The Holy Spirit and Prayer

“Likewise, the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. Now He who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:26-28).

The prayer life of a Christian is one of the most personal and sacred blessings God has granted them. There are moments in the believer’s life when they cry out to God in pain or distress, joy and thanksgiving with words bursting forth from the heart. On other occasions, there are times when even the pain or joy is so great that the believer does not know what to say. The Spirit of God bearing witness with our Spirit may be one of the most challenging passages in the Bible. Keep the context of what Paul is writing about in mind. Paul is describing the indwelling of the Spirit and the adoption of sons by God (Romans 8:12-17). 

The same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead can make alive the bodies that are subject to death. If the Spirit of God dwells in our lives, our spiritual bodies will not remain in the grave. Death is the last enemy that will be destroyed (1 Corinthians 15:50-58). Paul summarizes his argument against the flesh by stating that as the children of God, adopted by Him, we do not have a spirit of fear. The Holy Spirit testifies through the word of God to the part of humanity that reasons, thinks, and arrives at conclusions. This is part of the Spirit’s work to bear witness with our Spirit as we read the word of God. It should be pointed out that the Spirit does not bear witness with our Spirit for us to become children, but because we are children.

As the adopted children of God, the Spirit helps our weaknesses, precisely our inability to know what to pray for. This does not indicate that we do not know how to pray, but rather the longings, the needs of the heart, and the gratitude that the soul cannot always express. The Spirit takes the things we cannot verbalize to the throne of God! We are not orphans or left in weakness (John 14:18). The apostle tells us that if we only had ourselves to rely upon in prayer, our hearts would not provide the words we are trying to express. The “groanings” which cannot be uttered are not some unique “prayer language.” “Charismatics read “groanings too deep for words” …They claim that the Spirit takes control of their throats, tongues, and lips when they pray, causing them to speak a series of syllables unintelligible to the human ear.”^[1]

“We who are baptized into Christ, thus signifying our identification with him in death, life, mind, vocation, and destiny, surely should be groaning in the spirit and praying as Christ, though he had no part whatsoever in causing the sorrows of the earth, groaned in the spirit and prayed under the crushing weight of the world’s woe at the grave of his friend. Only after we come to this heart-pricked, self-effacing condition can the Spirit of Christ witness with us and pray for us. Unless we have a real sense of our human inability to pray aright about the earth’s deep wound; unless, as we raise our heads above the whelming flood of suffering and realize to what depths we were submerged, we feel a profound gratitude unto God for his deliverance, and, consequently, respond unto him with unutterable passion of commitment unto him, how can the Holy Spirit in fellowship make “intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered?”^[2]

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^[1] Roper, David L. Romans 8-16 A Doctrinal Study, Truth for Today Commentary: An Exegesis & Application of the Holy Scriptures. Eddie Cloer, ed. Resource Publications, 2014: 57

^[2] Bell, R.C. Studies in Romans, Firm Foundation Publishing House, 1957: 97, 98

By: Justin Odom