The Fragrance of Prayer

I have just finished reading in Exodus and considered how clear and concise God was in His instruction for each article of the tabernacle. He directed the heart of the writer to repeat those instructions, thus it is apparent that in the content of the details, God wanted us to understand something important.

The Golden Incense Altar was made of acacia wood overlaid with gold. It was situated just in front of the Veil (the curtain which separated the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies). The priest would burn incense at this altar in the morning and at twilight (Exodus 30:7-8), as a perpetual fragrance before the Lord. The incense that the priest would burn had a sweet and pleasing fragrance to the LORD.

The burning incense signifies prayer. The psalmist said (Psalm 141:2) Let my prayer be set before You as incense, the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice. In Christ’s revelation to John ( 5:8), John writes, Now when He had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints.

Sincere and simple prayer is fragrant to God. Through Jesus, our hearts become the golden altars that send the sweet fragrance of prayer to the heavenly throne, where Jesus Himself receives them and makes intercession for us. Paul said in Romans 8:34, 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.

JR Miller has a wonderful sermon on the fragrance of prayer that he wrote in 1888. You can access it in entirety at http://www.gracegems.org/Miller/sweet_fragrance_of_prayer. Nothing that I could possibly write could improve on this. In it, Pastor Miller says . . . In John's Apocalyptic visions, the redeemed are represented as "holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints." The thought seems to be that earth's supplications rise up into heaven as sweet incense — that while humble believers in this world are engaged in offering up prayers and supplications, holy fragrances are wafted up before God.

It shows that the prayers of believers are not lost. Some people tell us there is no ear to hear, when we speak our words of request and desire — that our petitions merely float off into the air, and that is the end of them. But here we get a glimpse inside heaven, and find our prayers caught and preserved in golden bowls.

In one of the psalms there is a similar hint regarding the tears of God's people. "You put my tears into your bottle," cries David. In ancient times tear-bottles were sometimes used. When a man was in some sore distress, his friends would visit him, and, as he wept, would gather his tears and put them in a bottle, preserving them as sacred memorials of the event. Something like this appears to have been in David's thought when, in sore distress, he made the prayer, "You put my tears into your bottle." The words suggest the precious truth — that God does indeed take notice of all our sorrows, and that he treasures up the remembrance of our griefs. Our very tears he gathers, and as it were — puts them in bottles, that they may not be lost or forgotten. This is one of those incidental allusions, which show us how deeply God loves us and how tender is his care.

John’s picture of the golden bowls in heaven containing earth's prayers, shows us like precious regard in the divine heart, for the desires and supplications which believing ones put up to God. As they rise in holy breathings or in earnest cries, he receives them — every sigh, every yearning, every pleading, every intercession of love, every heart-hunger — and puts them all into golden bowls, that none of them may be lost! Often our prayers may seem to remain long unanswered, for some blessings are so rich that they cannot be prepared for us in a day — but we may be sure that they are not lost nor forgotten. They are sacredly treasured and are always before God, and in due time they will receive gracious and wise answer.

Never grow weary in praying. Cultivate a relationship in prayer. Discipline yourself to communicate with God. He loves you so much that your prayer is received as a sweet fragrance in the throne room by Christ, who makes intercession for you!