the devil to give
you things and make you think God gave it to you, but you ain't
getting God to do anything because that ain't what prayer is about.
Prayer is God making you submit to His will. That's what prayer
is about. Our text is saying you can't
even pray unless the Spirit of God gives you what to pray. So
you see already, we see this thing is not us first going to
God, it's God coming to us first and putting a prayer in our heart
and bringing us into submission to Him. That's what true prayer
is. It's by the Spirit and it's in
the Spirit. It doesn't have anything to do
with the words that we speak necessarily or the posture that
we take. That doesn't have a thing to
do with it. You can pray driving down an interstate. You better
not close your eyes and bow your head. But you can pray to God
all you want to. You can pray to God in a restaurant,
in a crowded restaurant. I'll make it a point to try to
thank God for my food every time I eat in a crowded restaurant.
But you'd never know I prayed to God because I'm not going
to make a show out of it. It's not between me and you and
the people sitting around me slurping and burping. It's between
me and my God. Lord, thou hast heard the desire
of the humble. Thou wilt prepare their heart. and thou wilt cause thine ear
to hear." Lord, thou hast heard the desire of the humble, thou
wilt prepare their heart. That's how they got to be humble.
He prepared their heart and He caused His ear to hear. That's
true prayer. That's true prayer. Now listen
to this thirdly. God will hear because the Spirit
teaches us to pray according to God's will. Look at verse
27. God hears us because the Spirit of God teaches us to pray
according to God's will. He that searcheth the hearts,
that's God. That's Christ our Savior. He
already knows your heart. And He knows what is the mind
of the Spirit because the Spirit makes intercession for the saints
according to the will of God. See, God knows the heart. This
is why Christ said, Don't be like the world because the Father
knows what things you have need of before you ever ask Him. He
already knows what you need. The psalmist said, Lord, all
my desire is before Thee, listen to this, and my groaning is not
hid from Thee. These words that I can't even
speak is just a groan that the Spirit of God has put on my heart.
That's not hid from God. He hears that. He hears that. and he knows the mind of the
Spirit. That's what it means there. See
that? He that searches the heart knoweth
what is the mind of the Spirit. What does that mean? It doesn't
mean that God has a separate mind, the Spirit has a separate
mind, and they know each other's mind. God is one. God the Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit are one. So, of course, they have the
same mind. Whatever is the Spirit's mind, it's God the Father's mind. But here's what He's saying.
The Spirit of God puts a groan in our hearts. He puts the Word
in our hearts to pray. And that's what God already knows
that. He already knows that groan.
He knows what the Spirit has put on your heart. Because the
only thing the Spirit has put on your heart is what is God's
will to be put on your heart. You see? You get in the picture
here that prayer is not us first coming to God and just praying
to God what we want. Prayer is God coming to us and
the Spirit entering in and humbling our heart and settling our heart
and putting the Word in our heart that God wills for us to pray. And that's what we're going to
pray to God. It's what God wills us to pray. The Lord knows the
groaning. It's not hid. And the Lord knows
it not merely because He's omniscient. That means He knows everything.
He doesn't really know it just because of that, but it means
He regards it, and He approves of it, and He attends to it,
and He gives an answer to it. Why? Because it's His will. The
Spirit of God has put on our heart what is God's will. And
so He approves of what we're groaning. He approves of what...
That's what it means when it says He knows the minds of the
Spirit. He approves of what the Spirit's put on our heart. He
approves of the prayer He's put in our heart. Let me give you
a simple example. He knows... He knows... And He... Because the Spirit and God are
one. So He knows and He approves.
When Will was a baby, He would ask for things and he got to
that point where he could talk, you know, garbly, it was unintelligible. But he would just, boy, he would
just go to town like he was telling you a sentence and what he wanted
and we would all just sit and look at one another. We couldn't
understand what he was saying. Emma would turn around to us and go,
he said he wants to eat and when he gets finished he wants to
go outside. She knew what he was saying.
She knew his mind. It's like she was a baby talk
translator. She knew what he was saying.
And God knows what the Spirit puts on our heart because they're
one. And He approves of it. And He
regards it. And He hears it. He hears it. And here's the reason He hears.
Because the Spirit of God makes intercession for the saints according
to the will of God. Now, the first thing I want you
to see in that phrase is the Spirit only does this in the
hearts of the saints. He only does this in the hearts
of the saints. He doesn't do this in everybody's heart. Who's
a saint? Sanctification is what's taking
place to make us saints. All God's people are saints.
If you're born of God, even before you were born of God, you were
a saint in a sense. But God's saints are made saints
by God choosing us in Christ and setting us apart for His
holy use and declaring us to be holy. That was done in eternity. We've been saints from eternity.
And then we're made saints by Christ who He perfected by one
offering. He's perfected forever them that
are sanctified. We're sanctified by the will
of Christ performing the will of God on our behalf. And in
Christ we're perfectly holy. That's why He's made unto us
sanctification. Our sanctification is Him. We're
holy in Him. Perfectly holy in Him. And then
the Spirit of God sanctifies us when He comes and sets us
apart and declares us holy, creating a new holy man within us. And Christ is formed in our heart.
Then we're sanctified. That's who God does this for.
Those that are sanctified. And he says, and he puts in our
hearts a prayer, maybe it's unintelligible to man, maybe it's even unheard
by man, but it's according to the will of God, and God knows
it, God approves of it, and God answers it. You get that? It's not even spoken. Man never
hears it. You're the one that knows it
in your heart, because the Spirit of God put it there, and God
knows it. And it's God's will, and God
answers it, and approves of it. Remember Moses prayed, he prayed
that he might enter Canaan. And God denied him. And the Spirit
of God taught him it was God's will for Joshua to lead the children
of Israel into Canaan. And so Moses approved and he
prayed for Joshua because that was God's will. That man that
Christ healed, remember he said, Lord can I go with you and be
with you where you are? That was his prayer. That's what
he wanted. He asked Christ directly. That's a picture of us praying
to God. We want to be with you. We want to go. Christ said, No,
you can't go with me. You go home and tell them what
great things I've done for you. So then he knew the will of God.
He knew what God would have him to do. Now he can pray or write
according to what God's will is. Paul desired to go to Bithynia
to preach, but the Spirit forbid him, wouldn't allow him to go.
But then the Spirit made Paul hear a man over in Macedonia
saying, ìCome over, help us. Come over, help us.î And the
Spirit made him go that direction. So now Paul knew what to pray.
He knew to ask for help in Macedonia, not in Bithynia. When you hear these things, a
carnal man hears these things, heíll say, Well, you people say
God ordained everything and He's moving all things according to
His will and according to His eternal purpose. So, what's the
point of praying? What's the point of even praying
if you know God's going to do all these things and it's going
to be according to His will, nothing's out of His will, then
why even pray for these things? Faith knows this. Yeah, God ordained
it. God ordained it. And He also
ordained that we shall ask Him for it. You remember that in
Ezekiel? He told them beforehand everything
he was going to do, and then he said, but you're going to
inquire of me for this. So that's what prayer is. It's
God already ordained what he's going to do, then he puts in
your heart to ask God to do what he already willed to do. That's why, look at our text
right here. You wonder why the translators
had the sense to connect our text with verse 28, and we know
that all things work together for good to them that love God,
to them who are called according to His purpose. Why do they connect
that with this? Because this is how we know. The Spirit put it on our heart
to know God's will. That's the only thing that the
Spirit of God is going to let you pray for. It's God's will.
Now, we might pray in our flesh and it be not God's will, but
when we start praying God's will from our heart, it's what God
already ordained and what He's going to bring to pass. And so
we know all things are going to work together for our good
to us that love God right according to His purpose. Spurgeon said
this, a believer's prayers are the indicators of the movement
of the wheels of providence. He said, believing supplications
are forecasts of the future. Believing prayer where God's
put prayer on the heart. That's the forecast of what's
about to take place Because God only puts on your heart what
he's going to bring to pass you get that I? Pray God now help
us really pray and really pray all right for the heart