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Beware of thinking that intercession means bringing our own personal sympathies
and concerns into the presence of God, and then demanding that He do whatever we
ask. Our ability to approach God is due entirely to the vicarious, or
substitutionary, identification of our Lord with sin. We have “boldness to enter
the Holiest by the blood of Jesus.”
Spiritual stubbornness is the most effective hindrance to intercession, because
it is based on a sympathetic “understanding” of things we see in ourselves and
others that we think needs no atonement. We have the idea that there are certain
good and virtuous things in each of us that do not need to be based on the
atonement by the Cross of Christ. Just the sluggishness and lack of interest
produced by this kind of thinking makes us unable to intercede. We do not
identify ourselves with God’s interests and concerns for others, and we get
irritated with Him. Yet we are always ready with our own ideas, and our
intercession becomes only the glorification of our own natural sympathies. We
have to realize that the identification of Jesus with sin means a radical change
of all of our sympathies and interests. Vicarious intercession means that we
deliberately substitute God’s interests in others for our natural sympathy with
them.
Am I stubborn or substituted? Am I spoiled or complete in my relationship to
God? Am I irritable or spiritual? Am I determined to have my own way or
determined to be identified with Him?
". . having boldness to enter the Holiest by the
blood of Jesus . . ." - Hebrews 10:19
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