The Oberlin Evangelist.
November 22, 1854
By PRESIDENT FINNEY.
Reported by The Editor.
"These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication."--Acts 1:14
In the context we have an account of Christ's last interview with his disciples.
They had assembled at his request; he met them, "spoke to them of the things
pertaining to the kingdom of God;" commanded them not to depart from Jerusalem,
but to wait for the promise of the Father, assuring them that they "should be
baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence;" and then was taken up from
their sight. They returned to Jerusalem, went into an upper room, and there "all
continued with one accord in prayer and supplication." These, in brief, are the
circumstances of this wonderful prayer-meeting.
I propose to notice,
I. The object of this prayer-meeting;
II. Its characteristics;
III. Its results.
I. The special object of this meeting was to pray for the outpouring of the
Spirit upon themselves and the world. It had been promised, even from Abraham,
down the long line of holy seers, that in connection with the advent of Christ,
the Spirit should be given. Christ reminded his disciples of this great promise
and bade them tarry in Jerusalem and wait for its fulfillment. He had given them
their great commission, to go forth into all the world and preach the gospel to
every creature; but he would have them plainly understand that they could do
nothing without his Spirit, and therefore they must by all means wait in
Jerusalem till they had received this anointing of the Father. That they might
the better understand this baptism he referred to John's mission and work,
saying--"John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy
Ghost, not many days hence." That baptism was only a type; this was to be the
very thing symbolized.
This meeting to pray for the descent of the Spirit continued not less than ten
days. From the Passover at which Christ suffered, he met with them on various
occasions during forty days; then ascended to heaven. The feast of Pentecost was,
as its name imports, just fifty days after the Passover. The interval from the
ascension to the Pentecost, ten days, was the duration of this remarkable prayer-meeting;
for we are told that when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were still "all
with one accord in one place."
II. Of the characteristics of this meeting, the first to be noticed is that the
brethren and sisters were all present. This is a prominent peculiarity, and
deserves distinct and special notice. The sacred historian is careful to call
attention to the fact. "Peter stood up among them, the number of the names
together were about an hundred and twenty." All the eleven were there, "with the
women and Mary the mother of Jesus and with his brethren." Not one could be
spared. What, suppose ye, Christ would have thought, if only two or three had
come, and the rest had been too indifferent or too much engrossed in other
business to be there? They did not allow any other business to detain them. They
honored God enough to meet on his special call and to stay till the object of
the meeting was accomplished.
They were all interested in the object. This is manifest in the fact that they
all came and all remained together so long, and indeed until the object was
attained. Not only were they all there, but all held on through those long
sessions. This shows them really in earnest.
They expected the promised blessing. They knew Christ had promised it, and they
believed his promise. Of course their faith became a strong and definite
expectation.
Yet again, they were united. Over and over again, we are told they were all with
one accord in one place. United in the one desire to obtain this great blessing,
and of one heart in regard to the motives which led them to pray, there was the
most entire unanimity, as if the whole company had but one heart, and that were
strong and true in its impulse and purposes.
They were united in fraternal confidence. There is no hint of any loss or lack
of confidence in each other. Hence they could edify each other. Their communion
of soul was deep and precious.
They persevered. "These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication."
They were instant in their prayer until the object was gained. They could not
think of giving up and abandoning their effort before the blessing came. They
said as Jacob in his wrestlings, "I will not let thee go, except thou bless me."
What could they do without the Spirit! Besides, Christ had distinctly told them
not to go until the blessing came.
I said that the brethren and sisters both were there. this was contrary to the
doctrine and practice of the Jews then, and indeed is so to this day. They do
not admit women to sit with themselves in their holy places, in their seasons of
worship. They are allowed to occupy only the galleries, from which they may look
down as spectators, not being expected to join as associate worshippers. In
public acts of devotion they might have no part. Not so under the gospel. In
Christ there must be no distinction between bond and free, male and female. All
were to be one in him. All their old Jewish prejudices were discarded. This was
a most important fact in the constitution of the Christian church. Until Christ
came, no such meeting of brethren and sisters on the same level had been known.
The particularity with which this circumstance is recorded, shows that a new era
had opened. No partition wall is henceforth to thrust the female sex into the
court of the woman, or into the distant galleries; all sexes are counted alike
as brethren in Christ Jesus.
Observe also that there is no sectarian spirit or party spirit or party strife
among them. No party prejudice was there; all were true Christian brethren. The
division of the Christian church into parties and sects, now so great an evil,
was then unknown. Men were not then stickling for little things, were not
building up new denominations on a basis so unworthy as a mere difference in
forms or even in the forms of a form. The controversies of later days about
ordinances had not yet begun to distract and rend the body of Christ. Nor was
there then any strife for leadership. Diotrephes and his sect had not then
appeared in the Christian church.
You may think me censorious in having intimated that the ambition of leadership
makes sects. I wish there was no truth in this intimation. But who does not know
it to be but too sadly true!
Moreover, there was no caviling against the truth, or against judiciously
proposed measures. Suspicion had no room in their kindred bosoms. They had no
disposition to resist each other's prayer; there were none to whisper--I am not
edified with this brother's prayer, or by the prayer of that sister. All with
one accord, as well as all in one place! This must have been a charming season--a
meeting in which loving hearts blended in holy sympathy.
It was, finally, a deeply earnest meeting. No apathetic souls were there,
lagging and hanging as dead weights on the general heart of the assembly. All
seemed to take as equally deep and warm interest in the great supplications they
were convened to pour out before their ascended Lord for the great blessing of
the Christian dispensation.
III. Results. In brief, these are soon told. Three thousand were converted under
one short sermon. The Holy Ghost fell on the disciples with great power, and
from them the blessing diffused itself on every hand to the thousands who
believed. The little band found themselves launched forth upon the greatest
enterprise ever undertaken by mortals; and withal, drawn into such relations of
faith and sustaining strength towards God and their ascended Savior as had never
been realized on earth before. The conversion of the world to Jesus had fairly
begun and the mission of the Spirit was opened.
REMARKS.
This is doubtless to be taken as a model prayer-meeting--substantially, in its
spirit and leading circumstances, what a prayer-meeting ought to be. Why not?
There is nothing here that should not be in all prayer-meetings for objects of
similar importance.
Yet who can fail to notice that most prayer-meetings are nearly the reverse of
this, in all their characteristic features? What do you see now in
prayer-meetings appointed to pray for the conversion of sinners? Only a little
handful of Christians present; the rest of the church pouring contempt on the
very call for a meeting! It is easy to see that this must be regarded by Christ
as a real insult. A meeting is called, yet but few have interest enough to
attend! What would you think if, a notice being given out for a meeting at our
church to invite some distinguished personage to come and visit us--say
LaFayette, or Kossuth, or some one to whom the nation were under the very
greatest obligations; the call for a meeting is given out; it appears in the
daily papers; but when the hour arrives, only a very few are present! The people
do not come! Suppose this distinguished stranger is informed how thin this
meting is; will he come? Will he not deem the very call an insult? So when
meetings are appointed to invite the Lord Jesus, and almost none attend, will he
come? Nay, verily; why should he come? There is no unanimity in the invitation.
The understanding is they are not unanimous in inviting him to come. You will
say, perhaps, that you did not intend your absence to mean just that. You did
not mean to say that you did not want the Savior to come. You had your special
reasons for being absent. You had an excuse; but do you think such excuses would
avail in the case of any distinguished personage? Suppose the meeting had been
called to invite General Washington; but very few attend; yet they send on to
him their excuses for non-attendance; they tell him they were all very busy;
some had sickness in their family, and some were taking care of various home
concerns; they really felt the highest respect for him, &c., &c. Would their
apologies avail? Would it not be regarded as a downright insult to ask so great
a man to come among us, and yet in a called meeting to invite him, have only a
mere handful present?
Now does not this apply in the case of prayer to God? Indeed it does. The
prayer-meeting is specially called for the purpose of inviting him to come among
us. It is important to know who want him to come; how many they are; and how
much they desire his coming. The call of a meeting is the proper way to test and
determine all these points. If the result shows that but very few care enough
about it to even appear at the meeting, what can be expected but a failure in
the great object of inducing him to make us a visit? Suppose the meeting at the
day of Pentecost and during those previous days had been very thin, would the
blessing have descended? Who can suppose it would?
We may have a prayer-meeting and urge the very strongest reasons for the descent
of God's Spirit; but what avails it--if we are only a small minority of those
who are in the church?
How much worse still is the case in our modern prayer-meeting if even those who
do attend are manifestly not by any means earnest in prayer! How often we see
this to be undoubtedly the case. They do not press their plea for a visitation
of mercy from on high. They do not struggle long and earnestly as those praying
souls did in the first great primitive prayer-meeting. These pleas and prayers
are as different from those as can well be imagined. Let no one wonder that
these movements are so unavailing!
Prayer is wont to be offered now with very little expectation. So great a lack
of expectation denotes lack of faith in God, and therefore must fail to please
him.
People think they cannot take time for continuous prayer. To keep up a
prayer-meeting a whole week, is quite too much to think of! They have by no
means brought their views up to the point of praying till the blessing comes.
They do not feel earnest enough, nor are they sufficiently pressed with a sense
of want to make this seem a small thing compared with the greatness of the
blessing sought. They think they do well if they pray a little at one meeting
per week, keep up one weekly meeting, and spend even that mostly in something
else than prayer. What can be expected from such efforts?
Perhaps there is not unanimity enough, nor brotherly love enough to sustain even
one weekly prayer-meeting. This is the case in many churches and in many
neighborhoods. Is it so here in some portion of this great church?
Even where general prayer-meetings can be kept up, and are so, yet neighborhood
prayer-meetings fall through. Alienations of feeling arise among brethren and
sisters; bickerings, bad blood and bad words are there; they lose confidence in
each other, and cannot pray together! How awful! How different from the spirit
of the day of Pentecost! There, all the assembled brethren and sisters were of
one heart and one soul! The tears were scarcely dry on the cheek of the penitent
Peter; Thomas had not recovered from the deep mortification, shame and grief of
his unbelief, yet even these feelings did not stand in the way of the most
entire union of heart and soul in prayer for the great promised blessing.
Yet in how many churches you are astonished to find the prayer-meeting
abandoned; the hearts of brethren soured and alienated; confidence almost gone,
and worse than all the rest, few left to mourn over this deplorable state of
Zion. You may find, here and there, a brother or a sister mournfully asking,
"What shall we do for a prayer-meeting in our neighborhood? There is not
brotherly love and confidence enough here to sustain one." You would be
astonished to know how often this is the case. Sometimes a family prayer-meeting
drops to pieces in the same way. Alienation in some form arises; they lose
confidence in each other's prayers, and interest in each other's welfare; and,
of course, they cease to pray with and for each other. Under such influences,
Christians are not interested in each other's prayers, and are not led onward
and edified by mutual prayer. Where alienation exists, and mutual sympathy is
lacking, there can be no union of heart in prayer, and no spiritual edification.
You have often noticed in a prayer-meeting that the brethren and sisters will be
greatly quickened and edified by one brother's prayer, and not at all by
another's. When one prays, it is most manifest that the hearts of all are moved;
there is a sighing, an uplifting of heart, a general response; but when another
leads, you see no such tokens of general sympathy. You can tell who can lead the
hearts of the brethren in real prayer. You will always notice that no one can do
this unless they have confidence in him, and unless they feel the deep
pulsations of his heart moving upon their own. Sometimes this is seen in the
family. The head of the family prays, but all have lost confidence in him, and
are doing anything else and everything else but unite in his words of prayer. Is
it wonderful that such prayer avails nothing? Indeed, the very expressions which
such a man may use in prayer, will be interpreted as only so much hypocrisy!
Alas, the spirit of prayer cannot be there! The spirit of dissent, and not the
spirit of union, is there; they do not pray together, and cannot; they are not
united in prayer; a spirit of alienation exists, unexpressed, but deep; perhaps
their will is up about something. Even husband and wife do not pray together;
they are chafed in their feelings toward each other, and are indulging a state
of mind which forbids a spirit of mutual prayer. Often our prayer-meetings die
out by reason of little bickerings and heart-burnings.
Brethren and sisters, will you not look to this?
Often, when people stay away from meetings for prayer, they assign other than
the true and real reason. They do not say frankly, I stay away because I cannot
hear this or that brother pray. They profess to be too busy--too much and too
urgently occupied; but really they do not assign even to themselves the true
reason--the very thing which has kept them back from the meeting.
At the Pentecost meeting, they neglected all other business. Yet they were poor
in this world's goods, and had, no doubt, business enough to do; their women,
also, had enough to do; yet they were all there. But suppose it had been the
case that they felt their business to be too important to be dropped. Suppose
they had said--"O, it cannot be necessary for us all to go; we are so full of
business, and so pressed every way, and so fatigued withal;" do you believe
that, making such excuses for neglect of prayer, they could have had the
blessing? If they could not fulfill the condition, could they hope to receive
the promise? If they would not meet the demand made by the condition, obviously
the way would not be open for Christ to fulfill his promise. He could not grant
them the blessing without virtually giving a bounty to remissness and
unfaithfulness.
The fact is, brethren, our modern prayer-meetings are too cold and too
constrained. Christians are not earnest in prayer. Their souls cannot become
deeply burdened and earnestly agonized in supplication; they do not thirst
enough for spiritual blessings, and have not the deep communion with God which
is requisite for prevailing prayer. You know what a burden is felt in a
prayer-meeting when the heart is thoroughly broken; when pride is abased, the
soul humbled, and the entire energies are drawn out in earnest supplication. But
there are few such meetings for prayer now. There is a lack of sustaining
unanimity. It is a law of mind that union of heart sustains the interest and
power of prayer. Did you never observe how you can sustain another in prayer, if
you enter deeply into his sympathies? You uphold his faith and his fervor. I
have often thought that the practice common among the Methodists, is useful if
not abused. The responses that truly come from the heart serve to quicken and
sustain genuine prayer. The responses introduced in the service of the Church of
England are excellent, provided only that the heart be in them. I love to hear
these sustaining responses and to know that I have the sympathizing heart of
those who profess to be praying with me. Often our prayer-meetings are cold and
profitless because there is no liberty and no free utterance. The spirit of
prayer is straitened, because the natural expressions of deep feeling are
repressed. Said an English Congregationalist, "I do wish our people could learn
of the Methodists how to have a prayer-meeting." He felt the need of an
unconstrained utterance and of a free expression of feeling. Now I would not
sanction heartless noise and vociferation; that is not prayer and cannot help
real prayer. There is a wide difference between that and a meeting in which the
heart has free scope, and the Spirit of God is not straitened, but ranges with
free scope and melting power. I have seen prayer-meetings in which manifestly
the whole congregation went forth before God in mighty prayer. Some of you have
seen such prayer. The hearts of the people were moved as the trees of the forest
before a mighty rushing wind.--Words seem as if freightened with irrepressible
emotion. You can see that God is there. Everyone feels it. An awe of the Holy
Presence pervades each heart. And yet they are not afraid, but are drawn into
sweet confidence and most earnest pleading. Literally they seem to pour out
their hearts before him. This is true prayer, and meets the idea of social
praying. It is a union of hearts before God's mercy-seat, the Spirit coming down
to make intercession with their spirit with groanings that cannot be uttered.
Every prayer-meeting should bear this character, modified only according to the
type of those circumstances that call for prayer.