Neither Pray Alone.

“Neither pray I for these alone...” - John 17.20

In John chapter 17 we see the Prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ which He prayed just moments before He was betrayed and taken to be crucified.

He was specifically praying for His disciples, that first church, but in the prayer, we see our Lord often praying for us when He said such things as, “Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word;”.

Jesus was praying for me?

How should it make us feel to know that Jesus was praying for us?  All that time ago?  That very terrible night?

That is not all, later after Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to the disciples, one disciple, Thomas, was not present at the time.  When he was told that the disciples had seen Jesus he said, “Except I shall see... I will not believe.”  About a week later Jesus appeared to them again and said, “Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.”

Have you ever seen Jesus?  Neither have I.  Yet I believed.  Sometimes I think it would be nice if I could see Him, just to “look upon His face”, as the song says.  But I am “blessed” because I have not “seen, and yet (I) have believed.”  It makes Ephesians 2.8 so clear, “For by grace are ye saved through faith;” and also the verse, “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11.1)

~ Run with patience,

Pastor