Slain, Condemned...and Praying

Isaiah 53:12 "...yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors."

When Jesus was dying on the cross He prayed for those who condemned Him, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do". Little did they know that He was being condemned for those He would ever live to pray for.

You who are weary and downcast take heart. You who are defeated. You who are needy. Christ is praying for you right now. Does that thought humble you? If it does there is an ember of life burning in your soul that God will use to fan into flame a revival – it will begin in you and jump to someone else and it will be an unstoppable force that is not human but divine.

If the thought of Christ praying for you leaves you chilled (or saying you don’t need it, but thanks anyway) maybe you are not His. Take heart that it is those who are alive that can feel. Those who admit their need that the Great Physician can heal. Sometimes we feel the highest and lowest of emotions. Sometimes our hearts play tricks on us. Thank God that He is greater than our hearts and knows all things. Thank God the blood cleanses and the Word transforms. It is those who are alive that can love and also resent. It is those who are alive that God is at work in. It is those who are dead that Christ awakes.

It is the prayed for that receive the benefit of the intercession. Knowing it is Christ who is making those requests for us can only humble real followers. We are set free in Christ and by Christ. We are made new by the blood of the Lamb who was slain. It is the One who was condemned for us that took all condemnation that ever could and would be hurled at us. As Thomas Watson put it…"Christ by his intercession answers all bills of indictment brought in against the elect. Do what they can, sin, and then Satan, accuses believers to God, and conscience accuses them to themselves; but Christ, by his intercession, answers all these accusations."