ALL NIGHT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25937, 1 September 1945, Page 3

ALL NIGHT

Written for the Otago Daily Times By the Rev. Gardner Miller.

It has always been a cherished belief of mine that Christ never did anything for Himself that was beyond the reach of any ordinary man. Christ was Divine but He never used His Divinity—with all its amazing powers—for any purpose to suit Himself. His miraculous powers were supremely at the service of others, the blind, the halt and the lame, the sick and the dead, but never once did He use them for His own benefit. You may think that is not quite true and you will recall that on one occasion Jesus asked Peter to catch a fish and in that fish he would find a coin to pay the annual temple tax for Himself and Peter. But close examination will reveal the fact that what Christ meant was that Peter should exercise his calling as a fisherman and from his haul pay ' the tax. Christ never went out of His way to produce a miracle. His redemptive gospel does not rest on miracles but on the grace of God that seeks and saves at a price beyond price. It is the humanity of Jesus that makes His Divinity believable. Were He not completely human, how else could you account for the fact that He was tired, that He wept, and that He needed to pray? I find great comfort in the fact (hat He was driven to pray—there is no other word for it. I find in that the surest indication of his humanity. That He needed friendship and rest makes Him one of ourselves; that He needed to pray—and that need is very evident in (he New Testament for there is nothing theatrical about His recorded prayers—makes Him one with us at the deepest level of our life. So it is that I pause when I read that He spent all night in prayer. His need must have been very great for Him to do that. You will see it mentioned in Luke vi, 12. It is the only occasion in the life story of Jesus that He was up all night praying—No sleep, only prayer; No couch, only a constant concentration that drove ’away the demands of the body! We read that, on one occasion, He got up a great while before day and went to a solitary place to pray (Mark 1:35). Here, in Luke, is the only record that He was out in the open all night praying. For such a Man as Jesus, to do such a thing —for He was always in spiritual touch with God —meant that some great problem was pressing upon Him. And if you stop at verses 14, 15 and 16, you will be left in no doubt about the problem. He had to make

A Choice,

He had reached that point in His work when it was necessary to appoint others to share His work and, later, .to carry His message far and wide when He could not physically be with them. Such a choice, as to the kind of men He wanted, was more than important; it was charged with destiny. Any ordinary minister of the Gospel could tell you, ruefully, of wrong choices of elders and deacons and Sunday School teachers. I doubt if much prayer is even yet expended on these very important choices. The marvel to me is that so many good people do these high tasks and how few prove broken reeds. The men whom Jesus chose were young men, ardent and fit—No one who had not his living to earn. It meant much for them to be known as the followers of Christ, but they, without counting the cost (I think) were eager to take the risk. (That, to me, is the finest thing about the disciples, as it is still the finest thing about any man or woman who will put all at the disposal of Christ). All night in prayer to God about the men who were to be His companions! All night in prayer to God about their fitness to carry the torch when once His own hands were nailed to a tree! If He had not been truly human, such a night of prayer would have been farcical. But you will notice that one man of His choice, Judas, broke down and became a traitor to Him and to His cause. Do not tell me that it was ordained from all eternity that Judas was to do this awful deed. To believe that is to make the all night prayer session a mockery, and God and Christ a partnership in the most despicable business of ’marking out a man before he was born for the most infamous deed in human history. Jesus saw in Judas great possibilities. He never for a single moment imagined that any of the men He chose would be perfect, but He certainly believed that all of them, including’ Judas, were of such stuff as God could mould and shape for the Eternal good of humanity. No one was hurt more then, or felt so grieved as Jesus was when Judas 'played into the hands of His enemies. There is no record of what Jesus prayed that night. I do not think it could be recorded, for the deepest and most real prayers are prayers that never use words. God interprets feelings and emotions; He knows and feels the tug in the human heart. And here is a lesson to be learned by us all: your prayers which fail of accomplishment do so because you do not know all the human elements involved. We are free to become saints or sinners. When God made us, He gave us freedom to choose Him or deny Him. Man is always responsible for his own choices. And Judas made a wrong choice. So may someone for whom you pray. That is not to say that in the long run such a one is for ever outside the circle of the family of God I believe the last word is with God. But please do not forget all the human elements involved when you plead before God (not with God) for someone. Jesus made the choice of Judas, but Judas had a twist somewhere and Jesus suffered for it.

An Attitude,

If Jesus needed to pray so much, so earnestly, as the New Testament shows us, and if on one occasion He needed to pray all night, how solemnly we should regard this great business of prayer! I am not an advocate of all night, or half-night, prayer meetings. Very few people can stand the strain of prolonged prayer, Fewer still can concentrate even for ten minutes in prayer, But prayer should be constant, without ceasing, and it can be if we will remind ourselves that it is fundamentally not a matter of words or posture but of an attitude of the soul to God. Begin the day with God, look up to Him during all the business of the day. have a quiet few minutes with Him whenever and wherever possible and you will be aware—l assure you of this—of a Presence with you all day long. And when night comes and you go to sleep, you will still be in communion with Him.