01.B 02. The Influence of Prayer on Man
II THE INFLUENCE OF PRAYER ON MAN “It is good for me to draw near to God.” — Psalms 73:28.
Even Professor Tyndall, with all his skepticism, has said: “It is not my habit of mind to think otherwise than solemnly of the feelings which prompt to prayer.
Often unreasonable, even contemptible, in its purer forms prayer hints at disciplines which few of us can neglect without moral loss.” How true it is that we need but compare the life and bearing of the Christian much given to prayer with that of the one who thus communes but little with his Lord in order to see the quickening, purifying and elevating effects of prayer upon the soul. When Mrs. Browning asked Charles Kingsley the secret of his beautiful life, saying, *’tell me that I may make mine beautiful, too,” he replied, “I had a friend.” God pity the man who even in earthly associations has not had the companionship of some pure and genuine soul; for there are natures in close communion with whom we are conscious of a sort of baptism and consecration binding us over to a life pure and genuine like their own. Think, then, what unceasing communion with God must mean — how the soul is fixed in steadfast gaze upon His image and glory, *’ until,” as another has said, “that image is daguerreotyped, as it were, on the soul; nay, till the soul itself is “changed into the same image, from glory unto glory, as by the Spirit of the Lord.”
Many have doubtless read the beautiful story of the young girl who wore about her neck a locket that contained the secret of her own pure and beautiful life. Her character was so ripe in its loveliness that her friends wondered while they admired. Into the locket that hung continually about her neck no one had been permitted to look. At length, however, in an hour of sickness, one of her closest friends was allowed to open the sacred ornament, and there she saw the words, “ Whom having not seen I love.” That was the secret of her heavenly life; communion with the unseen Christ whom she loved had transfigured her life into a likeness with His own. To pray is to become Christ-like. But what are some of the more particular effects of prayer on the soul? It would be a lengthy task even to endeavor to mention them all, but here are some of the best, 1. Prayer enables us to realize the presence of God. Austin Phelps begins his little classic on *’The Still Hour” by quoting from Bishop Hall his lament, “ If God had not said. Blessed are those that hunger, I know not what could keep weak Christians from sinking in despair. Many times, all I can do is to complain that I want Him, and wish to recover Him.” In commenting on this pathetic utterance Austin Phelps says it only echoes the wail that has come down through all living hearts from the old patriarch when he cried, ’*Oh, that I knew where I might find Him.” This awful consciousness of the absence of God is what, so many complain, makes religious life so unreal. But was it not the Holy Spirit who said, “ Draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you”? and is not this a special promise for the hour of prayer?
He has promised to manifest Himself to those who love Him and those who really love Him will not find communion with Him tedious and irksome, for in such sweet hours it is that God becomes real as at no other time; in such hours so close does God draw nigh that you can close your eyes and see Him; in such hours we are veritably on the road to Emmaus, but we know with whom we are going. We hear others tell how they enjoy the presence of God, and we covet a like experience for ourselves, but this is no privilege for the favored few; what has been for others in this respect is also for you and me. There is a road to such experience; it is that “… Sweet hour of prayer That calls us from a world of care.”
If we would experience Edwards that inward sense of the Divine Presence which he describes as a “calm, sweet abstraction of soul from the concerns of this world in which he found himself rapt and swallowed up in God, “ it must be found in the self-same way that Edwards found it.
Truly one can see God in everything, but, after all, one can see Him best with his eyes shut. Some one has said that prayer is a closing of the eyes on things seen and opening them on things unseen. There is a legend which represents Saint Bridget engaged in holy conversation with a devout but blind nun called Dara. It was in the evening as the sun was going down, and as they talked of God and Jesus and of heaven they did not notice the hours go by until the sun came back in the morning and threw his golden light over the beautiful landscape, and then Bridget wished that Dara might see the beauties which God had made. She prayed and touched Dara’s eyes and they were opened. Dara looked at the golden sun, at the rare landscape that stretched before her, at the flowers glistening with dew drops that shone like jewels, and all the glory that was spread about her. After a while she said, “Now close my eyes again, for when the world is so visible to the eyes, God appears less clearly to the soul.”
There is a lesson here for you and me. As much as God speaks to us in the beauties and wonders of the world, it is sometimes well to shut out even the glories of nature that brighter visions still of God may fill the soul.
2. Prayer impresses the mind with the real character of God, and consequently tends to produce in us a disposition consistent therewith.
(a) It produces holiness of heart. When prayer once brings man into the felt presence of his God and reveals to him something of God’s own infinite holiness, His awe-inspiring purity and His perfect hatred of sin there, if anywhere, will he who prays learn to abhor himself, to loathe his own deep sinfulness, to repent, to cleanse his hands and purify his heart, “perfecting holiness in the fear of the Lord.”
(b) It produces humility of mind - so ornamental to Christian character. Paul was like the rest of us in one respect; in danger of being “exalted above due measure.” Job had a good deal to say about himself. It was all Job: what Job was and what Job had done, until God took him to task, told him to gird up his loins and answer a few questions, when Job learned his lesson—that he was but a worm as compared with God, and he went down in the dust and said, “I abhor myself.” When we see God’s greatness we recognize our own littleness.
(c) It produces peace of soul. It is written in the Word, “Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace whose mind in stayed on Thee, for he trusted in Thee.” Trusting in Him is something altogether different from a dumb resignation to what occurs because there is no help for it. When we come to know the heart of God, whether we fully understand His mind or not, we realize that He is a kind and compassionate and almighty Friend and that we can trust ourselves to Him amid all the storms and distractions of this world. “Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for thee,” and you will find worry giving place to a calm and quiet resting upon God for everything which He knows is best for His child to have. Every praying Christian knows this is true. It is the prayerful Christian who can sing:
“When peace like a river attendeth my way, And sorrows like sea billows roll, Whate’er be my lot, Thou hast taught me to say, It is well, it is well, with my soul.”
(d) It produces that submission of will which is one of the chief conditions of acceptable approach unto God. More elements than one enter into true religion. To be truly religious is to do the will of God. But Liddon has shown us how prayer is also religion in action. To pray is not only to put the affections in motion, the will in motion, but the understanding in motion as well. Thus in prayer one comes to see that other interests than his own are in the hands of God, that what He asks might not in the end be best, and that in view of God’s infinite wisdom He must know what is best, in view of His infinite justice He must do what is best, and in view of His perfect love He must desire what is best, and so believing with all his heart that even as God hath said, “All things work together for good to them that love Him,” he can say with becoming grace, “Thy will, O God, and not mine, be done.” God is always on our side; it is necessary sometimes to pray ourselves over to His side. It was Dr. Cuyler who said, “The pull of our prayer may not move the everlasting throne, but, like the pull on a line from the bow of a boat, it may draw us into closer fellowship with God and fuller harmony with His wise and holy will.”
3. Prayer, by directing the thoughts towards that which is holiest and best, tends to elevate and ennoble the soul. Paul tells us to think on things that are lovely and pure, on things that are honest and true, and to such things no man can direct his mind without becoming better for it. “As a man thinketh in his heart so is he.” Even a man’s face changes according to the nature of his thoughts and reflects the soul that has formed within him. It is Hillis who says, “He who sows foul thoughts shall reap the foul countenance of a fiend. He who sows pure thoughts shall reap the sweetness and nobility of the face of Fra Angelico.” Thus prayer has also its physical effects.
4. Prayer tends to keep the soul sensitive to spiritual impression and receptive to spiritual influence. Some one has painted a picture of a woman mourning by the seaside. The look on her face is that of hopeless despair as she sits on the low rocks with her eyes fixed upon the black waters beneath which the treasures of her heart have gone down. Just above her almost touching her mourning robes hovers the shadowy form of an angel with a harp filling the air about her with the soft, sweet strains of music. But the woman, absorbed in dumb, unconscious grief, is not aware of the angel’s nearness, nor does she hear the heavenly consolation his harp would speak.
Something not very different from that is sometimes true of us. We sometimes through neglect of prayer allow our minds and our hearts to become so centered on the earthly life about us, our eyes so fixed upon the dusty soil at our feet, that we are not only often unconscious of what is and what otherwise would prove for us to be the very presence of God, but our spiritual senses, through lack of exercise, are unable to appreciate what in reality is the choicest good that can come form God. But not so the one who is “instant in prayer.” Such a one God always finds with a soul open and receptive into which He can pour the blessings of His Spirit and with a soul so cultivated that His blessing are rightly appreciated when they come. The natural position of the hands when stretched out to God in prayer is with upturned palms as if to receive and hold the blessing they would have. This, too, is the attitude of the prayerful soul—ever upturned to receive what God will give.
5. Prayer impresses the mind with a becoming sense of our dependence upon God. He who is the source of our life, both physical and spiritual, is also the source of its sustenance. “In Him we live and move and have our being.” We could not live without Him, neither in the one sense nor in the other. But if we were privileged to come to God but once in many months or years, how would we not become thoughtless of God in the busy endeavor to take care of ourselves? We might keep physically alive this way: animals do. But what about our spiritual life?
It was a command of Zoroaster that his followers should at stated times extinguish the fires on their hearths and rekindle them from the sacred fire in the temple in order that they might not forget that fire was a gift from heaven. How can we not remember this of the gift of spiritual life and strength as well as physical sustenance when we are privileged to “pray without ceasing,” and are taught to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread”?
6. Prayer is a promoter of activity. It puts us at the disposal of God for our part in bringing about the thing we have desired of Him. Unless we are thus ready to be used of God we can have no guarantee that our praying has been in any sense acceptable. Prayer was never intended as a substitute for earnest self-sacrificing effort. But do you think that any one can earnestly pray, “Thy kingdom come” and then use the time God has given him as though he little cared whether it ever came or not? Do you think that any one could ever earnestly pray for the salvation of a friend without rising from his knees and seeking out if possible that friend that he might urge him to Christ and help him on his way to God? To pray in any other way may relieve somewhat the conscience of a not very conscientious Christian, but God is not deceived thereby. What labor cannot do prayer often will do, but prayer will never do what labor can do for itself, save as it inspires a man to such effect as may be necessary to do it. A pastor once said to the young people of his congregation, **I want you to spend fifteen minutes every day praying for missions; but beware how you pray, for I warn you it is a very costly experiment.” “Costly!” they asked, in surprise. “Aye, costly,” he reiterated, “when Carey began to pray for the conversion of the world, it cost him himself, and it cost those who prayed with him very much.
Brainerd prayed for the dark-skinned savages, and after two years of blessed work it cost him his life. Two students began to pray the Lord of the harvest to send forth more servants into the harvest, and lo! it is going to cost our country five thousand young men and women who have, in answer to this prayer, pledged themselves to the work. Be sure, it is a serious thing to pray in earnest for this work; you will find that you cannot pray and withhold your labor, or pray and withhold your money; nay, that your very life will no longer be your own when your prayers begin to be answered.”
Prayer always intensifies the heart’s desire and the very act of praying opens the eyes of the supplicant to the obligation upon him for the answer to the prayer he has offered.