AdamParker.org

Richard Crawford on Intercession

Filed under: Intercession

Richard Crawford is a missionary at IHOP-KC, the Associate Director of the Onething Internship and a Regional Coach for the Luke18 Project. He leads fiery prayer meetings in the evening section at IHOP, as well as one for California and our Nation that I happen to be apart of.

I asked Richard to write about the importance of Intercession. He has some incredible things to say regarding the necessity of standing in the gap and agreeing with God’s heart in intercession.

Intercession:
God is calling the body of Christ to the place of intercession. Intercession is the place where God and people meet, to stand between two opposing parties with the aim to resolve enmity. There is a depth to reach in Intimacy and friendship with God that only comes through intercession. Intercession is about fellowshipping with God yet at the same time being fully sympathetic with the misery of mankind. He’s calling us into His heart, His mind, and His will and wants a people committed to His plans and purposes in this generation. Intercession is coming into agreement with God.

God wants to fill His Church with power, the sick healed, the blind seeing, the lame walking, the captives set free, wickedness driven off the earth, God wants revival. God desires for His righteousness, His Kingdom, His will and His Name to be glorified in the earth. He chose to do these things in partnership with His people, its simply more enjoyable for Him this way. He wants us intimately involved with how He governs the universe. Jesus taught us to pray, “Your Kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.” (Matt 6:10) He also gave His people a key principle to live by, “ask and it shall be given,” (Mt 7:7) James says, “we have not because we ask not.” (Js 4:2) John says, “If we ask according to His will he hears us and we know we have that which we’ve asked of Him.” (1 Jn 5:15) Let us therefore get consumed with His desires and partner with Him through Intercession to see His Kingdom come to earth.

Jesus Himself lives forever to make Intercession. (Rom 8:34; Heb 7:25) Jesus embodies Intercession. Both fully God and fully man Jesus stands as the worthy Intercessor between the Father himself and mankind, until He brings all things both in heaven and on the earth together in Him. Through Christ, the Eternal Intercessor and Mediator, Heaven and Earth will be made one. Jesus is beckoning us into His heart to love what He loves, to hate what He hates, to actually desire what He desires and feel what He feels.

Intercession is standing in the gap between the misery of mankind and the everlasting pleasures of God, becoming the mediation between the temporal and eternal. Intercession is being caught in the tension of pleasure and pain, the nature of the Divine and nature of man. We must stand before God on behalf of mankind and stand before mankind on behalf of God. Who will stand in the gap? Who will partner with Jesus in Intercession in bringing Heaven to earth? I believe like in Ezekiel’s day, “God is searching for men who would make a wall and stand in the gap before Him on behalf of the land.” (Ez 22:30) We are called to literally hasten the day of the Lord, thus we have the ability to hold back that Glorious day. We can bring an end to wickedness and the misery of this fallen world faster and help establish everlasting righteousness; peace and eternal pleasure quicker as we eagerly wait for and passionately long for Him in Intercession. At its core intercession is the groan found in the last pages of scripture, “The Spirit and the Bride cry come.” (Rev 22:7)

Tags: Intercession