How does prayer work?

The answer to prayer seems to me the going forth in divine actions in power - what has flowed forth from divine wisdom, forming desire and wants in the soul. This connects itself with love, dwelling in love, and hence connects itself with confidence which faith expresses. Hence, if it be a mere lust, or to consume it on lust, it is not answered (James 4:3), or is answered in chastisement - is a Kibroth hattaavah (graves of lust); if it be in the Spirit, and the prayer of faith, it is answered according to the request. Thus also it is connected with the moral state of the soul - the entering, first in the 3 nature of the thing desired, and then spiritual acquaintance with God's will, into the thoughts of God, and what His love would have and cause us, as moved by that love, to desire. Christ, perfect in this, could say, "I know that thou hearest me always," save in atonement, where yet, in result, He was yet more gloriously heard.

Nobody imagines that we pray in order to inform God of what He does not know. Nor do we pray in order to secure His interest or His love. The saint who prays intelligently realises that he is speaking to One who knows his every need far better than he does himself, whose interest in all that concerns His people is unbounded, and whose love could not possibly be greater than it is. The object of prayer is that dependence upon God might be expressed, and that our souls might be brought into touch with Him about what we pray for; that in waiting upon Him we might learn His mind; that utterance might be afforded for desires which the Holy Ghost has wrought within us, and that when the answer comes we might be conscious that it is indeed from God that it comes.

An eminent clergyman, one of the chief pillars of the New Theology, has said that prayer is entirely subjective in its bearing; that is, it cannot effect any purpose outside the soul of the one who prays and is thus only useful in putting us in a more pleasant frame of mind. The devil is well aware that a flat contradiction of the truth would stand little chance of being believed. Hence he has always sought to substitute a half-truth for the whole truth. Ever since he beguiled our first parents in Eden how notoriously successful he has been. There he suggested that by obeying him, man would become as God, knowing good and evil. That was a statement perfectly true so far as it went, but one which required the complementary statement that man would also be unable to do the good or to resist the evil. So Satan wishes to instil into the minds of Christians the half-truth that prayer is subjective, well knowing that limitation of the truth invariably results in its being given up. That prayer is subjective is blessedly true. It has a wonderful, stimulating, purifying influence on the soul of the supplicant. But it is equally true that prayer has an objective side. It fulfils the purpose of moving the Hand that controls the physical universe, that holds the spirits of men, and that moulds everything material and moral to the accomplishment of His will! Elijah was a man such as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain, and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain. When Elijah stood before the people on Mount Carmel, he was God's envoy and as such, spoke and acted in virtue of his high commission. But at the close of that busy memorable day when he came into the presence of the Lord, he humbled himself in the dust. The beautiful view from Carmel's summit had no place in his thoughts.

I see no difficulty in God's answering prayer connected with general laws, if we allow God to be free to act in His own world, as free as I am. Do I change general physical laws, when I go on request to visit some sick person? My will - how, I know not - acts on and by those physical laws; gravity is in my feet, or in the earth, force in my muscle, electricity in the nerves which set it in motion, yet I, in my poor way, have answered a prayer. Now I fully recognise more power in God, because He can, I need not say, not only change His laws, but, without doing so, give force to agents in them - produce gastric juice more powerfully, or more electricity into the system at His will, without introducing a single new element, or law which governs it. Laws remain the same; His will interferes to produce agency by them. He may work a miracle - raise the dead - which is by no law - has done so. But I do not speak of miracles, which take place when He changes a law, as when He makes the hatchet swim, but of when He works by law - of particular effects of His will. This may be miraculous as when a strong east wind acted on the sea, and another took away locusts, or brought quails, but He may give special activity, or quantity to agents which act by laws regularly. I am sure, at any rate, He hears and answers prayer. The very action of mind on man's frame is so wonderful, that such results may be produced, and God's own mind, as to external circumstances, that I see no difficulty at all. Laws which bind nature I admit; laws which bind God I do not. Besides many or most prayers refer to spiritual things.

The difficulties, as to prayer changing God's mind, etc., which sometimes puzzles a sincere soul, and is common with infidels, are I think a mistake.

In the gospel of Matthew another aspect of prayer is presented - "All things, whatsoever ye ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive." (Matt. 21:22; see also Mark 11:24.) James too speaks of the necessity of faith in asking, and adds that a waverer must not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Now faith can only spring from confidence in God about the thing sought, and this confidence in God will only follow upon the conviction that what is prayed for is according to God's will; and, it may be added, the assurance that we have the mind of God can only be produced by the Holy Spirit, and by the Holy Spirit, speaking generally, through the written Word. Once having this assurance, we await with the certainty of expectation the answer, according to that word of the apostle John: "This is the confidence that we have in Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He heareth us: and if we know that He hear us, whatsoever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we desired of Him." (1 John 5:14-15.) This passage is important as showing that faith finds its sure foundation in the knowledge of God's will - a will that is unfolded to us in the Scriptures.

The apostle John warns us of a common hindrance to prayer. He says, "Beloved, if our hearts condemn us not, then have we confidence toward God. And whatsoever we ask, we receive of Him, because we keep His commandments, and do those things that are pleasing in His sight." (1 John 3:21-22.) Self-judgment and confession, if there has been failure or sin, are therefore pre-requisites to effectual prayer, even as the psalmist says, "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me." This will again link itself with the statement of James - "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much." The righteous man being, we judge, one who is practically such; one who, in the language of John, "keeps God's commandments." For walking in obedience is not only the path of holiness, but it is also the source through the Holy Spirit of intelligence in God's mind, and thus of confidence in prayer. The very example of Elijah that James adduces is an illustration in point. In the history Elijah announces by a word of the Lord that there should be no rain upon the earth for "these years;" and again, after that period, that there should be rain. And now we learn from James that both the one and the other were answers to his prayers.

Verses 14, 15. "If we ask anything according to his will he heareth us." Our souls are sometimes much exercised before God as to prayer; for God, who in His goodness grants us all things that are good for us, reserves to Himself the choice, the means, and the time. However we have the comfort of knowing that God always hears us. He is not absent nor too high to listen to our prayers. But more than this: "we know that we have the petitions that we desired of him." What mercy! God is willing to hear the requests which such feeble creatures as ourselves send up to Him. God perhaps does not answer at once. This exercise of patience is blessed to our souls, and is often more salutary than an immediate answer. It acts upon our intercourse with God, it moulds it, and teaches us dependence. It is well for us to know that we should not pray with the idea of dictating to God. But the faith which has prayed nevertheless feels sure that God has heard, and this confidence consoles and sustains.

But our spirits are not always up to this level, and we have already seen that Romans 8:26 - 28 recognizes this case. We know not what we should pray for as we ought; but the Spirit helpeth our infirmities. And He who searches our hearts knows how to take up all that is of His own Spirit in those hearts. As to the result, "we know" that all things work together for good to them that love God. And this gives peace whether our requests are granted or not. So we are not to restrain prayer because we are not on the highest plane of communion. On the contrary it is our privilege "in everything" to let our requests be made known unto God (Phil.4:6). An instructive example of this is Paul's prayer about the thorn in the flesh (2 Cor.12:8,9). For this thing he besought the Lord that it might depart from him. But his prayer was not in the intelligence of God's mind, who had a better thing in store for Paul, which Paul would have lost had his request been granted. The believer may indeed, as a chastisement, receive that which in unbrokenness he clamours for, but the result will not be happiness - as we read, "He gave them their request, but sent leanness into their soul" (Ps.106:15). To present our requests, with submission, is, however, always our privilege. The example of Paul shows this. He besought the Lord for his desire not once only, but thrice. In result, such submission was wrought in his soul that ultimately he took pleasure in the very infirmities of which he had implored the removal. A discontented and unsubject heart may reproach God with not answering its prayers; but in the retrospect of eternity, how much cause for praise may be discovered in the requests which our gracious God now refuses to grant.

But there are other statements which cast us more generally on the goodness of God, His interest in us, and show that, where faith is in exercise, the answer will be there: "All things whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing ye shall receive." This supposes faith and intimacy, so to speak, with God. The heart is supposed to be in His interests, and then, if there is faith as a grain of mustard seed, a mountain goes. I do not doubt this kind of faith was much more when any, as the apostles, felt themselves interested in God's cause, identified with Him and it on the earth; but there is no limit to it. Where such faith is, such answer will be; and God is as much occupied now with the details of blessing for us as for the great deeds of those days. It might be more palpable, more concentrated too then, but not more true. Not a sparrow falls now without Him more than then; and the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availing much is ever true: only we must, so to speak, put ourselves with God, for those to whom these things were said were identified with Him in His interests on the earth. This gave their prayers of course a peculiar place; but then if faith (that is, the operation of His Spirit and grace) brings me into His interest now even in details, the promise is there, and we can reckon on God and His power exercised in love now as then. There is no limit: only it is the working of His Spirit in us, and hence faith that reckons on the answer.

Presenting our requests, subject to His will, is always right. Of this we have an example even in Gethsemane; so Paul for his thorn in the flesh. And the answer will be more glorious and blessed than the request, even when it does not as asked answer it. See John 12 and Ps. 132: so Psalm 21, and even Paul's request about the thorn. Let us trust His love, and this will not come short, and if He has given us faith to expect a specific answer, bless God for it. Only our will must not come in; even if it was answered (this was the case of the quails), but as a rule not, as James teaches. But where there is earnest faith, God will surely hear, though He may give us safeguards against our own will in it.

A little confusion has often prevailed in the use of the phrases "for Christ's sake," and "in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ." We are not aware that the former is ever connected with prayer in the Scriptures. A case or two may, however, be adduced to explain its import. John says, "I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake." (1 John 2:12.) Exactly rendered it might be said, "because" or "on account of His name." That is, they had been freely forgiven "by reason of" the value of the name of Christ to God because He had fully glorified Him in all that He is, in His death upon the cross. The instance in Ephesians 4:32 is a mistranslation: it should read, "Even as God in Christ hath forgiven you." It is another phrase altogether where Peter says, "I will lay down my life for Thy sake": here it means "on Thy behalf," or even "in Thy stead." Coming now to what is found in John 16, as to prayer in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, or in the name of the Son (as in chapter 14), it should be first observed that our access to our God and Father is always and only through Christ. As Paul writes, "For through Him we both [Jew and Gentile] have access by one Spirit unto the Father." We cannot come in any other way. But coming thus "through Him" before God the question is at once met, What is praying in His name? It could not be using His name as a plea, or entreating to be heard for His sake, because the Lord says, without any limitation whatever, "Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in My name, He will give it you." By praying in His name, then, we understand appearing before the Father on His behalf, and as warranted to be there by Him, so that we are there with all the Son's claim upon the Father's heart, and taken up in the power of the Holy Ghost to utter and pray for, in communion with His own heart, all that He Himself desires to be accomplished for the Father's glory and His own joy. Praying, then, in His name is to intercede for His own interests, His own desires, objects, and ends. If this be so, this character of prayer has no reference to our own personal needs or circumstances; indeed, it could not. And let it not be forgotten that there is a circle in which we have no needs, because we are lost, absorbed in the Father's counsels for the glory of His beloved Son. At the same time we have full liberty to come at all times, through our blessed Lord, into the presence of God, and to tell out everything that burdens our hearts (Phil. 4:6-7); only this is not praying "in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ."

We have now finally, in this part, the Spirit Himself entering into this groaning condition. The Spirit joins His help to our infirmity. In such a condition of trial and sorrow, our weakness is made fully evident, but that only opens to us more the heart of God and produces in us a healthful dependence upon Him every step of the way. Notice, therefore, that in connection with the Spirit helping our infirmities, prayer is that upon which the apostle dwells. Prayer is the expression of dependence. It is the expression of the creature-place which we have with God. It is the expression, also, if it be that which can rightly be called prayer, of our confidence in God. Prayer is thus, as one may say, a large part of the Christian life, or rather, it is that which links itself with every part of it. If the Lord, in the sermon on the mount, would give us a special example of righteousness Godward, He illustrates this by prayer; but the very prayer itself manifests our infirmity. We do not know even what to pray for as we ought. How blessed to know that here we have a divine Intercessor; as we have Christ before God for us, so we have the Spirit of God in us, and He makes intercession for us according to God. The prayer that He makes is, of course, absolutely according to God; yet as wrought in our hearts it may be on that very account simply a groaning which cannot be uttered intelligibly, — a wonderful thing to realize that these groanings which are the evidence of our own infirmity may, nevertheless, be the fruit of the Spirit within us; that in the ear of God they may speak intelligently, and in absolute accordance with His mind concerning us. We do not know what to pray for, and yet we pray; and God who searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, little as we may know it and blunder as we may. "He maketh intercession for the saints according to God." That does not mean simply that it is God's will that He should make the intercession, as our common version might lead some to suppose, but that the intercession itself, as being; His, is of necessity in complete accordance with His thought and character. We are not, however, to suppose by all this, that the Spirit's prayer is simply groaning. The groaning accompanies the prayer and is part of the prayer. "With groanings that cannot be uttered." Nevertheless, these groanings express, as it were, after all, that which is higher in character, it may be, than the very prayers themselves, however intelligent. Our intelligence fails to accompany them. They go beyond it. But if they go beyond it, all the more they express the power of the Spirit in them — of Him who has come to join His help to our infirmities, and to carry us along the lighted road which leads to God.