Elements of True Prayer

By D. L. Moody

Copyright 1894

(This is an excellent sermon by the famous preacher, D. L. Moody. I have shortened it somewhat for this article.)

If there is going to be a great, deep, thorough, lasting work it is going to be in answer to prayer.

If we ask God to do a certain work He is not going to give us chaff. If we have faith to claim, I believe He will answer our prayers. I don't believe He mocks His children. I believe He will give out of His abundance, and give us the very best He has.

At different times we may ask, "What is the use of prayer, anyway? Sometimes when we pray it has seemed as if the heavens were closed over us. It seems as if God does not hear. Our words all come back to us.

In answer to that, let me say, in the first place, Jesus Christ is an example for us. We profess to be His disciples. Well, remember that as a man He prayed. As God He answers prayers. The key to Christ's character and life is this: He was a God-Man. At times He spoke as God, at times as a man. At times He acted as a man. At times as God.

But there is one thing, you will find His life all through His ministry was filled with prayer, and there was no great event in His life that was not preceded by prayer.

All through His public ministry you will find Him often in prayer, and every great event of His life, as I said before, was preceded by prayer.

At His baptism, he came out of the water praying. The Spirit came in answer to prayer, and the voice that came from heaven saying, "This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased," was a response to prayer.

The night preceding the most marvelous sermon He preached while on earth you will notice He spent in prayer. There were about fifteen thousand sermons in that one.

When He went up into the mountain and was transfigured we find that He was praying when His visage was changed. He had on that heavenly glory because His Father was to visit Him.

In the twelfth chapter of John, He was praying again that God might glorify His name, and in Gethsemane He was praying and sweating, as it were, great drops of blood when the angel came. The angel didn't come when He was uttering some parable or preaching some sermon, but when He was praying.

And if you and I are going to hear from heaven it will be when we are praying. I have often said that I would rather be able to pray like Daniel than preach like Gabriel.

What we want is men and women that know how to pray, who know how to call fire down from heaven. Do you have that power with God in prayer?

(In the next paragraph, Reverend Moody tells a story of a time when he was asked to preach in London. He went and stayed there for ten days, and four

hundred people were saved. At a later time, he found out that a bedridden woman had been praying for God to revive the whole church. She began to pray that God would send D. L. Moody to her church.)

"On Sunday morning her sister came home and said, 'Who do you think preached for us this morning?' She guessed a number of ministers and finally gave up. The sister said, 'It was Mr. Moody, from America.' The poor woman turned pale and said, 'I know what that means. That is in answer to prayer. There is going to be a great work here.' The servants brought up her dinner, but she said, 'No, no dinner for me today. I spend this day in prayer.' And that night while I was preaching she was praying, and in answer to her prayers the power of God just fell upon the audience."

Let us pray to God to give us the spirit of prayer. Let us expect great things, and we will not be disappointed if our expectations are from God. Let our expectations be from Him, not from man. If you look to man you are going to be disappointed, but God will never disappoint you. Bring your burden here and pray it out before God, and ask Him to do great and mighty things.

Elements of True Prayer

Christ never taught His disciples how to preach. He taught them to pray. We should often ask, "Lord teach me how to pray."

1. Contrition

Sometimes we go into the presence of God as if we are on equal footing with him. Let us keep in mind that God id holy. The closer we get to him the more we will think of His holiness. We will grow smaller and He larger. One of the truest signs that a person is growing great is that God increases and the

person decreases. When a person talks about themselves constantly, they are not growing in grace but in conceit.

But when we get near to God, how small we look and how great God seems! When Isaiah saw God he cried, "Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of Hosts." And then what did he say? That he was unclean and lived with unclean people, and he wanted the coal to be taken from off the altar and put upon his lips that his iniquity might be purged away.

Now it is one thing to hear God, but when we see Him it will be another thing, and let us keep it in mind that contrition is the first thing. You remember that when Christ taught His disciples to pray, He said, "Our Father."

2. Confession

The next thing that follows is the confession of our sins. There is no true prayer without confession. As long as we have unconfessed sin in our soul we are not going to have power with God in prayer. He says if we regard iniquity in our hearts He will not hear us, much less answer.

As long as we are living in any known sin we have no power in prayer. God is not going to hear it. It is a prayerless prayer and an abomination to God and man.

What God wants is reality. Now if there is some sin we have hidden in our hearts that we are not willing to confess, then of course we cannot pray. Put the question to yourself, can you pray? I don't mean to go through a form, but have you power with God in prayer? How many times do you hear people get up in prayer meeting to pray, but there is no power in it? If a man doesn't treat his wife right he needn't pray. It is all a farce, you know. The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to God. If sacrifice is an abomination to God, do

you tell me that the prayers of a man or woman who is not living right is not an abomination to God?

Now you must bear in mind that there must be true confession before we are going to have an answer to prayer. Not to confess and then go and do the same thing over again, but just turn from the sin.

My dear friend, if there is anything in your life that is wrong, make up your mind that you are not going to let the sun go down before you confess it. Let me read you a few verses from Psalm 32. "Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven..." There is no confession up to this time. The Psalmist didn't prosper because he would not confess. (First to the fifth verse) But now notice, "I acknowledge my sin unto thee, and my iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and you forgave the iniquity of my sin." See! At just the moment he confessed, the Lord forgave, and then it was that he had power with God in prayer.

3. Restitution

The next true element to prayer is restitution. It is folly for us to ask God to do something for us that we can do for ourselves. If I have five dollars in my pocket that belongs to someone else and I try to cheat him out of it, can I pray?

Once, a lady came to me after a meeting. She was greatly troubled, and I talked with her a number of days and found out what her trouble was. "I cannot pray. I get down onto my knees to pray, but five bottles of wine come up before me, and I cannot see the face of the Lord." She told that when she was a housekeeper for a wealthy gentleman in his sickness, she stole five bottles of wine, and every time since then when she got down on her knees to pray, up would come the five bottles of wine.

"Did you ever make restitution?"

"No."

"Well, you must confess and make restitution to that man before you will be able to pray."

"Why," she said, "have I got to confess that?"

"Not only confess, but you must make restitution."

Oh, but she couldn't do that, though the next day she came back and said, "Now, if I give that money to the church, won't that do just as well?"

"Why no, the Lord does not want any stolen money. It is not yours to give. There is only one way when you have done wrong to make it right and that is to confess your sins, and, if it is in your power, make restitution."

Finally she felt as if she could not carry the burden any longer. She took the train to the home of this man's son and told him the story of her sin and handed him the money to pay for the wine.

He said, "I don't want the money."

And she said, "Well, I don't want it."

Finally he said, "I will take it and put it into the treasure of the church."

She had gotten rid of the five bottles of wine!

If there is something wrong in your life, make restitution. Those kind of things speak louder than any sermons; that's the kind of Christianity that we want.

Supposed it costs you something. I never saw a person who was willing to do these things for God that didn't receive a blessing. I know this to be true. If someone has wronged you, you want them to make it right, don't you? There was a man in the south of Ireland who got right up and went out of the meeting, went clear up to the north of Ireland and paid man after man hundreds of pounds that he had cheated them out of. I believe there are a good many people who have no power at all because there is something in their lives that doesn't please God.

4. Forgiveness

The next element is forgiveness. There are more people that stumble right there and lose their power than anywhere else. Now, if I do not forgive just as I want God to forgive me then I cannot pray. That is the reason why a good many people cannot pray.

A man said to me some time ago, "We have a magnificent organ, a wealthy and cultured preacher, but we have not had a person converted in our church. Can you tell me why?”

"Yes, there are half a dozen families in your church who are not on speaking terms, and the Holy Spirit cannot work."

God cannot nullify himself. He says he cannot work. If there is anyone you are not willing to forgive, don't you see that you have broken down the bridge,

and how are you going to get over yourself? If you have not forgiven someone, go and make it right with him or her. Get things settled.

God delights to answer prayer. But you cannot deceive yourself. If you are living a dishonorable life God hides His face and will not hear you. Are there any bottles of wine in the way? That is the question. May God help you to answer it honestly.

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