common consent,
ignored in all our public teachings. Do not men believe that God means
what he appears plainly to have asserted? or, if we believe that he
means it, do we fear the charge of fanaticism if we openly avow that we
take him at his word?

The public silence on this subject does not, however, prevent a very
frequent private inquiry in respect to it. The thoughtful Christian,
when in his daily reading of the Scriptures he meets with any of those
wonderful promises made to believing prayer, often pauses to ask
himself, What can these words mean? Can it be that God has made such
promises as these to me, and to such men as I am? Have I really
permission to commit all my little affairs to a God of infinite wisdom,
believing that he will take charge of them and direct them according to
the promptings of boundless love and absolute omniscience? Is prayer
really a power with God, or is it merely an expedient by which our own
piety may be cultivated? Is it not merely a power (that is, a stated
antecedent accompanied by the idea of causation), but is it a
transcendent power, accomplishing what no other power can, over-ruling
all other agencies, and rendering them subservient to its own wonderful
efficiency? I think there are few devout readers of the Bible to whom
these questions are not frequently suggested. We ask them, but we do not
often wait for an answer. These promises seem to us to be addressed
either to a past or to a coming age, but not to us, at the present day.
Yet with such views as these the devout soul is not at all satisfied. If
an invaluable treasure is here reserved for the believer, he asks, why
should I not receive my portion of it? He cannot doubt that God has in a
remarkable manner, at various times, answered his prayers; why should he
not always answer them? and why should not the believer always draw near
to God in full confidence that he will do as he has said? He may
remember that the prayer which has been manifestly answered was the
offspring of deep humility, of conscious unworthiness, of utter
self-negation, and of simple and earnest reliance on the promises of God
through the mediation of Christ. Why should not his prayers be always of
the same character? With the apostles of old he pours out his soul in
the petition, "Lord, increase our faith."

And yet it can scarcely be denied that the will of God has been
distinctly revealed on this subject. The promises made to believing
prayer are