That great Welsh preacher, Christmas Evans, once said that if a long filmy thread were to float down out of heaven and fasten itself to any one of us, if we knew that God were at the other end, none would lightly brush it aside. Now prayer is not a thread linking us in a tangible way with God, but it is a line of communication with heaven, and God is at the other end of that line, so that by it we may enter into spiritual communion with Him. Is it not strange, therefore, that we so often neglect it?

Perhaps one of the greatest reasons for such neglect is an inability to approach God in a seemly and effective way. It is, therefore, an astonishing thing to find "Directions for Using the Communication Line" often so utterly disregarded. This is not merely a neglect shown in public but also in private prayer. And yet people sigh that they so seldom "get through."

There are certain instructions given us in Matthew 6 that have, perhaps, been peculiarly neglected by a certain class of Christians, because they regard them as given to Christians of a lower caste than themselves. They have reached a higher plane; they have more efficient means available; "the Spirit teaches them to pray;" "there are certain details of the instruction referred to that are too difficult to be followed;" "the prayer is not in His Name." Such and such are the reasons very piously and very sincerely advanced by the "caste."

If, however, we remember (and how can we do otherwise?) how ineffectual our prayers often are, how discouraged we become because of this, may we not very properly turn to the chapter again, study it once more for practical suggestions, and consider the wisdom displayed?

One of the great things that it teaches is that all prayer is to God and to God alone. The evangelist, Mr. Torrey, says in one of his books that this simple fact taught him more about prayer than he had ever learned elsewhere. "All prayer is to GOD." In prayer we address GOD. GOD is at the other end of the line. A man speaking over the radio must surely be impressed by the fact of the distance his voice is carrying, the multitude he is addressing, that possibly people of prominence are "listening in," but, oh, how much farther are we speaking, how vastly more important is He who listens, when we "get through" to GOD. Surely if we pray, forgetting this, or even if we give it a secondary place in our thoughts, our prayers are almost irreverent. "This people draweth nigh unto Me with their lips," but alas, too often lips and mouth are all there is to it. Such praying is mere formalism; it is as formalistic almost as the "Omi, mani, padmi, hum" of the ever-turning Buddhist prayer-wheel. Shakespeare has very cuttingly characterized such prayer in,

"Our words fly up, our thoughts remain below,
Words without thoughts never to heaven go."

Let us briefly refer to the objections to using our Lord's prayer as a model, above referred to.

All who are in the Church are also in the Kingdom. If the prayers of those in the Church are manifestly inferior (as they so often evidently are), then how much better would it be to shape their prayers after this great model.
"The Spirit now teaches to pray." It is, of course, a blessed thing that we do have the Holy Spirit to teach us, but does then that Great Teacher never lead us. at all to pray after the "manner" that He taught who was the burden and glory of all the Spirit's message to us? And is not the prayer of Him who was "full of the Holy Spirit" and whose words well forth from the great treasure-house wherein are hid "all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge," to be for the guidance of all them that call Him "Lord?"

And is not a prayer molded by the very words of the Lord, if not exactly "in His Name," utterly worthy to have that Name appended to it?

Yes, indeed, there are times and seasons and "dispensations," and questions of rightly dividing the Word of Truth, but let us not in this way suffer ourselves to be robbed of any available blessing in any of them. "All things are yours, and ye are Christ's, and Christ is God's."

There are two main divisions to the prayer. The first half is a prayer for God's things, the second half for our things. This is, of course, as it should be. God's things should come before ours, and when we remember that God even goes halves with us, it is very wonderful, astonishingly gracious. It is, also, alas, almost equally a matter "of course" with us, however, that "our things" have the first place, and sometimes that His things scarcely get much place at all. It is so natural for us to be selfish. A great English poet says:

"He prayeth best who loveth best
All things both great and small,"

and indeed the spring of prayer lies deep within the well of love.

Mr. Wilbur Chapman tells of a man who was very downcast and miserable and came to him for advice. Mr. Chapman asked him if he prayed often. He said that he did, that he was constantly beseeching God to help him, but that instead of getting happier he only grew more miserable. Mr. Chapman then told him to drop all prayer for himself for a period of two weeks and to come back and let him know the result. The prescription was carefully followed and shortly afterwards the man returned full of joy. Now, of course, it would not do to make such action a talisman whereby to attain our own selfish aims, that would be a mere bit of hypocrisy. But to lay aside selfish praying because we are ashamed of it, disapprove it, that is another matter.

And this prayer begins with "our." The one who prays does not once say "I" or "my." Assuredly it is not wrong thus to say, "I" and "my," and yet to lose the individual interest in the interest of the mass; actually, and not as a mere matter of form, to lose ourselves, and how good it often is to lose ourselves. People now-a-days are laying great stress on "community" interests, "community" aims; they are almost hoping by exalting the community over the individual to inculcate a practical unselfishness hitherto unknown. The principle, however, was long ago adopted in Christianity. It is, in its place, a very good principle indeed. Let then the spirit of "our" often possess us, and let the "our" in prayer impregnate us with fraternal feeling. Let us be full of "esprit de corps."

Notice, moreover, that the prayer is indeed to God, but it is to God as Father. Christians have grown so accustomed to the thought that God is a Father that the wonder of this revelation of the Father as given us in Jesus Christ is almost lost upon us. A prominent newspaper writer says that the, great message that our Lord brought is that "God is friendly," and it is a wonderful thing for anyone who has regarded God simply as a dread Being, to "be propitiated but never sought as a Friend, to awake to the fact that God is indeed "friendly." If you and I had lived in the heathen world of the Lord's day and had worshipped the gods many, that cluttered the temples of the world with their idols, to have learned that there was but one omnipotent, omniscient Creator would have been a tremendous revelation, and to feel that He was friendly might well have created an ecstacy of joy within us. Yet how far beyond all this does the revelation of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ go, one who is "kind unto the unthankful and the evil."

The story is told of a newspaper-boy in New York who used to run up to a gentleman who occasionally purchased papers from him, and almost every morning affectionately brush his coat.

Finally the gentleman, considerably puzzled by this conduct, said to him, "Tell me, why is it you so often do that for me? What is the reason?" The boy promptly replied:"Oh, sir, some time ago, when you bought a paper from me, you said,''My child.' I never had anyone call me that before, and I love you for it." Poor little waif, hungering for natural affection, it made him seem less alone in the world. And if God is shown to us as a heavenly Father, does not merely call us that, but assumes the relationship, how we poor, agnostic "orphans of nothing," as Tennyson phrases it, should be glad and rejoice that God is a Father, a Father who is kind unto the "unthankful and the evil." And how much happier still for us who know Him as "children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." Yea, "Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the children of God."

Let us never, in prayer, allow that precious name to become a mere form. Let every ounce of force that the expression will carry go into it. Let us pause when it does not, and let us sluice out our dry formalistic minds with fresh streams from the Word of life, lest we seem to trifle with so sacred a relationship.

It may perhaps seem strange that the words "in heaven" should be appended to the title. It pays, however, to watch every expression when the Word of God utters it. His words are supremely practical as well as doctrinal, and the doctrinal should ever be reinforced with the practical. "Missionary Joys in Japan" tells us that the Japanese in Bible Readings were never content to get mere doctrine without the practical, spiritual application of the doctrine. What then is the practical lesson of "Who art in heaven?" Here, we must call upon the Book of Experience, in order to understand, though no doubt were we sufficiently familiar with the Bible, we might also appeal to it for an interpretation.

There is such a thing as becoming too "familiar" with God. There is such a thing as losing proper reverence for Him, because of His infinite graciousness in bringing us into such close relationship with Himself. Sometimes we talk to our "Father" (or am I mistaken?) in ways that we might hesitate to adopt with an earthly father. We do well then to be reminded that it is our "Father who is in Heaven," whom we address. Listen to words from the Prophet Isaiah, teaching a similar lesson:"For thus saith the High and Lofty One that inhabiteth Eternity, I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit." The contrite and the humble will never be guilty of such an offence as undue familiarity, but we often are filled with pride or a kind of indifference. It is an astonishing and shameful thing that we are so, when we consider the grace shown us by this High and Lofty One. How sacrilegious prayers may become! May we duly humble ourselves before Him when they are.

The next clause of the prayer very suitably therefore follows, as if it would reinforce this all-important lesson:"Hallowed be Thy Name."

The Name represents the Person. The name "Father" in the prayer represents the Person whom we sometimes hymn:

"Glorious in holiness, fearful in praises,
Who shall not fear Thee and who shall not laud?
Anthems of glory the universe raises,
Holy and Infinite, Father and GOD."

And fancy turning the blessed liberty He has so freely accorded us into un unholy license. Shame on us!

Very suitably therefore may we apply the petition, "Hallowed be Thy Name," not merely to the outside world but to ourselves also. And how joyously should we hasten to hallow it, when we think of the many abominable irreverences to which it is subjected. How we should yearn after the abusers and profaners of it everywhere! This is but to remember that Name is now "Father," and that He is clothed in all the graces and tenderness of the father of the prodigal son; nay, more, of Him who was full of "grace and truth."

"Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy Name." This is the key unlocking a bountiful answer to the petitions that now follow. May we ever be deeply imbued with the spirit of it. Surely then, and then only,

"Prayer is the breath of God in man
Returning whence it came,
Love is the sacred fire within,
And prayer the rising flame."

"Thy Kingdom come." It is only those who have realized the full significance of the name, Father, who can utter this petition with all the fervor with which it should be uttered. It is His kingdom, but the blessedness of His kingdom may be understood only as He is understood. However, the fervor of such utterance is most necessarily increased when the sorrow of all other kingdoms is fully and completely realized. To desire this kingdom intensely, as it should be desired, requires a "hungering and thirsting after righteousness," and alone in the Father's kingdom is that righteousness attainable. But the "hungering and thirsting" cannot be in those who fail to feel how little of it there is even in the best of kingdoms (or republics, if you will) now upon earth. Had one the pen of a Carlyle, what a picture one might draw of the scene about us. How one might pillory even the best of the governments of men. A prominent scientist has pronounced the "annals of the (professing) Church) the annals of hell." How much more pertinently might he have lashed the "annals" of the world that knows nothing of Christ. To know all this and then to know the Father as revealed in Christ, how it should break open the fountains of the great deeps of yearning after the Father's kingdom, "wherein dwelleth righteousness."

Moreover, we the better utter this petition, when we remember that in that day, our King, Jesus, will "have His own again." If we sigh and cry over the abominations around us and sometimes within us, how must He, who once wept over the wicked rebellion of Jerusalem, look forward to the time when the sons of God shall be fully manifested. "Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of My Father." Just imagine all selfishness eradicated from the earth! Just imagine all the fruits of selfishness banished! Just imagine the sin that doth so easily beset us besetting us no longer; just picture for once Him who amidst the contradiction of sinners endured so patiently, and think of Him then seeing of the travail of His soul and being perfectly satisfied.

"Oh, the transporting rapturous scene
That rises to my sight!
Sweet fields arrayed in living green
And rivers of delight.

O'er all those wide extended plains
Shines one eternal day,
There God, the Father, ever reigns
And scatters night away.

No chilling winds or poisonous breath
Can reach that healthful shore,
Sickness and sorrow, pain and death,
Are felt and feared no more."

"Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven." It is to be feared that a keen "discerner of spirits" if called upon to study us at prayer, might find much in us of the spirit of "My Father, may my will be done on earth, as it ought to be in heaven." Of course there would be nothing of the kind in the form of our words, but it would be the sub-conscious turn of the mind cropping up in little things that would give us completely away. In fact, the writer must acknowledge that he often discovers it in himself without any outside assistance. We are intellectually aware that God knows more than we do, that He is wiser than we are, that He looks to the end, that He is "telicly minded," as the learned phrase it, but we have our own plans and thoughts, and God's plans and thoughts conflict with ours; we cannot see far ahead and therefore feel that His plans are wrong. We would absolutely eliminate the caterpillar and the cocoon, and have the larva develop at once into the glorious butterfly. And even as I write, my mind tends to say, "And why not? Why not?" But after all God knows really so very much more about all things than I know about anything, that anybody but a fool would rather leave things to Him than have me govern them. This long prologue introduces us to what I might have said at once -GOD'S WILL IS BEST.

And as God's will is best, it ought to be a delightfully easy and pleasant thing for us to say:"Thy will be done."

How then is it that it is so unconscionably hard often to say it from the heart? The reason is no doubt simple. We have wills of our own and we have very frequently taken good care to see that we had our own way, to follow our own wills, and the oftener that is done the harder the wrench it takes to drag us back to His way and the truly pleasant path. If we had been accustomed always to yield to His will when our wills came into conflict with it, if we had always actually walked in the path of FAITH, then this violent wrenching of our wills would never have occurred. It would never have been an agonizing thing to say, "Thy will be done."

But it will be said:"How can I know what His will is?" Well, it is not as hard even as that. We don't always have to know. But just as this beautiful little prayer-model puts God's things first so we only need to "Seek 'first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness." Let God be first, and then in its wider application we shall find it true:"He that will do His will shall know of the doctrine." And how good it is to yield to Him.

"I said, 'I shall miss the light;
And my friends will miss me, they say.'
He answered, 'Choose to-night,
Whether I am to miss you, or they!'

Then into His hand went mine,
And into my heart came HE,
And I walk in a light divine
The path I had feared to see."

Oh, my dear reader, make it the most important thing in your life to yield to Him always and to seek His things first. Take the word of the living Son of God for it, and sing heartily, as unto Him:

"My God and Father, while I stray
Afar from Thee on life's dark way,
Oh, teach me, from my heart to say:
'Thy will be done.' "

F. C. Grant