How does the Spirit intercede ? (continued)

The Spirit teaches Christians to understand and apply the promises of Scripture... This is what often happens to Christians when they pray for their children. Sometimes they pray, and are in darkness and in doubt. It seems to them that there is no foundation for their faith, no special promise for the children of believers. But while they plead with God, God shows them the extended meaning of a promise, and their soul leans upon it as on the arm of the Almighty.

I heard that a widow was very uncomfortable about her children until this passage came to her mind forcefully : "Give up your orphans ! I will keep them alive. When your widows, put their trust in me !" (Jeremiah 49:11) She saw that this declaration had a great significance, and she could seize it, so to speak, with both hands. She won the victory in prayer, and her children were converted.

The Spirit leads Christians to desire and ask for things that the written Word does not specify. God willing to save, that's a general truth. It is true as well as He is willing to answer prayers. But how will I know the will of God for a person, to know whether I can, yes or no, pray with faith and in the will of God, for his conversion and his salvation ? It is here that the Spirit of God intervenes, inclining the hearts of His children to pray for these souls, and that at the moment when God is ready to bless them.

When we do not know what to pray for, the Spirit leads us to think intensely about this or that object, to consider its circumstances, to appreciate its value, to have deep feelings about it, to pray and to experience as birth pains until the person is converted. I know that this kind of experience is less known in the city than in the country, because of the infinite number of things in the cities that divert thought and oppose the Spirit.

Jeremy Sourdril