Prayer for God’s Servants (2)

Most true is it that all the members of the flock share in the grace bestowed by God upon a Christian pastor. They partake of that which belongs to him. All the grace with which he is enriched, all the gifts with which he is endowed, all the abilities with which he is furnished, all the afflictions with which he is visited, all the comforts with which he is soothed, all the strength with which he is upheld, and all the distinction and renown with which he is adorned belong also to the church over which God has made him an overseer. There is in the pastoral relation a community of interest. He holds that grace, and he exercises those gifts, not merely on account of his own personal holiness and happiness, but with a view to your holiness and happiness. You are partakers with him. You are enriched by his “fatness” or are impoverished by his “leanness.” The degree of his grace will be the measure of your own; the amount of his intelligence, the extent of yours. As he is taught and blest of Christ, so will you be. The glory which he gathers in communion with God will radiate to you; the grace which he draws from Jesus will sanctify you; the wealth which he collects from the study of the Bible will enrich you. Thus, in all things are you “partakers of his grace.” How important, then, that on all occasions he should be a partaker of your prayers! Thus, your own best interests are his strongest plea. Your profit by him will be proportioned to your prayer for him.

Much of the barrenness complained of in hearing the Word may be traced to the neglect of this important duty. You have, perhaps, been prone to retire from God’s house grumbling at the doctrine, dissecting the sermon in a spirit of captious criticism, sitting in judgment upon the matter or the manner of the preacher, and bitterly complaining about the unprofitableness of the preaching. With all tender faithfulness would we lay the question upon your conscience: How much do you pray for your minister? Here, in all probability, lies the secret of the great evil that you deplore. You have complained of your minister to others (alas, how often and how bitterly, to your deep humiliation it is spoken); have you complained of him to the Lord? Have you never seriously reflected how closely allied may be the deficiency in the pulpit, of which you complain, to your own deficiency in the closet, of which you have not been aware? You have restrained prayer in behalf of your pastor. You have neglected to remember in special, fervent intercession with the Lord the instrument on whom your advancement in the divine life so much depends. You have looked up to him as a channel of grace, but you have failed to ask from the hands of Jesus for that grace of which he is but the channel. You have waited upon his ministrations for instruction and comfort, but you have neglected to beseech for him that teaching and anointing, by which alone he could possibly establish you in truth or console you in sorrow. You have perhaps observed a poverty of thought and been sensible of a lack of power in his ministrations, but you have not traced it in part to your own poverty and lack in the spirit and habit of prayer on his behalf. You have marveled at and lamented the absence of sympathy, feeling, and tenderness in the discharge of his pastoral duties, but you have forgotten to sympathize with the high responsibilities, oppressive anxieties, and bewildering engagements inseparable from the office which your pastor fills and in which he may largely share, often “pressed out of measure, above strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life” (2 Corinthians 1:8b). Thus, in a great degree the cause of an unprofitable hearing of the word may be found nearer home than is suspected. There has been a suspension of prayer and sympathy on your part, and God has permitted a suspension of power and sympathy on His.

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