Lesson 12: Pray to Your Father Who is in Secret, part 3
“And your Father, who sees in secret, will reward you.” Here Jesus assures us that secret prayer cannot be fruitless; its blessing will show itself in our life. We have but in secret, alone with God, to entrust our life before men to Him; He will reward us openly; He will see to it that the answer to prayer be made manifest in His blessing upon us. Our Lord would thus teach us that as infinite Fatherliness and Faithfulness is that with which God meets us in secret, so on our part there should be the childlike simplicity of faith, the confidence that our prayer does bring down a blessing. “He who comes to God must believe that He is a rewarder of them who seek Him.” Not on the strong or the fervent feeling with which I pray does the blessing of the closet depend, but upon the love and the power of the Father to whom I there entrust my needs. And therefore the Master has but one desire: Remember your Father is, and sees and hears in secret; go there and stay there, and go again from there in the confidence He will satisfy. Trust Him for it; depend upon Him: prayer to the Father cannot be in vain; He will reward you openly.
Still further to confirm this faith in the Father-love of God, Christ speaks a third word: “Your Father knows what things you have need of before you ask Him.” At first glance it might appear as if this thought made prayer less needful: God knows far better than we, what we need. But as we get a deeper insight into what prayer really is, this truth will help much to strengthen our faith. It will teach us that we do not need, as do the heathen, with the multitude and urgency of our words, to compel an unwilling God to listen to us. It will lead to a holy thoughtfulness and silence in prayer as it suggests the question: Does my Father really know that I need this? It will, when once we have been led by the Spirit to the certainty that our request is indeed something that, according to the Word, we do need for God’s glory, give us wonderful confidence to say, My Father knows I need it and must have it. And if there be any delay in the answer, it will teach us in quiet perseverance to hold on: FATHER, YOU KNOW I need it. Oh the blessed liberty and simplicity of a child that Christ our Teacher desires to cultivate in us, as we draw near to God: let us look up to the Father until His Spirit works it in us. Let us sometimes in our prayers, when we are in danger of being so occupied with our fervent, urgent petitions, as to forget that the Father knows and hears, let us hold still and just quietly say: My Father sees, my Father hears, my Father knows. It will help our faith to take the answer, and to say: We know that we have the petitions we have asked of Him.
And now, all you who have newly entered the school of Christ to be taught to pray, take these lessons, practice them, and trust Him to perfect you in them. Dwell much in the inner chamber, with the door shut—shut in from men, shut up with God; it is there the Father waits for you, it is there Jesus will teach you to pray. To be alone in secret with THE FATHER; this be your highest joy. To be assured that THE FATHER will openly reward the secret prayer, so that it cannot remain unblessed; this be your strength day by day. And to know that THE FATHER knows that you need what you ask; this be your liberty to bring every need, in the assurance that your God will supply it according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.
Prayer: My Father, bless especially the inner chamber of all Your servants who are working for You, as the place where God’s truth and God’s grace is revealed to them, where they are daily anointed with fresh oil, where their strength is renewed, and the blessings are received in faith, with which they are to bless their fellow-men. Lord, draw us all in the closet nearer to Yourself and the Father.