Lesson 75: Obedience the Path to Power in Prayer, part 3
The application of obedience in the school of prayer is very simple, but very solemn. “I chose you,” the Master says, “and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit,” much fruit (John 15:5, 8), “and that your fruit should remain,” that your life might be one of abiding fruit and abiding fruitfulness, “that” as fruitful branches abiding in me, “whatsoever you shall ask of the Father in My name, He may give it you.” Oh how often we have sought to be able to pray the effectual prayer for much grace to bear fruit, and have wondered that the answer did not come. It was because we were reversing the Master’s order. We wanted to have the comfort and the joy and the strength first, that we might do the work easily and without any feeling of difficulty or self-sacrifice. And He wanted us in faith, without asking whether we felt weak or strong, whether the work was hard or easy, in the obedience of faith to do what He said: the path of fruit-bearing would have led us to the place and the power of successful prayer. Obedience is the only path that leads to the glory of God. Not obedience instead of faith, nor obedience to supply the shortcomings of faith; no, but faith’s obedience gives access to all the blessings our God has for us. The baptism of the Spirit (John 14:16), the manifestation of the Son (John 14:21), the indwelling of the Father (John 14:23), the abiding in Christ’s love (Joh 15:10), the privilege of His holy friendship (John 15:14), and the power of all-overcoming prayer (John 15:16)—all wait for the obedient.
Let us take home the lessons. Now we know the great reason why we have not had power in faith to pray victoriously. Our life was not as it should have been: simple downright obedience, abiding fruitfulness, was not its chief mark. And with our whole heart we approve of the Divine appointment: men to whom God is to give such influence in the rule of the world, as at their request to do what otherwise would not have taken place, men whose will is to guide the path in which God’s will is to work, must be men who have themselves learned obedience, whose loyalty and submission to authority must be above all suspicion. Our whole soul approves the law: obedience and fruit-bearing, the path to prevailing prayer. And with shame we acknowledge how little our lives have yet borne this stamp.
Let us yield ourselves to take up the appointment the Savior gives us. Let us study His relation to us as Master. Let us seek no more with each new day to think in the first place of comfort, or joy, or blessing. Let the first thought be: I belong to the Master. Every moment and every movement I must act as His property, as a part of Himself, as one who only seeks to know and do His will. A servant, a slave of Jesus Christ—let this be the spirit that lives in me. If He says, “No longer do I call you servants, but I have called you friends,” let us accept the place of friends: “You are My friends if you do the things which I command you.”
The one thing He commands us as His branches is to bear fruit. Let us live to bless others, to testify of the life and the love there is in Jesus. Let us in faith and obedience give our whole life to that which Jesus chose us for and appointed us to—fruit-bearing. As we think of His electing us to this, and take up our appointment as coming from Him who always gives all He demands, we shall grow strong in the confidence that a life of fruit-bearing, abounding and abiding, is within our reach. And we shall understand why this fruit-bearing alone can be the path to the place of all prevailing prayer. It is the man who, in obedience to the Christ of God, is proving that he is doing what his Lord wills, for whom the Father will do whatsoever he will: “Whatsoever we ask we receive, because we keep His commandments, and do the things that are pleasing in His sight.”
Prayer: O Lord Jesus! Reveal Yourself to us, and the reality of Your purpose and Your power to make these Your wonderful promises, the daily experience of all who utterly yield themselves to You and Your words.