PRAYER LEADING TO CHANGE
Daniel 9: 3, 17–23; 12: 12, 13
I believe one outstanding feature of our heavenly calling is prayer. It has been much blessed in the recovery of the truth; the testimony came into Europe as people were praying, and a very fine assembly developed in Philippi. As we apprehend something of the greatness of our heavenly calling one thing would be that it would drive us to our knees. We may think the things we have been speaking about are almost unreal. You may look on the public breakdown of things today and wonder, How can we enjoy heavenly things? Is it true that we are to enjoy sonship? Is it true that we are to enjoy the best robe and the ring? Paul when he was writing to the Ephesians mentioned twice over that he prayed. I have often wondered about that, that, in the presence of the whole counsel of God, Paul almost says that the entrance into it is by prayer, and I believe that is verily true today.
I would like to speak of how in praying we should look for change. I am sure it is true that we should not rise from our knees the way we knelt down. I believe if we just tarried for a moment God would lift our view of things. Many persons in Scripture have gone into God very burdened; Hezekiah is one outstanding example; the pressure upon him was so great he hardly knew what to say, he just spread the letter that he had out before God, and God answered. There are many times like that; the burden of things may be so great we hardly know what to say, but God is very ready to come in as we are in that attitude.
I want to speak first of all about Jesus going up to pray; it says, “he went up into a mountain to pray”, and with Daniel it was a very deliberate thing. We need to have these times when we make room for the change that prayer would effect. I am not just speaking of crying to God in our need; that is open to us at all times; but it says here that Jesus “went up into a mountain to pray”. The Lord encourages the disciples to pray, to “enter into thy chamber … and shut thy door”. That would all make room for the divine answer, the change that God would bring about as we pray.
Here we have the Man who was here in lowly grace, who took His place in the likeness of men, touching the lepers in all their need; but here we see Him on the mountain—“And as he prayed the fashion of his countenance became different”—what a Man He was! These persons who were on the plain did not exactly see this, but here we come to see something of the Father’s thoughts about Jesus, here is God’s beloved Son. It changes our thoughts about everything when we come to see God’s thoughts about them. Peter, James and John would look on Jesus in a different way after this experience; Peter shows that as he writes his epistle, that divine majesty was here; not Jesus in lowly grace, but divine majesty. What a view to have of Christ! It helps us to realize the reality of what we have been speaking about, that there is a Man, God’s beloved Son, who is able to carry everything through to glory. I can understand Peter and John having confidence in Christ in a new way after this. I am sure this was in Peter’s soul when he said, “for neither is there another name under heaven which is given among men by which we must be saved”, Acts 4: 12. It was the same Jesus, but they had come to see Him in a different light, and prayer is to help us in the change of view.
Asaph was very discouraged about the breakdown until he went into the sanctuary, and in the sanctuary he saw things in a different way (Ps 73: 17); he thought that men who did not love God were prospering, and we may have these thoughts; persons who pay no attention to Christ seem to get on well in the world; they seem too to escape some of the sufferings that the saints go through. Asaph was discouraged about all these things; but as he went into God’s presence, he saw that all flesh was as grass; he saw that the wicked were like a leaf that would flourish for a day and soon dry up, but the path of the righteous was going on and brightening until the day be fully come.
Well, here is the Lord in His glory, once on the plain in all the circumstances of lowliness. What a privilege to get a view of Him in His own glory, the centre of all divine thoughts, and the One in whom all divine promises will be given effect. It says whatever promises of God there are, in Him is the yea, and in Him the amen, see 2 Cor 1: 20. That is the view they had of Jesus here, His raiment white and effulgent, and the scripture says it was “as he prayed”. You see, prayer makes way for heaven to bring its influence to bear upon us; prayer shuts man out and opens the door for God to come in with the wealth of His thoughts. So what they see in this experience is that there is nobody to be compared with Christ. God is saying here, ‘There is only one Man before Me, and that is My beloved Son’. Peter says about Him that He received from God the Father honour and glory when they were with Him on the holy mountain.
These things would be to encourage us as to making room for the idea of change in prayer. Daniel had the experience of it. He was in very broken times; he had read, bringing it to our time, the ministry of the recovery, he had read, typically, about Christ and the assembly, but he wondered how it could all be enjoyed, and he bowed his knees in prayer. What a resource! He had read about what God would do for His beloved city, but he is saying, All around me is breakdown. He felt he was part of it, felt his responsibility about it, but he laid hold of divine thoughts and promises, and bowed himself in prayer that he might understand how it was possible to enjoy them. He wanted to enjoy sonship; he wanted to enjoy fellowship; he had very few companions there; he wondered how he could work it out, and so he prays to God about it. He owned his part in the breakdown. As we go in to pray, you know, we are made to feel how small we are; we are in the presence of a God who is in heaven and we are mere mortal men in all our weakness, yet God would listen to us as we are in that attitude.
So Daniel does not give up, he lays hold of the thoughts as being God’s thoughts. I would like to encourage us, brethren, that the recovery is of God; it is not just something that happened in the 1880’s or 1950’s, or 1970’s; the recovery is something that is proceeding from God; it all proceeds from a Man gone into heaven and the blessed Spirit of God having come here to secure a bride for Christ. We need to embrace these thoughts; we are part of a heavenly company, surrounded by forces of evil, hades’ gates all around us. That is the position Daniel was in hades’ gates were active, but he had the faith that they would not prevail. So he set his face unto the Lord God, to seek by prayer, and God sees that. God finds delight in praying people; He is quick to answer. He did not change the circumstances, but he gave Daniel a fresh outlook on the circumstances. There will be conditions of public breakdown around until the rapture, but what will be raptured will be a bride for Christ, and we would seek to fill out our part in that wonderful vessel. It may be in reproach today, but Christ is soon to have it in glory.
Now Daniel would find support as he is praying; he embraces divine thoughts in all their wealth because it is God who has said it; the word of God is to be our stay and strength in these present conditions. God has not changed His thoughts because of the breakdown. He has not said that something less will do because things are very difficult. No, He is saying as we come in prayer, My strength is made perfect in weakness. What is to be secured at the rapture will be a wonderful triumph of the ways of God, that He has secured a vessel that is suited to those heavenly courts above; it has been beset by many foes, but is suited to be at home in glory. Daniel is on his knees and it says, “And whilst I was speaking, and praying, and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel”—he felt the responsibility of what was around, and who of us does not feel the confused days that we are in? But Daniel still speaks about “thy city Jerusalem”, and “the holy mountain of my God”. God’s thoughts are going through, dear brethren. So Daniel embraces these thoughts in his prayers. God comes in to strengthen him; it says, “whilst I was yet speaking in prayer, the man Gabriel … touched me about the time of the evening oblation”. Then Gabriel says, “for thou art one greatly beloved”. This is heaven’s estimation of a man in prayer. Daniel did not exactly expect this when he went in to pray; he went in burdened, but he gets some impression of the heavenly calling as he is in there. I believe God is ready to give us a touch like that—a man greatly beloved. Heaven is drawn to persons like this and would show that they can be trusted with divine secrets. I believe that the reason that many people understand things better than I do is because they pray more. Daniel would show us that the way to understand things is to pray about them, not to talk about the breakdown; the more we felt our part in it the less we would talk about it; but let us spread it out to God, dear brethren, and we shall find how ready God is to open our understanding about His thoughts. He says to Isaiah, My ways are not your ways, “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways”, Isa 55: 8, 9.
So as we are praying we are amenable to divine influence, to see how God views things. For God would strengthen His servant; it says earlier in the chapter that Daniel “understood by the books” (Dan 9: 2), but now he understands through a divine secret in his own soul. It is fine to know things through the Scriptures and the books and from the brethren, but it is finer still to have a secret in your own soul. That is something that Paul had; he went into Corinth, and he hardly knew where to begin his building; he went into that city where there was tremendous confusion, but he had a secret in his soul, that God had said to him, “I have much people in this city”. So when the sorrows came in, did he give up? No, he still laboured to have a chaste virgin to present to Christ; he had a secret in his soul which he received from God. And we need that in present circumstances, dear brethren, that we have a secret that God is seeing His testimony through in spite of hades’ gates. God is ready to confirm us as we make room for these divine visitations. It says in verse 21 that Gabriel was flying swiftly and touched him; that might be a very arresting thing, you know; God may come in to change the line of thought we have to bring us to see things as He sees them. The holy mountain has not changed. What a God He is! He has not only purposed, but He is able to give effect to these purposes in the Man Christ Jesus. I think that is what Daniel comes to see here, that the times are going to go on, but in the midst of all he can find his way.
At the close of the book he is told, “Blessed is he that waiteth, and cometh”; Daniel had a secret in his soul. It was still, we might say, a small meeting, the days were still difficult, but what a word—“But do thou go thy way until the end; and thou shalt rest, and stand in thy lot at the end of the days”. Dear brethren, the assembly will be raptured; it will not fade out through people dying off and conditions of weakness; the testimony is going to finish in glory. We shall meet the Lord in the air. What a meeting it will be! What a stay that is for our hearts! Paul brings that into the Thessalonians to be a comfort to them; in the midst of difficult days he would bring in the light of the Lord’s coming. We shall not be taken away because things are too difficult, but we shall be caught up because the Lord is wanting to have His assembly for Himself in suited surroundings. The vessel that has been a comfort to His heart, those two or three in a place holding faithfully to the testimony, who have been a comfort to His heart in the time of His rejection, to them He says, I want you now to be in My surroundings. He wants to have us in suited surroundings to enjoy His love.
Well, what a word it is to Daniel—“Go thy way until the end; and thou shalt rest, and stand in thy lot at the end of the days”. May we, be helped to go from these meetings strengthened, like Daniel. Next week, perhaps, back in testing surroundings, with pressures to be faced in households and localities. May these words be used to strengthen our knees and to lift up the hands that hang down. May we have Daniel’s secret treasured in our souls, that we may be enabled to take up our heavenly calling and function as sons for God’s eternal pleasure, for His Name’s sake.
GŐTEBORG, SWEDEN
3rd August 1985