Prayer To Yahshua: Is It Idolatry?


QUESTION:

    Is it acceptable to pray to the Messiah?  Yahshua said, “Whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My Name”, and even Yahshua prayed to the Father, so shouldn’t we?
 
ANSWER:

    My custom, personally, is pray to Yahweh in the Name of Yahshua, as this is the example which the Messiah gave us, and this is what I grew up with.  There are some, however, who are teaching that prayer to Yahshua is idolatry, and this NEEDS to be addressed.  First we ask the question, what is prayer?
 
    “Prayer: 1) In a general sense, the act of asking for a favor, and particularly with earnestness.  2) In worship, a solemn address to the Supreme Being consisting of adoration, or an expression of our sense of [Elohim’s] glorious perfections, confession of our sins, supplication for mercy and forgiveness, intercession for blessings on others, and thanksgiving, or an expression of gratitude to [Elohim] for His mercies and benefits.”
 
    Webster goes on to state that the word comes from the same family of words as “preach” or “bless”, the primary sense being to throw or to pour forth sounds or words.  So to say that one can not pray to the Messiah is to say that one cannot talk to Yahshua!  Does that make any sense??
 
    Acts 7:59 And they were stoning Stephen as he was calling and saying, “Master Yahshua, receive my spirit.” [60] And kneeling down he cried out with a loud voice, “Master, do not hold this sin against them”.  And having said this, he fell asleep.
 
    Clearly we see that Stephen prayed to Yahshua.  Now let’s turn to Revelation.
 
    Rev. 22:20 He that bears witness of these matters says, “Yea, I am coming speedily.”  Awmain.  Yea, come Master Yahshua.
 
    So we see that John ends his revelation by praying/speaking to Yahshua as well.

    Now to answer the next phase of the question, why does Yahshua say:
 
    Jhn. 14:13 And whatsoever ye shall ask  in My Name, that will I do, that the Father may be esteemed in the Son.

    Jhn. 15:16 Ye have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and [that] your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My Name, He may give it you.

    Jhn. 16:23 And in that day ye shall ask Me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in My Name, He will give [it] you.

    Jhn. 16:26 At that day ye shall ask in My name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father on your behalf.
 
    Okay, in plain words Yahshua is saying, “I am the mediator between you and the Father.  Give it to me and I’ll pass it on.”  But then Yahshua says, “In that day you will ask Me nothing” (Jhn. 16:22).  What does that mean?  Basically He is just telling the disciples that He will soon be ascending to the Father, and they will no longer be able to talk to Him in physical form, which brings us to the last phase of this question  –  Why didn’t Yahshua pray to Himself?  First off, from a human perspective, that would have been rather strange.  After all, why don’t we talk to ourselves?  Much more important than that, however, is that one of Yahshua’s primary reasons for coming to earth, besides making atonement, was to set an example for us to follow, and once He was ascended, we would have to pray to Yahweh in the Heavens in order to have contact.  If He had prayed to Himself, it would have set the example of praying to a man, because He was in the form of humanity.  But when He prayed to the Father, He set the example for us to pray to Yahweh, in His Name, or according to His example (see Matt. 6:9-13, Luke 11:2-4).

This article was published on Wednesday 21 December, 2016.
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