- Overcomer Literature Trust
- Swindon
- Wiltshire
‘Prayer is Work.’
By F.J.Huegel.
It has often been said that prayer is the greatest force in the universe. This is no exaggeration. It will bear constant repetition in this atomic age when forces are being released that stagger our thought and imagination, it is well to remember that prayer transcends all other forces.
The reason lies near at hand. It is that prayer does not release some mere force of man or nature. Prayer releases the immeasurable wealth and power of Almighty God. “Call on me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know” (Jer. 33 v3). There you have it. “I will tell you great and unsearchable things”. It is the voice of God. It is the omnipotent Sovereign Creator and Sustainer of a hundred million universes who here gives us His Word. He says in effect that if you will pray He will work. He with whom nothing is impossible, who spoke and worlds without number came into being, pledges His most holy and immutable word that if we will but seek His face in prayer He will work and bring to pass great and mighty things such as have never been entertained in our mind and thought.
It is to be understood that the great and unsearchable things which the Lord of heaven and earth promises to bring to pass are those which have to do with the well being of the children of men. The Lord is bent on the redemption of mankind. To attain this end He threw in, as it were, everything He had. He spared not His own Son but delivered him up for us all. He gave what was dearer than a million worlds. God’s supreme purpose has as its goal the everlasting bliss of the children of men. That is why He gave Himself in the person of His only Son, the Beloved of the Father, to die in infinite shame and pain upon a wretched Cross that sin, the enthralling monster, enemy of man’s well-being and happiness, might be forever destroyed. That Christ the Redeemer might be enthroned in the hearts of men and His Kingdom established, God will work great and unsearchable things in answer to the prayers of His children.
It is an amazing thing that should stab Christians into an awful realization of their responsibility, that in a real sense God has limited Himself in the working of the great and unsearchable things He so desires to accomplish for man’s good, to the prayers of His people. If we will not pray, to put it bluntly, He cannot work. Jesus our Lord, we are told, could not do the mighty works of love and healing He was wont to do, in Nazareth, His home town. It was because of the unbelief of the people. Unbelief and prayerlessness spring from the same root. As unbelief bound the Saviour’s hands, so prayerlessness binds God’s. Just why God’s working the great and unsearchable things for man’s eternal well-being and glory is limited to our praying may be one of the deep mysteries but there it stands. If there is a fact to which the Bible, which has been called a textbook on prayer, bears eloquent witness, it is this fact. If there is one thing that stands out with letters aflame with meaning, it is that if God is to work great and unsearchable things in the affairs of men and nations, carrying forward His sublime purposes of redemption, we must pray, lifting our voices to the throne of God in earnest supplication and sincere adoration. We must pray as did Abraham, pray as did Jacob, pray as did Moses, pray as did Isaiah and the prophets, yes, pray as did Jesus our Lord and His apostles.
We would not minimize the importance of other forms of service in the establishment of the Kingdom of God, but we must admit that prayer is the foremost weapon. “The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have Divine power”. Prayer must undergird all forms of Christian service if they are to be truly fruitful. We can do good things and bless men without prayer but God’s ends wherein man’s eternal good is found cannot be so achieved. We see an example in the life of our Lord. As a man He did nothing without prayer. He initiated nothing without prayerfully waiting on the Father. He laid down an unvarying principle, saying, “The Son can do nothing by himself; he can do only what he sees his Father doing” (John 5 v19). Prayer with the Son of Man was as the very breath of life. “Father”, He said as He stood beside Lazarus’ tomb, “I thank you that you have heard me. I knew that you always hear me”. His closing word on the Cross was a prayer and we are told that He lives for ever to make intercession for us.
Prayer is not only our highest privilege and most cherished joy, for thereby we hold communion with Him who is the Fountain of Life, but it is also our most effective weapon. Beside this, all else pales. All else leaves us floundering in the muck and chaos of self-effort which has never been anything but a blind alley. All else leaves us as a frail barque on life’s stormy seas without a helm, without a compass, without a pilot. If we build without direction from the Most High who orders all for our good according to an eternal plan - here is the highest definition of prayer whereby we listen to God and receive strength to obey - our labors however brilliant must finally come to nothing. “The one who does the will of God lives for ever” (1 John 2 v17). Prayer in its truest form, its deepest and most worthy expression, brings our little day and effort into a harmonious blend with the great pattern and purposes of the Father of Lights and thereby gives to our otherwise puny achievements everlasting glory and meaning.
Prayer is work of such a sublime order that it lies beyond our imagination. For when we pray, our capacity to achieve and our power to do good are multiplied a thousandfold. This is no exaggeration, the reason being that when we pray, God works. It is now no longer us, though without our co-operation the vast machine of spiritual outreach and achievement is, so to speak, without a spark plug. It is our releasing the wealth of the bank of heaven. It is as we conform ourselves with the purposes of God and so make it possible for them to be realized.
Witness Moses standing in the breach and praying for forgiveness for the children of Israel when, because of the worship of the golden calf, the Lord’s wrath was kindled and He purposed to destroy Israel. Listen to the voice of God as He speaks saying (Ezek. 22 v30-31), “I looked for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so that I would not have to destroy it, but I found none. So I will pour out my wrath on them and consume them with my fiery anger”. Witness the ministry of prayer of the great intercessors of the Bible. Witness the achievements of the George Mullers, the Praying Hydes and the Amy Carmichaels of the Church.
One might open the Book of the Psalms almost at random and find such passages as this one, “Some became fools through their rebellious ways . . . they draw near the gates of death. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress. He sent forth his word, and healed them; he rescued them from the grave. Let them give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love and his wonderful deeds for men!” (Ps. 107 v17-21). The power of prayer is shown forcibly in the words, “If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land” (2 Chron. 7 v14).
Furthermore, when we pray, we are no longer hemmed in within the circle of a merely human sphere of activity. When we preach we should be a herald of the glad tidings of God’s love, and bless a congregation of believers, but when we pray our capacity to bless is without limit. We may pray, as we are admonished to do, for all the saints and consequently bless a hundred million believers, yes, all the members of the body of Christ. It is no longer us, but the One who sustains the universe and gives to all things their life, and whose power to bless knows no bounds. Through prayer we can touch the ends of the earth and enter upon a universal ministry. Prayer makes it possible for us to open an immeasurably bountiful hand to bless souls in distant lands. Through prayer we may release forces which will bring redemption to races cursed with idolatry, superstition and despair. What a staggering fact. Jesus our Lord in His high priestly prayer prayed for all those who should believe on Him (John l7 v20). His prayer embraced the ages. So ours may bless peoples yet unborn. On our knees we may thrust forth missionaries to the farthermost reaches of sin-stricken humanity. Please read what the Saviour says in Luke 10 v2, and John 15 v7. With God neither time nor space are barriers. He can work immediately in the hearts of men everywhere. Did not the Saviour say, speaking of the coming of the Holy Spirit, that He would convict the world of sin, and are we not given to understand that it is not the Father’s will for any to perish? Is it not written that he, Christ the Lord, is the propitiation for the sins of the whole world? (1 John 2 v2).
It is when we bow the knee and call upon God that in a sense we become as mighty as the Almighty. Do not misunderstand me, I am not being irreverent. I am only saying what He says in His Holy Word, “Call on me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things, which you do not know.” ‘You pray’, says the Almighty God, ‘and I will work’. If you ask anything in my name, I will do it. “Call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you will honour me” (Ps. 50 v15).
Come, He says in effect, bow the knee and call upon me. As you pray I will work. I pledge my omnipotence. You may not see at once any change, though there are times when before my people call, I answer. If you will but believe and wait upon me, all things will be possible. The very course of history may be changed for with me nothing is impossible.
From ‘Prayer’s Deeper Secrets’. Zondervan.