What Happens to Our Prayers?

Here's a question for you: What happens to our prayers once they have been heard and answered by God? They have completed their purpose and are just notations in our prayer journals, right?

No, actually, our prayers don't stop there. In His gracious economy, God has a further purpose for our prayers.

Revelation 5 gives us some insight into this. As John watched, a scroll was presented, but there was no one found in heaven or on earth or under the earth who was worthy to open it. John wept and wept,  until one of the elders pointed out the Lion/Lamb to him. He came and took the scroll from the right hand of him who sat on the throne. And when he had taken it, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb. Each one had a harp, and they were holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song:
"You are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seal,
because you were slain,
and with your blood you purchased men for God
from every tribe and language and people and nation.
You have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God,
and they will reign on the earth" (5:7-10).

Our prayers are incense, filling the bowls of the elders in heaven! He has made of us, His saints, a kingdom and priests to serve Him. Our prayers -- prayers of praise to God and petition for ourselves and our world -- are sweet smelling offerings to God, used in worship of Him. Not only has He redeemed us by His blood, He cherishes our prayers and repurposes them for heavenly worship!

God Has Revealed Himself

from Thompson Chain-Reference Bible, NIV, copyright 1983

Over one-third of my 1900-page Thompson Chain-Reference Bible is study helps. I have always loved this Bible, with Jesus' words in red letters, chain references running down the outside columns of each page, concordance, maps, and tables in the back. I purchased my Bible in October of 1983, thirty years ago, when this edition had just come out.

I've filled up most of the blank pages in the front and back with quotes and notes from messages, and nearly every book has passages highlighted and comments scrawled in the margins. I had to have the cover replaced years ago. Instead of the lovely calfskin it used to be covered in it now has an impervious binding made from some hearty animal in Idaho that had already lived a good, long life! It doesn't have a dainty look, to be sure, but I've been told that you shouldn't judge a book by its cover. And what's inside is pretty good stuff!

So I was browsing through the helps at the back of the Bible the other day and I came across the Seven Editions of the Divine Law. It is an illustration of God's gradual revelation and the publication of his law. Step by step -- from the display of his workmanship in creation, to the law he has written on each person's conscience, to the tablets he inscribed for Moses, to Jesus, the Living Word, to the collection of all the scriptures we call our Bible, to the gospel written on our hearts, to believers being living epistles to the world around us -- God has revealed himself in every way possible.

Let's look at each of these seven "editions of the divine law" that are mentioned here, and the scripture that goes with each one. It may give you fresh insight into God's revelation of himself, and it might give you a way to share with others when they think there is no evidence for God's existence.

1. Written on Nature -- The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands (Psalm 19:1).

2. Written on Conscience -- Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law, since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them (Romans 2:14-15).

3. Written on Tablets of Stone -- The Lord said to Moses, "Come up to me on the mountain and stay here, and I will give you the tablets of stone, with the law and commands I have written for their instruction" (Exodus 24:12).

4. Christ the Living Word -- The Word became flesh and lived for a while among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14).

5. The Entire Scriptures -- For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope (Romans 15:4).

6. Written on the Heart -- This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people (Hebrews 8:10).

7. Christians as Living Epistles -- You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everybody. You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tables of stone but on tablets of human hearts (2 Corinthians 3:2-3).

Can we look with integrity and see that God has indeed revealed himself through these various means so that we would be without excuse since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities -- his eternal power and divine nature -- have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made so that people are without excuse. For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened (Romans 1:19-21).

Michael Guillen,* former science editor for ABC, calls the gulf between the communities of faith and reason that is so prevalent in our world today a "divide of enormous misunderstanding." Rather than "defending science" or "defending faith," he says that the gulf would disappear if we'd stop listening to the debates and do the work of seeking the truth for ourselves. The evidence of God has clearly been given.

And if we have seen the revelation of God expressed through the first six of these editions, we will want to live in such a way that, when others read the living epistles in our lives (edition seven), they will, in seeing us, be seeing Christ.

* * * * *

*Michael Guillen is the guest on Haven Today this week, talking about his book, Can a Smart Person Believe in God?

Behold the Lamb!

Drawing by Tom Kauffman

The image in my mind, as we consider the day of Christ's crucifixion, the long dark waiting, and the day of triumph, is of a lamb. Isaiah talks about the suffering servant as a lamb, led to the slaughter, silent before his accusers. And he talks about us, sheep who have gone astray. The death of the Lamb give us life, and the brokenness of the Lamb provides our healing. John the Baptiser saw Jesus approach and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world."

Please take a few moments to watch this moving recitation of Isaiah 53. 

And then I invite you to listen to two songs that celebrate the Lamb. (You can choose between the two if you like, but I simply couldn't make a choice myself!) The first is of Dottie Rambo singing a song which she wrote called Behold the Lamb. The other song is by Andrew Peterson and is called Behold the Lamb of God.

From the Revelation of John, chapter five:

Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain, 

standing in the center of the throne, 

encircled by the four living creatures and the elders... 

And they sang a new song:

"You are worthy to take the scroll

and to open its seals,

because you were slain,

and with your blood you purchased men for God

from every tribe and language

and people and nation.

You have made them to be a kingdom of priests 

to serve our God,

and they will reign on the earth."

Then I looked and heard the voice of many angels, 

numbering thousands upon thousands, 

and ten thousand times ten thousand. 

They encircled the throne 

and the living creatures and the elders. 

In a loud voice they sang:

"Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain,

to receive power and wealth and wisdom 

and strength and honor and glory and praise!"

Then I heard every creature in heaven 

and on earth and under the earth 

and on the sea, 

and all that is in them, 

singing:

"To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb

be praise and honor and glory and power,

for ever and ever!"

The four living creatures said, "Amen," 

and the elder fell down and worshipped.

(verses 6a, 9-14)