This second great promise of my text, introduced again by the solemn
affirmation, 'Verily, verily, I say unto you,' substantially appeared
in a former part of these discourses with a very significant
difference. 'Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name that will I do.' 'If ye
shall ask anything in My name I will do it.' There Christ presented
Himself as the Answerer of the petitions, because His more immediate
purpose was to set forth His going to the Father as His elevation to a
yet loftier position. Here, on the other hand, He sets forth the Father
as the Answerer of the petitions, because His purpose is to point away
from undue dependence on His own corporeal presence. But the fact that
He thus, as occasion requires, substitutes the one form of speech for
the other, and indifferently represents the same actions as being done
by Himself and by the Father in heaven, carries with it large teachings
which I do not dwell upon now. Only I would ask you to consider how
much is involved in that fact, that, as a matter of course, and without
explanation of the difference, our Lord alternates the two forms, and
sometimes says, 'I will do it,' and sometimes says, 'The Father will do
it.' Does it not point to that great and blessed truth, 'Whatsoever
thing the Father doeth, that also doeth the Son likewise?'
But passing from that, let me ask you to note very carefully the
limitation, which is here given to the broad universality of the
declaration that desires shall be satisfied. 'If ye shall ask anything
in My name'; there is the definition of Christian prayer. And what does
it mean? Is a prayer, which from the beginning to the end is reeking
with self-will, hallowed because we say, as a kind of charm at the end
of it, 'For Christ's sake. Amen'? Is _that_ praying in Christ's name?
Surely not! What is the 'name' of Christ? His whole revealed character.
So these disciples could not pray in His name 'hitherto,' because His
character was not all revealed. Therefore, to pray in His name is to
pray, recognising what He is, as revealed in His life and death and
resurrection and ascension, and to base all our dependence of
acceptance of our prayers upon that revealed character. Is that all?
Are any kind of wishes, which are presented in dependence upon Christ
as our only Hope and Channel of divine blessing, certain to be
fulfilled? Certainly not. To pray 'in My name' means yet more than
that. It means not only to pray in dependence upon Christ as our only
Ground of hope and Source of acceptance and God's only Channel of
blessing, but it means exactly what the same phrase means when it is
applied to us. If I say that I am doing something in your name, that
means on your behalf, as your representative, as your organ, and to
express your mind and will. And if we pray in Christ's name, that
implies, not only our dependence upon His merit and work, but also the
harmony of our wills with His will, and that our requests are not
merely the hot products of our own selfishness, but are the calm issues
of communion with Him. _Thus_ to pray requires the suppression of self.
Heathen prayer, if there be such a thing, is the violent effort to make
God will what I wish. Christian prayer is the submissive effort to make
my wish what God wills, and that is to pray in Christ's name.
My brother! do we construct our prayers thus? Do we try to bring our
desires into harmony with Him, before we venture to express them? Do we
go to His footstool to pour out petulant, blind, passionate,
un-sanctified wishes after questionable and contingent good, or do we
wait until He fills our spirits with longings after what it must be His
desire to give, and then breathe out those desires caught from His own
heart, and echoing His own will? Ah! The discipline that is wanted to
make men pray in Christ's name is little understood by multitudes
amongst us.
Notice how certain such prayer is of being answered. Of course, if it
is in harmony with the will of God, it is sure not to be offered in
vain. Our Revised Version makes a slight alteration in the order of the
words in the first clause of this promise by reading, 'If ye ask
anything of the Father He will give it you _in My name_.' God's gifts
come down through the same channel through which our prayer goes up. We
ask in the name of Christ, and get our answers in the name of Christ.
But, whether that be the true collocation of ideas or not, mark the
plain principle here, that only desires which are in harmony with the
divine will are sure of being satisfied. What is a bad thing for a
child cannot be a good thing for a man. What is a foolish and wicked
thing for a father down here to do cannot be a kind and a wise thing
for the Father in the heavens to do. If you wish to spoil your child
you say, 'What do you want, my dear? tell me and you shall have it.'
And if God were saying anything like that to us, through the lips of
Jesus Christ His Son, in the text, it would be no blessing, but a
curse. He knows a great deal better what is good for us; and so He
says: 'Bring your wishes into line with My purpose, and then you will
get them'; 'Delight thyself in the Lord, and He will give thee the
desires of thine heart.' If you want God most you will be sure to get
Him; if your heart's desires are after Him, your heart's desires will
be satisfied. 'The young lions do roar and suffer hunger.' That is the
world's way of getting good; fighting and striving and snarling, and
forcibly seeking to grasp, and there is hunger after all. There is a
better way than that. Instead of striving and struggling to snatch and
to keep a perishable and questionable portion, let us wait upon God and
quiet our hearts, stilling them into the temper of communion and
conformity with Him, and we shall not ask in vain.
He who prays in Christ's name must pray Christ's prayer, 'Not My will,
but Thine be done.' And then, though many wishes may be unanswered, and
many weak petitions unfulfilled, and many desires unsatisfied, the
essential spirit of the prayer will be answered, and, His will being
done in us and on us, our wishes will acquiesce in it and desire
nothing besides. To him who can thus pray in Christ's name in the
deepest sense, and after Christ's pattern, every door in God's
treasure-house flies open, and he may take as much of the treasure as
he desires. The Master bends lovingly over such a soul, and looks him
in the eyes, and with outstretched hand says, 'What wilt thou that I
should do unto thee? Be it unto thee even as thou wilt.'