Heads-up people: Mark, living in good Ol’ Scotland, and blogging in madetopraisehim has a great post entitled “When we shouldn’t ask“. In it he proposes that much of our shortcomings in being effective Kingdom Ambassadors may stem from asking the Father for stuff He has already given us, or asking Him to do stuff that we should be doing ourselves with the authority that He has given us. Focusing on healing, he says:
Pop quiz anyone? How many times in the Bible did Jesus pray for the sick? Um. Yes. It is a trick question. Jesus never prayed for the sick: he healed them. He didn’t petition His Father to do what he’d been asked to do.
He didn’t send out the twelve, and later on send the seventy-two, with instructions to petition Father to heal the sick. He sent them out with a commission which included healing the sick themselves. He gave them the authority to do it having also shown them the model for using it.
He didn’t commission the church with an instruction to petition Father to heal the sick either. He gave us His authority to do it ourselves having also shown us the same model in His own life and in the lives of the twelve and the seventy-two.
WOW. How often do I fall for that one? Why is it so hard to get a hold of the truth that Jesus gave us the tools, and then he said, “Just do it!” ?
Thanks John
There’s also an interesting discussion going on in the comments of that post about what authority looks like in practice. Would love to hear your thoughts.