<p>8:27&nbsp;<i>And he that searches the hearts</i>- A clear reference to God, whom many Bible passages present as the One who searches human hearts. God knows and recognizes what the Lord Jesus is &lsquo;saying&rsquo; because He Himself anyway knows the true state of our hearts, searching our motives and the inner thoughts which lay behind the external actions and words which are judged by men. Hence we can be judged harshly by men according to the flesh, but justified by the God who knows our spirit (1 Pet. 4:6). The &lsquo;searching&rsquo; of human hearts is also done by the Lord Jesus (s.w. Rev. 2:23), as well as by God. And their findings are of course congruent. In this sense, the intercession of the Lord Jesus is &ldquo;according to God&rdquo; Gk., or &ldquo;the will of God&rdquo; AV, or to fill out the ellipsis another way, &lsquo;according to the searching of God too&rsquo;.</p><p><i>Knows what is the mind of the Spirit Jesus</i><i>, because he makes intercession for the saints according to the will of God</i>- God who knows our minds knows the mind of Christ too. Because His mind is our mind, His Spirit is intertwined with, in dialogue with, reflective of, our deepest spirit in our inner, spiritual person. The hearts / minds of the believers are in this sense the mind of Christ; for due to our status in Him, &ldquo;we have the mind of Christ&rdquo; (1 Cor. 2:16). Thus the mind of Christ as He comes before the Father in intercession for us is at one with God&rsquo;s mind, as well as at one with our mind. In this we begin to see the profound depths, or something of them, of what it means to be &ldquo;in Christ&rdquo;, and how, mechanically, if you wish, reconciliation is achieved between God and man through Christ. The Lord Jesus does not just transfer our words to God as pieces of language. Seeing that we do not know how to properly express ourselves to God, He transfers the thoughts of our spirit to God (Rom. 8:26,27). It is in this context that Paul encourages us to have a spiritual mind in our daily life; because that is relayed to the presence of God by the Lord Jesus, &quot;the Lord the Spirit&rdquo;. Therefore our whole lives can be a life of prayer, lived out in the presence of the Lord God. However, we are encouraged to pray with our human words as well; indeed, Scripture is full of examples of men doing just this.</p>