by Murray Wylie | Download PDF | Purchase Hardcopy

Verse 1
Spirit of grace and supplication
For if there be such consolation
Comfort and fellowship of Spirit
And such affection and such mercy.

Verse 2
Blessed are those who, poor in spirit
In suffering, take this cup, fulfilling
My sacrifice, through holy living
Who now in grace are overflowing.

Chorus
(All) Pour out Your grace through supplication
(Women) 'Fulfil My joy through consecration'
Says 'The Amen', amen, amen
Says 'The Amen', amen, amen.

My attention was first drawn to the subject of supplication when reading Philippians chapter four. There we read in verse five that 'the Lord is at hand'. Then in verse six we read that we are to 'be anxious for nothing', but to practise supplication in everything. There is a contrast made between nothing and everything. At a simple level, the point is that we are to be anxious for nothing, and to pray about everything. That's where the message of the song begins.

As there is quite a range of Scripture content invested in the song, we will take time to read the following passages.

Zech 12:10. 'And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn.'

Phil 4:5-7. 'The Lord is at hand. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.' NKJV and NASU.

Phil 2:1-8. 'Therefore if there is any consolation in Christ, if there is any comfort of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, fulfil my joy by being of the same mind ... look out not only for [your] own interests, but also for the interests of others. Have this mind in yourselves which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although He existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a bond-servant.' NKJV and NASU.

Phil 1:19. 'For I know that this will turn out for my deliverance through your prayer [Gr. 'supplication'] and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ.'

2 Cor 1:11. 'You also helping together by prayer [Gr. supplication] for us, that for the gift bestowed upon us by the means of many persons thanks may be given by many on our behalf.'

2 Cor 8:9. 'For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich.' James 5:16. 'Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer [Gr. 'supplication'] of a righteous man availeth much.'

Heb 5:7. 'Who in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he feared.'

Prayer and supplication with thanksgiving

Taking an overall view of the above Scriptures: supplication is referring to travail in prayer that takes us from complete poverty of spirit, through to the rich supply that is in Christ Jesus. That's why thanksgiving is mentioned in the key verse from Philippians chapter four (verse 6). Thanksgiving is the endpoint of offering, being one of the elements of the peace offering. Offering takes us from supplication to thanksgiving. We could also say, from burnt offering through to peace offering.

This is significant, for the next verse in the Philippians chapter speaks of the peace of God. 'And the peace of God will guard your hearts and minds.' Phil 4:7. The reference to peace links us immediately with the peace offering. Two verses later, the point is repeated when we read, 'The God of peace will be with you'. Phil 4:9.

The Spirit of grace and supplication

In the key verse from the book of Zechariah, we read, 'I will pour ... the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced'. We read of grace and supplication. The first consideration is grace. What is the impact of the Spirit of grace? In this context, we'll consider that grace is the unique capacity, through offering, to be poor in order to make others rich.

Zechariah prophesies that the effect of the Spirit of grace and supplication is that we look on Him whom we have pierced, and we mourn. In other words, we join the activity of the cross – the intercession, the supplication – by which all our poverty was made rich. We learn that Christ's death on the cross was not merely an agonising death in our place.

His death was a pathway of 'strong crying and tears' where He was heard and saved from death. Now we can understand prayer and supplication. Supplication is our participation in the pathway from death through to being saved from death. Each matter for which we travail in prayer must be saved from death and brought through to life.

This requires grace from Christ, who was full of grace, and who travelled the whole pathway from eternal death to eternal life.

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ

When we speak about the 'grace' of Christ, we are not just referring to His kindness or His favour. The second book of Corinthians lifts the subject of 'grace' into a much larger frame of reference. 'For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich.' 2 Cor 8:9.

What is 'the grace of the Lord Jesus'? What is His grace capacity? His grace was revealed in His capacity to become poor in order to make many rich. Philippians chapter two records that He 'emptied Himself', taking the form of a slave. Christ emptied all His glory and personal prerogative in order to adopt our condition, fully. He was made sin. 2 Cor 5:21. Having emptied to this endpoint, He then poured out His fullness in order to grant us everlasting riches.

The main point, then, is this: in supplication, we participate with Christ in the aspect of becoming 'poor'. His grace capacity enables us to join His supplication.

Christ offered prayers and supplications

Once again, note the verse, 'In the days of His flesh ... He had offered up prayers and supplications, with vehement cries and tears'. Heb 5:7. So we are actually joining the supplication of Christ. His Spirit of grace enables us to participate in His offering. We participate in the very same grief and travail of the cross that yielded 'seed'. Indeed, the cross was a birthplace. 'It pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You make His soul an [trespass] offering for sin, He shall see His seed.' Isa 53:10.

By the Spirit of grace, we are to gain the capacity to join the way of offering. We participate in the one offering of Christ. We journey from grievous lack to joyous fulfilment in the particular matters for which we pray with supplication.

It is not that we simply ask for what we do not have, and then receive it through faith if the Lord wills. Rather, from being 'poor in spirit' (which is the first beatitude) we begin to beseech for grace. As we join Christ in supplication, we are heard in the cross. We are saved from death. The people or situations for whom we pray are saved through from death and brought to life. Fruit is brought to birth, through death.

Consolation, comfort, fellowship, affection, mercy - the mind of Christ

The lines of the first verse of the song are quoted from the book of Philippians. 'If there is any encouragement [consolation] in Christ, if there is any consolation [comfort] of love, if there is any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind.' Phil 2:1,2.

The key thought here is that we have consolation, comfort, fellowship, affection and mercy, because we are in Christ. And because this is so, we can be likeminded – having the same love and same purpose – with Christ and with one another. The apostle Paul continues, urging us to 'let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus'. Phil 2:5. There is no doubt. We are to be of one mind with Christ in the way of His offering.

Counted in the cross

Expressing this truth even more strongly, we are counted, reckoned, as partners in His death, just as He is counted with us. 'And He was numbered [reckoned, imputed] with the transgressors.' Luke 22:37. In the book of Romans, we read that we are numbered with Him. 'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress ... or peril ... as it is written: "For Your sake we are killed all day long; we are accounted [reckoned, imputed] as sheep for the slaughter" ... I am persuaded that neither death nor life ... shall be able to separate us from the love of God.' Rom 8:35-39.

The picture becomes most compelling. Whatever is our tribulation, distress or peril, these are counted as part of the offering death of Christ. We are inseparable. No wonder Paul also notes, a few verses earlier, 'If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us ...'. Rom 8:31-35.

Christ is making intercession. The cross is active wherever the Spirit of grace and supplication is poured out. Those who offer earnest supplication and thanksgiving are joining the active work of the cross in its power to redeem from death, right here and now. People who are dying, in every sense of the word, and situations where deception and corruption are bringing death, can be redeemed from the power of the grave. The cords of death can be loosed. Yokes can be broken. Captives can be set free.

Gethsemane - the Spirit is willing

Verse two of the song introduces the subjects of being poor in spirit, and of taking 'the cup' as Jesus did in Gethsemane. It was there that Christ urged His disciples to 'watch and pray', to avoid temptation, and said that 'the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak'. Matt 26:41. Running several thoughts together, recall that David prayed that the Lord would uphold Him with His willing Spirit. Psa 51:12. (The same word is used in Psa 110:3: 'free-will'.) It's an amazing encouragement that the Lord works in us 'to will and to do' of His good pleasure. Phil 2:13. Simply, when we are poor and broken in spirit, we are upheld by His willing Spirit. This is the Spirit of grace that leads us in supplication. The Spirit of grace is willing for the whole of the Calvary journey.

A broken spirit - poor in spirit

David understood the matter of a broken spirit when he said, 'You do not desire sacrifice, or else I would give it'. Psa 51:16. Then he went on to say, 'The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart – these, O God, You will not despise'. Psa 51:17.

David was saying that he was completely broken as far as being able to give an adequate sacrifice to God. There is nothing we can do, so in everything we seize hold of Him in prayer and supplication, as we are exhorted in the book of Philippians.

When the Spirit of grace enables us to have a broken spirit, or to be poor in spirit, then we are blessed. 'Blessed are the poor in Spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.' Matt 5:3. This is the first beatitude. This is the starting point in everything. The kingdom of heaven, where everything functions in holy offering, is ours when we make a beginning by being poor in spirit.

Watch and pray

This attitude is what the disciples were to watch when Jesus took them 'to a place', a very particular place of instruction in Gethsemane. 'When He came to the place, He said to them, "[Watch and] Pray that you may not enter into temptation".' Mark 14:38; Luke 22:40.

Yes, indeed, Christ did move a 'stone's throw' further on to a place that was His alone, in terms of the cup that He was to accept and drink. However, in this cup, there was a share that belonged to the disciples, as He later explained. 'Are you able to drink the cup ... you will indeed drink My cup.' Matt 20:22,23.

His precious death

The lesson carried in the song is that when we bring everything in prayer, we have nothing; nothing else. We are poor in spirit. Here, we are included in His precious death. Our death becomes His. Then our death is precious, for we read, 'Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints'. Psa 116:15.

As we come with a broken spirit, there is nothing we can do except to impute to His offering. Essential to this exercise is that we join Him at the point of His death, or end, when He is fully empty, but accepting the cup – all the grief that is put upon Him. Then we journey with Him from death to life, from complete poverty to the pouring out of His own 'riches'. This is His grace, or capacity.

Accordingly, the second verse of the song reads:

Blessed are those who, poor in spirit
In suffering, take this cup, fulfilling
My sacrifice, through holy living
Who now in grace are overflowing.

He will supply all our need

We journey from need to riches, for 'my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus'. Phil 4:19. He can supply all the need because He has poured out His soul to death.

This is how He supplies all our need – according to His riches. Supplication is seeking the supply for the lack. We approach Him in poverty, identifying with lack in ourselves or in others. Then our travail joins us to Him in the cross, as a birthplace. Paul illustrates this process when he speaks of personal deliverance that came to him through the supplication of others, and through the supply of the Spirit. Phil 1:19. He also rejoiced in 'the gift' that came to him through the supplication of faithful believers. 2 Cor 1:11.

So we sing in the song's chorus: 'Pour out Your grace through supplication'. And then we sing as if the Lord is replying to us, 'Fulfil My joy through consecration, says "The Amen".'

The Amen - Rev 3:14

Christ has accomplished the endpoint. Luke 22. What He has 'begun', He will finish, as the Author and Finisher. We sometimes forget that He is as much the Finisher as He is the Author. Heb 12:2. As the Finisher, He is 'the Amen', just as He speaks of Himself in the book of Revelation.

So, in the whole matter, 'The Amen' is saying to us: 'Fulfil My joy by joining Me in the way of supplication'. The song reminds us that His promises will yield an 'amen' as we persevere in supplication. Those who are poor in spirit will inherit the riches of the kingdom.

Author: Murray Wylie | Brisbane Christian Fellowship | BCF
Published by Vision One at Toowoomba Christian Fellowship | TCF
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