But I thought “It’s good to be King!”
And you can take it...think of it as a compliment!
However, notice this: “And since I perceive that through Mary’s intercession Jesus has given great blessings to me, I am going to indulge in words of gratitude and affection toward her as well as toward Jesus.”
There you have another difference. When others join me in prayer at a prayer service, and God grants what we prayed for, we...praise God. None of us turns to the other and says, “Since it was through your intercession that Jesus has given great blessings to me, Let me indulge in words of gratitude and affection toward you as well as toward Jesus”.
At Baptist prayer meetings, we thank God - not each other.
Thanking Mary suggests it was her effectiveness in convincing God to do something that resulted in a favorable response, rather than God’s love and mercy and justice.
I have never and will never go to my Pastor and say, “George, I know you were praying for me, and I want to thank you - without your intercession on my behalf, who knows what would have happened?”
Doesn't your congregation have prayer circles or other similar prayer requests for the benefit of seriously ill members?
What a "cabined, cribbed, confined" life! How austere the ways of the Protestant!
If I get what I want, heck, I thank the CAT! I think the weather! I just thank generally!
And yeah I thank intercessors. I don't JUST thank them, but I thank them. And if you saw the smile on the face of someone who entered your pain and anxiety and stood by and prayed with you and for you for your daughter's life, and then you tell him, some years later "God heard our prayers," and you show him the daughter, you'd thank him too.
God forbid I should not thank someone who prayed for me!
I usually quite wholeheartedly agree with your excellent points.
However, I’ve done the following sort of thing at least a time or 3:
I have never and will never go to my Pastor and say, “George, I know you were praying for me, and I want to thank you - without your intercession on my behalf, who knows what would have happened?”
Because it was true.