Pray: In Jesus' Name - John 14:13-14


 I don’t know if children still do this, but when I was a kid my friend and I would often talk about what we would wish for if we discovered a genie’s lamp or some other way of making wishes.  We didn’t always agree on what we would wish for, other than the first wish.  Our first wish, if we were granted three wishes, was always for unlimited wishes.  I remember saying I would wish to be a superhero—for me it was not Superman or Spiderman, it was to have the powers of Green Lantern or the arsenal and skill of Green Arrow.  There were wishes to own a private island—along the lines of Gilligan’s Island—I never understood why he wanted to escape from that tropical paradise.  As I grew older the wishes became a little more realistic, you know wishes for cars like a candy-apple red ’65 Mustang, a DeLorean, or a hearse, or wishes for a particular girlfriend.  I think we have all, at some point in our lives if we are completely honest, had those fanciful witnesses.

As we become adults, those wishes become more focused on the reality of our lives and situations.  We may wish for a new job or a promotion.  We may wish for a vacation.  We may wish for enough money to be able to pay off all our bills.  We may wish for our children to make good decisions.  We may wish for a relationship to be restored.  We may wish for the doctors to be able to figure out what is wrong with us.  We may wish for a loved one to get well.  Often, for those who have come into a relationship with God, those wishes turn into prayers.  We pray for the new job or promotion.  We pray for vacations.  We pray for more income.  We pray for the doctor’s wisdom.  We pray for folks to be cured.

And then it happens…our archrival gets the job we applied for…we are demoted…we are laid off.  Medical bills and emergency repairs eat way the vacation time and money, leaving us with more bills.  Our children make poor choices.  Divorce happens.  The doctors tell us they have no idea what is making us sick…they’ll have to run more tests.  We watch as they lower the casket of the person that has meant so much to our lives.

When these things happen—when our petitions before God go unanswered—we may let our faith begin to waver because we don’t understand.  Didn’t Jesus say, “I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son.  If in my name you ask me for anything, I will do it.”  We did that, didn’t we?  We prayed in Jesus name.  We remember it clearly.  We said, “Dear God, Please get me this job, let me take this vacation, help my kids make good decisions, reveal to the doctors what is going on, heal my friend, in Jesus’s Name, Amen.”  We did just what Jesus directed.  So what’s the problem?  Why didn’t we get what we wanted?  Did we do something wrong?

Unfortunately, there are some out there that will tell us it is because we just didn’t believe strong enough or that we didn’t have enough faith.  They’ll quote us the Scripture, “…truly I tell you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you…,”[i]so if what we sought from God didn’t come to pass, it was because you and I didn’t have enough faith.  They’ll remind us of the Scripture that says, “whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”[ii]  They will point to “ask and it will be given,”[iii] suggesting that maybe we didn’t ask correctly.  They will even point to this passage and maybe even question whether or not we remembered to make our request, “in Jesus’ Name.”

The problem is, my brothers and sisters, praying is not like rubbing a genie’s lamp and being granted three, or even unlimited, wishes.  Adding “in Jesus’ Name” on to the end of a prayer is not like “abracadabra,” “open sesame,” “please,” or some other magic word.  Praying “in the Name of Jesus” is not praying a self-seeking prayer, but a self-surrendering prayer.

When Jesus taught on the mountainside as related in the Gospel of Matthew and told the people to, “ask, seek, and knock,” and know that they will “receive, find, and find doors opened,” he was following up on the previous verses where Jesus had told the people that there was no need to worry, that God knew their needs, and that if they first sought God’s Kingdom and God’s Righteousness, that they would find their needs met…and so reading “ask, seek, and knock” in context leads us to understand that what we are asking, seeking, and knocking for will be in accordance with the Kingdom and Righteousness of God.  Then we trust in God to meet our true needs.

When Jesus is telling the disciples to believe that they have received whatever it is they have asked for in prayer, he was not telling them some magic formula for making sure your prayers are heard and answered, but he was telling them not to be surprised that God will answer their prayers.

The same can be said for when Jesus was explaining that “if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you can move mountains….”  It was about praying and trusting God to do the work that needed to be done.

It’s kind of like the story of the congregation in the middle of a drought that prayed for rain and the following Sunday only one little old lady brought her umbrella—the pastor dismissed the rest of the congregation as those who, evidently, did not believe that God would answer their prayers.  Jesus is telling the disciples that if they believe it is worth lifting before God, then believe that God is going to act.

With that said, there must be something more than a magic formula when praying “in Jesus Name.”  There is.  Looking to the larger context of these verses, we find them at the conclusion of the section in which Jesus is assuring the disciples that the work that He has been about is the work of God the Father working through Him…that all that He has been about is God’s work, and that when He departs, they will continue to do the Father’s work, and they will be able to accomplish even greater things than they have already seen and done with Jesus, because they will be acting in accordance with the will of God, and He will see it through.  In that context, Jesus is telling them, “when you are seeking to do the work of the Father, ask for support in my name, and I will be there to fill you.  Do the things that I have done, pray as I have prayed, and know that I will act.”

Praying “in Jesus’ Name” is about praying in the manner and with the attitude of Jesus.  It is about praying that God may be glorified in whatever happens, and that He might be glorified through us.  It is about lifting to God, and it is okay to do so, what we desire, “if it be possible, let this cup pass from us,” but when all is said and done, “not my will, but yours be done.”

Returning to the understanding from last week that to “pray without ceasing” is not about worrying God to death to change His mind, but a constant state of awareness of God’s presence with us, that He might change us, we find that to pray “in Jesus’ Name” is not an act of assertion of our will upon God’s actions, it is a surrender of our will to God’s Will.  It is surrendering, with the assurance that whatever happens, is for God’s glory.  It means when we bring before God our petitions, we are (1) asking God to use us in each situation we lift to him in such a way that we continue the ministry and mission of Christ, and (2) that we trust that whatever the answer God gives, it will be for His Glory.

That means when we pray for a new job, that we pray realizing that the new job is a way of God opening the door for us to do further work for His Kingdom and that the lack of a new job is because there is other Kingdom work that God has in store for us…that granted vacation time is for a Sabbath rest to prepare us for Kingdom work before us, and that a lack of vacation means that there is Kingdom work to be completed now…that good decisions or bad decisions, restorations or allowed brokenness, cures or physical death…all are open doors for us to continue the work of Jesus in revealing the Kingdom of God in this world through us…they are opportunities for God to be glorified.

My brothers and sisters, let us continually surrender our wills to God as we pray “in Jesus’ Name” knowing that “all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.”[iv]

In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.


[i] Matthew 17:20
[ii] Mark 11:24
[iii] Matthew 7:7
[iv] Romans 8:28

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