The Great Seven-Fold Prayer
r I HE sublimest argument of the Apostle Paul is that in defence of the doctrine of the Resurrection — in the fifteenth chapter of Corinthians. His sublimest expression of Christian experience is in the eighth chapter to the Romans. But no prayer which his pen has ever recorded has seemed to my mind, so wonderful in its spiritual richness and its comprehensiveness as that one which is contained in the first chapter of his Epistle to the Colossians. It covers only three verses, being a model for brevity in prayer. It contains seven distinct subjects of petition — each one of them being of the very highest magnitude.
1. The first petition for his brethren at Colosse is that they may be “filled with the knowledge of God’s will” This is a foundation-point. No one can obey God’s will until he knows what it is. The secret purposes of our Heavenly Father can not certainly be intended; for they “belong to God,’7 and to him only. The apostle evidently refers to what God is graciously ready to reveal — and that is the truths which we are to believe, and the things which we are to do. Paul prayed that God would make their rule of faith and practice very clear to them.
2. To discern the divine will clearly, and to know just what steps we should take every hour of life, requires spiritual insight. This does not refer to intellectual acumen, but to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. No richer blessing is promised to sincere believers than that the Spirit of God will illuminate and guide them. A precious gift is this indeed, by which our vision is clarified, our knowledge of right and wrong wonderfully assisted, and our consciences enlightened from above. The Spirit scatters the mists of error and doubt, and fills our souls with delightful perceptions of God, of his will, of his grace, and of our own duties hour by hour. Faith has its telescopes by which it penetrates into the unseen worlds as distinctly as the tubes of the astronomers took observations of the transit of Mercury last week. The holier our lives, the clearer will be our spiritual vision. Sin blurs and bedims the glass. If the heart be “single77 to the glory of God, and longs to do his will, our whole being shall be “filled with light.77
3. Having discovered our pathway of duty, what next? Assuredly that we should walk straightforward in it. A” worthy walk 77 signifies a life in the footsteps of Jesus, a constant and conscientious endeavor to keep his commandments. Was there ever a time when this was more vitally important than in these days of sad stumblings and disgraceful falls? He only who walks uprightly walketh surely. To set our feet squarely on the line of Christ7s commandments and to hold our course steadily on that straight and narrow track, without
a tremor of the knees, or a glance to the right hand or the left, is a glorious achievement. One such life in a community is a perpetual answer to the scoffer, a perpetual argument for the Gospel, a perpetual benediction to society. Felix Neff and Oberlin enriched their Alpine home an hundred-fold more by their beautiful and godly lives than if they had produced a whole library of sacred literature. What we most need now are honest, holy lives — sermons in shoes — men and women who keep step with Jesus in a daily walk of conformity to God’s will.
4. Such a Christian will be no barren cumberer of the ground. As the glory of a healthy apple-tree is its fruit, so the glory of a genuine Christian is his usefulness. He does not merely blossom out with a goodly profession; he bears fruit with all his might and main. There is not a sapless twig, or a barren bough on the whole tree which is planted by the rivers of grace and yield eth its fruit every month. In our old homeorchard there were many varieties of apples. So in God’s orchards there are ancient olives like Augustine and Calvin — rich, juicy “sweetings” like Rutherford and Baxter — mellow pippins grown by Leighton, Hamilton, and Taylor — and bountiful bearers like Spurgeon and Newman Hall. Even some small trees bear large fruit. Whether it be on a foreign mission field, or in an humble tract-district, or in a charity-school, or in a sick room where love moves about with gentle tread, — the fruits of the Spirit ripen under the smile of God. Herein is the Father glorified that we strive to bear fruit on every branch. We have in our mind’s eye a broadlimbed brother who is as heavy-laden at threescore and ten as when he was first grafted with grace. He is a tree that will always drop you a sweet apple of kindness for the shaking.
5. The blessings and promises of God’s Word often group themselves into sevens. So is it with this wonderful prayer of Paul. He prays for knowledge of God’s will, for spiritual insight, for consistency of conduct, for fruitfulness in every good work. Then he begs that God would bestow three other precious gifts. Those are strength — and patience (or “long-mindedness’”) and joyfulness. I wish I had time and space to dwell on each of these imperial gifts. They make up a trinity of spiritual blessings which this poverty-stricken world can neither give nor take away. Every humble follower of Jesus can possess them all. What paltry estates are such as Yanderbilt’s or Girard’s or Stewart’s — for which hungry heirs contend — in comparison with the magnificent possessions which this sevenfold prayer unfolds! Turn, my dear reader, to the chapter which contains this wonderful prayer; study it devoutly; and make it your own.