CHILDREN OF PRAYER, OF THE TESTIMONY, AND OF PROPHECY
N. T. Meek
1 Samuel 1: 9–12; 1 Timothy 1: 18; 1 John 2: 1–6
I have read about young men. John’s address is more general but the other two refer specifically to Samuel and Timothy. Samuel we may describe as a child of prayer, which I have no doubt most of us are. We may now be grown up but there was a time when we were children and most of us are children of prayer. I would just like to engage you for a moment with what it means to be a child of prayer. It means, quite simply, that you have been prayed for. It is true that there are believers who have been converted who did not have parents who prayed for them. God’s grace operates because it is God’s grace, and sometimes even if the parents are not converted. He converts their children without any help or aid from the parents. That is the magnificence of God’s grace so that if He has to do the work, it is entirely His own. Of course, it is always His work anyway, and yet it may be greatly watered by our parents’ prayers. When we are young we do not realize it too much, how much prayer has gone up for us, how often our names have been mentioned in heaven. Samuel is an example of one who was prayed for before he was born. His mother wanted a child and she prayed for one and later she had several, but Samuel is the one that I want to speak about.
It may be that sometime you wished that your parents had not prayed about you. It may be you wished that they had left you to go your own way unhinderedly. Prayer is something like a holding cord, a restraining cord, even if you cannot see it. God says to Job in chapter 38 verse 31, “Canst thou fasten the bands of the Pleiades, or loosen the cords of Orion?” (Job 38: 31). You may wonder what that means, but it refers to some heavenly influences. He speaks about loosening the cords of Orion. Can it be done? Dear young one, it is not in your power to do that, neither can you loosen the prayers that your parents plead for you. Perhaps you would rather they did not pray for you; perhaps you feel at times a certain restraint upon you, in fact you would like to go further than you are going. It may be that God will answer their prayers and He may physically stop you from going further on the way you would like to go.
It is something that you will have to reckon with, dear young one, as having been brought up in a Christian household. You may find yourself unable to move in the way you want to because God is paying attention to your parents’ prayers and maybe also your grandparents’ prayers. Samuel apparently did not resent the prayers that his mother constantly made for him and he grew up in his day as one who was able to meet the need of the moment. In every generation, dear brethren, there arises a particular need and it calls for persons who are able to meet the need amongst us. God employed Samuel to meet the need that was extant at that time. It all stemmed from the prayers of a sister. It became known through the length and breadth of the land that he was a prophet. He stands in a singular place as the last of the judges and the first of the prophets (Acts 13: 20). He stands in a kind of a transitional position, a judge and a prophet, and he met the needs of the nation of Israel in a most critical time. He introduces God’s king and I say again that his service developed from the prayers of Hannah, his mother. We are not told much about the father and what we are told about him is not too good. If there is both a mother and a father praying, that is better than just one. I would encourage every parent to pray; I am sure you do; pray more. There is many a person that has overcome in his life and you could call such a child of prayer.
Now I want to speak next about John’s children. He says in his epistle, “My children”; he is referring to them in a moral sense. They are not exactly regarded as children of prayer but as children of the testimony. John writes for the last days; I expect you have heard that said many times, he writes for these days. They have not changed morally, they are still the same characteristically as the days in which John wrote, and one need of the moment is that we may not sin. If I, as a believer, sin, it may have its effect on the testimony. I remember as a young man, just out to work and having confessed the Lord’s name, how I subsequently broke down under provocation. I lost my temper and so the testimony was marred. I felt bad about it because what I did was not commensurate with my confession. No doubt most of us have had some such experience.
So John says here, “I write to you in order that ye may not sin; and if any one sin, we have a patron with the Father. Jesus Christ the righteous”. It is a great comfort, dear young believer, that God has made every provision for you, even for your failure. John writes that we may not fail, but if you do fail you will find that God has made provision for you that your part in the testimony may be mended. Alas, how much the testimony has been affected because of our failure! There are three things connected with the testimony in the Old Testament, namely, the tables of testimony embodying the law, then there is the ark of the testimony, and then there is the tabernacle of testimony. The tables of testimony were perfect; the law was given by God; and also the ark of the testimony was perfect. One Person has been here and He has carried through God’s testimony. The ark, you remember, became the depository of the testimony. Israel broke the law before they even received it, but God had in mind that the piece of furniture that is called the ark would be able to take those tables of the testimony and carry them right through the wilderness into the land. The ark is Christ, the one blessed Person who kept the testimony inviolate. How your heart goes out to Him, does it not? One Person has been here and was able to carry God’s testimony, God’s will, through in perfection. If it had been dependent on you or me it would have failed long ago. Christ carried it through. Then there is the tabernacle of the testimony in which you and I have a part and that is where failure may be. There is no failure with the tables, there is no failure with the Ark, but there may be a failure with you and me. The word here is that we may not sin, and the Spirit is here to give us power. In the instance I have quoted as to myself, I eventually was brought to learn that if I had cried to the Spirit, and been on better terms with the Spirit, I would not have failed as I did. But there is such a thing as being a child of the testimony.
There is need for it because the testimony has got so confused in Christendom. The testimony in its purity and in its distinction has been marred in Christendom. The need of the moment is for a clear and pure testimony. I sometimes wonder if one of the marks of the very last days will be that there is a revival of the testimony, a clear and distinct revival. One would long for that, that the light once given without any adulteration, without any weakening, given from God, is rightly maintained and adhered to. Mr. Stoney replied to someone who wrote about placarding, presumably referring to advertising the gospel, ‘There should be no publicity now but the publicity which personal devotedness to Christ would entail’ (‘Letters’, Vol. 1, p.30).
A testimony is rendered by persons going along to the meeting and whose devotion is seen by their neighbours. ‘Why’, they say, ‘are you churching again?’ What do the neighbours say behind the curtains? ‘Those people are always going to their meetings’. There is a testimony of devoted hearts that is to be seen in our places of work, amongst our neighbours, and in the streets. We should be a testimony to the whole profession and a testimony to men. There are to be such persons, beloved; they are children of the testimony. Would you not like to be among them? What is going to become of the testimony? Will there be persons who are owning His rights when He comes? John’s children are children of the testimony; there is a need for them at the present time.
Now I just refer briefly to Timothy. He probably was a child of prayer but that is not the point I want to make about him, nor do I want to make a point of the fact that he was a child of the testimony though no doubt he was. The point that I want to make is that he was a child of prophecy. It has registered with me only of late that Timothy could be described as a child of prophecy. There are two references to him thus; the one we have read and one in 1 Timothy 4: 14. This latter confirms the one that we read. Now what does it mean? It means that God may have been thinking in relation to you before you were born. He may have had you in mind for something. I do not know if you have ever thought about that, that you have your own personality and there is no one like you. I speak to you soberly; there is no one quite like you. You are distinctive, dear brother, dear sister, the Lord may have something in mind for you. He may have some work, some service. He may even have a gift that He wants to give you and He may at some time begin to speak about it. Cyrus was spoken of nearly two hundred years before he was known. God can do that; Isaiah mentions his name long before he was even born. If that was done regarding a Gentile king, to be used in God’s ways, how much more in regard of a believer.
So we get this rather remarkable scripture and it may be that there is someone here who is a child of prophecy. It may be there is someone here for whom the Lord has a distinctive service. There have been such in the history of the testimony and I would like you to consider the possibility that, quite apart from your will, the Lord may have designed a particular service for you, and, as I say, He may even give you a gift and if He does give you a gift you must remember that it is for the benefit of His people and not for yourself. I take it that as long as the testimony is here there will be a need for gift. I do not know that there is anywhere any suggestion that gift is ever withdrawn. You say, What is it?
It is an impression of Christ and the ability to convey it. It is the ability to speak and act effectively. We say someone has a gift in the gospel, that means that he can effectively speak of Jesus. He not only loves Jesus but he has the gift of effectively speaking of Him. There may be someone else who loves Jesus equally but he has not been given a gift. Divine sovereignty enters into that, and I think at the end of the testimony there will be a need for gift and it may be that a sister can have a gift as well. There were certain sisters who prophesied (Acts 21: 9), but as far as public service goes gift is amongst the brothers, and I must say that it is laid upon me to point out to the young men here that it may be that the Lord has something particular for you to do.
The imposition of the hands of the elderhood shows that they came to recognise it, that someone in their midst was a child of prophecy. That would be a very delicate thing and the working out of it would require very much skill and self-judgment and a freedom from personal feeling. It speaks of this young man being able to war the good warfare. There is such a thing as the good warfare. Some of the present difficulties have emphasized the need for persons that can war the good warfare. That means that they are free from feeling, certainly free from personal feeling. They love the truth for the truth’s sake and they are able to speak because of the love of the truth and not out of personal feeling or vindictive or family feeling. They are able to war the good warfare. I suppose all the time the testimony is here there will be the need for such persons.
I just commend those remarks to you that we may pray about them and be concerned each of us as to whether we have yet come up to our parents’ desires in prayer as to us, whether we are as committed as they would like to have seen us be, whether we are really in the testimony. It may be that someone here is a child of prophecy; the Lord will show it sooner or later, but we should envisage the possibility of it. May the Lord help us in His testimony and His service. His testimony is largely the outward thing, His service is what ministers to His heart, and both have been sadly neglected in Christendom at large. There is a need to maintain these things. These persons were all brought forward as meeting the need of the moment and the Lord will not fail in our day to bring persons forward to meet the need of the moment. May each of us understand and fill out our place according to His mind for His name’s sake. Amen.
Address at Peterhead
16 March 1985