God Loves… Himself

The following quote is an excerpt taken from FIRE FROM HEAVEN by Paul Cook:

“In 1807 the early beginnings of Primitive Methodism had taken place at Mow Cop in Staffordshire… There were some mighty men of prayer amongst them. One of these was a quaint character… the name of John Oxtby. Born in 1767 near Pocklington, he had lived for thirty-seven years haring religion and indulging himself in every form of wickedness. But in 1804 he was awakened and came under a terrible conviction of sin. After suffering great agonies of soul he was wonderfully converted. In 1824 he entered the word of God full times, and we are told he did so ‘like a boxer wanting to give a knock-out blow to Satan’…who became known as ‘Praying Johnny’ because…’his power lay in the spiritual realm and there he was indeed a prince of God. Six hours each day he usually spent on his knees and in this way he girded himself for his amazing conquests.'”

“Filey, a fishing village in the East Riding was noted for its wickedness and pagan practices. Attempts had been made to establish a work there…but the work had proved fruitless and a proposal was made to abandon it. John Oxtby objected…’let me go.’ When he reached Muston Hill and viewed Filey in the distance, he fell upon his knees in a dry ditch and began to agonize with God. A miller passing that way thought he heard two men arguing. But it was only one man praying. He was engaging in ‘the argument of faith’ with his God. Evantually God gave Oxtby the assurance that his prayers were answered. He ‘rose in faith’ and exclaimed. ‘It is done, Lord! It is done! Filey is taken! Filey is taken! So he descended into the town; and it was taken!…He preached through the village…fifty of the eighty were saved. A great revival swept the town which completely transformed its moral and spiritual tone and laid the foundations of a powerful church which continued in strength into the twentieth century… The outlook…before Charles Finney’s ideas began to influence evangelical life in this country, was that when the work of God languished they needed to seek by earnest prayer a sovereign intervention of God.”

There are several things to notice that should burn the necessity of prayer into our souls. First, the great need to have mighty men of prayer among the people of God. David had his mighty men around him who could handle swords, but we need to have mighty men who can truly seek the Lord in prayer. The souls of mighty men in prayer need to train a lot in prayer and faith. God raises up men who are mighty in prayer when He is about to pour out His Spirit. This is not to say that mighty women in prayer are not needed, but we need mighty men of prayer who fill the pulpits in the land. Second, though not all will be able to spend six hours a day in prayer, it points to how utterly bankrupt we are in America when we have books that encourage us to spend five minutes a day. We need men and women who will seek the Lord for strength and power to spend a few to several hours a day in prayer. We need Anna’s in the land: “And there was a prophetess, Anna the daughter of Phanuel… She never left the temple, serving night and day with fastings and prayers” (Luke 2:36-37). We need people who will give themselves to prayer and a kind of prayer that is truly seeking the Lord.

Third, no place is truly hopeless if the Lord gives people hearts to pray for it. No place is beyond the power of God if He chooses to act. If we truly believe in the sovereignty of God, then we must live in the assurance that God can act where and when He is pleased to act. Fourth, let us learn that when we begin to pray for a place, a few short utterances is not going to cut it. What is needed is a heart that is willing to spend the time in agonized prayer arguing with God (giving reasons for His name) to revive that place. A comfortable word a few minutes here and there is useless for revival. This is not a heart that is prepared to seek the Lord. Fifth, from the statement on Finney above, let us turn from his ways (or influenced by him) to ways taught of the Lord. We need hearts given over to earnest prayer for a sovereign intervention. Any revival is sovereign by nature and must be prayed for in that way. Until we are finished with the wisdom of men’s plans and see revival as God’s sovereign work we will not pray with fervency. As long as we just pray for God’s help, nothing will happen. But when our hearts are broken and we look to Him alone, revival may be at the door. Sixth, God saves great sinners by a great grace for a great work.

The quotes below come from Boston Revival 1842 published in 1980 by Richard Owen Roberts.

“Mr. Whitefield’s preaching was blessed to multitudes in Boston, as well as in other parts of the land. After Mr. Whitefield’s departure, Mr. Gilbert Tennent came and watered what he had planted. Dr. Prince has given us a particular account of this revival: “And now,” says he, “there was such a time as we never knew. The Rev. Mr. Cooper was wont to say, that more came to him in one week, in deep concern about their souls, than in the whole twenty-four years of his preceding ministry. I can also say the same as to the numbers that repaired to me. By Mr. Cooper’s letters to Scotland, it appears he has had about 600 different persons in three months’ time; and Mr. Webb informs me that he has had in the same space, above 1,000… those who had been in full communion, and going on in a course of religion many years. And their cases represented, were a blind mind, a vile, and a hard heart; and some under a deep sense thereof; some under great temptations; some in great concern for their souls; some in great distress of mind for fear of being unconverted; others for fear they had been all along building on a righteousness of their own, and were still in the gall of bitterness and bond of iniquity. Some under flighty, and others under strong convictions of their sins and sinfulness, guilt and condemnation, the wrath and curse of God upon them, their impotence and misery; some for a long time, even several months, under those convictions; some fearing lest the Holy Spirit should withdraw’ others having quenched his operations, were in great distress, lest he should leave them forever; persons far advanced in years, afraid of being left behind, whole others were hastening to their great Redeemer. Nor were the same persons satisfied with coming once or twice as formerly, but again and again, I know not how often, complaining of their evil and cursed hearts.”

The above words show the Spirit’s work during true revival. Jesus said when the Spirit comes (He has) He will convict the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment (Jn 16:8). This work of the Spirit is part of true revival. The men who heard Peter preach on the day of Pentecost when the Spirit was sent were pierced with conviction of their sin. When the Holy Spirit begins to work in the souls of men and women He works a deep conviction of sin in their souls. As Thomas Watson said many years ago, “Until sin becomes bitter, Christ will not be sweet.”

During the time of true revival entertainment in churches is like biting into gravel. When there is conviction of the Spirit and concern for everlasting souls, all of that is nonsense. Some thought to be converted who practiced religion for years became acutely aware of their sin and lost condition. The Spirit opened their blind eyes to their wicked and vile hearts and convicted of them of their lack of true righteousness. The Spirit opened their eyes to judgment and they felt the wrath and curse of God upon them. The writer tells us that people were in these states of conviction for a long time, and even for several months. How different this account is than the modern religious practices when we simply ask people if they are sinners and if they believe certain thing about Christ. When the Spirit is working in revival awakened people are not satisfied with anything but the work of God in their souls.

This should teach us to pray and what to pray. We should pray that the Lord would convict us, the world, churches that are full of the world, and other souls of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. Our own souls are too full of misery and our own hearts are too hard because of hidden sin. Perhaps many ministers and church members have never had the work of the Spirit in their souls opening them up to a sight of their own heart and bringing the sword of deep conviction. But in true revival this happens. Let us pray for the Spirit’s work of conviction and plead with God to send His Spirit and start this work of deep conviction. Before and during revival there must be a time of deep and painful conviction. If we truly desire true revival then we will not stop at the inner agony as the Lord opens our hearts to the depths of its sin. We do want revival, right? Are we ready to undergo the searching work of the Spirit? We do want true revival, right? Are we ready to repent of all our beloved sins? We do want revival, right? Will we pray with desire for the Spirit to do these things in us? Are we ready to go for months in deep conviction? Do we really want the revival sent by God with His methods? Many of Christ’s followers fell away at hard words. We must know that praying for true revival will cost us our whole hearts. Do we really desire revival?

The quotes below come from Boston Revival 1842 published in 1980 by Richard Owen Roberts.

God has been accustomed to build up his kingdom in the world mostly by the instrumentality of revivals of religion…Mr. Shepard of Cambridge was eminently a revival preacher. It was on account of his searching preaching, and skill in detecting errors, that the college was located at Cambridge. It was the desire of the founders of this college to raise up a generation of ministers to carry forward the work of revivals in these churches, that they had begun…”I was told when a youth, by elderly people, that he scarce ever preached a sermon, but that some one or other of his congregation were struck with great distress of soul, and cried aloud in agony, what shall I do to be saved? Though his voice was low, yet so searching was his preaching, and so great a power attending, as an hypocrite could not easily hear, and it seemed so irresistible.”

The Lord Jesus Christ was so plainly held up, in the preaching of the gospel unto poor, lost sinners, and the absolute necessity of the new birth; and God’s Holy Spirit, in those days, was blessed to the accompanying the word with such efficacy upon the hearts of many, that our hearts were taken off from old England and placed upon heaven…The discourse…was not, how shall we go to England, but how shall we go to heaven? Have I true grace in my heart? Have I Christ or not? Oh, how men and women, young and old, pray for grace, beg for Christ in those days; and it was not in vain; many were converted, and others established in believing.

I might multiply witnesses to prove that the churches of New England were at first Revival Churches… The spirit of revival planted these churches. Things of religion were the most prominent objects of attention…Such were the men that planted churches around Massachusetts bay. They laid the foundation of these churches in the spirit of revivals. The Holy Ghost overshadowed them….During the first thirty years of their existence they enjoyed the continued influences of the Holy Ghost. In the second generation, there began to be a decay in vital godliness. This was deeply lamented by Increase Mather, and other ministers of that age. President Mather, in 1678, thus remarks: “Prayer is needful on this account, in that conversions are become rare in this age of the world…The body of the rising generation is a poor, perishing, unconverted, and, except the Lord pour down his Spirit, and undone generation…How many churches, how many towns are there in New England, that we may sigh over them and say, the glory is departed.” Arminianism has gradually stolen into our churches. The half-way covenant had been adopted, and the tone of piety lowered down.

The above quotes were taken from a man discussing Christianity very early in America. He was speaking of Thomas Shepard who was the founder of Harvard University. It is amazing to think, in light of what it is now, that Harvard was started to raise up a generation of ministers to carry forward the work of revivals in the churches. One reason that this was important is that revival was seen as the way that God used to build His kingdom. Another writer said that revival is the ordained way that God uses to build His Church. The churches in New England were started by and during a spirit of revival. But a decay of piety came in and Arminianism came in. Without trying to be disparaging, we can at least look at this and understand that the revival that the older Reformed men sought is not consistent with the way Arminians would seek it. The men of old sought revival as an outpouring of the Spirit of the sovereign God who alone could do the work of regeneration in the hearts of men and women. The Arminians sought to have the people make a choice. The men of old preached the glory of God in Christ and told the people that they must seek God and pray that He would give them grace. The Arminians would tell the people that they needed to make a choice. True revival comes by grace alone and by the hand of a sovereign God. We are to seek it that way and we must seek it by hearts that groan for Him and His glory in prayer. We must also realize that hearts that desire Him and His glory will only come by the work of His grace in our souls. We cannot work up revival and we cannot work up hearts for revival. We must pray for both and they only come by grace alone.

“And He said to them, “Are you so lacking in understanding also? Do you not understand that whatever goes into the man from outside cannot defile him, 19 because it does not go into his heart, but into his stomach, and is eliminated?” (Thus He declared all foods clean.) 20 And He was saying, “That which proceeds out of the man, that is what defiles the man. 21 “For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed the evil thoughts, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, 22 deeds of coveting and wickedness, as well as deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride and foolishness. 23 “All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man” (Mark 7:18-23).

We know that we are kept from prayer from the things that fill our time and hearts. We know that when we regard sin in our hearts God is far from us and that God hates pride and it is the lamp of the wicked. We imagine that these things are for those unlike us who are involved in external sin. We can violate in principle the teachings of Jesus above if we do not examine our own hearts in the realm of religion and in the realm of prayer. While man is constantly engaged in the practice of justifying his own behavior, thoughts, words, and actions before God, other people, and himself; in doing so he is blinding himself to his own heart and the practice of all religion and prayer.

What we must be aware or increase our awareness of the state of our own hearts. If our lives drown out our words, then we must know that the state of our hearts and the deepest desires of our hearts will also drown out prayer. God knows the depths of our hearts and hears them and not just our words. As the Pharisee’s heart was a prayer to himself rather than to God so it was heard as a prayer to himself by God. In like fashion the true desires of our hearts are heard by God and not just our words. If the words that come from our mouths defile us or show how defiled our hearts really are to God, we need to awaken from the slumbers of our sleepy prayers and cold hearts to ask God to show us our hearts so we can see what our prayers really are. As a parent looks through the stuttering words of a young child to the intent of the words, so God sees through our words to the truest intent of our hearts.

When we pray for other people, do we do so out of duty or do we really desire God in their souls? Down deep do we judge them and think that they brought it on themselves or do we really desire the glory of God to shine through them? When we pray for revival, what are the deepest desires in our souls? The worst form of adultery is spiritual adultery as God charged Israel with. Could it be that the desires of our hearts actually come from an adulterous heart before God? Could it be that we desire to pray for selfish reasons and that we desire church growth for selfish reasons and that we pray for revival for selfish reasons? A heart that is more concerned with self than the glory of God is an adulterous heart as it loves self more than God in its very prayers. The Greatest Commandment is to love God with all of our being and yet we will come to Him with love for self in what we think of as our prayers? Surely this should give us pause to ask God to show us our hearts before and in prayer.

The tenth commandment governs our desires and shows the spiritual nature of the Law. The heart can covet in many ways when it comes to pray and excuse it by reasons of darkness. The heart can be full of envy when it comes to pray and have it hidden under differing words of darkness. The heart can be full of deceit when it comes to pray and be deceived to think it is praying. Our hearts can be full of pride and yet we may think of it in different terms because the world and the professing Church has deceived us about what pride really is. Verse 23 of Mark 7 tells us that “All these evil things proceed from within and defile the man.” May the truths of this verse be driven in our hearts like a spear. These things are evil. If we have these things (of the text) in our hearts, then we have evil in our hearts. Let us not deceive ourselves or others by trying to excuse them in any way. These things are evil and they defile us. When we do what we call “prayer” and yet have not dealt with our own hearts, our very prayers are expressions of evil things and defile us. The Pharisees were defiled and deceived by the evil of their hearts and prayers. May God search our hearts and grant true repentance from evil hearts that we may truly seek Him in prayer. Do not be deceived by self-love and pride even if it is covered in disguise by external prayer. Only God can show the truth of our hearts to us by His light. Without that light, we live and pray with evil and defiled hearts. Apart from repentance and love our prayers are the expressions of evil hearts that defile us. Ask the Pharisees.

The following excerpts are taken from AN ANTHOLOGY OF EARLY BAPTISTS IN NEW HAMPSHIRE. It was originally published in 1836 and republished in 2001 by Particular Baptist Press.

A number of young people were now under concern for their salvation. Mr. John Peckins came and preached a powerful sermon; after which, while I was exhorting the people, there was much weeping and sobbing through the assembly, which increased till at length many broke out into a loud cry, which continued for an hour or more. We had something similar at a meeting the next day, but we had to lament over the most of those who made the greatest outcry; for they soon returned to their former courses, but others brought forth fruit.

I felt my heart very much drawn out in prayer for the dear youth. And I was often melted into tenderness while urging upon them the love of our dying Saviour. Not was I satisfied with praying for them in public, but I agonized in secret. There was a delightful water-fall in a pleasant grove, at a little distance from my dwelling, where I spent many precious seasons in prostrating myself before the Lord, mingling my feeble voice with the sound of many waters, in humble supplication for the blessing of God to descend upon the souls of the people to whom I preached the word. But sin was mixed with all I did. I often though that it was presumption to look for a divine blessing to attend the labours of one so weak and unworthy as I was; and yet, if any were brought to rejoice in hope under my preaching, this wretched heart would be seeking self-praise. But the Lord wrought wonders; and by the month of May, a considerable number were made to rejoice in hope, and were ready to offer themselves as candidates for baptism.

The attention of the people increased through the winter, and our prospects were more encouraging… I had strength to preach frequently in different parts of Newbury and Newburyport; and the Holy Spirit attended the word to the conviction of some of the young people…The members of the church were blessed with a spirit of prayer, and our prayer meetings became frequent, and were interesting. I held an inquiring meeting at my house on Monday evenings. In May and June, we had several candidates for baptism and membership, who were received…Thus the good work progressed, so that in about one year, the church had doubled in number.

There are several important points to notice in these excerpts. These all happened in local churches. God has set up the local church and that is His primary means of working through. It was preaching in the local churches and it was prayer in the local churches that God used. Not all of the meetings necessarily took place in a church building as such, but the meetings consisted of the people of God meeting for specific purposes. The minister in the second excerpt spent much time in private prayer for the people of his congregation that the blessing of God would descend on their souls. While he may have prayed for their physical and financial health, what is mentioned here is the blessing of God on their souls. In the modern day prayer meetings focus on health and wealth issues. If we are looking for true revival, we need to be praying for spiritual issues. God has given the vast amount of worldly riches to those His wrath is upon. What we must learn to seek is the blessings of God on souls. That is how Jesus prayed and that is how Paul prayed. They prayed for the work of God in the souls of men as that is true love.

The attention of the people in hearing the word increased and a spirit of prayer was given. God does not move just because churches offer words we call prayer, but only when there is true prayer. True prayer will not occur until He gives us a spirit of prayer, and we have to seek that as well. But when He begins to move in giving these things, the churches are strengthened and grow. Revival is biblical church growth and it is to be sought by prayer at all times and not just when it is convenient and we think we need something. A minister that feels the weight of the work of Satan in his soul with pride and desires for self-praise will be a minister that prays for his own heart and the hearts of others. Our prayers must be for souls and spiritual things because that is where the battle really is.

The following quotes are from the book SCOTLAND SAW HIS GLORY which was published by International Awakening Press in 1995. The quotes are intended to show the nature of true revival, the necessity of preaching and prayer for spiritual awakening, which takes note of the sovereignty of God in sending spiritual awakening.

Once he [John Carstares] assisted at a communion in Kirkintilloch, and the evening proving very stormy, the people lingered in the church. He addressed the waiting congregation “upon believing in Christ; and there was such a mighty power came along with it that either two or three hundred dated their conversion from that discourse.” Upon another occasion about the same time, he was helping at a sacrament at Cadder. “Upon the Sabbath he was wonderfully assisted in his first prayer, and had a strange gale throu all the sermon; and there was a strange motion upon all the hearers.” When he came to serve the table, “all in the house were strangely affected, and glory seemed to fill that house.” Such incidents were not isolated.

Many serious people…were longing much to partake of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, and having been at much pains in public preaching and from house to house to prepare them for it…he administered that holy ordinance at Obsdale in the house of the lady dowager of Fowlis. Two ministers assisted, for which one of them had to pay dearly. At the last sermon “there was a great many present, and the eldest Christians there declared they had not been witnesses to the like. In short, there were so many sensible and glorious discoveries made of the Son of Man, and such evident presence of the Master of assemblies this day and the preceding, that the people seemed to be in a transport, and their souls filled with heaven and breathing thither while their bodies were upon the earth; and some were almost at that, whether in the body of out of the body I cannot tell. Even some drops fell on strangers.”…Praying societies had existed since the earlier days of the century; they became exceeding precious when fiery persecution was rolling over the land. The whole time, however, was not propitious for an open movement of religious revival, but whenever the pressure of persecution was removed, the life that was in the people showed itself in the usual way.

It was amazing, he exclaims, “To see a congregation sit with looks so eager, as if they were to eat the words as they came out of the mouth of the preacher; to see the affection which they hear, that there shall be a general sound of a mourning through the whole church upon the extraordinary warmth of expression in the minister, and this not affected and designed, but casual and undissembled.”

He told me himself (and he was a man incapable of vain boasting) that for years afterwards he never preached on the Lord’s Day but some of his people on the ensuing week, at times as many as six or eight, came to him under conviction of sin, asking the way to Jesus….I remember asking him what were the truths in his preaching which seemed to have been specially blessed for producing the awakening, and I could never forget his answer….He told me that the truth which seemed above all others to impress and awaken his people was the dying love of Christ.”

These few stories should help us connect a few dots and turn our minds and hearts to see how God works. We see that praying societies existed from early on in the century and we must not dismiss that point. If we truly desire to see revival in our day we must seek the Lord individually so that He will grant us the desire to pray in groups. If the Lord moves His people to pray then we must count the cost and deny ourselves in order to seek grace at the throne of grace. Until we are a praying people we will not have preaching that will feed the souls of the people and they will then come eagerly to be fed with the words of the living God. People do not want to hear the bare words of a text, they want to hear living words from God. When people are praying, thirsting and hungering for the words of God, the Spirit of God is not far from being poured out. When the Spirit of the living God is poured out, then heaven comes down and glory fills the souls of the people. If we don’t long for that, something is wrong with our souls. If we will not seek the Lord for this, we have to wonder if we have ever tasted and seen that the Lord is good. May the Lord who alone can give revival awaken us to see the true means of revival. We need hearts to seek the Lord and not more man-centered methods drawn from man-centered hearts. He will comes in His own ways.

The following is from Glory Filled the Land, published by International Awakening Press on the 1904-1905 Welsh revival. This section is by G. Cambell Morgan who originally spoke and then wrote after going to Wales to “examine” the revival. You can detect a note of amazement or admiration in his “voice” as you read.

THE ORIGIN OF THE MOVEMENT
You cannot trace it, and yet I will try to trace it tonight. Whence has it come? All over Wales-I am giving you roughly the result of the questioning of fifty ore more persons at random in the week-a praying remnant have been agonizing before God about the state of their beloved land, and it is through that the answer of fire has come. You tell me that the revival originates with Roberts. I tell you that Roberts is a product of the revival. You tell me that it began in an Endeavor meeting where a dear girl bore testimony. I tell you that it was part of the result of a revival breaking out everywhere. If you and I could stand above Wales, looking at it, you would see fire breaking out here and there, and yonder, and somewhere else, without any collusion or prearrangement. It is a divine visitation in which God-let me say reverently-in which God is saying to us, “See what I can do without the things you are depending on;” “See what I can do in answer to a praying people;” “See what I can do through the simplest who are ready to fall in line and depend wholly and absolutely upon Me.”

A CHURCH REVIVAL
What is the character of this revival? It is a church revival. I do not mean by that merely a revival among church members. It is that, but it is held in church buildings. I have been saying for a long time that the revival which is to be permanent in the life of a nation must be associated with the life of the churches. What I am looking is that there shall come a revival breaking out in all our regular church life. The meetings are held in the chapels, all up and down the valleys. Revival began among church members, and when it touches the outside man it makes him into a church member at once. I am tremendously suspicious of any mission or revival movement that treats with the contempt the Church of Christ, and affects to despise the churches. Within the last five weeks twenty thousand have joined the churches. I think more than that have been converted, but the churches in Wales have enrolled during the last five weeks twenty thousand new members.

STRIKING CASES OF PERSONAL INFLUENCE
First of all, it is turning Christians everywhere into evangelists. There is nothing more remarkable about it that that, I think. People you never expected to see doing this kind of thing are becoming definite personal workers… The movement is characterized by the most remarkable confessions of sin-confessions that must be costly. I heard some of them, men rising who have been members of the Church and officers of the Church, confessing hidden sin in their heart, impurity committed and condoned, and seeking prayer for putting it away. The whole movement is marvelously characterized by a confession of Jesus Christ, testimony to His power, to His goodness, to His beneficence, and testimony merging forevermore into outbursts of singing.

This whole thing is of God; it is a visitation in which He is making man conscious of Himself without any human agency. The revival is far more wide spread than the fire zone. In this sense you may understand that the fire zone is where the meetings are actually held, and where you feel the flame that burns. But even when you come out of it, and go into railway trains, or into a shop, a bank, anywhere, men everywhere are talking of God. Whether they obey or not is another matter. There are thousands not yielded to the constraint of God, but God has given Wales in these days a new conviction and consciousness of Himself. That is the profound thing, the underlying truth.

In our day (2009 almost 2010) we must seek the Lord for these things. We must learn from Him by practice what prayer and life are that are totally dependent on God for all things. We must learn what it means to work though the Churches because the Church is the body of Christ. We must learn to confess sin and seek God for the power to put it away. We must seek God for a fire in our hearts, churches, nation, and then world. A fire (!!!) like Pentecost.

Prayer is often conceived of and practiced as a work of man rather than a work of grace in the heart of man. God has created the human mind to think in terms of causation, which is insight into reality and enables man to trace all things to the Divine cause, but since the Fall we are inclined to look at human causation and not see the Divine. So when we see in history that men have prayed before God acts we think that God responded to prayer. But the heart that is truly praying does not correspond to spontaneous combustion in the natural realm as if a truly praying heart came from no cause, but instead it has a Divine cause. The heart that is broken from self and is truly praying is also not the work of the self as that would be just another level of praying from self-centeredness. True prayer is the fruit of the Spirit because there can be no true prayer apart from the love of God and there is no love but that which is from God. There is nothing good in the physical or spiritual realm that does not ultimately come from the working of God as the First Cause. All spiritual good that comes to human beings only come on the basis of grace.

Even those who are Reformed and think of the word “grace” a lot tend to make the means of grace into a work. We think of prayer as a means of grace and so we “pray” to receive grace. But if think of it just a little more, we will see that if we pray as a means of grace thinking that God will give grace if we pray, then we turn prayer into a work. God does not give grace because of works. It is true that prayer is a means of grace, but it is still grace. God is under no obligation to dispense grace just because a human being is doing a “means of grace.” God does give grace through prayer, but just because it is a means of grace does mean it automatically brings grace. By no means is this true. Instead we must “use” the means of grace to seek grace itself and as if it comes totally without cause on account of the works or merits of men. True prayer is when sinful men come to God in order to be made broken and humble instruments of grace. The grace of God will make its instruments of grace before it bestows grace. Grace is always given to the praise of His glory and men who think that they can dispense grace to themselves by using the means of grace are trying to obtain grace for selfish purposes and don’t understand biblical grace at all.

Prayer must always be going to the throne of grace to receive grace. We must never think of prayer as anything else. It is not what God responds to because we do it, but God responds to prayers for grace when He has broken and humbled the heart to receive grace. By definition it is pride to think that I can do anything to cause God to respond to me that is not of His own work in the soul. That would be a sinful human being having the power to manipulate God and put the grace of God in the hands of men to dispense it. How we want to dispense grace to ourselves as we please, and so we use the means of grace to get grace for ourselves. Oh how the proud human heart will trick itself into thinking that it can obtain grace because of its own efforts and not seeing how despicable it is in doing so. Our proud prayers, though perhaps orthodox, are opposed by God because the Scriptures tell us with a great deal of clarity that God opposes the proud and gives grace to the humble (James 4:6; I Peter 5:5).

When we pray in solitary or in groups for revival what we must know that revival only comes as grace. Revival is not something that God responds to men when they work hard for it, but it is the pouring out of God’s grace in pouring out Himself into human souls. God never gives Himself on the basis of works, but only by grace. Revival must be sought with broken hearts that truly desire God’s glory shining in Christ. Revival must be sought as grace because true revival is grace. God will only bring revival when He has worked His desire for His glory in His people. His desire in revival is to manifest the beauty of the glory of His grace. Do we desire revival in our hearts for His glory alone? Can we desire the God’s grace and expect it to come to us because we have performed certain actions? Oh no, that is to want something from God because of what we do and that is something other than grace.
What a great need there is for the soul to be humbled before it prays and to ask for humility while it prays. There is no true prayer apart from humility because God will not give grace to the proud.

Hebrews 4:16 – “Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

“He that moves and acts according to a law of his own, offers a manifest wrong to God, the highest wisdom and chiefest good; disturbs the order of the world; annuls the design of the righteousness and holiness of God. The law of God is the rule of that order he would have observed in the world; he that makes another law his rule, thrusts out the order of the Creator, and establishes the disorder of the creature. But this will be more evident in the fourth thing. (4) Man would make himself the rule of God, and give laws to his Creator. We are willing God should be our benefactor, but not our ruler; we are content to admire his excellency and pay him a worship, provided he will walk by our rule. This commits a riot upon his nature; to think him to be what we ourselves would have him and wish him to be. Psal 50:21. We would amplify his mercy and contract his justice. We would have his power enlarged to supply our wants, and straitened when it goes about to revenge our crimes. We would have him wise to defeat our enemies, but not to disappoint our unworthy projects; we would have him all eye to regard our indigence, and blind, not to discern out guilt; we would have him true to his promises, regardless of his precepts, and false to his threatenings. We would form anew the nature of God according to our models, and shape a God according to our fancies, as he made us at first according to his own image; instead of owning and obeying him, we would have him obey us; instead of owning and admiring his perfections, we would have him strip himself of his infinite excellency, and clothe himself with a nature agreeable to our own. This is not only to set us self as the law of God, but to make our own imaginations the model of the nature of God.” (Stephen Charnock)

This paragraph serves as an excellent mirror for people to hold their hearts before and see what their motives and intents are in prayer. We are so used to thinking that we do God a favor when we do our religious duty of going before Him and asking Him to do things for us according to the desires of our selfish hearts. However, we don’t see anything like that in the teachings of Jesus on prayer. We are told that we are to pray according to His will (I John 5:14). We are told in John 15:7 what to do before we obtain what we ask for: “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.” Yet if we are only asking for things according to our own wills and they are not aligned with His, regardless of how much we want them and how much we think of our desires as coming from Scripture, we are praying according to a law of self rather than His wisdom and rather than according to the Chief Good. It is possible, and most likely the vast majority of prayer is performed in this way, to make ourselves the one that sets out the rule and then try to get God to conform to us.

When we go to prayer we know that we want God as our benefactor, yet while we tell children that they should not whine if the parent says no, yet we whine when God does not give us the answer our selfish hearts desire. We will happily worship and pray as long as God gives us the desires of our hearts. But surely this shows us that something is wrong. It does not take a lover of God to pray to a benefactor and ask for things or to adjust circumstances so that they are favorable to me, it only takes a heart that is dead in sin and self to do that. It is easy to have pleasant and joyful affections and so think we worship God when things are going according to the desires of self. But are we so ready to worship when things are not pleasant? Are we so ready to pray for His will to be done when His will is for us to suffer? It is easy to pour out platitudes to Jesus for saying “yet not My will, but Yours be done” (Luke 22:42) in the Garden when facing the cross. It is easy to preach to others what they should do. But how hard it is to worship/pray when life is hard and the heavens seem like brass. Job bowed in worship when all things were taken away, yet we want God to do our own will instead of ours bowing to Him. True prayer involves our bowing to God and asking Him to work His will in us. True prayer involves seeking the will of God as our desire and truly seeking for His will to be done. True prayer is to come to Him with broken hearts so indeed we will not be asking Him to obey us but instead we are asking Him to work obedience to Him in us. If our hearts are not broken when we pray, and we are not seeking broken hearts in order to pray, our prayers are nothing more than an expression of the idol self and we are asking God to bow down before us. Let us not imagine that prayer is a simple little thing that can easily be performed. Self must be denied or our prayers are not to God but are to the idol of self.

“Many, if not most actions, materially good in the world, are done more because they are agreeable to self, than as they are honourable to God. As the word of God may be heard not as his word, I Thess 2:13, but as there may be pleasing notions in it, or discourses against an opinion or party we disaffect; so the will of God may be performed, not as his will, but as it may gratify some selfish consideration, when we will please God so far as it may not displease ourselves, and serve him as our Master so far as his command be a servant to our humour; when we consider not who it is that commands, but how short it comes of displeasing that sin which rules in our heart, pick and choose what is least burdensome to the flesh and distasteful to our lusts… He that doth the will of God, not out of conscience of that will, but because it is agreeable to himself, casts down the will of God, and sets his own will in the place of it; takes the crown from the head of God, and places it upon the head of self. If things are done, not because they are commanded by God, but desirable to us; it is a disobedient obedience; a conformity to God’s will in regard of the matter, a conformity to our own will in regard of the motive; either as the things done are agreeable to natural and moral self, or sinful self.” (Stephen Charnock)

Do we pray because we truly seek the face of God out of love or because we want something from God?
Do we pray because we want to be seen as spiritual and holy more than we want to actually be spiritual and holy? Do we pray with the strength of self because God commanded it rather than love God and His glory in the world?
Does it please us to pray because we have found the face of God and have seen His glory or to do our duty?
When we pray, do we really seek the things from God because they glorify Him or for some motive of self?
Do we pray for some things simply because we see that they are biblical rather than truly desire them?
Are there things we pray for that we really don’t want God to give because of selfish considerations?
Do we pray at times with fervor and feeling and yet confuse the things we are asking for with desire for God?
Do we pray for the things that are easy for us and not for the things that would be hard for us?
Do we pray for things for God to do them rather than willingness for Him to do them through us?
Do we use prayer as an excuse not to do things that we don’t want to do?
Do we pray to be holy and yet refuse to seek to die to self, self-love, and self-centeredness?
Do we pray for God to send revival because we want bigger churches rather than more of God and His glory?
Do we pray for revival for some excitement or so God can show that He favors us and we are right?

Praying for revival is easy if we think of it is just words offered into the air. But if true prayer comes from hearts that love and desire God and His glory, then it will be seen as a Divine activity in the soul rather than the exertions of self. True prayer for revival must be spiritual prayer and not the words that can come from the flesh or simply be turned on or off so we can be religious when we please. True prayer for revival will only begin when our hearts are broken from self, the things of self, and the religion of self in order to seek God. Revival is not just something that happens, it is when God Himself comes and walks in and among His people. We cannot truly desire true revival unless we desire God Himself. Until our hearts desire God above all things, we don’t truly desire revival. Until our hearts are willing to die to all else (even religious things) and seek Him as the true hunger and thirst of the soul, we will not desire or pray for true revival. The Great Commandment is to love God with all of the heart, mind, soul, and strength. Until we pray in keeping with the Great Commandment our prayers will be out of the love and strength of self. We are to have fervent prayers, but fervent with the love of God in our souls rather than love for the things of self. In Luke 22:44 we see Jesus in agony praying fervently. Until our hearts have enough discomfort to seek God’s glory in revival, God will not be moving in us as He does before He sends revival. We must seek Him to grant us hearts with a holy focus on Him to truly pray for revival. True prayer for revival will cost pain in the heart, death to self, and many trials. Do we really want to pray without any reserve for revival? In Jesus’ prayer of agony, He submitted all to God so the glory of God would shine. That was true prayer. We must learn it by experience. Christ is our altar now, but we must lay all (not some and not most) on the altar to truly pray. His agony of soul in laying all down to go to the cross must be worked in us to pray as He prayed.