I heard and read much theology on thiswhile inpentacostal circles, as they would see using his name to pray to God almost like a ticket to what you want, as if just speaking it forces God to always answer as you ask for ofHim to do!
When I was in the WoF movement, it was considered almost a demand of God. Kind of like showing an FOP card to a cop to get out of a ticket.
It was as if you were speaking to spirits/the Devil/circumstances on behalf of God and by uttering Jesus' name, somehow, they're all obligated to do what you want. Shouting abracadabra would have been just as effective.
But, that having been said, that's not really what I meant.
I mean people who use Jesus' name because it's been ingrained into them to say. Kind of like people who use the word "just" a thousand times when they pray. (i.e. "We just come before You and we just ask you...").
They don't mean any disrespect by it and they don't put any superstitious meaning into it, but they really don't know why they say it or what it means. Only that it's how they've always heard people pray and so that's how they figure they should pray.
Yep. "In the name of JESUS, I command you..." and "I rebuke you in the name of JESUS" were very big.
We used to bind the Devil in the name of Jesus until one day, it finally occurred to me that either we were misusing the name of Jesus pretty egregiously or the name of Jesus wasn't as powerful as I thought. Since I knew it wasn't the second one...
I went to one WoF church once that actually had a guy come in and insist that we could time travel if we commanded time to obey us in Jesus' name.
Shocking how ignorant we were of the things of God.
I was in AoG church over 10 yeras, was an Elder and trained int heir schools, would say that they are Chrsitians with dustinctive, but also wrong understandings of the workings of the Spirit today, but charasmatics are really the ones that gave to the church error/heresies like WoF, altter day rain, manifest sons of God, name it claim it etc!
I attended a very large AoG church in Burlington, NJ. I was a member of another church, but used to attend the AoG when my church wasn't meeting.
When I attended it, they were within the bounds of orthodoxy and, overall, a pretty good church. But it's my understanding that in the years since then, they've really dived headlong into the WoF movement.
Unless they have changed their statement of beliefs since my time among them, they held to healing in response to prayer, but NOT in the atonement, held to God blessing us, but NOT name it claim it way, and did NOT hold to ongoing revelations from "modern day Apsotles/prophets!"
I tend to see AOG as more like Free will baptists with some peculiar extra doctrines, but none aree heretical as charasmatics tend to hold to!
We pray in His name, if we are God's son, by default.
Here's where too much Trinity hath made us mad.
Praying to the Father is praying in Jesus' name is praying in the Spirit, etc.
One LORD.
Agreed. Closing a prayer with "in the name of Jesus" is not what scripture means by praying in His name. No one is scripture prayed that way. Prayer does not even require an Amen to be answered.
I remember one prayer meeting while in the AoG church ewas a member in, that the group spent an hour binding and rebuking the Devil and his demons for things, and I had enough, and just stated to all there, if we spent half the time praising and interceding before God instead, HE would deal with the devil, not us!
When I was in Federal law enforcement, I acted "in the name of the U. S. Federal Government".
In effect, when I acted officially in my duties - seizing property, arresting a person - I WAS the government.
When we pray "in the name of Jesus" we are praying as if we were Jesus in that moment.
God listens to us as if we were Jesus.
So those who have mentioned this is NOT simply a magic incantation or spell are correct.
We are not doing a ritual to get our prayers answered, we are praying as children of God.
Hopefully, that is a rather sobering thought.
That should make us more aware of the immense nature of our prayer and our relationship with God.