Fasting and prayer

Week 2 – including prayer points

Psalm 24:3-4

“Who may ascend the mountain of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place?The one who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not trust in an idol or swear by a false god. They will receive blessing from the Lord and vindication from God their Saviour”

This passage has been coming through in our thoughts and prayers over the last week. We all love the ‘blessing and vindication’ of God and to ‘ascend the mountain of the Lord’, here are some thoughts on this passage though…

‘The one who has clean hands and a pure heart’ – This Psalm is a beautiful insight into a heart that pursues God. It carries a weighty understanding of the holiness of God. It echoes Moses ascent of Mt Sinai when he received the Law. Approaching a holy God was not to be trifled with. His Presence could consume you if you approached without His permission or protocol. The Psalm echoes this understanding, yet the invitation and yearning to be with God ‘on his holy mountain’ was there.

I think we do have to read this verse from our vantage point of being New Covenant believers, sons and daughters of God, with all our sins past, present and future fully justified and sealed by the Holy Spirit! I believe that when it comes to understanding our access to God’s holiness and access to His presence it must be ‘Nothing but the blood of Jesus’, as the song goes! We do not and cannot make ourselves clean or pure in the sense of having our sins atoned for. It is not 80% God and 20% us (or any other ratio) – it is ‘Nothing but the blood of Jesus’ – he alone is our mediator and He alone is also the one who KEEPS us by grace. Please meditate on this. Do not mix grace and law when it comes to ‘getting saved’, ‘remaining saved’ or remaining in the love of God.

So what’s next? From our vantage point as New Covenant believers, we need to know who we now are IN CHRIST. A New Covenant ‘psalmist heart’ is – We are holy (through the sanctifying work of Christ) therefore we need to live in holiness. We are sanctified (set apart) by Christ therefore we need to live as those who are set apart for Him. We are justified (by the blood of Jesus) therefore let us live as those who have been brought from death to life! God has given us a new name! A new identity. An eternal state – we are His new creation! We now have the Holy Spirit as our inheritance, not a sinful nature (which is dead and buried in Christ!) therefore let us live as those who carry the Holy Spirit, because we do! We do not work towards victory, we work from the victory of Jesus.

I want to emphasise that you are not working towards or working to try and keep your access to God, lest His wrath returns…no….this has been taken away by Jesus! (Christ is our propitiation)

So what is the relevance of this Psalm? For me, the relevance is that we can falter in living out this commission to live well as those who have been brought from death to life in Jesus by what this Psalm says but how? By trusting in an idol. An idol doesn’t have to be a little statue on a mantle-piece. It can be an over-riding affection or a kind of substitute for God in our priorities. Something that we think we cannot live without unless we have it. Something that becomes preeminent in our hearts and minds that can relegate God or put Him on the ‘back-burner’ so to speak.

We will never be able to live in the life and promises of what Christ has purchased for us if we trust in an ‘idol’.

Repentance and turning our faces to Jesus needs to start here. Who or what are we trusting in? What fears, insecurities or lies are seeded into our minds and hearts and cause us to trust in a false narrative and to ‘swear by a false god’?

Let us come back to the Lord and trust in Him alone. Not only for our salvation but for our whole lives!

Adam and Eve turned to their own way because they trusted in the voice of the enemy.

Don’t allow this. Take time to meditate on the faithfulness of God and to roll all your trust onto Him! I believe that when we do this we will begin to enjoy our fellowship with God. We need to also ensure that our lives match up to the updated version of who we truly are – born again and loved children of God!

Finally, there is no doubt that the Holy Spirit’s work in our lives and impact in our community is also linked to our faith and obedience. So this Psalm still has tremendous relevance when it comes to our inheritance, which is linked to faith and obedience. If you want to be part of a generation of believers in Mid-Ulster and beyond who are seeing the greater works of the Lord in our lives and community, then there is no doubt that we must understand that we are called to be those who do not gratify the flesh but are those whose delight is to live in God and for God, through the Holy Spirit in us and among us.

I believe that the Holy Spirit is attracted to this kind of faith and obedience, that delights in the Lord! It is not just a chore. It is not just religious conformity. We become a landing strip for the Holy Spirit as a community. It’s not something we work for, its something that God does by grace in us as we ALIGN to Him and refuse to turn our hearts to an idol.

Some prayer points:

1. Take time to understand your New Covenant position because of Jesus’ atoning sacrifice. Give thanks and pray from this vantage point!
2. Turn away from any false idols or things that you are trusting in. Turn to God and put your trust in Him! He is faithful in all his ways. Relinquish control to Him! This repentance brings such peace and joy too, such freedom!
3. Pray from the vantage point as a son of God who ALREADY has full access to God’s presence and His righteousness (holiness)! Align yourself to what this means: to walk by the Spirit and to live in all the fulness of what Jesus won for us.
4. Delight yourself in Him and pray for his Kingdom to come here. Call on His name to come and use us as a church.

Jason (14.01.25)