possible to do a great deal of faithful, earnest work for our
fellowmen without true love to them. Just as a lawyer or a physician,
from a love of his profession and a high sense of faithfulness to duty,
may interest himself most thoroughly in clients or patients without any
special love to each, so servants of Christ may give themselves to their
work with devotion and even self-sacrificing enthusiasm without the
Christlike love to souls being strong. It is this lack of love that
causes so much shortcoming in prayer. It is as love of our profession
and work, delight in thoroughness and diligence, sink away in the tender
compassion of Christ, that love will compel us to prayer, because we
cannot rest in our work if souls are not saved. True love must pray.

3. Note _the sense of impotence_.--We often speak of the power of love.
In one sense this is true; and yet the truth has its limitations, which
must not be forgotten. The strongest love may be utterly impotent. A
mother might be willing to give her life for her dying child, and yet
not be able to save it. The friend at midnight was most willing to give
his friend bread, but he had none. It was this sense of impotence, of
his inability to help, that sent him a-begging: "My friend is come to
me, and _I have nothing_ to set before him." It is this sense of
impotence with God's servants that is the very strength of the life of
intercession.

"I have nothing to set before them": as this consciousness takes
possession of the minister or missionary, the teacher or worker,
intercession will become their only hope and refuge. I may have
knowledge and truth, a loving heart, and the readiness to give myself
for those under my charge; but the bread of heaven I cannot give them.
With all my love and zeal, "I have nothing to set before them." Blessed
the man who has made that "I have nothing," the motto of his ministry.
As he thinks of the judgment day and the danger of souls, as he sees
what a supernatural power and life is needed to save men from sin, as he
feels how utterly insufficient all he can ever do is to give them life,
that "_I have nothing_" urges him to pray. Intercession appears to him,
as he thinks of the midnight darkness and the hungry souls, as his only
hope, the one thing in which his love can take refuge.

Let us take the lesson to heart, for a warning to all who are strong and
wise to work, for the encouragement of all who are feeble. The sense of
our impoten