Passionate prayer 1

Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared;
Heb 5:7

During his life on earth, Jesus prayed to God, who could save him from death. He prayed and pleaded with loud crying and tears, and he was heard because of his devotion to God.

Heb 5:7 (GW)

Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

James 5:16

June 14, 1742

‘I set apart this day for secret fasting and prayer…the Lord visited me marvelously. I wrestled for an ingathering of souls…I was in such agony from sun half an hour, till near dark, that I was all over wet with sweat. Oh, my dear Saviour did sweat blood for poor souls. I went to bed with my heart wholly set on God.’
~the diary of David Brainerd

pas·sion·ate [pásh'nət]
adjective
-Showing intense emotion: expressing intense feeling
-Enthusiastic: having a keen enthusiasm or intense desire for something
-Having strong emotions: tending to have strong feelings, especially of love, desire, or enthusiasm

Loud cries and tears

I grew up in the more conservative evangelical tradition. The way we whispered in prayer confirmed the truth that God is not deaf. Isaiah knew what he was talking about when he reminded us that God does not need hearing aids.

Behold, the LORD'S hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it cannot hear:

Is 59:1

Over the years, I saw a few people in the same tradition pray passionately. Sitting in Professor and Mrs. Mordi’s living room for devotions with other boys one evening during Easter holidays, she pointed out that we were always mumbling in praise and prayer. Mummy Mordi was always passionate and exuberant, almost contagious in prayer. Her memorable comments that evening were, “If you are going to sing, sing. If you are going to pray, pray. Let’s hear you.”

My dad hosted a group of men in our home for a weekly prayer meeting. I would occasionally stumble upon this group of diverse, every day men- mechanics in their soiled work clothes, battery chargers, panel beaters and other blue collar workers, businessmen, a few regular guys with white collar jobs and ministers of the gospel. They were intense, loud, emotional people. I’d walked through the room looking for leg space because almost all of them were sprawled prostrate on the bare floor or kneeling. Boy, was their prayer expressive and loud!  Some would pray shaking their heads or stomping their feet. When they sang, it was with passion. Some of the prayer songs I remember in Yoruba are from this group of passionate men. ‘Agbara esu da, ni’bi ti Jesu gbe n joba? Kosi o! O ti wo.’* [Where is Satan’s power where Jesus rules and reigns? It doesn’t exist! It is collapsed.] They sang it till the passion permeated the environment. There was a palpable Presence in the living room prayer tower. I always asked myself the question, ‘Is this necessary?’ Is this passionate expression really necessary? I had no problem screaming at football or basketball games, or at some fellow on television who was driving in the wrong direction...But praying with passion? It didn’t seem to fit the refined, intellectual, upper middle class, tie wearing, money making, and foreign trained gentleman.

 

Then one day, through scriptures, I glimpsed Jesus praying through the eyes of the writer of Hebrews. ‘Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared’. Loud cries and tears. Strong cries in liquid prayer. Shouting and crying. Now, if that is not passion, then I’m not sure what is.

 

And being in an agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.

Luke 22:44

 

The pattern of the Christ is expressed passionate prayer. In Luke 22:44 we find a rare medical condition described. Haematidrosis. Sweating blood. A state of intense vasodilatation which may occur when a person is suffering extreme levels of stress. Jesus was in agony when he went to pray at the garden. This pain was translated to a passion. Luke, the writer, was a physician conversant with the technical language of the medical schools in Asia Minor and knew what he was penning down. The Greek term thromboi haimatos implies great drops of blood falling as clots. In Jesus’ passion, blood and blood pigments came out of his sweat pores as he prayed more earnestly.

 

Jesus prayed more earnestly. He modelled expression in the place of prayer. He modelled praying with loud cries and tears. That is not a 21st century addition to church practice. Jesus himself prayed more earnestly.

 

Fewer people have heard of Abel Clary or ‘Father’ Daniel Nash than of Charles G. Finney, the great revivalist of the 19^th century sometimes referred to as the father of modern revivalism. The historical truth is that they were the bastion of Finney’s ministry. Nash had been infected with an eye disease that left him unable to read or see for a period of time. During this time, he gave himself most entirely to prayer. Recovering from the disease, he became a man of powerful intercession. Nash would go three or four weeks ahead of the revivalist sometimes alone or with Clary into whatever city or town Finney was to preach in and pray down revival. Nash was not timid in prayer. His praying could sometimes be heard up to half a mile away! During revivals, Clary was said to pray nearly all the time with unimaginable agony of mind. Sometimes he could not even stand on his knees and would fall prostrate and groan, praying in an astounding manner and seeking God’s face for revival and the salvation of souls. Nash and Clary were expressing passion and fervency in prayer.

Finney in his lectures on revival said, ‘I have never seen a person sweat blood, but I do know a person who prayed until his nose bled. And people have prayed until drenched in sweat, even in the coldest winter. Some have prayed for hours until their strength was exhausted from the labour of their minds. Such prayers reached and took hold on God.’

...The earnest (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available [dynamic in its working]

Jas 5:16 [AMP]

The Greek translated ‘earnest’ or ‘effectual, fervent’ in the Authorised Version is the word energeo from which we derive the English word energy. How much energy do we expend in our prayers? Our prayers must be fuelled with the energy of passion if they are to make tremendous power available, dynamic in its working.