Daily Manna · Day 315 · November 11
Boldly to the Throne
“Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.”
A waiting room outside an office, and a person in it going over the sentence again, deciding which parts are appropriate to raise and editing the desperation out of the middle.
That is the room most people pray from, and the letter is written to move you out of it. It gives the seat a name, and the name is a contradiction if you have only ever waited outside offices: the throne of grace. Throne, so the authority is genuine and the decision is final. Grace, so the disposition toward you was settled before you were shown in. You are not there to establish whether you will be received.
Boldly is a citizen's word rather than a brave one. It meant the right to speak freely in the assembly, the liberty of somebody who belongs there, which is the opposite of the courage it takes to knock. And the reason it is available is in the two verses before: a high priest touched with the feeling of our infirmities, tempted in all points like as we are. The one on the throne is not being briefed on what this is like.
Then the offer, and it is in two halves that people usually collapse into one. Mercy for what has already gone wrong. Grace to help in time of need, and the phrase behind time of need means well-timed, help arriving at the hour rather than in general.
So what is the unedited version. Not the tidied request; the one with the number in it, or the name, or the thing you have been praying around for months without ever praying about. What would you say if the waiting room were not a waiting room?
Daily Manna runs on a two-year cycle. The year two reading for day 315 is The Place He Slept (Genesis 28:16).