The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1895-05-25
M SERMON. az
NATURE AND VALUE OF PRAYER,

BY MARION D. SHUTTER, D. D.

him and what profit should we have. II we pray
unto Him?"-Job xxi.15.
The Book of Job is dramatic poem
whose characters wrestle with the cage
long mystery, Why are the good az
ficted? The patriarch feels that his
friends unjustly accuse him, and re-
sents to the last their theory OF his
guilt. They say to him, "You would
not now be suffering, you would not
be sitting desolate in sackcloth and
ashes, if you had not sinned. Only
the wicked are afflicted" The sturdy
old skeptic, the valiant disbeliever in
the current theology and philosophy,
points out that the facts of life con-
tradict them, that little observation
of what goes on every day will put
them down. "The wicked live, be-
come old; yea, are mighty in power.
They are safe from fear, neither is
the rod of God upon their homes.
They take the timbrel and harp, and
rejoice in the sound of the organ.
They spend their days in wealth, and
in moment go down into the grave"
They do not have to linger long in
torment = as 7 do, = the patriarch
would seem to say. More than that,
"They say unto God, Depart from us
for we desire not the knowledge of
thy ways" Nay, they even sneer
and scott. "What is the Almighty
that we should serve him? And what
profit should we have, if we pray I'M
to him9" All this they say and do,
and yet they are not molested. No
bolt falls from the insulted heavens.
The prosperity of the wicked is no
torious; the adversely of the good is
equally plain. You must mend your
theory.
This is the setting of our text. But
this sneering question of the wicked,
"Whot profit should ace hare, IT ace
pray unto him ?" is one that has often
been asked in very different spirit
and by reverent hearts. 1t is ques-
ton that has arisen from the very
depths. 1t is the voice of sorrow, the
lamentation of bereavement, the cry
of despair. What profit should we
have, if we pray unto him? Tell us
what is the use? What good will it
do? What answer will it bring?
What benefit shall we receive? Will
not our prayers simply strike against
skies of brass and fall unanswered
back to earth?
There are three questions that con-
front us upon the threshold of this
discourse: % Why do ace pray?
CD What is the meaning of proyers
and (III) What as its Ualtes Per-
haps l can state those questions even
more succinctly; the first is WHYa
the second WHAT? the third WHAT
THEM
I. Taking up the first of these
questions, then, "WHY DO WE PRAY7"
answer, in general, because we can
not help it. We are SO made. The
origin of that instinct or impulse
which prompts us to cry out to that
Larger Life we feel to be back OF us
ALL do not discuss. | simply state
the recognized fact.
There are certain Eastern mystics
who believe that if the name of AL
lah were not spoken, even for single
instant, the universe would fall into
primal chaos. According to them,
she breath of prayer upholds and sus-
aims all things. Without taking
such an extravaganza view, we may
we'll believe that an instinct so uni
7ersal has not organized itself into |
he human mind without some cor /
reality in the nature OF
Kings. The incense of prayer as
.ends from the heart of man as nat
lrally as the perfume ascends from
he flower, as beautifully as the
streams respond, with their rainbow
nists, to the wooing of the sun.
Ill We oil prdy,-chitdren and
men, poet and sage, believer and I'm
1elever. We all pray,-not with the
same ideas or for the same purpose;
out we all show, in one way or an
,ther, the presence of that elemental
instinct.
The child lisps its "Now lay me-"
wien the evening shadows fall. The
youth, upon the threshold, looks up
'or guidance through ways unknown.
Lovers Irvine each others names in
prayer with the name of him whose
own best name is LOVE. Parents fling
iaily out the golden chain, and with
is solemn strength and beauty bind
he wanderers from home to the olden
affairs of the Greater Father. The
soldier, on the eve of battle, lifts his
ayes with thoughts of the Lord of
nosts. to the midnight stars. Sick |