The Ministry of Intercession Part 10

PRAY WITHOUT CEASING

Helps to Intercession

=Pray without Ceasing.=--Who can do this? How can one do it who is surrounded by the cares of daily life?--How can a mother love her child without ceasing? How can the eyelid without ceasing hold itself ready to protect the eye? How can I breathe and feel and hear without ceasing?

Because all these are the functions of a healthy, natural life. And so, if the spiritual life be healthy, under the full power of the Holy Spirit, praying without ceasing will be natural.

=Pray without Ceasing.=--Does it refer to continual acts of prayer, in which we are to persevere till we obtain, or to the spirit of prayerfulness that should animate us all the day? It includes both. The example of our Lord Jesus shows us this. We have to enter our closet for special seasons of prayer; we are at times to persevere there in importunate prayer. We are also all the day to walk in G.o.d's presence, with the whole heart set upon heavenly things. Without set times of prayer the spirit of prayer will be dull and feeble. Without the continual prayerfulness the set times will not avail.

=Pray without Ceasing.=--Does that refer to prayer for ourselves or others? To both. It is because many confine it to themselves that they fail so in practising it. It is only when the branch gives itself to bear fruit, more fruit, much fruit, that it can live a healthy life, and expect a rich inflow of sap. The death of Christ brought Him to the place of everlasting intercession. Your death with Him to sin and self sets you free from the care of self, and elevates you to the dignity of intercessor--one who can get life and blessing from G.o.d for others. Know your calling; begin this your work. Give yourself wholly to it, and ere you know you will be finding something of this "_Praying always_" within you.

=Pray without Ceasing.=--How can I learn it? The best way of learning to do a thing--in fact the only way--is _to do it_. Begin by setting apart some time every day, say ten or fifteen minutes, in which you say to G.o.d and to yourself, that you come to Him now as intercessor for others.

Let it be after your morning or evening prayer, or any other time. If you cannot secure the same time every day, be not troubled. Only see that you do your work. Christ chose you and appointed you to pray for others.

If at first you do not feel any special urgency or faith or power in your prayers, let not that hinder you. Quietly tell your Lord Jesus of your feebleness; believe that the Holy Spirit is in you to teach you to pray, and be a.s.sured that if you begin, G.o.d will help you. G.o.d cannot help you unless you begin and keep on.

=Pray without Ceasing.=--How do I know what to pray for? If once you begin, and think of all the needs around you, you will soon find enough.

But to help you this little tract is issued, with subjects and hints for prayer for a month. It is meant that we should use it month by month, until we know more fully to follow the Spirit's leading, and have learnt, if need be, to make our own list of subjects, and can dispense with it. In regard to the use of these helps a few words may be needed.

=1. How to Pray.=--You notice for every day two headings--the one =What to Pray=; the other, =How to Pray=. If the subjects were only given, one might fall into the routine of mentioning names and things before G.o.d, and the work become a burden. The hints under the heading =How to Pray= are meant to remind of the spiritual nature of the work, of the need of Divine help, and to encourage faith in the certainty that G.o.d, through the Spirit, will give us grace to pray aright, and will also hear our prayer. One does not at once learn to take his place boldly, and to dare to believe that he will be heard. Therefore take a few moments each day to listen to G.o.d's voice reminding you of how certainly even you will be heard, and calling on you to pray in that faith in your Father, to claim and take the blessing you plead for. And let these words about =How to Pray= enter your hearts and occupy your thoughts at other times too. The work of intercession is Christ's great work on earth, intrusted to Him because He gave Himself a sacrifice to G.o.d for men. The work of intercession is the greatest work a Christian can do. Give yourself a sacrifice to G.o.d for men, and the work will become your glory and your joy too.

=2. What to Pray.=--Scripture calls us to pray for many things: for all saints; for all men; for kings and all rulers; for all who are in adversity; for the sending forth of labourers; for those who labour in the gospel; for all converts; for believers who have fallen into sin; for one another in our own immediate circles. The Church is now so much larger than when the New Testament was written; the number of forms of work and workers is so much greater; the needs of the Church and the world are so much better known, that we need to take time and thought to see where prayer is needed, and to what our heart is most drawn out.

The Scripture calls to prayer demand a large heart, taking in all saints, and all men, and all needs. An attempt has been made in these helps to indicate what the chief subjects are that need prayer, and that ought to interest every Christian.

It will be felt difficult by many to pray for such large spheres as are sometimes mentioned. Let it be understood that in each case we may make special intercession for our own circle of interest coming under that heading. And it is hardly needful to say, further, that where one subject appears of more special interest or urgency than another we are free for a time day after day to take up that subject. If only time be really given to intercession, and the spirit of believing intercession be cultivated, the object is attained. While, on the one hand, the heart must be enlarged at times to take in all, the more pointed and definite our prayer can be the better. With this view paper is left blank in which we can write down special pet.i.tions we desire to urge before G.o.d.

=3. Answers to Prayer.=--More than one little book has been published in which Christians may keep a register of their pet.i.tions, and note when they were answered. Room has been left on every page for this, so that more definite pet.i.tions with regard to individual souls or special spheres of work may be recorded, and the answer looked for. When we pray for all saints, or for missions in general, it is difficult to know when or how our prayer is answered, or whether our prayer has had any part in bringing the answer. It is of extreme importance that we should prove that G.o.d hears us, and to this end take note of what answers we look for, and when they come. On the day of praying for all saints, take the saints in your congregation, or in your prayer-meeting, and ask for a revival among them. Take, in connection with missions, some special station or missionary you are interested in, or more than one, and plead for blessing. And expect and look for its coming, that you may praise G.o.d.

=4. Prayer Circles.=--There is no desire in publis.h.i.+ng this invitation to intercession to add another to the many existing prayer unions or praying bands. The first object is to stir the many Christians who practically, through ignorance of their calling, or unbelief as to their prayer availing much, take but very little part in the work of intercession; and then to help those who do pray to some fuller apprehension of the greatness of the work, and the need of giving their whole strength to it. There is a circle of prayer which asks for prayer on the first day of every month for the fuller manifestation of the power of the Holy Spirit throughout the Church. I have given the words of that invitation as subject for the first day, and taken the same thought as keynote all through. The more one thinks of the need and the promise, and the greatness of the obstacles to be overcome in prayer, the more one feels it must become our life-work day by day, that to which every other interest is subordinated.

But while not forming a large prayer union, it is suggested that it may be found helpful to have small prayer circles to unite in prayer, either for one month, with some special object introduced daily along with the others, or through a year or longer, with the view of strengthening each other in the grace of intercession. If a minister were to invite some of his neighbouring brethren to join for some special requests along with the printed subjects for supplication, or a number of the more earnest members of his congregation to unite in prayer for revival, some might be trained to take their place in the great work of intercession, who now stand idle because no man hath hired them.

=5. Who is sufficient for these things?=--The more we study and try to practise this grace of intercession, the more we become overwhelmed by its greatness and our feebleness. Let every such impression lead us to listen: =My grace is sufficient for thee=, and to answer truthfully: =Our sufficiency is of G.o.d=. Take courage; it is in the intercession of Christ you are called to take part. The burden and the agony, the triumph and the victory are all His. Learn from Him, yield to His Spirit in you, to know how to pray. He gave Himself a sacrifice to G.o.d for men, that He might have the right and power of intercession. "He bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors." Let your faith rest boldly on His finished work. Let your heart wholly identify itself with Him in His death and His life. =Like Him=, give yourself =to G.o.d= a sacrifice for men: it is your highest n.o.bility, it is your true and full union to Him; it will be to you, as to Him, your power of intercession.

Beloved Christian! come and give your whole heart and life to intercession, and you will know its blessedness and its power. G.o.d asks nothing less; the world needs nothing less; Christ asks nothing less; let nothing less be what we offer to G.o.d.

FIRST DAY

WHAT TO PRAY.--For the Power of the Holy Spirit

="I bow my knees unto the Father, that He would grant you that ye may be strengthened with power through His Spirit."=--EPH. iii. 16.

="Wait for the promise of the Father."=--ACTS i. 4.

"The fuller manifestation of the grace and energy of the Blessed Spirit of G.o.d, in the removal of all that is contrary to G.o.d's revealed will, so that we grieve not the Holy Spirit, but that He may work in mightier power in the Church, for the exaltation of Christ and the blessing of souls."

G.o.d has one promise to and through His exalted Son; our Lord has one gift to His Church; the Church has one need; all prayer unites in the one pet.i.tion--the power of the Holy Spirit. Make it your one prayer.

HOW TO PRAY.--As a Child asks a Father

="If a son ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? How much more shall your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him?"=--LUKE xi. 11, 13.

Ask as simply and trustfully as a child asks bread. You can do this because ="G.o.d hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your heart, crying, Abba, Father."= This Spirit is in you to give you childlike confidence. In the faith of His praying in you, ask for the power of that holy Spirit everywhere. Mention places or circles where you specially ask it to be seen.

SPECIAL PEt.i.tIONS

SECOND DAY

WHAT TO PRAY.--For the Spirit of Supplication

="The Spirit Himself maketh intercession for us."=--ROM. viii. 26.

="I will pour out the Spirit of Supplication."=--ZECH. xii. 10.

"The evangelisation of the world depends first of all upon a revival of prayer. Deeper than the need for men--ay, deep down at the bottom of our spiritless life--is the need for the forgotten secret of prevailing, world-wide prayer."

Every child of G.o.d has the Holy Spirit in him to pray. G.o.d waits to give the Spirit in full measure. Ask for yourself, and all who join, the outpouring of the Spirit of Supplication. Ask it for your own prayer circle.

HOW TO PRAY.--In the Spirit

="With all prayer and supplication, praying at all seasons in the Spirit."=--EPH. vi. 18.