Progressively many of us have broken through to a freedom in intercession, but there may yet be a struggle before we enter into the next level. This simple message may help you to understand the more effective intercession that lies ahead.
The next phase of intercession will require a greater awareness of the Lord through worship. Intercession has been effective to deliver us from demonic oppression, spiritual heaviness, or the lukewarm Laodicean spirit. Without wholehearted intercession, our walk with God would have cooled off and become sectarian. We could have fallen into a rut, even though the moving of the Lord in our singing in the Spirit and prophesying had first delivered us out of the many ruts in the old church services. Now the intense intercession which has broken us out of a rut of passivity could become a rut, too.
What is the highest level that we should have in our walk with God? The concept of many Christians is that they “feel the call, and go to work for Jesus.” I do not say that this is such a bad idea. If you are living on this level of dedication, this is what you should do. However, this dedication fails when there is so much human initiative involved that there can also be ambition and self-seeking. Someone may have a very sincere call of God initially, but he may soon regress into building himself a name and a reputation too. It is easy to become very professional, seeking to prosper financially and materially. But let us give him credit—he is working for Jesus. He is also working for himself.
We cry and yearn for the restoration of scriptural truths, for the experiences and abilities which come by the Holy Spirit, but mostly for holy discipleship as it was at the beginning of the early Church. We yearn to break through to this pure quality in our walk with God. How can we tolerate our existence if we do not break through to what God has called us to be before Him? This is not a fleshly ambition; our hunger and yearning is for the Lord.
Our vision should not be to work for Jesus, nor even to have the concept of working for the Kingdom. We should not have the limited idea that we are working for the church, or that we are working for the publication of today’s Living Word. Paul gave this little hint about what our attitude should be: And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus… Colossians 3:17. Of course we accomplish our work in His name because we cannot do it otherwise, but it means also that we look for a relationship with the Lord in our work.
To explain this further, let us look at Isaiah 26:12, a prophecy of what was to come: Lord … thou also hast wrought all our works in us. Philippians 2:13 tells us, For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. This simply means that He not only works in you the will to do what pleases Him, but He also works in you the performance of it. The doing of the will of God not only involves what is done within your own life, but what is done through your life. God is working in you “to will and to do of His good pleasure.”
The first commissions for the disciples were wonderful during the time when Christ walked with them on the earth. They had cast out devils and healed the sick (Mark 6:13). They were very much impressed, but they could not go forth “into all the world” (Mark 16:15) until something further happened in them. This commission was not to be obeyed until they had tarried in Jerusalem and were “endued with power from on high” (Luke 24:49). They were told that the Holy Spirit was with them and would be in them (John 14:17). They would not be using the Holy Spirit to do something, but they would find the Holy Spirit working through them. He was to be in them.
This very important truth is the key of Christ coming forth in His many-membered Body (I Corinthians 12). Any concept that we are working for Jesus Christ must disappear. Let us believe for Jesus Christ to come forth in us, through the works that we do, and through the words that we speak. We must have an infusion of God within us. We are to draw from Him to do works, but it is to be God within us who does them (John 14:10).
Keep in mind that this is a message on intercession, and we are leading up to that point. In I Corinthians 3:9 we read what Paul wrote to the church: For we are God’s fellow-workers… God was working, and they were working with Him. Notice the important little phrase which occurs in II Corinthians 6:1: “working together with Him.”
Note in II Corinthians 5:20: Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were entreating through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. God was entreating through them. He was speaking through them. They were not working for the Lord; they were working with Him. They were fellow-workers with God. Remember these phrases.
In a related Scripture in the book of Colossians, Paul declares, And we proclaim Him, admonishing every man and teaching every man with all wisdom, that we may present every man complete in Christ. And for this purpose also I labor, striving according to His power, which mightily works within me. Colossians 1:28–29.
The Scriptures have given us a sufficient foundation for our wholehearted understanding of what it means to work with Christ. The difference between working for or with Jesus may seem like a pointless technicality, but it is not. Have you ever heard someone say, “I have a good feeling when I go out and work for Jesus”? We are not working to have a good feeling. The Lord must be working in us, and He must be working through us.
The book of Acts starts out with a beautiful picture of Jesus working: The first account I composed, Theophilus, about all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when He was taken up, after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen. Acts 1:1–2. Luke was writing about the Gospel he had written concerning “all that Jesus began to do and teach until the day He was taken up.”
In Acts 1:4 we read that Jesus gathered the disciples together and told them, “Wait for the promise of the Father which you heard from Me.” The second chapter of Acts tells how the Holy Spirit came and literally possessed and filled every one of them. Why was this necessary? This was the only way that the ministry of Jesus Christ would be continued. By the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, the authority, the words, and all the richness of Christ was to flow through these humble vessels.
God did not try to choose men with excellent qualifications, and then tell them, “Now, you do it.” He chose fishermen, a tax collector, and a few other types. Fishing for a living does not require great intellect. A tax collector has some mental abilities, but is he that considerate of anyone in need? He will take all he can get, which is the opposite of someone you would expect the Lord to choose to write the Gospel of Matthew. The men whom Christ chose did not excel in their natural qualifications. In fact, their opponents and critics, who were mystified at the amazing work they were doing, marveled “that they were unlearned and ignorant men” (Acts 4:13).
By some people’s evaluation, we might be called ignorant and unlearned, too. The wise of this world would refer to us as foolish. In the first chapter of I Corinthians we see that God has made the foolishness of this world to be His wisdom. He has made wise men stumble in their own folly. We should not be bothered by any lack of abilities—it will lead to our having a wonderful treasure. As men look upon us, they will see in us the glorious face of Jesus Christ coming forth in all of His glory, but they will not be distracted by any excellence in the vessel. We are earthen vessels, as we were told: But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. II Corinthians 4:7.
Paul had said, Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think anything as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God; who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament (new covenant). II Corinthians 3:5–6a. The important thing was what God had put within Paul and had become within him. The reference to God here means the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit comes to bring the authority of Christ through the vessel; and the Holy Spirit comes in order to bring the glorifying of the Father and for His will to be done.
We are coming to an important truth here. The Kingdom will not come forth in any measure by our working for Jesus, but by Him possessing us, indwelling us, and by our obedience and submission to Him. Any little child knows this, but rarely does a mature mind understand this truth. When a little child says, “Come into my heart, Lord Jesus,” he seems to understand what he is saying. He feels it. The indwelling Christ is the key of all victory. The indwelling Christ is also the key of the words that come forth through the vessel.
The disciples were warned that when they went forth they were not to give thought to what they would say when they were brought before the magistrates, because a word of wisdom, an anointing, a prophetic flow would come in that hour (Luke 21:12–15). Through the years I have learned that it is not the well-prepared sermon that seems to move anyone, but the fact that the one who brings the Word has waited on the Lord, so that He comes forth. I have said many times that the preparation to preach is not study, but waiting on the Lord until He fills our very being and the worship comes forth. We must look to the Lord and enter His presence.
We have struggled to get into the liberty and flow to sing and worship the Lord as we do now. But do you know how true worship is described in the Scriptures? Hebrews 2:12 says that in the midst of His brethren, Christ will sing praises. Colossians 3:16 says to “let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly”; then you will speak to one another with “psalms and hymns and spiritual songs.” Until we see this indwelling Christ, we cannot worship or do anything else completely right.
There are various degrees of dedication. We should thank God for everyone who is working for the Lord Jesus today—to whatever degree of dedication they have to Him—even those who are so Babylonian that they are commercial in their efforts. Let us thank God for all His people who have found Him to any degree. But we should not be content with thanking God that they have a little. Let us cry with the Holy Spirit, “Come out of her, My people. Come out of her, My people. Be not a partaker of her plagues and of her sins” (Revelation 18:4). This should be the burden of our hearts, rather than to condemn or to bring judgment upon those in Babylon. If God would bring judgment on all Babylon now, millions of people whom God has touched would be destroyed. He has met them in Babylon, and He wants to bring them out. We will not reach them by giving them more propaganda—they have had too much propaganda already. There is a way by which Christ and the Father can bring a revelation to the hearts of these people.
Now we are ready to study some truths on intercession. Keep in mind that all of this is one message, and it is foundational to intercession. Much of our intercession has been interceding to God instead of reaching into the higher level of intercession which is the ministry of Christ and of the Holy Spirit. Christ “ever lives to make intercession” for us (Hebrews 7:25). When we wait on the Lord and tune in to Him, we become a part of what Christ is doing and what the Holy Spirit is doing. Then we are not trying to pray to God. Otherwise our earnest intercession might seem as if we are throwing rocks at God. We cannot get anywhere with that attitude.
When I was a small child living on a farm, I loved going outside to play “catch” with God. I would throw a ball up in the air, and then I would catch it. God always threw the ball back. You will find that He will do the same to you. If you throw a rock at God, it will come right back at you. Do not be guilty of this. However, you should be very earnest as you intercede, because the Lord loves an intense approach, that agonizing intercession. Still we must reach into a higher plane of intercession. The prayers that count are the prayers that reach into what God is praying for and what He is doing. Then we will be laboring together with God, reaching into His perfect will. Let us not pray, “Lord, if it be Thy will…” Let us find the will of the Lord.
The command in Ephesians 5:17 is this: Wherefore be ye not foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. This is why intercession does not need to be long. With faith we can break through in worship until His presence and indwelling become very real. Then our intercession may be violent, or quiet; it may be in song, or in many other ways. Regardless, it will be more an expression with Christ to bring His will forth. Our intercession will be an expression of the Holy Spirit.
Romans 8 is a chapter that deals with the great manifestation of the sons of God. It speaks about creation being delivered from slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. Verse 21. How we love this truth! Romans 8:16–17 tells us, The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow-heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. This is not suffering for Christ, but suffering with Christ. We do not have a kingdom ourselves—we share His Kingdom! This preposition “with” is to be noted very carefully. By this we see that everything God does is to draw us into and make us a part of what He is doing. What we are becoming in Christ and what Christ is becoming in us is a key of what will take place in all creation. Therefore we must come into that freedom of the glory of the sons of God.
Verse 22 tells how creation groans. Then we see the complete picture of our intercession in verse 23: And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. We pray for resurrection life and for the redemption of our body. We look for the promises in Romans 8, groaning because of the firstfruits of the Spirit that is in us. The Holy Spirit in us provokes our intercession. Intercession comes not because we hear a sermon about it and are sold on it, but because the Holy Spirit within us creates the groaning.
Verses 26–27 speak of this groaning: And in the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; and He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. Even when you do not know what to intercede for, the Holy Spirit within you makes groanings and cryings out. This deep intensity of burden which comes by the Holy Spirit is the basis of intercession. If there is not the groaning of the Spirit, you can question the effectiveness of the intercession. No matter how earnest intercession is, it will not be effective until the burden and the groaning of the Holy Spirit within you has become your burden and your groaning. When it becomes your burden and your groaning, it will reach God.
The human reaction is, “This is not what I want. I want to throw off any heaviness!” Our greatest example of heaviness in intercession took place in the Garden of Gethsemane. There Christ asked three disciples to pray while He went on a little further and fell agonizing before the Father. Perhaps no prayer was ever this heartrending—“He sweat as it were great drops of blood” (Luke 22:44). How can we understand the intensity! Was this a rupture of blood vessels in His body? What caused His intense agony as He approached the hour of the cross? When He came back to His disciples and found them asleep, He said, “Could you not watch with Me one hour?” (Mark 14:37.) Their human flesh was not able to enter into the sufferings and intercession of Christ.
How different they were after the day of Pentecost! The Holy Spirit within them then enabled them to become great men of prayer, contending before the face of God—interceding. Then they were able to suffer with Christ, so that they might reign with Him (Romans 8:17). We cannot overestimate the value of leading believers into the fullness of the Holy Spirit and into submission to the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Then Christ can come forth in them; and all their works which are wrought within them or through them will be wrought in God.
Let us see how the Holy Spirit generates our intercession. Romans 8:34–39: Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us. (Christ intercedes for us.) Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? (It is impossible to separate us from His love. We are one with it. It is within us.) Just as it is written, “For Thy sake we are being put to death all day long; we were considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. (We, like Paul, are conquering through Him who loved us.) For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Without regarding the chapter break, notice how Paul was still talking about intercession in Romans 9:1–3. I am telling the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh. Paul was speaking about his kinsmen, the Jews; he was willing even to give himself to destruction and to be separated from Christ, if this would save his brethren. This is true intercession, which of course, is what Christ did when He came down and was even willing to be alienated from the Father. Jesus, seeing the Father turn away from Him, said, “My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?” Mark 15:34b. How great was His love for us and His desire to be one with us!
Our deep burdens of intercession and prayer can go beyond our human understanding. We are moved with Christ’s compassion; we are moved with His love. We are moved with the burden for His Kingdom to come forth. This is the truest, highest level of intercession that we can ever visualize. We must not quench or grieve the Holy Spirit. We must be filled with the Spirit!
Do you understand that Christ must dwell in you richly? Everything that springs forth must come through your yieldedness and appropriation of His very life. This is a simple process of yielding to the Lord and believing Him, a process of becoming led by the Spirit. This is the plumb line we see in Romans 8:14: For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. Your walk with God comes by His leading. How does He lead you? Not by a pillar of fire. Not by a cloud. He leads you by the Holy Spirit within you. Isaiah 30:21 says that you will hear His voice behind you saying, “This is the way, walk in it,” when you would turn to the right or to the left. Christ is so with you that He is guiding you. He is strengthening you.
In Zechariah 2:5 we read, For I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about, and will be the glory in the midst of her. It is not enough to be surrounded by protection; our immunity also comes by the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit. In I John 4:4b we read, Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world. In I John 5:4 we read, For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.
Paul said, I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. I do not frustrate the grace of God.… Galatians 2:20–21. If you have a legalistic sense of duty of what you are to do, you have positioned yourself in a life apart from God. Then you are trying to do God’s work for Him, and this you will not be able to do. The only way is by appropriating Christ’s fullness.
When Goliath bellowed down through the valley that he would give David’s flesh to the fowls of the air and the beasts of the field, David said, “You come against me with sword and spear, but I come against you in the name of the Lord” (I Samuel 17:45). David had a deep faith in his heart and a strong anointing of the Lord, though he may not have understood technically what it meant to be filled with the Holy Spirit. There has been much teaching that no one was ever filled with the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. I do not believe this teaching, because I see in the Old Testament that the Holy Spirit did come within men; and they arose to accomplish fantastic feats.
The Holy Spirit filled many people before the day of Pentecost. For instance, John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit from his mother’s womb (Luke 1:15). The fullness of the Holy Spirit happened to Ezekiel and other prophets. Samson is a different example. He was not morally strong; in fact, he was immoral. What was the key to his physical strength? He had been a Nazarite with long hair. Many had been Nazarites with long hair, but without that gift of strength. Nevertheless, his long hair was the sign of a covenant with God. In Judges 14:5–6 we read that “the Spirit of the Lord came mightily upon Samson” so that he was able to rend a lion. When the Philistines tried to keep him in their town to kill him, he picked up the tremendous gates of the city and carried them to a hilltop miles away (Judges 16:3). The Spirit of the Lord came upon him many times to do great things, but I do not believe that the Spirit was dwelling within him to accomplish them.
Many other men in the Bible were filled with the Holy Spirit, and they walked in that fullness. This is what we are speaking about, which is even greater than having Him with you. The disciples did tremendous things when the Spirit was with them; and if the Spirit is with you, you can be very effective. However, you will be more effective when you believe that you are not just working for the Lord, but you are working with Him; and His indwelling presence is brought into the situation.
When this comes forth, you become aware of your human inadequacy. You see nothing in yourself, humanly speaking, to accomplish the work. Only Christ in you can bring it forth. Paul said, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13). We must have this beautiful concept. Paul prayed for the Ephesians: … be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man; so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fulness of God. Ephesians 3:16–19. It is not that we must have human understanding, but rather that the Spirit of the Lord moves within us, so that wisdom and utterance are born of the Spirit. How much more must we have this in our intercession!
When you are learning to wait on the Lord, you may find it beneficial to speak in tongues. As you do, you will be exercising your will to not pray at your own initiative. Usually when we pray, we have already decided what we want to say and what we want God to do. We have a shopping list when we ring the doorbell of heaven, “This is what I would like to have, Lord. Please give it to me!” We do not always receive as much from this approach as we do when we intercede by the Spirit of the Lord. When you pray in tongues you are “giving thanks well” (I Corinthians 14:17). In the Spirit you are speaking mysteries (I Corinthians 14:2). You have relinquished the initiative of your own thought for that moment, and so this is a good exercise.
Pray with your understanding, and pray prophetically; but sometimes for a breakthrough, pray in an intermediate stage where your own mind is not determining what your prayers and worship will be. Let the Holy Spirit within you come from your heart through your lips to “give thanks well.” This type of prayer in the Spirit is a beautiful exercise.
Paul censured the Corinthians for using tongues too much in the church assembly, for this reason: … those that are unlearned, or unbelievers, will they not say that ye are mad? I Corinthians 14:23. He also said in verse 18: I thank my God, I speak with tongues more than ye all. By this, I think Paul meant that much of the prophetic flow came from the anointing of the Holy Spirit within himself, from the indwelling Spirit who gave thanks and praise continually.
Your own emotions, your own burden, and your own perspective can so overwhelm you that your prayers are colored. Your prayers may even become a little vindictive or vicious. Shift from this soul level and break through to the spirit level, and you can do this by praying in other tongues. Is it correct to pray in tongues? It must be because it is according to the principle of Christ and the Holy Spirit speaking and moving through you.
What is the highest level of utterance that comes? Paul wrote this to the Corinthian church: since you are seeking for proof of the Christ who speaks in me… II Corinthians 13:3. Paul was answering their challenge to his apostleship. He was troubled because they were not accepting the fact that Christ was speaking through him. Is it too much to assume that Christ can speak through you? No, it is not.
Paul wrote of the time he had come to the Corinthian church: And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power: that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. I Corinthians 2:4–5. Paul carefully gave himself to the flow of God ministering through him, so that it would be a miracle flow from within.
Let our prophecies be an inner well flowing—rivers of living water coming forth because we have drunk of the Spirit. When we have received of the Spirit, then out of this flow of the Spirit we can give a life-giving flow of revelation and deliverance to others.
The day will come when we will look back on these days and marvel, “We thought we had so much. We thought we were really moving in God, and we were; but it was just the beginning of something greater.” Let us yearn for the days of the fullness of the Lord’s presence—the days when He completely possesses His people. This, of course, will be the key of the beautiful worship and the effective intercession that will come.
The day will come when we will look back at the way we have praised God, sought Him, and interceded from our own human inspiration; and we will say, “It was not enough!” We will strive with all of our hearts to be found only with the Lord Jesus Christ moving through us. Let this Word be sealed to our hearts like a burning fire shut up in our bones, so that we will strive to reach to this more excellent way of intercession.
We are thankful for our former way of intercession. Let us not condemn the intense intercession that jarred us out of ruts which would have been our grave. We thank the Lord for breakthrough after breakthrough, for the dynamite of intercession which broke the indifferent, heavy spirit of this age. Now let us strive to take the next step in Him, so that we are found in Him and He in us, and that we rejoice as we speak the Word of the Lord to one another. Let us be intercessors with the Lord. What a solemn responsibility, but let us accept it.
This sermon can be interpreted in two ways. Those who are restrained and have drawn back from wholehearted intercession would say, “Yes, I knew that there was something wrong with it all the time.” Others who have been intense in their intercession may think, “This will put a restraint on me.” Possibly it will. If you have the vision of moving to the higher level, you will find it difficult to shift your approach.
Every step God sets before us will seem difficult, but we can strive and ultimately walk in each new step. This step of interceding with Christ is “meat in due season” for us. We should be able to walk in it quickly.
First find a place alone with the Lord. Then spend some time going over these Scriptures; also pray and sing in tongues, until your thoughts and burdens shift to the Holy Spirit’s leading. Then move in a prophetic flow of prayer, and you will marvel at how strong and how effective your praying will be because the day of boldness has come. Next you will see that your prayers have been fulfilled.
We have interceded much, but we need to be more effective. Much has happened, and much has not. There has been a great deal of effort for the returns we have received. Let us seek to become more efficient in our intercession. It will be like “entering into His rest and ceasing from our labors as God also did from His” (Hebrews 4:10). This means ceasing from our laboring until God is laboring through us to accomplish those things that He ordained that we should walk in. He intended to live in us, to work through us, and to bring forth the destiny of the universe through a people that He filled. He intended to go in them to bring forth His will. God works in you.