Should Christians pray to Jesus and the Holy Spirit?

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thistle93

Puritan Board Freshman
Wondering if there is anything in Scripture that tells us we should or should not pray to Jesus and the Holy Spirit? I have been raised with belief to only pray to the Father in the name of Jesus and in the power of the Holy Spirit. Curious if I have missed something in Scripture either for or against exclusively praying to the Father? Or is this a matter of personal convection that Christians can disagree upon?


For His Glory-
Matthew
 
Ask Stephen, Acts 7:58-60:

And cast him out of the city, and stoned him: and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man's feet, whose name was Saul.
And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.
And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep.
 
Ask Stephen, Acts 7:58-60:

And cast him out of the city, and stoned him: and the witnesses laid down their clothes at a young man's feet, whose name was Saul.
And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.
And he kneeled down, and cried with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And when he had said this, he fell asleep.

Well, that about sums it up! :)
 
In sermon tapes by Donald Gray Barnhouse I heard in the 1980s he always said, "We come to the Father, through the Lord Jesus Christ, and in Thy Holy Spirit." I've adapted that to my own prayer life ever since.
 
Prayer takes in a broad spectrum of communication. In the formal sense, prayer is to be addressed to the Father in the name of the Son with the help of the Spirit. This follows the pattern taught in Scripture. As with all biblical forms, there is something valuable which is maintained by it, and the lack of a form generally opens the door to misunderstanding and disorder. At the same time there are other less formal expressions of communion which are also within the scope of biblical example, and these are in keeping with the rich truth that the one God is always indivisible in His external works. But as this "infinitude" is to us a wide ocean, and we feel safest by staying close to the shoreline, it is best to abide as much as possible by the formal pattern taught in Scripture.
 
But as this "infinitude" is to us a wide ocean, and we feel safest by staying close to the shoreline, it is best to abide as much as possible by the formal pattern taught in Scripture.

I agree.

I got diverted but wanted to mention something along these lines. We are indeed taught a pattern, and the pattern is important to frame our thoughts, but the pattern not is such a rule that we are prohibited from crying out, "Lord Jesus, help!"
 
I pray what the Scriptures teach regarding the Trinity, such as praising and thanking Jesus for mediating for me, or asking the spirit to illuminate the scriptures for me, or to intercede when all I can pray are the deep groanings of my heart.
 
Wollebius:

Prayer is made to the entire Hoy Trinity, in such form that either all the persons are invoked at once, or any one of them separately.
I think Durham gets at something similar when he says that prayer is made to God as God.
 
The oneness of God should not be forgotten. We can pray to God and be praying to all three Persons at once. And we might direct our prayer to any of the Persons, especially when engaged in a task we know that Person to have a special role in. The prayer to the Spirit for the illumination of Scripture, mentioned above, is an example of this. So, yes, we should pray to Jesus and the Spirit.

That said, the Bible seems to suggest we take extra delight in being able to pray to the Father. The Son is one of us, a fellow human, and so it seems little wonder that he should hear us. The Spirit is ever with us, and so every bit of our lives is a conversation with him. But the Father—ah, when we pray to the Father, brought near to him by our attachment to the Son and the ministry of the Spirit, then we rightly are awed, transported and warmed in ways that make us particularly eager and grateful that we have a Father who, amazingly, listens to our prayers.
 
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