As Evangelicals we know that God loves us, - but we don't really unless He teaches the heart.  If only the church knew how much God loves her we should have a very different church.   Even teachers amongst us don't love God with the heart, how many in the sixties grieved at the suggestion that God was dead?    The expression that the meaning of the word has to move from the head to the heart is overworked and yet even those using it do not spend enough time in the Lord's presence to allow the scriptures to take on the full meaning.  

Prayer for the Church and for Wales
We came to live on the Welsh-English border in April 1994 and were drawn to worship in the Church in Wales.    As a result we became involved with Anglican Renewal Ministries(Wales) going to our first conference in September 1994.   Here I heard the Lord say I want you to pray for Wales but I also helped out with some of the administration  work as they arranged the 1995 conference.    It was at that conference at Dolfor, on 28^th September that I was anointed for “Intercession”.     I had not heard what Elizabeth Kamau[v] had said but the Lord made me walk forward.     This was the first time that I had fallen before the Lord, my legs just gave way.    As I lay on the floor in ecstasy I knew that it had to be "All to Jesus I surrender" and I asked Bob Pitcher our worship leader, to sing it.   

At the end of November 1995 I took on the job of Prayer Co-ordinator for A.R.M.(Wales) and it was about that time that the Lord told me that he wanted me to be a prayer.     How can one be a prayer?      Many ways have become apparent since that time, but at first I just accepted  that I was the prayer God wanted in that place, just where I was and no matter what I was doing.  I had, to my mind, shelved any responsibility.    Whilst I still believe that can be the case I now understand some of the things that have happened more recently in the light of being the prayer, by standing in the gap and allowing the answer to be worked out in me first.    This seems to gain a victory position in intercession as Rees Howells might have described it.

On March 9th 1996 during the singing of the chorus "Reign in me", the Lord challenged me.  We must not sing words unless we mean them.......  He showed me that it meant Gal.2:20 and walking the way of the Cross.   It led to prayer for a Holy Church.   Each time I felt the Lord show me from scripture what His expectations were I strove to incorporate that into "my prayer".   I felt that this was identifying with His will and assumed that this was how He wanted me to pray.   Time and again He brought me back to sitting in His presence to do nothing.   Often I wrestled as I constantly questioned if I was wasting my time, but all God wanted of me was to concentrate on Him and allow Him to do the praying.    Although I  knew this[vi] for a long time it was still a temptation to resort to praying "my prayers".      As an intermediary step I was able to reflect and meditate on things that concerned or interested me, bringing my desires and longings to the surface and offering the lot to God to "sort out"[vii].     I knew that He had an interest in these things and that He had to a greater or lesser extent given me the associated feelings regarding these matters, I just trusted Him "to pick up the pieces."     This I believe he graciously did, but He  still urged me to trust Him more with "my" prayer.  

During my time as Prayer Co-ordinator for A.R.M.(Wales) I met many intercessors and had the privilege of praying for our conferences and those who participated, both speakers and delegates.    I experienced a number of manifestations which were pointers on the way.   I felt both pain and joy in the spirit,  sometimes the pain was physical and often there was weeping.    I shared this with others as we stood in the gap before the Lord it was wonderful to see different giftings working together.   But there were many blessings too as we approached  the throne of God, He drew us close and assured us of his love and protection.

God led me to pray Ephesians[viii].    Paul’s letter clearly shows His purpose and lays out the details for living in His Holy Church.    The 1997 conference was covered with those prayers and we saw many answered.   God showed me that Eph.5:21-33 was really talking about the Church[ix].   I've heard so many sermons and Bible studies make the point of wives submitting to husbands, in the best they also stress the responsibilities of the husband, but they always seem to miss this point.     Male clergy often say that it is harder for a man to be the loving husband than for women to submit, but when they take on board what it costs for them to submit as the spouse, then I believe that the Church will begin her preparation to be the Bride that God intends.

God asked me to give up this position in A.R.M.(Wales)  after that conference.  It was like a bereavement but not before some amazing experiences of being in His presence and also a brief glimpse of living Galations 2:20.

Soon afterwards He also asked that I give back the giftings for Intercession.   Was I no longer able to ask for anything?   I could rejoice that I feel His presence and so praise Him and thank Him.    At the time I wrote “If He chooses to give me back the gift of Intercession it will have been refined as gold and the chaff burnt away but I have no right to expect anything now.”    I tried to do this but I’ve never been sure if I did for I have continued to pray for the church.  The request came only hours after talking a Spiritual Director who seemed to be confirming that I continue to pray for the Church.   Obviously I needed further humbling and must die again to pride.   What I can say is that I ceased to feel the pain of Intercession and manifestations had no place.   Looking back some 3 years later I know it was right to continue to pray for the Church, but it was not intercession as I had previously known it.   I needed to separate my pain, as I went through a grieving and healing, from the pain of Jesus which we still cause Him.    If we allow Him He bears our pain and yet He is willing for us to glimpse His.

Then one day is was as if I heard a gentle voice saying that what He was asking of me was in fact the hardest prayer of all, that is simply waiting on the Lord.   Early the next day (Palm Sunday 1998) as I prayed for the church, I sensed a great battle within - it was painful -  was I still trying to do the praying?    The answer came through two dreams, both I could understand as meaning that it was no longer “my job” to pray, “my job” was to wait patiently for the Lord, to honour and praise Him.   It has taken much struggling and pain to learn this lesson, much grieving for I seemed to be losing something I valued, in fact it took my husbands illness in August 1999 to really come to that place of trust.    Now five years after I felt that the Lord said "I want you to be a prayer", it is beginning to make sense, my response has needed constant review.     Now I dare to suggest that I am "locked in" to God's network of similar people.      It is a network of contemplatives who probably don't know for what they intercede.    It demands a faith that has to be refined and a love that I do not yet possess but it can only happen through a mystical grace that we do not understand.

I found help in understanding from books by the Carthusians and checked up the prayer stage of Union of Will [x].     I read again that it is rare, this step on the road to Union with God.     I have resisted coming to this opinion because it sounds elitist and I firmly believe that we are all called to be holy, set apart for God[xi].    Eventually it dawns on me what this Union of Will really is.    Voicing our differences grieves the Lord and all committed Christian believe that they are serving God according to His will.    But we can't all be right and therefore we are often sadly deluded!   Those of us that would claim to be in Charismatic Renewal are amongst the offenders simply because we do hear so often.    The only way to pray now is to wait on Him, no opinion, no request, just standing in the gap to give the church back to Him and allow Him to purify her. [xii]  

This is why I believe that the Lord said it is the hardest prayer;  it has to be a prayer of "His will" not mine and I surrender that too in a new way ....................  I am amazed at the number of times I think that I have surrendered only to find that I am still claiming back or interfering. 

I realise now why the outcome of Union with God is rare, because it is hard to fulfil the conditions especially when it comes to taking pride in the spiritual journey.   We can never say I'm nearly there or measure our position in the mansions described by St Teresa of Avila.     It doesn't matter.    God gave Jesus as a total guide and through Him only can we know the face of the Father God.    When we can face Jesus we shall see God.    Jesus humbled Himself more than we are asked  to, so He can make it possible for me to become nothing, so that He can have my life, my body, my space.

So ultimately I shall not need to intercede.      I shall only have to be part of the true Intercessor - the prayer that he asked of me in November 1995.      My prayer will cease to be.

 

continue

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