Chapter III

What place should prayer have in a Christian life? Should we pray little or much? Should we confine our praying to certain days — Sundays, for example; or to certain hours or moments of our days — mornings, for example, then evenings? Should we pray concerning certain things, certain affairs, portions only of our life? Are there things we have no permission to take to God in prayer? Should we pray only in certain places — in our accustomed closet or room at home, or in places set apart for divine worship? Is there any place where we may not pray?

There is a word of Saint Paul’s which seems to answer all these questions. “Pray without ceasing.” That means, pray always and everywhere. There is nothing we may not take to God in prayer, asking Him to help us do it. There is no hour of the day when we may not turn to God and find Him ready to hear and bless us. The gates of prayer are never shut by day or by night.

There is no place where we may not pray. God is as accessible to us on the street, in the desert, in the midst of a great storm at sea, or in the most debased spot of the earth as He is in our own sacred closet of prayer, in a consecrated building, or at the Lord’s table. “Pray without ceasing.”

But how is it possible to obey this teaching? Are we to spend all our time on our knees? This certainly is not the meaning. We have our duties, our tasks, our work to do. Suppose that men should spend all their days at home, praying, for a month, for a year, what would become of their business? What would their families do? Suppose that women should give up all their duties — their household duties, their social duties, all the work that now fills their hands — and literally pray without ceasing the remainder of their days, would they please God?

Evidently we are not to interpret the lesson that way. We are put here to work. “Six days shalt thou labor.” Our duties fill our hands every hour. We sin against God when we neglect any of these. I can conceive even of a kind of praying that would be sinful — praying when some imperative task demands attention, when some one needs help, neglecting a duty of love, that you may attend some religious service or keep some appointment for devotion. It is told in monastic legends of Saint Francesca that although she never wearied in her religious duties, yet if during her prayers she was summoned away by any domestic service, she would close her book cheerfully, saying that a wife and mother, when called upon, must quit her God at the altar to find Him in the duties and tasks of her home. There are times when prayer is not the duty of the hour. What, then, are we to understand by the counsel, “Pray without ceasing “?

For one thing, prayer is part of the expression of the Christian’s very life. One who does not pray is not a Christian, is not a religious man. He may be a moral man. A gentleman said the other day of a certain prominent business man, “He is the most moral and the least religious man I ever knew.” He meant that the man is honest, honorable, just, generous, charitable, very careful and exact in all his relations to men, but that toward God he is utterly indifferent, never thinks of Him, never recognizes Him in any way, never prays. So far as he is concerned, there is no God. This man would not himself admit as much. He would say he believes in God. But practically he is an agnostic or an atheist. He is utterly without religion, which means knowinr God, recognizing God as Father and Friend, living in personal relations with God.

When the Lord would make Ananias understand that Saul was now a Christian, he said, “Behold he prayeth.” When a man begins really to pray there is no doubt of his conversion. Saul prayed a great deal before he accepted Christ. He was a rigid Pharisee and was very religious, so far as forms of religion were concerned. But he had never prayed before as he prayed that day after he had seen Christ. The Christian should know God intimately. One writes, “I talk to God as to a companion, in prayer and praise, and our communion is joy.” That is religion, and prayer is the heart of it. It is not a matter of times and places. Wherever we go we are with God. Whatever we are doing, our hearts are oing out to Him.

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“Prayer is the Christian’s vital breath. The Christian’s native air.”

God is our Father and we are His children. We can easily think of the child of a good, noble, and loving father, who is entirely out of relations with that father. One was telling of a young man who has not spoken to his father for five years. He is estranged from him. The father is a most worthy man — the fault is not his. He has a heart of love — he loves his estranged son and longs to give him back his place of confidence and honor. But all these years the son has lived as if he had no father in the world.

God is our Father, with infinite love in His heart for us, ready and eager to help us and bless us in every way. We can cut ourselves off from Him if we will. Religion, faith, is putting ourselves in the children’s place toward God. We do not then pray to make God willing to give good things to us — He is always willing to give. The Master said: “If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father who is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?” Prayer then is going to God, believing in His love for us, knowing that He wants to help us, and asking Him as children ask their parents for the things we need.

The true child has always the child’s place in the home. He is not granted the privileges of a child only on certain days or at certain hours. To pray without ceasing is to be always in happy relations of love with our Father. One tells this pleasant incident: —

*’ My little girl to-night with childish glee,

Although her months have numbered not two score,

Escaped her nurse, and at my study door.

With tiny fingers rapping, spoke to me.

Though faint her words, I heard them tremblingly

Fall from her lips, as if the darkness bore

Its weight upon her. ‘Father’s child! ‘No more

I waited for, but straightway willingly

I brought the sweet intruder into light,

With happy laughter.”

If we always keep ourselves in the relation of children to God — loving, obedient, trustful, submissive to His will — we shall really pray without ceasing. Every act will then be a prayer. Every word will be a song of praise. All we do will then be reverent worship.

Again, to pray without ceasing is to do everything with prayer. This does not mean that every piece of work we undertake must be begun with a formal act of prayer — stopping, kneeling down, and offering a spoken petition. To pray without ceasing is to have the heart always in converse with God. It is to live so near to God that we can talk with Him wherever we go, ask Him questions and get His answers, seek His help, His wisdom, His guidance, and obtain what we ask.

There is no habit that we should more sedulously form than that of talking with God about everything we do. We are often told that we should begin every day with prayer. That is very fit and beautiful. The first face our eyes see in the morning should be Christ’s. His too should be the first voice we hear, and to Him our first words should be spoken. Henry Drummond tells us that ten minutes in the morning, yes, two minutes, spent really with Christ, will change all our day for us. A day without prayer is a day of darkness and sadness.

It is often said that we should count that day lost in which no kindness is done, no deed of love to any one, no help given. But sadder far is a day without prayer. It is a day without God, without heaven’s light shining into it, a day unblessed. The morning you forget to pray is an unhappy morning for you. One writes thus of a prayerless day: —

“The sunlight streaming o’er my temple gate
With ray beguiling, soft and fair,
Made me at dawn neglect until too late
To bar it with the wonted prayer.

Two fair-clad robbers, Duty and Delight, Won entrance and engaged my mind, While dark, unnoticed, and in rags bedight Worry and Folly crept up behind.

“To-night there’s ruin in my Holy Place, Its vessels gone, its treasures spent — Contentment, faith, and every hard-won grace Displaced and spoiled — Lord, I repent.”

But besides beginning each day with prayer, we may do each several act all the day with prayer. We may form the habit of praying at every step as we go along. That was part of St. Paul’s meaning when he said, “Whatsoever ye do, in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.” He would have us include every word we speak as well as every deed we do. Think what it would mean to have every word that passes our lips winged and blessed with prayer — always to breathe a little prayer before we speak, as we speak. This would put heavenly sweetness into all our speech. It would make all our words kindly, loving, inspiring words, words that will edify and minister grace to them that hear. We can scarcely think of one using bitter words, backbiting words, unholy words, if his heart be always full of prayer, if he have trained himself to pray always before he speaks.

But we are to do all our deeds, too, in the name of the Lord Jesus. That means that we should do everything for Him, to please Him. If we could get this lesson learned, if we would really pray without ceasing, how beautiful our lives would be! How well we should do all our work! Only think of a man in business doing all his day’s business in a spirit of prayer — breathing a little prayer as he makes a bargain, as he writes a business letter, as he talks with other men. Think of a woman amid her household cares taking everything to God for His blessing, for His approval, for His direction. These are not by any means impossible suppositions. Indeed, this is the way a Christian is to live, should always live — doing all in the name of the Lord. Jesus.

We are exhorted elsewhere, too, to make all our requests known to God in prayer. We do not know what we miss by leaving God out of so much of our life. We wonder often why we fail, why so little comes of our efforts, why we do not get along better with people, why we are not happy, why joy is so wanting in our experience, why we are so easily fretted and vexed and made discontented, why we fall so easily into surliness and bad temper. It is because we cease to pray.

“O what peace we often forfeit,
O what needless pain we bear,
All because we do not carry
Everything to God in prayer.”

You say you haven’t time to pray so much. “Haven’t time?” You have time for everything else — time for many things, perhaps, of questionable importance. Have you not time to look into God’s face for a moment before you begin a newpiece 6f work, before you make a new investment, before you start on a business trip, before you go out to spend an evening, before you open a new book? “Haven’t time?” Does it seem wasted time when you stop to eat your meals? Do you regard your hours spent in sleep as lost hours? Does being courteous waste time? Nor is time spent in getting God’s blessing ever lost time. The Sabbath hours given to worship are not wasted hours.

But really the habit of unceasing prayer does not require time. It is but looking into God’s face and saying, “Help me in this.” “Bless me as I do this.”

Francis of Assisi was mighty in prayer. God’s blessing seemed to be on everything he did, on every word he spoke. One who loved him desired to learn the secret of his devotions, and watched him to see how he prayed. All he saw was this — again and again Francis was heard saying, with bowed head and clasped hands, the name of Jesus — “Jesus! Jesus!” That was the way he prayed. He did everything in that blessed name, and all the power of Jesus was in what he did. It wastes no time to speak that name as we enter a new path, or begin a new task, or go out to a new duty. Yet that is what it is to pray without ceasing.

It is well for us to learn this lesson — to take everything to God in prayer, to pray as we go from task to task — always silently, unostentatiously. We need to guard against making a show of our praying, talking about it. But we may form the habit of putting up little wordprayers continually. When you feel an inclination to speak bitterly, to answer sharply; when you have been stung by another’s speech or act; when you are tempted to refuse a request for help, to do some selfish thing, to pass by a human need, to speak an untruth, lift up your heart in the prayer, “Jesus, help me to do thy will.” Or if you meet a sudden temptation and are in danger of being swept away, look up and cry, “Jesus, save me!”

Do you suppose that God is far off from you these days, any day? Do you suppose that Christ ever leaves you alone for an instant, anywhere you may chance to be? No, no; He is nearer to you all the time than your dearest, nearest friend, now close by your side. Believe this, and when you feel any need, any heart hunger, any sense of loneliness, the creeping over you of any shadow of danger, the coming upon you of any enemy; when you fear you will fall, or stumble, or say some word you would not say, or let some feeling into your heart you would not admit there; if you are growing discontented or discouraged, speak His name. That will be prayer enough.

It is impossible to tell of the blessing of such a spirit and habit of prayer. Those who have not learned to pray thus “without ceasing” have no conception of what they are missing. If we all had learned this lesson, what a company of overcoming Christians we would be! The world would have little power over us. We would tread it under our feet. We would be strong where now we are so weak. We would be victorious over temptation, where now we fail so sadly. If you knew that Christ was always actually walking with you, how strong you would be!

“Why, therefore, should we 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?”

Some people seem to think that all prayer is request, asking favors from God. They never go to God unless they want Him to give them something, to do something for them, or to get them out of some trouble or danger. But if we pray only when we have a favor to ask, we do not love God as we should. Really, request is but a small portion of truest praying.

You have a dear human friend whom you love very much. You greatly enjoy being with this friend. You say it strengthens you, cheers you, helps you, to spend an hour with him. Now when you are with this friend, what do you talk about? Do you do nothing but make requests and ask favors, and beg your friend to do things for you? I am quite sure that is not all you do. Ofttimes you pass the whole hour that you are together and do not make one request nor ask one favor. You commune — that is the word. You sit together, your friend and you, and talk of many things that are dear to you both. Then sometimes you do not talk at all. It is just enough to be with your friend, to have his presence near you, to look into his face, to know that he loves you. It strengthens you just to be with him.

The same is true of communion with Christ.

It is not all request. We come to Him many times with no definite favor to ask. We want just to be with Him, to look into His face, to sit in the sweet atmosphere of His presence, to let His love pour into our hearts: —

It is not prayer —

This clamor of our eager wants
That fills the air

With wearying, selfish plaints.

It is true prayer

To seek the Giver more than gift;
God’s life to share,

And love — for this our cry to lift.”

There is no lesson we need to take more to heart than this lesson of prayer. This is not a praying age. Every call is to work, to activity. We are living in most strenuous times. The pressure of active duty is tremendous. In all departments of life this is true. Men have little time for leisure. In the church, too, the call is to activity. The cry is for the evangelizing of the world. It is a missionary age in which we are living. Christians hear but little about the duty of meditation, of devotion, of prayer — they are called rather out into the field to work, to hasten the coming of the kingdom.

This is well. Every redeemed life should be consecrated to service. But there is danger in this intense activity. The danger is not that we become too strenuous in carrying the gospel to men — this never could be — but that we get too little quiet in our lives for the cultivation of our own heart piety. There must be root before there can be strong branches and much fruit We must sit at Christ’s feet to be fed before we can go out to feed others. Not a word should be said to restrain earnestness, to check enthusiasm in Christ’s work, to hold any one back from the service of Christ. But in our much serving and work we should never forget the necessity of Bible reading and communion with Christ, to prepare us for the noble work we are striving to do. All the best things of Christian life are the fruit of silent meditation.

Life is not easy for any of us. We can live grandly, purely, Christianly, only by being much with Christ. We will rob ourselves of Divine blessing, of beauty of character, of power in service, if we fail to make room in all our busy days for quiet retreats from noise and strife, where we may sit at Christ’s feet to hear His words and lie on His bosom that we may absorb His spirit, to prepare us for the toil and the witnessing.

Father Ryan, a Roman Catholic poet-priest of the South, writes thus of “the valley of silence “: —

In the hush of the valley of silence

I dream all the songs that I sing; And the music floats down the dim valley

Till each finds a word for a wing, That to hearts, like the dove of the deluge,

A message of peace they may bring.

But far out on the deep there are billows That never shall break on the beach;

And I have heard songs in the silence
That never shall float into speech;

And I have had dreams in the valley
Too lofty for language to reach.

And I have seen thoughts in the valley — Ah, me, how my spirit was stirred!

And they wear holy veils on their faces; Their footsteps can scarcely be heard:

They pass through the valley like virgins Too pure for the touch of a word.

Do you ask me the place of the valley.
Ye hearts that are harrowed by care?

It lieth afar between mountains,

And God and His angels are there:

One is the dark mountain of sorrow.
And one the bright mountain of prayer.

It is only in the “valley of silence” with Christ that we can dream the dreams and see the visions which we would translate into noble life, Christly character, and worthy deed, out among men. We must hide away much in prayer if we would get strength for valiant struggle and effective service for our Master.

IV A PARABLE OF GROWTH “I will be as the dew unto Israel; he shall blossom as the lily, and cast forth his roots as Lebanon. His branches shall spread, and his beauty shall be as the olive tree, and his smell as Lebanon.” — Hosea xiv. 5, 6.

“God’s Spirit falls on thee as dewdrops on a rose, If but like a rose to Him thy heart unclose.”

“Dear God! Let me grow from day to day, Clinging and sunny and bright! Though planted in shade, Thy window is near, And my leaves may turn to the light.”