9 Oct 2006
No Substitute for Prayer by Oswald J. Smith
Intercessory prayer is the Christian's most effective weapon. Nothing can withstand it's power. It will do things when all else has failed. And the marvel is that we turn to other agencies in order to accomplish what only prayer can bring to pass. God has placed this mighty weapon in our hands, and He expects us to use it. How disappointed He must be when we lay it aside and substitute natural means for supernatural work.
In this twentieth century we are, more and more, turning from the God-appointed means of intercessory prayer and adopting, instead, merely natural agencies for the carrying on of His work. Everywhere we look it is the same, both in evangelism and ordinary church work. Intercessory prayer has been shelved. For some reason it is out of date. Our methods, we say, are better, our plans more successful, and so we adopt natural means to bring to pass the supernatural.
My brethren, it can never be done, We may appear to be successful; the crowds may come; the altar may be full night after night. Reported results may be broadcasted everywhere. Whole cities may be stirred and mightily moved! And yet when it is all over and two or three years have passed, how little will be found to be genuine! And why? Simply because we have been satisfied with a superficial, spectacular work, brought to pass by natural means. Consequently the truly supernatural has been largely lacking. Oh let us get back to intercessory prayer, the highest form of Christians service, and give God no rest until we have a spiritual outcome.
And When They Were ALONE... by C.W. Ruth
If you would confide in a friend and really open up your heart, you wait until such a time as your friend can take time to come apart and be alone with you. So they who would know the secret and hidden things of God and have Him "expound all things," must find time to be alone with Him. Such is the philosophy of love; while there may be the throbbing heart, and some expressions of affection in the presence of the multitudes, the hour of true bliss is when the doors are closed and the curtains drawn. It is there that love finds her opportunity for expression, and the confiding heart gives forth its secrets. The intensity of love demands the secret interview and longs for an opportunity of being alone with the object of its love. We read of "the secret place of the Most High" (Ps. 91:1), and "the secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him" (Ps. 25:14). So we can see plainly the Lord has secrets and a secret place for His children. How beautiful it is to feel and know that one is permitted to come into "the secret place of the Most High." Visitors and strangers come into reception halls and parlors, but only they who are in most intimate relations known to be tried and true can come into the secret places. What is the meaning of a secret place, but the shutting out of all that might intrude or detract; to be left alone with the object of its love? Again we say, the deepest expressions of mutual affection, confidence and pleasure are not in public assemblies, in hurried greetings and mere social relations, but in the "secret place," alone and unobserved.
It is exactly so in our relations to Jesus. Men and women who fail to take time to be much "alone" in the "secret place" with Jesus, are never deeply spiritual and are compelled to get their news concerning the kingdom second-hand. They know simply what the preacher or some one else tells them; they are ever running after men -the newest preacher and the latest evangelist- to get some more news, second-hand, concerning the King's business. But they who have learned the "secret" of being much alone with Him in the secret Place, get the secrets of the Lord directly from the King himself and so are not dependent on the newspapers for the latest news. No amount of religious activities or service can make up for the lack of secret communion and fellowship with God. Joseph and Mary had been engaged in the worship and service of the Temple when they lost Jesus, and traveled a whole day's journey "supposing Him to have been in the company" before they discovered they had lost Him. One may become so absorbed with religious work and duties, so hurried and preoccupied that there is no time for secret prayer, and being alone with Him and the Word, and become lean in soul and backslide while thus engaged in the work of the "Temple".
Oswald J. Smith and C.W. Ruth
|
