When we have finished the preaching of the Word of God in worship each week, we close that portion of the service in prayer. In this case, it is a prayer of intercession. We bring our requests to God. We pray that the Word that has just been preached will be effective to do its work in us by the power of the Holy Spirit. We then pray for the missionary or missions organization for the month and for the family of the week in our church. We also lift up other important concerns that may be acute that week.

Prayers of intercession aren’t about making sure God knows our needs. The omniscient God has no need to be informed or reminded of anything. Our offering up of our requests is an act of humble submission and an expression of reliance upon God. It is a reminder to us that he is our Father and our God and that he has invited us to bring our needs to him. It is a reminder of his own faithfulness and expressed desire and intention to provide for us. In short, it is an act of faith on our part to bring our needs to him. We know only he is powerful to provide. And we know that he is motivated by his love of us to provide for us. And so we gladly take our requests to him in humble reliance upon his divine grace.

We close this prayer with the Lord’s Prayer from the Gospel of Matthew. In repeating this prayer each week we have prayer modeled for us as Christ taught his disciples. This text will be the basis for an upcoming sermon in which we will consider briefly each clause and what it teaches about prayer.

Next week we will consider the Apostles’ Creed which we say together in worship each week. 

I hope to see you Sunday,
Pastor Matt