“Okay then explain to me why it was necessary for the 24 elders to deliver prayers to God?”
Because it is symbolism, types, part of the vision describing the heavenly court, where the prayers of the saints are continually given importance and power before the throne of God. Incense, in Psalms, is made to symbolize prayer that continually wafts before the Lord. Psa 141:2 Let my prayer be set forth before thee as incense; and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.
Unless you think that my prayers get turned into incense that 24 elders, for whatever reason, must deliver to an omniscient and omnipotent God.
Your casual interpretation is some weak support centuries of Roman dogma, which just a few sentences later is declared invalid upon the cold, clean fact that all believers are made Kings and Priests in His sight, and that our prayers are precious and worthy to be heard by the great God.
Here is Christ’s explanation of prayer to our Father, who gives good gifts to those who ask Him. Quite simple, really:
Luk 11:2-13 And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. (3) Give us day by day our daily bread. (4) And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil. (5) And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves; (6) For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him? (7) And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee. (8) I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth. (9) And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. (10) For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. (11) If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? (12) Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? (13) If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?
Mat 7:11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?
Joh 16:23-28 And in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you. (24) Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full. (25) These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the time cometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I shall shew you plainly of the Father. (26) At that day ye shall ask in my name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father for you: (27) For the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God. (28) I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father.
Imagine that, Jesus will deliver our prayers to the Father! How novel an idea! I suppose Mary has been wasting her time, hearing and bothering with those millions of daily Catholic prayers to her! Little did she know that our advocate, all along, is Christ Himself!
1Jn 2:1 My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous:
Out of all the miracles in my own life I have seen, not one was ever given to me my Mary or some random Saint.
Yes or no did the elders act as Mediators delivering prayers to God on behalf of others?
I don't think you understand symbolism here. Symbolism represents an underlying reality. The prayers are not wafting - they are being carried. The symbol holding the prayers could have been an urn, a chalice, or plate. Whatever the symbol, the action of the prayers being carried by the elders is the reality.
Christ was the vine, we are the branches. The reality is that we cannot (as branches) live without the vine. The symbol could have been a tree. Christ is the door (The symbol could have been a gate)- but we can’t get there without Christ opening the entrance.
The symbolic image was the vessel, not that fact and reality that the elders were taking the prayers to God.