Boldness in Prayer: Accessing God Through Faith

The Apostle has been reminding these Ephesians of this glorious and wonderful thing that they who had been Gentiles and aliens and strangers from the covenants of Promise without hope and without God in the world have now by this glorious gospel that he had preached unto them being made fellow HS with the Saints fellow members of the body with the Jews fellow partakers of the great promises. [00:11:10]

The thing he's getting them to Rejoice about is this that now they as the Jews who formerly alone had been the people of God and who had access to God through their ceremonial and ritual in the temple and through their high priest and so on they now who were a strange from God have been brought nigh and they can enter into the presence of God they can pray as the Jews had always prayed. [00:12:00]

Of all the blessings of Christian salvation none is greater than this that we have access to God In Prayer now let me emphasize this before I come to the details you notice the word we in whom we have boldness and access in other words what I'm going to say doesn't only apply to Apostles it doesn't only apply to certain people whove given themselves entirely to the cultivation of their Christian Life it applies to all Christians. [00:12:42]

Let us banish from our thinking once and forever that artificial and unscriptural and in indeed sinful dichotomy which you get for instance in all forms of Catholic teaching which divides people off into two groups the religious and the Ley there is no such distinction in scripture we says Paul I the Apostle you who are formerly Gentiles we all together have this boldness and access with confidence. [00:13:24]

The manner of our Approach To God In Prayer shall I introduce it by asking a question how do you pray what's the character of your prayer life if you if I asked you one by one to get up at this moment and tell me how you feel when you get on your knees in prayer to God what happens do you enjoy it is it free is it certain is it assured how do you get on in prayer what kind of praying is your praying what kind of life is your prayer life. [00:14:09]

Here is what it should be according to the Apostle it should be one which is characterized by bold access with confidence that's true Christian prayer now the terms are worth looking at separately what do he mean by boldness it means fearlessness it means a freedom from all apprehension it means a freedom from all doubt that we may be rejected it means a freedom from all sense of evil which tends to make true prayer impossible. [00:14:54]

Boldness obviously means an absence of restraint or fear in any shape or form you just think of the picture of a bold man he's a man who steps straight forward he's afraid of nothing there's a mighty enemy but the bold man walks with chest high with a confidence and with an assurance he's bold now that's the essence of this word there's no fear there there's no restraint he's not conscious of inhibitions he's not hesitant or doubtful or uncertain boldness is the exact opposite of all that. [00:15:26]

The second word is the word exess what does this represent well if you like you can translate this word as Entre having an Entre we use that term don't we ah says the man I've got an Entre there many people are not allowed in but I I know the way to get in I have a means of Entry it's the privilege of entrance it's the privilege of admission you can get into a certain house the majority are not allowed but you have an Entre that's it. [00:16:20]

It means that uh there is a kind of friendly relationship existing between us and God whereby we know that we are acceptable to him and have an assurance that he is favorably dispersed towards us that's the essence of this term exis again you see it carries much the same idea we know I say that that that God is ready to look upon us and to receive us that he's waiting there to receive us so that we don't fumble as it were on the doorstep we've got a right of Entry an access an entree. [00:16:57]

Confidence is always the end of a process when you've got confidence it means that you've been doing something and the end of that which you've been doing is that you're now confident think of your inst for instance of yourself learning to ride a bicycle and the first moment when the hand of the one helping you was taken off you were hesitant and uncertain but you reach a point when having done it so many times you've got confidence and you're ready to go alone on the street and round corners and uphills and down it confidence it's the result of a process. [00:18:15]

We go into the presence of God with confidence because of a process through which we've gone it's the conclusion of something that has taken place so we go with confidence as well as boldness in this AIS that we have now you can search the whole of the New Testament about prayer and you will find that everywhere always that is what it teaches us about how to pray this according to the New Testament is true prayer and you know there is a sense in which nothing else rarely is praying. [00:19:19]

What is it that makes this way of entry into God's presence possible how can I have this boldness and access with confidence and again you know there's only one answer to that and again because of its importance the Apostle says it twice over in this one verse in whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him whom him he couldn't emphasize it more than that what does the faith of him mean well it means the faith of which he is the object if you prefer it you can say in whom we have boldness with and exess with confidence by means of our faith in him the Lord Jesus Christ. [00:20:43]