THE WORD OF GOD AND PRAYER
HABIT both _shows_ and _makes_ the man, for it is at once historic and
prophetic, the mirror of the man as he is and the mould of the man as he
is to be. At this point, therefore, special attention may properly be
given to the two marked habits which had principally to do with the man
we are studying.
Early in the year 1838, he began reading that third biography which,
with those of Francke and John Newton, had such a singular influence on
his own life--Philip's Life of George Whitefield. The life-story of the
orphan's friend had given the primary impulse to his work; the
life-story of the converted blasphemer had suggested his narrative of
the Lord's dealings; and now the life-story of the great evangelist was
blessed of God to shape his general character and give new power to his
preaching and his wider ministry to souls. These three biographies
together probably affected the whole inward and outward life of George
Muller more than any other volumes but the Book of God, and they were
wisely fitted of God to co-work toward such a blessed result. The
example of Francke incited to faith in prayer and to a work whose sole
dependence was on God. Newton's witness to grace led to a testimony to
the same sovereign love and mercy as seen in his own case. Whitefield's
experience inspired to greater fidelity and earnestness in preaching the
Word, and to greater confidence in the power of the anointing Spirit.
Particularly was this impression deeply made on Mr. Muller's mind and
heart: that Whitefield's unparalleled success in evangelistic labours
was plainly traceable to two causes and could not be separated from them
as direct effects; namely, his _unusual prayerfulness, and his habit of
reading the Bible on his knees._
The great evangelist of the last century had learned that first lesson
in service, his own utter nothingness and helplessness: that he was
nothing, and could do nothing, without God. He could neither understand
the Word for himself, nor translate it into his own life, nor apply it
to others with power, unless the Holy Spirit became to him both
_insight_ and _unction._ Hence his success; he was filled with the
Spirit: and this alone accounts both for the quality and the quantity of
his labours. He died in 1770, in the fifty-sixth year of his age, having
preached his first sermon in Gloucester in 1736. During this thirty-four
years his labours had been both unceasing and untiring. While on his
journeyings in America, he preached one hundred and seventy-five times
in seventy-five days, besides travelling, in the slow vehicles of those
days, upwards of eight hundred miles. When health declined, and he was
put on 'short allowance,' even that was _one sermon each week-day and
three on Sunday._ There was about his preaching, moreover, a nameless
charm which held thirty thousand hearers half-breathless on Boston
Common and made tears pour down the sooty faces of the colliers at
Kingswood.
The passion of George Muller's soul was to know fully the secrets of
prevailing with God and with man. George Whitefield's life drove home
the truth that God alone could create in him a holy earnestness to win
souls and qualify him for such divine work by imparting a compassion for
the lost that should become an absorbing passion for their salvation.
And--let this be carefully marked as another secret of this life of
service--_he now began himself to read the word of God upon his knees,_
and often found for hours great blessing in such meditation and prayer
over a single psalm or chapter.
Here we stop and ask what profit there can be in thus prayerfully
reading and searching the Scriptures in the very attitude of prayer.
Having tried it for ourselves, we may add our humble witness to its
value.
First of all, this habit is a constant reminder and recognition of the
need of spiritual teaching in order to the understanding of the holy
Oracles. No reader of God's word can thus bow before God and His open
book, without a feeling of new reverence for the Scriptures, and
dependence on their Author for insight into their mysteries. The
attitude of worship naturally suggests sober-mindedness and deep
seriousness, and banishes frivolity. To treat that Book with lightness
or irreverence would be doubly profane when one is in the posture of
prayer.
Again, such a habit naturally leads to self-searching and comparison of
the actual life with the example and pattern shown in the Word. The
precept compels the practice to be seen in the light of its teaching;
the command challenges the conduct to appear for examination. The
prayer, whether spoken or unspoken, will inevitably be:
"Search me, O God, and know my heart,
Try me, and know my thoughts;
And see if there be any wicked way in me,
And lead me in the way everlasting!"
(Psalm cxxxix. 23, 24.)
The words thus reverently read will be translated into the life and
mould the character into the image of God. "Beholding as in a glass the
glory of the Lord, we are changed into the same image from glory to
glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit."*
* 2 Cor. iii. 18.
But perhaps the greatest advantage will be that the Holy Scriptures will
thus suggest the very words which become the dialect of prayer. "We know
not what we should pray for as we ought"--neither what nor how to pray.
But here is the Spirit's own inspired utterance, and, if the praying be
moulded on the model of His teaching, how can we go astray? Here is our
God-given liturgy and litany--a divine prayer-book. We have here God's
promises, precepts, warnings, and counsels, not to speak of all the
Spirit-inspired literal prayers therein contained; and, as we reflect
upon these, our prayers take their cast in this matrix. We turn precept
and promise, warning and counsel into supplication, with the assurance
that we cannot be asking anything that is not according to His will,*
for are we not turning His own word into prayer?
* 1 John v. 13.
So Mr. Muller found it to be. In meditating over Hebrews xiii. 8: "Jesus
Christ the same yesterday and to-day and for ever," translating it into
prayer, he besought God, with the confidence that the prayer was already
granted, that, as Jesus had already in His love and power supplied all
that was needful, in the same unchangeable love and power He would so
continue to provide. And so a promise was not only turned into a prayer,
but into a prophecy--an assurance of blessing--and a river of joy at
once poured into and flowed through his soul.
The prayer habit, on the knees, with the Word open before the disciple,
has thus an advantage which it is difficult to put into words: It
provides a sacred channel of approach to God. The inspired Scriptures
form the vehicle of the Spirit in communicating to us the knowledge of
the will of God. If we think of God on the one side and man on the
other, the word of God is the mode of conveyance from God to man, of His
own mind and heart. It therefore becomes a channel of God's approach to
us, a channel prepared by the Spirit for the purpose, and unspeakably
sacred as such. When therefore the believer uses the word of God as the
guide to determine both the spirit and the dialect of his prayer, he is
inverting the process of divine revelation and using the channel of
God's approach to him as the channel of his approach to God. How can
such use of God's word fail to help and strengthen spiritual life? What
medium or channel of approach could so insure in the praying soul both
an acceptable frame and language taught of the Holy Spirit? If the first
thing is not to pray but to hearken, this surely is hearkening for God
to speak to us that we may know how to speak to Him.
It was habits of life such as these, and not impulsive feelings and
transient frames, that made this man of God what he was and strengthened
him to lift up his hands in God's name, and follow hard after Him and in
Him rejoice.* Even his sore affliction, seen in the light of such
prayer--prayer itself illuminated by the word of God--became radiant;
and his soul was brought into that state where he so delighted in the
will of God as to be able from his heart to say that he would not have
his disease removed until through it God had wrought the blessing it was
meant to convey. And when his acquiescence in the will of God had become
thus complete he instinctively felt that he would speedily be restored
to health.
* Psalm lxiii. 4, 8, 11.
Subsequently, in reading Proverbs iii. 5-12, he was struck with the
words, "Neither be _weary_ of His correction." He felt that, though he
had not been permitted to "despise the chastening of the Lord," he had
at times been somewhat "weary of His correction," and he lifted up the
prayer that he might so patiently bear it as neither to faint nor be
weary under it, till its full purpose was wrought.
Frequent were the instances of the habit of translating promises into
prayers, immediately applying the truth thus unveiled to him. For
example, after prolonged meditation over the first verse of Psalm lxv,
_"O Thou that hearest prayer,"_ he at once asked and recorded certain
definite petitions. This writing down specific requests for permanent
reference has a blessed influence upon the prayer habit. It assures
practical and exact form for our supplications, impresses the mind and
memory with what is thus asked of God, and leads naturally to the record
of the answers when given, so that we accumulate evidences in our own
experience that God is to us personally a prayer-hearing God, whereby
unbelief is rebuked and importunity encouraged.
On this occasion eight specific requests are put on record, together
with the solemn conviction that, having asked in conformity with the
word and will of God, and in the name of Jesus, he has confidence in Him
that He heareth and that he has the petitions thus asked of Him.* He
writes:
* 1 John v. 13.
"I believe _He has heard me._ I believe He will make it _manifest_ in
His own good time _that He has heard me;_ and I have recorded these my
petitions this fourteenth day of January, 1838, that when God has
answered them He may get, through this, glory to His name."
The thoughtful reader must see in all this a man of weak faith, feeding
and nourishing his trust in God that his faith may grow strong. He uses
the promise of a prayer-hearing God as a staff to stay his conscious
feebleness, that he may lean hard upon the strong Word which cannot
fail. He records the day when he thus takes this staff in hand, and the
very petitions which are the burdens which he seeks to lay on God, so
that his act of committal may be the more complete and final. Could God
ever dishonour such trust?
It was in this devout reading on his knees that his whole soul was first
deeply moved by that phrase,
"A FATHER OF THE FATHERLESS." (Psalm lxviii. 5.)
He saw this to be one of those "names" of Jehovah which He reveals to
His people to lead them to trust in Him, as it is written in Psalm ix.
10:
"They that know Thy name
Will put their trust in Thee."
These five words from the sixty-eighth psalm became another of his
life-texts, one of the foundation stones of all his work for the
fatherless. These are his own words:
"By the help of God, this shall be my argument before Him, respecting
the orphans, in the hour of need. He is their Father, and therefore has
pledged Himself, as it were, to provide for them; and I have only to
remind Him of the need of these poor children in order to have it
supplied."
This is translating the promises of God's word, not only into praying,
but into living, doing, serving. Blessed was the hour when Mr. Muller
learned that one of God's chosen names is "the Father of the
fatherless"!
To sustain such burdens would have been quite impossible but for faith
in such a God. In reply to oft-repeated remarks of visitors and
observers who could not understand the secret of his peace, or how any
man who had so many children to clothe and feed could carry such
prostrating loads of care, he had one uniform reply: "By the grace of
God, this is no cause of anxiety to me. These children I have years ago
cast upon the Lord. The whole work is His, and it becomes me to be
without carefulness. In whatever points I am lacking, in this point I am
able by the grace of God to roll the burden upon my heavenly Father."*
* Journal 1:285
In tens of thousands of cases this peculiar title of God, chosen by
Himself and by Himself declared, became to Mr. Muller a peculiar
revelation of God, suited to his special need. The natural inferences
drawn from such a title became powerful arguments in prayer, and rebukes
to all unbelief. Thus, at the outset of his work for the orphans, the
word of God put beneath his feet a rock basis of confidence that he
could trust the almighty Father to support the work. And, as the
solicitudes of the work came more and more heavily upon him, he cast the
loads he could not carry upon Him who, before George Muller was born,
was the Father of the fatherless.
About this time we meet other signs of the conflict going on in Mr.
Mullers own soul. He could not shut his eyes to the lack of earnestness
in prayer and fervency of spirit which at times seemed to rob him of
both peace and power. And we notice his experience, in common with so
many saints, of the _paradox_ of spiritual life. He saw that "such
fervency of spirit is altogether the gift of God," and yet he adds, "I
have to ascribe to myself the loss of it." He did not run divine
sovereignty into blank fatalism as so many do. He saw that God must be
sovereign in His gifts, and yet man must be free in his reception and
rejection of them. He admitted the mystery without attempting to
reconcile the apparent contradiction. He confesses also that the same
book, Philip's Life of Whitefield, which had been used of God to kindle
such new fires on the altar of his heart, had been also used of Satan to
tempt him to neglect for its sake the systematic study of the greatest
of books.
Thus, at every step, George Mullers life is full of both encouragement
and admonition to fellow disciples. While away from Bristol he wrote in
February, 1838, a tender letter to the saints there, which is another
revelation of the man's heart. He makes grateful mention of the mercies
of God, to him, particularly His gentleness, long-suffering, and
faithfulness and the lessons taught him through affliction. The letter
makes plain that much sweetness is mixed in the cup of suffering, and
that our privileges are not properly prized until for a time we are
deprived of them. He particularly mentions how _secret prayer,_ even
when reading, conversation, or prayer with others was a burden, _always
brought relief to his head._ Converse with the Father was an
indispensable source of refreshment and blessing at all times. As J.
Hudson Taylor says "Satan, the Hinderer, may build a barrier about us,
but he can never _roof us in,_ so that we cannot _look up."_ Mr. Muller
also gives a valuable hint that has already been of value to many
afflicted saints, that he found he could help by prayer to fight the
battles of the Lord even when he could not by preaching. After a short
visit to Germany, partly in quest of health and partly for missionary
objects, and after more than twenty-two weeks of retirement from
ordinary public duties, his head was much better, but his mental health
allowed only about three hours of daily work. While in Germany he had
again seen his father and elder brother, and spoken with them about
their salvation. To his father his words brought apparent blessing, for
he seemed at least to feel his lack of the one thing needful. The
separation from him was the more painful as there was so little hope
that they should meet again on earth.
In May he once more took part in public services in Bristol, a period of
six months having elapsed since he had previously done so. His head was
still weak, but there seemed no loss of mental power.
About three months after he had been in Germany part of the fruits of
his visit were gathered, for twelve brothers and three sisters sailed
for the East Indies.
On June 13, 1838, Mrs. Muller gave birth to a stillborn babe,--another
parental disappointment,--and for more than a fortnight her life hung in
the balance. But once more prayer prevailed for her and her days were
prolonged.
One month later another trial of faith confronted them in the orphan
work. A twelvemonth previous there were in hand seven hundred and eighty
pounds; now that sum was reduced to one thirty-ninth of the
amount--twenty pounds. Mr. and Mrs. Muller, with Mr. Craik and one other
brother, connected with the Boys' Orphan House, were the only four
persons who were permitted to know of the low state of funds; and they
gave themselves to united prayer. And let it be carefully observed that
Mr. Muller testifies that his own faith was kept even stronger than when
the larger sum was on hand a year before; and this faith was no mere
fancy, for, although the supply was so low and shortly thirty pounds
would be needed, notice was given for seven more children to enter, and
it was further proposed to announce readiness to receive five others!
The trial-hour had come, but was not past. Less than two months later
the money-supply ran so low that it was needful that the Lord should
give _by the day and almost by the hour_ if the needs were to be met. In
answer to prayer for help God seemed to say, "Mine hour is not yet
come." Many pounds would shortly be required, toward which there was not
one penny in hand. When, one day, over four pounds came in, the thought
occurred to Mr. Muller, "Why not lay aside three pounds against the
coming need?" But immediately he remembered that it is written:
"SUFFICIENT UNTO THE DAY is THE EVIL THEREOF."* He unhesitatingly cast
himself upon God, and paid out the whole amount for salaries then due,
leaving himself again penniless.
* Matt. vi. 34.
At this time Mr. Craik was led to read a sermon on Abraham, from Genesis
xii, making prominent two facts: first, that so long as he acted in
faith and walked in the will of God, all went on well; but that,
secondly, so far as he distrusted the Lord and disobeyed Him, all ended
in failure. Mr. Muller heard this sermon and conscientiously applied it
to himself. He drew two most practical conclusions which he had abundant
opportunity to put into practice:
First, that he must go into no byways or paths of his own for
deliverance out of a crisis;
And, secondly, that in proportion as he had been permitted to honour God
and bring some glory to His name by trusting Him, he was in danger of
dishonouring Him.
Having taught him these blessed truths, the Lord tested him as to how
far he would venture upon them. While in such sore need of money for the
orphan work, he had in the bank some two hundred and twenty pounds,
intrusted to him for other purposes. He might _use this money for the
time at least,_ and so relieve the present distress. The temptation was
the stronger so to do, because he knew the donors and knew them to be
liberal supporters of the orphans; and he had only to explain to them
the straits he was in and they would gladly consent to any appropriation
of their gift that he might see best! Most men would have cut that
Gordian knot of perplexity without hesitation.
Not so George Muller. He saw at once that this would be _finding a way
of his own out of difficulty, instead of waiting on the Lord for
deliverance._ Moreover, he also saw that it would be _forming a habit of
trusting to such expedients of his own, which in other trials would lead
to a similar course and so hinder the growth of faith._ We use italics
here because here is revealed one of the _tests_ by which this man of
faith, was proven; and we see how he kept consistently and persistently
to the one great purpose of his life--to demonstrate to all men that to
_rest solely on I the promise of a faithful God_ is the only way to know
for one's self and prove to others, His faithfulness.
At this time of need--the type of many others--this man who had
determined to risk everything upon God's word of promise, turned from
doubtful devices and questionable methods of relief to _pleading with
God._ And it may be well to mark his _manner_ of pleading. He used
_argument_ in prayer, and at this time he piles up _eleven reasons_ why
God should and would send help.
This method of _holy argument_--ordering our cause before God, as an
advocate would plead before a judge--is not only almost a lost art, but
to many it actually seems almost puerile. And yet it is abundantly
taught and exemplified in Scripture. Abraham in his plea for Sodom is
the first great example of it. Moses excelled in this art, in many
crises interceding in behalf of the people with consummate skill,
marshalling arguments as a general-in-chief marshals battalions. Elijah
on Carmel is a striking example of power in this special pleading. What
holy zeal and jealousy for God! It is probable that if we had fuller
records we should find that all pleaders with God, like Noah, Job,
Samuel, David, Daniel, Jeremiah, Paul, and James, have used the same
method.
Of course God does not _need to be convinced:_ no arguments can make any
plainer to Him the claims of trusting souls to His intervention, claims
based upon His own word, confirmed by His oath. And yet He will be
inquired of and argued with. That is His way of blessing. He loves to
have us set before Him our cause and His own promises: He delights in
the well-ordered plea, where argument is piled upon argument. See how
the Lord Jesus Christ commended the persistent argument of the woman of
Canaan, who with the _wit of importunity_ actually turned his own
_objection_ into a _reason._ He said, "It is not meet to take the
children's bread and cast it to the little dogs."* "Truth, Lord," she
answered, "yet the little dogs under the master's tables eat of the
crumbs which fall from the children's mouths!" What a triumph of
argument! Catching the Master Himself in His words, as He meant she
should, and turning His apparent reason for not granting into a reason
for granting her request! "O woman," said He, "great is thy faith! Be it
unto thee even as thou wilt"--thus, as Luther said, "flinging the reins
on her neck."
* Cf. Matt. vii. 6, xv. 26, 27. Not [Transcriber's note: Greek word
here], but [Transcriber's note: another Greek word here], the diminutive
for little pet dogs.
This case stands unique in the word of God, and it is this use of
argument in prayer that makes it thus solitary in grandeur. But one
other case is at all parallel,--that of the centurion of Capernaum,*
who, when our Lord promised to go and heal his servant, argued that such
coming was not needful, since He had only to speak the healing word. And
notice the basis of his argument: if he, a commander exercising
authority and yielding himself to higher authority, both obeyed the word
of his superior and exacted obedience of his subordinate, how much more
could the Great Healer, in his absence, by a word of command, wield the
healing Power that in His presence was obedient to His will! Of him
likewise our Lord said: "I have not found so great faith, no, not in
Israel!"
* Matt. viii. 8.
We are to argue our case with God, not indeed to convince _Him,_ but to
convince _ourselves._ In proving to Him that, by His own word and oath
and character, He has bound Himself to interpose, we demonstrate _to our
own faith_ that He has given us the right to ask and claim, and that He
will answer our plea because He cannot deny Himself.
There are two singularly beautiful touches of the Holy Spirit in which
the right thus to order argument before God is set forth to the
reflective reader. In Micah. vii. 20 we read:
"Thou wilt perform the _truth_ to Jacob,
The _mercy_ to Abraham,
Which thou hast sworn unto our fathers,
From the days of old."
Mark the progress of the thought. What was mercy to Abraham was truth to
Jacob. God was under no obligation to extend covenant blessings; hence
it was to Abraham a simple act of pure _mercy;_ but, having so put
Himself under voluntary bonds, Jacob could claim as _truth_ what to
Abraham had been mercy. So in 1 John i. 9:
"If we confess our sins
He is _faithful and just_ to forgive us our sins,
And to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."
Plainly, forgiveness and cleansing are not originally matters of
faithfulness and justice, but of mercy and grace. But, after God had
pledged Himself thus to forgive and cleanse the penitent sinner who
confesses and forsakes his sins,* what was originally grace and mercy
becomes faithfulness and justice; for God owes it to Himself and to His
creature to stand by His own pledge, and fulfil the lawful expectation
which His own gracious assurance has created.
* Proverbs xxviii. 13.
Thus we have not only examples of argument in prayer, but concessions of
the living God Himself, that when we have His word to plead we may claim
the fulfillment of His promise, on the ground not of His mercy only, but
of His truth, faithfulness, and justice. Hence the 'holy boldness with
which we are bidden to present our plea at the throne of grace. God owes
to His faithfulness to do what He has promised, and to His justice not
to exact from the sinner a penalty already borne in his behalf by His
own Son.
No man of his generation, perhaps, has been more wont to plead thus with
God, after the manner of holy argument, than he whose memoir we are now
writing. He was one of the elect few to whom it has been given to revive
and restore this lost art of pleading with God. And if all disciples
could learn the blessed lesson, what a period of _renaissance_ of faith
would come to the church of God!
George Muller stored up reasons for God's intervention, As he came upon
promises, authorized declarations of God concerning Himself, names and
titles He had chosen to express and reveal His true nature and will,
injunctions and invitations which gave to the believer a right to pray
and boldness in supplication--as he saw all these, fortified and
exemplified by the instances of prevailing prayer, he laid these
arguments up in memory, and then on occasions of great need brought them
out and spread them before a prayer-hearing God. It is pathetically
beautiful to follow this humble man of God into the secret place, and
there hear him pouring out his soul in these argumentative pleadings, as
though he would so order his cause before God as to convince Him that He
must interpose to save His own name and word from dishonour!
These were _His_ orphans, for had He not declared Himself the Father of
the fatherless? This was _His_ work, for had He not called His servant
to do His bidding, and what was that servant but an instrument that
could neither fit itself nor use itself? Can the rod lift itself, or the
saw move itself, or the hammer deal its own blow, or the sword make its
own thrust? And if this were God's work, was He not bound to care for
His own work? And was not all this deliberately planned and carried on
for His own glory? And would He suffer His own glory to be dimmed? Had
not His own word been given and confirmed by His oath, and could God
allow His promise, thus sworn to, to be dishonoured even in the least
particular? Were not the half-believing church and the unbelieving world
looking on, to see how the Living God would stand by His own unchanging
assurance, and would He supply an argument for the skeptic and the
scoffer? Would He not, must He not, rather put new proofs of His
faithfulness in the mouth of His saints, and furnish increasing
arguments wherewith to silence the cavilling tongue and put to shame the
hesitating disciple?*
* Mr. Muller himself tells how he argued his case before the Lord at
this time. (Appendix F. Narrative, vol. 1, 243, 244)
In some such fashion as this did this lowly-minded saint in Bristol
plead with God for more than threescore years, _and prevail_--as every
true believer may who with a like boldness comes to the throne of grace
to obtain mercy and find grace to help in every time of need. How few of
us can sincerely sing:
I believe God answers prayer,
Answers always, everywhere;
I may cast my anxious care,
Burdens I could never bear,
On the God who heareth prayer.
Never need my soul despair
Since He bids me boldly dare
To the secret place repair,
There to prove He answers prayer.