Romans 8:26-27  

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.  ²⁷ 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.

These past few weeks as we’ve continued our walk through Paul’s letter to the believers in Rome, we’ve focused quite a bit on the reality of life as a Christian.  For instance, we learned that the Christian life is a daily battle between our old, sinful human nature and the new life of faith in Jesus Christ, a battle whose outcome we can thank God through our Lord Jesus Christ and the full and free forgiveness of our sins which He won at the cross.  We learned that the Christian life is a “groaning” life—a life where we join the creation in groaning inwardly, not because the world is so bad, but because we await our final adoption, the redemption of our bodies on the last day. 

Today we are reminded of another truth about the reality of the Christian life.  The reality that the Christian life is a life of prayer.  The one word that comes to mind as we consider “The Christian Faith, One Word at a Time,” in God's Word for today is this:  “praying.” 

And yet it’s important to remember that along with everything else in the Christian life, we are not left on our own to try to figure things out with regard to prayer.  We aren’t just praying; we’re Praying—With the Spirit’s Help.

1. He prays by inexpressible groans.

People have lots of ideas about prayer, especially when it comes to what it takes to get those prayers answered.  For some, prayer means that you can’t say something that somebody else wrote down or something you memorized, that the words have to spontaneously come from the heart in order for God to hear them.  For others prayer is exactly the opposite:  that it’s all about saying the right words, that you have say everything exactly right—exactly the way it was written, with all the right phrases, etc.  Why?  Because, they believe, if you say the right things to God, you can get Him to do what you want.  (Kind of sounds like magic, right?) 

The trouble with both these approaches is that they’re hung up on words.  If you can’t memorize any prayers or read a prayer that’s been written down, what if you don’t know what to say?  What if the situation you’re in is so emotionally trying that you just can’t come up with the words?  On the other side, the side of those who believe that it’s by only saying the exact words that you can get God to listen to you:  what if you have a bad memory?  What if you mess up?  Is God still going to hear you if you turn a “Thee” or “Thy” into “You” or “Yours”?  Both sides put way too much emphasis on the part we play in praying. 

The fact is that prayer is just not something that you and I are good at on our own, for, as Paul says, “we do not know what we should pray for as we ought” (v. 26).  Like other people, you and I too get hung up on words—on saying all the right things—instead of being focused on what it is we need.  And the truth is that while we think we know what we ought to pray for, more often than not we don’t.  Kind of like the patient who goes into the doctor’s office having self-diagnosed his disease on Wikipedia.  He wants a treatment the doctor cannot give.  So we wind up asking for things that we ought not be asking for. 

Prayer is hard; it’s kind of like trying to move a tree trunk out of the road by yourself.  You lift and lift and the tree trunk maybe moves a bit, but by the time it moves you’re so tired that you wind up going on to something else.  How many times have we gone to that tree trunk of prayer?  You start praying and you’re trying really hard to concentrate and you want to say all the right things; but in the end instead of praying you get so frustrated that you wind up talking not to God—but to yourself:  “Come on, now, focus!  What do I really want to say?”  When it comes to praying, we are weak. 

Enter the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit “helps us in our weaknesses” in praying by interceding for us “with groanings which cannot be uttered” (v. 26).  He joins you at the tree trunk called “prayer”; the two of you bend down at the same time and lift together.  Only this time, the tree moves—a lot!  And you get the distinct feeling that you’re not the one doing the work here.  Underneath all your halting, fumbling words, the Holy Spirit is hard at work—but not even in the words you’re saying, but with all those groans and sighs—those groans and sighs that mean so much more than groans and sighs.

A single sigh has the potential to capture all the need, all the built-up frustration and tension, all the worry and care of life here on earth:  your struggles with sin; the crosses you’re bearing in life; the decay and death in your own bodies that we share with all creation.  On sigh can capture it all.  And at the same time, when you let that sigh out, in your body you’re letting go of a measure of all that.  The sigh of the Christian is not a throwing the hands up and giving up, but just another way of saying, “Not my will be done, O Lord, but let Your will be done.”  At the same time it’s the realization that we’re not able; and the comfort of knowing God is not just able, but willing to help.    

You don’t do this on your own.  The Holy Spirit does it for you; and He does it purely by the grace of God.  You see, God doesn’t lose patience with us in our prayers, the way we lose patience with people who can’t seem to just “spit it out.”  Instead He sends His Holy Spirit to you, since He justified you through the redemption won by Jesus Christ at the cross.  He calls you His saint—His holy one—on account of the righteousness of Jesus.  He has adopted you, declared you to be His child.  “And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, ‘Abba, Father!’” (Gal 4:6).  The only reason we can approach God at all, let alone be able to say anything to Him, is through faith in the cross of Jesus Christ. 

The Christian life is a life of prayer.  However, that doesn’t mean it’s the kind of life where a person stands all day knocking at the door only to have no one be there on the other side.  We don’t just hope God is hearing us when we pray.  We know He hears us.  That’s because when we’re praying with the Spirit’s help, He always prays according to God’s will.  

2. He always prays according to God’s will.   

Praying “according to God’s will” means that when you’re praying, that instead of demanding God do things the way you’d like to see them done, you ask God to take care of things His way.  You take the people and things you treasure and you turn to God and say, “Here, you do what you want.”  According to our human nature it’s impossible to pray according to God’s will because everything has to be “my way.”  “You can’t let me be sick this week, Lord; come on!”  “Lord, the only way I’m ever going to be happy in life is if you let me marry So-and-so.”  Never mind the fact that we don’t really know what we need—or what we truly want, for that matter. 

So that’s another thing that the Holy Spirit does for us as God’s children:  “He makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God” (v. 27).  When it comes to the prayers that the Holy Spirit offers on our behalf through groans and sighs, they are all desires that are in lock step with the mind and heart of the Father and the Son.  All the desires the Spirit expresses for us perfectly match up with God’s plans for our lives. 

It’s another source of confidence we have when we pray.  Not only does God hear our lowly, humble prayers, but He answers them too, according to His good and gracious will:  “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” (v. 27).  God is the only one who searches the heart (Ps 139:1).  And Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are in perfect sync; in mind and will they are one with each other.   So the Holy Spirit is perfectly aware of the Father’s will:  “For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God” (1 Cor 2:10).

When by the Holy Spirit you pray for spiritual blessings—whether it be for forgiveness of sins, stronger faith, or anything else like that—you’re praying for things that God has already graciously promised to give you.  So God will answer that prayer; He has to.  It’s already His own will! 

And when you pray in the Spirit for earthly blessings, for things like success, friendships, to see the way out of financial difficulties and hardships, you can trust that those requests are heard and answered too—always according to God’s will, His good and gracious will which promises to do what is best for you not just now, but for all eternity. 

In that confidence you can “pray continually,” as Paul says elsewhere.  Martin Luther was famous for complaining to his wife and others, saying, “I have so much to do today, I’ve got to spend at least three hours in prayer if I ever expect to get it all done.”  Pray at home; pray at work or school.  Pray when you get up; pray when you go to bed.  Pray while driving in the car.  Written or memorized prayers are great—just think of the very prayer that Jesus taught us to pray, let alone the entire book of Psalms.  But simple words spoken to God are great too.  It’s not the words so much as the Spirit praying them with you—the same Holy Spirit who uses not just words, but inexpressible sighs and groans, to get the point across to the Father for you.  Even when you’re not praying, the Holy Spirit still is praying—for you.       

Prayer in itself is not a means of grace.  But it is a privilege—a privilege afforded only to those who are God’s children by faith in Christ Jesus.  And it is a fruit of faith—faith implanted and grown in us by the Spirit through the power of the Gospel.  And the Spirit’s help is there for you, not just when you pray, but always, by the grace of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Amen.