Question 98

We come now to the subject of Prayer, the third and last of the three great Christian ordinances enumerated in Answer 88. As will be seen on examination, the structure of the Catechism takes a new departure with that Question and Answer. And in it we are taught that the word, sacraments, and prayer, are Christ’s “ordinary means whereby He communicateth to us the benefits of redemption.” We have already studied the Questions connected with the word read and preached, and we have just finished the doctrine of the sacraments, and now we enter on the last of the three means of grace above enumerated. And according to the uniform and careful method of the Catechism, a definition or description of prayer is asked for and supplied.

Prayer is an offering up of our desires unto God—All prayer presupposes need, and a desire to possess the things needed. Such desire is altogether indispensable to true prayer. And in many passages of Scripture a true desire is represented as all that is needed to make prayer acceptable and effectual. And on the other hand, where earnest desire is absent, nothing will make up for the want of it. God answers no man’s prayer when his heart is not engaged in his supplication. “Every good and holy desire, though it lack the form, hath notwithstanding in itself the substance, and with Him the force of a prayer, who regardeth the very moanings, groans, and sighs of the heart of man. Petitionary prayer presupposeth in us first the want of that which we pray for; secondly, a feeling of that want; thirdly, an earnest willingness of mind to be eased therein; and fourthly, a declaration of our desire in the sight of God” (Hooker).

“But if for any wish thou dar’st not pray,
Then pray to God to cast that wish away.”

for things agreeable to his will—We ought to ask nothing in prayer that we know not to be agreeable to the will of God, and we ought to use every endeavour to find out what is agreeable to His will; for assuredly, neither by prayer, nor by any other effort of ours, shall we get anything that is not so agreeable. Before we pray, we must, so far as we can, learn His will about the things we desire, and restrain or put forward our prayer accordingly. And we have God’s will revealed so as to be our guide in prayer as in all other matters of faith and duty. “The first step toward prayer, therefore, is the knowledge of the promises of God, which are, as it were, the charter to go by. Further than these revealed purposes, His will is an impenetrable mystery” (Irving). (See Answers 2, 39, and 99.) Writers on practical religion teach us that there are some things we may and ought to ask for absolutely, and other things we must ask for only conditionally, and they are able to illustrate this distinction at great fulness from the Scriptures.

in the name of Christ—(See Larger Catechism, Answers 180, 181.) Mediation was a fundamental principle of the Mosaic economy, and as soon as that economy “decayed and waxed old,” and the One Mediator between God and man appeared, that divine principle began to display itself in Him. Even before He had entered into the Holiest with His own blood, and while as yet His best disciples were scarcely able to hear it, He declared plainly His own unique position between God and man as the Son in the house, the way, the door, the alone access. And in our day, and in our case, prayer in His name, when offered with the enlightened understanding and the believing heart, is just the believer’s recognition and acceptance of Christ as his alone sacrifice and intercessor before God. This is far from a “bare mentioning of His name,” for it is our “drawing of our encouragement to pray, and our boldness, strength, and hope of acceptance in prayer from Christ and His mediation.” The “name of Christ” in a true believer’s prayer is not a written word or an uttered sound; it is rather our richest conception and utterance of all that Scripture teaches us of the divinity, incarnation, sacrifice, and intercession of Him we call Christ. “What is His name, and what is His Son’s name, if thou canst tell?” Who is the Redeemer of God’s elect? (See Answers 21–28.)

To the clause, “in the name of Christ,” the Larger Catechism adds, “by the help of His Spirit,” which comfortable addition is true both to many scriptures and to manifold Christian experience. The Larger Catechism is the best commentary on itself, and on the Shorter Catechism also, and it expands and illustrates this clause in its own admirable and scriptural way. “The Holy Ghost, who is the intercessor in us, and who searcheth the deep things of God, doth offer, prompt, and suggest to us in our prayer those very motives that are in God’s heart, to grant the thing we desire of Him, so as it often comes to pass, that a poor creature is carried on to speak God’s very heart to Himself, and then God cannot, nor doth not deny” (Goodwin). For our dependence on His Holy Spirit’s working in other things, see Answers 22, 24, 30, 31, 89, 91.

with confession of our sins—It is impossible that a sinner should truly draw near to God in the name of Christ without such a sense of his corruption and guilt being awakened within him as to make him introduce and intersperse his prayer with confession of sin and lamentation on account of it. Let the student pass his mind over the record of Scripture, and mark how universal and how acceptable this state of mind was in God’s people. There is nothing more becoming sinful men than confession and contrition. It is the very “spot” of His children.

and thankful acknowledgment of his mercies. “We are to pray with an awful apprehension of the majesty of God, and a deep sense of our own unworthiness, necessities, and sins; with penitent, thankful, and enlarged hearts; with understanding, faith, sincerity, fervency, love, and perseverance waiting upon Him with humble submission to His will.” “Prayer and thanks are like the double motion of the lungs; the air that is sucked in by prayer is breathed out again by thanks” (Old writer).

Uses

Desire aright, and then seek inflamed desires.
“It is best to be careful in prayer not to put up those petitions of which I do not feel a sincere desire; for thereby my prayer is rendered less sincere, less acceptable to God, and less useful to myself” (Jonathan Edwards’ Diary).
“Is it enough to make prayer acceptable that the matter is agreeable to God’s will? No, it is not; for the manner as well as the matter must be so too. If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me” (Flavel’s Catechism).
Never let Christ’s name pass in a prayer with a “bare mention,” but seize on some aspect of His Person or work suitable to the matter in hand. Be sure there is something somewhere in Christ’s fulness to support and carry with God every right petition. Seeking it out will in course of time make you wiser than all your teachers.

Questions

In tracing out the structure of the Catechism, with what previous Question would you connect Question 98?
Explain absolutely and conditionally in the Notes, and give scriptural illustrations.
In the name of Christ. Suppose you read this all-important Answer for the first time, and had no means of religious information beyond the Catechism, to what previous Answers would you return to get light on the inquiry, Who and what is Christ? and why does His name so prevail in prayer?
Commit and be reproved toward God and man by the following lines:—

The virtues were invited once
To banquet with the Lord of All;
They came,—the great ones rather grim,
And not so pleasant as the small.

They talked and chatted o’er the meal,
They even laughed with temp’rate glee;
And each one knew the other well,
And all were good as good could be.

Benevolence and Gratitude
Alone of all seemed strangers yet;
They stared when they were introduced,—
On earth they never once had met.—Academy, No. 575.