The Denison review. [volume] (Denison, Iowa) 1867-current, 1902-12-19
EXPERIENCE CoNvINCES.
A Doubter Doubts Only So Long az
He Refuses to Make the
Prayer Test.


Prayer Test.
To those who were taught in child
hood to pray, prayer seems one OF the
most natural things in the world-and
it is so. Even though afterward one
may long neglect prayer, and cease to
call on God in his ordinary need, he
WILL in time of special peril or eX-
ceptional need, cry out for help-cry
out in despair, if not in truth. One
who has at any time prayed, even
though it were but to have said his
little child-prayer at his mothers or
his nurses knee, can hardly under
stand the feelings of one who has
never prayed.
We little realize how much we are
indebted to our earliest training for
our best feelings, our hottest aspira-
tions, our most sacred hopes and con-
fidences, in our ordinary and our ex-
traordinary experiences of life. One
who has arrived at mature age with
out having prayed, or learned to pray,
is like one. spiritually deaf and dumb
and blind. How shall he be taught
what he lacks, or taught how to sup
ply that lack? That is one of the most
| difficult practical questions that con-
fronts him who would give help to
doubter.
A Christian worker who has had
much experience in guiding others
through their spiritual doubts and re-
ligious difficulties, became interested
in young man whom he sought to
lead into the brighter light of trust
in Christ. The young man was of high
moral principle and of upright con-
duct. So far, he was am example OF
| many believer. But his religion, ii
it could be called a religion, was
wholly one of high morality and we'll
doing toward his fellows.
That young mans religion was prac-
ticaMy as barren and limited and ma
terialistic as Confucianism. 1t mi CHIT
possibly have been called Deism, for a
nominal belief in God as there, but
there was no conscious close relation
or communing with God day by day
Yet that young man was university
graduate. He had been accustomed tic
hear prayers in public, and to listen to
appeals to his spiritual nature, and tc
commentator of personal prayer
Experimentally, however, he knew
nothing of God in Gods relation to his
inner spirit and soul. Strange as this
case may seem, that young man wa:
an illustration of many another, ant
therefore his case has the more in
terest as subject Of study.
AS they talked together one day
the would-be helper asked the young
man, who had said that he wished HI
knew more of God, whether he eve1
prayed to God for special guidance
and help in drawing nearer to Him
The young man answered frankly tina
he had never done so.
"Then why do you not do SOP" aske'
his friend. "You need help. Yo1
want help. God can help you. Go,
is ready to give. you help if you onl.
ask Him. Why not kneel down ant
ask. from God the help that you want
and that He is ready to give? 1t is
very simple matter, but very i'm
portant one. Why do you hesitate?
Then came an impressive and il
structive response from the youn!
man that the helper never forgot.
'It may seem to you a very simpl
matter, but you can't understand hoy
much of a matter it is to me- and no,
next to impossible it is for me even t
consider it, much less to attempt i
You want me to kneel down on tn
floor and to speak into the air, will
out seing anything, or hearing an.
thing. or knowing just what am Dc
; ing, or why; and then you want m
e to expect some kind of an answer an
). to get it, from no one, or nowher
And you say that it is very simp
r thing. You can't understand how II
reasonable and how unnatural a thin
= it seems to me, with my life habi
Il. and training-not to say how ridic1
es lous it would seem to me to appear
er And then the older man realize
how difficult case he had to de-
,e with, how different a case of doubtir
Of from any he had met before was no
to presented to him. He asked guidant
hit from God, to enable him to say rigl
ed words that might instruct and e
al courage.
tn Those were the early days of the no
nd common telephone. The helper W.
Id led to think of that, and he said to ii
ry young man:
"You are familiar with the tel
at phone?"
of yes"
SIS ''But you have none in your house
al believer"
he "No."
81 happen to have one in mine. No
if you had never tried a telephone,
re known much about it, and shou
la. come into my house. and see me spea
;.,Gr INT ], al