EXTRAORDINARY THOUGHT-READING by C H
SpurgeonFROM SWORD & TROWEL 2003 No 3
Lord, thou hast heard the desire of the humble: thou wilt prepare their heart,
thou wilt cause thine ear to hear (Psalm 10.17).
It is not a vain thing to wait upon God; it is your comfort, your strength, your
life. Any person admitted to audience with the Most High is honoured to an unspeakable
degree. The lowliest form of prayer may be most true and acceptable, and this lowliest form
of prayer is described in the text - ‘The desire of the humble’.
It is not the prayer of the serene faith of Abraham, nor the wrestling of
energetic Jacob, nor the intercession of prevailing Moses, nor the pleading of holy Samuel,
nor the commanding cry of Elias shutting and opening Heaven: it is only a desire - a motion
of the heart towards good things - and yet the Lord hears it.
This lowliest form of prayer may be the truest; for the essence of all real
prayer is desire. Words are but the ‘house’ of prayer, the living tenant is desire. Other forms
of prayer may be attractive to man, and yet they may have no influence whatever with the
living God; but this manner of supplication has been successful from of old, as it is written
- ‘He will fulfil the desire of them that fear him,’ and again, ‘The desire of the righteous
shall be granted.’ In fact, prayer is desire, as our poet puts it:
Prayer is the soul’s sincere desire,
Uttered or unexpressed;
The motion of a hidden fire,
That trembles in the breast.
Notice, this kind of prayer is only a desire. A desire may be
unattended by speech. The suppliant may not be able to put his desire into words at all, for
he may be too sorrowful, or his emotion may choke his utterance. He may be only able to
pour forth groanings that cannot be uttered, and tears whose eloquence is silent, yet God is
pleased to hear the desire which lacks expression.
Many prayers are very prettily expressed; in fact, they are expressed so
grandly that their fineries will not be tolerated in Heaven. Prayers will never enter Heaven’s
gate which are meant to catch the applause of man. God will say, ‘They were meant for
men, and let men have them.’ He does not stoop to accept man’s leftovers, and if a prayer is
meant to be a feast for man, God will not be a second-rate guest at its table.
A believer may have a wealth of desire and a poverty of everything else, and
yet he may be heard of the Lord. Possibly his confession may run thus - ‘I desire to be
humble, but I lament my pride; I desire to be strong in faith, but I mourn my unbelief; I
desire to be fervent, but I sigh over my lukewarmness; I desire to be holy, but I confess my
transgressions.’ If your heart seethes and boils with desires, the steam thereof will rise to
Heaven. Your desires have voices of their own: they knock hard at Heaven’s door, and it
shall be opened unto them.
Note that your desire may not even be accompanied by any confident
expectation. When you pray you ought to believe the promise and expect its fulfilment, for
it is the duty of every suppliant to believe that when he prays in the name of Jesus he will be
heard. But sometimes humility, which is a good thing, is attended by a lack of faith, which
is an evil thing; and this much hinders prayer. Humility is deceived by unbelief, and so it
gives way to the dark thought that its poor feeble prayer will not have a ready hearing.
I fear that in some cases this lack of expectancy is an effectual barrier to
prayer, and prevents it being answered; but it is forgiven to naturally despondent, heavily-
laden spirits, whose fears are not so much doubts of God as a deeply humiliating judgement
of themselves. It is not so much the case that their faith is sinfully defective as that they
have a painfully acute sense of their own unworthiness, and so when they cry they
hope that the Lord will hear them, and they mean to wait upon Him till He does; but
they are afraid. They will go nowhere else, for their only hope lies in the free grace and
sovereign mercy of God, but yet they do not exercise happy expectation.
My brethren, I would chide your unbelief, but I would still encourage your
desires, for the text says, ‘Lord, thou hast heard the desire of the humble.’ The Lord will yet
hear your humble sighs, and you will be surprised to find the Lord doing for you exceeding
abundantly above what you asked or even thought. May your faith grow exceedingly.
This leads me to observe that this form of prayer which the Lord hears is
described as ‘the desire of the humble’. It has this advantage about it, that it is free from
pride. Do not be startled to hear me say - I fear that many people ask to be humble in order
that they may be admired for it. Some seek great grace so that they may be highly thought of
in the market of the church.
Have we not all found that in the rushing stream of our earnest zeal there
will be some back-current which runs not towards God but towards ourselves? Have we
not even striven to win souls so that we might be notable as soul-winners? ‘Come with me,
and see my zeal for the Lord,’ has been the language of many a Jehu. It is hard to keep out
pride.
This psalm says much concerning the proud man and the oppressor, whom
God abhors, and will surely visit in judgement; and then shines forth this bright word, like a
lone star in a dark night. Never was precious pearl found in a rougher oyster-shell. May the
Lord keep us humble if we are so, and make us humble if we are not so.
I believe every Christian has a choice between being humble and being humbled. Now, to be humble is a sweet thing; there is no lovelier spot on the road to the Celestial City than the Valley of Humiliation. He that lives in it dwells among flowers and birds, and may sing all day long, like the shepherd boy whose song ran thus -
He that is down need fear no fall,
He that is low no pride;
He that is humble ever shall
Have God to be his guide.
If you do not choose to be humble you will have to be humbled; and that is
not at all a desirable thing. To be humbled is to be sorely smitten and made to suffer shame
in the estimation of your fellow men, both ungodly and godly. Certain persons who have
carried their heads very high have struck them against the beam, and have had to go with
bruised foreheads for the rest of their lives. God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the
humble. Therefore may God help us to offer before him ‘the desire of the humble’.
If you would be heard in prayer you must come to God as needy and empty.
Low thoughts of ourselves are the companions of prevailing prayer. No person may expect
to receive out of the fulness that is treasured up in Christ Jesus until he is willing to confess
his own poverty. Grace for grace will be given only to those who feel need upon need; all
successful pleadings must find their argument in free grace.
We must never urge claims against the Lord as though He were our debtor;
for then mercy will not deal with us. We will have appealed unto the Caesar of justice and
unto Caesar we must go. Let us have done with merits and deserts, and let this be our cry,
‘For Thy mercy and for Thy truth’s sake, and for Thy Son’s sake, hear Thou the voice of my
prayer.’ This is the proper Gospel spirit; and if we plead in any other fashion we shall be
sent empty away.
Our second point is that God is quick to hear the lowliest prayer. We have
heard a good deal about thought-reading. I give no opinion of that matter among men; but
here is a wonderful instance of it with the Lord. ‘Thou hast heard the desire of the humble.’
This kind of desire-reading is the prerogative of God alone. He knows our desires even
when we do not know them ourselves.
Sitting in this Tabernacle you are desiring, but it is quite impossible for the
person sitting next to you to know your wishes, and it is just as well perhaps. The Lord is
reading your thoughts now. Your groaning out of the very deeps ascends to the heights. You
would not like to tell your inward feelings: perhaps your secret is too painful to be told. But
God’s hearing is so acute that He can hear your desires. Wonderful art! We should be very
glad if the Lord had promised to hear us when we speak; but He has gone far beyond that,
and He hears the unspeakable and unutterable. Was there ever power and pity like this?
Thirdly, we will remark that the heart is the main matter in prayer. Desires
are the fruit of the heart. The heart is the source, the seat, and the essence of supplication.
Prayer with the heart is the heart of prayer.
Without the heart prayer is a wretched mockery. There is as much grace in
the bark of a dog or the grunt of a swine as in a form of prayer if the heart be absent. God is
as likely to hear the cry of ravens than to regard prayers uttered in chapels or churches, if the
mind is not in earnest.
I fear that much so-called public prayer is nothing better than presumptuous
sin. If your child should come to you and ask a favour in an affected voice, would you
notice him? If, instead of saying, ‘Dear father, I want so-and-so,’ he should take up a book
and intone such words as these, ‘Dearly beloved father, I have to request of thee that thou in
thy great affection wilt give unto me such and such things,’ you would not regard his
nonsense. You would say, ‘Come, boy, what do you want? Tell me plainly.’ I fear that
praying in sing-song is the most fearful mockery God ever hears. Imagine Peter, when he
was beginning to sink, intoning, ‘Lord, save me.’ When the heart really gets to speak with
God, it cannot talk in affected tones: it throws such rubbish overboard.
But cannot a man pray with his heart and yet use a written prayer? Certainly
he can. Many have done so for years. If you cannot walk without your crutches, I would
sooner you walked with them than not at all. Still it is not the best words put together by the
most devout men that ever lived, nor the holiest language composed extemporaneously by
yourself, that can make up prayer if the heart be gone. Words are seldom more than the
baggage of prayer. Language at best is but the flesh in which prayer is embodied: the desire
of the heart is the life of the prayer.
He that prays with little desire asks God to refuse him. If you go through
your prayer, and your mind is wandering up and down among a thousand vanities, your
desires are feeble, and your supplication will have little effect. Prayer must be fervent to be
effectual; it must be ardent to be acceptable. If the utter failure of your prayer would not
grieve you, and if its success would not much gratify you, then depend upon it you will
have to wait long at mercy’s wicket to be admitted.
Importunity is indispensable: our Lord has given us many parables to that
effect. To play at praying will never do: heart and soul must be fully awake; for no sleepy
prayer can enter Heaven. We must praise God with our whole heart, and we must pray in
the same manner. If a double-minded man may not expect to receive anything of the Lord,
neither may a half-hearted man.
When the soul grows warm, the spirit fervent, and desires are strong, then do
not spare your prayers. We are not always in that condition, so let us pray much when we
are. We are bound to prepare ourselves for prayer; but I believe the best qualifications are
strong desires and intense longings. No preparation for food is equal to intense hunger.
It will be your wisdom when your desires are acute to pray more than you
ordinarily do. You cannot always pray like this, but when good times come use them. When
a fair wind fills the sails of desire, then make all possible headway. Set apart a longer
season for private devotion when the soul is all alive. At another time you may have to try
very hard and make but small progress, let it not at such a time be a source of regret that you
wasted a happier season. Cease not to obtain blessings beyond number both for yourself, for
the church, and for a perishing world; but take heed that your heart be greatly exercised with
longings for souls before God.
The Lord prepares His people’s hearts by giving them a deep sense of what
they need. You have grief, temptation, and hardship, and your spirit cries out under the
lashes of conscience; but all this is right, because by this means you are instructed in the art
and mystery of supplication. Nobody cries to Christ so well as the man who is beginning to
sink. Jonah’s cry in the whale’s belly was the most intense prayer he ever prayed. When
your spirit is overwhelmed with sorrow, then look up to Christ, the Saviour, and find Him
to your soul’s joy. Our desires are apt to sleep, but when the Lord by His Spirit reveals to us
our spiritual poverty, we long, and pine, and sigh for spiritual blessings.
Give your heart up to the Holy Spirit that He may prepare you to seek the
blessing, and prepare you to receive the blessing when the time comes for the Lord to grant
it. This is wonderful condescension on God’s part, and on our part we ought to feel the
utmost encouragement to prepare our own hearts for earnest supplication.
Where God leads you to pray He means you to receive. You find a holy
desire in your heart; the Lord put that desire into your heart, and for the honour of His
infinite majesty, lest He stain His goodness and dishonour His great name, He must hear
you.
With such comfort would I address those here who are just beginning to
pray. I know I speak to some who tell us you are seeking peace, and that day and night the
desire for salvation occupies the entire chamber of your soul. Well, this did not come from
your own nature. Neither devil nor the old nature has taught you to pray like this. Dear
hearer, be sure that the great Father Who is moving you to cry to Him, is hearing you, and
will incline His ear to catch the faintest appeal of your spirit. Believe that He is hearing you,
and cast yourself at the feet of His dear Son. Behold the wounds of Jesus, and let these
invite you to draw nigh to God. I know of no more eloquent words than the wounds of the
dying Lord. Let them persuade you to come to Him and to trust and rest at His feet, for
since He has inclined your heart to pray, He is surely about to hear you and bless you.
Edited and abridged from a sermon preached at the Metropolitan Tabernacle
by C H Spurgeon, October 5th 1884
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