The professing Church simply must turn from seeking itself while using the name of God to seeking God for Himself. There will be no true revival or true life within the Church until this happens. But of course this will not happen until our hearts are broken before God and are turned by Him to Himself. There is no prayer apart from a heart that prays and there is no prayer apart from the love of the heart. But God is sovereign over the heart and not just external events. We must learn to seek the Lord for broken hearts in order to seek Him. We must learn to seek the Lord for His love for Himself to be put in our hearts so that we seek Him out of love. We simply must wake up and realize that prayer is not saying words to God and it is not asking God for the things we want, but instead it is the heart groaning forth its desires for God Himself and for His glory to be manifested in us and through us.
The following quote is from A.W. Pink’s writings on the prayers of the apostles:
Note also the catholicity of them. Not that it is either wrong or unspiritual to pray for ourselves individually, any more than it is to supplicate for temporal and providential mercies; I mean, rather, to direct attention to where the apostles placed their emphasis. In one only do we find Paul praying for himself, and rarely for particular individuals (as is to be expected with prayers that are a part of the public record of Holy Scripture, though no doubt he prayed much for individuals in secret). His general custom was to pray for the whole household of faith. In this he adheres closely to the pattern prayer given us by Christ, which I like to think of as the Family Prayer. All its pronouns are in the plural number: “Our Father,” “give us” (not only “me”), “forgive us,” and so forth. Accordingly we find the Apostle Paul exhorting us to be making “supplication for all saints” (Eph 6:18, ital. mine), and in his prayers he sets us an example of this very thing. He pleaded with the Father that the Ephesian church might “be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge” (Eph 3:18, ital. mine). What a corrective for self-centeredness! If I am praying for “all saints,” I include myself.
Let us look at some of the points that Pink points out. First, by “catholicity” he just means that the prayer is for all the Church or church rather than just for me. This is very important in terms of our hearts. We are commanded to love God with all of our beings. If we are constantly praying for things for ourselves-even if we attach spiritual reasons to them-we show that we love ourselves more than God and think of God as more of a genie that carries out our personal wishes. Instead, however, what we must do if we love God is to love His glory and His people who are the expression and manifestation of His glory. If we love the glory of God and His people more than anything else, that is what the longings of our hearts will cry out to Him for. Our love must be for God’s glory that shines in and through Christ and so it will be for the body of Christ which is the Church. If we truly love God we love His Son and if we love His Son we will love His bride and the other children of God.
From this point we can see why the prayers of Paul were so often for the whole household of the faith. He does not just want what is good for another person; He wants what is good for a whole church and all of God’s people. We must also realize that what is the true good of a single person is what is good for the whole and what is good for the person and the whole is God Himself. When we pray for ourselves as individuals we are actually not praying what is best in the big picture for ourselves as individuals. If our chief love is God Himself then what is best for each person is the glory of God. God’s glory is manifested through His people as whole and not just individuals. The more the glory of God is manifested through the local church and the Church as a whole the better that is for the true love of believers.
True prayer must be seen as the person and each local church seeking the Lord for Himself and not just for things. When people begin to truly seek the Lord for Himself, this is a sign that they love God and other people in truth. We hear much in our day about speaking the truth in love, but not so much about loving in truth. There is no true love apart from the truth. We must learn to pray in truth in order that there would be true love. We must learn to pray in true love so that there will be truth. The true way to love others is to pray for what is true and what is good for them. When we are seeking the glory of God out of true love for Him and for it to be manifested in and through others, only then are we are praying for others in accordance with knowledge, truth, and love. It is not just that it is important to pray for others in some general way, but it is utterly vital to pray for others in accordance with the glory of God and of true love. Just uttering words for the physical welfare of another is perhaps one of the worst things we can do for them in terms of the bigger spiritual picture. If God does heal them apart from working a true spiritual good in their soul, the illness does them no real good and it may even increase their pride. We simply must pray for others and think of them in terms of a group which is always in terms of the glory of God.
The second point is that this kind of praying is in accordance with the model prayer that Christ has given us. As Pink points out, all of the pronouns in that prayer are plural. The disciples came to Christ and asked Him to teach them how to pray. The model prayer that He gave them used plural pronouns. We should note that surely this means praying for others and ourselves as a whole but also that this points to corporate prayer as well. For one person that is part of a body to pray mostly for self is for the eye of the body to pray for itself and ignore the rest. If we focus on physical things we are ignoring what is truly important in prayer and that is the soul which is the very dwelling place of God. Christ has taught His body (the Church) to pray in a way that is beneficial for the whole body which is the instrument of His glory in the world. In praying for the body of Christ one is praying what is in accordance with the model prayer of Christ. God uses the whole body and so we are to pray for the whole body rather than just ourselves and our favorite person.
The third point has already been made in a sense but it is that when we truly pray for the church (local) and the Church (all true believers) are we then truly praying for ourselves in the proper realm. Each person is part of the body and is not a separate entity of self. If we love Christ and His body more than anything else, then our prayers must be for the body and yet we are in the body and so we are praying for what is best for ourselves. When one part of the body suffers, it all suffers. When the body as a whole is in good health, then each part is in health. Each individual part is under the judgment of God because the professing Church as a whole is under the judgment of God. We must learn that if we desire true revival and for God to turn His face toward us we must have our hearts turned to pray for His glory and the good of His body. True Christians have to learn that each person is not an island and that when true believers are not prayed for it is not praying for the body or ourselves either. Most importantly, when we are not praying for the body we are not truly praying for the glory of God in the world.
What kind of heart is it that is engaged in prayer like this if it is more than just words? We must be instructed to know how to pray but our hearts must be taught of the Spirit to truly do this. We have to begin to ask God to teach our hearts to pray. We must begin to seek the Lord to give the body a true love for Christ and His Bride in order to pray out of a heart of love. Until we learn the real connectedness of true believers in Christ we will not understand that when we pray for others and ourselves to know the love of Christ which passes understanding we are praying in such a way that the body of Christ is built up. Ephesians 4:16 teaches us something about this: “from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.” It is only when each part is working as it is supposed to be working does the body as a whole grow in Christ which is termed “building up of itself in love.” Let us meditate on verses like that and see that our hearts must be broken from our present ways and practices in order to truly love and in order to truly pray. American individualism is very strong in the professing Church but to the degree it is strong is to the same degree that the Church has been weakened.
What must we do to have a heart that desires the glory of God through His people rather than to focus on ourselves as individuals? We must be broken from our self-centeredness and our self-love. It is easy enough to stop what we are doing and start uttering different words, but the heart has to be changed. God alone can change our hearts and God alone is the only source of love that can pour forth His love in our hearts. Until we see how utterly wicked it is for us to “pray” in the ordinary way, we will not be broken from our self-centered and selfish prayers. Until we are broken from hearts that desire things for self and will be religious for self too, we will not know what it means to truly commune with God in prayer. Until our hearts are broken from our religious duties and religious prayers apart from Christ we will not know what it means to seek His glory by praying for His people. Again, we can say the words but these are things that must be done from the depths of the soul. Our true prayer is the deepest desire of the heart and God sees that deepest desire as our real prayer rather than hearing the words. We can say many words in what we call prayer but our deepest desire will be heard. Until God changes our hearts and gives us desires for Himself the desires of our selfish and wicked hearts will be our real prayers. God will justly hate them.
God Loves... Himself 
Leave a comment