Our Identity in Christ, the Armor of God
Prayer
Ephesians 6:18
praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints
Matthew 9:36
But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd.
Matthew 14:14
And when Jesus went out He saw a great multitude; and He was moved with compassion for them, and healed their sick.
Many of the wrongs people do are attempts to alleviate personal suffering. Many addictions start with trying to medicate physical or emotional pain. We try to be compassionate to ourselves but often get it wrong. The compassion of Jesus always gets it right. Jesus has empathy for us that he feels in the deepest part, as if our suffering were his own. Our attempts at self-medication often result in guilt and give rise to feelings of shame and self-disdain. The compassion of Jesus is pity without disdain that motivates action on our behalf from the God of all wisdom whose perfect love casts out all fear.
Matthew 15:32
Now Jesus called his disciples to Himself and said, “I have compassion on the multitude because they have now continued with me three days and have nothing to eat and I do not want to send them away hungry, lest they faint on the way.
Mark 1:40-42
Now a leper came to Him, imploring Him, kneeling down to Him and saying to Him, “If You are willing, You can make me clean.”
Then Jesus, moved with compassion, stretched out His hand and touched him, and said to him, “I am willing; be cleansed.” As soon as He had spoken, immediately the leprosy left him, and he was cleansed.
When Jesus healed the leper it says that Jesus was moved by compassion to touch him. A leper could not be touched. Who knows how long it had been since that man had felt human touch? Jesus could have healed him from a distance but this man had another need that Jesus immediately met with the touch of his hand.
Luke 23:33-34
And when they had come to the place called Calvary, there they crucified Him, and the criminals, one on the right hand and the other on the left. Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.”
After suffering rejection, betrayal and humiliation, after being beaten and reviled by those he came to save Jesus’ final prayer for us was that the Father should forgive us. His reason for forgiveness is our ignorance. The Jews who condemned and the Romans who crucified had no understanding of their action’s place in redemptive history. We stand in the same need of forgiveness. We have the same lack of understanding and the same Jesus forgives us just as he did them.
Romans 8:34
It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us.
John 17:20-21
“I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me.
This is Jesus’ intercession for us that we would love one another as closely and thoroughly as the Father loves the Son. What a heaven on earth will arise among us as we align our wills with His perfect will.
1John 5:14
Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.
Hebrews 4:14-16
Seeing then that we have a great High Priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
It is God’s nature to be compassionate. It is His desire to forgive. With reverent fear and yet with bold confidence that He is who He says He is, we come with nothing and are given everything. Let us therefore pray.
brotherpayne 