The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1894-01-15

noon tnls mlgnt DC Leu US DOW our
heads in prayer.
MONDAY AFTERNOON.
The Ten Elements That Go to Make
Up True Prayer.
This afternoon want to call your at
tention to the subject of prayer. AS this
is the week of prayer we want, II possi-
BILE, to get into the spirit of prayer and
into sympathy with those who are pray
ing. II there is to be great, deep,
thorough, lasting work 1t is going to be
in answer to prayer.
have no sympathy with this idea that
IL we ask God to do q certain work He is
going to give us chaff. IL we have faith to
claim, believe He will answer our prayers.
/ don't believe He mocks His children.
believe He will give out of His abundance,
and give US the very best He has. Now,
have no doubt but that great many of
you have said at different times, "W hat is
the use OF prayer any wayTH Sometimes
when l have prayed it has seemed as il the
heavens were closed over me. 1t seems as
il God does not hear. My words all seem
to come back to me. Haven't you often
felt that way? i see some of you giving
your ascent to that. Now, in an
swer to that, let me say in the first place,
Jesus Christ is an example for us. We
profess to be His disciples. Well, remem-
ber that as man He prayed. AS God he
answers prayers. The key to Christ's
character and life Is this, He was a God
Man. At times he spoke as God, at
times as man. At times He acted as q
man. At times as God. But there is one
thing you will find His life all through,
His ministry was filled with prayer, and
there was no great event in His life that
was not proceeded by prayer. All
through His public ministry you will find
Him often in prayer and every great event
of His life, as / said before, was
preceded by prayer. / was q
christian a good many years before / no.
ticed that He was praying at his baptism,
but the Bible tells us that He came out of
the water praying. The spirit came in
answer to prayer, and the voice that came
from heaven saying, "This is my beloved
Son, in whom l am well pleased" was re-
sponse to prayer. The night preceding
the most marvellous sermon He preached
while on earth you will notice He spent
in prayer. There were about fifteen thous-
and sermons in that one. When He went
up into the mountain and was transfig-
ured we find that He was praying
when His visage was changed. He
had on that heavenly glory
because His Father was to visit
him. Then we read in the 18th chapter of
John that he was praying again that God
might glorify his name, and in Gethsem-
ane He was praying and sweating as it
were great drops of blood when the angel
came. The angel came, not when He was
uttering some parable or preaching some
sermon, but when He WAS praying. And
il you and are going to hear from heaven
it will be when we are praying. / have
often said that / had rather be able to
pray like Daniel than preach like Gabriel.
What we want is men and women that
know how to pray, who know how to call
fire down from heaven. Man, have you that
power with God in prayer? Now, when
say men;I mean men and women. Some
of you think that you cannot do much in
this work and you have said: 81 wish
were stronger. l wish / was not so con-
fined to my household duties" But /
want to say that you may accomplish just
as much IL you cannot come out to any of
the meetings. 1t may be that some bed
ridden saint i'm Providence may do more
towards bringing down fire than all the
pastors put together. / went to London
in '72 just to spend three or four months,
and one night / spoke in a prayer
meeting. / went into Con-
gregational church and preached
with no unusual power. There didn't
seem to be anything out OF the regular
line in the service. In fact, i was q little
disappointed. Ididn't seem to have much
liberty there. That evening, at $3.50,
preached to men. There seemed to be
great power. II seemed as IL the build
ing was filed with the glory of God, and
i asked for an expression when i got
through. They rose by the hundreds. /
said. "They don't know what this MEANS"
so thought would put another test.
just asked them to step back into the
chapel-all those that wanted to become
Christians, but no one else. They
fiocked into the chapel by the
hundreds. l was in great perplexity,
couldn't understand what 1t meant. 1
went down TO Dublin the next day, and
on Tuesday morning got dispatch say
ing, "Come 90 London at once and help
us" didn't know what 10 make OF IL,
but I fastened back to London and
laborcd there ten days, and there were 400
names recorded at that time. For
months I could not understand what IL
meant, but by and by found out. There
was i'm that church poor bed-ridden Iwo-
man, and she used to take different ones
upon her heart, and she began to pray
God TO revive the whole church. She began