JAMES V. i6 17
I.
The Force of Prayer.
1. It is strange that we understand so little about prayer ; with most people, including the greater part of the professedly rehgious, it is regarded simply as a sort of spiritual safety-valve, adapted to relieve the soul from strain and over-pressure ; is any afflicted, they say, let him pray ; and as for us, who are merry, we will sing psalms. Now, if we were looking at a steam-engine, and meditating over the motive power of it, we should scarcely direct our thoughts to the safety-valve, or say of it, "What a mighty power is stored up in this little lever." On the contrary,' our attention would be fixed on the piston and the steam at the back of it, and on the laws which govern its production, expansion, and condensation. And we need scarcely say that there is not much in common between those who regard prayer simply as an emotional safety-valve, and those who look upon it as one of the great moving forces of the spiritual world. It happens often enough that there are forces in the world of which people generally are ignorant, or of which they have an idea that is totally inadequate. For instance, we have known cynical politicians deride the expression of public opinion, as being valuable only as a political safety-valve, and useful to keep the "many-headed monster," the populace, from more dangerous courses ; but not once or twice have they been awakened to find that there is nothing to stand before the rush of a well-formed public sentiment. So that we say rightly public opinion is of great force. And certainly the idea which the majority of folk attach to the word prayer is but very incommensurate to the part which it occupies, not only in t-he development of the life of the individual soul, but in the life and lot of the world at large.
^ Not long ago the Principal of a Theological College, who was accustomed to receive University graduates as his students, was asked the question — " What would you most like done for your students while at the Universities? How could they be best prepared while there ? " The answer was, " I think the chief thing which they want is to be taught how to inay" ^
' W. Lock, Oxford University SerifioJis, 383. JAS.-JUDE — 2
i8 THE PRAYER OF A RIGHTEOUS MAN
^ The literature of dtevotion is amongst the best reading in the world. The study of it brings us in contact with the world's greatest spirits — with Jesus, with Paul, with Augustine, with Francis, with Luther, with AVesley. It is the meeting-ground of opposing creeds, where they fuse, lose their opposition, become one prevailing force. When you are reading Augustine's Confessions, or Andrewes' Devotions, or Bishop Wilson's Sacra Privata, or Methodist William Bramwell's mighty supplications, you forget theological differences ; you are in contact with one and the same spiritual energy. To keep on the outer circle of mere fussy activities, while neglecting this innermost force, is like turning a hand-loom and forgetting steam or electricity. In the world of the spiritual, as in that of the physical, to reach the true sphere of power we must go down from the circumference to the innermost centre.^
2. Let it be understood clearly that the prayer of which St. James here speaks is intercessory prayer — prayer for others. What is intercession ? It is simply " a coming in between " ; we know the word well in Eoman political history as the tribune's veto. The patricians propose some law that seems likely to injure the people ; the tribune intercedes ; he stands between the people and the threatened danger; and their rights are saved. Again, a great patrician general has become the object of the envy and ill-will of the populace : he is brought to trial : he is in danger of being banished from the country which he has saved. A Tiberius Gracchus intercedes, and Scipio Africanus is saved. In its widest sense it may be applied to every act in which one human being is able to come in between another and some evil that might befall him. We may extend it even more widely still to the whole principle of mediation, by which one man is used to convey blessings to another.
3. In what ways, then, can intercession be a great force for blessing ? Lock suggests three ways.
(1) It is a great force because it compels us to keep up a true ideal of what those for whom we pray may be. It makes us, in George MacDonald's striking phrase, " think of them and God together." If I pray for any one, that implies that I have faith in him, that I believe he may be better than he is. If I pray thoughtfully for any particular blessings for him, then I have ^ J. Brierley, Life and the Ideal, 75.
JAMES V. i6 19
considered what are the right blessings to ask for him ; I must know what God means him to be ; my imagination must picture to itself what his true self is, what it can develop into.
(2) Intercession is again a gieat force, because it pledges us to do the best we can for those for whom we pray. We cannot, for very shame, ask God to help those whom we ourselves are refusing to help when that help lies within our power ; the very fact of intercession reminds us of the truth of the dependence of man upon man ; we ask God to bless those for whom we care, and again and again He reminds us that His blessings are <nven through men, and the answer to our prayer is that we are sent on His errand of mercy. Even more than this, the prayer returns into our own bosom ; we cannot pray for any one, or for anybody for whom we care, without being driven back to look at our own lives. Do we pray for our parents ? At once we feel that one of the greatest blessings that can happen to them is that we should be true sons to them. " A wise son maketh a glad father : but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother."