{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_73032/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_73032","id":"gutenberg_73032","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/73032","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Religion/Spirituality","Jesus Christ -- Prayers","Prayer -- Christianity"],"text":"The Reality of Prayer\n\n\n\n\n_EDITED BY HOMER W. HODGE_\n\nThe Spiritual Life Books\n\nBy EDWARD M. BOUNDS\n\n                       _The Possibilities of Prayer._\n                       Cloth          $1.25\n\nA rich, exceptionally helpful addition to Doctor Bounds\u2019 books, which\ndeal with the place and significance prayer has in the life of the\nbeliever.\n\n                      _Heaven_: A Place\u2014A City\u2014A Home.\n                      Cloth           $1.25\n\nPossessed of a wonderfully full knowledge of Holy Scripture, a man of\nunswerving faith and mystical insight, Mr. Bounds writes with a\ncertitude, confidence and joyous anticipation of the eternal felicity\nawaiting the faithful believer.\n\n                _Purpose in Prayer._  Cloth           $1.25\n\n\u201cMr. Bounds has the gift of insight, and with this a faculty for\nselecting words to express precisely that which responds to the\nheart-hunger of those who are seeking spiritual enlightenment.\u201d\n\n\u2014_Sunday School Times._\n\n            _Satan_: His Personality, His Power, His Overthrow.\n            Cloth        $1.25\n\nWith irrefutable logic backed by the testimony of Holy Scripture, it\nshows the Arch Enemy of mankind to be a Person\u2014actual, literal, ever\nactive for the destruction of human souls. Indicates whereby Christian\nbelievers can withstand his assaults and how they may finally triumph.\n\n\n\n\n                         The Reality of Prayer\n\n\n                                   By\n                         EDWARD M. BOUNDS, D.D.\n\n           _Author of \u201cPurpose in Prayer,\u201d \u201cThe Possibilities\n                  of Prayer,\u201d \u201cHeaven,\u201d \u201cSatan,\u201d etc._\n\n\n                               EDITED BY\n                             HOMER W. HODGE\n\n                        NEW YORK        CHICAGO\n                       Fleming H. Revell Company\n                          LONDON AND EDINBURGH\n\n\n\n\n                       Copyright, 1924, by\n                       FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY\n\n\n                       New York: 158 Fifth Avenue\n                       Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave.\n                       London: 21 Paternoster Square\n                       Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street\n\n\n\n\n                                Foreword\n\n\nDuring the last twenty-five years of the nineteenth century and a score\nof years of the twentieth, there lived and died three great men of God\nwhom I knew\u2014men whom God has doubtless numbered among the foremost of\nHis heavenly host. The first was Edward McKendree Bounds, author of this\npresent volume and the other \u201cSpiritual Life\u201d Books. The second was\nClaud L. Chilton, minister for many years in the Methodist Episcopal\nChurch, South, and a musical composer of religious music of considerable\nnote. The third, Clement C. Cary, preacher and editor, lost his life in\nan automobile accident in 1922. The fourth was Dr. B. F. Haynes,\nminister, editor and author, who died in Nashville, in 1923.\n\nWhat Dr. Thomas Goodwin, the Puritan, was to Strong, Arrowsmith and\nSpurstow; what John Wesley was to Whitefield, Fletcher and Clark, Bounds\nwas to Chilton, Cary and Haynes. What David Brainerd\u2019s _Journal_ did for\nCary, Martyn, McCheyne, Bounds\u2019 books can do for thousands of God\u2019s\nchildren. He was a man who lived ever on prayer ground. He walked and\ntalked with the Lord. Prayer was the great weapon in his arsenal, his\npathway to the Throne of Grace. None who read what he has written can\nfail of realising that Edward McKendree Bounds talked with God, as a man\ntalketh to his friend.\n\nHOMER W. HODGE.\n\n_Flushing, N. Y._\n\n\n\n\n                                Contents\n\n\nI. PRAYER\u2014A PRIVILEGE, PRINCELY, SACRED . . . 9\n\nII. PRAYER\u2014FILLS MAN\u2019S POVERTY WITH GOD\u2019S RICHES . . . 18\n\nIII. PRAYER\u2014THE ALL-IMPORTANT ESSENCE OF EARTHLY WORSHIP . . . 28\n\nIV. GOD HAS EVERYTHING TO DO WITH PRAYER . . . 34\n\nV. JESUS CHRIST, THE DIVINE TEACHER OF PRAYER . . . 46\n\nVI. JESUS CHRIST, THE DIVINE TEACHER OF PRAYER (_Continued_) . . . 56\n\nVII. JESUS CHRIST AN EXAMPLE OF PRAYER . . . 69\n\nVIII. PRAYER INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF OUR LORD . . . 80\n\nIX. PRAYER INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF OUR LORD (_Continued_) . . . 87\n\nX. OUR LORD\u2019S MODEL PRAYER . . . 97\n\nXI. OUR LORD\u2019S SACERDOTAL PRAYER . . . 102\n\nXII. THE GETHSEMANE PRAYER . . . 112\n\nXIII. THE HOLY SPIRIT AND PRAYER . . . 122\n\nXIV. THE HOLY SPIRIT OUR HELPER IN PRAYER . . . 133\n\nXV. THE TWO COMFORTERS AND TWO ADVOCATES . . . 143\n\nXVI. PRAYER AND THE HOLY GHOST DISPENSATION . . . 148\n\n\n\n\n                                   I\n                  PRAYER\u2014A PRIVILEGE, PRINCELY, SACRED\n\n    _I am the creature of a day, passing through life as an arrow\n    through the air. I am a spirit come from God and returning to God;\n    just hovering over the great gulf; till a few moments hence I am no\n    more seen; I drop into an unchangeable eternity! I want to know one\n    thing, the way to heaven; how to land safe on that happy shore. God\n    Himself has condescended to teach the way; for this end He came from\n    heaven. He hath written it down in a book. O give me that book! At\n    any price give me the Book of God! Lord, is it not Thy word\u2014\u201cIf any\n    man lack wisdom, let him ask of God? Thou givest liberally, and\n    upbraidest not. Thou hast said, if any be willing to do Thy will he\n    shall know. I am willing to do; let me know Thy will.\u201d_\u2014JOHN WESLEY.\n\nThe word \u201cPrayer\u201d expresses the largest and most comprehensive approach\nunto God. It gives prominence to the element of devotion. It is\ncommunion and intercourse with God. It is enjoyment of God. It is access\nto God. \u201cSupplication\u201d is a more restricted and more intense form of\nprayer, accompanied by a sense of personal need, limited to the seeking\nin an urgent manner of a supply for pressing need.\n\n\u201cSupplication\u201d is the very soul of prayer in the way of pleading for\nsome one thing, greatly needed, and the need intensely felt.\n\n\u201cIntercession\u201d is an enlargement in prayer, a going out in broadness and\nfullness from self to others. Primarily, it does not centre in praying\nfor others, but refers to the freeness, boldness and childlike\nconfidence of the praying. It is the fullness of confiding influence in\nthe soul\u2019s approach to God, unlimited and unhesitating in its access and\nits demands. This influence and confident trust is to be used for\nothers.\n\nPrayer always, and everywhere is an immediate and confiding approach to,\nand a request of, God the Father. In the prayer universal and perfect,\nas the pattern of all praying, it is \u201cOur Father, Who art in Heaven.\u201d At\nthe grave of Lazarus, Jesus lifted up His eyes and said, \u201cFather.\u201d In\nHis sacerdotal prayer, Jesus lifted up His eyes to Heaven, and said,\n\u201cFather.\u201d Personal, familiar and paternal was all His praying. Strong,\ntoo, and touching and tearful, was His praying. Read these words of\nPaul: \u201cWho in the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and\nsupplications, with strong crying and tears, unto him that was able to\nsave him from death, and was heard in that he feared\u201d (Hebrews 5:7).\n\nSo elsewhere (James 1:5) we have \u201casking\u201d set forth as prayer: \u201cIf any\nof you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who giveth to all men liberally,\nand upbraideth not, and it shall be given him.\u201d\n\n\u201cAsking of God\u201d and \u201creceiving\u201d from the Lord\u2014direct application to God,\nimmediate connection with God\u2014that is prayer.\n\nIn John 5:13 we have this statement about prayer:\n\n    \u201cAnd this is the confidence that we have in him, that if we ask\n    anything according to his will, he heareth us. And if we know that\n    he heareth us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions\n    that we desired of him.\u201d\n\nIn Philippians 4:6 we have these words about prayer:\n\n    \u201cBe careful for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and\n    supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known\n    unto God.\u201d\n\nWhat is God\u2019s will about prayer? First of all, it is God\u2019s will that we\npray. Jesus Christ \u201cspake a parable unto them to this end, that men\nought always to pray, and not to faint.\u201d\n\nPaul writes to young Timothy about the first things which God\u2019s people\nare to do, and first among the first he puts prayer: \u201cI exhort,\ntherefore, that first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and\ngiving of thanks, be made for all men\u201d (I Tim. 2:1).\n\nIn connection with these words Paul declares that the will of God and\nthe redemption and mediation of Jesus Christ for the salvation for all\nmen are all vitally concerned in this matter of prayer. In this his\napostolical authority and solicitude of soul conspire with God\u2019s will\nand Christ\u2019s intercession to will that \u201cthe men pray everywhere.\u201d\n\nNote how frequently prayer is brought forward in the New Testament:\n\u201cContinuing instant in prayer\u201d; \u201cPray without ceasing\u201d; \u201cContinue in\nprayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving\u201d; \u201cBe ye sober and watch\nunto prayer\u201d; Christ\u2019s clarion call was \u201cwatch and pray.\u201d What are all\nthese and others, if it is not the will of God that men should pray?\n\nPrayer is complement, make efficient and cooperate with God\u2019s will,\nwhose sovereign sway is to run parallel in extent and power with the\natonement of Jesus Christ. He, through the Eternal Spirit, by the grace\nof God, \u201ctasted death for every man.\u201d We, through the Eternal Spirit, by\nthe grace of God, _pray_ for every man.\n\nBut how do I know that I am praying by the will of God? Every true\nattempt to pray is in response to the will of God. Bungling it may be\nand untutored by human teachers, but it is acceptable to God, because it\nis in obedience to His will. If I will give myself up to the inspiration\nof the Spirit of God, who commands me to pray, the details and the\npetitions of that praying will all fall into harmony with the will of\nHim who wills that I should pray.\n\nPrayer is no little thing, no selfish and small matter. It does not\nconcern the petty interests of one person. The littlest prayer broadens\nout by the will of God till it touches all words, conserves all\ninterests, and enhances man\u2019s greatest wealth, and God\u2019s greatest good.\nGod is so concerned that men pray that He has promised to answer prayer.\nHe has not promised to do something general if we pray, but He has\npromised to do the very thing for which we pray.\n\nPrayer, as taught by Jesus in its essential features, enters into all\nthe relations of life. It sanctifies brotherliness. To the Jew, the\naltar was the symbol and place of prayer. The Jew devoted the altar to\nthe worship of God. Jesus Christ takes the altar of prayer and devotes\nit to the worship of the brotherhood. How Christ purifies the altar and\nenlarges it! How He takes it out of the sphere of a mere performance,\nand makes its virtue to consist, not in the mere act of praying, but in\nthe spirit which actuates us toward men. Our spirit toward folks is of\nthe life of prayer. We must be at peace with men, and, if possible, have\nthem at peace with us, before we can be at peace with God.\nReconciliation with men is the forerunner of reconciliation with God.\nOur spirit and words must embrace men before they can embrace God. Unity\nwith the brotherhood goes before unity with God. \u201cTherefore, if thou\nbring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath\naught against thee; leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy\nway. First, be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy\ngift\u201d (Matt. 5:23).\n\nNon-praying is lawlessness, discord, anarchy. Prayer, in the moral\ngovernment of God, is as strong and far-reaching as the law of\ngravitation in the material world, and it is as necessary as gravitation\nto hold things in their proper sphere and in life.\n\nThe space occupied by prayer in the Sermon on the Mount bespeaks its\nestimate by Christ and the importance it holds in His system. Many\nimportant principles are discussed in a verse or two. The Sermon\nconsists of one hundred and eleven verses, and eighteen are about prayer\ndirectly, and others indirectly.\n\nPrayer was one of the cardinal principles of piety in every dispensation\nand to every child of God. It did not pertain to the business of Christ\nto originate duties, but to recover, to recast, to spiritualise, and to\nre-enforce those duties which are cardinal and original.\n\nWith Moses the great features of prayer are prominent. He never beats\nthe air nor fights a sham battle. The most serious and strenuous\nbusiness of his serious and strenuous life was prayer. He is much at it\nwith the intensest earnestness of his soul. Intimate as he was with God,\nhis intimacy did not abate the necessity of prayer. This intimacy only\nbrought clearer insight into the nature and necessity of prayer, and led\nhim to see the greater obligations to pray, and to discover the larger\nresults of praying. In reviewing one of the crises through which Israel\npassed, when the very existence of the nation was imperilled, he writes:\n\u201cI fell down before the Lord forty days and forty nights.\u201d Wonderful\npraying and wonderful results! Moses knew how to do wonderful praying,\nand God knew how to give wonderful results.\n\nThe whole force of Bible statement is to increase our faith in the\ndoctrine that prayer affects God, secures favors from God, which can be\nsecured in no other way, and which will not be bestowed by God if we do\nnot pray. The whole canon of Bible teaching is to illustrate the great\ntruth that God hears and answers prayer. One of the great purposes of\nGod in His book is to impress upon us indelibly the great importance,\nthe priceless value, and the absolute necessity of asking God for the\nthings which we need for time and eternity. He urges us by every\nconsideration, and presses and warns us by every interest. He points us\nto His own Son, turned over to us for our good, as His pledge that\nprayer will be answered, teaching us that God is our Father, able to do\nall things for us and to give all things to us, much more than earthly\nparents are able or willing to do for their children.\n\nLet us thoroughly understand ourselves and understand, also, this great\nbusiness of prayer. Our one great business is prayer, and we will never\ndo it well without we fasten to it by all binding force. We will never\ndo it well without arranging the best conditions of doing it well. Satan\nhas suffered so much by good praying that all his wily, shrewd and\nensnaring devices will be used to cripple its performances.\n\nWe must, by all the fastenings we can find, cable ourselves to prayer.\nTo be loose in time and place is to open the door to Satan. To be exact,\nprompt, unswerving, and careful in even the little things, is to\nbuttress ourselves against the Evil One.\n\nPrayer, by God\u2019s very oath, is put in the very stones of God\u2019s\nfoundations, as eternal as its companion, \u201cAnd men shall pray for him\ncontinually.\u201d This is the eternal condition which advances His cause,\nand makes it powerfully aggressive. Men are to always pray for it. Its\nstrength, beauty and aggression lie in their prayers. Its power lies\nsimply in its power to pray. No power is found elsewhere but in its\nability to pray. \u201cFor my house shall be called the house of prayer for\nall people.\u201d It is based on prayer, and carried on by the same means.\n\nPrayer is a privilege, a sacred, princely privilege. Prayer is a duty,\nan obligation most binding, and most imperative, which should hold us to\nit. But prayer is more than a privilege, more than a duty. It is a\nmeans, an instrument, a condition. Not to pray is to lose much more than\nto fail in the exercise and enjoyment of a high, or sweet privilege. Not\nto pray is to fail along lines far more important than even the\nviolation of an obligation.\n\nPrayer is the appointed condition of getting God\u2019s aid. This aid is as\nmanifold and illimitable as God\u2019s ability, and as varied and exhaustless\nis this aid as man\u2019s need. Prayer is the avenue through which God\nsupplies man\u2019s wants. Prayer is the channel through which all good flows\nfrom God to man, and all good from men to men. God is the Christian\u2019s\nfather. Asking and giving are in that relation.\n\nMan is the one more immediately concerned in this great work of praying.\nIt ennobles man\u2019s reason to employ it in prayer. The office and work of\nprayer is the divinest engagement of man\u2019s reason. Prayer makes man\u2019s\nreason to shine. Intelligence of the highest order approves prayer. He\nis the wisest man who prays the most and the best. Prayer is the school\nof wisdom as well as of piety.\n\nPrayer is not a picture to handle, to admire, to look at. It is not\nbeauty, coloring, shape, attitude, imagination, or genius. These things\ndo not pertain to its character or conduct. It is not poetry nor music.\nIts inspiration and melody come from Heaven. Prayer belongs to the\nspirit, and at times it possesses the spirit and stirs the spirit with\nhigh and holy purposes and resolves.\n\n\n\n\n                                   II\n              PRAYER\u2014FILLS MAN\u2019S POVERTY WITH GOD\u2019S RICHES\n\n    _For two hours I struggled on, forsaken of God, and met neither God\n    nor man, all one chilly afternoon. When at last, standing still and\n    looking at Schiehallion clothed in white from top to bottom, this of\n    David shot up into my heart: \u201cWash me, and I shall be whiter than\n    snow!\u201d In a moment I was with God, or rather God was with me. I\n    walked home with my heart in a flame of fire._\n\n    \u2014ALEXANDER WHYTE, D.D.\n\nWe have much fine writing and learned talk about the subjective benefits\nof prayer; how prayer secures its full measure of results, not by\naffecting God, but by affecting us, by becoming a training school for\nthose who pray. We are taught by such teachers that the province of\nprayer is not to get, but to train. Prayer thus becomes a mere\nperformance, a drill-sergeant, a school, in which patience, tranquility\nand dependence are taught. In this school, denial of prayer is the most\nvaluable teacher. How well all this may look, and how reasonable soever\nit may seem, there is nothing of it in the Bible. The clear and\noft-repeated language of the Bible is that prayer is to be answered by\nGod; that God occupies the relation of a father to us, and that as\nFather He gives to us when we ask the things for which we ask. The best\npraying, therefore, is the praying that gets an answer.\n\nThe possibilities and necessity of prayer are graven in the eternal\nfoundations of the Gospel. The relation that is established between the\nFather and the Son and the decreed covenant between the two, has prayer\nas the base of its existence, and the conditions of the advance and\nsuccess of the Gospel. Prayer is the condition by which all foes are to\nbe overcome and all the inheritance is to be possessed.\n\nThese are axiomatic truths, though they may be very homely ones. But\nthese are the times when Bible axioms need to be stressed, pressed,\niterated and reiterated. The very air is rife with influences, practices\nand theories which sap foundations, and the most veritable truths and\nthe most self-evident axioms go down by insidious and invisible attacks.\n\nMore than this: the tendency of these times is to an ostentatious parade\nof doing, which enfeebles the life and dissipates the spirit of praying.\nThere may be kneeling, and there may be standing in prayerful attitude.\nThere may be much bowing of the head, and yet there may be no serious,\nreal praying. Prayer is real work. Praying is vital work. Prayer has in\nits keeping the very heart of worship. There may be the exhibit, the\ncircumstance, and the pomp of praying, and yet no real praying. There\nmay be much attitude, gesture, and verbiage, but no praying.\n\nWho can approach into God\u2019s presence in prayer? Who can come before the\ngreat God, Maker of all worlds, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus\nChrist, who holds in His hands all good, and who is all powerful and\nable to do all things? Man\u2019s approach to this great God\u2014what lowliness,\nwhat truth, what cleanness of hands, and purity of heart is needed and\ndemanded!\n\nDefinition of prayer scarcely belongs to Bible range at any point.\nEverywhere we are impressed that it is more important and urgent that\nmen pray, than that they be skilled in the homiletic didactics of\nprayer. That is a thing of the heart, not of the schools. It is more of\nfeeling than of words. Praying is the best school in which to learn to\npray, prayer the best dictionary to define the art and nature of\npraying.\n\nWe repeat and reiterate. Prayer is not a mere habit, riveted by custom\nand memory, something which must be gone through with, its value\ndepending upon the decency and perfection of the performance. Prayer is\nnot a duty which must be performed, to ease obligation and to quiet\nconscience. Prayer is not mere privilege, a sacred indulgence to be\ntaken advantage of, at leisure, at pleasure, at will, and no serious\nloss attending its omission.\n\nPrayer is a solemn service due to God, an adoration, a worship, an\napproach to God for some request, the presenting of some desire, the\nexpression of some need to Him, who supplies all need, and who satisfies\nall desires; who, as a Father, finds His greatest pleasure in relieving\nthe wants and granting the desires of His children. Prayer is the\nchild\u2019s request, not to the winds nor to the world, but to the Father.\nPrayer is the outstretched arms of the child for the Father\u2019s help.\nPrayer is the child\u2019s cry calling to the Father\u2019s ear, the Father\u2019s\nheart, and to the Father\u2019s ability, which the Father is to hear, the\nFather is to feel, and which the Father is to relieve. Prayer is the\nseeking of God\u2019s great and greatest good, which will not come if we do\nnot pray.\n\nPrayer is an ardent and believing cry to God for some specific thing.\nGod\u2019s rule is to answer by giving the specific thing asked for. With it\nmay come much of other gifts and graces. Strength, serenity, sweetness,\nand faith may come as the bearers of the gifts. But even they come\nbecause God hears and answers prayer.\n\nWe do but follow the plain letter and spirit of the Bible when we affirm\nthat God answers prayer, and answers by giving us the very things we\ndesire, and that the withholding of that which we desire and the giving\nof something else is not the rule, but rare and exceptional. When His\nchildren cry for bread He gives them bread.\n\nRevelation does not deal in philosophical subtleties, nor verbal\nniceties and hair-splitting distinctions. It unfolds relationships,\ndeclares principles, and enforces duties. The heart must define, the\nexperience must realise. Paul came on the stage too late to define\nprayer. That which had been so well done by patriarchs and prophets\nneeded no return to dictionaries. Christ is Himself the illustration and\ndefinition of prayer. He prayed as man had never prayed. He put prayer\non a higher basis, with grander results and simpler being than it had\never known. He taught Paul how to pray by the revelation of Himself,\nwhich is the first call to prayer, and the first lesson in praying.\nPrayer, like love, is too ethereal and too heavenly to be held in the\ngross arms of chilly definitions. It belongs to Heaven, and to the\nheart, and not to words and ideas only.\n\nPrayer is no petty invention of man, a fancied relief for fancied ills.\nPrayer is no dreary performance, dead and death-dealing, but is God\u2019s\nenabling act for man, living and life-giving, joy and joy-giving. Prayer\nis the contact of a living soul with God. In prayer, God stoops to kiss\nman, to bless man, and to aid man in everything that God can devise or\nman can need. Prayer fills man\u2019s emptiness with God\u2019s fullness. It fills\nman\u2019s poverty with God\u2019s riches. It puts away man\u2019s weakness with God\u2019s\nstrength. It banishes man\u2019s littleness with God\u2019s greatness. Prayer is\nGod\u2019s plan to supply man\u2019s great and continuous need with God\u2019s great\nand continuous abundance.\n\nWhat is this prayer to which men are called? It is not a mere form, a\nchild\u2019s play. It is serious, difficult work, the manliest, the mightiest\nwork, the divinest work which man can do. Prayer lifts men out of the\nearthliness and links them with the heavenly. Men are never nearer\nHeaven, nearer God, never more God-like, never in deeper sympathy and\ntruer partnership with Jesus Christ, than when praying. Love,\nphilanthropy, holy affiances,\u2014all of them helpful and tender for men\u2014are\nborn and perfected by prayer.\n\nPrayer is not merely a question of duty, but of salvation. Are men saved\nwho are not men of prayer? Is not the gift, the inclination, the habit\nof prayer, one of the elements or characteristics of salvation? Can it\nbe possible to be in affinity with Jesus Christ and not be prayerful? Is\nit possible to have the Holy Spirit and not have the spirit of prayer?\nCan one have the new birth and not be born to prayer? Is not the life of\nthe Spirit and the life of prayer co\u00f6rdinate and consistent? Can\nbrotherly love be in the heart which is unschooled in prayer?\n\nWe have two kinds of prayer named in the New Testament\u2014prayer and\nsupplication. Prayer denotes prayer in general. Supplication is a more\nintense and more special form of prayer. These two, supplication and\nprayer, ought to be combined. Then we would have devotion in its widest\nand sweetest form, and supplication with its most earnest and personal\nsense of need.\n\nIn Paul\u2019s Prayer Directory, found in the sixth chapter of Ephesians, we\nare taught to be always in prayer, as we are always in the battle. The\nHoly Spirit is to be sought by intense supplication, and our\nsupplications are to be charged by His vitalising, illuminating and\nennobling energy. Watchfulness is to fit us for this intense praying and\nintense fighting. Perseverance is an essential element in successful\npraying, as in every other realm of conflict. The saints universal are\nto be helped on to victory by the aid of our prayers. Apostolic courage,\nability and success are to be gained by the prayers of the soldier\nsaints everywhere.\n\nIt is only those of deep and true vision who can administer prayer.\nThese \u201cLiving Creatures,\u201d in Revelation 4:6, are described as \u201cfull of\neyes before and behind,\u201d \u201cfull of eyes within.\u201d Eyes are for seeing.\nClearness, intensity, and perfection of sight are in it. Vigilance and\nprofound insight are in it, the faculty of knowing. It is by prayer that\nthe eyes of our hearts are opened. Clear, profound knowledge of the\nmysteries of grace is secured by prayer. These \u201cLiving Creatures\u201d had\neyes \u201cwithin and without.\u201d They were \u201cfull of eyes.\u201d The highest form of\nlife is intelligent. Ignorance is degrading and low, in the spiritual\nrealm as it is in other realms. Prayer gives us eyes to see God. Prayer\nis seeing God. The prayer life is knowledge without and within. All\nvigilance without, all vigilance within. There can be no intelligent\nprayer without knowledge within. Our inner condition and our inner needs\nmust be felt and known.\n\nIt takes prayer to minister. It takes life, the highest form of life, to\nminister. Prayer is the highest intelligence, the profoundest wisdom,\nthe most vital, the most joyous, the most efficacious, the most powerful\nof all vocations. It is life, radiant, transporting, eternal life. Away\nwith dry forms, with dead, cold habits of prayer! Away with sterile\nroutine, with senseless performances and petty playthings in prayer! Let\nus get at the serious work, the chief business of men, that of prayer.\nLet us work at it skillfully. Let us seek to be adepts in this great\nwork of praying. Let us be master-workmen, in this high art of praying.\nLet us be so in the habit of prayer, so devoted to prayer, so filled\nwith its rich spices, so ardent by its holy flame, that all Heaven and\nearth will be perfumed by its aroma, and nations yet in the womb will be\nblest by our prayers. Heaven will be fuller and brighter in glorious\ninhabitants, earth will be better prepared for its bridal day, and hell\nrobbed of many of its victims, because we have lived to pray.\n\nThere is not only a sad and ruinous neglect of any attempt to pray, but\nthere is an immense waste in the seeming praying which is done, as\nofficial praying, state praying, mere habit praying. Men cleave to the\nform and semblance of a thing after the heart and reality have gone out\nof it. This finds illustrations in many who seem to pray. Formal praying\nhas a strong hold and a strong following.\n\nHannah\u2019s statement to Eli and her defense against his charge of\nhypocrisy was: \u201cI have poured out my soul before the Lord.\u201d God\u2019s\nserious promise to the Jews was, \u201cThen shall ye call upon me, and ye\nshall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you. And ye shall\nseek me and find me when ye shall search for me with all your heart.\u201d\n\nLet all the present day praying be measured by these standards, \u201cPouring\nout the soul before God,\u201d and \u201cSeeking with all the heart,\u201d and how much\nof it will be found to be mere form, waste, worthless. James says of\nElijah that he \u201cprayed with prayer.\u201d\n\nIn Paul\u2019s directions to Timothy about prayer, (I Tim. 1:8) we have a\ncomprehensive verbal description of prayer in its different departments,\nor varied manifestations. They are all in the plural form,\nsupplications, prayers and intercessions. They declare the\nmany-sidedness, the endless diversity, and the necessity of going beyond\nthe formal simplicity of a single prayer, and press and add prayer upon\nprayer, supplication to supplication, intercession over and over again,\nuntil the combined force of prayers in their most superlative modes,\nunite their aggregation and pressure with cumulative power to our\npraying. The unlimited superlative and the unlimited plural are the only\nmeasures of prayer. The one term of \u201cprayer\u201d is the common and\ncomprehensive one for the act, the duty, the spirit, and the service we\ncall prayer. It is the condensed statement of worship. The heavenly\nworship does not have the element of prayer so conspicuous. Prayer is\nthe conspicuous, all-important essence and the all-colouring ingredient\nof earthly worship, while praise is the pre-eminent, comprehensive,\nall-colouring, all-inspiring element of the heavenly worship.\n\n\n\n\n                                  III\n          PRAYER\u2014THE ALL-IMPORTANT ESSENCE OF EARTHLY WORSHIP\n\n    _Where the spiritual consciousness is concerned\u2014the department which\n    asks the question and demands the evidence\u2014no evidence is competent\n    or relevant except such as is spiritual. Only that which is above\n    matter and above logic can be heard, because the very question at\n    issue is the existence and personality of a spiritual and\n    supernatural God. Only the Spirit himself beareth witness with our\n    spirit. This must be done in a spiritual or supernatural way, or it\n    cannot be done at all._\u2014C. L. CHILTON.\n\nThe Jewish law and the prophets know something of God as a Father.\nOccasional and imperfect, yet comforting glimpses they had of the great\ntruth of God\u2019s Fatherhood, and of our sonship. Christ lays the\nfoundation of prayer deep and strong with this basic principle. The law\nof prayer, the right to pray, rests on sonship. \u201cOur Father\u201d brings us\ninto the closest relationship to God. Prayer is the child\u2019s approach,\nthe child\u2019s plea, the child\u2019s right. It is the law of prayer that looks\nup, that lifts up the eye to \u201cOur Father, Who art in Heaven.\u201d Our\nFather\u2019s house is our home in Heaven. Heavenly citizenship and heavenly\nhomesickness are in prayer. Prayer is an appeal from the lowness, from\nthe emptiness, from the need of earth, to the highness, the fullness and\nto the all-sufficiency of Heaven. Prayer turns the eye and the heart\nheavenward with a child\u2019s longings, a child\u2019s trust and a child\u2019s\nexpectancy. To hallow God\u2019s Name, to speak it with bated breath, to hold\nit sacredly, this also belongs to prayer.\n\nIn this connection it might be said that it is requisite to dictate to\nchildren the necessity of prayer in order to their salvation. But alas!\nUnhappily it is thought sufficient to tell them there is a Heaven and a\nhell; that they must avoid the latter place and seek to reach the\nformer. Yet they are not taught the easiest way to arrive at salvation.\nThe only way to Heaven is by the route of prayer, such prayer of the\nheart which every one is capable of. It is prayer, not of reasonings\nwhich are the fruits of study, or of the exercise of the imagination,\nwhich fills the mind with wondering objects, but which fails to settle\nsalvation, but the simple, confidential prayer of the child to his\nFather in Heaven.\n\nPoverty of spirit enters into true praying. \u201cBlessed are the poor in\nspirit, for theirs is the kingdom of Heaven.\u201d \u201cThe poor\u201d means paupers,\nbeggars, those who live on the bounties of others, who live by begging.\nChrist\u2019s people live by asking. \u201cPrayer is the Christian\u2019s vital\nbreath.\u201d It is his affluent inheritance, his daily annuity.\n\nIn His own example, Christ illustrates the nature and necessity of\nprayer. Everywhere He declares that he who is on God\u2019s mission in this\nworld will pray. He is an illustrious example of the principle that the\nmore devoted the man is to God, the more prayerful will he be. The\ndiviner the man, the more of the Spirit of the Father and of the Son he\nhas, the more prayerful will he be. And, conversely, it is true that the\nmore prayerful he is, the more of the Spirit of the Father and of the\nSon will he receive.\n\nThe great events and crowning periods of the life of Jesus we find Him\nin prayer\u2014at the beginning of His ministry, at the fords of the Jordan,\nwhen the Holy Spirit descended upon Him; just prior to the\ntransfiguration, and in the garden of Gethsemane. Well do the words of\nPeter come in here: \u201cLeaving us an example that ye should follow His\nsteps.\u201d\n\nThere is an important principle of prayer found in some of the miracles\nof Christ. It is the progressive nature of the answer to prayer. Not at\nonce does God always give the full answer to prayer, but rather\nprogressively, step by step. Mark (8:22) describes a case which\nillustrates this important truth, too often overlooked:\n\n    \u201cAnd he cometh to Bethsaida; and they bring a blind man unto him,\n    and besought him to touch him.\n\n    \u201cAnd he took the blind man by the hand, and led him out of the town;\n    and when he had spit on his eyes, and put His hands upon him, he\n    asked him if he saw aught.\n\n    \u201cAnd he looked up, and said, \u2018I see men as trees, walking.\u2019\n\n    \u201cAfter that he put his hands again upon his eyes, and made him look\n    up; and he was restored, and saw every man clearly.\u201d\n\nAlone He has to take us at times, aside from the world, where He can\nhave us all to Himself, and there speak to and deal with us.\n\nWe have three cures in blindness in the life of our Lord, which\nillustrate the nature of God\u2019s working in answering prayer, and show the\nexhaustless variety and the omnipotence of His working.\n\nIn the first case Christ came incidentally on a blind man at Jerusalem,\nmade clay, softened it by spittle, and smeared it on the eyes and then\ncommanded the man to go and wash in the pool of Siloam. The gracious\nresults lay at the end of his action\u2014washing. The failure to go and wash\nwould have been fatal to the cure. No one, not even the blind man, in\nthis instance, requested the cure.\n\nIn the second case the parties who bring the blind man, back their\nbringing with earnest prayer for cure; they beseech Christ to simply\ntouch him, as though their faith would relieve the burden of a heavy\noperation. But He took the man by the hand and led him out of the town\nand apart from the people. Alone, and in secret, this work was to be\ndone. He spat on his eyes and put his hands on them. The response was\nnot complete, a dawning of light, a partial recovery; the first gracious\ncommunication but gave him a disordered vision, the second stroke\nperfected the cure. The man\u2019s submissive faith in giving himself up to\nChrist to be led away into privacy and alone, were prominent features of\nthe cure, as also the gradual reception of sight, and the necessity of a\nsecond stroke to finish the perfect work.\n\nThe third was the case of blind Bartim\u00e6us. It was the urgency of faith\ndeclaring itself in clamourous utterances, rebuked by those who were\nfollowing Christ, but intensified and emboldened by opposition.\n\nThe first case comes on Christ unawares; the second was brought with\nspecific intent to Him; the last goes after Christ with irresistible\nurgency, met by the resistance of the multitude and the seeming\nindifference of Christ. The cure, though, was without the interposition\nof any agent, no taking by the hand, no gentle or severe touch, no\nspittle, nor clay, nor washing\u2014a word only and his sight, full-orbed,\ncame instantly. Each one had experienced the same divine power, the same\nblessed results, but with marked diversity in the expression of their\nfaith and the mode of their cure. Suppose, at their meeting, the first\nhad set up the particulars and process of his cure, the spittle, the\nclay, the washing in Siloam as the only Divine process, as the only\ngenuine credentials of a Divine work, how far from the truth, how narrow\nand misleading such a standard of decision! Not methods, but results,\nare the tests of the Divine work.\n\nEach one could say: \u201cThis one thing I know, whereas I was blind I now\nsee.\u201d The results were conscious results; that Christ did the work they\nknew; faith was the instrument, but its exercise different; the method\nof Christ\u2019s working different; the various steps that brought them to\nthe gracious end on their part and on His part at many points strikingly\ndissimilar.\n\nWhat are the limitations of prayer? How far do its benefits and\npossibilities reach? What part of God\u2019s dealing with man, and with man\u2019s\nworld, is unaffected by prayer? Do the possibilities of prayer cover all\ntemporal and spiritual good? The answers to these questions are of\ntranscendental importance. The answer will gauge the effort and results\nof our praying. The answer will greatly enhance the value of prayer, or\nwill greatly depress prayer. The answer to these important questions are\nfully covered by Paul\u2019s words on prayer: \u201cBe careful for nothing, but in\neverything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your\nrequests be made known unto God\u201d (Phil. 4:6).\n\n\n\n\n                                   IV\n                  GOD HAS EVERYTHING TO DO WITH PRAYER\n\n\n    _Christ is all. We are complete in Him. He is the answer to every\n    need, the perfect Savior. He needs no decoration to heighten His\n    beauty, no prop to increase His stability, no girding to perfect His\n    strength. Who can gild refined gold, whiten the snow, perfume the\n    rose or heighten the colors of the summer sunset? Who will prop the\n    mountains or help the great deep? It is not Christ and philosophy,\n    nor Christ and money, nor civilization, nor diplomacy, nor science,\n    nor organization. It is Christ alone. He trod the winepress alone.\n    His own arm brought salvation. He is enough. He is the comfort, the\n    strength, the wisdom, the righteousness, the sanctification of all\n    men._\u2014C. L. CHILTON.\n\n\nPrayer is God\u2019s business to which men can attend. Prayer is God\u2019s\nnecessary business, which men only can do, and that men must do. Men who\nbelong to God are obliged to pray. They are not obliged to grow rich,\nnor to make money. They are not obliged to have large success in\nbusiness. These are incidental, occasional, merely nominal, as far as\nintegrity to Heaven and loyalty to God are concerned. Material successes\nare immaterial to God. Men are neither better nor worse with those\nthings or without them. They are not sources of reputation nor elements\nof character in the heavenly estimates. But to pray, to really pray, is\nthe source of revenue, the basis of reputation, and the element of\ncharacter in the estimation of God. Men are obliged to pray as they are\nobliged to be religious. Prayer is loyalty to God. Non-praying is to\nreject Christ and to abandon Heaven. A life of prayer is the only life\nwhich Heaven counts.\n\nGod is vitally concerned that men should pray. Men are bettered by\nprayer, and the world is bettered by praying. God does His best work for\nthe world through prayer. God\u2019s greatest glory and man\u2019s highest good\nare secured by prayer. Prayer forms the godliest men and makes the\ngodliest world.\n\nGod\u2019s promises lie like giant corpses without life, only for decay and\ndust unless men appropriate and vivify these promises by earnest and\nprevailing prayer.\n\nPromise is like the unsown seed, the germ of life in it, but the soil\nand culture of prayer are necessary to germinate and culture the seed.\nPrayer is God\u2019s life-giving breath. God\u2019s purposes move along the\npathway made by prayer to their glorious designs. God\u2019s purposes are\nalways moving to their high and benignant ends, but the movement is\nalong the way marked by unceasing prayer. The breath of prayer in man is\nfrom God.\n\nGod has everything to do with prayer, as well as everything to do with\nthe one who prays. To him who prays, and as he prays, the hour is sacred\nbecause it is God\u2019s hour. The occasion is sacred because it is the\noccasion of the soul\u2019s approach to God, and of dealing with God. No hour\nis more hallowed because it is the occasion of the soul\u2019s mightiest\napproach to God, and of the fullest revelation from God. Men are Godlike\nand men are blessed, just as the hour of prayer has the most of God in\nit. Prayer makes and measures the approach of God. He knows not God who\nknows not how to pray. He has never seen God whose eye has not been\ncouched for God in the closet. God\u2019s vision place is the closet. His\ndwelling place is in secret. \u201cHe that dwelleth in the secret place of\nthe most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.\u201d\n\nHe has never studied God who has not had his intellect broadened,\nstrengthened, clarified and uplifted by prayer. Almighty God commands\nprayer, God waits on prayer to order His ways, and God delights in\nprayer. To God, prayer is what the incense was to the Jewish Temple. It\nimpregnates everything, perfumes everything and sweetens everything.\n\nThe possibilities of prayer cover the whole purposes of God through\nChrist. God conditions all gifts in all dispensations to His Son on\nprayer: \u201cAsk of me,\u201d saith God the Father to the Son, as that Son was\nmoving earthward on the stupendous enterprise for a world\u2019s salvation,\n\u201cand I will give thee the heathen for thy inheritance, and the uttermost\nparts of the earth for thy possession.\u201d Hinging on prayer were all the\nmeans and results and successes of that wonderful and Divine movement\nfor man\u2019s salvation. Broad and profound, mysterious and wonderful was\nthe scheme.\n\nThe answer to prayer is assured not only by the promises of God, but by\nGod\u2019s relation to us as a Father.\n\n\u201cBut thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou has\nshut thy door, pray to thy Father, which is in secret; and thy Father,\nwhich seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly.\u201d\n\nAgain, we have these words: \u201cIf ye, being evil, know how to give good\ngifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father, which is in\nheaven, give good things to them that ask him?\u201d\n\nGod encourages us to pray, not only by the certainty of the answer, but\nby the munificence of the promise, and the bounty of the Giver. How\nprincely the promise! \u201cAll things whatsoever.\u201d And when we superadd to\nthat \u201cwhatsoever\u201d the promise which covers all things and everything,\nwithout qualification, exception or limitation, \u201canything,\u201d this is to\nexpand and make minute and specific the promise. The challenge of God to\nus is \u201cCall unto me, and I will answer thee, and show thee great and\nmighty things which thou knowest not.\u201d This includes, like the answer to\nSolomon\u2019s prayer, that which was specifically prayed for, but embraces\nvastly more of great value and of great necessity.\n\nAlmighty God seems to fear we will hesitate to ask largely, apprehensive\nthat we will strain His ability. He declares that He is \u201cable to do\nexceeding abundantly above all that we can ask or think.\u201d He almost\nparalyses us by giving us a _carte blanche_, \u201cAsk of me things to come\nconcerning my sons, and concerning the work of my hands, command ye me.\u201d\nHow He charges, commands and urges us to pray! He goes beyond promise\nand says: \u201cBehold my Son! I have given Him to you.\u201d \u201cHe that spared not\nhis own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him\nfreely give us all things?\u201d\n\nGod gave us all things in prayer by promise because He had given us all\nthings in His Son. Amazing gift\u2014His Son! Prayer is as illimitable as His\nown Blessed Son. There is nothing on earth nor in Heaven, for time or\neternity, that God\u2019s Son did not secure for us. By prayer God gives us\nthe vast and matchless inheritance which is ours by virtue of His Son.\nGod charges us to \u201ccome boldly to the throne of grace.\u201d God is glorified\nand Christ is honoured by large asking.\n\nThat which is true of the promises of God is equally true of the\npurposes of God. We might say that God does nothing without prayer. His\nmost gracious purposes are conditioned on prayer. His marvelous promises\nin the thirty-sixth chapter of Ezekiel are subject to this qualification\nand condition: \u201cThus saith the Lord God: I will yet for this be inquired\nof by the house of Israel to do it for them.\u201d\n\nIn the second Psalm the purposes of God to His enthroned Christ are\ndecreed on prayer, as has been previously quoted. That decree which\npromises to Him the heathen for His inheritance relies on prayer for its\nfulfillment: \u201cAsk of me.\u201d We see how sadly the decree has failed in its\noperation, not because of the weakness of God\u2019s purpose, but by the\nweakness of man\u2019s praying. It takes God\u2019s mighty decree and man\u2019s mighty\npraying to bring to pass these glorious results.\n\nIn the seventy-second Psalm, we have an insight into the mighty\npotencies of prayer as the force which God moves on the conquest of\nChrist: \u201cPrayer shall be made for him continually.\u201d In this statement\nChrist\u2019s movements are put into the hands of prayer.\n\nWhen Christ, with a sad and sympathising heart, looked upon the ripened\nfields of humanity, and saw the great need of labourers, His purposes\nwere for more labourers, and so He charged them, \u201cPray ye therefore the\nLord of the harvest that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.\u201d\n\nIn Ephesians, chapter three, Paul reminds those believers of the eternal\npurposes of God, and how he was bowing his knees to God in order that\nthat eternal purpose might be accomplished, and also that they \u201cmight be\nfilled with all the fullness of God.\u201d\n\nWe see in Job how God conditioned His purposes for Job\u2019s three friends\non Job\u2019s praying, and God\u2019s purposes in regard to Job were brought about\nby the same means.\n\nIn the first part of Revelation, (chapter eight) the relation and\nnecessity of saintly prayers to God\u2019s plans and operations in executing\nthe salvation of men is set forth in rich, expressive symbol, wherein\nthe angels have to do with the prayers of the saints.\n\nPrayer gives efficiency and utility to the promises. The mighty ongoing\nof God\u2019s purposes rests on prayer. The representatives of the Church in\nHeaven and of all creation before the throne of God \u201chave every one of\nthem golden vials of odours which are the prayers of the saints.\u201d\n\nWe have said before, and repeat it, that prayer is based not simply upon\na promise, but on a relationship. The returning penitent sinner prays on\na promise. The child of God prays on the relation of a child. What the\nfather has belongs to the child for present and prospective uses. The\nchild asks, the father gives. The relationship is one of asking and\nanswering, of giving and receiving. The child is dependent upon the\nfather, must look to the father, must ask of the father, and must\nreceive of the father.\n\nWe know how with earthly parents asking and giving belong to this\nrelation, and how in the very act of asking and giving, the relationship\nof parent and child is cemented, sweetened and enriched. The parent\nfinds his wealth of pleasure and satisfaction in giving to an obedient\nchild, and the child finds his wealth in the father\u2019s loving and\ncontinuous giving.\n\nPrayer affects God more powerfully than His own purposes. God\u2019s will,\nwords and purposes are all subject to review when the mighty potencies\nof prayer come in. How mighty prayer is with God may be seen as he\nreadily sets aside His own fixed and declared purposes in answer to\nprayer. The whole plan of salvation had been blocked had Jesus Christ\nprayed for the twelve legions of angels to carry dismay and ruin to His\nenemies.\n\nThe fasting and prayers of the Ninevites changed God\u2019s purposes to\ndestroy that wicked city, after Jonah had gone there and cried unto the\npeople, \u201cYet forty days and Nineveh shall be destroyed.\u201d\n\nAlmighty God is concerned in our praying. He wills it, He commands it,\nHe inspires it. Jesus Christ in Heaven is ever praying. Prayer is His\nlaw and His life. The Holy Spirit teaches us how to pray. He prays for\nus \u201cwith groanings which cannot be uttered.\u201d All these show the deep\nconcern of God in prayer. It discloses very clearly how vital it is to\nHis work in this world, and how far-reaching are its possibilities.\nPrayer forms the very center of the heart and will of God concerning\nmen. \u201cRejoice evermore, pray without ceasing, and in everything give\nthanks. For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.\u201d\nPrayer is the pole star around which rejoicing and thanksgiving revolve.\nPrayer is the heart sending its full and happy pulsations up to God\nthrough the glad currents of joy and thanksgiving.\n\nBy prayer God\u2019s Name is hallowed. By prayer God\u2019s kingdom comes. By\nprayer is His kingdom established in power and made to move with\nconquering force swifter than the light. By prayer God\u2019s will is done\ntill earth rivals Heaven in harmony and beauty. By prayer daily toil is\nsanctified and enriched, and pardon is secured, and Satan is defeated.\nPrayer concerns God, and concerns man in every way.\n\nGod has nothing too good to give in answer to prayer. There is no\nvengeance pronounced by God so dire which does not yield to prayer.\nThere is no justice so flaming that is not quenched by prayer.\n\nTake the record and attitude of Heaven against Saul of Tarsus. That\nattitude is changed and that record is erased when the astonishing\ncondition is announced, \u201cBehold he prayeth.\u201d The recreant Jonah is\nalive, and on dry ground, with scarce the taste of the sea or the smell\nof its weeds about him, as he prays. \u201cOut of the belly of hell cried I,\nand thou heardst my voice.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe waters compassed me about, even to the soul; the depth closed me\nround about, the weeds were wrapped about my head.\n\n\u201cI went down to the bottoms of the mountains; the earth with her bars\nwas about me for ever; yet hast thou brought up my life from corruption,\nO Lord my God.\n\n\u201cWhen my soul fainted within me I remembered the Lord: and my prayer\ncame in unto thee, into thine holy temple.\n\n\u201cAnd the Lord spake unto the fish, and it vomited out Jonah upon the dry\nland.\u201d\n\nPrayer has all the force of God in it. Prayer can get anything which God\nhas. Thus prayer has all of its plea and its claim in the name of Jesus\nChrist, and there is nothing too good or great for God to give that\nname.\n\nIt must be borne in mind that there is no test surer than this thing of\nprayer of our being in the family of God. God\u2019s children pray. They\nrepose in Him for all things. They ask Him for all things\u2014for\neverything. The faith of the child in the father is evinced by the\nchild\u2019s asking. It is the answer to prayer which convinces men not only\nthat there is a God, but that He is a God who concerns Himself about\nmen, and about the affairs of this world. Answered prayer brings God\nnigh, and assures men of His being. Answered prayer is the credentials\nof our relation to and our representative of Him. Men cannot represent\nGod who do not get answers to prayer from Him.\n\nThe possibilities of prayer are found in the illimitable promise, the\nwillingness and the power of God to answer prayer, to answer all prayer,\nto answer every prayer, and to supply fully the illimitable need of man.\nNone are so needy as man, none are so able and anxious to supply every\nneed and any need as God.\n\nPreaching should no more fully declare and fulfill the will of God for\nthe salvation of all men, than should the prayers of God\u2019s saints\ndeclare the same great truth, as they wrestle in their closet for this\nsublime end. God\u2019s heart is set on the salvation of all men. This\nconcerns God. He has declared this in the death of His Son by an\nunspeakable voice, and every movement on earth for this end pleases God.\nAnd so He declares that our prayers for the salvation of all men are\nwell pleasing in His sight. The sublime and holy inspiration of pleasing\nGod should ever move us to prayer for all men. God eyes the closet, and\nnothing we can do pleases Him better than our large-hearted, ardent\npraying for all men. It is the embodiment and test of our devotion to\nGod\u2019s will and of our sympathetic loyalty to God.\n\nIn I Tim. 2:13 the apostle Paul does not descend to a low plane, but\npresses the necessity of prayer by the most forceful facts. Jesus\nChrist, a man, the God-man, the highest illustration of manhood, is the\nMediator between God and man. Jesus Christ, this Divine man, died for\nall men. His life is but an intercession for all men. His death is but a\nprayer for all men. On earth, Jesus Christ knew no higher law, no holier\nbusiness, no diviner life, than to plead for men. In Heaven He knows no\nmore royal estate, no higher theme, than to intercede for men. On earth\nHe lived and prayed and died for men. His life, His death and His\nexaltation in Heaven all plead for men.\n\nIs there any work, higher work for the disciple to do than His Lord did?\nIs there any loftier employment, more honourable, more divine, than to\npray for men? To take their woes, their sins, and their perils before\nGod; to be one with Christ? To break the thrall which binds them, the\nhell which holds them and lift them to immortality and eternal life?\n\n\n\n\n                                   V\n               JESUS CHRIST, THE DIVINE TEACHER OF PRAYER\n\n\n    _A friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing\n    to set before him! He knocks again. \u201cFriend! lend me three loaves.\u201d\n    He waits a while and then knocks again. \u201cFriend! I must have three\n    loaves!\u201d \u201cTrouble me not: the door is now shut; I cannot rise and\n    give thee!\u201d He stands still. He turns to go home. He comes back. He\n    knocks again. \u201cFriend!\u201d he cries. He puts his ear to the door. There\n    is a sound inside, and then the light of a candle shines through the\n    hole of the door. The bars of the door are drawn back, and he gets\n    not three loaves only, but as many as he needs. \u201cAnd I say unto you,\n    Ask and it shall be given you; seek and ye shall find; knock and it\n    shall be opened unto you.\u201d_\n\n    \u2014ALEXANDER WHYTE, D.D.\n\n\nJesus Christ was the Divine Teacher of prayer. Its power and nature had\nbeen illustrated by many a saint and prophet in olden times, but modern\nsainthood and modern teachers of prayer had lost their inspiration and\nlife. Religiously dead, teachers and superficial ecclesiastics had\nforgotten what it was to pray. They did much of saying prayers, on state\noccasions, in public, with much ostentation and parade, but pray they\ndid not. To them it was almost a lost practice. In the multiplicity of\nsaying prayers they had lost the art of praying.\n\nThe history of the disciples during the earthly life of our Lord was not\nmarked with much devotion. They were much enamoured by their personal\nassociation with Christ. They were charmed by His words, excited by His\nmiracles, and were entertained and concerned by the hopes which a\nselfish interest aroused in His person and mission. Taken up with the\nsuperficial and worldly views of His character, they neglected and\noverlooked the deeper and weightier things which belonged to Him and His\nmission. The neglect of the most obliging and ordinary duties by them\nwas a noticeable feature in their conduct. So evident and singular was\ntheir conduct in this regard, that it became a matter of grave inquiry\non one occasion and severe chiding on another.\n\n\u201cAnd they said unto him, Why do the disciples of John fast often, and\nmake prayers, and likewise the disciples of the Pharisees; but thine eat\nand drink? And he said unto them, Can ye make the children of the\nbridechamber fast, while the bridegroom is with them? But the days will\ncome, when the bridegroom shall be taken away from them, and then shall\nthey fast in those days.\u201d\n\nIn the example and the teaching of Jesus Christ, prayer assumes its\nnormal relation to God\u2019s person, God\u2019s movements and God\u2019s Son. Jesus\nChrist was essentially the teacher of prayer by precept and example. We\nhave glimpses of His praying which, like indices, tell how full of\nprayer the pages, chapters and volumes of His life were. The epitome\nwhich covers not one segment only, but the whole circle of His life, and\ncharacter, is pre-eminently that of prayer! \u201cIn the days of his flesh,\u201d\nthe Divine record reads, \u201cwhen he had offered up prayers and\nsupplications, with strong crying and tears.\u201d The suppliant of all\nsuppliants He was, the intercessor of all intercessors. In lowliest form\nHe approached God, and with strongest pleas He prayed and supplicated.\n\nJesus Christ teaches the importance of prayer by His urgency to His\ndisciples to pray. But He shows us more than that. He shows how far\nprayer enters into the purposes of God. We must ever keep in mind that\nthe relation of Jesus Christ to God is the relation of asking and\ngiving, the Son ever asking, the Father ever giving. We must never\nforget that God has put the conquering, inheriting and expanding forces\nof Christ\u2019s cause in prayer. \u201cAsk of me, and I will give thee the\nheathen for thy inheritance, and the uttermost part of the earth for thy\npossession.\u201d\n\nThis was the clause embodying the royal proclamation and the universal\ncondition when the Son was enthroned as the world\u2019s Mediator, and when\nHe was sent on His mission of receiving grace and power. We very\nnaturally learn from this how Jesus would stress praying as the one sole\ncondition of His receiving His possession and inheritance.\n\nNecessarily in this study on prayer, lines of thought will cross each\nother, and the same Scripture passage or incident will be mentioned more\nthan once, simply because a passage may teach one or more truths. This\nis the case when we speak of the vast comprehensiveness of prayer. How\nall-inclusive Jesus Christ makes prayer! It has no limitations in extent\nor things! The promises to prayer are Godlike in their magnificence,\nwideness and universality. In their nature these promises have to do\nwith God\u2014with Him in their inspiration, creation and results. Who but\nGod could say, \u201cAll things whatsoever ye ask in prayer, believing, ye\nshall receive?\u201d Who can command and direct \u201cAll things whatsoever\u201d but\nGod? Neither man nor chance nor the law of results are so far lifted\nabove change, limitations or condition, nor have in them mighty forces\nwhich can direct and result all things, as to promise the bestowment and\ndirection of all things.\n\nWhole sections, parables and incidents were used by Christ to enforce\nthe necessity and importance of prayer. His miracles are but parables of\nprayer. In nearly all of them prayer figures distinctly, and some\nfeatures of it are illustrated. The Syro-ph\u0153nician woman is a\npre-eminent illustration of the ability and the success of importunity\nin prayer. The case of blind Bartim\u00e6us has points of suggestion along\nthe same line. Jairus and the Centurion illustrate and impress phases of\nprayer. The parable of the Pharisee and the publican enforce humility in\nprayer, declare the wondrous results of praying, and show the vanity and\nworthlessness of wrong praying. The failure to enforce church discipline\nand the readiness of violating the brotherhood, are all used to make an\nexhibit of far-reaching results of agreed praying, a record of which we\nhave in Matthew, chapter 18:19.\n\nIt is of prayer in concert that Christ is speaking. Two agreed ones, two\nwhose hearts have been keyed into perfect symphony by the Holy Spirit.\nAnything that they shall ask, it shall be done. Christ had been speaking\nof discipline in the Church, how things were to be kept in unity, and\nhow the fellowship of the brethren was to be maintained, by the\nrestoration of the offender or by his exclusion. Members who had been\ntrue to the brotherhood of Christ, and who were labouring to preserve\nthat brotherhood unbroken, would be the agreed ones to make appeals to\nGod in united prayer.\n\nIn the Sermon on the Mount, Christ lays down constitutional principles.\nTypes and shadows are retired, and the law of spiritual life is\ndeclared. In this foundation law of the Christian system prayer assumes\na conspicuous, if not a paramount, position. It is not only wide,\nall-commanding, and comprehensive in its own sphere of action and\nrelief, but it is ancillary to all duties. Even the one demanding kindly\nand discriminating judgment toward others, and also the royal\ninjunction, the Golden Rule of action, these owe their being to prayer.\n\nChrist puts prayer among the statutory promises. He does not leave it to\nnatural law. The law of need, demand and supply, of helplessness, of\nnatural instincts, or the law of sweet, high, attractive privilege\u2014these\nhowsoever strong as motives of action, are not the basis of praying.\nChrist puts it as spiritual law. Men must pray. Not to pray is not\nsimply a privation, an omission, but a positive violation of law, of\nspiritual life, a crime, bringing disorder and ruin. Prayer is law\nworld-wide and eternity-reaching.\n\nIn the Sermon on the Mount many important utterances are dismissed with\na line or a verse, while the subject of prayer occupies a large space.\nTo it Christ returns again and again. He bases the possibilities and\nnecessities of prayer on the relation of father and child, the child\ncrying for bread, and the father giving that for which the child asks.\nPrayer and its answer are in the relation of a father to his child. The\nteaching of Jesus Christ on the nature and necessity of prayer as\nrecorded in His life, is remarkable. He sends men to their closets.\nPrayer must be a holy exercise, untainted by vanity, or pride. It must\nbe in secret. The disciple must live in secret. God lives there, is\nsought there and is found there. The command of Christ as to prayer is\nthat pride and publicity should be shunned. Prayer is to be in private.\n\u201cBut thou when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and shut thy door,\nand pray to thy Father in secret. And thy Father, which seeth in secret,\nshall reward thee openly.\u201d\n\nThe Beatitudes are not only to enrich and adorn, but they are the\nmaterial out of which spiritual character is built. The very first one\nof these fixes prayer in the very foundation of spiritual character, not\nsimply to adorn, but to compose. \u201cBlessed are the poor in spirit.\u201d The\nword \u201cpoor\u201d means a pauper, one who lives by begging. The real Christian\nlives on the bounties of another, whose bounties he gets by asking.\nPrayer then becomes the basis of Christian character, the Christian\u2019s\nbusiness, his life and his living. This is Christ\u2019s law of prayer,\nputting it into the very being of the Christian. It is his first step,\nand his first breath, which is to colour and to form all his after life.\nBlessed are the poor ones, for they only can pray.\n\n                  Prayer is the Christian\u2019s vital breath,\n                      The Christian\u2019s native air;\n                  His watchword at the gates of death;\n                      He enters Heaven with prayer.\n\nFrom praying Christ eliminates all self-sufficiency, all pride, and all\nspiritual values. The poor in spirit are the praying ones. Beggars are\nGod\u2019s princes. They are God\u2019s heirs. Christ removes the rubbish of\nJewish traditions and glosses from the regulations of the prayer altar.\n\n    \u201cYe have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not\n    kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment:\n\n    \u201cBut I say unto you, that whosoever is angry with his brother shall\n    be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his\n    brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever\n    shall say, thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.\n\n    \u201cTherefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar and there rememberest\n    that thy brother has aught against thee:\n\n    \u201cLeave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way; first, be\n    reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift.\u201d\n\nHe who essays to pray to God with an angry spirit, with loose and\nirreverent lips, with an irreconciled heart, and with unsettled\nneighbourly scores, spends his labour for that which is worse than\nnaught, violates the law of prayer, and adds to his sin.\n\nHow rigidly exacting is Christ\u2019s law of prayer! It goes to the heart,\nand demands that love be enthroned there, love to the brotherhood. The\nsacrifice of prayer must be seasoned and perfumed with love, by love in\nthe inward parts. The law of prayer, its creator and inspirer, is love.\n\nPraying must be done. God wants it done. He commands it. Man needs it\nand man must do it. Something must surely come of praying, for God\nengages that something shall come out of it, if men are in earnest and\nare persevering in prayer.\n\nAfter Jesus teaches \u201cAsk and it shall be given you,\u201d etc., He encourages\nreal praying, and more praying. He repeats and avers with redoubled\nassurance, \u201cFor every one that asketh receiveth.\u201d No exception. \u201cEvery\none.\u201d \u201cHe that seeketh, findeth.\u201d Here it is again, sealed and stamped\nwith infinite veracity. Then closed and signed, as well as sealed, with\nDivine attestation, \u201cTo him that knocketh it shall be opened.\u201d Note how\nwe are encouraged to pray by our relation to God!\n\n    \u201cIf ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your\n    children, how much more shall your Father which is in Heaven give\n    good things to them that ask him?\u201d\n\nThe relation of prayer to God\u2019s work and God\u2019s rule in this world is\nmost fully illustrated by Jesus Christ in both His teaching and His\npractice. He is first in every way and in everything. Among the rulers\nof the Church He is primary in a pre-eminent way. He has the throne. The\ngolden crown is His in eminent preciousness. The white garments enrobe\nHim in pre-eminent whiteness and beauty. In the ministry of prayer He is\na Divine example as well as the Divine Teacher. His example is affluent,\nand His prayer teaching abounds. How imperative the teaching of our Lord\nwhen He affirms that \u201cmen ought always to pray and not to faint!\u201d and\nthen presents a striking parable of an unjust judge and a poor widow to\nillustrate and enforce His teaching. It is a necessity to pray. It is\nexacting and binding for men always to be in prayer. Courage, endurance\nand perseverance are demanded that men may never faint in prayer. \u201cAnd\nshall not God avenge his own elect that cry day and night unto him?\u201d\n\nThis is His strong and indignant questioning and affirmation. Men must\npray according to Christ\u2019s teaching. They must not get tired nor grow\nweary in praying. God\u2019s character is the assured surety that much will\ncome of the persistent praying of true men.\n\nDoubtless the praying of our Lord had much to do with the revelation\nmade to Peter and the confession he made to Christ, \u201cThou art the\nChrist, the Son of the Living God.\u201d Prayer mightily affects and molds\nthe circle of our associates. Christ made disciples and kept them\ndisciples by praying. His twelve disciples were much impressed by His\npraying. Never man prayed like this man. How different His praying from\nthe cold, proud, self-righteous praying which they heard and saw on the\nstreets, in the synagogue, and in the Temple.\n\n\n\n\n                                   VI\n        JESUS CHRIST, THE DIVINE TEACHER OF PRAYER (_Continued_)\n\n\n    _Luke tells us that as Jesus was praying in a certain place, when He\n    ceased, one of His disciples said unto Him, \u201cLord, teach us to\n    pray.\u201d This disciple had heard Jesus preach, but did not feel like\n    saying, \u201cLord, teach us to preach.\u201d He could learn to preach by\n    studying the methods of the Master. But there was something about\n    the praying of Jesus that made the disciple feel that he did not\n    know how to pray; that he had never prayed, and that he could not\n    learn by listening even to the Master as He prayed. There is a\n    profound something about prayer which never lies upon the surface.\n    To learn it, one must go to the depths of the soul, and climb to the\n    heights of God._\n\n    \u2014A. C. DIXON, D.D.\n\n\nLet it not be forgotten that prayer was one of the great truths which He\ncame into the world to teach and illustrate. It was worth a trip from\nHeaven to earth to teach men this great lesson of prayer. A great lesson\nit was, a very difficult lesson for men to learn. Men are naturally\naverse to learning this lesson of prayer. The lesson is a very lowly\none. None but God can teach it. It is a despised beggary, a sublime and\nheavenly vocation. The disciples were very stupid scholars, but were\nquickened to prayer by hearing Him pray and talk about prayer.\n\nThe dispensation of Christ\u2019s personality, while it was not and could not\nbe the dispensation in its fullest and highest sense of need and\ndependence, yet Christ did try to impress on His disciples not alone a\ndeep necessity of the necessity of prayer in general, but the importance\nof prayer to them in their personal and spiritual needs. And there came\nmoments to them when they felt the need of a deeper and more thorough\nschooling in prayer and of their grave neglect in this regard. One of\nthese hours of deep conviction on their part and of eager inquiry was\nwhen He was praying at a certain place and time, and they saw Him, and\nthey said to Him, \u201cLord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his\ndisciples.\u201d\n\nAs they listened to Him praying, they felt very keenly their ignorance\nand deficiency in praying. Who has not felt the same deficiency and\nignorance? Who has not longed for a teacher in the Divine art of\npraying?\n\nThe conviction which these twelve men had of their defect in prayer\narose from hearing their Lord and Master pray, but likewise from a sense\nof serious defect even when compared with John the Baptist\u2019s training of\nhis disciples in prayer. As they listened to their Lord pray (for\nunquestionably He must have been seen and heard by them as He prayed,\nwho prayed with marvelous simplicity, and power, so human and so Divine)\nsuch praying had a stimulating charm for them. In the presence and\nhearing of His praying, very keenly they felt their ignorance and\ndeficiency in prayer. Who has not felt the same ignorance and\ndeficiency?\n\nWe do not regret the schooling our Lord gave these twelve men, for in\nschooling them He schools us. The lesson is one already learned in the\nlaw of Christ. But so dull were they, that many a patient iteration and\nreiteration was required to instruct them in this Divine art of prayer.\nAnd likewise so dull are we and inapt that many a wearying patient\nrepetition must be given us before we will learn any important lesson in\nthe all-important school of prayer.\n\nThis Divine Teacher of prayer lays Himself out to make it clear and\nstrong that God answers prayer, assuredly, certainly, inevitably; that\nit is the duty of the child to ask, and to press, and that the Father is\nobliged to answer, and to give for the asking. In Christ\u2019s teaching,\nprayer is no sterile, vain performance, not a mere rite, a form, but a\nrequest for an answer, a plea to gain, the seeking of a great good from\nGod. It is a lesson of getting that for which we ask, of finding that\nfor which we seek, and of entering the door at which we knock.\n\nA notable occasion we have as Jesus comes down from the Mount of\nTransfiguration. He finds His disciples defeated, humiliated and\nconfused in the presence of their enemies. A father has brought his\nchild possessed with a demon to have the demon cast out. They essayed to\ndo it but failed. They had been commissioned by Jesus and sent to do\nthat very work, but had signally failed. \u201cAnd when he was come into the\nhouse, his disciples asked him privately, saying, Why could not we cast\nhim out? And he said unto them, This kind can come forth by nothing but\nby prayer and fasting.\u201d Their faith had not been cultured by prayer.\nThey failed in prayer before they failed in ability to do their work.\nThey failed in faith because they had failed in prayer. That one thing\nwhich was necessary to do God\u2019s work was prayer. The work which God\nsends us to do cannot be done without prayer.\n\nIn Christ\u2019s teaching on prayer we have another pertinent statement. It\nwas in connection with the cursing of the barren fig tree:\n\n    \u201cJesus answered and said unto them, Verily I say unto you, if ye\n    have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done\n    to the fig tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be\n    thou removed and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done.\n\n    \u201cAnd all things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye\n    shall receive.\u201d\n\nIn this passage we have faith and prayer, their possibilities and powers\nconjoined. A fig tree had been blasted to the roots by the word of the\nLord Jesus. The power and quickness of the result surprised the\ndisciples. Jesus says to them that it need be no surprise to them, or\nsuch a difficult work to be done. \u201cIf ye have faith\u201d its possibilities\nto affect will not be confined to the little fig tree, but the gigantic,\nrock-ribbed, rock-founded mountains can be uprooted and moved into the\nsea. Prayer is leverage of this great power of faith.\n\nIt is well to refer again to the occasion when the heart of our Lord was\nso deeply moved with compassion as he beheld the multitudes because they\nfainted and were scattered as having no shepherd. Then it was He urged\nupon His disciples the injunction, \u201cPray ye the Lord of the harvest that\nhe would send forth labourers into his harvest,\u201d clearly teaching them\nthat it belonged to God to call into the ministry men whom He will, and\nthat in answer to prayer the Holy Spirit does this very work.\n\nPrayer is as necessary now as it was then to secure the needed labourers\nto reap earthly harvests for the heavenly garners. Has the Church of God\never learned this lesson of so vital and exacting import? God alone can\nchoose the labourers and thrust them out, and this choosing He does not\ndelegate to man, or church, convocation or synod, association or\nconference. And God is moved to this great work of calling men into the\nministry by prayer. Earthly fields are rotting. They are untilled\nbecause prayer is silent. The labourers are few. Fields are unworked\nbecause prayer has not worked with God.\n\nWe have the prayer promise and the prayer ability put in a distinct form\nin the higher teachings of prayer by our Lord: \u201cIf ye abide in me, and\nmy words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done\nunto you.\u201d\n\nHere we have a fixed attitude of life as the condition of prayer. Not\nsimply a fixed attitude of life toward some great principles or\npurposes, but the fixed attitude and unity of life with Jesus Christ. To\nlive in Him, to dwell there, to be one with Him, to draw all life from\nHim, to let all life from Him flow through us\u2014this is the attitude of\nprayer and the ability to pray. No abiding in Him can be separated from\nHis Word abiding in us. It must live in us to give birth to and food for\nprayer. The attitude of the Person of Christ is the condition of prayer.\n\nThe Old Testament saints had been taught that \u201cGod had magnified his\nword above all his name.\u201d New Testament saints must learn fully how to\nexalt by perfect obedience that Word issuing from the lips of Him who is\nthe Word. Praying ones under Christ must learn what praying ones under\nMoses had already learned, that \u201cman shall not live by bread alone, but\nby every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.\u201d The life of\nChrist flowing through us and the words of Christ living in us, these\ngive potency to prayer. They breathe the spirit of prayer, and make the\nbody, blood and bones of prayer. Then it is Christ praying in me and\nthrough me, and all things which \u201cI will\u201d are the will of God. My will\nbecomes the law and the answer, for it is written \u201cYe shall ask what ye\nwill, and it shall be done unto you.\u201d\n\nFruit bearing our Lord puts to the front in our praying:\n\n    \u201cYe have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you,\n    that ye shall go and bring forth fruit and that your fruit shall\n    remain, that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he\n    may give it you.\u201d\n\nBarrenness cannot pray. Fruit bearing capacity and reality only can\npray. It is not past fruitfulness, but present: \u201cThat your fruit should\nremain.\u201d Fruit, the product of life, is the condition of praying. A life\nvigourous enough to bear fruit, much fruit, is the condition and the\nsource of prayer. \u201cAnd in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily,\nverily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name,\nhe will give it you. Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask and\nye shall receive, that your joy may be full.\u201d \u201cIn that day ye shall ask\nme nothing.\u201d It is not solving riddles, not revealing mysteries, not\ncurious questionings. This is not our attitude, not our business under\nthe Dispensation of the Spirit, but to pray, and to pray largely. Much\ntrue praying increases man\u2019s joy and God\u2019s glory.\n\n\u201cWhatsoever ye shall ask in my name, I will give,\u201d says Christ, and the\nFather will give. Both Father and Son are pledged to give the very\nthings for which we ask. But the condition is \u201cin His name.\u201d This does\nnot mean that His name is talismanic, to give value by magic. It does\nnot mean that His name in beautiful settings of pearl will give value to\nprayer. It is not that His name perfumed with sentiment and larded in\nand closing up our prayers and doings will do the deed. How fearful the\nstatement: \u201cMany will say unto me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not\nprophesied in thy name? and in thy name cast out devils? and in thy name\ndone many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never\nknew you. Depart from me, ye that work iniquity.\u201d How blasting the doom\nof these great workers and doers who claim to work in His name!\n\nIt means far more than sentiment, verbiage, and nomenclature. It means\nto stand in His stead, to bear His nature, to stand for all for which He\nstood, for righteousness, truth, holiness and zeal. It means to be one\nwith God as He was, one in spirit, in will and in purpose. It means that\nour praying is singly and solely for God\u2019s glory through His Son. It\nmeans that we abide in Him, that Christ prays through us, lives in us\nand shines out of us; that we pray by the Holy Spirit according to the\nwill of God.\n\nEven amid the darkness of Gethsemane, with the stupor which had settled\nupon the disciples, we have the sharp warning from Christ to His\nsluggish disciples, \u201cWatch and pray lest ye enter into temptation. The\nspirit truly is willing, but the flesh is weak.\u201d How needful to hear\nsuch a warning, to awaken all our powers, not simply for the great\ncrises of our lives, but as the inseparable and constant attendants of a\ncareer marked with perils and dangers on every hand.\n\nAs Christ nears the close of His earthly mission, nearer to the greater\nand more powerful dispensation of the Spirit, His teaching about prayer\ntakes on a more absorbing and higher form. It has now become a\ngraduating school. His connection with prayer becomes more intimate and\nmore absolute. He becomes in prayer what He is in all else pertaining to\nour salvation, the beginning and the end, the first and the last. His\nname becomes all potent. Mighty works are to be done by the faith which\ncan pray in His name. Like His nature, His name covers all needs,\nembraces all worlds, and gets all good.\n\n    \u201cBelievest thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in me?\n    The words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the\n    Father that dwelleth in me, he doeth the works.\n\n    \u201cBelieve me that I am in the Father and the Father in me: or else\n    believe me for the very works\u2019 sake.\n\n    \u201cVerily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works\n    that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he\n    do; because I go unto my Father.\n\n    \u201cAnd whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the\n    Father may be glorified in the Son.\n\n    \u201cIf ye shall ask anything in my name I will do it.\u201d\n\nThe Father, the Son and the praying one are all bound up together. All\nthings are in Christ, and all things are in prayer in His name. \u201cIf ye\nshall ask anything in my name.\u201d The key which unlocks the vast\nstorehouse of God is prayer. The power to do greater works than Christ\ndid lies in the faith which can grasp His name truly and in true\npraying.\n\nIn the last of His life, note how He urges prayer as a preventive of the\nmany evils to which they were exposed. In view of the temporal and\nfearful terrors of the destruction of Jerusalem, He charges them to this\neffect: \u201cPray ye that your flight be not in winter.\u201d\n\nHow many evils in this life which can be escaped by prayer! How many\nfearful temporal calamities can be mitigated, if not wholly relieved, by\nprayer! Notice how, amid the excesses and stupefying influences to which\nwe are exposed in this world, Christ charges us to pray:\n\n    \u201cAnd take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be\n    overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this\n    life, and so that day come upon you unawares.\n\n    \u201cFor as a snare shall it come on all them that dwell on the face of\n    the whole earth.\n\n    \u201cWatch ye therefore and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy\n    to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand\n    before the Son of man.\u201d\n\nIn view of the uncertainty of Christ\u2019s coming to judgment, and the\nuncertainty of our going out of this world, He says: \u201cBut of that day\nand that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels which are in Heaven,\nneither the Son, but the Father. Take ye heed, watch and pray, for ye\nknow not when the time is.\u201d\n\nWe have the words of Jesus as given in His last interview with His\ntwelve disciples, found in the Gospel of John, chapters fourteen to\nseventeen, inclusive. These are true, solemn parting words. The\ndisciples were to move out into the regions of toil, and peril, bereft\nof the personal presence of their Lord and Master. They were to be\nimpressed that prayer would serve them in everything, and its use, and\nunlimited possibilities would in some measure supply their loss, and by\nit they would be able to command all the possibilities of Jesus Christ\nand God the Father.\n\nIt was the occasion of momentous interest to Jesus Christ. His work was\nto receive its climax and crown in His death and His resurrection. His\nglory and the success of His work and of its execution, under the\nmastery and direction of the Holy Spirit, was to be committed to His\napostles. To them it was an hour of strange wonderment and of peculiar,\nmysterious sorrow, only too well assured of the fact that Jesus was to\nleave them. All else was dark and impalpable.\n\nHe was to give them His parting words and pray His parting prayer.\nSolemn, vital truths were to be the weight and counsel of that hour. He\nspeaks to them of Heaven. Young men, strong though they were, yet they\ncould not meet the duties of their preaching life and their apostolic\nlife, without the fact, the thought, the hope and the relish of Heaven.\nThese things were to be present constantly in all sweetness, in all\ntheir vigour, in all freshness, in all brightness. He spoke to them\nabout their spiritual and conscious connection with Himself, an abiding\nindwelling, so close and continuous that His own life would flow into\nthem, as the life of the vine flows into the branches. Their lives and\ntheir fruitfulness were dependent upon this. Then praying was urged upon\nthem as one of the vital, essential forces. This was the one thing upon\nwhich all the Divine force depended, and this was the avenue and agency\nthrough which the Divine life and power were to be secured and continued\nin their ministry.\n\nHe spake to them about prayer. He had taught them many lessons upon this\nall-important subject as they had been together. This solemn hour he\nseizes to perfect his teaching. They must be made to realize that they\nhave an illimitable and exhaustless storehouse of good in God and that\nthey can draw on Him at all times and for all things without stint, as\nPaul said in after years to the Philippians, \u201cMy God shall supply all\nyour need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                                  VII\n                   JESUS CHRIST AN EXAMPLE OF PRAYER\n\n\n    _Christ, when He saw that He must die, and that now His time was\n    come, He wore His body out: He cared not, as it were, what became of\n    Him: He wholly spent Himself in preaching all day, and in praying\n    all night, preaching in the temple those terrible parables and\n    praying in the garden such prayers, as the seventeenth of John, and\n    \u201cThy will be done!\u201d even to a bloody sweat._\u2014THOMAS GOODWIN.\n\n\nThe Bible record of the life of Jesus Christ gives but a glance of His\nbusy doing, a small selection of His many words, and only a brief record\nof His great works. But even in this record we see Him as being much in\nprayer. Even though busy and exhausted by the severe strain and toils of\nHis life, \u201cin the morning a great while before day, he rose up and went\nout and departed into a desert place, and there prayed.\u201d Alone in the\ndesert and in the darkness with God! Prayer filled the life of our Lord\nwhile on earth. His life was a constant stream of incense sweet and\nperfumed by prayer. When we see how the life of Jesus was but one of\nprayer, then we must conclude that to be like Jesus is to pray like\nJesus and is to live like Jesus. A serious life it is to pray as Jesus\nprayed.\n\nWe cannot follow any chronological order in the praying of Jesus Christ.\nWhat were His steps of advance and skill in the Divine art of praying we\nknow not. He is in the act of prayer when we find Him at the fords of\nthe Jordan, when the waters of baptism, at the hands of John the\nBaptist, are upon Him. So passing over the three years of His ministry,\nwhen closing the drama of His life in that terrible baptism of fear,\npain, suffering, and shame, we find Him in the spirit, and also in the\nvery act of praying. The baptism of the Cross, as well as the baptism of\nthe Jordan, are sanctified by prayer. With the breath of prayer in His\nlast sigh, He commits His spirit to God. In His first recorded\nutterances, as well as His first acts, we find Him teaching His\ndisciples how to pray as His first lesson, and as their first duty.\nUnder the shadow of the Cross, in the urgency and importance of His last\ninterview with His chosen disciples, He is at the same all-important\nbusiness, teaching the world\u2019s teachers how to pray, trying to make\nprayerful those lips and hearts out of which were to flow the Divine\ndeposits of truth.\n\nThe great eras of His life were created and crowned with prayer. What\nwere His habits of prayer during His stay at home and His toil as a\ncarpenter in Nazareth, we have no means of knowing. God has veiled it,\nand guess and speculation are not only vain and misleading, but proud\nand prurient. It would be presumptuous searching into that which God has\nhidden, which would make us seek to be wise above that which was\nwritten, trying to lift up the veil with which God has covered His own\nrevelation.\n\nWe find Christ in the presence of the famed, the prophet and the\npreacher. He has left His Nazareth home and His carpenter shop by God\u2019s\ncall. He is now at a transitional point. He has moved out to His great\nwork. John\u2019s baptism and the baptism of the Holy Ghost are prefatory and\nare to qualify Him for that work. This epochal and transitional period\nis marked by prayer.\n\n    \u201cNow when all the people were baptized, it came to pass that Jesus,\n    being also baptized, and praying, the heaven was opened.\n\n    \u201cAnd the Holy Ghost descended in a bodily shape like a dove upon\n    him, and a voice came from heaven, which said, Thou art my beloved\n    Son; in thee I am well pleased.\u201d\n\nIt is a supreme hour in His history, different and in striking contrast\nwith, but not in opposition to, the past. The descent and abiding of the\nHoly Spirit in all His fullness, the opening heavens, and the attesting\nvoice which involved God\u2019s recognition of His only Son\u2014all these are the\nresult, if not the direct creation and response to His praying on that\noccasion.\n\n\u201cAs He was praying,\u201d so we are to be praying. If we would pray as Christ\nprayed, we must be as Christ was, and must live as Christ lived. The\nChrist character, the Christ life, and the Christ spirit, must be ours\nif we would do the Christ praying, and would have our prayers answered\nas He had His prayers answered. The business of Christ even now in\nHeaven at His Father\u2019s right hand is to pray. Certainly if we are His,\nif we love Him, if we live for Him, and if we live close to Him, we will\ncatch the contagion of His praying life, both on earth and in Heaven. We\nwill learn His trade and carry on His business on earth.\n\nJesus Christ loved all men, He tasted death for all men, He intercedes\nfor all men. Let us ask then, are we the imitators, the representatives,\nand the executors of Jesus Christ? Then must we in our prayers run\nparallel with His atonement in its extent. The atoning blood of Jesus\nChrist gives sanctity and efficiency to our prayers. As world-wide, as\nbroad, and as human as the man Christ Jesus was, so must be our prayers.\nThe intercessions of Christ\u2019s people must give currency and expedition\nto the work of Christ, carry the atoning blood to its benignant ends,\nand help to strike off the chains of sin from every ransomed soul. We\nmust be as praying, as tearful, and as compassionate as was Christ.\n\nPrayer affects all things. God blesses the person who prays. He who\nprays goes out on a long voyage for God and is enriched himself while\nenriching others, and is blessed himself while the world is blessed by\nhis praying. To \u201clive a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and\nhonesty\u201d is the wealthiest wealth.\n\nThe praying of Christ was real. No man prayed as He prayed. Prayer\npressed upon Him as a solemn, all-imperative, all-commanding duty, as\nwell as a royal privilege in which all sweetness was condensed, alluring\nand absorbing. Prayer was the secret of His power, the law of His life,\nthe inspiration of His toil and the source of His wealth, His joy, His\ncommunion and His strength.\n\nTo Christ Jesus prayer occupied no secondary place, but was exacting and\nparamount, a necessity, a life, the satisfying of a restless yearning\nand a preparation for heavy responsibilities.\n\nCloseting with His Father in counsel and fellowship, with vigour and in\ndeep joy, all this was His praying. Present trials, future glory, the\nhistory of His Church, and the struggles and perils of His disciples in\nall times and to the very end of time\u2014all these things were born and\nshaped by His praying.\n\nNothing is more conspicuous in the life of our Lord than prayer. His\ncampaigns were arranged and His victories were gained in the struggles\nand communion of His all night praying. By prayer He rent the heavens.\nMoses and Elijah and the transfiguration glory wait on His praying. His\nmiracles and teaching had their power from the same source. Gethsemane\u2019s\npraying crimsoned Calvary with serenity and glory. His sacerdotal prayer\nmakes the history and hastens the triumph of His Church on earth. What\nan inspiration and command to pray is the prayer life of Jesus Christ\nwhile in this world! What a comment it is on the value, the nature and\nthe necessity of prayer!\n\nThe dispensation of the Person of Jesus Christ was a dispensation of\nprayer. A synopsis of His teaching and practice of prayer was that \u201cMen\nought always to pray and not to faint.\u201d\n\nAs the Jews prayed in the name of their patriarchs and invoked the\nprivileges granted to them by covenant with God; as we have a new Name\nand a new covenant, more privileged and more powerful and more\nall-comprehensive, more authoritative and more Divine; and as far as the\nSon of God is lifted above the patriarchs in divinity, glory and power,\nby so much should our praying exceed theirs in range of largeness, glory\nand power of results.\n\nJesus Christ prayed to God as Father. Simply and directly did He\napproach God in the charmed and revered circle of the Father. The awful,\nrepelling fear was entirely absent, lost in the supreme confidence of a\nchild.\n\nJesus Christ crowns His life, His works and His teaching with prayer.\nHow His Father attests His relationship and puts on Him the glory of\nanswered prayer at His Baptism and Transfiguration when all other\nglories are growing dim in the night which settles on Him! What almighty\npotencies are in prayer when we are charged and surcharged with but one\ninspiration and aim! \u201cFather, glorify thy name.\u201d This sweetens all,\nbrightens all, conquers all and gets all. \u201cFather, glorify thy name.\u201d\nThat guiding star will illumine the darkest night and calm the wildest\nstorm and will make us brave and true. An imperial principle it is. It\nwill make an imperial Christian.\n\nThe range and potencies of prayer, so clearly shown by Jesus in life and\nteaching, but reveal the great purposes of God. They not only reveal the\nSon in the reality and fullness of His humanity, but also reveal the\nFather.\n\nChrist prayed as a child. The spirit of a child was found in Him. At the\ngrave of Lazarus \u201cJesus lifted up His eyes and said, Father.\u201d Again we\nhear Him begin His prayer after this fashion: \u201cIn that hour Jesus\nrejoiced in spirit, and said, I thank thee, O Father.\u201d So also on other\noccasions we find Him in praying addressing God as His Father, assuming\nthe attitude of the child asking something of the Father. What\nconfidence, simplicity and artlessness! What readiness, freeness and\nfullness of approach are all involved in the spirit of a child! What\nconfiding trust, what assurance, what tender interest! What profound\nsolicitudes, and tender sympathy on the Father\u2019s part! What respect\ndeepening into reverence! What loving obedience and grateful emotions\nglow in the child\u2019s heart! What Divine fellowship and royal intimacy!\nWhat sacred and sweet emotions! All these meet in the hour of prayer\nwhen the child of God meets His Father in Heaven, and when the Father\nmeets His child! We must live as children if we would ask as children.\nWe must act as children if we would pray as children. The spirit of\nprayer is born of the child spirit.\n\nThe profound reverence in this relation of paternity must forever\nexclude all lightness, frivolity and pertness, as well as all undue\nfamiliarity. Solemnity and gravity become the hour of prayer. It has\nbeen well said: \u201cThe worshipper who invokes God under the name of Father\nand realises the gracious and beneficent love of God, must at the same\ntime remember and recognise God\u2019s glorious majesty, which is neither\nannulled nor impaired, but rather supremely intensified through His\nfatherly love. An appeal to God as Father, if not associated with\nreverence and homage before the Divine Majesty, would betray a want of\nunderstanding of the character of God.\u201d And, we might add, would show a\nlack of the attributes of a child.\n\nPatriarchs and prophets knew something of the doctrine of the Fatherhood\nof God to God\u2019s family. They \u201csaw it afar off, were persuaded of it, and\nembraced it,\u201d but understood it not, in all its fullness, \u201cGod having\nprovided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be\nmade perfect.\u201d\n\n\u201cBehold he prayeth!\u201d was God\u2019s statement of wonderment and surprise to\nthe timid Ananias in regard to Saul of Tarsus. \u201cBehold he prayeth!\u201d\napplied to Christ has in it far more of wonderment and mystery and\nsurprise. He, the Maker of all worlds, the Lord of angels and of men,\nco-equal and co-eternal with the Everlasting God; the \u201cbrightness of the\nFather\u2019s glory and the express image of his person\u201d; \u201cfresh from his\nFather\u2019s glory and from his Father\u2019s throne.\u201d\u2014\u201cBehold he prayeth!\u201d To\nfind Him in lowly, dependent attitude of prayer, the suppliant of all\nsuppliants, His richest legacy and His royal privilege to pray\u2014this is\nthe mystery of all mysteries, the wonder of all wonders.\n\nPaul gives in brief and comprehensive statement the habit of our Lord in\nprayer in Hebrews 5:7\u2014\u201cWho, in the days of his flesh, when he had\noffered up prayers and supplications, with strong crying and tears, unto\nhim that was able to save him from death, and was heard in that he\nfeared.\u201d We have in this description of our Lord\u2019s praying the outgoing\nof great spiritual forces. He prayed with \u201cprayers and supplications.\u201d\nIt was no formal, tentative effort. He was intense, personal and real.\nHe was a pleader for God\u2019s good. He was in great need and He must cry\nwith \u201cstrong cryings,\u201d made stronger still by His tears. In an agony the\nSon of God wrestled. His praying was no playing a mere part. His soul\nwas engaged, and all His powers were taxed to a strain. Let us pause and\nlook at Him and learn how to pray in earnest. Let us learn how to win in\nan agony of prayer that which seems to be withholden from us. A\nbeautiful word is that, \u201cfeared,\u201d which occurs only twice in the New\nTestament, the fear of God.\n\nJesus Christ was always a busy man with His work, but never too busy to\npray. \u201cThe divinest of business filled His heart and filled His hands,\nconsumed His time, exhausted His nerves. But with Him even God\u2019s work\nmust not crowd out God\u2019s praying. Saving people from sin or suffering\nmust not, even with Christ, be substituted for praying, nor abate in the\nleast the time or the intensity of these holiest of seasons. He filled\nthe day with working for God; He employed the night with praying to God.\nThe day-working made the night-praying a necessity. The night-praying\nsanctified and made successful the day-working. Too busy to pray gives\nreligion Christian burial, it is true, but kills it nevertheless.\u201d\n\nIn many cases only the bare fact, yet important and suggestive fact, is\nstated that He prayed. In other cases the very words which came out of\nHis heart and fell from His lips are recorded. The man of prayer by\npre-eminence was Jesus Christ. The epochs of His life were created by\nprayer, and all the minor details outlines and inlines of His life were\ninspired, coloured and impregnated by prayer.\n\nThe prayer words of Jesus were sacred words. By them God speaks to God,\nand by them God is revealed and prayer is illustrated and enforced. Here\nis prayer in its purest form and in its mightiest potencies. It would\nseem that earth and heaven would uncover head and open ears most wide to\ncatch the words of His praying who was truest God and truest man, and\ndivinest of suppliants, who prayed as never man prayed. His prayers are\nour inspiration and pattern to pray.\n\n\n\n\n                                  VIII\n                PRAYER INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF OUR LORD\n\n\n    _There was a great cape at the south of Africa and so many storms\n    and so much loss of life until it was called the Cape of Death. One\n    day in 1789 a bold navigator shoved the prow of his vessel into the\n    storms that thundered around it and found a calm sea. He then named\n    it the Cape of Good Hope. So there is a cape that jutted out from\n    earth into the sea of eternity called death. All were afraid of it.\n    All navigators, sooner or later, must contend with these murky\n    waters. But once upon a time, nearly two thousand years ago, a brave\n    navigator from heaven came and drove the prow of His frail humanity\n    bark down into the gloomy waters of this cape and lay under its\n    awful power for three days. Emerging therefrom, He found it to be\n    the door to endless calm and joy, and now we call it Good Hope._\n\n    \u2014JOHN W. BAKER.\n\n\nOne of Christ\u2019s most impassioned and sublime p\u00e6ans of prayer and praise\nis found recorded by both Matthew and Luke, with small verbal contrasts\nand with some diversity of detail and environments. He is reviewing the\npoor results of His ministry and remarking upon the feeble responses of\nman to God\u2019s vast outlay of love and mercy. He is arraigning the\ningratitude of men to God, and is showing the fearfully destructive\nresults of their indifference with their increased opportunities,\nfavours and responsibilities.\n\nIn the midst of these arraignments, denunciations and woes, the seventy\ndisciples return to report the results of their mission. They were full\nof exhilaration at their success, and evinced it with no little\nself-gratulation. The spirit of Jesus was diverted, relieved and\nrefreshed by their animation, catching somewhat the contagion of their\njoy, and sharing in their triumph. He rejoiced, gave thanks, and prayed\na prayer wonderful for its brevity, its inspiration and its revelation:\n\n    \u201cIn that hour Jesus rejoiced in spirit, and said, I thank thee, O\n    Father, Lord of Heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things\n    from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes: even\n    so, Father; for so it seemed good in thy sight.\n\n    \u201cAll things are delivered to me of my Father; and no man knoweth who\n    the Son is, but the Father; and who the Father is, but the Son, and\n    he to whom the Son will reveal him.\u201d\n\nThe Christ life was in the image of His Father. He was the \u201cexpress\nimage of His person.\u201d And so the spirit of prayer with Christ was to do\nGod\u2019s will. His constant asseveration was that He \u201ccame to do His\nFather\u2019s will,\u201d and not His own will. When the fearful crisis came in\nHis life in Gethsemane, and all its darkness, direness and dread, with\nthe crushing weight of man\u2019s sins and sorrows which were pressing down\nupon Him, His spirit and frame crushed, and almost expiring, then He\ncried out for relief, yet it was not His will which was to be followed.\nIt was only an appeal out of weakness and death for God\u2019s relief in\nGod\u2019s way. God\u2019s will was to be the law and the rule of His relief, if\nrelief came.\n\nSo he who follows Christ in prayer must have God\u2019s will as his law, his\nrule and his inspiration. In all praying, it is the man who prays. The\nlife and the character flow into the closet. There is a mutual action\nand reaction. The closet has much to do with making the character, while\nthe character has much to do with making the closet. It is \u201cthe\neffectual fervent prayer of the righteous man which availeth much.\u201d It\nis with them who \u201ccall upon the Lord out of a pure heart\u201d we are to\nconsort. Christ was the greatest of pray-ers because He was the holiest\nof men. His character is the praying character. His spirit is the life\nand power of prayer. He is not the best pray-er who has the greatest\nfluency, the most brilliant imagination, the richest gifts, and the most\nfiery ardour, but he who has imbibed most of the spirit of Christ.\n\nIt is he whose character is the nearest to a facsimile of Christ. His\nprayer referred to just named, in the form of thanksgiving, sets forth\nthe characters upon whom God\u2019s power is bestowed and to whom God\u2019s\nperson and will are revealed. \u201cHid these things from the wise and\nprudent,\u201d those, for instance, who are wise in their own eyes, skilled\nin letters, cultured, learned, philosophers, scribes, doctors,\nrabbis\u2014\u201cprudent\u201d\u2014one who can put things together, having insight,\ncomprehension, expression. God\u2019s revelation of Himself and His will\ncannot be sought out and understood by reason, intelligence nor great\nlearning. Great men and great minds are neither the channels nor\ndepositories of God\u2019s revelation by virtue of their culture, braininess\nnor wisdom. God\u2019s system in redemption and providence is not to be\nthought out, open only to the learned and wise. The learned and the\nwise, following their learning and their wisdom, have always sadly and\ndarkly missed God\u2019s thoughts and God\u2019s ways.\n\nThe condition of receiving God\u2019s revelation and of holding God\u2019s truth\nis one of the heart, not one of the head. The ability to receive and\nsearch out is like that of the child, the babe, the synonym of docility,\ninnocence and simplicity. These are the conditions on which God reveals\nHimself to men. The world by wisdom cannot know God. The world by wisdom\ncan never receive nor understand God, because God reveals Himself to\nmen\u2019s hearts, not to their heads. Only hearts can ever know God, can\nfeel God, can see God, and can read God in His Book of Books. God is not\ngrasped by thought but by feeling. The world gets God by revelation, not\nby philosophy. It is not apprehension, the mental ability to grasp God,\nbut plasticity, ability to be impressed, that men need. It is not by\nhard, strong, stern, great reasoning that the world gets God or gets\nhold of God, but by big, soft, pure hearts. Not so much do men need\nlight to see God as they need hearts to feel God.\n\nHuman wisdom, great natural talents, and the culture of the schools,\nhowsoever good they may be, can neither be the repositories nor\nconservors of God\u2019s revealed truth. The tree of knowledge has been the\nbane of faith, ever essaying to reduce revelation to a philosophy and to\nmeasure God by man. In its pride, it puts God out and puts man into\nGod\u2019s truth. To become babes again, on our mother\u2019s bosom, quieted,\nweaned, without clamour or protest, is the only position in which to\nknow God. A calmness on the surface, and in the depths of the soul, in\nwhich God can mirror His will, His Word and Himself\u2014this is the attitude\ntoward Him through which He can reveal Himself, and this attitude is the\nright attitude of prayer.\n\nOur Lord taught us the lesson of prayer by putting into practice in His\nlife what He taught by His lips. Here is a simple but important\nstatement, full of meaning: \u201cAnd when he had sent the multitudes away,\nhe went up into a mountain apart to pray: and when the evening was come\nHe was there alone.\u201d\n\nThe multitudes had been fed and were dismissed by our Lord.\n\nThe Divine work of healing and teaching must be stayed awhile in order\nthat time, place and opportunity for prayer might be secured,\u2014Prayer,\nthe divinest of all labour, the most important of all ministries. Away\nfrom the eager, anxious, seeking multitudes, He has gone while the day\nis yet bright, to be alone with God. The multitudes tax and exhaust Him.\nThe disciples are tossed on the sea, but calmness reigns on the mountain\ntop where our Lord is kneeling in secret prayer\u2014where prayer rules.\n\u201cWhen Jesus therefore perceived that they would come and take him by\nforce, to make him a king, he departed again into a mountain alone.\u201d\n\nHe must be alone in that moment with God. Temptation was in that hour.\nThe multitude had feasted on the five loaves and the two fishes. Filled\nwith food and excited beyond measure, they would fain make Him king. He\nflees from the temptation to secret prayer, for here is the source of\nHis strength to resist evil. What a refuge was secret prayer even to\nHim! What a refuge to us from the world\u2019s dazzling and delusive crowns!\nWhat safety there is to be alone with God when the world tempts us,\nallures us, attracts us!\n\nThe prayers of our Lord were prophetic and illustrative of the great\ntruth that the greatest measure of the Holy Spirit, the attesting voice\nand opening Heavens are only secured by prayer. This is suggested by His\nbaptism by John the Baptist, when He prayed as He was baptised, and\nimmediately the Holy Spirit descended upon Him like a dove. More than\nprophetic and illustrative is this hour to Him. This critical hour is\nreal and personal, consecrating and qualifying Him for God\u2019s highest\npurposes. Prayer to Him, just as it is to us, was a necessity, an\nabsolute, invariable condition of securing God\u2019s fullest, consecrating\nand qualifying power. The Holy Spirit came upon Him in fullness of\nmeasure and power in the very act of prayer.\n\nAnd so the Holy Spirit comes upon _us_ in fullness of measure and power\nonly in answer to ardent and intense praying. The heavens were opened to\nChrist, and access and communion established and enlarged by prayer.\nFreedom and fullness of access and closeness of communion are secured to\nus as the heritage of prayer. The voice attesting His Sonship came to\nChrist in prayer. The witness of our sonship, clear and indubitable, is\nsecured only by praying. The constant witness of our sonship can only be\nretained by those who pray without ceasing. When the stream of prayer is\nshallow and arrested, the evidence of our sonship becomes faint and\ninaudible.\n\n\n\n\n                                   IX\n         PRAYER INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF OUR LORD (_Continued_)\n\n\n    _Sin is so unspeakably awful in its evil that it struck down, as to\n    death and hell, the very Son of God Himself. He had been amazed\n    enough at sin before. He had seen sin making angels of heaven into\n    devils of hell. Death and all its terrors did not much move or\n    disconcert our Lord. No. It was not death: It was sin. It was\n    hell-fire in His soul. It was the coals, and the oil, and the rosin,\n    and the juniper, and the turpentine of the fire that is not\n    quenched._\n\n    \u2014ALEXANDER WHYTE, D.D.\n\n\nWe note that from the revelation and inspiration of a transporting\nprayer-hour of Christ, as its natural sequence, there sounds out that\ngracious encouraging proclamation for heavy-hearted, restless, weary\nsouls of earth, which has so impressed, arrested and drawn humanity as\nit has fallen on the ears of heavy-laden souls, which has so sweetened\nand relieved men of their toils and burdens:\n\n    \u201cCome unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will\n    give you rest.\n\n    \u201cTake my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in\n    heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.\n\n    \u201cFor my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.\u201d\n\nAt the grave of Lazarus and as preparatory to and as a condition of\ncalling him back to life, we have our Lord calling upon His Father in\nHeaven. \u201cFather, I thank thee that thou hast heard me, and I know that\nthou hearest me always.\u201d The lifting to Heaven of Christ\u2019s eyes\u2014how much\nwas there in it! How much of confidence and plea was in that look to\nHeaven! His very look, the lifting up of His eyes, carried His whole\nbeing Heaven-ward, and caused a pause in that world, and drew attention\nand help. All Heaven was engaged, pledged and moved when the Son of God\nlooked up at this grave. O for a people with the Christly eye, Heaven\nlifted and Heaven arresting! As it was with Christ, so ought we to be so\nperfected in faith, so skilled in praying, that we could lift our eyes\nto Heaven and say with Him, with deepest humility, and with commanding\nconfidence, \u201cFather, I thank thee that thou hast heard me.\u201d\n\nOnce more we have a very touching and beautiful and instructive incident\nin Christ\u2019s praying, this time having to do with infants in their\nmothers\u2019 arms, parabolic as well as historical:\n\n    \u201cThen were there brought unto him little children, that he should\n    put his hands on them, and pray: and the disciples rebuked them.\n\n    \u201cBut when Jesus saw it he was much displeased, and said unto them,\n    Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not; for\n    of such is the kingdom of God.\n\n    \u201cVerily I say unto you, whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of\n    God as a little child, he shall not enter therein.\n\n    \u201cAnd he took them up in his arms, put his hands upon them and\n    blessed them.\u201d\n\nThis was one of the few times when stupid ignorance and unspiritual\nviews aroused His indignation and displeasure. Vital principles were\ninvolved. The foundations were being destroyed, and worldly views\nactuated the disciples. Their temper and their words in rebuking those\nwho brought their infants to Christ were exceedingly wrong. The very\nprinciples which He came to illustrate and propagate were being\nviolated. Christ received the little ones. The big ones must become\nlittle ones. The old ones must become young ones ere Christ will receive\nthem. Prayer helps the little ones. The cradle must be invested with\nprayer. We are to pray for our little ones. The children are now to be\nbrought to Jesus Christ by prayer, as He is in Heaven and not on earth.\nThey are to be brought to Him early for His blessing, even when they are\ninfants. His blessing descends upon these little ones in answer to the\nprayers of those who bring them. With untiring importunity are they to\nbe brought to Christ in earnest, persevering prayer by their fathers and\nmothers. Before they know, themselves, anything about coming of their\nown accord, parents are to present them to God in prayer, seeking His\nblessing upon their offspring and at the same time asking for wisdom,\nfor grace and Divine help to rear them that they may come to Christ when\nthey arrive at the years of accountability of their own accord.\n\nHoly hands and holy praying have much to do with guarding and training\nyoung lives and to form young characters for righteousness and Heaven.\nWhat benignity, simplicity, kindness, unworldliness and condescension\nand meekness, linked with prayerfulness, are in this act of this Divine\nTeacher!\n\nIt was as Jesus was praying that Peter made that wonderful confession of\nhis faith that Jesus was the Son of God:\n\n    \u201cAnd it came to pass, as he was alone praying, his disciples were\n    with him; and he asked them, saying, Whom say the people that I am?\n\n    \u201cAnd they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist; some,\n    Elias; and others, Jeremias or one of the prophets.\n\n    \u201cHe saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am?\n\n    \u201cAnd Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of\n    the living God.\n\n    \u201cAnd Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon\n    Bar-jona; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my\n    Father which is in heaven.\n\n    \u201cAnd I say also unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I\n    will build my church: and the gates of hell shall not prevail\n    against it.\n\n    \u201cAnd I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of Heaven; and\n    whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and\n    whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.\u201d\n\nIt was after our Lord had made large promises to His disciples that He\nhad appointed unto each of them a kingdom, and that they should sit at\nHis table in His kingdom and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of\nIsrael, that He gave those words of warning to Simon Peter, telling him\nthat He had prayed for Peter. \u201cAnd the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold\nSatan hath desired to have you, so that he may sift you as wheat. But I\nhave prayed for thee that thy faith fail not. And when thou art\nconverted, strengthen thy brethren.\u201d\n\nHappy Peter, to have such an one as the Son of God to pray for him!\nUnhappy Peter, to be so in the toils of Satan as to demand so much of\nChrist\u2019s solicitude! How intense are the demands upon our prayers for\nsome specific cases! Prayer must be personal in order to be to the\nfullest extent beneficial. Peter drew on Christ\u2019s praying more than any\nother disciple because of his exposure to greater perils. Pray for the\nmost impulsive, the most imperilled ones by name. Our love and their\ndanger give frequency, inspiration, intensity and personality to\npraying.\n\nWe have seen how Christ had to flee from the multitude after the\nmagnificent miracle of feeding the five thousand as they sought to make\nHim king. Then prayer was His escape and His refuge from this strong\nworldly temptation. He returns from that night of prayer with strength\nand calmness, and with a power to perform that other remarkable miracle\nof great wonder of walking on the sea.\n\nEven the loaves and fishes were sanctified by prayer before He served\nthem to the multitude. \u201cHe looked up to Heaven and gave thanks.\u201d Prayer\nshould sanctify our daily bread and multiply our seed sown.\n\nHe looked up to heaven and heaved a sigh when He touched the tongue of\nthe deaf man who had an impediment in his speech. Much akin was this\nsigh to that groaning in spirit which He evinced at the grave of\nLazarus. \u201cJesus therefore again groaning in himself, cometh to the\ngrave.\u201d Here was the sigh and groan of the Son of God over a human\nwreck, groaning that sin and hell had such a mastery over man; troubled\nthat such a desolation and ruin were man\u2019s sad inheritance. This is a\nlesson to be ever learned by us. Here is a fact ever to be kept in mind\nand heart and which must ever, in some measure, weigh upon the inner\nspirits of God\u2019s children. We who have received the first fruit of the\nSpirit groan within ourselves at sin\u2019s waste, and death, and are filled\nwith longings for the coming of a better day.\n\nPresent in all great praying, making and marking it, is the man. It is\nimpossible to separate the praying from the man. The constituent\nelements of the man are the constituents of his praying. The man flows\nthrough his praying. Only the fiery Elijah could do Elijah\u2019s fiery\npraying. We can get holy praying only from a holy man. Holy being can\nnever exist without holy doing. Being is first, doing comes afterward.\nWhat we are gives being, force and inspiration to what we do. Character,\nthat which is graven deep, ineradicably, imperishably within us, colours\nall we do.\n\nThe praying of Christ, then, is not to be separated from the character\nof Christ. If He prayed more unweariedly, more self-denyingly, more\nholily, more simply and directly than other men, it was because these\nelements entered more largely into His character than into that of\nothers.\n\nThe transfiguration marks another epoch in His life, and that was\npre-eminently a prayer epoch. Luke gives an account with the animus and\naim of the event:\n\n    \u201cAnd it came to pass about an eight days after these sayings, he\n    took Peter and John and James, and went up into a mountain to pray.\n\n    \u201cAnd as he prayed, the fashion of his countenance was altered, and\n    his raiment was white and glistering.\n\n    \u201cAnd, behold, there talked with him two men, which were Moses and\n    Elias:\n\n    \u201cWho appeared in glory, and spake of his decease which he should\n    accomplish at Jerusalem.\u201d\n\nThe selection was made of three of His disciples for an inner circle of\nassociates, in prayer. Few there be who have the spiritual tastes or\naptitude for this inner circle. Even these three favoured ones could\nscarcely stand the strain of that long night of praying. We know that He\nwent up on that mountain to pray, not to be transfigured. But it was as\nHe prayed, the fashion of His countenance was altered and His raiment\nbecame white and glistering. There is nothing like prayer to change\ncharacter and whiten conduct. There is nothing like prayer to bring\nheavenly visitants and to gild with heavenly glory earth\u2019s mountain to\nus, dull and drear. Peter calls it the holy mount, made so by prayer.\n\nThree times did the voice of God bear witness to the presence and person\nof His Son, Jesus Christ\u2014at His baptism by John the Baptist, and then at\nHis transfiguration the approving, consoling and witnessing voice of His\nFather was heard. He was found in prayer both of these times. The third\ntime the attesting voice came, it was not on the heights of His\ntransfigured glory, nor was it as He was girding Himself to begin His\nconflict and to enter upon His ministry, but it was when He was\nhastening to the awful end. He was entering the dark mystery of His last\nagony, and looking forward to it. The shadows were deepening, a dire\ncalamity was approaching and an unknown and untried dread was before\nHim. Ruminating on His approaching death, prophesying about it, and\nforecasting the glory which would follow, in the midst of His high and\nmysterious discourse, the shadows come like a dread eclipse and He\nbursts out in an agony of prayer:\n\n    \u201cNow is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from\n    this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour.\n\n    \u201cFather, glorify thy name. Then came there a voice from heaven,\n    saying, I have both glorified it and will glorify it again.\n\n    \u201cThe people therefore that stood by, and heard it, said that it\n    thundered: others said, An angel spake to him.\n\n    \u201cJesus answered and said, This voice came not because of me, but for\n    your sakes.\u201d\n\nBut let it be noted that Christ is meeting and illuminating this fateful\nand distressing hour with prayer. How even thus early the flesh\nreluctantly shrank from the contemplated end!\n\nHow fully does His prayer on the cross for His enemies synchronise with\nall He taught about love to our enemies, and with mercy and forgiveness\nto those who have trespassed against us! \u201cThen said Jesus, Father,\nforgive them; for they know not what they do.\u201d Apologising for His\nmurderers and praying for them, while they were jeering and mocking Him\nat His death pains and their hands were reeking with His blood! What\namazing generosity, pity and love!\n\nAgain, take another one of the prayers on the cross. How touching the\nprayer and how bitter the cup! How dark and desolate the hour as He\nexclaims, \u201cMy God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?\u201d This is the last\nstroke that rends in twain His heart, more exquisite in its bitterness\nand its anguish and more heart-piercing than the kiss of Judas. All else\nwas looked for, all else was put in His book of sorrows. But to have His\nFather\u2019s face withdrawn, God-forsaken, the hour when these distressing\nwords escaped the lips of the dying Son of God! And yet how truthful He\nis! How childlike we find Him! And so when the end really comes, we hear\nHim again speaking to His Father: \u201cFather, into thy hands I commit my\nspirit. And having said this, he gave up the ghost.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                                   X\n                        OUR LORD\u2019S MODEL PRAYER\n\n\n    _What satisfaction must it be to learn from God Himself with what\n    words and in what manner, He would have us pray to Him so as not to\n    pray in vain! We do not sufficiently consider the value of this\n    prayer; the respect and attention which it requires; the preference\n    to be given to it; its fulness and perfection; the frequent use we\n    should make of it; and the spirit which we should bring with it.\n    \u201cLord, teach us how to pray.\u201d_\u2014ADAM CLARK.\n\n\nJesus gives us the pattern prayer in what is commonly known as \u201cThe\nLord\u2019s Prayer.\u201d In this model, perfect prayer He gives us a law form to\nbe followed, and yet one to be filled in and enlarged as we may decide\nwhen we pray. The outlines and form are complete, yet it is but an\noutline, with many a blank, which our needs and convictions are to fill\nin.\n\nChrist puts words on our lips, words which are to be uttered by holy\nlives. Words belong to the life of prayer. Wordless prayers are like\nhuman spirits; pure and high they may be, but too ethereal and\nimpalpable for earthly conflicts and earthly needs and uses. We must\nhave spirits clothed in flesh and blood, and our prayers must be\nlikewise clothed in words to give them point and power, a local\nhabitation, and a name.\n\nThis lesson of \u201cThe Lord\u2019s Prayer,\u201d drawn forth by the request of the\ndisciples, \u201cLord, teach us to pray,\u201d has something in form and verbiage\nlike the prayer sections of the Sermon on the Mount. It is the same\ngreat lesson of praying to \u201cOur Father which art in Heaven,\u201d and is one\nof insistent importunity. No prayer lesson would be complete without it.\nIt belongs to the first and last lessons in prayer. God\u2019s Fatherhood\ngives shape, value and confidence to all our praying.\n\nHe teaches us that to hallow God\u2019s name is the first and the greatest of\nprayers. A desire for the glorious coming and the glorious establishment\nof God\u2019s glorious kingdom follows in value and in sequence the hallowing\nof God\u2019s name. He who really hallows God\u2019s name will hail the coming of\nthe Kingdom of God, and will labour and pray to bring that kingdom to\npass and to establish it. Christ\u2019s pupils in the school of prayer are to\nbe taught diligently to hallow God\u2019s name, to work for God\u2019s kingdom,\nand to do God\u2019s will perfectly, completely and gladly, as it is done in\nHeaven.\n\nPrayer engages the highest interest and secures the highest glory of\nGod. God\u2019s name, God\u2019s kingdom and God\u2019s will are all in it. Without\nprayer His name is profaned, His kingdom fails, and His will is decried\nand opposed. God\u2019s will can be done on earth as it is done in Heaven.\nGod\u2019s will done on earth makes earth like Heaven. Importunate praying is\nthe mighty energy which establishes God\u2019s will on earth as it is\nestablished in Heaven.\n\nHe is still teaching us that prayer sanctifies and makes hopeful and\nsweet our daily toil for daily bread. Forgiveness of sins is to be\nsought by prayer, and the great prayer plea we are to make for\nforgiveness is that we have forgiven all those who have sinned against\nus. It involves love for our enemies so far as to pray for them, to\nbless them and not curse them, and to pardon their offences against us\nwhatever those offences may be.\n\nWe are to pray, \u201cLead us not into temptation,\u201d that is, that while we\nthus pray, the tempter and the temptation are to be watched against,\nresisted and prayed against.\n\nAll these things He had laid down in this law of prayer, but many a\nsimple lesson of comment, expansion, and expression He adds to His\nstatute law.\n\nIn this prayer He teaches His disciples, so familiar to thousands in\nthis day who learned it at their mother\u2019s knees in childhood, the words\nare so childlike that children find their instruction, edification and\ncomfort in them as they kneel and pray. The most glowing mystic and the\nmost careful thinker finds each his own language in these simple words\nof prayer. Beautiful and revered as these words are, they are our words\nfor solace, help and learning.\n\nHe led the way in prayer that we might follow His footsteps. Matchless\nleader in matchless praying! Lord, teach us to pray as Thou didst\nThyself pray!\n\nHow marked the contrast between the Sacerdotal Prayer and this \u201cLord\u2019s\nPrayer,\u201d this copy for praying He gave to His disciples as the first\nelements of prayer. How simple and childlike! No one has ever approached\nin composition a prayer so simple in its petitions and yet so\ncomprehensive in all of its requests.\n\nHow these simple elements of prayer as given by our Lord commend\nthemselves to us! This prayer is for us as well as for those to whom it\nwas first given. It is for the child in the A B C of prayer, and it is\nfor the graduate of the highest institutions of learning. It is a\npersonal prayer, reaching to all our needs and covering all our sins. It\nis the highest form of prayer for others. As the scholar can never in\nall his after studies or learning dispense with his A B C, and as the\nalphabet gives form, colour and expression to all after learning,\nimpregnating all and grounding all, so the learner in Christ can never\ndispense with the Lord\u2019s Prayer. But he may make it form the basis of\nhis higher praying, this intercession for others in the Sacerdotal\nPrayer.\n\nThe Lord\u2019s Prayer is ours by our mother\u2019s knee and fits us in all the\nstages of a joyous Christian life. The Sacerdotal Prayer is ours also in\nthe stages and office of our royal priesthood as intercessors before\nGod. Here we have oneness with God, deep spiritual unity, and unswerving\nloyalty to God, living and praying to glorify God.\n\n\n\n\n                                   XI\n                      OUR LORD\u2019S SACERDOTAL PRAYER\n\n\n    _Jesus closes His life with inimitable calmness, confidence and\n    sublimity. \u201cI have glorified Thee; I have finished the work which\n    Thou gavest me to do.\u201d The annals of earth have nothing comparable\n    to it in real serenity and sublimity. May we come to our end thus,\n    in supreme loyalty to Christ._\n\n    \u2014EDWARD BOUNDS.\n\n\nWe come now to consider our Lord\u2019s Sacerdotal Prayer, as found recorded\nin the seventeenth chapter of John\u2019s Gospel.\n\nObedience to the Father and abiding in the Father, these belong to the\nSon, and these belong to us, as partners with Christ in His Divine work\nof intercession. How tenderly and with what pathos and how absorbingly\nHe prays for His disciples! \u201cI pray for them; I pray not for the world.\u201d\nWhat a pattern of prayerfulness for God\u2019s people! For God\u2019s people are\nGod\u2019s cause, God\u2019s Church and God\u2019s Kingdom. Pray for God\u2019s people, for\ntheir unity, their sanctification, and their glorification. How the\nsubject of their unity pressed upon Him! These walls of separation,\nthese alienations, these riven circles of God\u2019s family, and these\nwarring tribes of ecclesiastics\u2014how He is torn and bleeds and suffers\nafresh at the sight of these divisions! Unity\u2014that is the great burden\nof that remarkable Sacerdotal Prayer. \u201cThat they may be one, even as we\nare one.\u201d The spiritual oneness of God\u2019s people\u2014that is the heritage of\nGod\u2019s glory to them, transmitted by Christ to His Church.\n\nFirst of all, in this prayer, Jesus prays for Himself, not now the\nsuppliant as in Gethsemane, not weakness, but strength now. There is not\nnow the pressure of darkness and of hell, but passing for the time over\nthe fearful interim, He asks that He may be glorified, and that His\nexalted glory may secure glory to His Father. His sublime loyalty and\nfidelity to God are declared, that fidelity to God which is of the very\nessence of interceding prayer. Our devoted lives pray. Our unswerving\nloyalty to God are eloquent pleas to Him, and give access and confidence\nin our advocacy. This prayer is gemmed, but its walls are adamant. What\nprofound and granite truths! What fathomless mysteries! What deep and\nrich experiences do such statements as these involve:\n\n    \u201cAnd this is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true\n    God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.\n\n    \u201cAnd all mine are thine, and thine are mine, and I am glorified in\n    them.\n\n    \u201cAnd I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it, that\n    the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them.\n\n    \u201cAnd now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the\n    glory which I had with thee before the world was.\u201d\n\nLet us stop and ask, have we eternal life? Do we know God\nexperimentally, consciously, and do we know Him really and personally?\nDo we know Jesus Christ as a person, and as a personal Saviour? Do we\nknow Him by a heart acquaintance, and know Him well? This, this only, is\neternal life. And is Jesus glorified in us? Let us continue this\npersonal inquiry. Do our lives prove His divinity? And does Jesus shine\nbrighter because of us? Are we opaque or transparent bodies, and do we\ndarken or reflect His pure light? Once more let us ask: Do we seek God\u2019s\nglory? Do we seek glory where Christ sought it? \u201cGlorify thou me with\nthy own self.\u201d Do we esteem the presence and the possession of God our\nmost excellent glory and our supreme good?\n\nHow closely does He bind Himself and His Father to His people! His heart\ncenters upon them in this high hour of holy communion with His Father.\n\n    \u201cI have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of\n    the world; thine they were, and thou gavest them me; and they have\n    kept thy word.\n\n    \u201cNow they have known that all things whatsoever thou hast given me\n    are of thee.\n\n    \u201cFor I have given unto them the words which thou gavest me; and they\n    have received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee,\n    and they have believed that thou didst send me.\n\n    \u201cI pray for them; I pray not for the world; but for them which thou\n    hast given me; for they are thine.\n\n    \u201cAnd all mine are thine, and thine are mine; and I am glorified in\n    them.\u201d\n\nHe prays also for keeping for these disciples. Not only were they to be\nchosen, elected and possessed, but were to be kept by the Father\u2019s\nwatchful eyes and by the Father\u2019s omnipotent hand. \u201cAnd now I am no more\nin the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy\nFather, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that\nthey may be one, as we are.\u201d\n\nHe prays that they might be kept by the Holy Father, in all holiness by\nthe power of His Name. He asks that His people may be kept from sin,\nfrom all sin, from sin in the concrete and sin in the abstract, from sin\nin all its shapes of evil, from all sin in this world. He prays that\nthey might not only be fit and ready for Heaven, but ready and fit for\nearth, for its sweetest privileges, its sternest duties, its deepest\nsorrows, and its richest joys; ready for all of its trials, consolations\nand triumphs. \u201cI pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the\nworld, but that thou shouldest keep them from the evil.\u201d\n\nHe prays that they may be kept from the world\u2019s greatest evil, which is\nsin. He desires that they may be kept from the guilt, the power, the\npollution and the punishment of sin. The Revised Version makes it read,\n\u201cThat thou shouldst keep them from the evil one.\u201d Kept from the devil,\nso that he might not touch them, nor find them, nor have a place in\nthem; that they might be all owned, possessed, filled and guarded by\nGod. \u201cKept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.\u201d\n\nHe places us in the arms of His Father, on the bosom of His Father, and\nin the heart of His Father. He calls God into service, puts Him to the\nfront, and places us under His Father\u2019s closer keeping, under His\nFather\u2019s shadow, and under the covert of His Father\u2019s wing. The Father\u2019s\nrod and staff are for our security, for our comfort, for our refuge, for\nour strength and guidance.\n\nThese disciples were not to be taken out of the world, but kept from its\nevil, its monster evil, which is itself. \u201cThis present evil world.\u201d How\nthe world seduces, dazzles, and deludes the children of men! His\ndisciples are chosen out of the world, out of the world\u2019s bustle and\nearthliness, out of its all-devouring greed of gain, out of its\nmoney-desire, money-love, and money-toil. Earth draws and holds as if it\nwas made out of gold and not out of dirt; as though it was covered with\ndiamonds and not with graves.\n\n\u201cThey are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.\u201d Not only\nfrom sin and Satan were they to be kept, but also from the soil, stain\nand the taint of worldliness, as Christ was free from it. Their relation\nto Christ was not only to free them from the world\u2019s defiling taint, its\nunhallowed love, and its criminal friendships, but the world\u2019s hatred\nwould inevitably follow their Christ-likeness. No result so necessarily\nand universally follows its cause as this. \u201cThe world hath hated them\nbecause they are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.\u201d\n\nHow solemn and almost awful the repetition of the declaration, \u201cThey are\nnot of the world, even as I am not of the world.\u201d How pronounced,\nradical and eternal was our Lord Christ\u2019s divorce from the world! How\npronounced, radical and eternal is that of our Lord\u2019s true followers\nfrom the world! The world hates the disciple as it hated his Lord, and\nwill crucify the disciple just as it crucified his Lord. How pertinent\nthe question, have we the Christ unworldliness? Does the world hate us\nas it hated our Lord? Are His words fulfilled in us?\n\n    \u201cIf the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated\n    you.\n\n    \u201cIf ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because\n    ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world,\n    therefore the world hateth you.\u201d\n\nHe puts Himself before us clear cut as the full portraiture of an\nunworldly Christian. Here is our changeless pattern. \u201cThey are not of\nthe world even as I am not of the world.\u201d We must be cut after this\npattern.\n\nThe subject of their unity pressed upon Him. Note how He called His\nFather\u2019s attention to it, and see how He pleaded for this unity of His\nfollowers: \u201cAnd now I am no more in the world, but these are in the\nworld and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those\nwhom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.\u201d\n\nAgain He returns to it as He sees the great crowds flocking to His\nstandard as the ages pass on:\n\n    \u201cThat they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in\n    thee, that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe\n    that thou hast sent me.\n\n    \u201cAnd the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may\n    be one, even as we are one.\n\n    \u201cI in them and thou in me that they may be made perfect in one; and\n    that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them,\n    as thou hast loved me.\u201d\n\nNotice how intently His heart was set on this unity. What shameful\nhistory, and what bloody annals has this lack of unity written for God\u2019s\nChurch! These walls of separations, these alienations, these riven\ncircles of God\u2019s family, these warring tribes of men, and these\ninternecine fratricidal wars! He looks ahead and sees how Christ is\ntorn, how He bleeds and suffers afresh in all these sad things of the\nfuture. The unity of God\u2019s people was to be the heritage of God\u2019s glory\npromised to them. Division and strife are the devil\u2019s bequest to the\nChurch, a heritage of failure, weakness, shame and woe.\n\nThe oneness of God\u2019s people was to be the one credential to the world of\nthe divinity of Christ\u2019s mission on earth. Let us ask in all candor, are\nwe praying for this unity as Christ prayed for it? Are we seeking the\npeace, the welfare, the glory, the might and the divinity of God\u2019s cause\nas it is found in the unity of God\u2019s people?\n\nGoing back again, note, please, how He puts Himself as the exponent and\nthe pattern of this unworldliness which He prays may possess His\ndisciples. He sends them into the world just as His Father sent Him into\nthe world. He expects them to be and do, just as He was and as He did\nfor His Father. He sought the sanctification of His disciples that they\nmight be wholly devoted to God and purified from all sin. He desired in\nthem a holy life and a holy work for God. He devoted Himself to death in\norder that they might be devoted in life to God. For a true\nsanctification He prayed, a real, whole, and thorough sanctification,\nembracing soul, body and mind, for time and eternity. With Him the word\nitself had much to do with their true sanctification. \u201cSanctify them\nthrough thy truth; thy word is truth. And for their sakes I sanctify\nmyself, that they also might be sanctified by the truth.\u201d\n\nEntire devotedness was to be the type of their sanctification. His\nprayer for their sanctification marks the pathway to full\nsanctification. Prayer is that pathway. All the ascending steps to that\nlofty position of entire sanctification are steps of prayer, increasing\nprayerfulness in spirit and increasing prayerfulness in fact. \u201cPray\nwithout ceasing\u201d is the imperative prelude to \u201cthe very God of peace\nsanctify you wholly.\u201d And prayer is but the continued interlude and\ndoxology of this rich grace in the heart: \u201cI pray God your whole spirit\nand soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord\nJesus Christ. Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it.\u201d\n\nWe can only meet our full responsibilities and fulfill our high mission\nwhen we go forth sanctified as Christ our Lord was sanctified. He sends\nus into the world just as His Father sent Him into the world. He expects\nus to be as He was, to do as He did, and to glorify the Father just as\nHe glorified the Father.\n\nWhat longings He had to have us with Him in Heaven: \u201cFather, I will that\nthey also whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am; that they may\nbehold my glory, which thou hast given me.\u201d What response do our truant\nhearts make to this earnest, loving, Christly longing? Are we as eager\nfor Heaven as He is to have us there? How calm, how majestic and how\nauthoritative is His \u201cI will\u201d!\n\nHe closes His life with inimitable calmness, confidence and sublimity.\n\u201cI have glorified thee on the earth; I have finished the work which thou\ngavest me to do.\u201d\n\nThe annals of earth have nothing comparable to it in real serenity and\nsublimity. May we come to our end thus in supreme loyalty to Christ.\n\n\n\n\n                                  XII\n                         THE GETHSEMANE PRAYER\n\n\n    _The cup! the cup! the cup! Our Lord did not use many words: but He\n    used His few words again and again, till this cup! and Thy will!\u2014Thy\n    will be done, and this cup\u2014was all His prayer. \u201cThe cup! The cup!\n    The cup!\u201d cried Christ: first on His feet: and then on His knees:\n    and then on His face.... \u201cLord, teach us to pray!\u201d_\u2014ALEXANDER WHYTE,\n    D.D.\n\n\nWe come to Gethsemane. What a contrast! The sacerdotal prayer had been\none of intense feelings of universal grasp, and of world-wide and\nillimitable sympathy and solicitude for His church. Perfect calmness and\nperfect poise reigned. Majestic He was and simple and free from passion\nor disquiet. The Royal Intercessor and Advocate for others, His\npetitions are like princely edicts, judicial and authoritative. How\nchanged now! In Gethsemane He seems to have entered another region, and\nbecomes another man. His sacerdotal prayer, so exquisite in its tranquil\nflow, so unruffled in its strong, deep current, is like the sun, moving\nin meridian, unsullied glory, brightening, vitalising, ennobling and\nblessing everything. The Gethsemane prayer is that same sun declining in\nthe west, plunged into an ocean of storm and cloud, storm-covered,\nstorm-eclipsed with gloom, darkness and terror on every side.\n\nThe prayer in Gethsemane is exceptional in every way. The\nsuper-incumbent load of the world\u2019s sin is upon Him. The lowest point of\nHis depression has been reached. The bitterest cup of all, His bitter\ncup, is being pressed to His lips. The weakness of all His weaknesses,\nthe sorrow of all His sorrows, the agony of all His agonies are now upon\nHim. The flesh is giving out with its fainting and trembling pulsations,\nlike the trickling of His heart\u2019s blood. His enemies have thus far\ntriumphed. Hell is in a jubilee and bad men are joining in the hellish\ncarnival.\n\nGethsemane was Satan\u2019s hour, Satan\u2019s power, and Satan\u2019s darkness. It was\nthe hour of massing all of Satan\u2019s forces for a final, last conflict.\nJesus had said, \u201cThe prince of this world cometh and findeth nothing in\nme.\u201d The conflict for earth\u2019s mastery is before Him. The spirit led and\ndrove Him into the stern conflict and severe temptation of the\nwilderness. But His Comforter, His Leader and His inspiration through\nHis matchless history, seems to have left Him now. \u201cHe began to be\nsorrowful and very heavy,\u201d and we hear Him under this great pressure\nexclaiming, \u201cMy soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death.\u201d The\ndepression, conflict and agony had gone to the very core of His spirit,\nand had sunk Him to the very verge of death. \u201cSore amazed\u201d He was.\n\nSurprise and awe depress His soul. \u201cVery heavy\u201d was the hour of hell\u2019s\nmidnight which fell upon His spirit. Very heavy was this hour when all\nthe sins of all the world, of every man, of all men, fell upon His\nimmaculate soul, with all their stain and all their guilt.\n\nHe cannot abide the presence of His chosen friends. They cannot enter\ninto the depths and demands of this fearful hour. His trusted and set\nwatchers were asleep. His Father\u2019s face is hid. His Father\u2019s approving\nvoice is silent. The Holy Spirit, who had been with Him in all the\ntrying hours of His life, seems to have withdrawn from the scene. Alone\nHe must drink the cup, alone He must tread the winepress of God\u2019s fierce\nwrath and of Satan\u2019s power and darkness, and of man\u2019s envy, cruelty and\nvindictiveness. The scene is well described by Luke:\n\n    \u201cAnd he came out and went, as he was wont, to the Mount of Olives:\n    and his disciples also followed him.\n\n    \u201cAnd when he was at the place, he said unto them, Pray that ye enter\n    not into temptation.\n\n    \u201cAnd he was withdrawn from them about a stone\u2019s cast, and kneeled\n    down and prayed.\n\n    \u201cSaying, Father, if thou be willing remove this cup from me;\n    nevertheless, not my will, but thine, be done.\n\n    \u201cAnd there appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening\n    him.\n\n    \u201cAnd being in an agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat was\n    as it were great drops of blood falling down to the ground.\n\n    \u201cAnd when he rose up from prayer, and was come to his disciples, he\n    found them sleeping for sorrow.\n\n    \u201cAnd said unto them, Why sleep ye? Rise and pray, lest ye enter into\n    temptation.\u201d\n\nThe prayer agony of Gethsemane crowns Calvary with glory and while the\nprayers offered by Christ on the cross are the union of weakness and\nstrength, of deepest agony and desolation, accompanied with sweetest\ncalm, divinest submission and implicit confidence.\n\nNowhere in prophet or priest, king or ruler, of synagogue or church,\ndoes the ministry of prayer assume such marvels of variety, power and\nfragrance as in the life of Jesus Christ. It is the aroma of God\u2019s\nsweetest spices, aflame with God\u2019s glory, and consumed by God\u2019s will.\n\nWe find in this Gethsemane prayer that which we find nowhere else in the\npraying of Christ. \u201cO, my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass\nfrom me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.\u201d This is\ndifferent from the whole tenor and trend of His praying and doing. How\ndifferent from His sacerdotal prayer! \u201cFather, I will,\u201d is the law and\nlife of that prayer. In His last directions for prayer, He makes our\nwill the measure and condition of prayer. \u201cIf ye abide in me, and my\nwords abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto\nyou.\u201d He said to the Syro-ph\u0153nician woman, \u201cGreat is thy faith! Be it\nunto thee as thou wilt.\u201d\n\nBut in Gethsemane His praying was against the declared will of God. The\npressure was so heavy upon Him, the cup was so bitter, the burden was so\nstrange and intolerable, that the flesh cried out for relief. Prostrate,\nsinking, sorrowful unto death. He sought to be relieved from that which\nseemed too heavy to bear. He prayed, however, not in revolt against\nGod\u2019s will, but in submission to that will, and yet to change God\u2019s plan\nand to alter God\u2019s purposes. He prayed. Pressed by the weakness of the\nflesh, and by the powers of hell in all their dire, hellish malignity\nand might, Jesus was on this one only occasion constrained to pray\nagainst the will of God. He did it, though, with great wariness and\npious caution. He did it with declared and inviolable submission to\nGod\u2019s will. But this was exceptional.\n\nSimple submission to God\u2019s will is not the highest attitude of the soul\nto God. Submission may be seeming, induced by conditions, nothing but an\nenforced surrender, not cheerful but grudging, only a temporary\nexpedient, a fitful resolve. When the occasion or calamity which called\nit forth is removed, the will returns to its old ways and to its old\nself.\n\nJesus Christ prayed always with this one exception in conformity with\nthe will of God. He was one with God\u2019s plan, and one with God\u2019s will. To\npray in conformity with God\u2019s will was the life and law of Christ. The\nsame was law of His praying. Conformity, to live one with God, is a far\nhigher and diviner life than to live simply in submission to God. To\npray in conformity\u2014together with God\u2014is a far higher and diviner way to\npray than mere submission. At its best state, submission is\nnon-rebellion, an acquiescence, which is good, but not the highest. The\nmost powerful form of praying is positive, aggressive, mightily outgoing\nand creative. It molds things, changes things and brings things to pass.\n\nConformity means to \u201cstand perfect and complete in all the will of God.\u201d\nIt means to delight to do God\u2019s will, to run with eagerness and ardour\nto carry out His plans. Conformity to God\u2019s will involves submission,\npatient, loving, sweet submission. But submission in itself falls short\nof and does not include conformity. We may be submissive but not\nconformed. We may accept results against which we have warred, and even\nbe resigned to them.\n\nConformity means to be one with God, both in result and in processes.\nSubmission may be one with God in the end. Conformity is one with God in\nthe beginning, and the end. Jesus had conformity, absolute and perfect,\nto God\u2019s will, and by that He prayed. This was the single point where\nthere was a drawing back from God\u2019s processes, extorted by insupportable\npain, fear and weariness. His submission was abject, loyal and\nconfiding, as His conformity had been constant and perfect. Conformity\nis the only true submission, the most loyal, the sweetest and the\nfullest.\n\nGethsemane has its lessons of humble supplications as Jesus knelt alone\nin the garden. Of burdened prostration, as He fell on His face, of\nintense agony, of distressing dread, of hesitancy and shrinking back, of\ncrying out for relief\u2014yet amid it all of cordial submission to God,\naccompanied with a singleness of purpose for His glory.\n\nSatan will have for each of us his hour and power of darkness and for\neach of us the bitter cup and the fearful spirit of gloom.\n\nWe can pray against God\u2019s will, as Moses did, to enter the Promised\nLand; as Paul did about the thorn in the flesh; as David did for his\ndoomed child; as Hezekiah did to live. We must pray against God\u2019s will\nthree times when the stroke is the heaviest, the sorrow is the keenest,\nand the grief is the deepest. We may lie prostrate all night, as David\ndid, through the hours of darkness. We may pray for hours, as Jesus did,\nand in the darkness of many nights, not measuring the hours by the\nclock, nor the nights by the calendar. It must all be, however, the\nprayer of submission.\n\nWhen sorrow and the night and desolation of Gethsemane fall in heaviest\ngloom on us, we ought to submit patiently and tearfully, if need be, but\nsweetly and resignedly, without tremour, or doubt, to the cup pressed by\na Father\u2019s hand to our lips. \u201cNot my will, but thine, be done,\u201d our\nbroken hearts shall say. In God\u2019s own way, mysterious to us, that cup\nhas in its bitterest dregs, as it had for the Son of God, the gem and\ngold of perfection. We are to be put into the crucible to be refined.\nChrist was made perfect in Gethsemane, not by the prayer, but by the\nsuffering. \u201cFor it became him to make the captain of their salvation\nperfect through suffering.\u201d The cup could not pass because the suffering\nmust go on and yield its fruit of perfection. Through many an hour of\ndarkness and of hell\u2019s power, through many a sore conflict with the\nprince of this world, by drinking many a bitter cup, we are to be made\nperfect. To cry out against the terrific and searching flame of the\ncrucible of a Father\u2019s painful processes is natural and is no sin, if\nthere be perfect acquiescence in the answer to our prayer, perfect\nsubmission to God\u2019s will, and perfect devotion to His glory.\n\nIf our hearts are true to God, we may plead with Him about His way, and\nseek relief from His painful processes. But the fierce fire of the\ncrucible and the agonising victim with His agonising and submissive\nprayer, is not the normal and highest form of majestic and\nall-commanding prayer. We can cry out in the crucible, and can cry out\nagainst the flame which purifies and perfects us. God allows this, hears\nthis, and answers this, not by taking us out of the crucible, nor by\nmitigating the fierceness of the flame, but by sending more than an\nangel to strengthen us. And yet crying out thus, with full submission,\ndoes not answer the real high, world-wide, royal and eternity-reaching\nbehests of prayer.\n\nThe prayer of submission must not be so used as to vitiate or substitute\nthe higher and mightier prayer of faith. Nor must it be so stressed as\nto break down importunate and prevailing prayer, which would be to\ndisarm prayer of its efficiency and discrown its glorious results and\nwould be to encourage listless, sentimental and feeble praying.\n\nWe are ever ready to excuse our lack of earnest and toilsome praying, by\na fancied and delusive view of submission. We often end praying just\nwhere we ought to begin. We quit praying when God waits and is waiting\nfor us to really pray. We are deterred by obstacles from praying, or we\nsuccumb to difficulties, and call it submission to God\u2019s will. A world\nof beggarly faith, of spiritual laziness, and of half-heartedness in\nprayer, are covered under the high and pious name of submission. To have\nno plan but to seek God\u2019s plan and carry it out, is of the essence and\ninspiration of Christly praying. This is far more than putting in a\nclause of submission. Jesus did this once in seeking to change the\npurpose of God, but all His other praying was the output of being\nperfectly at one with the plans and purposes of God. It is after this\norder we pray when we abide in Him and when His word abides in us. Then\nwe ask what we will and it is done. It is then our prayers fashion and\ncreate things. Our wills then become God\u2019s will and His will becomes\nours. The two become one, and there is not a note of discord.\n\n\u201cAnd this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask\nanything according to his will, he heareth us.\u201d And if we know that He\nhear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we\ndesired of Him. And then it proves true: \u201cAnd whatsoever we ask, we\nreceive of him, because we keep his commandments, and do those things\nthat are pleasing in his sight.\u201d\n\nWhat restraint, forbearance, self-denial, and loyalty to duty to God,\nand what deference to the Old Testament Scriptures are in that statement\nof our Lord: \u201cThinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he\nshall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels? But how then\nshall the scriptures be fulfilled, that thus it must be?\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                                  XIII\n                       THE HOLY SPIRIT AND PRAYER\n\n\n    _During the great Welsh Revival a minister was said to be very\n    successful in winning souls by one sermon that he preached\u2014hundreds\n    were converted. Far away in a valley news reached a brother minister\n    of the marvelous success of this sermon. He desired to find out the\n    secret of the man\u2019s great success.\u2014He walked the long way, and came\n    to the minister\u2019s poor cottage, and the first thing he said was:\n    \u201cBrother, where did you get that sermon?\u201d He was taken into a poorly\n    furnished room and pointed to a spot where the carpet was worn\n    threadbare, near a window that looked out upon the everlasting hills\n    and solemn mountains and said, \u201cBrother, there is where I got that\n    sermon. My heart was heavy for men. One night I knelt there\u2014and\n    cried for power as I never preached before. The hours passed until\n    midnight struck, and the stars looked down on a sleeping world, but\n    the answer came not. I prayed on until I saw a faint streak of grey\n    shoot up, then it was silver\u2014silver became purple and gold. Then the\n    sermon came and the power came and men fell under the influence of\n    the Holy Spirit.\u201d_\u2014G. H. MORGAN.\n\n\nThe Gospel without the Holy Spirit would be vain and nugatory. The gift\nof the Holy Spirit was vital to the work of Jesus Christ in the\natonement. As Jesus did not begin His work on earth till He was anointed\nby the Holy Spirit, so the same Holy Spirit is necessary to carry\nforward and make effective the atoning work of the Son of God. As His\nanointing by the Holy Ghost at His baptism was an era in His life, so\nalso is the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost a great era in the\nwork of redemption in making effective the work of Christ\u2019s Church.\n\nThe Holy Spirit is not only the bright lamp of the Christian\nDispensation, its Teacher and Guide, but is the Divine Helper.\n\nHe is the enabling agent in God\u2019s new dispensation of doing. As the\npilot takes his stand at the wheel to guide the vessel, so the Holy\nGhost takes up His abode in the heart to guide and empower all its\nefforts. The Holy Ghost executes the whole gospel through the man by His\npresence and control of the spirit of the man.\n\nIn the execution of the atoning work of Jesus Christ, in its general and\nmore comprehensive operation, or in its minute and personal application,\nthe Holy Spirit is the one efficient Agent, absolute and indispensable.\n\nThe gospel cannot be executed but by the Holy Ghost. He only has the\nregal authority to do this royal work. Intellect cannot execute it,\nneither can learning, nor eloquence, nor truth, not even the revealed\ntruth can execute the gospel. The marvelous facts of Christ\u2019s life told\nby hearts unanointed by the Holy Spirit will be dry and sterile, or\n\u201clike a story told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying\nnothing.\u201d Not even the precious blood can execute the gospel. Not any,\nnor all of these, though spoken with angelic wisdom, angelic eloquence,\ncan execute the gospel with saving power. Only tongues set on fire by\nthe Holy Spirit can witness the saving power of Christ with power to\nsave others.\n\nNo one dared move from Jerusalem to proclaim or utter the message along\nits streets to the dying multitudes till the Holy Spirit came in\nbaptismal power. John could not utter a word, though he had pillowed his\nhead on Christ\u2019s bosom and caught the pulsations of Christ\u2019s heart, and\nthough his brain was full of the wondrous facts of that life and of the\nwondrous words which fell from His lips. John must wait till a fuller\nand richer endowment than all of these came on him. Mary could not live\nover that Christ-life in the home of John, though she had nurtured the\nChrist and stored heart and mind full of holy and motherly memories,\ntill she was empowered by the Holy Spirit.\n\nThe coming of the Holy Spirit is dependent upon prayer, for prayer only\ncan compass with its authority and demands, the realm where this Person\nof the Godhead has His abode. Even Christ was subject to this law of\nprayer. With Him, it is, it ever has been, and ever will be, \u201cAsk, and\nit shall be given you; seek and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be\nopened unto you.\u201d To His disconsolate disciples, He said, \u201cI will pray\nthe Father, and He will give you another Comforter.\u201d This law of prayer\nfor the Holy Spirit presses on the Master and on the disciples as well.\nOf so many of God\u2019s children it may truly be said, \u201cYe have Him not\nbecause ye ask not.\u201d And of many others it might be said, \u201cYe have Him\nin faint measure because ye pray for Him in faint measure.\u201d\n\nThe Holy Spirit is the spirit of all grace and of each grace as well.\nPurity, power, holiness, faith, love, joy and all grace are brought into\nbeing and perfected by Him. Would we grow in grace in particular? Would\nwe be perfect in all graces? We must seek the Holy Spirit by prayer.\n\nWe urge the seeking of the Holy Spirit. We need Him, and we need to stir\nourselves up to seek Him. The measure we receive of Him will be gauged\nby the fervour of faith and prayer with which we seek Him. Our ability\nto work for God, and to pray to God, and live for God, and affect others\nfor God, will be dependent on the measure of the Holy Spirit received by\nus, dwelling in us, and working through us.\n\nChrist lays down the clear and explicit law of prayer in this regard for\nall of God\u2019s children. The world needs the Holy Spirit to convict it of\nsin and of righteousness and judgment to come and to make it feel its\nguiltiness in God\u2019s sight. And this spirit of conviction on sinners\ncomes in answer to the prayers of God\u2019s people. God\u2019s children need Him\nmore and more, need His life, His more abundant life, His super-abundant\nlife. But that life begins and ever increases as the child of God prays\nfor the Holy Spirit. \u201cIf ye, then, being evil, know how to give good\ngifts unto your children, how much more shall your Heavenly Father give\nthe Holy Spirit to them that ask him?\u201d This is the law, a condition\nbrightened by a promise and sweetened by a relationship.\n\nThe gift of the Holy Spirit is one of the benefits flowing to us from\nthe glorious presence of Christ at the right hand of God, and this gift\nof the Holy Spirit, together with all the other gifts of the enthroned\nChrist, are secured to us by prayer as the condition. The Bible by\nexpress statement, as well as by its general principles and clear and\nconstant intimations, teaches us that the gift of the Holy Spirit is\nconnected with and conditioned in prayer. That the Holy Spirit is in the\nworld as God is in the world, is true. That the Holy Spirit is in the\nworld as Christ is in the world is also true. And it is also true that\nthere is nothing predicated of Him being in us and in the world that is\nnot predicated of God and Christ being in us, and in the world. The Holy\nSpirit was in the world in measure before Pentecost, and in the measure\nof His operation then He was prayed for and sought for, and the\nprinciples are unchanged. The truth is, if we cannot pray for the Holy\nSpirit we cannot pray for any good thing from God, for He is the sum of\nall good to us. The truth is we seek after the Holy Spirit just as we\nseek after God, just as we seek after Christ, with strong cryings and\ntears, and we are to seek always for more and more of His gifts, and\npower, and grace. The truth is, that the presence and power of the Holy\nSpirit at any given meeting is conditioned on praying faith.\n\nChrist lays down the doctrine that the reception of the Holy Spirit is\nconditioned on prayer, and He Himself illustrated this universal law,\nfor when the Holy Spirit came upon Him at His baptism, He was praying.\nThe Apostolic Church in action illustrates the same great truth.\n\nA few days after Pentecost the disciples were in an agony of prayer,\n\u201cand when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were\nassembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit.\u201d This\nincident destroys every theory which denies prayer as the condition of\nthe coming and re-coming of the Holy Spirit after Pentecost, and\nconfirms the view that Pentecost as the result of a long struggle of\nprayer is illustrative and confirmatory that God\u2019s great and most\nprecious gifts and conditioned on asking, seeking, knocking, prayer,\nardent, importunate prayer.\n\nThe same truth comes to the front very prominently in Philip\u2019s revival\nat Samaria. Though filled with joy by believing in Christ, and though\nreceived into the Church by water baptism, they did not receive the Holy\nSpirit till Peter and John went down there and prayed with and for them.\n\nPaul\u2019s praying was God\u2019s proof to Ananias that Paul was in a state which\nconditioned him to receive the Holy Spirit.\n\nThe Holy Spirit is not only our Teacher, our Inspirer and our Revealer,\nin prayer, but the power of our praying in measure and force is measured\nby the Spirit\u2019s power working in us, as the will and work of God,\naccording to God\u2019s good pleasure. In the third chapter of Ephesians,\nafter the marvelous prayer of Paul for the Church, he seemed to be\napprehensive that they would think he had gone beyond the ability of God\nin his large asking. And so he closes his appeal for them with the\nwords, that God was able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we\nask or think. The power of God to do for us was measured by the power of\nGod in us. \u201cAccording to,\u201d says the Apostle, that is, after the measure\nof, \u201cthe power that worketh in us.\u201d The projecting power of praying\noutwardly was the projecting power of God in us. The feeble operation of\nGod in us brings feeble praying. The mightiest operation of God in us\nbrings the mightiest praying. The secret of prayerlessness is the\nabsence of the work of the Holy Spirit in us. The secret of feeble\npraying everywhere is the lack of God\u2019s Spirit in His mightiness.\n\nThe ability of God to answer and work through our prayers is measured by\nthe Divine energy that God has been enabled to put in us by the Holy\nSpirit. The projecting power of praying is the measure of the Holy\nSpirit in us. So the statement of James in the fifth chapter of his\nEpistle is to this effect:\n\n\u201cThe fervent effectual prayer of a righteous man availeth much.\u201d The\nprayer inwrought in the heart by the almighty energy of the Holy Spirit\nworks mightily in its results just as Elijah\u2019s prayer did.\n\nWould we pray efficiently and mightily? Then the Holy Spirit must work\nin us efficiently and mightily. Paul makes the principle of universal\napplication. \u201cWhereunto I also labour, striving according to his\nworking, which worketh in me mightily.\u201d All labour for Christ which does\nnot spring from the Holy Spirit working in us, is nugatory and vain. Our\nprayers and activities are so feeble and resultless, because He has not\nworked in us and cannot work in us His glorious work. Would you pray\nwith mighty results? Seek the mighty workings of the Holy Spirit in your\nown spirit.\n\nHere we have the initial lesson in prayer for the Holy Spirit which was\nto enlarge to its full fruitage in Pentecost. It is to be noted that in\nJohn 14:16, where Jesus engages to pray the Father to send another\nComforter, who would dwell with His disciples and be in them, that this\nis not a prayer that the Holy Spirit might do His work in making us\nchildren of God by regeneration, but it was for that fuller grace and\npower and Person of the Holy Spirit which we can claim by virtue of our\nrelation as children of God. His work in us to make us the children of\nGod and His Person abiding with us and in us, as children of God, are\nentirely different stages of the same Spirit in His relation to us. In\nthis latter work, His gifts and works are greater, and His presence,\neven Himself, is greater than His works or gifts. His work in us\nprepares us for Himself. His gifts are the dispensations of His\npresence. He puts and makes us members of the body of Christ by His\nwork. He keeps us in that body by His Presence and Person. He enables us\nto discharge the functions as members of that body by His gifts.\n\nThe whole lesson culminates in asking for the Holy Spirit as the great\nobjective point of all praying. In the direction in the Sermon on the\nMount, we have the very plain and definite promise, \u201cIf ye, being evil,\nknow how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your\nFather in Heaven give good things to them that ask him?\u201d In Luke we have\n\u201cgood things\u201d substituted by \u201cthe Holy Spirit.\u201d All good is comprehended\nin the Holy Spirit and He is the sum and climax of all good things.\n\nHow complex, confusing and involved is many a human direction about\nobtaining the gift of the Holy Spirit as the abiding Comforter, our\nSanctifier and the one who empowers us! How simple and direct is our\nLord\u2019s direction\u2014ASK! This is plain and direct. Ask with urgency, ask\nwithout fainting. Ask, seek, knock, till He comes. Your Heavenly Father\nwill surely send Him if you ask for Him. Wait in the Lord for the Holy\nSpirit. It is the child waiting, asking, urging and praying\nperseveringly for the Father\u2019s greatest gift and for the child\u2019s\ngreatest need, the Holy Spirit.\n\nHow are we to obtain the Holy Spirit so freely promised to those who\nseek Him believingly? Wait, press, and persevere with all the calmness\nand with all the ardour of a faith which knows no fear, which allows no\ndoubt, a faith which staggers not at the promise through unbelief, a\nfaith which in its darkest and most depressed hours against hope\nbelieves in hope, which is brightened by hope and strengthened by hope,\nand which is saved by hope.\n\nWait and pray\u2014here is the key which unlocks every castle of despair, and\nwhich opens every treasure-store of God. It is the simplicity of the\nchild\u2019s asking of the Father, who gives with a largeness, liberality,\nand cheerfulness, infinitely above everything ever known to earthly\nparents. Ask for the Holy Spirit\u2014seek for the Holy Spirit\u2014knock for the\nHoly Spirit. He is the Father\u2019s greatest gift for the child\u2019s greatest\nneed.\n\nIn these three words, \u201cask,\u201d \u201cseek\u201d and \u201cknock,\u201d given us by Christ, we\nhave the repetition of the advancing steps of insistency and effort. He\nis laying Himself out in command and promise in the strongest way,\nshowing us that if we will lay ourselves out in prayer and will\npersevere, rising to higher and stronger attitudes and sinking to deeper\ndepths of intensity and effort, that the answer must inevitably come. So\nthat it is true the stars would fail to shine before the asking, the\nseeking and the knocking would fail to obtain what is needed and\ndesired.\n\nThere is no elect company here, only the election of undismayed,\nimportunate, never-fainting effort in prayer: \u201cFor to him that knocketh,\nit shall be opened.\u201d Nothing can be stronger than this declaration\nassuring us of the answer unless it be the promise upon which it is\nbased, \u201cAnd I say unto you, ask and it shall be given you.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                                  XIV\n                  THE HOLY SPIRIT OUR HELPER IN PRAYER\n\n\n    _We must pray in the Spirit, in the Holy Ghost, if we would pray at\n    all. Lay this, I beseech you, to heart. Do not address yourselves to\n    prayer as to a work to be accomplished in your own natural strength.\n    It is a work of God, of God the Holy Ghost, a work of His in you and\n    by you, and in which you must be fellow-workers with Him\u2014but His\n    work notwithstanding._\u2014ARCHBISHOP TRENCH.\n\n\nOne of the revelations of the New Testament concerning the Holy Spirit\nis that He is our helper in prayer. So we have in the following incident\nin our Lord\u2019s life the close connection between the Holy Spirit\u2019s work\nand prayer:\n\n    \u201cAt that time Jesus rejoiced in spirit and said, I thank thee, O\n    Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things\n    from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes; even\n    so, Father, for it seemed good in thy sight.\u201d\u2014Luke 10:21.\n\nHere we have revelations of what God is to us. Only the child\u2019s heart\ncan know the Father, and only the child\u2019s heart can reveal the Father.\nIt is by prayer only that all things are delivered to us by the Father\nthrough the Son. It is only by prayer that all things are revealed to us\nby the Father and by the Son. It is only in prayer that the Father gives\nHimself to us, which is much more every way than all other things\nwhatsoever.\n\nThe Revised Version reads: \u201cAt that same hour Jesus rejoiced in the Holy\nSpirit.\u201d This sets forth that great truth not generally known, or if\nknown, ignored, that Jesus Christ was generally led by the Holy Spirit,\nand that His joy and His praying, as well as His working, and His life,\nwere under the inspiration, law and guidance of the Holy Spirit.\n\nTurn to and read this passage:\n\n    Romans 8:26\u2014\u201cLikewise the spirit also helpeth our infirmities; for\n    we know not what we should pray for as we ought.\u201d\n\nThis text is most pregnant and vital, and needs to be quoted. Patience,\nhope and waiting help us in prayer. But the greatest and the divinest of\nall helpers is the Holy Spirit. He takes hold of things for us. We are\ndark and confused, ignorant and weak in many things, in fact in\neverything pertaining to the Heavenly life, especially in the simple\nservice of prayer. There is an \u201cought\u201d on us, an obligation, a necessity\nto pray, a spiritual necessity upon us of the most absolute and\nimperative kind. But we do not feel the obligation and have no ability\nto meet it. The Holy Spirit helps us in our weaknesses, gives wisdom to\nour ignorance, turns ignorance into wisdom, and changes our weakness\ninto strength. The Spirit Himself does this. He helps and takes hold\nwith us as we tug and toil. He adds His wisdom to our ignorance, gives\nHis strength to our weakness. He pleads for us and in us. He quickens,\nillumines and inspires our prayers. He indites and elevates the matter\nof our prayers, and inspires the words and feelings of our prayers. He\nworks mightily in us so that we can pray mightily. He enables us to pray\nalways and ever according to the will of God.\n\nIn I John 5:14 we have these words:\n\n    \u201cAnd this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask\n    anything according to his will, he heareth us:\n\n    \u201cAnd if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we\n    have the petitions that we desired of him.\u201d\n\nThat which gives us boldness and so much freedom and fullness of\napproach toward God, the fact and basis of that boldness and liberty of\napproach, is that we are asking \u201caccording to the will of God.\u201d This\ndoes not mean submission, but conformity. \u201cAccording to\u201d means after the\nstandard, conformity, agreement. We have boldness and all freedom of\naccess to God because we are praying in conformity to His will. God\nrecords His general will in His Word, but He has this special work in\npraying for us to do. His \u201cthings are prepared for us,\u201d as the prophet\nsays, who \u201cwait upon him.\u201d How can we know the will of God in our\npraying? What are the things which God designs specially for us to do\nand pray? The Holy Spirit reveals them to us perpetually.\n\n\u201cThe Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which\ncannot be uttered.\n\n\u201cAnd he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the spirit\nbecause he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of\nGod.\u201d Combine this text with those words of Paul in First Corinthians,\nsecond chapter, eighth verse and what follows:\n\n    \u201cBut as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither\n    have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath\n    prepared for them that love him.\n\n    \u201cBut God hath revealed them unto us by his spirit; for the spirit\n    searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.\n\n    \u201cFor what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man\n    which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the\n    spirit of God.\n\n    \u201cNow we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit\n    which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given\n    to us of God.\n\n    \u201cWhich things also we speak, not in the words which man\u2019s wisdom\n    teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth, comparing spiritual\n    things with spiritual.\n\n    \u201cBut the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God;\n    for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because\n    they are spiritually discerned.\n\n    \u201cBut he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is\n    judged of no man.\n\n    \u201cFor who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him?\n    But we have the mind of Christ.\u201d\n\n\u201cRevealed to us by the Spirit.\u201d Note those words. God searches the heart\nwhere the Spirit dwells and knows the mind of the Spirit. The Spirit who\ndwells in our hearts searches the deep purposes and the will of God to\nus, and reveals those purposes and that will of God, \u201cthat we might know\nthe things which are freely given to us of God.\u201d Our spirits are so\nfully indwelt by the Spirit of God, so responsive and obedient to His\nillumination and to His will, that we ask with holy boldness and freedom\nthe things which the Spirit of God has shown us as the will of God, and\nfaith is assured. Then \u201cwe know that we have the petitions that we have\nasked.\u201d\n\nThe natural man prays, but prays according to his own will, fancy and\ndesire. If he has ardent desires and groanings, they are the fire and\nagony of nature simply, and not that of the Spirit. What a world of\nnatural praying there is, which is selfish, self-centered,\nself-inspired! The Spirit, when He prays through us, or helps us to meet\nthe mighty \u201coughtness\u201d of right praying, trims our praying down to the\nwill of God, and then we give heart and expression to His unutterable\ngroanings. Then we have the mind of Christ, and pray as He would pray.\nHis thoughts, purposes and desires are our desires, purposes and\nthoughts.\n\nThis is not a new and different Bible from that which we already have,\nbut it is the Bible we have, applied personally by the Spirit of God. It\nis not new texts, but rather the Spirit\u2019s embellishing of certain texts\nfor us at the time.\n\nIt is the unfolding of the word by the Spirit\u2019s light, guidance,\nteaching, enabling us to perform the great office of intercessors on\nearth, in harmony with the great intercessions of Jesus Christ at the\nFather\u2019s right hand in Heaven.\n\nWe have in the Holy Spirit an illustration and an enabler of what this\nintercession is and ought to be. We are charged to supplicate in the\nSpirit and to pray in the Holy Spirit. We are reminded that the Holy\nSpirit \u201chelpeth our infirmities,\u201d and that while intercession is an art\nof so Divine and so high a nature that though we know not what to pray\nfor as we ought, yet the Spirit teaches us this Heavenly science, by\nmaking intercession in us \u201cwith groanings which cannot be uttered.\u201d How\nburdened these intercessions of the Holy Spirit! How profoundly He feels\nthe world\u2019s sin, the world\u2019s woe, and the world\u2019s loss, and how deeply\nHe sympathises with the dire conditions, are seen in His groanings which\nare too deep for utterance and too sacred to be voiced by Him. He\ninspires us to this most Divine work of intercession, and His strength\nenables us to sigh unto God for the oppressed, the burdened and the\ndistressed creation. The Holy Spirit helps us in many ways.\n\nHow intense will be the intercessions of the saints who supplicate in\nthe spirit! How vain and delusive and how utterly fruitless and\ninefficient are prayers without the Spirit! Official prayers they may\nbe, fitted for state occasions, beautiful and courtly, but worth less\nthan nothing as God values prayer.\n\nIt is our unfainting praying which will help the Holy Spirit to His\nmightiest work in us, and at the same time He helps us to these\nstrenuous and exalted efforts in prayer.\n\nWe can and do pray by many inspirations and in many ways which are not\nof God. Many prayers are stereotyped in manner and in matter, in part,\nif not as a whole. Many prayers are hearty and vehement, but it is\nnatural heartiness and a fleshly vehemence. Much praying is done by dint\nof habit and through form. Habit is a second nature and holds to the\ngood, when so directed, as well as to the bad. The habit of praying is a\ngood habit, and should be early and strongly formed; but to pray by\nhabit merely is to destroy the life of prayer and allow it to degenerate\ninto a hollow and sham-producing form. Habit may form the bank for the\nriver of prayer, but there must be a strong, deep, pure current, crystal\nand life-giving, flowing between these two banks. Hannah multiplied her\npraying, \u201cbut she poured out her soul before the Lord.\u201d We cannot make\nour prayer habits too marked and controlling if the life-waters be full\nand overflow the banks.\n\nOur divine example in praying is the Son of God. Our Divine Helper in\npraying is the Holy Spirit. He quickens us to pray and helps us in\npraying. Acceptable prayer must be begun and carried on by His presence\nand inspiration. We are enjoined in the Holy Scriptures to \u201cpray in the\nHoly Ghost.\u201d We are charged to \u201cpray always with all prayer and\nsupplication in the Spirit.\u201d We are reminded for our encouragement, that\n\u201cLikewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities; for we know not what\nwe should pray for as we ought; but the Spirit itself maketh\nintercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.\u201d \u201cAnd he\nthat searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit,\nbecause He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of\nGod.\u201d\n\nSo ignorant are we in this matter of prayer; so impotent are all other\nteachers to impart its lessons to our understanding and heart, that the\nHoly Spirit comes as the infallible and all-wise teacher to instruct us\nin this divine art. \u201cTo pray with all your heart and all your strength,\nwith the reason and the will, this is the greatest achievement of the\nChristian warfare on earth.\u201d This is what we are taught to do and\nenabled to do by the Holy Spirit. If no man can say that Jesus is the\nChrist but by the Spirit\u2019s help; for the much greater reason can no man\npray save by the aid of God\u2019s Spirit. Our mother\u2019s lips, now sealed by\ndeath, taught us many sweet lessons of prayer; prayers which have bound\nand held our hearts like golden threads; but these prayers, flowing\nthrough the natural channel of a mother\u2019s love, can not serve the\npurposes of our manhood\u2019s warring, stormy life. These maternal lessons\nare but the A B C of praying. For the higher and graduating lessons in\nprayer we must have the Holy Spirit. He only can unfold to us the\nmysteries of the prayer-life, its duty and its service.\n\nTo pray by the Holy Spirit we must have Him always. He does not, like\nearthly teachers, teach us the lesson and then withdraw. He stays to\nhelp us practise the lesson He has taught. We pray, not by the precepts\nand lessons He has taught, but we pray by Him. He is both teacher and\nlesson. We can only know the lesson because He is ever with us to\ninspire, to illumine, to explain, to help us to do. We pray not by the\ntruth the Holy Spirit reveals to us, but we pray by the actual presence\nof the Holy Spirit. He puts the desire in our hearts; kindles that\ndesire by His own flame. We simply give lip and voice and heart to His\nunutterable groanings. Our prayers are taken up by Him and energised and\nsanctified by His intercession. He prays for us, through us and in us.\nWe pray by Him, through Him and in Him. He puts the prayer in us and we\ngive it utterance and heart.\n\nWe always pray according to the will of God when the Holy Spirit helps\nour praying. He prays through us only \u201caccording to the will of God.\u201d If\nour prayers are not according to the will of God they die in the\npresence of the Holy Spirit. He gives such prayers no countenance, no\nhelp. Discountenanced and unhelped by Him, prayers, not according to\nGod\u2019s will, soon die out of every heart where the Holy Spirit dwells.\n\nWe must, as Jude says, \u201cPray in the Holy Ghost.\u201d As Paul says, \u201cwith all\nprayer and supplication in the Spirit.\u201d Never forgetting that \u201cthe\nSpirit also helpeth our infirmities; for we know not what we should pray\nfor as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with\ngroanings which cannot be uttered.\u201d Above all, over all, and through all\nour praying there must be the Name of Christ, which includes the power\nof His blood, the energy of His intercession, the fullness of the\nenthroned Christ. \u201cWhatsoever ye ask in my name that will I do.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                                   XV\n                  THE TWO COMFORTERS AND TWO ADVOCATES\n\n\n    _If we were asked whose Comforter the Holy Spirit was, the answer\n    would be\u2014Ours. The answer is not so ready when we are asked whose\n    Advocate He is. The Spirit is Christ\u2019s Advocate, not ours. It is\n    Christ\u2019s place He takes, Christ\u2019s cause He pleads, Christ\u2019s name He\n    vindicates, Christ\u2019s Kingdom He administers._\u2014SAMUEL CHADWICK.\n\n\nThe fact that man has two Divine Comforters, Advocates, Helpers, is\ndeclarative of the affluence of God\u2019s provisions in the gospel, and also\ndeclarative of the settled purpose of God to execute His work of\nsalvation with efficacy and final success. Many-sided are the\ninfirmities and needs of man in his pilgrimage and warfare for Heaven.\nThese two Christs can meet with manifold wisdom.\n\nThe affluence of God\u2019s provision of two Intercessors in executing the\nplan of salvation finds its counterpart in the prayer promise in its\nunlimited nature, comprehending all things, great and small. \u201cAll things\nwhatsoever ye ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.\u201d All things we\nhave in Christ, all things we have in the Holy Spirit, and all things we\nhave in prayer.\n\nHow much is ours in God\u2019s plan and purposes we have in these two\nChrists, the one ascended to Heaven and enthroned, there to intercede\nfor our benefit, the other Christ, His Representative, and better\nSubstitute, on earth, to work in us and make intercessions for us!\n\nThe first Christ was a person. The other Christ, a person, but not\nclothed in physical form nor subject to human limitations as the first\nChrist necessarily was. Transient and local was the first Christ. The\nother Christ not limited to locality, not transient, but abiding; not\ndealing with the sensible, the material, the fleshly, but entering\npersonally into the mysterious and imperial domain of the spirit, to\nemancipate and transform into more than Eden beauty that waste and dark\nrealm. The first Christ left His novitiates that they might enter into\nhigher regions of spiritual knowledge. The man Christ withdrew that the\nSpirit Christ might train and school into the deeper mysteries of God;\nthat all the historical and physical might be transmuted into the pure\ngold of the spiritual. The first Christ brought to us a picture of what\nwe must be. The other Christ mirrored this perfect and fadeless image on\nour hearts. The first Christ, like David, gathered and furnished the\nmaterial for the temple. The other Christ out of this material forms\nGod\u2019s glorious temple.\n\nThe possibilities of prayer, then, are the possibilities of these two\nDivine Intercessors. Where are the limitations to results when the Holy\nSpirit intercedes for us with groanings which cannot be uttered, when He\nso helps us that our prayers run parallel to the will of God, and we\npray for the very things and in the very manner in which we ought to\npray, schooled in and pressed to these prayers by the urgency of the\nHoly Spirit! How measureless are the possibilities of prayer when we are\nfilled with all the fullness of God; when we stand \u201cperfect and complete\nin all the will of God\u201d?\n\nIf the intercession of Moses so wondrously preserved the being and\nsafety of Israel throughout its marvelous history and destiny, what may\nwe not secure through our Intercessor, who is so much greater than\nMoses? All that God has lies open to Christ through prayer. All that\nChrist has lies open to us through prayer.\n\nIf we have the two Christs covering the whole realm of goodness, power,\npurity and glory, in Heaven and on earth\u2014if we have the better Christ\nwith us here in this world\u2014why is it that we sigh to know the Christ\nafter the flesh as the disciples knew Him? Why is it that the mighty\nwork of these two Almighty Intercessors finds us so barren of Heavenly\nfruit, so feeble in all Christly principles, so low in the Christly\nlife, and so marred in the Christly image? Is it not because our prayers\nfor the Holy Spirit have been so faint and few? The Heavenly Christ can\nonly come to us in full beauty and power when we have received the\nfullness of the present earthly Christ, even the Holy Spirit.\n\nLiving always the life of prayer, breathing always the spirit of prayer,\nbeing always in the fact of prayer, praying always in the Holy Spirit,\nthe Heavenly Christ would become ours by a clearer vision, a deeper\nlove, and a more intimate fellowship than He was to His disciples in the\ndays of His flesh.\n\nWe would not disguise nor abate the fact that there is a loss to us by\nour absent Christ as we will see and know Him in Heaven. But in our\nearthly work to be done by us, and above all to be done in us, we will\nknow Christ and the Father better, and can better utilise them by the\nministry of the Holy Spirit than would have been possible under the\npersonal, human presence of the Son. So to the loving and obedient ones\nwho are filled with the Spirit, both the Father and the Son \u201cWill come\nunto us and make their abode with us.\u201d In the day of the fullness of the\nindwelling Spirit, \u201cYe shall know that I am in my Father and ye in me\nand I in you.\u201d Amazing oneness and harmony, wrought by the almighty\npower of the other Christ!\n\nThere is not a note in the archangel\u2019s song to which the Holy Spirit\ndoes not attune man into sympathy, not a pulsation in the heart of God\nto which the Holy Spirit-filled heart does not respond with loud amens\nand joyful hallelujahs. Even more than this, by the other Christ, the\nHoly Ghost, \u201cwe know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge.\u201d More\nthan this, by the Holy Spirit we are \u201cfilled with all the fullness of\nGod.\u201d More than this, God is able to do exceeding abundantly above all\nthat we ask or think according to the power of the Holy Spirit which\nworketh in us.\n\nThe presence and power of the other Christ would more than compensate\nthe disciples for the loss of the first Christ. His going away had\nfilled their hearts with a strange sorrow. A loneliness and desolation\nlike an orphan\u2019s woe had swept over their hearts and stunned and\nbewildered them; but He comforted them by telling them that the Holy\nGhost would be like the pains of a travailing mother, all forgotten in\nthe untold joy that a man-child was born into the world.\n\n\n\n\n                                  XVI\n                 PRAYER AND THE HOLY GHOST DISPENSATION\n\n\n    _How God needs, how the world needs, how the Church needs the flow\n    of the mighty river, more blessed than the Nile, deeper, broader and\n    more overflowing than the Amazon\u2019s mighty current! and yet what mere\n    rills we are! We need, the age needs, the Church needs, memorials of\n    God\u2019s mighty power, which will silence the enemy and the avenger,\n    dumbfound God\u2019s foes, strengthen weak saints, and fill strong ones\n    with triumphant raptures._\n\n    \u2014EDWARD BOUNDS.\n\n\nThe dispensation of the Holy Ghost was ushered in by prayer. Read these\nwords from Acts 1:13\u2014\u201cAnd when they were come in, they went up into an\nupper room where abode both Peter and James and John and Andrew, Philip\nand Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James, the son of Alpheus, and\nSimon Zelotes, and Judas, the brother of James. These all continued with\none accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary, the\nmother of Jesus, and with his brethren.\u201d\n\nThis was the attitude which the disciples assumed after Jesus had\nascended to Heaven. That meeting for prayer ushered in the dispensation\nof the Holy Spirit, to which prophets had looked forward with entranced\nvision. And to prayer in a marked way has this dispensation, which holds\nin its keeping the fortune of the Gospel, been committed.\n\nApostolic men knew well the worth of prayer and were jealous of the most\nsacred offices which infringed on their time and strength and hindered\nthem from \u201cgiving themselves continually to prayer and to the ministry\nof the Word.\u201d They put prayer first. The Word depends on prayer that it\n\u201cmay have free course and be glorified.\u201d Praying apostles make preaching\napostles. Prayer gives edge, entrance and weight to the Word. Sermons\nconceived by prayer and saturated with prayer are weighty sermons.\nSermons may be ponderous with thought, sparkle with the gems of genius\nand of taste, pleasing and popular, but without they have their birth\nand life in prayer, for God\u2019s uses, they are trifles, dull and dead.\n\nThe Lord of the harvest sends out labourers, full in number and perfect\nin kind, in answer to prayer. It needs no prophetic ken to declare that\nif the Church had used prayer force to its utmost the light of the\ngospel would have long since girdled the world.\n\nGod\u2019s Gospel has always waited more on prayer than on anything else for\nits successes. A praying Church is strong though poor in all besides. A\nprayerless Church is weak though rich in all besides. Praying hearts\nonly will build God\u2019s Kingdom. Praying hands only will put the crown on\nthe Saviour\u2019s head.\n\nThe Holy Spirit is the Divinely appointed Substitute for and\nrepresentative of the personal and humanised Christ. How much is He to\nus! And how we are to be filled by Him, live in Him, walk in Him, and be\nled by Him! How we are to conserve and kindle to a brighter and more\nconsuming glow the holy flame! How careful should we be never to quench\nthat pure flame! How watchful, tender, loving ought we to be so as not\nto grieve His sensitive, loving nature! How attentive, meek and\nobedient, never to resist His Divine impulses, always to hear His voice,\nand always to do His Divine will. How can all this be done without much\nand continuous prayer?\n\nThe importunate widow had a great case to win against helpless, hopeless\ndespair, but she did it by importunate prayer. We have this great\ntreasure to preserve and enhance, but we have a Divine Person to\nentertain and help. We can only be enabled to meet our duties by\nexceeding much prayer.\n\nPrayer is the only element in which the Holy Spirit can live and work.\nPrayer is the golden chain which happily enslaves Him to His happy work\nin us.\n\nEverything depends upon our having this Second Christ, and retaining Him\nin the fullness of His power. With the disciples, Pentecost was made by\nprayer. With them, Pentecost was continued by giving themselves to\ncontinued prayer. Persistent and unwearied prayer is the price we will\nhave to pay for our Pentecost, by instant and continued prayer. Abiding\nin the fact and in the spirit of prayer is the only surety of our\nabiding in Pentecostal power and purity.\n\nNot only should the many-sided operation of the Holy Spirit in us and\nfor us, teach us the necessity of prayer for Him, but His condition with\nour praying assumes another attitude, the attitude of mutual dependence,\nthat of action and reaction. The more we pray the more He helps us to\npray, and the larger the measure of Himself He gives to us. We are not\nonly to pray and press and wait for His coming to us, but after we have\nreceived Him in His fullness, we are to pray for a fuller and still\nlarger bestowment of Himself to us. We are to pray for the largest and\never-increasing and constant fullness of capacity. \u201cThat ye might be\nstrengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man,\u201d as Paul prayed\nfor the Spirit-baptised Ephesian Church. It will be remembered that He\nalso prayed that \u201cChrist might dwell in your hearts by faith,\u201d rooted\nand grounded in love, measuring up to the breadth, length, depth and\nheight of the most perfect sainthood, and up to the immeasurable love of\nChrist, being \u201cfilled with all the fullness of God.\u201d\n\nIn that wonderful prayer for those Christians, Paul laid himself out to\npray to God, and by prayer he sought to fathom the fathomless depths and\nto measure the illimitable purposes and benefits of God\u2019s plan of\nsalvation for immortal souls by the presence and work of the Holy\nSpirit. Only importunate and invincible prayer can bring the Holy Spirit\nto us, and secure for us these ineffably gracious results. \u201cEpaphras\nalways labouring fervently in prayers, that ye may stand perfect and\ncomplete in all the will of God.\u201d\n\nThe Word of God provides for a mighty, consciously realised religion in\nHis saints, into whose happy, shining spirits God has been brought as a\nDweller, and whose Heaven-toned lives have been attuned to melody by\nGod\u2019s own hand.\n\nThen will it prove true: \u201cHe that believeth on me, out of his belly\nshall flow rivers of living water.\u201d Here is a promise concerning the\nindwelling and outflowing of the Holy Spirit in us, life-giving,\nfructifying, irresistible, a ceaseless outflow of the river of God in\nus.\n\nHow God needs, how the world needs, how the Church needs the flow of\nthis mighty river, more blessed than the Nile, deeper, broader, more\noverflowing than the Amazon\u2019s broad and mighty current! And yet what\nmere rills we are and have!\n\nO that the Church, by the infilling and outflowing of the Holy Spirit,\nmight be able to raise up everywhere memorials of the Holy Spirit\u2019s\npower, which might fix the eye as well as engage the heart! We need, the\nage needs, the Church needs, memorials of God\u2019s mighty power, which will\nsilence the enemy and the avenger, dumbfound God\u2019s foes, strengthen weak\nsaints, and fill strong ones with triumphant raptures.\n\nA glance at some more of the Divine promises concerning this vital\nquestion would show us how they need to be projected into the\nexperimental and the actual. \u201cIf any man will do his will, he shall know\nof the doctrine, whether it be of God or whether I speak of myself.\u201d How\nwe do need a conscious religion, personal and vital, unspeakable in its\njoy, and full of glory! The need is for a conscious religion, made so by\nthe Spirit bearing witness that we are the children of God. A religion\nof \u201cI know\u201d is the only powerful, vital and aggressive religion. \u201cOne\nthing I know, whereas I once was blind, but now I see.\u201d We need men and\nwomen in these loose days who can verify the above mentioned promise of\nChrist in their inner consciousness. And yet how many untold thousands\nof people in all of our churches, who have only a dim, impalpable, hope\nso, maybe so, I trust so, kind of religion, all dubious, intangible and\nunstable.\n\nThere is certainly a great need in these days in the modern Church,\nfirst, for Christians to see and seek and obtain the high privilege in\nthe Gospel of a Heaven-born, clear cut, and happy religious experience,\nborn of the presence of the Holy Spirit, giving an undoubted assurance\nof sins forgiven, and of adoption into the family of God.\n\nAnd secondly, there is a need, subsequent to this conscious realization\nof Divine favour in the forgiveness of sins, and added to it, of the\nreception of the Holy Spirit in His fullness, purifying their hearts by\nfaith, perfecting them in love, overcoming the world, and bestowing a\nDivine, inward power over all sin, both inward and outward, and giving\nboldness to bear witness and qualifying for real religious service in\nthe Church and in the world.\n\nThere is a fearfully prevailing agnosticism along here in the Church\njust at this time. We greatly fear that a vast majority of our Church\nmembers are now in this school of spiritual agnosticism, and really deem\nit to be a virtue to be there. God\u2019s word gives no encouragement\nwhatever to a shadowy religion and a vague religious experience. It\ncalls us definitely into the realm of knowledge. It crowns religion with\nthe crown of \u201cI know.\u201d It passes us from the darkness of sin, doubt and\ninward misgiving into the marvelous light, where we see clearly and know\nfully our personal relations to God.\n\n                    \u201cThe things unknown to feeble sense,\n                      Unseen by reason\u2019s glimmering ray,\n                    With strong, commanding confidence,\n                      Their heavenly origin display.\u201d\n\nTwo things may be said just here in concluding this part of our study\nupon this subject: First, this sort of Bible religion, hereinbefore\ndescribed, comes directly through the office of the Holy Spirit dealing\npersonally with each soul; and secondly, the Holy Spirit in all of His\noffices pertaining to spiritual life and religious experience is secured\nby earnest, definite, prevailing prayer.\n\n_Printed in the United States of America_\n\n\n\n\n                           EVANGELISTIC WORK\n\n\n_NEWELL DWIGHT HILLIS, D.D._\n\nThe Great Refusal\n\n           And Other Evangelistic Sermons. . . .           $1.50.\n\nDr. Hillis never addresses himself to any kind of subject he does not\nadorn. Literature, art, world-affairs, are, for him, all congenial\nfields. He is equally at home in them all. And here in treating of great\nGospel themes he gives us of his best, bringing to their presentation\nhis splendid gifts and ripened powers.\n\n\n_R. A. TORREY, D.D._\n\nHow to Be Saved\n\n                Evangelistic Sermons. . . .           $1.50.\n\nA striking new volume of Evangelistic addresses, by the famous preacher\nand Bible teacher, which are marked by all his old-time vigor and\ncertitude. He is the proclaimer of a straight Gospel, about which no\nnote of doubt or preadventure finds a place.\n\n\n_EDWARD M. BOUNDS_\n\nThe Possibilities of Prayer\n\n    The Bounds \u201cSpiritual Life Books\u201d Edited by Homer W. Hodge. . . .\n       $1.25.\n\nA rich, exceptionally helpful addition to Dr. Bounds\u2019 books.\n\n\u201cMany will find their understanding clarified and their faith in the\npossibilities of prayer strengthened by a careful reading of this\nbook.\u201d\u2014_Watchman-Examiner._\n\n\n_SADHU SUNDAR SINGH_\n\n                _Translated by Rev. and Mrs. Arthur Parker._\n\nAt the Master\u2019s Feet\n\n                         Boards. . . .         75c.\n\nSimple but impressive chapters on God\u2019s Presence, Sin, Prayer, Service,\nThe Cross, Heaven and Hell by a man who has proved himself to be a\nfaithful Christian evangelist. They take the form of a colloquy between\nthe Master and the Disciple, expressed in parabolic form and Oriental\nimagery.\n\n\n_GEORGE WHITEFIELD RIDOUT_\n\n                       _Asbury College, Wilmore, Ky._\n\nAmazing Grace\n\n             Messages on the Grace of God. . . .         $1.25.\n\nA book of stirring Gospel addresses by a man of large experience in the\nevangelistic field. They are clear, ringing messages, simply phrased,\nyet forming the vehicle for the conveyance of a Gospel of \u201camazing\ngrace.\u201d\n\n\n                             PROPHECY, ETC.\n\n\n_J.J. ROSS, D.D._\n\nPearls from Patmos\n\nIntroduction by Rev. W. H. Griffith-Thomas.\n\n                          Cloth. . . .     $1.50.\n\nA Spiritual and Devotional Study of the Early Chapters of the Book of\nRevelation.\n\nDr. Ross deals with the great Apocalypse under what he describes as the\n\u201cPresentist\u201d method\u2014that is, he furnishes an interpretation of its\nsymbolism which applies neither to the far future nor the historic past,\nbut to the days through which we are now passing.\n\n\n_RICHARD W. LEWIS, D.D._\n\n                           _Associate Editor\n                           \u201cPentecostal Herald.\u201d_\n\nA New Vision of Another Heaven\n\n                                   $1.25.\n\nRecorded in the form of a vision, Dr. Lewis sets forth his conception of\nthe great things \u201cwhich shall shortly come to pass.\u201d The entire work is\nbased on Scriptural warrants, and is never allowed to assume a fantastic\nor an unsupportable character.\n\n\n_SAMUEL HENRY KELLOGG, D.D., LL.D._\n\n               _Sometime Professor of Systematic Theology in\n               Western Theology Seminary, and for Seventeen\n               Years a Missionary in India._\n\nAre Premillennialists Right?\n\n                                   $1.00.\n\nWith Biographical Memoir of the Author by J. J. Lucas, D.D., Allahabad,\nIndia, and a Foreword by Henry S. Nesbitt, D.D., New Concord, Ohio. A\nnew edition of a book first published nearly a generation ago.\n\n\n_WILLIAM EVANS, Ph.D., D.D._\n\nThe Coming King\n\n              The World\u2019s Next Great Crisis. . . .     $1.50.\n\nDr. Evans examines the testimony of the Scriptures, of the Apostolic\nFathers, and reviews the order of events.\n\n\u201cThere is scarcely a subject demanding more strength to-day than the\nSecond Coming of Christ. Those who wish light in the matter will find\nhelp in this carefully prepared book.\u201d\u2014_Herald and Presbyter._\n\n\n_FRANCIS ASAWIGHT, D.D_\n\n                   _Pastor, Center Street Baptist Church,\n                   Jamaica Plains, Mass._\n\nThe Kingdom of God\n\n            Or, The Reign of Heaven Among Men. . . .     $1.50.\n\nMr. Wight brings all Biblical teaching of both the Old and the New\nTestament into complete harmony, enabling, an earnest, truth-seeking\nstudent to understand the purpose and nature of the Coming Kingdom.\n\n\n                         QUESTIONS OF THE HOUR\n\n\n            _NEVILLE S. TALBOT, D.D._      _Bishop of Pretoria._\n\nThe Returning Tide of Faith\n\n                                   $1.50.\n\n_The Congregationalist_ says: \u201cA Modernist in temper and method, Bishop\nTalbot\u2019s very literal belief in the Incarnation, the Resurrection and\nthe Virgin Birth give added interest to the breath and intensity of his\nspiritual interpretation of these matters.\u201d\n\n\n             _NOLAN RICE BEST_     _Editor of \u201cThe Continent.\u201d_\n\nInspiration\n\n                A Study of Divine Influence and Authority in\n                the Holy Scriptures. . . .     $1.25.\n\nMr. Best\u2019s new book \u201ctakes sides\u201d with neither conservatives nor\nliberals. \u201cOne of the sanest and best balanced discussions of the\nsubject of inspiration of the Bible, for the average church member to\nread, which we have yet seen.\u201d\u2014_Herald of Gospel Liberty._\n\n\n_FREDERIC C. SPURR_\n\n               _President of National Council of Evangelical\n               Churches Great Britain._\n\nJesus Christ and the Modern Challenge\n\n          Can We Still Believe in His Divinity. . . .      $1.50.\n\nMr. Spurr accepts the gage of battle which modern unbelief has thrown\ndown, and with great skill of fence, defends the priceless possession of\nthe Christian believer. The defense of the faith is presented, and made\nto stand out irrefutably, as being impervious to the assaults of\npresent-day unbelief or hostility.\n\n\n_JOHN J. LAWRENCE, D.D._\n\n           _Pastor, First Presbyterian Church, Binghamton, N. Y._\n\nThe Christian Credentials\n\n                An Appeal of Faith to Doubt. Introduction by\n                S. Parkes Cadman, D.D. . . .     $1.50.\n\nCommencing with a review of the present theological situation, Dr.\nLawrence depicts the character of the Divine Founder of Christianity,\ndiscusses the divine element in Christian origins, marshals the\narguments of personal experiences, adduces the witness of history, and\nconcludes with a survey of the religious trend and tendency of the age.\n\n\n_RT. REV. JAMES E. FREEMAN, D.D._\n\n                          _Bishop of Washington._\n\n                     Everyday Religion . . .     $1.50.\n\n\u201cHere are gathered together about ninety short sermons, part of a\nharvest of a generous and constant sowing from the hand and heart and\nbrain of the Bishop of Washington, related to the more practical phases\nof religion.\u201d\u2014_Christian Advocate._\n\n\n                         SERMONS AND ADDRESSES\n\n\n_HOBERT D. McKEEHAN, S.T.M._ (_Editor_)\n\n           _Pastor, St. Paul\u2019s Reformed Church, Dallastown, Pa._\n\n                   Great Modern Sermons . . .     $1.50.\n\nSermons by Canon E. W. Barnes, M.A., (Westminster); David J. Burrell,\nD.D.; S. Parkes Cadman, D.D.; Harry Emerson Fosdick, D.D.; George A.\nGordon, D.D.; Newell Dwight Hillis, D.D.; John A. Hutton, D.D.;\n(Glasgow); W. R. Inge, D.D. (Dean of St. Paul\u2019s); Charles E. Jefferson,\nD.D.; John Kelman, D.D.; J. Fort Newton, D.D.; F. W. Norwood, D.D.\n(London), and Frederick F. Shannon, D.D.\n\n\n_SIDNEY M. BERRY, M.A._\n\n                            _Carr\u2019s Lane Church,\n                            Birmingham._\n\n                      Revealing Light . . .     $1.50.\n\n_The British Weekly_ says: \u201cHe is a young man\u2019s man with bold,\noptimistic outlook.... He flashes into debate like a knight entering\nbattle.\u201d\n\n_Christian Century_ says: \u201cThe secret of Dr. Berry\u2019s success is that he\nis in vital touch with life as men live it to-day.\u201d\n\n\n_MALCOLM J. McLEOD, D.D._\n\n            _Minister of The Collegiate Church of St. Nicholas,\n            New York City._\n\n                  The Revival of Wonder . . .      $1.25.\n\nDr. McLeod utilizes apt illustrations drawn from everyday life,\u2014from the\nfountains of literature and from the experiences of humanity.\n\n\u201cDr. McLeod has the gift of finding the hearts of men and women, and he\nknows how to comfort those who are in trouble and to help the\ndistressed.\u201d\u2014_Baptist Standard._\n\n\n_RT. REV. CHARLES D. WILLIAMS, D.D._\n\n                         _Late Bishop of Michigan._\n\nThe Gospel of Fellowship\n\n                 The Cole Lectures, 1923. . . .      $1.50.\n\nThe choice of Bishop Williams as Cole Lecturer was a notable one, and\nthe subject chosen by him is one eminently characteristic. Death,\nhowever, claimed the Bishop, and his lecture-course, which he left\ncompleted, was delivered by Samuel S. Marquis, D. D.\n\n\n_ROBERT J. MacALPINE, M.A., D.D._\n\n          _Minister, Central Presbyterian Church, Buffalo, N. Y._\n\n                  What Is True Religion? . . .     $1.50.\n\n\u201cThere can be no question that these addresses, here collected in\npermanent form, will bring solace, encouragement, and strength to\nstruggle onward, to many disheartened and doubting souls.\u201d\u2014_Hartford\nCourant._\n\n\n\n\n \u25cf Transcriber\u2019s Notes:\n    \u25cb Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).","title":"The reality of prayer","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":36550}