FROM YEAR BOOK 1997/98 (VOL. 11) PG. 153: PRAYER
reminiscences
The prayer of the first Christians was simply a reflection of the LIVING CHRIST in their midst.
The prayer of the first Christians was simply a reflection of the LIVING CHRIST in their midst. It was prayer ‘in His Name’ and by this we mean not that a formula was added at the end of every petition, but that in all their prayer they joined themselves to the prayer of Christ Himself, and knew that it was His Spirit (and power) which prayed in them. The best worship they could offer was simply His self-oblation in them. Praying in that Spirit, the Christian prayer is immersed in the ocean of the Son’s communion with the Father.
In Holy Spirit praying, keep yourselves in the love of God (Jude 21): pray in the power of the Holy Spirit.
‘Keep your watch with continuous prayer and supplication, praying the whole time in the Spirit: with constant wakefulness and perseverance you will find opportunity to pray for all the Christian brethren.” (Eph.6:18 – Ward translation).
‘We do not even know how we ought to pray, but through our inarticulate groans the Spirit Himself is pleading for us, and God who searches our inmost being knows what the Spirit means, because He pleads for God’s own people in God’s own way’ (Romans 8:26).
To live in prayer, therefore, is to live in the Spirit, and to live in the Spirit is to live in Christ. I am not saying that prayer is a means or a method which we have to use in order to have more of Christ in us or in order to be more fully possessed by the Spirit. I am saying something simpler and more fundamental.
From 1994 Year Book
“WORSHIP IS:
THE SUBMISSION OF OUR NATURE TO GOD;
THE QUICKENING OF CONSCIENCE BY HIS HOLINESS;
THE NOURISHMENT OF THE MIND BY HIS TRUTH;
THE PURIFYING OF THE IMAGINATION BY HIS BEAUTY;
THE OPENING OF THE HEART TO HIS LOVE;
THE SURRENDER OF THE WILL TO HIS PURPOSE” WILLIAM TEMPLE
TO BE A CHRISTIAN:
Does not mean to be religious in a particular way, to make something of oneself (a sinner, a penitent or a saint) on the basis of some method or other, but to be a man-not a type of man, but the man that Christ creates in us. – John. 3:3, 5.
PONDER
- “Throughout history” It has been the inaction of those who should have acted; the indifference of those who should have known better: the silence of the voice of justice when it matters most that had made it possible for evil to triumph.
- EVERYONE talks of changing the world, but no one talks of changing himself. – Leo Tolstoy – From Year Book 1994 pg. 128
There is nothing wrong in looking back into the past, of course, providing we use it simply as a reference point and not a resting point. Every Day With Jesus. Nov\Dec. 2011, Monday 14th November