The best prayers said John Bunyan have more groans than words, and I don't know about you this morning, but I know that lately my prayers have been short on words and long on groans. If you get our church emails, if you get our prayer list through the email, then you know that recently Omar Nuihid has received a word that he may be facing a possible diagnosis of ALS disease, or what is commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease. And as we think about that, that would be enough for one man to bear, for one family to bear, but as most of you are aware that Omar and Maravat have been facing another terrible disease in their family, that their son Joseph has. He has been suffering from leukemia, and they have been fighting every day for the life of their son, and now they are confronted with the possibility of fighting for the life of his father too. It's almost too much to bear, isn't it? And so as I've been thinking about this and praying about this all week long, and I have to tell you that my prayers have been long on groans and short on words. But Bunyan says that the best prayers, the best prayers, he says, are short on words and long on groans. And you know that's an interesting word that he chooses there, because that's the word that the Apostle Paul uses to talk about not only our prayers, but about creation in general, about the people of God, and about God himself. If you look in the book of Romans in chapter 8, I want us to look at how Paul talks about these three classifications of creation, the people of God, and God himself, particularly God, the Holy Spirit. And if you look at chapter 8 beginning with verse 22, he says, we know that the whole creation has been growing, growing as in pains of childbirth right up to this present time. Beloved, creation is groaning. Creation is growing. It longs, it aches, it groans for the redemption, for the completeness of the redemption of God. Creation groans because of the curse, creation groans because of the fall, creation longs for the new heavens and the new earth, the new creation when all of the curse is gone. But not only does creation groan, but we groan with it. Look at what he says. We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in pains of childbirth right up to the present time, but not only so, but we ourselves groan. We ourselves, who are the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for the adoptions of sons, the redemption of our bodies. Beloved, we live in a world that is full of pain, of hurt, of death, of affliction, and we groan for a time when there's no more pain, when there's no more death, when there's no more tears. We long for the time when our bodies will be completely and fully redeemed. We groan for that time, but more importantly, in verse 26 the Apostle Paul tells us that not only does creation groan, not only do we groan, but the Holy Spirit groans. In the same way the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express creation groans. The people of God groan and the Holy Spirit groans for a better time, for a better day, for a better place, a time in which every tear will be wiped away. But right now we live in the in between times, and so we are trying to figure out how to live in the tension between the kingdom already coming and the kingdom that is yet to come and all of its fullness and all of its glory and all of its completeness. And Paul says that we groan during that time, but I like what Bunyan has said, Bunyan says that the best prayers are short on words and long on groans. And so we groan this morning, but the best prayers are not our groans, the best prayers are the groans of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit Paul says, groans as he makes intercession for us. What all this tells us below it is that we need help. I've told you before, I've said it many times in front of you. The most frequent prayer in my prayer journal is simply this. I need help. I cannot do this. I don't have what it takes. I need help. And if you're honest with yourselves this morning, as we think about our dear brother and his family, if you're honest with yourself, as you go to God and prayer this morning, you have to tell me that you feel something of our own inadequacy. Something of our human weakness and inadequacy in our weakness, in our impotence, we need the help of the Holy Spirit. And Paul tells us here that we have just that help, we have the help of the Holy Spirit. Look at what he says in verse 26. In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We live in a culture that seems to revel in power and strength. But the truth is that we are weak. We are inadequate. We need help. You know, Friday, a week ago, Friday, I received a call from Omar when he had just gotten back from his back surgeon who informed him at the time that the atrophy that he had in his legs and his arms and the other symptoms that he was experiencing were not the result of a herniated disc in his back as they originally thought, but that was likely to be something along the lines of a motor neuron disease. And so I picked Omar up right here at school and we were driving down to lunch. And Omar told me that he told me about a night one time when he was in the hospital with his son Joseph. And he had said that he was in the hospital with his son Joseph and his son Joseph was lying in the hospital bed with leukemia. And he was sick in addition to having leukemia. We know that he's had fevers and high fevers. We know that his blood counts have been dangerously low from time to time. And here's this young little boy Omar says, his son lying in this bed and he's sitting in the rocking chair next to him. And he said that I was sitting there in this rocking chair. I had the overwhelming sense that here's my son. I am his father. And yet I'm sitting here next to him in his bed and there is nothing that I can do to help him. This is my son. I'm his father. I'm supposed to be able to help my son. And yet there's nothing that I can do.
And I looked at Omar and I said Omar, you're exactly right. And he said to me, and that's exactly now how I feel about myself. This is the disease that my father died from. I watched my father die in agonizing death from this cruel disease. We sought. We watched it. And now not only can't I help my son, but there's nothing I can do to help myself. And I said, Omar, you're exactly right. But I said, let me tell you something that that is a state in which we all live. What is true for you and true about your son is true for all of it. But it takes a disease like this or an accident or some other irreversible loss to drive home the fact, the reality that you and I are really and truly and honestly helpless. And in our week, we are impotent to do anything to help ourselves or to help others. That's the human predicament. That's the reality of the case.
Beloved, I want to say to you this morning that you are Omar. I am Omar. We are all Omar. None of us can do anything to help ourselves. None of us can do anything to help another person. We are weak. We are helpless. That's the human condition. You and I are dependent upon God for life and breath and health and everything else. You do not know when or how or where you will die. You are helpless. You are at the mercy of God. But in times like these, you see, we realize our own helplessness. We realize our own weakness. We realize our own inadequacy. And the myth, as it were, the bubble of our own self-sufficiency and our own strength and our own omnicompanance is blown away. And what we are left with is the reality of our own weakness. That just like Omar sitting next to the bed of his son, there is nothing that we can do. I want to suggest to you that that is exactly where God wants us to come to an end of our own selves, to come to an end of our own means, to come to an end of the illusion and the myth. That we can somehow do something for ourselves or for someone else without the aid and assistance of Almighty God. And I have good news for you here this morning, beloved, that while we are helpless, we are not without help. Paul says that the Holy Spirit helps us in the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. And I want to tell you this morning, beloved, that I believe that the Holy Spirit will help us this morning as we pray for Omar. The Holy Spirit helped us when we prayed for John Barros, the Holy Spirit helped us when we prayed for Charlotte Brown, the Holy Spirit has helped us every single time that we have prayed for a little Joseph. And I believe the Holy Spirit will help us today in our weakness, in our inadequacy, in our impetus. But not only does the Holy Spirit help us in our weakness, but it helps us in our ignorance. Look at what Paul says in the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for. See not only in our weakness, but in our ignorance, you and I don't even know what to pray for. We don't even know what to ask for. We don't even know what to go to God for. Even when we pray, we pray in ignorance. We almost claim agnosticism here. You know what I do when I hear about stuff like this? Oh Mark, I tell you, because he gets tired hearing about it from me. I go on the internet, and I read absolutely everything I can find out about motor neuron disease. I want to know the vocabulary, I want to know the language, I want to know all the research, I want to know what all the latest medical journals have said. I want to know everything that can be known about this disease, and so I read, and I research, and I study. And I go from one website to the other, because I want to know everything there is to know about this disease. I want to know every time that has been misdiagnosed. I want to know every other disease that masked itself as AOS. And I read, and I research, because I want to know. But beloved the truth is, we don't know. No matter how much we know, the truth is, we don't know. You and I do not know. And I have to tell you this too, the doctors don't know. The fact of the matter is, the reality of the case is simply this, that we don't know. No one really knows. When we come before God, we come before God, as it were, ignorantly. When we pray, we pray, not knowing. But you see, therein again is the good news, because we are weak, but God is strong. We are ignorant, but God knows all things. We pray from weakness, God prays from omnipotence. We pray from ignorance, He prays from omniscience, and complete accordance with the will of God. That's what Paul is saying here, beloved. He is saying that the Holy Spirit, even though we pray in weakness and ignorance, the Holy Spirit prays in omnipotence and omniscience, and complete accordance with the will of God. Look at what he says here, and he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints and accordance with God's will. I don't know about you, but I'm always glad when people tell me they're praying for me. And I know many of you pray for me, and I'm always glad when the officers of this church pray for me, the elders, and I know that they pray for me. In a few minutes, we're going to bring Omar down front here, and we're going to pray for him. And we're going to do what the Bible says. We're going to anoint him with oil. We're going to call the elders to pray. And so I'm glad when you pray for me, and I'm glad when the elders pray for me, and I know that you are glad when I pray for you, but I'm going to tell you something, beloved. We're going to call Omar down here, and his pastor is going to pray for him, and the elders are going to pray for him, and the people of God are going to pray for him. But you make no mistake about this, that we are not the only ones praying this morning, that this text tells us that the Holy Spirit is praying for him. We pray in weakness. He prays in strength and power and omnipotence. We pray in ignorance. He prays with all knowledge and omniscience. We pray not knowing what the will of God is, but he knows exactly and precisely exhaustively and categorically what the will of God is. And he never prays out of accordance to the will of God Almighty in heaven. Now you think about that, about the reality of the Holy Spirit in his omnipotence and his omniscience, praying in full accord with the will of God as we join him prayer this morning. I don't know about you, beloved, but I want the Holy Spirit praying for me. And what Paul tells us here is that the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Godhead, God, the Holy Spirit, intercedes for us in our weakness and in our ignorance. Omar, come and let your pastor pray for you. Come and let the elders pray for you. Come and let the people of God pray for you. But more importantly, you come here and you let the Holy Spirit pray for you.