In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God’s will. (Romans 8:26-27, NIV)
What can we ask God for? Sometimes when I am playing golf, I ask God to help me play better. That seems to be in line with what God says we can ask for. I have also wanted to ask him to let me win, but I have never been able to figure out just how he might answer that prayer if more than one of his children were asking for a conflicting thing at the same time! That’s kind of a silly example, but there are times when we don’t know when and if our desires are in the will of God.
The mind of the Spirit that intercedes for us does it in accordance with God’s will.There are many promises in the Scriptures that we know are absolutely God’s will. When what we ask for in his name is definitely in his will, we can expect answers in the affirmative. As we grow deeper and study the Bible in more detail, we will know more specifically what the will of God is. We need to study the Scriptures to understand what God really desires for us.
Often situations happen to us where we just don’t know how to pray correctly. We find no specific example in Scripture that applies to our situation, and sometimes there is inadequate information available to us to truly understand the situation we are dealing with. Some situations seem so overwhelming that we can find no words to express to God how we feel. The death of a loved one, a diagnosis that may spell the end for us, a financial situation with to have no feasible resolution. Just how are we supposed to pray when we are too weak, confused, or despondent to ask God for anything?
God knew we would have times like that in our life and he knows exactly what to do. Our passage for today spells it out like this. When we are too weak to pray, he—the Holy Spirit prays for us. When we don’t know what to pray for, the Holy Spirit intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. God searches our hearts and knows what we need. The mind of the Spirit that intercedes for us does it in accordance with God’s will. When we don’t know what to pray for or don’t have the strength to pray at all we can ask God to help us pray. He does that in a perfect way that we will not understand but that communicates directly to him according to what is his best and perfect will for us.
When we surrender to him, he promises to never leave or forsake us; and when we don’t know what to ask for, we can turn to him and know that his will will be accomplished in our life because we belong to him and he is praying for us.
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Linda Ballard
March 9, 2017
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The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.