Part 5

{84} Our lives upon the earth are full of illustrations of how necessary it is for us to put ourselves into perfect harmony with our environments when we wish to attain certain ends. If we wish to mingle with so-called society, we must conform to the artificial standards of society in dress, and manners, and speech, and many other things; otherwise, we become outcasts from society and are despised. Or again, if we set up an apparatus for wireless telegraphy, we must, whether we like it or not, make all connections close and in proper way, and we must use the right kind of materials in both the transmitting and the receiving instruments; otherwise, we can neither send nor receive messages. If in the society of men, and in the application of the principles of science, it is so urgently necessary to observe the rules of society and the laws of science, it is very easy to understand that, if we would come into close and constant touch with God, we must observe also the laws of such divine communion. Anything at all that might come between one and real communion with God would be disastrous. Indeed, in the teaching of Jesus, it would constitute the greatest sorrow, the greatest tragedy in human existence. Since it is life eternal to know God, not to know Him, not to find Him, is loss eternal. Although a man may prosper, then, in this life--although he may find his life, as it were, in this world--yet shall he lose it eternally, if he has not found God. If we stop now, and think this out clearly, we may understand very easily what Jesus meant when He said to His disciples, "He {85} that findeth his life, shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for my sake, shall find it."

[Sidenote: Three forms of temptation.]

We may now ask ourselves, What is likely to come between us and close touch with God, to prevent us from finding God, and thus to prevent us from gaining life eternal? You will recall what we have already learned about the temptation of Jesus. The devil tempted Jesus first through the physical, the bodily, appetites; then through the desire, the love of wordly praise; and lastly, through the love of worldly power and riches. It was these very forms of temptation that Jesus feared might come between man and God. Especially did He fear that the love of the praise of men might tempt people and bring about their destruction. So, as He taught one time those who followed Him, He explained to them the right attitude in worship.

[Sidenote: Instruction in praying and alms-giving.]

"Take heed that ye do not your alms before men," said Jesus, "to be seen of them; otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. Therefore, when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth: that thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret Himself shall reward thee openly.

"And when thou prayest," said Jesus further, "thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to {86} pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly."

"Moreover," continued Jesus, touching the third conventional form of worship, "when ye fast, be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance: for they disfigure their faces, that they may appear unto men to fast. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. But thou, when thou fastest, anoint thine head, and wash thy face; that thou appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy Father which is in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly."

[Sidenote: The real value of worship.]

Now, it is not necessary to think that these sayings of Jesus are to be taken literally. It is not absolutely necessary that, in order to pray in secret, one should retire to his chamber and shut the door, then pray; nor is it absolutely necessary that, in fasting, one should anoint one's head and wash one's face. Jesus used these figures merely to portray a condition opposite to that assumed by the hypocrites. But Jesus wanted to teach that the value of worship depends upon the motive that inspires it. If one gives alms to be seen of men and to be praised therefore, one's reward lies there in the praise one receives. God will bestow no other favor. Likewise, those who pray and fast to be praised of men, get their reward in the worldly praise they receive. They have not found God. They {87} are not in real, vital touch with Him. Worldly ambitions have come between them and Him. In gaining the life of this world they have lost life eternal. They have yielded to the temptation of mere ostentation and display. And this spirit has entered unfortunately, into the service of many churches. "Obviously," says a noted student of the Bible, "many of the elaborate forms and ceremonies which have developed in connection with the worship of the Christian Church are contrary to His (Jesus's) spirit and teachings. Only in so far as they lead the individual into closer personal touch with God are they justifiable or of real value."

[Sidenote: Humility and sincerity.]

What then is the right attitude in worship? God Himself has declared, you remember, that those who worship Him must do so in spirit and in truth. The motive of worship is of more importance than the form. The value of worship lies in humility, in laying aside all worldly ambitions, in approaching close to God for the sole purpose of communing with Him. It is better to lose one's worldly life in the service of God, than to gain that worldly life and fail to find God; for he who thus loses the worldly life, shall find life eternal.

"I give unto you these sayings," said Jesus once to Joseph the Prophet, "that ye may understand and know how to worship, and know what you worship, that you may come unto the Father in my name, and in due time receive of His fulness; for if you keep my commandments you shall receive of His fulness, and be glorified in me as I am in the Father; therefore, I say unto you, you shall receive grace for grace."

{88} THE REFERENCES

Matt. 10:39. Matt. 6:5, 6.

Matt. 6:1-4. Matt. 6:16-18.

Doc. and Cov. 93:19, 20.

THE QUESTIONS

1. What did Jesus mean by the saying "He that findeth his life shall lose it?"

2. What is the chief thing in a man's life?

3. Show how it is necessary to put ourselves in harmony with our environments.

4. What is likely to come between us and close communion with God?

5. What is right attitude in worship?

6. Wherein lies the value of worship?

{89}

{90} PICTURE: JESUS PRAYING, Liska

{91}

XII

HOW TO PRAY

"And it came to pass, that, as (Jesus) was praying in a certain place, when He ceased, one of His disciples said unto Him, Lord teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.

"And He said unto them, When ye pray, say,

[Sidenote: The Lord's prayer.]

"Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. Give us day by day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins: for we also forgive everyone that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil."

This is the wonderfully simple prayer uttered by the Lord Himself--a prayer that has guided the faith of Christians since first it was spoken. You may have learned it as the disciple Matthew has recorded it. Matthew's version is just a little different from Luke's, which is here given. But Luke's version makes two or three points just a little clearer, perhaps, than does Matthew's; so, we shall use it for our text in this lesson.

[Sidenote: Jesus had found God.]

According to St. Luke, Jesus gave this prayer to His disciples in response to the request, "Lord, teach us to pray." You have observed, of course, that Jesus prayed often. He lived in close communion with the Father in heaven. He Himself had found God; and He knew that God will answer the prayer of the righteous. He knew, too, that only through the prayer of faith can a man come close to God, and obtain in full the blessings that {92} belong to him as a son of God. Therefore, Jesus prayed often, and as no other man has prayed.

[Sidenote: The prayers of the Jews.]

But if you will study carefully the prayers of Jesus, and compare them with other prayers preserved in the records of the Jews, you will find His prayers quite different from those other prayers. The prayers used anciently--and still used--in the Jewish service are very beautiful, noble in their faith and devotion. But they were distinctly the prayers of a special people, inspired by the thought that this special people was also a chosen, a select people. The type prayer which Jesus gave, on the other hand, while individual is yet universal in its appeal, and in its application; it is concrete and practical, yet it is profoundly spiritual. Of course, it was not intended by Jesus that all men should repeat this prayer only and no other. He gave it merely as a type, a model. Certainly, then, if we wish to know how to frame our own prayers, it will be well to analyze this one.

First, then, you will observe that this prayer possesses the characteristics that distinguish most of Jesus's prayers.

[Sidenote: The prayer of Jesus.]

It is brief.

It is direct.

It is sincere.

It is unselfish.

It expresses a simple, unshakable confidence in the goodness of God.

Jesus addresses God as Father. So should man address God. Man should learn to think of God as the Father of our spirits, and go to Him with the same simple trust and confidence manifested by a little child {93} when it runs with outstretched arms to its earthly father. Jesus felt and manifested that perfect unity between father and son.

[Sidenote: The Lord's prayer analyzed.]

"Hallowed be Thy name." In this phrase, Jesus taught that we should recognize the sanctity of the name of Jehovah, and at the same time that we should show our reverence and devotion. This is a personal, individual and profound emotion on the part of him who prays sincerely.

Then Jesus prayed, "Thy kingdom come." Perhaps you do not fully realize what this petition means when you repeat it in your prayers. What is the use of praying for the kingdom of God to come to earth if we do not help in its establishment? When we utter this petition, then, we virtually promise that we ourselves will do all in our power to help. Only then can God's will be done, "as in heaven, so in earth." And the doing of the will of God is, throughout the teachings of Jesus, the essential element in the establishment of God's reign.

These petitions, you will notice, are of universal interest. Now, Jesus asks for that which will meet and satisfy personal needs. "Give us day by day our daily bread." But even here, the petition is an expression of implicit confidence in God's power to provide, and in His unlimited love, rather than merely a request for some specific gift. Its meaning has been interpreted in these words: "Provide for us each day that which Thou, in Thy Fatherly care and wisdom, seeth is needful for us."

The fourth petition is also full of meaning. "Forgive us our sins; for we also forgive everyone that is indebted to us." Jesus emphasized time and again in His ministry the necessity of forgiving others, if we would ourselves be {94} forgiven. Only in a spirit of humility and sincere worship can we approach the throne of God.

The last petition has been often misunderstood. "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." Certainly the words as they are here recorded do not clearly represent the meaning of Jesus. Yet, perhaps, even in the days of the apostles some people had failed to understand. For James wrote once, "Let no man, who is being tempted, say, 'my temptation is from God,' for God is not to be tempted Himself by evil and He tempts no man, but each man is tempted with evil when he is drawn away by his own lusts and enticed." The petition in the Lord's prayer is, therefore, a petition for strength to overcome. Its meaning is, "Deliver us from temptations which we can not withstand." Or, as our own Prophet has phrased it, "Leave us not in temptation, but deliver us from evil."

[Sidenote: Teach us to pray.]

These general points in the type prayer given by Jesus, it is well to remember. God is not to be reached by many words. It is the broken spirit and the contrite heart that call down the love of the Father. Neither will the hollow, selfish prayer please the Father of us all. But as we pray, finding our own words in which to express the desires of our hearts, let us remember the characteristics of the prayer that Jesus gave.

It is brief.

It is direct.

It is sincere.

It is unselfish.

It expresses a simple, unshakable confidence in the providence of God.

{95} Moreover, Jesus prayed often. So should we all. Only then may we hope to live in the presence of God.

"O Thou by whom we come to God, The Life, the Truth, the Way! The path of prayer Thyself hath trod; Lord, teach us how to pray."

THE REFERENCES

Luke 11:1-4.

THE QUESTIONS

1. Repeat the Lord's prayer.

2. What prompted Jesus to utter this prayer?

3. What is the difference between the Lord's prayer, and the prayers of the Jews in general?

4. What are the characteristics of Jesus's prayers?

5. Analyze the Lord's prayer.

6. What do we learn to guide us in our own prayers?

{96} PICTURE: RIVER JORDAN, PALESTINE

{97}

XIII

PERSISTENCE IN PRAYER

[Sidenote: The Lord will answer.]

Everyone who has prayed devoutly and sincerely has undoubtedly experienced at times the keenest kind of disappointment because he has not received an immediate answer to his prayer, Perhaps you have yourself prayed sometimes for something that you wanted badly. It was an insistent, an urgent desire. You felt that you could hardly wait even to utter the prayer. Yet, your prayer has remained apparently unanswered. At such times you may have found comfort in this beautiful Sunday School hymn:

"Unanswered yet? Tho' when you first presented This one petition at the Father's throne, It seemed you could not wait the time of asking, So urgent was your heart to make it known. Tho' years have passed since then, do not despair; The Lord will answer you, sometime, somewhere."

This is a beautiful hope, a sublime faith; and every one of us should cultivate such hope, such faith. Moreover, everyone of us should practice such persistency in prayer as is described by the poet in this hymn.

"The prayer your lips have pleaded In agony of tears these many years?"

For very often, without question, our prayers fail to move the Father, because they are not urged upon Him, nor are they upheld by that hopeful trust which knows no wavering. Jesus emphasized two points in this connection that we should grapple to our hearts.

[Sidenote: Pray often and persistently.]

As we have already learned, Jesus condemned long. {98} repetitious prayers. He despised also the hypocrite, and the hollow prayer of the hypocrite. But Jesus did not mean by such condemnation that we should not appear often before the persistently. Father, and press the case for which we are pleading. On the contrary, as you will readily see from the following parables, Jesus emphasized the importance of persistency in prayer.

[Sidenote: The importunate friend.]

"And (Jesus) said unto them. Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves; for a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him? And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee. I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth."

[Sidenote: The unrighteous judge.]

"And (again) He spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint; Saying, There was in a city a judge, which feared not God, neither regarded man: and there was a widow in that city: and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary. And he would not for awhile: but afterward he said within himself. Though I fear not God, nor regard man; yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me. And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith. And shall not God avenge His own elect, which cry day and night unto Him, though He bear {99} long with them? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily."

[Sidenote: An urgent desire necessary.]

These parables speak sufficiently for themselves. The lesson that Jesus wanted to impart is clear. It is important that we persist in the prayer that we want urgently to be fulfilled. However, it was not Jesus's purpose to teach His disciples merely to repeat constantly an urgent prayer. Merely repeating a prayer is really of no more worth than uttering a long prayer full of repetitions. Jesus taught that Father gives His best and choicest gifts only to those who desire them intensely. We keep on praying for those things that we truly want, because the desire for them is urgent, intense and insistent; and we keep on keeping on.

[Sidenote: Implicit trust necessary.]

But there is a second element that must necessarily enter into the right attitude in prayer to God. Not only should our prayers express our intense desires, and be spoken frequently, but they should be accompanied by a simple, childlike trust and confidence in God.

[Sidenote: Seek first the kingdom of God.]

"Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink," taught Jesus; "Nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature.

"And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, {100} neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore, If God so clothe the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is cast into the oven, shall He not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? . . . .

"Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."

[Sidenote: Labor and confidence hand in hand.]

Now, Jesus did not mean by this splendid teaching that we should not plan for the future; nor that we should not be industrious and spin and weave and harvest. His illustrations impress the thought that we should not allow ourselves to fret over the petty worries and anxieties of life. God knows our needs before we utter them. We should rely implicitly then upon His providence, knowing that if we serve Him and do our best, He will care for us as well as for the birds of the air and the lilies of the field.

[Sidenote: The sin of worry.]

Undue anxiety may be called almost a sin. It preys upon the peace of mind and happiness of untold thousands of men and women. The most learned and efficient men in the world have devoted much of their time to the study of worry; but no one of them has found a cure for it. Many books have, however, been written advising this or that course of life to overcome the evil, and all these books possess value. But it is to be noted that the cause of worry in any man is {101} usually something over which man has no control. Neither worry, nor any other thing that man may do, can change the nature of things. We are forced therefore to admit that the only cure for worry known to man is that presented by Jesus. His cure consists of a childlike faith and trust in the goodness of God--a trust so simple and strong that anxious care can find no place in the mind. It consists of such a confidence in the providence of God as Abraham displayed when he was commanded to offer his dearly beloved son Isaac on the altar of sacrifice. Abraham wavered not; he worried not; and God provided the sacrifice that was meet. Of course, it requires courage, patience, and persistent effort to cultivate so supreme a degree of faith. Yet, one who has it not can hardly say with truth that he has learned fully to know God. Indeed, such sublime faith alone marks the truly converted and nobly devoted soul; whereas the lack of such faith reveals a lack of fulness of trust in God--almost a disloyalty to God. One cannot in this world attain to real peace and happiness without implicit faith in God. Without it, one can not keep on keeping on in fervent prayer to God.

[Sidenote: God knows best.]

Finally, it must be remembered that another phase of this childlike trust may affect the answer to our prayers. If they remain unanswered, it may be because it is best for us so. No other man has ever suffered as did Jesus in Gethsemane. No other man has ever prayed as Jesus did there. Yet, recall the spirit of that prayer. "O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from {102} me: nevertheless not as I will but as Thou wilt." This is the true spirit of faith-inspired prayer.

[Sidenote: Thy will be done.]

Such petitions Jesus would have us utter. He would have us pray constantly for those things that we desire intensely. He would have us repose implicit childlike trust in the Heavenly Father. He would have each one of us feel always, "Nevertheless not my will, but Thine, be done." And in this spirit He would have us always keep on keeping on.

THE REFERENCES

Luke 11:5-8. Matt. 6:25-30.

Luke 18:1-8. Matt. 6:33-34.

THE QUESTIONS

1. What should be the feeling of one whose prayer is not immediately answered?

2. What is the lesson conveyed in the Sunday School hymn "Unanswered Yet?"

3. Why are our prayers often unanswered?

4. What is the difference between long repetitious prayers and frequent prayers?

5. What is the meaning of the parable of the importunate friend?

6. What is the lesson of the parable of the unrighteous judge?

7. Why is childlike trust and confidence in God necessary in prayer?

8. What did Jesus mean by teaching "Take no thought for your life?"

9. How can anxiety or worry be called almost a sin?

10. What lesson do we derive from the attitude of Jesus in the wonderful prayer in Gethsemane?

{103}

{104} PICTURE: "LORD HELP ME." Plockhorst

{105}

XIV

THE POWER OF FAITH

[Sidenote: Confidence vs. Faith]

It is, of course, evident to you now that the two essentials of acceptable prayer are implicit reliance on the wisdom and the goodness of God, and the spirit of forgiveness. The first is the only attitude that can be rightly assumed toward God; and the second is the attitude that we should all assume toward our fellowmen. There is certainly no use in praying to God if we do not trust Him; and as certainly, God will not forgive us and answer our prayers, if we are unwilling to forgive our fellowmen and help them. But this attitude of unwavering trust in God is really more than merely an essential of prayer. It is a principle of power in both the spiritual and the temporal life of man. In this lesson we shall consider the power of faith--the invincible power of childlike confidence.

[Sidenote: The incident of the fig tree.]