When I pray to God, am I praying to the Father or the Son?
Question:
I am reading your lesson on Who is God? Let me see if I am understanding this. God is three beings: The Father, The Son, and the Holy Spirit. Jesus is God's Son, but when we refer to God in prayer or in time of need, so am I praying to God? Or Jesus? Or are they now one and the same? I know Jesus is God's Son but is Jesus being referred to as God? And if I am right, then I can continue in the lesson with full understanding.
Answer:
When a husband and wife are married, are they one person or two? "And He answered and said to them, "Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning 'made them male and female,' and said, 'For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh'? So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate" (Matthew 19:4-6). For some reason, we have fewer problems with this concept when talking about a married couple than we have in a discussion about God.
Though my wife and I are separate individuals, we act as a team, a single unit. I teased my children not to bother asking Mom after I gave them a negative answer because they would receive the same answer. We don't always agree about everything, but we try hard to show a united front to the world.
Jesus prayed, "I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me. And the glory which You gave Me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me" (John 17:20-23). Jesus' desire is that all of his followers be one. That doesn't mean there is only one Christian in the entire world. It is a statement that all the various Christian act in a united fashion. "Now I plead with you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment" (I Corinthians 1:10).
Just like married couples, Christians don't always achieve the goal of being completely one. We try hard, but we sometimes fail. Still, we know what we are trying to achieve.
The word "God" in Hebrew is a plural noun. Though the word is singular, it refers to a group, just as "church," "herd," or "flock" are all plural nouns. God is composed of three divine beings who act in such harmony that they are one. Unlike our weak attempts at being one, there is no disharmony or disagreement between God, the Father, God, the Son, and God, the Holy Spirit. The three are one God. "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one!" (Deuteronomy 6:4).
When you pray to God, it doesn't matter to whom you direct your prayers because God is one. The answer from the Father is no different than the answer from the Son or the Spirit. We generally direct prayers to the Father because the Bible indicates He is the head of the Godhead, just as a husband is to be the head of the family, but it doesn't mean prayer can only be addressed to the Father.
