Let Us Be Much In Prayer

He hath been mindful of us, he will bless us. Let our memory of his past lovingkindness excite us to prayer for present and future favors. David then passed on to speak of the greatness of the promise: “This was yet a small thing in thy sight, O Lord God; but thou hast spoken also of thy servant’s house for a great while to come.” We also have received exceeding great and precious promises, and since God has promised so much, will we not be much in prayer? Shall he be large in promising and shall we be narrow in asking? Shall he stand before us and say, “Whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer believing, ye shall receive,” and will we be content with slender, starved petitions?

Beggars seldom need pressing to beg, and when a promise is given them they usually put the widest possible construction upon it, and urge it with great vehemence; will it not be well to take a leaf out of their book?

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Where True Prayer Is Found," delivered May 5, 1878. Image by S. Hart Photography on Flickr under Creative Commons License, without alteration.

The Habit and the Spirit of Prayer

To deal with this matter practically, then, it is the duty and privilege of every Christian to have set times of prayer. I cannot understand a man’s keeping up the vitality of godliness unless he regularly retires for prayer, morning and evening at the very least. Daniel prayed three times a day, and David says, “Seven times a day will I praise thee.” It is good for your hearts, good for your memory, good for your moral consistency that you should hedge about certain portions of time and say, “These belong to God. I shall do business with God at such-and-such a time, and try to be as punctual to my hours with him as I should be if I made an engagement to meet a friend.” When Sir Thomas Abney was Lord Mayor of London the banquet somewhat troubled him, for Sir Thomas always had prayer with his family at a certain time. The difficulty was how to quit the banquet to keep up family devotion; but so important did he consider it that he vacated the chair, saying to a person near that he had a special engagement with a dear friend which he must keep. And he did keep it, and he returned again to his place, none of the company being the wiser, but he himself being all the better for observing his wonted habit of worship.

But now, having urged the importance of such habitual piety, I want to impress on you the value of another sort of prayer; namely, the short, brief, quick, frequent ejaculations of which Nehemiah gives us a specimen. And I recommend this, because it hinders no engagement and occupies no time. You may be measuring off your calicoes, or weighing your groceries, or you may be casting up an account, and between the items you may say, “Lord, help me.” You may breathe a prayer to heaven and say, “Lord, keep me.” It will take no time. It is one great advantage to persons who are hard pressed in business that such prayers as those will not, in the slightest degree, incapacitate them from attending to the business they may have in hand. It requires you to go to no particular place. You can stand where you are, ride in a cab, walk along the streets, be the bottom sawyer in a saw pit, or the top one either, and yet pray just as well such prayers as these. No altar, no church, no so-called sacred place is needed, but wherever you are, just a little prayer as that will reach the ear of God, and win a blessing. Such a prayer as that can be offered anywhere, under any circumstances. I do not know in what condition a man could be in which he might not offer some such prayer as that. On the land, or on the sea, in sickness or in health, amidst losses or gains, great reverses or good returns, still might he breathe his soul in short, quick sentences to God. The advantage of such a way of praying is that you can pray often and pray always. If you must prolong your prayer for a quarter of an hour you might possibly be unable to spare the time, but if it only wants the quarter of a minute, why, then, it may come again and again and again and again - a hundred times a day. The habit of prayer is blessed, but the spirit of prayer is better; and the spirit of prayer it is which is the mother of these ejaculations; and therefore do I like them, because she is a plentiful mother. Many times in a day may we speak with the Lord our God.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Ejaculatory Prayer," delivered September 9, 1877. Image by snowpeak on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

Amazed At My Great High Priest

The Son of man on earth pleading for sinners is very gracious, but I am overwhelmed when I think of His interceding for sinners now that He reigns yonder, where harps unnumbered tune His praise and cherubim and seraphim count it their glory to be less than nothing at His feet, where all the glory of His Father is resplendent in Himself, and He sitteth at the right hand of God in divine favor and majesty unspeakable. How can we hear without amazement that the King of kings and Lord of lords occupies Himself with caring for transgressors - caring indeed for you and me. It is condescension that he should commune with the bloodwashed before His throne, and allow the perfect spirits to be His companions, but that His heart should steal away from all heaven’s felicities to remember such poor creatures as we are and make incessant prayer on our behalf, this is like His own loving Self-it is Christlike, Godlike.

Methinks I see at this moment our great high Priest pleading before the throne, wearing His jeweled breastplate and His garments of glory and beauty, wearing our names upon His breast and His shoulders in the most holy place. What a vision of incomparable love! It is a fact, and no mere dream. He is within the Holy of Holies, presenting the one sacrifice. His prayers are always heard, and heard for us, but the marvel is that the Son of God should condescend to exercise such an office and make intercession for transgressors. This matchless grace well nigh seals my lips, but it opens the floodgates of my soul, and I would fain pause to worship Him whom my words fail to set forth.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Jesus Interceding For Transgressors," delivered November 18, 1877. Image by Paul Bica on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

Set Your Face To The Wall And Pray

Brother, pray if you are between the jaws of death and hell. Pray, brother, if all hope seem to be utterly slain; ay, and if thou canst put thy finger on passages of God’s own word which apparently condemn thee, still pray. Whether thy fears have contorted those threatening passages or not, though many of them frown upon thee, still pray. Perish with thy hand on the horn of the altar if perish thou must. Never believe thy case to be utterly hopeless so long as thou canst plead with God. There can be no hurt come of thy supplication, but good must come of it in some form or other. If God do not prolong life in answer to prayer, as often as he may not, or nobody would ever die, yet still he may give a greater blessing than continued earthly existence; and if it be a greater blessing in God’s judgment, it is better for us to receive it than to have the precise thing we have craved.

In all cases “pray without ceasing.” The mercy seat once stood within the veil where none could approach it except at one set season in the year; but now the veil is rent from top to bottom, and you may come to it when you will. Therefore I charge you come boldly unto the throne of the heavenly grace in every time of need; yea, draw near in the darkest night, and in the most wintry season, when God seems to have forgotten to be gracious, and when thou thinkest he will be favorable no more.

“Men ought always to pray and not to faint.” Pray in the teeth of difficulty, pray though impossibility seem to stand in the way, pray against death and the devil; pray like Manasseh in the low dungeon, and like Jonah out of the belly of hell. Pray against conscience and carnal reason; I was going to say even pray against thy terrifying interpretation of God’s word itself, for thou must surely have misread it if thou hast thought that it forbids thee to pray: it cannot be so, since Jehovah’s glorious memorial is that he is the God that heareth prayer. He has never said to the seed of Jacob, seek ye my face in vain. He may say, and he knows his own meaning when he says it, “Thou shalt die, and not live,” and yet he may afterwards declare, “I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will add unto thy days fifteen years.” He will be favorable unto the voice of thy supplication.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Love's Medicines and Miracles," delivered January 21, 1877. Image by mendhak on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

Prayer is your Weapon!

“Praying in the Holy Ghost” is the weapon with which the hosts of the Lord will put to rout the armies of the alien. The prayers of saints are the mighty artillery with which the walls of our Jerusalem are protected. Supplication is a cannon which throws tremendous bolts against the advancing foe, as Sennacherib knew when Hezekiah pleaded with God. The prayers, however, must be deeply spiritual, written on the heart by the Holy Ghost, and presented with energy of his creating. Formal, lifeless petitions are but a Chinese painted fortress, but praying in the Holy Ghost is an impregnable castle.

Those “groanings which cannot be uttered” are pieces of ordnance which make the gates of hell to tremble. But we must put our hearts under the influence of the blessed Spirit of God and then lift them up in continued intercession before God, and there can be no fear about the preservation of our minds from the error of the wicked. A praying church soon tries the spirits of false prophets, and casts them forth as evil. I have far more faith in prayer than in controversy. Keep the prayer meetings right, maintain private prayer with earnestness, and we may laugh to scorn all the sophisms of unbelievers and deceivers.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "A Weighty Charge," delivered March 26, 1876. Image by Stephen Heron on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

The weapon of love

Prayer for ourselves is blessed work, but for the child of God it is a higher exercise to become an intercessor, and to pray for others. Prayer for ourselves, good as it is, has just a touch of selfishness about it: prayer for others is delivered from that ingredient. Herein is love, the love which God the Holy Spirit delights to foster in the heart, when a man’s prayers go up for others. And what a Christlike form of prayer it is when you are praying for those who have ill-treated you and despitefully used you. Then are you like your master. Praying for yourselves, you are like those for whom Jesus died; but praying for your enemies, you are like the dying Jesus himself. “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,” has more of heaven in it than the songs of seraphs, and your prayer when offered for those who have treated you ill is somewhat akin to the expiring prayer of your Lord.

Job was permitted to take a noble revenge, I am sure the only one he desired, when he became the means of bringing them back to God. God would not hear them, he said, for they had spoken so wrongly of his servant Job, and now Job is set to be a mediator, or intercessor on their behalf: thus was the contempt poured upon the patriarch turned into honor. If the Lord will only save the opposer’s soul through your prayer, it will be a splendid way of returning bitter speeches.. If many unkind insinuations have been thrown out, and wicked words said, if you can pray for those who used such words, and God hears you and brings them to Jesus, it will be such a triumph as an angel might envy.

My brother, never use any other weapon of retaliation than the weapon of love. Avenge not thyself in anywise by uttering anything like a curse, or desiring any hurt or mischief to come to thy bitterest foe, but inasmuch as he curses, overwhelm him with blessings. Heap the hot coals of thy good wishes and earnest prayers upon his head, and if the Lord give thee to bring him to a state of salvation, he shall be praised, and thou shalt have happiness among the sons of men.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "The Turning of Job's Captivity." Image by Abaconda on Flickr under Creative Commons License.

Praying for our Fellow Believers

Every believer has a watchman’s place appointed him in the matter of prayer, and he is bound not to be silent, but to give the Lord no rest till he establish and make Jerusalem a praise in the earth. We are all equally bound to pray for the peace of Jerusalem, and our prosperity is made to hinge upon it. The new commandment which the Lord has given us, in which he bids us “love one another,” necessitates our praying for each other.

How shall a man claim that he loves his brother if he never intercedes with God for him? Can I live continually with my fellow-believers and see their sorrows, and never cry to God on their behalf? Can I observe their poverty, their tribulation, their temptation, their heaviness of heart, and yet forget them in my supplications? Can I see their work of faith and labor of love, and never implore a blessing upon them? Can I wrap up myself within myself, and be indifferent to the case of those who are my brethren in Christ Jesus? Impossible. I must belong to some other family than that of God, for in the family of love, common sympathy leads to constant intercession. God forbid that we should sin against the Lord by ceasing to pray for our brethren.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "Intercessory Prayer," delivered May 5, 1872. Image by nao.k under Creative Commons License.

Christ Our Intercessor

Now our Lord Jesus Christ not only prays for those whom we pray for, but he prays for those we never thought of praying for. There are some whom he mentions before the eternal throne whom we have never mentioned, who have never yet been observed by any interceding Christian, whose cases have never impressed a single godly heart, yet Jesus knows them: and does he cry to God for them, and shall there not come to them grace in due season? Ay, my brethren, I rejoice in this, that where through ignorance or through the narrowness of my charity my prayer has never stretched itself, the prayer of the great High Priest who wears the Urim and Thummim can yet reach, and the salvation of God shall come to such. I doubt not Jesus might well have said to Paul, ““I have prayed for thee, and therefore thou shalt be mine,”” and in many other cases the like is true.

The intercession of our Lord is a mighty power, and as it wins gifts for men, yea, for the rebellious also, apostles, and preachers, and teachers, are called forth by divine grace. Not our colleges, our councils, our societies, or our conferences, but the intercession of Jesus is the mainstay of our strength, the secret cause of the calling of men into the mystery of the gospel.

From a sermon by Charles Haddon Spurgeon entitled "An Encouraging Lesson From Paul's Conversion," delivered August 7, 1870. Image by Luis Argerich under Creative Commons License.