Hey Jude…

“The more I learn, the more I realize how much I don’t know.” ~ Albert Einstein

I hear ya Albert. I hear ya.

“But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost,

²¹ Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.” ~Jude 2:20,21

Learning as I go, step by step, little by little.

The last few weeks have seen me wrestling with some internal demons, old ones, ones I thought I had come to understand and God had released me from. But it seems they have a little brother or two.

I feel that I have taken a hit… but I wasn’t knocked off course.

I was studying, researching, and applying PRAYER to my life. Again, asking, and questioning, the negative thoughts I was having.

If you haven’t experienced it… an answer to praying can look a lot like a heavier dumbbell in the gym. You go to pick it up for the first time and… you struggle to lift it at first… it’s new to you, you have the technique, you have the knowledge about why you need to move on to it, and you know what the outcome will be, but when you actually grab hold of it… you feel the initial weight of both the real dumbbell… and the weight of doubt in your mind… when you struggle with that first repetition, that first heavier prayer.

And when you get that first rep in… you may feel inspired… gaining a new insight from a not so obvious source.

My breakthrough this week came via a movie script.

The movie: Man On Fire with Denzel Washington.

He plays an ex-military covert agent; struggling with a drinking problem; due to his past he is suicidal; and he has taken a job as a body guard for a young girl played by Dakota Fanning.

In short, through a relationship with the young girl he learns to live again.

Through the course of spending time together the young girl presents Mr. Creasy with a gift, a necklace, with a Saint Medal attached… she tells him, as he takes it out of the box, “It’s St. Jude, Patron St. of lost causes.” As she gives him a knowing smile.

That line, “It’s St. Jude, Patron St. of lost causes”, hit my ear.

As did Einsteins quote, and I said to myself, “The only other person I’ve prayed to, other than Jesus, was Our Lady of Blessed Acceleration, and I learned that in another movie, from a character named Elwood Blues.”

I invoked the prayer, “Our Lady of Blessed Acceleration, don’t fail me now!”, when I had to escape from an incoming tornado! The radio was saying, “If you are on such and such a road, in this town, get out of your car and into the ditch!”

I could see it. It was right there. No way in hell I was getting out of that car.

Good thing I was in a heavy, old, Chevy Monte Carlo, because that sucker was trying to peel that car right off of the road. So I said my little prayer, mashed the gas pedal, and headed for literal daylight!

The St. Jude necklace, stays with our main character for the rest of the movie.

I had to ask… because I didn’t know, “Who is St. Jude then?”

Turns out, his real name is Judas, same as that other guy named Judas, you know the one.

Legend has it that early Christians didn’t want to pray to anybody named Judas, just in case of getting the wrong guy, so the good one never got any attention.

Until…

Some folks reached the end of their rope. Having no one else to turn to. They then invoked the name Judas, the good one, when all else had failed them.

Over time, to clear things up, bible translators decided to use the shorter, informal name of Jude, for the good Judas.

Still, his is a little book amongst the 66, and he’s little known outside of the “professional church” and lesser known still as a venerated Saint amongst the general population.

And as legend has it, because of all the confusion, with the other guy, if you go to St. Jude, and pray for his help… he (according to legend) comes through, because he knows if you have searched him out you have no where else to turn.

Then I researched Danny Thomas, and why he used St. Jude for his children’s hospital.

Turns out Danny Thomas wasn’t always Danny Thomas.

At the start of his career he was struggling for work. But being a devout Catholic he turned to his last hope… and prayed for intercession.

https://www.stjude.org/about-st-jude/history.html?sc_icid=us-mm-history

My first thought was, “Why didn’t he just pray to Jesus directly?”

Then my second thought was, “Why does God allow, and encourage, and require, intercessory prayer? One person, praying for, interceding for… another person?”

The whole message of the bible is that we have a personal high priest, in Jesus Christ, who is our personal mediator, our personal intercessor.

But if we have that already… why would he need me to pray for you… and hopefully, vice versa?

My third thought was, “I don’t even really pray for myself. If asking for stuff is praying.”

Until recently that is.

I started a personal prayer book. I wanted to “track” my prayers, and keep my requests, so that… if answered… I could go back and acknowledge God and his attention on my life.

I gotta tell ya, “It’s been an eye opener.”

And then, as the Lord is want to do, He showed me, through all of that, how important prayer really is.

What is the point of personal prayer, intercessory prayer for others, and prayer in general?

Here’s what I got…

It is what “inserts” us into Gods overall plan, and our personal life plan.

Like a hand, inserting a key into an ignition switch.

Gods grace and favor is his hand… our prayer, a sort of key… that he allows us access with… to His overall plan, and our specific life plan… using one prayer at a time, to answer us, grow us, and delight in us.

His plan was set before the beginning of time, way before we were even conceived. Prayer then links us up with God, the same way when you stop your car, to pick up a friend, to go somewhere special.

“But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost,

²¹ Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.” ~Jude 2:20,21

To build your muscles the weights need to be heavy… to build up your most holy faith… your prayers, for yourself and others, will be heavy at times also.

If you need some encouragement on “HOW TO” pray, if you want to learn from Jesus himself, go to the book of Matthew, you’ll see where prayer falls on HIS… “how important is it” list.