PARENTHOOD
a divine stewardship

The flesh denotes the totality of the fallen old man. Hence, the flesh does not refer simply to part of our being, but to our entire fallen being. According to Romans 6:6, the old man has been crucified with Christ. Because the old man is hopeless, God put it on the cross and crucified it with Christ.... The destiny of the flesh is to be put to death. No matter how the flesh may appear to us, in God's eyes it is rebellious and despicable. For this reason, God has decided to blot out the name of Amalek.

III. HOW TO FIGHT AGAINST AMALEK

A. By Praying with the Interceding Christ

We come now to the important matter of how to fight against Amalek. In the first place, we fight by praying with the interceding Christ (Exodus 17:11). Moses lifting up his hand on the mountaintop typifies the interceding Christ in the heavens. We are told in 17:12 that when Moses' hands were heavy, "Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands, the one on the one side and the other on the other side; and his hands were steady until the going down of the sun." What is the significance of this? We have pointed out that Moses here is a type of Christ interceding for us in the heavens. But we cannot say that Christ's hands are heavy, can we? Surely Christ does not need anyone to stay up His hands. There is no Aaron or Hur in the heavens helping Christ with His intercession. It seems, then, that the type is not altogether fitting. However, since the Bible was inspired by God, there must be something here related to our spiritual experience.

If we consider these verses in the light of our experience, we shall understand that to deal with the flesh we not only need Christ's intercession for us in the heavens, but we ourselves also need to pray.... As we have pointed out, Moses praying on the mountaintop typifies Christ interceding for us in the heavens. But the fact that Moses needed Aaron and Hur to stay up his hands signifies our need to pray. While Christ is praying in the heavens, we must pray here on earth. When we pray, we are one with Moses on the mountaintop. But when we put the flesh to death, we are one with Joshua fighting in the valley.

Although the interceding Christ does not need anyone to support His hands, we need our praying hands to be stayed up. It is easy for them to become heavy. We know that to deal with the flesh we need to pray. But often our hands become heavy. Thus, we need the help of Aaron and Hur.

Aaron, the high priest, signifies the priesthood, and Hur, who was of the tribe of Judah, signifies the kingship.... Our prayer needs to be sustained by the priesthood and the kingship. Sometimes our praying hands become heavy not because we lack the desire to pray, but because we are lacking in incentive and encouragement. This means that we may be in need of Aaron and Hur, in need of the priesthood and the kingship.

The priesthood is related to the Holy of Holies. In our experience, the Holy of Holies is always related to our spirit. Hence, to be heavy in prayer indicates a problem or shortage in our spirit. For some reason, our spirit is not keen, active, or positive with the Lord. This causes our prayer to become heavy. Our experience confirms this. At such times of heaviness, we should not deal with our prayer by trying to pray more. Instead, we should deal with our spirit. In our spirit there is the shortage of the priesthood. We need Aaron, the high priest, to strengthen our spirit.

Another reason for heaviness in prayer is rebellion against the kingship. If you say that you are not rebellious, then I would inquire about the matter of disobedience. Can you say that you are never disobedient toward the Lord? For example, a sister may sense a restraining of the Lord keeping her from going to a department store, but she may disobey this restraint and go anyway. In the course of a single day we may disobey the Lord many times. We go against the authority, the kingship, within us. Therefore, due to the shortage of the kingship, we easily become heavy in prayer....

In our prayer we should be one with Christ in the heavens. We need to join Christ and be one with Him in His intercession. We should make His prayer our prayer, His intercession our instant prayer. Supported by the priesthood and the kingship, that is, stirred up in our spirit and subdued under God's authority, we need to pray with Him on the throne in the heavens. Furthermore, the direction of our prayer must be toward the goal of the building of God's house. If we have these factors-the priesthood, the kingship, and God's building in view-I do not believe our prayer can be stopped. The picture of Aaron and Hur holding up Moses' hands is a portrait of the union in prayer between Christ and us. When Christ intercedes, we pray. We join with Him in His intercession. This is the proper way for us to pray in dealing with the flesh.

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