THE PLACE OF THE PRAYER THE life of our Lord was a life of giving. It needed to be also a life of receiving. It brings us very close to his great divine and human life, that we find Him at the end of a weary day spending the night in gathering strength for the work which was before Him. He had been teaching in Capernaum, and from all the land the people in their need had gathered about Him. They had come from other parts of Galilee, from Judea, from Jerusalem, from distant Edom, from Tyre and Sidon, and every one brought a necessity which nowhere else could be helped. They thronged about Him, they touched Him, they besought Him; and men with evil spirits fell at his feet, crying, "Thou art the Son of God." He healed many, and when He could no longer endure what was cast upon his willing heart He asked his disciples to bring a boat that He might take refuge in it, and from its security He spoke to the people standing upon the shore. At length the end came, and leaving the throng, and leaving his friends, He went up into the mountain and spent the whole night in prayer. He needed to pray. Strong though He was, He had still his need. At the well of Samaria He needed to rest, for his weariness was as real as ours has ever been, and it was in a real thirst that he said to the woman, "Give me to drink." There were times when angels came and ministered to Him. But not rarely, constantly He lived in prayer. Many times He was found at prayer, but commonly it was in secret. He prayed at the grave of Lazarus, when his sympathy had taken the sorrow of his friends upon his life. He prayed in Gethsemane, when his agony was upon Him; and at the last Passover, beneath the shadow of the Cross, He breathed out the prayer which is the most sacred portion of the sacred Scriptures. It belonged to his humiliation, it was a part of his true manhood, to pray, and to Him came the strength He sought. From the night upon the mountains He came refreshed to his friends, and from his disciples chose twelve who should attend Him, and henceforth there were thirteen, less one, who were bearing his name through the land. The lesson is a very simple one. He who would have the Christ life must needs have the Christ strength, and he who would have this must seek it in Christ's way. He went up into the mountain and continued all night in prayer to God. It is no reflection upon us, or upon the world, that we have this constant necessity. It was never meant that the world should give us all that we require, or that we should find within ourselves the strength which we must embody in our life. It was never meant that men should be selfsupporting, or should find in the world which they rule the rest and strength which the world needs to receive from them. As well wonder that the tree must reach out its branches for the sunshine, or send down its roots to the water-springs, as that man must look beyond himself for light and life. Let us be reasonable. If we were of the world, the world should care for us; because we are of God, God will care for us. Because Christ's work is given to us, Christ's strength will be given to Because we are branches, the vine will furnish our life; only like the vine himself, whose branches we are, we must look to the husbandman for the life which we can transform into grapes. us. He who has made us thus dependent invites us to ask of Him what we would have, to seek from Him what the world would have from us. "It is the comfort of our littleness that He is great." Thus God makes our weakness into strength, and from our dependence ordains the sacrament of help, which He will keep with us. |