Sermon Cloud

I. PRAYER ESSENTIAL TO GOD

"Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer; thou shalt cry, and

he shall say, Here I am. 14th verse: Then shalt thou delight thyself in

the Lord; and I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the

earth, and feed thee with the heritage of Jacob thy father: for the

mouth of the Lord hath spoken it."--Isaiah 58:9.

It must never be forgotten that Almighty God rules this world. He is

not an absentee God. His hand is ever on the throttle of human affairs.

He is everywhere present in the concerns of time. "His eyes behold, his

eyelids try the children of men." He rules the world just as He rules

the Church by prayer. This lesson needs to be emphasized, iterated and

reiterated in the ears of men of modern times and brought to bear with

cumulative force on the consciences of this generation whose eyes have

no vision for the eternal things, whose ears are deaf toward God.

Nothing is more important to God than prayer in dealing with mankind.

But it is likewise all-important to man to pray. Failure to pray is

failure along the whole line of life. It is failure of duty, service,

and spiritual progress. God must help man by prayer. He who does not

pray, therefore, robs himself of God's help and places God where He

cannot help man. Man must pray to God if love for God is to exist.

Faith and hope, and patience and all the strong, beautiful, vital

forces of piety are withered and dead in a prayerless life. The life of

the individual believer, his personal salvation, and personal Christian

graces have their being, bloom and fruitage in prayer.

All this and much more can be said as to the necessity of prayer to the

being, and culture of piety in the individual. But prayer has a larger

sphere, a more obligated duty, a loftier inspiration. Prayer concerns

God, whose purposes and plans are conditioned on prayer. His will and

His glory are bound up in praying. The days of God's splendour and

renown have always been the great days of prayer. God's great movements

in this world have been conditioned on, continued and fashioned by

prayer. God has put Himself in these great movements just as men have

prayed. Present, prevailing, conspicuous and mastering prayer has

always brought God to be present. The real and obvious test of a

genuine work of God is the prevalence of the spirit of prayer. God's

mightiest forces surcharge and impregnate a movement when prayer's

mightiest forces are there.

God's movement to bring Israel from Egyptian bondage had its inception

in prayer. Thus early did God and the human race put the fact of prayer

as one of the granite forces upon which His world movements were to be

based.

Hannah's petition for a son began a great prayer movement for God in

Israel. Praying women, whose prayers like those of Hannah, can give to

the cause of God men like Samuel, do more for the Church and the world

than all the politicians on earth. Men born of prayer are the saviours

of the state, and men saturated with prayer give life and impetus to

the Church. Under God they are saviours and helpers of both Church and

state.

We must believe that the divine record of the facts about prayer and

God are given in order that we might be constantly reminded of Him, and

be ever refreshed by the faith that God holds His Church for the entire

world, and that God's purpose will be fulfilled