A Picture of Grace

On day two, this verse was touched on and I wanted to give another biblical example of praying for others who have sinned against us.

“If anyone sees his brother commit a sin that does not lead to death, he should pray and God will give him life. I refer to those whose sin does not lead to death. There is a sin that leads to death. I am not saying that he should pray about that.”

~1 John 5:16 (NIV)

A great example of this in the Old Testament is the book of Job. Job was a righteous man in God's eyes and He wanted to prove it to Satan by allowing a series of catastrophes in his family and finally, by allowing Job to be stricken with a very painful disease. Job literally loses everything except for his wife. Later in the story, Job has three friends who come to console him. It ends up that his friends, with their human instinct, tell Job he must have sin in his life because there's no other logical reason for all these terrible things to happen. These men accuse Job of terrible things and the accusations go on and on and on. In the end, God tells Job's friends to ask for forgiveness and because Job prayed for them, God will forgive them.  I think this is a great example for us when we are wronged and are trying to decide what to do.

“So now take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and sacrifice a burnt offering for yourselves. My servant Job will pray for you, and I will accept his prayer and not deal with you according to your folly. You have not spoken of Me what is right, as my servant Job has.” So Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite did what the Lord told them; and the Lord accepted Job's prayer. After Job had prayed for his friends, the Lord made him prosperous again and gave him twice as much as he had before.”

~Job 42:8-10 (NIV)

Not only does God promise to forgive Job's friends, once Job prays for his friends, He restores Job's life and makes him prosperous once again. I’ve given you a very brief synopsis of this 42nd chapter of the book, but it is a great book to study to learn about relationships with other believers.

~Jeri Heintz