When John F. Kennedy was president of the US, photographers sometimes
captured a winsome scene. Seated around the president’s desk in the Oval
Office, cabinet members are debating matters of world consequence. Meanwhile, a
toddler, the 2-year-old John-John, crawls around and inside the huge
presidential desk, oblivious to White House protocol and the weighty matters of
state. He is simply visiting his daddy.
That is the kind of shocking accessibility conveyed in the word Abba
when Jesus said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible for You” (Mark 14:36).
God may be the sovereign Lord of the universe, but through His Son, God became
as approachable as any doting human father. In Romans 8, Paul brings the image
of intimacy even closer. God’s Spirit lives inside us, he says, and when we do
not know what we ought to pray “the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us
with groanings which cannot be uttered” (v.26).
Jesus came to demonstrate that a perfect and holy God welcomes pleas for
help from a widow with two mites and a Roman centurion and a miserable publican
and a thief on a cross. We need only call out “Abba” or, failing that, simply
groan. God has come that close to us.
Prayer is an intimate conversation with our God. (RBC)
