New Thoughts (11/21/01)
"Prayer is the breath of spiritual life." What a statement that is! What conviction it brings upon my heart, for of late, my prayer life has felt very weak indeed. Is it any wonder that my spiritual life has been struggling as well? Not at all. How shall life continue without breath? Even in last night's home study (which has been cross-pollinating with this study quite heavily), we approached the thought of praying for patience together, we saw the beauty and necessity of that prayer, as had come clear in the previous part of this study. Yet, we failed to actually pray the prayer that we so extolled! What's up with that?
Lord, were we so tired that we could not grasp Your leading? Has the message that such prayers are 'dangerous' become so ingrained in us that we can't see through it? Oh, God, You know how badly my patience needs exercising. How often have I complained of the weakness of my love? Love is patient. How often have I felt hopeless, given the trials that seem never to end? Hope needs patience to stay hopeful. How often has my faith been weak? Faith cannot be separated from patient perseverance. If I failed to ask You last night, I ask You now. Father, do as You must, bring whatever may be necessary to create in me the strength of patience on which true character depends. I know it must hurt. I know it must mean further trials when I already feel so overburdened. Remind me, Holy Spirit, that these, even the worst of these, are but light and momentary afflictions. Help me to rejoice as Paul and David rejoiced, knowing that the trials could only serve to strengthen faith and hope, knowing that in patience, their capacity for love was being enlarged. Return me, Lord, to a fervency for prayer. Build in me a fervency to talk with You above and beyond all I've known before, that we may draw closer, that we may be face to face.
Holy Spirit, what shall I say? I look upon what I've learned in this, and You are everywhere through it. The things You have been doing on my behalf, I had ceased to notice, and now I find myself excited anew to recall Your hand in my life. Without You, my prayers would be so filled with errors and mistakes that there could be no accepting them. Yet, as You have been filling my heart, building my spirit, renewing my mind, You have led me to pray in accord with the will of my Father. Indeed, You have quieted those things I might have sought from Him that were not in His perfect desire for me. What a great comfort You bring to me, oh Holy Comforter, when I recognize that You have been superintending my prayers, to protect me from error! Help me to see, as well, that You are doing this very same work in my wife. Oh the power of knowing You are there to protect us from ourselves! Indeed, my Father, it is true that our prayer life is as much a pure gift of Your grace as is our salvation! You are so gracious, so merciful to me. How shall I repay? I know I cannot possibly repay. My debt to You is far too great for that. What else, then, can I do but to serve You with all that I am so long as You will have me.
"Folly, weakness, and distraction in prayer, are what all the saints are complaining of." So Mr. Henry reminds us, and I know it's certainly true of myself. It's entirely too easy to be distracted by anything and everything when we try to focus ourselves on prayer. It takes an incredible effort of will to remain 'on task.' In this, I'm no better than my daughter. It's simply beyond our human frailty to remain long engaged in spiritual converse. Yet here, too, we find the Holy Spirit helping us along. He excites us to pray. He so ministers the truth of God to our hearts that our words fail in their ability to express the feelings He stirs up. We are reduced. We are forced away from any strength of language we may pride ourselves in . Indeed, our fluency is not only inessential to prayer, it can prove detrimental, as we get more caught up in phrasing things 'just right' than in expressing the true extent of our heart's cry.
It is at just those points where words fail us that our prayers begin to be at their strongest. Why is this? It is simply because at that very point we are forced to depend on the Holy Spirit. We are reduced to the humility that becomes us, all pride stripped away. Yet in that humility, we know to come boldly to our Father and cry out to Him. This is the work of the Spirit in us, reminding us to cease from the mere repetition of words by which the pagans plague their idols, and depend upon God. We come to depend upon His holiness, upon His righteousness, upon His goodness, knowing He knows our needs, knowing He is good, He will provide.
I noted back when I first worked through this bit of Scripture that I suspected that there was a level of prayer that is beyond the prayer in tongues. Today I am more convinced of that than ever. Just as we have learned that there is a level of praise and worship that is beyond singing, beyond singing even in tongues, beyond 'high praises.' There is indeed prayer that is more potent even than that which comes from our mouth in unknown words and noises. There is something deeper yet than those groanings we hear but don't understand. The most powerful prayers may not be heard by man at all. They are a direct communication from our heart, our spirit to God. They go unheard in the world, but God hears and understands. Here is the purest work of the Spirit, giving the heart means to express itself directly to the object of all our desires, removing all chance of losing anything in interpretation, for no interpretation is necessary when our heart is in direct communion with our Father.
Indeed, we must learn to allow the Spirit to pray through. Just as I have learned to set myself aside, as it were, when I am called to aid in worship service (at least on occasion, I can manage it); so in prayer I must learn to set myself aside. I must reach a point where I no longer cast about my mind for words, where I no longer concern myself with filling the air around me with sounds. It is in the place of silence that God will find my prayers the most eloquent, for it is then that I am in best communion with the Spirit, with the Spirit and with my Lord Jesus, and we, all together, are deep in communion with my Father. It is then that I can be assured that my prayers are not in vain, for they are the prayers of the Spirit, and the prayers of the Spirit are in certain and absolute accord with His will. And that which is prayed in accord with His will, we know cannot be prayed in vain. Hallelujah! Amen!
