Alone with God—a life of prayer

Alone with God

I've seen the lightning flashing, I've heard the thunder roll.
I've felt sin's breakers dashing, which almost conquered my soul.
I've heard the voice of my Savior, bidding me still to fight on.
He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone!

Refrain

No, never alone, no never alone,
He promised never to leave me,
He'll claim me for His own;
No, never alone, no never alone.
He promised never to leave me,
Never to leave me alone.

The world's fierce winds are blowing, temptation sharp and keen.
I have a peace in knowing my Savior stands between—
He stands to shield me from danger when my friends are all gone.
He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone!

Refrain

When in affliction's valley I tread the road of care,
My Savior helps me carry the cross so heavy to bear;
Though all around me is darkness, earthly joys all flown;
My Savior whispers His promise, never to leave me alone!

Refrain

He died on Calvary's mountain, for me they piercèd His side.
For me He opened that fountain, the crimson, cleansing tide.
For me He waiteth in glory, seated upon His throne.
He promised never to leave me, never to leave me alone!

RefrainWords:
Ludie D. Pickett, 1897. http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/n/e/neveralo.htm

I will confess that there are times in my life when I am alone and there have been times when I have been lonely. Being alone simply means that no one else is around. For a period of time you are in your own little world. Your thoughts are on that world and you can choose to focus on the beauty of a prairie flower or the movement of a dragonfly, the hummingbird who can hover for long periods of time. At such times we can get close to God because no noise, no television, no conversation, no computer beeps and whistles, interferes with our conversation with God.

Being lonely is when you feel that you have been abandoned, left alone, and a sense of no-one-really-cares.

Both being alone and being lonely can occur when there are all sorts of people around. The presence of people does not guarantee we will not feel we are alone.

For Christians it sometimes means that we must stand alone in the vast sea of evil that flows around us.

Prayer is one time when we can be alone with God. If we can be alone with God then there is no time when we will be lonely.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones once wrote: "Prayer is beyond any question the highest activity of the human soul. Man is at his greatest and highest when upon his knees he comes face to face with God"

 

No spiritual exercise is such a blending of complexity and simplicity. It is the simplest form of speech that infant lips can try, yet the sublimest strains that reach the Majesty on high. It is as appropriate to the aged philosopher as to the little child. It is the ejaculation of a moment and the attitude of a lifetime. It is the expression of the rest of faith and of the fight of faith. It is an agony and an ecstasy. It is submissive and yet importunate. In the one moment it lays hold of God and binds the devil. It can be focused on a single objective and it can roam the world. It can be abject confession and rapt adoration. It invests puny man with a sort of omnipotence (Effective Prayer [Chicago: Moody, 1969], 7).

The essence of prayer

The ability to talk to God as you would to a beloved friend. But this is where many believers have trouble. Some people think you have use a prayer voice, one that sounds much more religious or holy, a Charleton Heston version of Moses. Some think that you have to use prayer language, language that will reach the heart of God better than other language. Some think you have to have the right theology, especially in your prayer requests, or God will not consider your prayers. Some think you have to be in the right position, on your knees, on your face, with your arms in the air. Others think they need to be prayer guardians and make sure everyone's prayers are only the prayers that should be offered.

Modern Jews do not use one biblical name for God—Yahweh. Sometime before the time of Jesus on earth, about 300 BC, the Jewish leaders decided that they could no longer pronounce the name of God. As with any name there was the risk of mispronunciation.

I cannot hear it myself, but when nine times out of ten when I give someone my name, it comes out to them Haddock. I have to carefully walk them through the name like you would a kindergartener. I think the fault is mine, but I have never been able to correct it.

The story is told of a young man who had trouble remembering names. So when he met someone he should know, he would say, "Now, do you spell that with an "I" or an "E"? That worked fine until one when the respondent said in an irritated fashion, "My name is HILL."

Every year I have to acquaint myself with a minimum of 100 new names of students. Ninety percent of the time I get it done correctly, but there will be those whose names I mispronounce and sometimes really butcher.

So the Jewish leaders concluded, "We dare not offend God by mispronouncing his name. "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord in vain." Explanation—you can be in serious trouble if you mispronounce God's name, so the smart thing to do is not pronounce it at all.

Thus, when we place all kinds of requirements on how prayer ought to be done, we are doing the same thing to people the Jewish leaders did to their people. Needless to say all these phantom requirements causes some people to avoid prayer because they are afraid they will make an error and be eternally damned by God.

Meanwhile, back to the ranch. Prayer is our time of conversation with God. When we pray it should be as though we are talking to God like we would to a friend.

Why is prayer so hard for some people? We have to recognize that God has granted us great power through prayer and the enemy would like to disable us if at all possible. So the devil encourages us to:

Sleep

Watch TV

Enjoy personal pursuits

Read

Even read the Bible

Focus on good deeds

Anything that helps us avoid spending time in prayer

We often turn prayer into a task that we hate to do, but feel that it is necessary. Take cleaning house. We have two dogs and two cats, not counting human beings. We know that we can vacuum every day or even twice a day, but there is a sure guarantee that we will have to do it again the next day. We could clean for hours on one day and still need to vacuum again the next day. Why? Because dogs and cats have this wonderful ability to produce hair which they shed which goes everywhere and thus we need to clean every day. How exciting. "Hey, the vacuum cleaner picked up a pound of hair today. That was a little less than yesterday, but the record was set in January at 1 lb. 5 oz. I'm not sure we can beat that record."

I wear one of those pedometer gadgets to keep track of how far I walk. They tell us we need to walk 10,000 steps a day, which is about five miles. I am up to 7000, so I have a ways to go.

Is that our attitude toward prayer then? I have to put in so much time or else I will not be in good standing with God?

Instead look at it like visiting with a good friend. I have known of these conversations lasting for hours, yet we never really kept track of the time. We should be excited about our conversations with God. God is more than a good friend, but he allows us to treat him as a good friend.

I have a good relationship with the new president of MCC. Occasionally we will interact by e-mail and set a date when we will go somewhere, have a cup of coffee, and talk over various matters. He is still the president, my boss, but we are friends. I come to these events without any fear or trepidation. Rather, I know that he is concerned about me as well as my opinions. That is our relationship with God, but we don't have to use e-mail to make an appointment. All we need to do is pause in our driven, fast-paced lives, and say, "Here I am God. I came to talk to you today."

Prayer is not the place where we attempt to manipulate God into what we want. Here we take on the role of children. A child soon learns techniques by which he/she can manipulate parents. I see this in stores all the time. A child finds something he wants. Mother says No. And then the screaming begins, "You don't love me!" "Why can't I have what I want?" The good parent knows what is good for the child and so chooses not to give them what they think they want.

Finally, prayer is a barometer of our spiritual life. When we are alone with God we have to examine the person we really are.

Prayer is then according to Martyn Lloyd Jones:

It is the highest activity of the human soul, and therefore it is at the same time the ultimate test of a man's true spiritual condition. There is nothing that tells the truth about us as Christian people so much as our prayer life. . . . Ultimately, therefore, a man discovers the real condition of his spiritual life when he examines himself in private, when he is alone with God. . . . And have we not all known what it is to find that, somehow, we have less to say to God when we are alone than when we are in the presence of others? It should not be so; but it often is. So that it is when we have left the realm of activities and outward dealings with other people, and are alone with God, that we really know where we stand in a spiritual sense (Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, 2 vols. [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979], 2:45).