Unexpected Absence
“or do you think that I cannot appeal to My Father, and He will at once put at My disposal more than twelve legions of angels?” Matthew 26:53
Appeal – The Hebrew vocabulary is rich in words for prayer. Every nuance of our relationship with God seems to find its own special word. So, when we come to this statement by Jesus, clearly indicating a request of the Father, we expect to find a similar breadth of meanings in Greek. But, amazingly, we don’t. The word we find here is familiar. It’s parakaleo (to call alongside), the same root word that Jesus uses to identify the coming Holy Spirit (the Paraclete). But when we investigate further, we discover the amazing fact that parakaleo is almost never used for calling on God or Christ in prayer. It finds most of its usage in the action of salvation, calling on Jesus to rescue us from our pitiful, sinful condition. The idea of exhorting, quite common in ancient Greek literature, is virtually absent from the New Testament. Instead, we find this word used in connection with calling for aid in missions and admonitions.
Just for a moment, consider how unusual this really is. Here is a word that could have been incorporated into the prayer language of the New Testament. It has parallels in Hebrew (like “entreat,” and “cry out”). But it finds another specialized use – a use that is associated with a particular event rather than with a continual request. The paradigm of parakaleo is not prayer but rather redemption. In the New Testament, this Greek word is lifted out of its wider context of making a request and applied to the much narrower context of divine aid of salvation through Jesus. When parakaleo is used for “asking,” it is found in the act of asking for grace. When it is used for “exhorting,” it is found in the context of salvation already granted. Either way, parakaleo becomes a word that defines God’s truest form of comfort – redemption.
It’s such a shame that we are left without a way to clearly see the Greek words behind translations like “appeal.” That particular translation does help us identify that Jesus is using a word with carefully defined connotations. If we knew this, we might understand just a bit more the role and the responsibility of the Spirit. The Spirit does not come alongside for any reason whatsoever. No, the Paraclete is about parakaleo – ushering in salvation and sanctification, the once-redeemed, daily delivered process that summarizes what it means for God to shed His grace upon us.
Is parakaleo a prayer word? Yes, it is. But is it not the kind of prayer word we might imagine. It is not about asking for our needs. It is about the specific action of the Spirit, given in grace, which brings us into fellowship with the Father. So pray with parakaleo in mind, and let the Spirit work in you.
