Prayer: The Secret of the Spiritual Life
"Tell me, what is the secret of your success?" was the question put to Evan Roberts, when referring to the Welsh Revival. "There is no secret," was his reply. "All that is needed is reliance on the great promise, 'Ask and ye shall receive.'" Prayer is the secret of the deeper life. Prayer is a sin-killer. No one can sin and pray, for prayer will either make us cease from sin, or sin will make us cease from prayer. Prayer is a power-bringer. It is the hand which touches the hem of the garment of Divine grace, and causes the life which is in the Divine One to flow into us. Prayer is a victory-giver. Bunyan's Christian found that the weapon of "all prayer" was sufficient to wound and defeat the adversary, who would stop him in his progress as a pilgrim. Prayer is a holiness-promoter. It is like the gentle dew which falls upon the thirsty plants, and causes them to be refreshed and to fructify. Prayer is a dispute-adjuster. Let any two brethren who are at loggerheads get on their knees, and ask the Lord about any disputed matter, and they will find the Lord saying to their troubled spirits, "Peace, be still." Prayer is an obstacle-remover, as Peter found when an angel came in answer to the prayers of the saints, and delivered him from the prison of Herod's hate; and prayer is a Christ-revealer, for it clarifies our vision, and enables us to see the unseen.
We cannot do without prayer. The spiritual life is born in prayer, and it flourishes, and is strong, as it lives in that same atmosphere.
"Why, therefore, should be do ourselves this wrong,
Or others - that we are not always strong;
That we are ever overborne with care;
That we should ever weak or heartless be,
Anxious or troubled, when with us is prayer,
And joy, and strength, and courage are with Thee?"
There are seven strands in the cable of prayer, and these are denominated in the seven words which are associated with the inner life of prayer, as revealed in the New Testament.
1. The Art of Prayer is the Prayer from the Heart. Of Elijah we read, "He prayed earnestly," or as it might read, "with prayer he prayed." His prayer was no cold and formal petition, but it was all aglow with intense and deliberate asking. He illustrates, in a striking manner, two of the essential requisites in prayer, namely, "heart" and "art." When the warm heart of earnest feeling and the holy art of definite pleading are present, there is sure to be effectual prayer.
Longfellow says: "The heart giveth grace unto every art."
George MacDonald says something similar, "Better to have the poet's heart than brain, feeling than song; but better far than both, to be a song, a music of God's making."
When the music of the Spirit's pleading is making our petition, there is sure to be the warm heart of felt need, and this at once will lead us to the art of pointed petition. The thing which made Elijah to pray as he did, was the man that he was. When our great High Priest comes with the lighted torch of His grace, and ignites the wood of our being into a holy flame, then the sweet smelling savors of our definite requests ascend acceptably to God, and bring down the benediction of His love.
We recognize that, the art of prayer is a sense of desperate need, for as an old writer has said: "It is not the arithmetic of our prayers, how many they are; not the rhetoric of our prayers, how eloquent they be; nor the geometry of our prayers, how long they be; nor the music of our prayers, how sweet our voice may be; nor the logic of our prayers, how argumentative they may be; nor the method of our prayers, how orderly they may be; nor even the theology of our prayers, how good the doctrine may be - which God cares for. Fervency of spirit is that which availeth much."
2. The Sense of Need will Make Us Sensible to the Necessity of Prayer. The Holy Spirit, like a skilled artist in painting a picture, has given to us in the words which are rendered prayer, suggestive touches as to the qualifications which go to make up its volume.
We are told, "the effectual prayer of a righteous man availeth much" (James 5:16). The word "prayer" in this instance signifies a "sense of deed." [The substantive "deesis" occurs nineteen times, and the verb "deomai" occurs twenty-three times, and in every case more or less there is a sense of need expressed in the use of the words.] The noun is rendered "supplication" in Acts 1:14, where we are told the disciples met "with one accord in prayer and supplication." They were conscious of their deep need of the Spirit's equipment for life and service; hence, they were pleading in prayer and supplication for this enduement. The verb is rendered "besought" in Luke 5:12, and "making request" in Romans 1:10. In the former passage we have described to us a man full of leprosy, who fell on his face before Christ and besought Him to cleanse him; and in the latter passage the apostle is praying that he might have a prosperous journey to the saints in Rome. In each case there is a sense of need, and an earnest desire to have that need met. We pray so little because we feel so little. If we only realized it, there are always four petitions which we could make to the Lord, as Southey says: "Four things which are not in Thy Treasury, I lay before Thee, Lord, with this petition: my nothingness, my wants, my sins, and my contrition."
The sense of our sin will make us cry out with Isaiah, "Woe is me," till we know the cleansing of the Lord's sacrifice, which removes sin from us, and fits us for future service. The consciousness of our nothingness, as we are confronted with the demoniacs of evil, will make u cry out with the Syrophenician woman, "Lord, help me"; and the wants which press us on every side, and the meager supply we have to meet them, will make us say with Andrew, as he contemplated the few loaves and fishes and compared them with the needy multitude around him, "What are these among so many?"
~F. E. Marsh~
(continued with # 4)
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