Restraining Prayer
Job XV. 4. And restrainest prayer before God.
The duties of religion are made up of those we owe to God and our fellow-men. Among those we owe to God, prayer holds a place of high and acknowledged importance. God is the hearer of prayer. No man can be a Christian, or can ever become one, who does not seek to become so by prayer. No man who is a Christian already can grow in grace, be encouraged in his duty, strengthened in his hopes, or comforted in his trials, who cannot often say with the Psalmist, “Blessed be God who hath not turned away my prayer, nor his mercy from me.”
Yet what multitudes are there who “restrain prayer before God!” Some pray very irregularly; some seldom pray; some never pray at all.
If we search for the secret cause of restraining prayer, we shall find it in a prayerless heart; if the heart were right, men could no more live without prayer than without their daily bread. They would be irresistibly drawn to the mercy-seat by cords of love; they could not be happy without habitual fellowship with their Father who is in heaven. But there are causes for restraining prayer which are more definite than this general one, and which we shall employ a few moments in specifying.
1. In the first place, there are those who feel that they do not know how to pray. They sometimes try, but are discouraged; they have neither the grace of prayer, nor the gift. They cannot give utterance to their requests, and know not indeed what requests to utter. They can speak to their fellow-men, but cannot address the great and holy God. They are shut up whenever they attempt to do so. They are not in the habit of it; it is altogether out of their Kne of business; and were they to attempt it, it would be such a novelty, that they would be startled at the sound of their own voice. They often take the name of God in vain, but it is very difficult for them to speak of him, or to him, in earnest. They are often heard profanely to call upon God to damn them; but know not how to lift their eyes to heaven, and like the publican in the parable, smite upon their heart and say, “God be merciful to me a sinner!”
2. There are others who restrain prayer, because they are not satisfied with their prayers. They cannot make a good prayer, nor pray as well as others. They have not found in their prayers that aliment. to a proud and self-righteous heart, which they looked for. Good men also there are, who restrain prayer because they have little or no comfort in the exercise. The spirit of adoption does not always rest upon them, whereby they say, Abba, Father! They cannot always fix their minds upon the duty in which they are employed; nor upon God their portion. Their hearts are sluggish and cold, nor are their desires and affections moved, as they hoped they would be, in fellowship with their Maker. They do not enjoy these strong inducements to prayer, and the devil tempts them, and they are tempted by their own hearts, to restrain this exercise. The seasons of prayer become insipid and dull; they have no elevating, or even composing and tranquillizing views of the things that are not seen and eternal, no spiritual joys, and no light in the dark night of their affliction. And they restrain prayer before God, and say in their hearts, “What profit shall we have if we pray unto him?”
3. Some restrain prayer, because their prayers are not answered. This appointed means of blessing does not seem to obtain the blessing they seek. The answer fails, or is long delayed, and they have no courage to urge their requests, and ‘’ quietly hope, and wait for the salvation of God.”
4. Others restrain prayer, because they are so sensible of their vileness that they are persuaded God will not regard them. Their sins drive them from God, rather than to God. They are greatly distressed on account of them, and are afraid to pray. How can such a sinner as I am lift up my face before him? What hope can there be for me? It is mockery, it is insult for such a wretch to pray! The great Adversary often employs the sins of men, and their own painful sense of sin, thus to keep them away from God.
5. There is also a large class of persons who restrain prayer, because they are resolved on continuing in sin. There is great weight in the maxim, “Praying makes men leave off sinning, and sinning makes them leave off praying.” The man who is in the habit of prayer cannot pray, even if he deliberately purposes to commit any particular sin. If he attempts to go to the throne of grace, and bow his knees before God; he * cannot speak, he dare not pray; there is a struggle in his heart, and he must give up his premeditated sin, or give up prayer. “If I regard iniquity in my heart,” says the Psalmist, “the Lord will not hear me.” The commission, and much more the practice, of the most secret sin, will prove an insurmountable barrier to free access to God. Any idol sin, or cherished lust, which the sinner feels he cannot relinquish, seals the lips of prayer. It is like a corroding, wasting worm, that preys upon the heart, and eats out the desire of prayer. “He is not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness, neither shall evil dwell with him.” I add,
6. Some there are who restrain prayer, because they are not willing to follow out the spirit of their prayers in those correlative duties which their prayers suggest. There are duties suggested by their prayers, and obligations implied in them, the neglect of which is flagrantly inconsistent with their prayers. The conscience of a man who prays in his closet, is rarely so torpid, but he is sensible he ought to act up to his prayers, and to live as a man of prayer ought to live. If he does not mean to maintain a reproachless deportment before his fellow-men, he will be embarrassed in his prayers, and will probably restrain them before God. Those who are not willing and desirous to perform every Christian duty, and do not earnestly implore grace to enable them so to do, are rarely brought to their knees. Their prayers would condemn them; they are ashamed to pray. A prayerful spirit will not allow a man to remain quiet under any known sin, or the omission of any known duty. He must give no quarter to his negligence, because his negligence will give him no rest till it is either abandoned and reformed, or roots out all the spirit of prayer.
Such are some of the considerations which lead men to restrain prayer before God.
II. Let us now, in the second place, direct our thoughts to the duty of resisting this unhallowed influence, and of guarding our minds against these, and all other restraints to prayer.
The nature of prayer itself shows that it is a duty, and one which nothing may restrain. It is the dictate of nature, of reason, of conscience, and of piety; and by restraining it, we violate the strongest obligations. But to spread out this thought over a somewhat wider surface, I remark,
1. In the first place, prayer is a duty commanded by God. With all the authority with which he ever addresses men in his word, he says, “I will that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting.” Elsewhere he says, “Pray without ceasing;” — “pray with all prayer and supplication in the spirit: — “continue instant in prayer.” There is no more weighty, or powerful reason for prayer, than this command of AlmigJity God. There is, there can be no excuse for neglect of so plain a duty, and violating so plain a command; and those who violate it must be self-condemned and speechless.
2. Prayer is necessary in order to preserve a right state of moral feeling in our own hearts. Men have no sense of God’s being and government; nor of their own obligations, dependence, and sins; nor of the divine goodness and mercy, if they never pray. They can never become Christians without prayer. They live without the fear of God, and without his favor. What must be the state of that man’s mind who never asks God for anything, and never thanks him for any-RESTRAINING PRAYER. jg?
thing; who never seeks his favor, nor deprecates his wrath.
3. Prayer is the appointed means of obtaining the greatest and most needed blessings. God says, “Ask and ye shall receive.” The Saviour says, “• Whatsoever ye ask the Father in my name, he shall give it you.” No matter what our condition, or dangers, or wants, or temptations, or trials, we shall never be forsaken of God so long as we truly seek his grace. He gives blessings not a few to men who never pray; but he withholds more and greater blessings from them because they are not asked for. Do you need an enlightened mind, a tender conscience, and an humble heart; do you need the pardon of sin, and the influence of his Spirit to quicken and sanctify you; do you need Heaven’s direction from day to day, and from hour to hour, and from moment to moment; do you need peace and comfort; do you need a “friend that sticketh closer than a brother,” when all earthly friends die; forget not that no good thing will God withhold from all-powerful prayer.
4. No man is extensively useful without prayer. Prayer has wondrous influence in leading men to a useful life. They are very apt to live as they pray. Intercourse with God governs our intercourse with the world, and the men of the world. It gives firmness and decision in opposing what is wrong, in resisting false maxims, and fashionable vices; while it makes the mind steadfast and immovable in what is ridit. It wakes up the soul and makes it ready for every good work. No benevolent effort will be constant and vigorous, that is not cherished by prayer; no zeal burn with a pure and unceasing flame, that is not kindled and fed at God’s altar. Men will not rise above their own selfishness, they will not deny themselves, and give their heart, their time, their influence, their property to doing good, unless they are men of prayer. It is at the mercy-seat that the great impulse is imparted, which is the instrument of conveying great and extended blessings to this guilty world. Prayer is indispensable to prepare the mind to meet the difficulties, contend with the enemies, struggle with the dangers, and survive the discouragements which everywhere oppose the accomplishment of almost every great and good work. Prayer takes hold on Almighty strength, and allies itself with all-conquering grace. “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.”
5. Prayer is the best and surest antidote to a vain and useless confidence in an arm offiesh. It is no easy lesson to learn, that all our help must come from God. “Woe unto them who go down to Egypt for help!” “Cursed is the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord his God!” The wisest and best of the human race are worms, and no men. In want and woe, in trouble and in danger, in doubt and perplexity, compared with the Living God, “miserable comforters are they all.” “God is our refuge and strength.” No matter what our condition, our desires and aims, our plans and efforts, our hopes and fears; “except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it.” A single change in human affairs, a single change in the winds which the God of heaven holds in his fists, may spoil all our hopes in creatures. O how delightful it is to say with the Psalmist, *’ I will lift up mine eyes beyond the everlasting hills whence cometh my help: my help is in the Lord
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who made heaven and earth!” And where do creatures learn this? where do they say this? where do they feel it? It is prayer alone that thus leads the soul to God. It is no voice of creatures that can inspire us with hope; it is no created arm, faint and weary, that can give us help in danger, and make our way prosperous. Heaven’s own voice alone can say, “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire thou shalt not be burnt, neither shall the flame kindle upon thee; for I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Redeemer!” Creatures control not our condition and destiny; God can control them by a word. They cannot promise what he promises. Well did he say to the heathen, “Go and call upon your gods, and let them save thee, if they can save thee!” Nothing like prayer teaches us the vanity of all other confidence. Wonders, wonders upon wonders have been done in answer to prayer, when all around us has been full of darkness, and when human helpers have been no better than senseless idols.
G. I remark, in the sixth and last place, prayer becomes us as dying men, and men who are hasting to the judgment and eternity. Every man, not excepting the ungodly infidel, feels that he needs the divine presence and favor when he comes to die. Nothing prepares men for death and eternity, who restrain prayer. Let them neglect this appointed means of preparation, and the hour of death proves a sad hour. It is an awful spectacle to see a prayerless man die. But how tranquil the scene, how delightful the view, to see the young, or the old breathe out their departing spirits in humble and believing prayer! Who would not die in the very act of prayer, and with the very language of prayer on his lips? Men who restrain prayer in life and health, may pray when they come to die, but their prayers will be bitter prayers. They shall call, but God will not answer. To live without prayer, to be wasted by disease, or to be cut off by sudden calamity, — to be swallowed up in the grave without hope, — what a life, what a death, were this! Do not put these solemn reflections far from you, and say that they are gloomy thoughts. They are pensive and gloomy subjects because they are not thought of. Do not say you have no time to think of them; you must have time to think of them, because you must have time to die.
“stoop down my thoughts that used to rise,
Converse a while with death;
Think how a gasping mortal lies
And pants away his breath.
“Ilis quivering lip hangs feebly down,
His pulse is faint and few;
Then, speechless, with a doleful groan
He bids the world adieu.
“But O the soul that never dies!
At once it leaves the clay!
Ye thoughts pursue it where it flies,
And track its wondrous way.
“Up to the courts where angels dwell.
It mounts triumphing there;
Or devils plunge it down to hell
In infinite despair,
“And must my body faint and die ‘?
And must my soul remove ‘?
O for some guardian angel nigh,
To bear it safe above!”
The end of the man of prayer is peace. The days of his mourning are ended; his struggle with sin is over; he is dismissed from toil, and gone to his rest. They are not unthought of, unpremeditated scenes, on which he enters; death has but removed the veil, and broken down the dense wall that separated him from the God he loves, and the object of his prayers. He has come home to his Father who is in heaven. His immortal spirit is there a few hours, it may be a few moments, after it leaves its forsaken clay. Angels bear it to Abraham’s bosom. And when, from the long sleep of the tomb, he awakes, it is to stand in his presence whose favor and fellowship he so often sought and enjoyed in the present world; to behold his face in righteousness, whose love, and the light of whose countenance, so often cheered him this side the grave.
It was of men of prayer that the Saviour once said, “I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any pluck them out of my hand.” It was to men of prayer that he said, “I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go, I will come again and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.”
Ye who are men of prayer, take courage. “Go on your way, till the end be; for you shall rest, and stand in your lot, at the end of the days.” When Jesus shall come with great power and glory, and erect his throne in the clouds; when the angels shall be sent forth to gather together the men of prayer from the earth and the sea; you also shall be caught up to meet the Lord in the air, to be openly acknowledged and acquitted by your Judge, and to enter into his joy.
Ye who cast off fear and restrain prayer, must look for a diflferent allotment. Remaining as you are, you will die in your sins, make your grave with the wicked, come forth in the resurrection of the unjust, stand at the left hand of your Judge, and hear that melancholy sentence, Depart ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels. These shall go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal.
Which of these two characters, which of these two allotments, will you choose? Which life, which death, which resurrection, which place at the judgment, which allotment for eternity? And forget not this question is to be decided by another; and that is, Whether you will restrain prayer before God?