The Name and Path of Answered Prayer

The disciples had not asked in the Name of Christ, nor had He Himself ever used the expression. The nearest approach is to meet in my name! In His parting words, He repeats the word unceasingly in connection with those promises of unlimited meaning, Whatsoever, Anything, What ye will,' to teach them and us that His Name is our only, but also our all-sufficient plea. The power of prayer and the answer depend on the proper use of the Name.

What is a person's name? The person is called up or represented to us in that word or expression. When I mention or hear a name, it calls up the whole man, what I know of him, and the impression he has made on me.

The name of a king includes his honor, power, and kingdom.

His name is the symbol of his power. And so each name of God embodies and represents some part of the glory of the Unseen One. And the Name of Christ is the expression of all He has done and all He is and lives to do as our Mediator.

And what is it to do a thing in the name of another? It is to come with the power and authority of that other as his representative and substitute. We know how such a use of another’s name always supposes a community of interest.

No one would give another the unrestricted use of his name without being assured that his honor and interest were as safe with that other as with himself.

And what is it when Jesus gives us power over His Name, the unrestricted use of it, with the assurance that whatever we ask in it will be given to us? The ordinary comparison of one person giving another, on some special occasion, the liberty to ask something in his name comes altogether short here,--Jesus solemnly gives to all His disciples a general and unlimited power of the free use of His Name at all times for all they desire. He could not do this if He did not know that He could trust us with His interests and that His honor would be safe in our hands. The free use of the name of another is always the token of great confidence, of close union. He who gives his name to another stands aside to let that other act for him; he who takes the name of another gives up his own as of no value. When I go in the name of another, I deny myself; I take his name and himself and what he is instead of myself and what I am.

Such a use of a person’s name may be in virtue of a legal union. A merchant leaving his home and business gives his chief clerk general power, which allows him to draw thousands of pounds in the merchant's name. The clerk does this not for himself but only in the interests of the business. Because the merchant knows and trusts him as wholly devoted to his interests and business, he dares put his name and property at his command. When the Lord Jesus went to heaven, He left His work, the management of His kingdom on earth, in the hands of His servants. He could not do anything other than give them His Name to draw all the supplies they needed for the due conduct of His business. And they have the spiritual power to avail themselves of the Name of Jesus just to the extent to which they yield themselves to live only for the interests and the work of the Master. Using the Name always implies surrendering our interests to Him, whom we represent.

Such a name use may be a virtue of a life union. In the case of the merchant and his clerk, the union is temporary.

But we know how oneness of life on earth gives oneness of name: a child has the father's name because he has his life. And often, the child of a good father has been honored or helped by others for the sake of the name he bore. But this would not last long if it were found that it was only a name and that the father's character was wanting. The name and the character or spirit must be in harmony. When such is the case, the child will have a double claim on the father's friends: the character secures and increases the love and esteem rendered first for the name's sake. So it is with Jesus and the believer: we are one, we have one life, one Spirit with Him; for this reason, we may come in His Name. Our power to use that Name, whether with God, men, or devils, depends on the measure of our spiritual life union. The use of the name rests on the unity of life; the Name and the Spirit of Jesus ate one.'

Or the union that empowers the use of the Name may be the union of love. When a bride whose life has been one of poverty becomes united to the bridegroom, she gives up her name to be called by his, and has now the full right to use it. She purchases in his name, and that name is not refused.

This is done because the bridegroom has chosen her for himself, counting on her to care for his business interests: they are now one. And so the heavenly bridegroom could do nothing less; having loved us and made us one with himself, what could he do but give those who bear his name the right to present it before the father or to come With it to himself for all they need. No one gives himself to live in the name of Jesus who does not receive in ever-increasing measure the spiritual capacity to ask and receive in that name what he will. The bearing of the name of another, My, having given up my own, and with it my own independent life; but then I Shirley, my possession of all there is in the name I have taken instead of my own.

* Whatsoever ye shall ask in my Name, that is, in my nature; things with God are called according to their nature. We ask in Christ's Name, not when at the end of some request we say, This I ask in the Name of Jesus Christ, but when we pray according to His nature, which is love, which seeketh not its own but only the will of God and the good of all creatures.

Such asking is the cry of His own Spirit in our hearts.

Such illustrations show us how defective the common view is of a messenger sent to ask in the name of another or a guilty one appealing to the name of a surety. No Jesus Himself is with the Father, it is not an absent one in whose name we come.

It must be in His Name even when we pray to Jesus Himself.

The name represents the person; to ask in the Name is to ask in the complete union of interest, life, and love with Himself as one who lives in and for Him. Let the Name of Jesus only have undivided supremacy in my heart and life; my faith will grow to the assurance that what I ask in that Name cannot be refused. The name and the power of asking go together: when the Name of Jesus has become the power that rules my life, its power in prayer with God will be seen, too.

We see thus that everything depends on our relation to the Name: the power it has on my life is the power it will have in my prayers. There is more than one expression in Scripture that can make this clear to us. When it says, Do all in the Name of the Lord Jesus, we see how this is the counterpart of the other, Ask all.' These go together to do all and ask all in His Name. When we read, We shall walk in the Name of our God,' we see how the power of the Name must rule in the whole life; only then will it have power in prayer. It is not to the lips but to the life; God looks to see what the Name is to us. When Scripture speaks of men who have given their lives for the Name of the Lord Jesus,' or of one ready to die for the Name of the Lord Jesus,' we see what our relation to the Name must be when it is everything to me, it will obtain everything for me. If I let it have all I have, it will let me have all it has.

Whatever you ask in my name, I will do that! Jesus means the promise literally. Christians have sought to limit it: it looked too free; it was hardly safe to trust man so unconditionally. We did not understand that the word in my Name' is its own safeguard. It is a spiritual power which no one can use further than he obtains the capacity for, by his living Disciples of Jesus! Let the lessons of this day enter deep into your hearts. The Master says: Only pray in my Name; whatsoever ye ask will be given. Heaven is set open to you; the treasures and powers of the world of spirit are placed at your disposal on behalf of men around you. O come, and let us learn to pray in the Name of Jesus. As to the disciples, He says to us, Hitherto ye have not asked in my Name: ask, and ye shall receive. Let each disciple of Jesus seek to avail himself of the rights of his royal priesthood and use the power placed at his disposal for his circle and his work. Let Christians awake and hear the message: your prayer can obtain what will be withheld and accomplish what remains undone.

O awake, and use the name of Jesus to open the treasures of heaven for this perishing world. Learn as the servants of the King to use His Name: WHATSOEVER ye shall ask in my Name, THAT WILL I DO!

LORD, TEACH US TO PRAY!

The path of answered prayer.

THE promise of the Father's giving whatsoever we ask is here again renewed, in such a connection as to show us to whom it is that such extraordinary influence in the council chamber of the Most High is to be granted. I chose you,' the Master says, and appointed you that ye should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, and then He adds, to the end, that whatsoever ye,’ the fruit-bearing ones, shall ask of the Father in my name, He may give it to you.' This is the fuller expression of what He had spoken in the words If ye abide in me.' He had spoken of the object of this abiding as the bearing fruit,' more fruit,' much fruit; in this was God to be glorified and the mark of discipleship seen. No wonder that He now adds, that where the reality of the abiding is seen in fruit abounding and abiding, this would be the qualification for praying to obtain what we ask. Entire consecration to the fulfillment of our calling is the condition of effectual prayer, and is the key to the unlimited blessings of Christ’s wonderful prayer promises.

Some Christians fear that such a statement is at variance with the doctrine of free grace. But surely not of free grace rightly understood, nor with so many express statements of God's blessed word. Take the words of St. John (1 John iii.

22): Let us love in deed and truth; hereby shall we assure our heart before Him. And whatsoever we ask, we receive of Him, because we keep His commandments, and do the things that are pleasing in His sight." Or take the oft-quoted words of James: The fervent effectual prayer of a righteous man availeth much; that is, of a man of whom, according to the definition of the Holy Spirit, it can be said, He that doeth righteousness, is righteous even as He is righteous.' Mark the spirit of so many of the Psalms, with their confident appeal to the integrity and righteousness of the supplicant. In Ps. xviii, David says: The Lord rewarded me according to my righteousness; according to the cleanness of my hands hath He recompensed me.... I was upright before Him, and I kept myself from mine iniquity: therefore hath the Lord recompensed me according to my righteousness.'

(Ps. xviii. 20-26. See also Ps. vii. 3-5, xv. 1, 2, xvili. 3, 6, xxvi. 1-6, ex. 121, 153.)

If we carefully consider such utterances in the light of the New Testament, we shall find them in perfect harmony with the explicit teaching of the Savior’s parting words: If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love Ye are my friends if ye do what I command you. The word is meant literally: I appointed you that ye should go and bear fruit, that, then, whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, He may give it you!'

Let us seek to enter into the spirit of what the Saviour here teaches us. There is a danger in our evangelical religion of looking too much at what it offers from one side, as a specific experience to be obtained in prayer and faith. There is another side that God's word puts very firmly, that of obedience as the only path to blessing. What we need is to realize that in our relationship to the Infinite Being whom we call God who has created and redeemed us, the first sentiment that ought to animate us is that of subjection: the surrender to His supremacy, His glory, His will, His pleasure, ought to be the first and uppermost thought of our life. The question is not, how we are to obtain and enjoy His favour, for in this the main thing may still be self. But what this Being in the very nature of things rightfully claims, and is infinitely and unspeakably worthy of, is that His glory and pleasure should be my one object. Surrender to His perfect and blessed will, a life of service and obedience, is the beauty and the charm of heaven.

Service and obedience, these were the thoughts that were uppermost in the mind of the Son, when He dwelt upon carth.

Service and obedience, these must become with us the chief objects of desire and aim, more so than rest or light, or joy or strength: in them we shall find the path to all the higher blessedness that awaits us.

Just note how prominently the Master places it, not only in the 15th chapter, in connection with the abiding but also in the 14ªth, where He speaks of the indwelling of the Three-One God. In verse 15, we have it: If ye love me, keep my commandments, and the Spirit will be given you of the Father.

Then verse 21: He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me; and he shall have the extraordinary love of my Father resting on him and the unique manifestation of myself.

And then again, verse 23, one of the highest of all the exceeding great and precious promises:

If a man loves me, he will keep my words, and the Father and I will come and take up our abode with him.' Could words put it more clearly that obedience is the way to the indwelling of the Spirit, to His revealing the Son within us, and to His again preparing us to be the abode, the home of the Father? The indwelling of the Three-One God is the heritage of them that obey. Obedience and faith are but two aspects of one act,-surrender to God and His will. As faith strengthens for obedience, it is strengthened by it: faith is made perfect by works. It is to be feared that often our efforts to believe have been unavailing because we have not taken up the only position in which a large faith is legitimate or possible -that of entire surrender to the honor and the will of God. It is the man who is entirely consecrated to God and His will who will find the power to claim everything that His God has promised to be for him.

Applying this in prayer is very simple but very solemn. I chose you, the Master says, and appointed you that ye should go and bear fruit, much fruit (verses 5, b), and that your fruit should abide; that your life might be one of abiding fruit and abiding fruitfulness, that thus, as fruitful in my name, He may give t

to be able to pray the effectual prayer for much grace to bear fruit, and have wondered that the answer came not. It was because we were reversing the Master's order.

We first wanted comfort, joy, and strength so that we could do the work quickly and without 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 prevailing 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, faith's obedience gives access to all the blessings our God has for us.

The baptism of the Spirit (xiv. 16),

the manifestation of the Son (xiv. 21),

the indwelling of the Father (xiv. 23),

the abiding in Christ's love (xv. 10),

the privilege of His holy friendship (av.14),

and the power of all-prevailing prayer (xv. 16),- all wait for the obedient.

Let us take home the lessons. Now we know why we have not had the power in faith to pray prevailingly.

Our life was not as it should have been: simple downright obedience and abiding fruitfulness were not its chief marks. 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 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 Saviour 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, joy, or blessing. Let the first thought be: I belong The one thing He commands us as His branches is to bear fruit. Let us live to bless others and testify of the life and the love in Jesus. In faith and obedience, let us 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.

LORD, TEACH US TO PRAY!