Chapter 4 starts at 47:21.
“Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.”
Luke 12:32
“But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who was made unto us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption.”
1 Corinthians 1:30
“For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only so, but ourselves also, which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body. For by hope we were saved; but hope that is seen is not hope: for who hopeth for that which he seeth? But if we hope for that which we see not, then do we with patience wait for it. And in like manner the Spirit also helpeth our infirmity: for we know not how to pray as we ought; but the Spirit Himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered; and He that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is in the mind of the Spirit, because He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that to them that love God all things work together for good, even to them that are called according to His purpose.”
Romans 8:23-28
Let me at once clear the ground by making plain what I do not mean by preparation for prayer. In this title there is no reference to any preparation which is occasional and special. For such preparation there will be no necessity in proportion as the larger preparation of the life is assured. It is a great question whether the attitude of mind which demands some recall and readjustment in order to public or private prayer is at any time one which is honouring to our Lord and Master. I am perfectly well aware that this is a somewhat startling statement, and I appeal for a careful consideration of the subject now to be dealt with that the truth concerned, may be ascertained. In the meantime I do most confidently affirm that it ought to be a perfectly natural and easy thing to turn from work or play to prayer at any time or in any place, and more-over, it seems to me increasingly, as days pass on that any work or play which makes that spontaneous prayer impossible should be abandoned at all costs and once for all. As to private prayer, believing as I do in its required constancy I cannot also believe in the necessity for any process of preparation. As to public prayer, an illustration will express in the simplest way my entire feeling on the subject. Some few years ago in a certain city in England, which shall be nameless, in preparation for special services I met the ministers and workers in conference. In the course of an address to them I said that I should be very glad if my brethren in the ministry would be on the platform with me and be ready to lead in prayer as they were asked. At the close of the meeting one minister came to me and said, “I should be so glad if you think of asking me to pray if you will let me know the day before so that I may be prepared.” I replied, “If I want you to pray I will let you know the day before.” I never asked him to pray. Some may object to this, believing that a man ought to have time to prepare to pray on such an occasion. I can only say for myself that the kind of preparation which has been very largely followed in any such case has in my judgment wrought wide-spread harm. At many of our great ecclesiastical gatherings, prayers are heard which are perfect literary productions, but which lack the passion and power which prevail. Consequently I am not dealing with the subject of how to prepare for prayer upon some special occasion. If we learn the deep secrets of prayer we shall be able to pray anywhen and anywhere. We shall fulfil the injunctions of the New Testament which startle us - Christ’s injunction, “Men ought always to pray,” and the Apostolic injunction, “Pray without ceasing.” Too often our method of dealing with such texts is a revelation of our unpreparedness for prayer. We say Christ did not really mean that men ought always to pray. He meant that they ought to pray as often as they can. He meant nothing of the kind. When He said, “Men ought always to pray,” He meant it. When the Holy Spirit speaking through the Apostle said “Pray without ceasing,” He meant it. If we can but learn the true secret of preparation we shall find that our whole life becomes prayer, that it will be impossible for us to write a letter without a lifting of the heart to God for guidance. I am inclined to think that the more we know of real prayer the less time we may spend in the external and apparent exercise thereof.
I am speaking then of the preparation which touches life, and so makes us ready for prayer at all times. Having thus attempted to clear the ground let me proceed. I propose first to put the whole statement into one brief sentence, and then examine that sentence in detail. The whole case then may thus be stated.
Preparation for prayer is secured by response in the life to the great facts which make prayer possible.
That I maintain is the inclusive philosophy of preparation for prayer. Now let us examine that statement. First of all it must be remembered that all truth is a light which reveals a pathway in which man must walk. Truth always sets up a claim, makes a demand. It is never merely a commodity which can be stored and labelled and shelved. A man cannot hold truth. Truth must hold the man. Immediately truth presents itself to a life it makes a demand upon that life. While that is so in regard to all truth it is pre-eminently the case in regard to spiritual truth. Every truth of the Christian faith taken hold of by the mind makes a call upon the will. In proportion as that claim is answered the life is sanctified. I hold the truth which holds me. Take that principle and apply it to this subject of prayer. We have seen that the platform of prayer consists of the threefold fact of the revelation of the Father, the mediation of the Son, the inspiration of the Spirit. I am prepared for prayer in proportion as I obey the claims set up upon my life by the revelation of the Father ; in proportion as I yield myself to the claims made upon my life by the mediation of the Son; in proportion as my life answers the claims set up within me by the Spirit’s indwelling and inspiration. I see the truth about God revealed in Jesus and that truth makes claims upon me. If I answer them I am by such answer prepared for prayer. I am brought into the place where I see the truth concerning Christ’s great mediatorial work. If I answer the claim that truth makes upon me I am prepared for prayer. I see the truth concerning the Spirit’s method of making intercession. If I answer that indwelling illumination, yield myself to it, refuse to quench, or resist or grieve the Spirit, and allow my life to be borne along by the great currents of the river of God, I shall be prepared to pray, bound to pray, and shall always pray. In other words, preparation for prayer is the life lived in harmony with the truth we profess to believe. It is not spasmodic, occasional; but lies rather in the preparation of the life itself and in proportion as we are living as we ought to live, we not only want to pray, we are able to pray: we not only want to pray and are able to pray, but we do pray, and that so as to prevail.
Let us consider this more particularly by application of the principle in the case of the previous study, our platform of prayer. We saw it to be of threefold significance, including the revelation of the Father, the mediation of the Son, the inspiration of the Spirit. If it be true that we are prepared for prayer as we respond to the great truths suggested by those words, we now have to ask ourselves, “What is the revelation of the Father; what the mediation of the Son; what the inspiration of the Spirit?” We need to examine these things in order to find out how far we are responsive to them, how far we are obedient, so that thus we may find out how far we are really prepared for prayer. Such questions, of course, finally involve the study of the whole of Christian doctrine but for our present practical purpose a less comprehensive inquiry will suffice. I have therefore selected the passages with which this study is prefaced, not to consider the specific teaching of each passage, but because they contain light which will help us.
Take the first of them, “Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the Kingdom.” These are the actual words of Jesus. I am not dealing with the message of encouragement they contain, great and gracious as it is and having some bearing on our subject of prayer, as it has. I desire rather to look at the verse from a purely literary standpoint, and in so doing we find that Jesus recognizes all the essential truth concerning God which He came to reveal to man. Sometimes in ordinary conversation a very general statement will reveal the speaker’s whole philosophy on a certain subject. When Jesus uttered these words He was not intending to make a revelation of the Father, but His conception of God flashes forth in great clearness and beauty. If such a statement appeared in a press issue from the pen of a modern author, a merely literary critic might be tempted to find a great deal of fault with it. I can imagine him saying, “Our author has fallen into a strange mixture of metaphors. He begins, “Fear not, little flock,” and the figure in his mind is evidently that of the shepherd and his sheep; but forgetting this, he continues, “it is your Father’s good pleasure,” showing that he has already mixed the figure of the shepherd and the sheep with that of the father and the family; and again immediately he seems to have forgotten the previous figures as he continues “to give you the Kingdom.” We know perfectly that the metaphors of Jesus never clash. In this saying there is a perfect unfolding of all the truth concerning God which Jesus came to teach man. He is revealed as the Shepherd, Father, King. The picture suggested is purely Eastern, and there can be no doubt that in many respects, Eastern conditions explain fundamental positions far more clearly than many of our Western methods do. In the Arab tribe the Sheik is at once shepherd of the flock, father of the family and king of the nation. In those figures as Jesus used them He takes us back to the original ideal of government. Through the picture of the ancient economy He reveals the eternal verities of which the material things are but the shadow upon time’s surface. We must remember that these words were spoken to His own. When He addresses those outside He calls them first to submission to the Kingship of God. No man ever found God as Father until He recognized Him as King. In speaking to His own the Master begins with the thought of the Shepherd, then passes to that of the Father, and finally to that of the King. At the heart of the revelation is the thought of the Fatherhood. We shall see that more clearly when we come to deal with the pattern prayer, the whole of which is addressed to the Father, the first half asking for the setting up of the Kingdom, and the last for the care and provision of the Shepherd. None of these things were new. There is nothing in the Gospels which had not been said in the Scriptures of the old economy. Yet everything He said was new. Men had said, “The Lord is my Shepherd” for ages, but when He said “I am the good Shepherd” men understood as they had never done before. In the midst of trouble, men had constantly sung “Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him,” but when Jesus said “Your Father knoweth,” He revealed the meaning of Fatherhood far more perfectly than the song which spoke of His pity merely. Men had recognized Jehovah as King, but Jesus came to reveal the meaning of His Kingship. Nothing was new. Everything was new. The old things blossomed into new beauty such as humanity had never dreamed of.
It is only in proportion as we answer the claims of this revelation that we are prepared for prayer. As we are loyal to the King, like unto the Father, content with the provision of the Shepherd, we are ready to pray. All this is surely self-evident. How can we pray “Thy Kingdom come,” if we are rebelling against the King? How is it that our prayer so often fails to prevail? Because we persist in praying, quite honestly, “Thy Kingdom come” and yet in our own heart we are not submissive to the King. Something in the life is permitted which is contrary to His will; something in the business, the friendships, the amusements. It is a solemn, yet awful truth that we blaspheme when we pray for the Kingdom to come and will not permit it to obtain in our own life. It is an infinitely worse thing that I should pray for God’s Kingdom to come in the world while I refuse to allow it to be set up in my heart, than it is to take His name in vain because I was born in a slum and had never learned to revere it. If prayer is not prevailing in our experience it is not because some scientific teacher has denied its possibility, but rather because we are not responding to the revelation. Of the significance of the Shepherd I would speak in all tenderness. It is when I am resting in my Shepherd’s provision that I am able to pray. If I am rebellious against my lot and persist in looking upon my work as drudgery, I cannot pray. It is the heart at leisure from itself because perfectly content with the Shepherd’s provision, that is able to pray. If I can truly say that where’er my Shepherd leads I am content because He leads; if through the desert, I am glad, for that is best if ‘tis His Will; or if He leads by waters still, I sing, not because the waters are still and the pastures green, but because He leads; then I am able to pray. I pray God to teach me that.
Jesus revealed God as Father. This fact is central and final. How do we respond to it? A child responds to fatherhood when it reproduces the father’s likeness. That is something infinitely beyond loyalty to Kingship, or content with pasture. The child inherits his father’s nature. If I am a child of God I inherit my Father’s nature. The proportion in which I yield myself thereto until it manifests itself through me is the measure of my power to pray. One illustration must suffice. How can we hope to pray so as to prevail while we call ourselves children of God, and yet nurse in our hearts bitterness and malice which are unlike God? It is only when God’s nature of love rules and reigns and inspires all our life, that we shall want to pray, and that our praying will prevail. To use the terminology of the praying man, is not to pray. To have the revelation and to answer it in loyalty to the King, in contentment with the provision of the Shepherd, in the reproduction of the Father’s likeness, that is to pray.
Take a step further and consider the response of the soul to the fact of Christ’s mediation. In his letter to the Corinthian Christians Paul had been contrasting the wisdom of men’s words with the wisdom of the Word of the Cross. Assuring them that our Gospel, while a message of foolishness to the Greeks is not devoid of wisdom, in a comprehensive statement he declares what that wisdom is, “Of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, who was made unto us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and sanctification and redemption.” Whether wisdom, righteousness, sanctification and redemption are separate and differing aspects of our Lord’s work in the believer, or whether righteousness, sanctification and redemption are but the apostle’s analysis of wisdom, the one all-inclusive word, appears to me immaterial, though personally I hold the latter interpretation. Christ is wisdom, and this wisdom of God is manifest in righteousness, sanctification and redemption. These three words cover the whole fact of Christ’s mediatorial work. They reveal the tenses of the Christian life. These tenses are indicated by three great words, righteousness, sanctification, redemption. The past tense of salvation is that experience to which I look back. When I believed Christ was imputed to me as righteousness. That was the salvation of my spirit. The present tense of salvation is that process through which I am now passing. Christ is being imparted to me as sanctification. That is the salvation of my mind. The future tense of salvation is the life which is nearer than when I believed. Christ will be implanted in me as redemption. That is the salvation of my body. The word translated redemption is always used with regard to the coming glory. The same word occurs in the letter to the Romans, “Even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for our adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.” Of course, it will be understood that I do not mean that the English word redemption is always used of the coming glory, but that the Greek word so translated is always used in this sense. It is most important that we should grasp this threefold idea of our salvation. It consists in Christ imputed as righteousness, imparted as sanctification, implanted as glorification. I was saved in the essential fact of my being, my spirit, when in answer to my faith Christ was imputed to me as the righteousness of God. I am being saved in mind or consciousness as Christ through all the discipline of the present life is being imparted to me as sanctification. I shall be saved finally when my body shall be fashioned anew in the likeness of His glorious beauty, when Christ shall be implanted within me and manifest through me. Through the mediatorial work of Jesus righteousness is made mine, sanctification is being made mine, redemption in its perfection will yet be made mine.
If we are to pray we must answer the claims of these truths. How am I to answer the claims of righteousness? By yielding myself to God as one alive from the dead. In proportion as I do that I am prepared for prayer. The dynamic of prayer is holiness, which is rectitude of character, and righteousness, which is rectitude of conduct. Rectitude of conduct can only grow out of rectitude of character. Rectitude of character is given to me potentially when Christ is imputed to me. My responsibility is that I yield myself as one alive from the dead to Jesus Christ for righteousness. How am I to respond to sanctification? Sanctification is the imparting of Christ to me, grace for grace. That is to say, every grace which is in Him, is in Him for me, and my responsibility is that I appropriate day by day what He communicates in order that He may reproduce Himself in me. When in order that I may be more perfectly conformed to His image, the indwelling Christ calls me to some new duty, some new sacrifice, some new enterprise, I must answer with ready consent. If I do, prayer prevails. If I refuse, prayer becomes impossible.
Finally, what response can I make to-day to the future tense of my life in Christ? Dr. James Denney in his book on Thessalonians says, “The attitude of expectation is the bloom, as it were, of the Christian character. Without it there is something lacking. The Christian who does not look onward and upward wants one mark of perfection. This is in all probability the point on which we should find ourselves most from home in the atmosphere of the Christian Church. Not unbelievers only, but disciples as well, have practically ceased to think of the second advent. … Yet a truth so clearly a part of Scripture teaching cannot be neglected without loss.” I believe that to be most important truth. We have been so afraid of being called otherworldly, that we have not cared even to sing hymns about heaven. It is a grave mistake. We have been so afraid that some one would name us star-gazers, that we have abandoned all speech concerning the second advent. Yet the only light that we can ever shed upon the darkness of the world must be light beaming from the face lifted towards God’s to-morrow. In the matter of prayer this is of supreme importance. To pray with prevailing power there must be the vision of the morning breaking in the Eastern sky. It is the man who sees the coming glory who knows what it is to put blood and sacrifice into the business of establishing that Kingdom here. In order to pray prevailingly, I must live in the power of the hope that maketh not ashamed, having my face ever lifted towards the light while I yet look at the sorrow around me, and serve diligently the will of my King.
Once again, there must be response to the Spirit. I am not now proposing to deal with the whole of the Spirit’s work, but with that whereby He creates intercession. I would suggest three words as helpful in following the line of thought. They are, interpretation, consciousness, desire. The Spirit of God indwelling interprets. His interpretation creates a consciousness. That consciousness creates a desire, and that is prayer.
- Prayer is the soul’s sincere desireUttered or unexpressed;The motion of a hidden fireThat trembles in the breast.
The indwelling Spirit knows the will of God and interprets it to the soul in whom He abides. This He does by unveiling Christ, who is the revelation of the will of God to me. As He was the Word of God incarnate. He was the will of God incarnate. I come to Him that I may see what is God’s will for myself and for all men; that I may understand what is God’s purpose concerning the whole world. As we look out upon the movements of the hour and upon all the facts of life, the indwelling Spirit sets them in relation to the will of God, and a keen consciousness is born within us of the failure in the midst of which we live. Thus the Spirit makes intercession in us with groaning which cannot be uttered as He gives us this new consciousness of the limitation and paralysis of all life without God. As the Spirit interprets to us the will of God, He shows the disaster of being out of harmony with that will. As the Spirit interprets the will of God, therefore. He makes the soul profoundly discontented with everything that is contrary thereto, and this because of the soul’s supreme content with the good and perfect and acceptable will of God. That is what the apostle meant when he wrote, “The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only so, but ourselves also, which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves.” Faber sang this sublime and overwhelming truth in simplest words, “Earth’s sorrows are most keenly felt in heaven.” The heavenly people are, therefore, those who most acutely feel earth’s sorrows and are able to enter into fellowship with God in prayer for the winning of the victories of His love. Following consciousness of discontent is that of desire for the coming of the Kingdom, for the setting up of the will of God, which means the healing of wounds and the breaking of chains.
To that work of the indwelling Spirit there must be ready response. “Quench not the Spirit.” When the Spirit interprets the will of God for life, for home, for city, for nation, we must listen to no other philosophy, be seduced by no other ideal. As the glories of that Kingdom flame and flash before us, we must never be turned aside by the glamour of the things of the world, the flesh and the devil. Answer the Spirit. Let Him teach. Let Him show the vision. Believe the Spirit. “Quench not the Spirit.”
But more, infinitely more. When the Spirit revealing the will of God for the world creates in the heart a great pain and a great discontent, do not let us check it. That is what Christian men and women, alas, are too constantly doing. When the story of the sin and sorrow of humanity is told, they close their ears and are not willing to share in the pain. That is to grieve the Spirit indeed. We ought to hear. We ought to know. We ought to be ready to bring the new sensitiveness of our Christian life into close touch with the world’s agony until we feel its pain as our very own. The Spirit desires that we should know its sorrow. His work is to interpret to us the meaning of the sob and sigh and the agony of the world. When we feel that, there will spring out of our life a new desire which will drive us to prayer that God’s Kingdom may come, and to self-sacrificing service without which such prayer is blasphemy. Thus we shall begin to sob with God and to God, in our sense of the world’s sorrow. Out of such prayer the toil and travail come which bring the Kingdom in.
Thus it will be seen that preparation for prayer is no slight, spasmodic process. It is the supreme matter of life. Yet, thank God, we can, if we will, respond to this revelation, mediation and inspiration so as to pray with prevailing power.