Part 8

How are we to obtain the Holy Spirit so freely promised to those who seek Him believingly? Wait, press, and persevere with all the calmness and with all the ardour of a faith which knows no fear, which allows no doubt, a faith which staggers not at the promise through unbelief, a faith which in its darkest and most depressed hours against hope believes in hope, which is brightened by hope and strengthened by hope, and which is saved by hope.

Wait and pray—here is the key which unlocks every castle of despair, and which opens every treasure-store of God. It is the simplicity of the child’s asking of the Father, who gives with a largeness, liberality, and cheerfulness, infinitely above everything ever known to earthly parents. Ask for the Holy Spirit—seek for the Holy Spirit—knock for the Holy Spirit. He is the Father’s greatest gift for the child’s greatest need.

In these three words, “ask,” “seek” and “knock,” given us by Christ, we have the repetition of the advancing steps of insistency and effort. He is laying Himself out in command and promise in the strongest way, showing us that if we will lay ourselves out in prayer and will persevere, rising to higher and stronger attitudes and sinking to deeper depths of intensity and effort, that the answer must inevitably come. So that it is true the stars would fail to shine before the asking, the seeking and the knocking would fail to obtain what is needed and desired.

There is no elect company here, only the election of undismayed, importunate, never-fainting effort in prayer: “For to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.” Nothing can be stronger than this declaration assuring us of the answer unless it be the promise upon which it is based, “And I say unto you, ask and it shall be given you.”

XIV THE HOLY SPIRIT OUR HELPER IN PRAYER

_We must pray in the Spirit, in the Holy Ghost, if we would pray at all. Lay this, I beseech you, to heart. Do not address yourselves to prayer as to a work to be accomplished in your own natural strength. It is a work of God, of God the Holy Ghost, a work of His in you and by you, and in which you must be fellow-workers with Him—but His work notwithstanding._—ARCHBISHOP TRENCH.

One of the revelations of the New Testament concerning the Holy Spirit is that He is our helper in prayer. So we have in the following incident in our Lord’s life the close connection between the Holy Spirit’s work and prayer:

“At that time Jesus rejoiced in spirit and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes; even so, Father, for it seemed good in thy sight.”—Luke 10:21.

Here we have revelations of what God is to us. Only the child’s heart can know the Father, and only the child’s heart can reveal the Father. It is by prayer only that all things are delivered to us by the Father through the Son. It is only by prayer that all things are revealed to us by the Father and by the Son. It is only in prayer that the Father gives Himself to us, which is much more every way than all other things whatsoever.

The Revised Version reads: “At that same hour Jesus rejoiced in the Holy Spirit.” This sets forth that great truth not generally known, or if known, ignored, that Jesus Christ was generally led by the Holy Spirit, and that His joy and His praying, as well as His working, and His life, were under the inspiration, law and guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Turn to and read this passage:

Romans 8:26—“Likewise the spirit also helpeth our infirmities; for we know not what we should pray for as we ought.”

This text is most pregnant and vital, and needs to be quoted. Patience, hope and waiting help us in prayer. But the greatest and the divinest of all helpers is the Holy Spirit. He takes hold of things for us. We are dark and confused, ignorant and weak in many things, in fact in everything pertaining to the Heavenly life, especially in the simple service of prayer. There is an “ought” on us, an obligation, a necessity to pray, a spiritual necessity upon us of the most absolute and imperative kind. But we do not feel the obligation and have no ability to meet it. The Holy Spirit helps us in our weaknesses, gives wisdom to our ignorance, turns ignorance into wisdom, and changes our weakness into strength. The Spirit Himself does this. He helps and takes hold with us as we tug and toil. He adds His wisdom to our ignorance, gives His strength to our weakness. He pleads for us and in us. He quickens, illumines and inspires our prayers. He indites and elevates the matter of our prayers, and inspires the words and feelings of our prayers. He works mightily in us so that we can pray mightily. He enables us to pray always and ever according to the will of God.

In I John 5:14 we have these words:

“And this is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask anything according to his will, he heareth us:

“And if we know that he hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him.”

That which gives us boldness and so much freedom and fullness of approach toward God, the fact and basis of that boldness and liberty of approach, is that we are asking “according to the will of God.” This does not mean submission, but conformity. “According to” means after the standard, conformity, agreement. We have boldness and all freedom of access to God because we are praying in conformity to His will. God records His general will in His Word, but He has this special work in praying for us to do. His “things are prepared for us,” as the prophet says, who “wait upon him.” How can we know the will of God in our praying? What are the things which God designs specially for us to do and pray? The Holy Spirit reveals them to us perpetually.

“The Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.

“And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the spirit because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.” Combine this text with those words of Paul in First Corinthians, second chapter, eighth verse and what follows:

“But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.

“But God hath revealed them unto us by his spirit; for the spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.

“For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the spirit of God.

“Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.

“Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth, comparing spiritual things with spiritual.

“But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

“But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.

“For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.”

“Revealed to us by the Spirit.” Note those words. God searches the heart where the Spirit dwells and knows the mind of the Spirit. The Spirit who dwells in our hearts searches the deep purposes and the will of God to us, and reveals those purposes and that will of God, “that we might know the things which are freely given to us of God.” Our spirits are so fully indwelt by the Spirit of God, so responsive and obedient to His illumination and to His will, that we ask with holy boldness and freedom the things which the Spirit of God has shown us as the will of God, and faith is assured. Then “we know that we have the petitions that we have asked.”

The natural man prays, but prays according to his own will, fancy and desire. If he has ardent desires and groanings, they are the fire and agony of nature simply, and not that of the Spirit. What a world of natural praying there is, which is selfish, self-centered, self-inspired! The Spirit, when He prays through us, or helps us to meet the mighty “oughtness” of right praying, trims our praying down to the will of God, and then we give heart and expression to His unutterable groanings. Then we have the mind of Christ, and pray as He would pray. His thoughts, purposes and desires are our desires, purposes and thoughts.

This is not a new and different Bible from that which we already have, but it is the Bible we have, applied personally by the Spirit of God. It is not new texts, but rather the Spirit’s embellishing of certain texts for us at the time.

It is the unfolding of the word by the Spirit’s light, guidance, teaching, enabling us to perform the great office of intercessors on earth, in harmony with the great intercessions of Jesus Christ at the Father’s right hand in Heaven.

We have in the Holy Spirit an illustration and an enabler of what this intercession is and ought to be. We are charged to supplicate in the Spirit and to pray in the Holy Spirit. We are reminded that the Holy Spirit “helpeth our infirmities,” and that while intercession is an art of so Divine and so high a nature that though we know not what to pray for as we ought, yet the Spirit teaches us this Heavenly science, by making intercession in us “with groanings which cannot be uttered.” How burdened these intercessions of the Holy Spirit! How profoundly He feels the world’s sin, the world’s woe, and the world’s loss, and how deeply He sympathises with the dire conditions, are seen in His groanings which are too deep for utterance and too sacred to be voiced by Him. He inspires us to this most Divine work of intercession, and His strength enables us to sigh unto God for the oppressed, the burdened and the distressed creation. The Holy Spirit helps us in many ways.

How intense will be the intercessions of the saints who supplicate in the spirit! How vain and delusive and how utterly fruitless and inefficient are prayers without the Spirit! Official prayers they may be, fitted for state occasions, beautiful and courtly, but worth less than nothing as God values prayer.

It is our unfainting praying which will help the Holy Spirit to His mightiest work in us, and at the same time He helps us to these strenuous and exalted efforts in prayer.

We can and do pray by many inspirations and in many ways which are not of God. Many prayers are stereotyped in manner and in matter, in part, if not as a whole. Many prayers are hearty and vehement, but it is natural heartiness and a fleshly vehemence. Much praying is done by dint of habit and through form. Habit is a second nature and holds to the good, when so directed, as well as to the bad. The habit of praying is a good habit, and should be early and strongly formed; but to pray by habit merely is to destroy the life of prayer and allow it to degenerate into a hollow and sham-producing form. Habit may form the bank for the river of prayer, but there must be a strong, deep, pure current, crystal and life-giving, flowing between these two banks. Hannah multiplied her praying, “but she poured out her soul before the Lord.” We cannot make our prayer habits too marked and controlling if the life-waters be full and overflow the banks.

Our divine example in praying is the Son of God. Our Divine Helper in praying is the Holy Spirit. He quickens us to pray and helps us in praying. Acceptable prayer must be begun and carried on by His presence and inspiration. We are enjoined in the Holy Scriptures to “pray in the Holy Ghost.” We are charged to “pray always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit.” We are reminded for our encouragement, that “Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities; for we know not what we should pray for as we ought; but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.” “And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.”

So ignorant are we in this matter of prayer; so impotent are all other teachers to impart its lessons to our understanding and heart, that the Holy Spirit comes as the infallible and all-wise teacher to instruct us in this divine art. “To pray with all your heart and all your strength, with the reason and the will, this is the greatest achievement of the Christian warfare on earth.” This is what we are taught to do and enabled to do by the Holy Spirit. If no man can say that Jesus is the Christ but by the Spirit’s help; for the much greater reason can no man pray save by the aid of God’s Spirit. Our mother’s lips, now sealed by death, taught us many sweet lessons of prayer; prayers which have bound and held our hearts like golden threads; but these prayers, flowing through the natural channel of a mother’s love, can not serve the purposes of our manhood’s warring, stormy life. These maternal lessons are but the A B C of praying. For the higher and graduating lessons in prayer we must have the Holy Spirit. He only can unfold to us the mysteries of the prayer-life, its duty and its service.

To pray by the Holy Spirit we must have Him always. He does not, like earthly teachers, teach us the lesson and then withdraw. He stays to help us practise the lesson He has taught. We pray, not by the precepts and lessons He has taught, but we pray by Him. He is both teacher and lesson. We can only know the lesson because He is ever with us to inspire, to illumine, to explain, to help us to do. We pray not by the truth the Holy Spirit reveals to us, but we pray by the actual presence of the Holy Spirit. He puts the desire in our hearts; kindles that desire by His own flame. We simply give lip and voice and heart to His unutterable groanings. Our prayers are taken up by Him and energised and sanctified by His intercession. He prays for us, through us and in us. We pray by Him, through Him and in Him. He puts the prayer in us and we give it utterance and heart.

We always pray according to the will of God when the Holy Spirit helps our praying. He prays through us only “according to the will of God.” If our prayers are not according to the will of God they die in the presence of the Holy Spirit. He gives such prayers no countenance, no help. Discountenanced and unhelped by Him, prayers, not according to God’s will, soon die out of every heart where the Holy Spirit dwells.

We must, as Jude says, “Pray in the Holy Ghost.” As Paul says, “with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit.” Never forgetting that “the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities; for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.” Above all, over all, and through all our praying there must be the Name of Christ, which includes the power of His blood, the energy of His intercession, the fullness of the enthroned Christ. “Whatsoever ye ask in my name that will I do.”

XV THE TWO COMFORTERS AND TWO ADVOCATES

_If we were asked whose Comforter the Holy Spirit was, the answer would be—Ours. The answer is not so ready when we are asked whose Advocate He is. The Spirit is Christ’s Advocate, not ours. It is Christ’s place He takes, Christ’s cause He pleads, Christ’s name He vindicates, Christ’s Kingdom He administers._—SAMUEL CHADWICK.

The fact that man has two Divine Comforters, Advocates, Helpers, is declarative of the affluence of God’s provisions in the gospel, and also declarative of the settled purpose of God to execute His work of salvation with efficacy and final success. Many-sided are the infirmities and needs of man in his pilgrimage and warfare for Heaven. These two Christs can meet with manifold wisdom.

The affluence of God’s provision of two Intercessors in executing the plan of salvation finds its counterpart in the prayer promise in its unlimited nature, comprehending all things, great and small. “All things whatsoever ye ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.” All things we have in Christ, all things we have in the Holy Spirit, and all things we have in prayer.

How much is ours in God’s plan and purposes we have in these two Christs, the one ascended to Heaven and enthroned, there to intercede for our benefit, the other Christ, His Representative, and better Substitute, on earth, to work in us and make intercessions for us!

The first Christ was a person. The other Christ, a person, but not clothed in physical form nor subject to human limitations as the first Christ necessarily was. Transient and local was the first Christ. The other Christ not limited to locality, not transient, but abiding; not dealing with the sensible, the material, the fleshly, but entering personally into the mysterious and imperial domain of the spirit, to emancipate and transform into more than Eden beauty that waste and dark realm. The first Christ left His novitiates that they might enter into higher regions of spiritual knowledge. The man Christ withdrew that the Spirit Christ might train and school into the deeper mysteries of God; that all the historical and physical might be transmuted into the pure gold of the spiritual. The first Christ brought to us a picture of what we must be. The other Christ mirrored this perfect and fadeless image on our hearts. The first Christ, like David, gathered and furnished the material for the temple. The other Christ out of this material forms God’s glorious temple.

The possibilities of prayer, then, are the possibilities of these two Divine Intercessors. Where are the limitations to results when the Holy Spirit intercedes for us with groanings which cannot be uttered, when He so helps us that our prayers run parallel to the will of God, and we pray for the very things and in the very manner in which we ought to pray, schooled in and pressed to these prayers by the urgency of the Holy Spirit! How measureless are the possibilities of prayer when we are filled with all the fullness of God; when we stand “perfect and complete in all the will of God”?

If the intercession of Moses so wondrously preserved the being and safety of Israel throughout its marvelous history and destiny, what may we not secure through our Intercessor, who is so much greater than Moses? All that God has lies open to Christ through prayer. All that Christ has lies open to us through prayer.

If we have the two Christs covering the whole realm of goodness, power, purity and glory, in Heaven and on earth—if we have the better Christ with us here in this world—why is it that we sigh to know the Christ after the flesh as the disciples knew Him? Why is it that the mighty work of these two Almighty Intercessors finds us so barren of Heavenly fruit, so feeble in all Christly principles, so low in the Christly life, and so marred in the Christly image? Is it not because our prayers for the Holy Spirit have been so faint and few? The Heavenly Christ can only come to us in full beauty and power when we have received the fullness of the present earthly Christ, even the Holy Spirit.

Living always the life of prayer, breathing always the spirit of prayer, being always in the fact of prayer, praying always in the Holy Spirit, the Heavenly Christ would become ours by a clearer vision, a deeper love, and a more intimate fellowship than He was to His disciples in the days of His flesh.

We would not disguise nor abate the fact that there is a loss to us by our absent Christ as we will see and know Him in Heaven. But in our earthly work to be done by us, and above all to be done in us, we will know Christ and the Father better, and can better utilise them by the ministry of the Holy Spirit than would have been possible under the personal, human presence of the Son. So to the loving and obedient ones who are filled with the Spirit, both the Father and the Son “Will come unto us and make their abode with us.” In the day of the fullness of the indwelling Spirit, “Ye shall know that I am in my Father and ye in me and I in you.” Amazing oneness and harmony, wrought by the almighty power of the other Christ!

There is not a note in the archangel’s song to which the Holy Spirit does not attune man into sympathy, not a pulsation in the heart of God to which the Holy Spirit-filled heart does not respond with loud amens and joyful hallelujahs. Even more than this, by the other Christ, the Holy Ghost, “we know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge.” More than this, by the Holy Spirit we are “filled with all the fullness of God.” More than this, God is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power of the Holy Spirit which worketh in us.

The presence and power of the other Christ would more than compensate the disciples for the loss of the first Christ. His going away had filled their hearts with a strange sorrow. A loneliness and desolation like an orphan’s woe had swept over their hearts and stunned and bewildered them; but He comforted them by telling them that the Holy Ghost would be like the pains of a travailing mother, all forgotten in the untold joy that a man-child was born into the world.

XVI PRAYER AND THE HOLY GHOST DISPENSATION

_How God needs, how the world needs, how the Church needs the flow of the mighty river, more blessed than the Nile, deeper, broader and more overflowing than the Amazon’s mighty current! and yet what mere rills we are! We need, the age needs, the Church needs, memorials of God’s mighty power, which will silence the enemy and the avenger, dumbfound God’s foes, strengthen weak saints, and fill strong ones with triumphant raptures._

—EDWARD BOUNDS.

The dispensation of the Holy Ghost was ushered in by prayer. Read these words from Acts 1:13—“And when they were come in, they went up into an upper room where abode both Peter and James and John and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James, the son of Alpheus, and Simon Zelotes, and Judas, the brother of James. These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women, and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.”

This was the attitude which the disciples assumed after Jesus had ascended to Heaven. That meeting for prayer ushered in the dispensation of the Holy Spirit, to which prophets had looked forward with entranced vision. And to prayer in a marked way has this dispensation, which holds in its keeping the fortune of the Gospel, been committed.

Apostolic men knew well the worth of prayer and were jealous of the most sacred offices which infringed on their time and strength and hindered them from “giving themselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the Word.” They put prayer first. The Word depends on prayer that it “may have free course and be glorified.” Praying apostles make preaching apostles. Prayer gives edge, entrance and weight to the Word. Sermons conceived by prayer and saturated with prayer are weighty sermons. Sermons may be ponderous with thought, sparkle with the gems of genius and of taste, pleasing and popular, but without they have their birth and life in prayer, for God’s uses, they are trifles, dull and dead.

The Lord of the harvest sends out labourers, full in number and perfect in kind, in answer to prayer. It needs no prophetic ken to declare that if the Church had used prayer force to its utmost the light of the gospel would have long since girdled the world.