Basic Bible Study Lesson 8

How Prayer Works

Today we will discuss about prayer. Prayer is the most important part of our Christian
life. At most of us know and believe that. It is our way of communicating to our God. But
sadly, we don’t pray enough. Naneneglect natin itong bagay na ito. Maaaring dahilan ay
hindi masydong nauunawaan ang prayer, ang ilan ay tinatamad lang, o di kaya ilan sa
atin nagpepray sa gabi hanggang makatulugan na ung panalangin at di na maalala kung
ano nga ba yung pinagdarasal nya. But one of the most common reason ng hindi
pananalangin ay yung feeling na “Im not worthy” nakakahiyang lumapit kay Lord, dami
kong kasalanan at pagkukulang…

---- james 5… the prayer of the righteous…

We are being made righteous through Jesus Christ…. This righteousness is not because
of our good works.

We all know how to pray but not all us fully understand how prayer works.8
In Ephesians 2:18
Now all of us can come to the Father through the same Holy Spirit because of what
Christ has done for us.

Paul mentioned here the trinity and he is telling us how Christian life should work.
Everything in our life as a believer must believed through the Holy Spirit, in the name of
the Son to the Father.
And if everything in our Christian life is supposed to be lived like that Prayer Life is not
an exemption.

Let’s focus today on the facts that the more we understand how there is the Trinity, that
there’s always been God the father, God the son and God the Holy spirit will help us
understand prayer.

Acknowldege ron potter

Katulad ng nadiscuss natin last lesson, a healthy and good relationship requires a two-
way communication. In our relationship to God, He communicates with us through His
word and we communicate with Him through our words, that is through our prayer.
 Sa ating pakikipagcommunicate kay God, we sometimes think that we require spiritual
capability to hear God, but when it comes to speaking to God through prayer we do not
need anything more than the natural ability we already possess? As there is involvement
of the entire Trinity in hearing God speak, there is also the involvement of the entire
Trinity in our speaking to God.

Let’s analayze each one of the three person with regards to our prayer.

 First, to the Father:

First of all, our Lord Jesus instructs us to pray to “our Father which art in heaven” in Matthew
6:9. Dito dinidirect tayo to address the Father. The significance of this directive not only lies in
the fact of our familial relationship with the Father as a result of the completed work of Christ
but also sa katotohanan na walang sinuman ang may presensiya sa lahat ng lugar para
makarinig sa atin at walang sinuman ang nakakaalam ng lahat ng bagay para sumagot sa atin.
Kailangan natin ng Omniscient (all-knowing), Omnipresent (all-present) hearing God to
communicate the desires of our heart to.

Prayer is always to be directed to the Father. He is the One who alone has the power to answer
prayer. In His hands are all times, kings, and nations (Proverbs 21:1). All good and perfect gifts
come down from the Father above (James 1:17). The Father knows how to give good gifts to His
children (Matthew 7:11). Prayer is always directed to the Father in heaven whose will it is that
we must pray according to (Romans 8:27). 

To be sure, men by nature, especially in a crisis will call upon their gods, who by nature are no
gods at all. These gods cannot be everywhere present to hear the prayer, nor can they know all
things, nor can they even speak or hear. But it has been supernaturally given unto us who are
redeemed to know the one true and living God and in and for the sake of Christ, ay naging
bahagi sa pamilya ng Dios.. naging mga anak Niya at dahil din duon mayroon tayong dakilang
pribilehiyong tawagin ang Dios “Ama kong nasa langit” It is granted to us supernaturally. We
are able to communicate within the circle of the Trinity because it has been given to us to know
Him who answers prayer. Every prayer therefore, if it is to be true prayer, must involve our
omniscient, omnipotent heavenly Father.

Our Father in heaven reaveals to us what He wills us to pray for. He is directly involved in
guiding us to pray aright.

1John 5:14-15 NLT

And we are confident that he hears us whenever we ask for anything that pleases him. 15And
since we know he hears us when we make our requests, we also know that he will give us what
we ask for.
The involvement of the Lord in supernaturally revealing to us through His word what prayer is
to consist of, engenders the confidence that when we pray, we do not pray in vain, but may
wait expectantly for Him to respond. If we are to communicate in prayer with God, we must see
the involvement of the first person of the Trinity, the father.

 Second, through the Son:

Of ourselves we would have no right to approach the Father in any way, including in prayer. In
the Old Testament, only the high priest was allowed to go into God’s presence in the Holy of
Holies in the temple and only once a year. They even tied a rope to his foot in case God killed
him on the spot for some uncleanness in him. Approaching the Holy Father whose name is Holy
is something that we can only do in the New Testament because of what Christ has done on the
cross. When He died, the veil in the temple, which guarded the way into the Holy of Holies, was
torn in two (Mark 15:38, Exodus 26:33). This symbolized the fact that now all Christians are
priests of God and able to approach the presence of God (Hebrews 9, 1 Peter 2:5, 9). Indeed
Christ lives within us, and God has made His abode with man. The role of the Son is to intercede
on our behalf so that we can approach the throne of grace to get help in the time of need
(Hebrews 4:16). 

So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his
16 

mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.

We can even approach God’s holy throne with confidence because of our righteousness in
Christ (Hebrews 10:19). 

And so, dear brothers and sisters,  we can boldly enter heaven’s Most Holy Place
19  [a]

because of the blood of Jesus.

Christ, as Romans 8:27 

And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit
27 

pleads for us believers  in harmony with God’s own will.

[a]

says, searches the hearts and minds of believers to get the mind of the Spirit He then carries
our requests, in a sense, to God. Jesus is the means by which we have direct access to God. He
makes sure that our prayers reach the Father. Just as He made the way for us to have eternity
with God in heaven, He too enables our prayers to reach God’s throne. As Jesus says in John
14:13-14,

You can ask for anything in my name, and I will do it, so that the Son can bring
13 

glory to the Father. 14 Yes, ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it!
This command to ask in His name is repeated again in John 15:16 and John 16:23-24, 26. We
pray to the Father in the name of Jesus, through Whom alone we have access to the Father in
prayer. 

It is the merits of Christ that we depend on for reconciliation to God and salvation, and it is the
merits of Christ that we also depend on to enable our ongoing communication with the Father.
We now, because of Christ, have boldness to enter into the presences of God “by a new and
living way, which He hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, His flesh (heb.
10:20-22

By his death,  Jesus opened a new and life-giving way through the curtain into
20  [g]

the Most Holy Place. 21 And since we have a great High Priest who rules over God’s
house, 22 let us go right into the presence of God with sincere hearts fully trusting
him. For our guilty consciences have been sprinkled with Christ’s blood to make us
clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water.

Therefore, to pray in the name of Christ is to display before the Father the merits of the Son
imputed to the beliver so as to be able to petition the Father for all that is desired and be
assured of a hearing and a response. To pray acceptably we must be in Christ. Thus there is the
involvement of both the first and second Person of the Trinity in prayer

 Thirdly, by the Spirit:

We pray by the Spirit

We are taught in scripture that because of sin, men are spiritually dead. Among other
things this means na walang clue ang tao kung anong talaga ang kailangan nya, walang
disposisyon ang puso na hanapin ang tanging tunay at buhay na Dios at walang pagnanais na
mabuti. Unless the Holy spirit grants him the disposition to pray to the Father and the desire to
express himself properly in the light of who God is, he will not and cannot pray aright. Dahil dito,
sabi sa biblia, God takes the initiative through His Spirit. According to:

Zechariah 12:10 NLT

“Then I will pour out a spiritb of grace and prayer on the family of David and on the people of
Jerusalem. They will look on me whom they have pierced and mourn for him as for an only son.
They will grieve bitterly for him as for a firstborn son who has died

Galatians 4:6
nd because wec are his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, prompting us
to call out, “Abba, Father.”

Even then, however, we do not know what we should pray for as ought unless the Spirit
continuously helps us in our communication with the Father. In Romans 8:26-27
 And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know
26 

what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with
groanings that cannot be expressed in words. 27 And the Father who knows all
hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us
believers  in harmony with God’s own will.
[a]

 27And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for
us believersl in harmony with God’s own will. 

We need the Spirit to give us what to pray, to help us to pray, and to adequately express what
our words fail to say. The Spirit leads us in our prayers, enables us to pray, and takes the
essence of what we are saying to Jesus who gives it to the Father. When we don’t feel like we
know what to pray, we are in a good place, for that is when we will actually trust in the Spirit to
lead us to what we should say and think. 

This is the work of the Spirit that accounts for the desire to pray in the first place. So everytime
we pray, we pray by the Spirit. Dahil sa banal na Espiritu kaya there are periods of fervency in
prayer na nararanasan natin, ung stirring up of affections during prayer, the desires, mga salita
at luha sa pananalangin at marami pang iba… Yung mga pagkukulang o kahinaan kahit sa kabila
ng grasya, nalilimitahan ang kakayanan natin na manalangin. But the Holy spirit intercedes for us
in heaven.

Conclusion

Now having said that, let me point out that the involvement of the Trinity in our prayers speaks
of the economical labors of the Trinity on our behalf, enabling prayer. But there is also an
ontological aspect to praying as well. By this I mean, the Trinity cannot be divided or separated
in terms of being. Therefore to pray to the Father is at the same time to pray to the ontological
Trinity—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. To pray, “Our Father which art in heaven” is not to exclude
the Son and the Spirit. They are included in that prayer with the Father because they are One in
being even though each of the persons are involved in different aspects of our praying. Though
there is evidence in the scripture that prayer is made to the Son, and here I am thinking of Acts
7:59, which begins by saying, “and they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying Lord
Jesus receive my Spirit.” In calling upon Jesus, Stephen was at the same time, calling upon God.
There is a three-fold work of God in our praying. We are not alone. God who indwells us is
listening to us, if only we do not hinder our own prayers by going against His will and
commands. 

He will lead us to pray according to His will so that we can be sure that we have what we have
asked (1 John 5:14). It is a beautiful thing yet so mysterious, for though all three Persons do
something different, they are all doing it together. However it works, let us be glad that it does
work. We have a powerful God on our side who wants to hear from us. He involves us in His
plans and purposes. Let us listen to Him, yield to Him, and call out to Him in prayer.

In sum, we are heard by God the Father, for the sake of the merits of God the Son, and through
the agency of God the Holy Spirit. The entire trinity is involved in our prayers.

Let us pray to the Father through the Son and by the Holy Spirit.