Intercession: The Throne Ministry # 7

The Throne Ministry

"But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood ... wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider (fix your minds and attention upon) the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, Christ Jesus."  And "He ever liveth to make intercession: for us unto "the uttermost," that is, until the finished work of Christ is brought through to completion in us. "He ever liveth," that is, He is ever, "always at all times," living - both now ... and before every age ... and in ages past ... and in ages future - making intercession for them "that come unto God by Him" (1 Peter 2:9; Hebrews 3:1; 7:25).

But, as for you, "ye are a chosen generation (elected to be), a royal priesthood," those who are to become the priesthood, a body of believers working in full cooperation with their High Priest. A priesthood who, through the processing of God, through the chastening and purging, through the transforming and conforming work of the Holy Spirit, will become vessels of honor. And the great honor bestowed upon these earthen vessels by the Lord is to pour through them His High Priestly Prayers of Intercession.

Paul is an example of one whose fragile vessel of clay was used this way. Paul utters many of these prayers by the Spirit in his epistles, and in Colossians 1:27; 2:3 he gives us insight into this great work of intercession. In these verses, the Holy Spirit through Paul proclaims the greatest mystery of the ages, "which is Christ in you, the hope of glory"; and because of this mystery, Paul is plunged into the throes of conflict and intercession, "laboring to present every man complete in Christ Jesus":

To whom God was pleased to make known how great for the Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is, Christ within and among you the hope of [realizing] the glory. Him we are constantly announcing, admonishing every man and instructing every man in every wisdom in order that we may present every man spiritually mature in Christ Jesus, to which end also I am constantly laboring to the point of exhaustion, engaging in a contest in which I am controlled by His energy which operates in me in power. For I want you to know how great is my solicitude for you - in how sever an inward struggle I am engaged for you - and for those [believers] at Laodicea, and for all who (like ourselves) have never seen my face and known me personally. [For my concern is] that their hearts may be braced (comforted, cheered and encouraged) as they are knit together in love, that they may come to have all the abounding wealth and blessings of assured conviction of understanding, and that they may become progressively more intimately acquainted with, and may know more definitely and accurately and thoroughly, that mystic secret of God [which is] Christ, the Anointed One. In Him all the treasures of [divine] wisdom, and [all the riches of spiritual] knowledge and enlightenment are stored up and lie hidden (Colossians 1:27-29; 2:1-3).

The purpose of such prayers is to present every man perfect, mature and developed, no longer a babe and a beginner, but a full grown adult man in Christ; one who is in union with his Head, "Who is to every limb that true cause and law of its full development".

Yes, it is Christ Who "ever liveth to make intercession" for them "to the uttermost"; and it is nothing less than Christ, the Anointed One, through the energizing power of the Holy Spirit, Who is working in the prayer-instrument that is yielded to Him for His purposes.

Through the ages, many of our brethren have lent their vessels to be used of our Lord for His great work of intercession, such as: Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Hannah, Amos, Nehemiah, Esther, Ananias, Simeon, Lucius, Manaen, Lydia, Aquila and Priscilla, Clement, Kempis, Fenelon, Guyon, Amy Carmichael, and countless others known only to the Lord. The list continues through the ages, named or unnamed, these have joined the Body of believers to become a Royal Priesthood.

~T. Austin-Sparks~

(continued with # 8)