I suppose you can remember in your boyhood some of you are as
old as I that it was not an uncommon thing for the minister to pray
earnestly for certain things that intelligent men would hardly think of
praying for in the same fashion to-day. It was not an uncommon thing, a
few years ago, to have a special prayer- meeting during a drought in
the endeavor to prevail upon God to send the rain; and there was
certainly a Scriptural warrant for it; for Elijah is represented in the
Old Testament as having, by the power of prayer, shut up the heavens
for three years and a half, and then as bringing rain again as the
result of his petition. If you study the Book of James, and remember,
when you do study it, that it was not written by the apostle, but by
some unknown author towards the middle of the second century, you will
see that he teaches that, if any one is sick, you are not to send for a
physician. The brethren are to assemble, the invalid is to be anointed
with oil, they are to pray over him, and the explicit and unqualified
promise is given that the prayer of faith shall save the sick. And yet
we have been confronted for ages with the spectacle of people breaking
their hearts in pleading prayer for those that were sick, and seeing
them fade and vanish from their sight in spite of their petitions.
I have heard it said a good many times that the fame of the Cunard line
of steamships touching the matter of the safety of its passengers was
to be explained by the piety of the founders of the line, and the fact
that they prayed every time a ship sailed that it might safely cross
the seas and land its passengers without accident in the wished-for
haven.
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