bygraceiam..revelation..
Hello Everyone God Bless You..
Oh! yes, the
possibility
connected with Prayer is, assuredly, a startling one. It may be we
have never paused to think about it. It may be it has not struck us,
that it is on account of this possibility that men have been so urged to
pray, that the Bible lays such stress on the importance of this
exercise, and that the Saviour Christ as He passed across the stage of
earth-life was so pre-eminently a Man of Prayer. I said the possibility
attached to Prayer is a startling one; and is it not so? At first
thought, it does seem incredible that we, poor, feeble, faulty
creatures, who are such tiny specks in the immensity around us, who know
so very little, and are so hemmed in by the restrictions of the
Physical, may, nevertheless, by Prayer, soar above the limitations of
Time and Space, and the laws that condition Matter, and may literally
transport our vital self into a realm that is Spiritual, and cause that
self to function in the same way as the Being of God and the beings of
angels are functioning. But such is the possibility of Prayer; and our
realization of that possibility will re-color and give definiteness to
the whole of our religious ideas. Our knowledge of what we
can
do by Prayer will lead us to better understand the complexity and
greatness of our own being. The words of the Psalmist, in speaking of
man, will not appear to us a pious exaggeration—"Thou hast made him
but little lower than God,
and crownest him with glory and honor" (Ps. 8: 5, Revised Version). The
knowledge of what our spirit self is capable of doing in the act of
Prayer will enable us also to view more complacently the incident of
dying. If we be conscious that our vital and essential self has
constantly projected itself from its "earthly tabernacle," and has
actually energized in the realm of spirit, the thought of leaving that
tabernacle more completely and forever will not appal us. If my self has
been able to touch the Spiritual, in spite of my having been heavily
handicapped by a coarse physical body, what a reasonable thought that my
contact with God and spiritual things will be closer—much closer, when
that body shall have been left behind! Thus, the consciousness of the
possibility of Prayer gives us a magnificent foundation for our hope of
continued life after death.
Before we pass on to consider more particularly this subject, it will
not be out of place to note a fact that is very suggestive.
Mankind has always had an ineradicable conviction that in some way or
another great possibilities are bound up in Prayer. With respect to
every Religion, of whatsoever age, and under whatsoever conditions of
human life. Prayer has always been considered an indispensable adjunct.
Not only Christians and Jews, but Mohammedans, Parsees, Buddhists,
Hindoos, and even Pagans have felt, and felt intensely, that they must
pray. They have felt that some great end is attainable by Prayer. They,
or many of them, not acquainted with the facts of scientific research
with which we are familiar—the demonstrated facts of Telepathy and
Telaesthesia—may not have been able to fully gauge the possibilities of
Prayer; but, at all events, they have felt that Prayer has possibilities
linked with it. They have believed that by Prayer they, in some way or
another, could get into contact with God and spiritual realities.
This all but universal instinct points, surely, to the possibility of
such a contact. The great All-Father is no heartless mocker of His
creatures. He would never have implanted in men this desire to pray,
unless communion with them and Him could be established. Here, then, in
the persistent prayers of mankind, we have an indication that God means
us to be in touch with the Spiritual
Amen and Amen....
