Part 2
Those who are strangers to the closet, fall an easy prey to temptation. Satan gets an advantage of them at every turn. Nothing comes right: everything happens, in an untoward way, for,
Thorny is the road
That leads my soul from God.
If a brother is not at the prayer meeting for a time or two, you can speak to him about it and exhort him. His absence is a thing you can see. But if he is absenting himself from the closet, that is a thing beyond your observation. You only feel, when you come into contact with him, that something is sapping his spiritual life: and who shall estimate the eternal loss that follows the neglect of secret prayer.
On speaking to one as to how it fared with him and his God, he surprised us by saying he was a backslider. He had tasted of the heavenly joys: but had gone back to the world. His backsliding had commenced with the neglect of secret prayer.
“I missed prayer for a time,” he said, “and then I missed it oftener, and things went on in this way until, somehow, everything slipped through my fingers, and I found myself in the world again.”
We fear this is true of many. Little by little, neglect eats in, until they wake up to find they have not even the desire to go into the closet to meet with their God.
How different with those who watch with jealous care that the Lord has always His portion, whoever may have to want theirs. Their going out, their coming in, their whole manner of life declares that they have been where the heavenly dew has been falling.
Their Father who saw them in secret, is rewarding them openly. They carry about with them, although all unconscious of it, the serenity of the secret place, where they have been communing with God as friend with friend. But these are reckoned “peculiar”, and it is to be feared their number is few, few compared with the many who are hurrying on, strangers to the closet and the hour alone with God.
Little wonder that the saints are getting as worldly as the very worldling. Little wonder the plainest precepts of the Word of God are brought to bear upon them in vain. We need not wonder that they as resolutely refuse to obey the Word of the Lord, as a water-logged ship refuses to obey its helm. They cannot see this truth; and that practical truth which affects the closet has never exercised them.
But why should this surprise us, if private prayer has lost its charm?
It is an Abraham, in sweet communion with God, that knows the fate of Sodom, long before the dwellers in that city are dreaming of danger. And it is the same Abraham who hastens and rises early in the morning to do the thing the Lord has commanded, although that thing be the severing of natures tenderest tie (Gen. 22). Men of communion are men of obedience.
It is men, delighting to be near the King, who are ready to hazard their lives to fetch him a drink from Bethlehem’s well (1 Chron. 11:1717And David longed, and said, Oh that one would give me drink of the water of the well of Bethlehem, that is at the gate! (1 Chronicles 11:17)). And it is men of prayer that have moved the arm of Omnipotence in all ages; while they who seemed to have least need to pray, have been the very ones to whom the closet has been dearest.
Our great example was a man of prayer. We read of Him rising a great while before day, and departing into a solitary place to pray (Mark 1:3535And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed. (Mark 1:35)). Let us follow Him, whithersoever He goeth. If He needed the aid of heavenly power to help Him in the evil hour, how much more do we. Then let no uncertain sound be given in this all-important matter.
Let secret prayer be urged on God’s people as one of the great essentials of spiritual life, without which our greatest service will be barren and fruitless in the eyes of Him who looks on the heart. And let each one of us ask ourselves the question,
“Am I delighting in the secret place—to plead with the Lord—to renew my strength—to have power with God and prevail?”
(Concluded)