Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 3484
“O Lord, hear; O Lord, forgive; O Lord, listen and do; defer not, for Your own sake, O my God, for Your city and Your people are called by Your name.” Daniel 9:19.
DANIEL was a man in very high position in life. It is true he was not living in his own native land, but, in the Providence of God, he had been raised to great eminence under the dominion of the country in which he dwelt. He might, therefore, naturally have forgotten his poor kinsmen—many have done so. Alas, we have known some that have even forgotten their poor fellow Christians when they have grown in Grace and have thought themselves too good to worship with the poorer sort when they have grown rich in this world’s goods. But it was not so with Daniel. Though he had been made a president of the empire, yet he was still a Jew—he felt himself still one with the seed of Israel. In all the afflictions of his people he was afflicted, and he felt it his honor to be numbered with them and his duty and his privilege to share with them all the bitterness of their lot. If he could not become despised and as poor as they, if God’s Providence had made him to be distinguished, yet his heart would make no distinction—he would remember them and pray for them, and would plead that their desolation might yet be removed.
Daniel was also a man very high in spiritual things. Is he not one of God’s three mightier in the Old Testament? He is mentioned with two others in a celebrated verse as being one of three whose intercessions God would have heard if he had heard any intercessions. But though thus full of Grace, himself, (and for that very reason), he stooped to those who were in a low state. Rejoicing as he did before God as to his own lot, he sorrowed and cried by reason of those from whom joy was banished. It is a sad fault with those Christians who think themselves full of Grace, when they begin to despise their fellows! They may rest assured they are greatly mistaken in the estimate they have formed of themselves. But it is a good sign when your own heart is fruitful and healthy before God, when you condescend to those who backslide and search after such as are weak, and bring again such as were driven away. When you have, like your Master, a tender sympathy for others, then are you rich in Divine things! Daniel showed his intimate sympathy with his poorer and less gracious Brothers and Sisters in the way of prayer. He would have shown that sympathy in other ways had occasions occurred, and no doubt he did—but this time the most fitting way of proving his oneness with them was in becoming an intercessor for them.
My objective here and now will be to stir up the people of God and especially the members of this Church, to abound exceedingly in prayer—more and more to plead with God for the prosperity of His Church and the extension of the Redeemer’s Kingdom.
First, our text gives us a model of prayer. Secondly, it and its surroundings give us encouragement for prayer First, then, our text gives us—
I. A Model of Prayer
I think I may notice this first as to the antecedents of the prayer. This prayer of Daniel was not offered without consideration. He did not come to pray as some people do, as though it were a thing that required no forethought whatever. We are constantly told we ought to prepare our sermons and I surely think that if a man does not prepare his sermons he is very blameworthy. But are we never to prepare when we speak to God, but only when we speak to man? Is there to be no preparation of the heart of man when we open our mouth before the Lord? Do not you think we often, both in private and public, begin to pray without any kind of preparation? The words come and then we try to quicken them rather than the desires coming first and the words like garments to clothe them?
But Daniel’s considerations lay in this, first—he studied the Books of God. He had with him an old manuscript of the Prophet Jeremiah. He read that through. Perceiving such-and-such things spoken of, he prayed for them. Perceiving such-and-such a time given, and knowing that that time was almost come, he prayed the more earnestly! Oh, that you studied your Bibles more! Oh, that we all did! How we could plead the promises! How often we should prevail with God when we could hold Him to His Word and say, “Fulfill this, Your Word, unto Your servant, whereon You have caused me to hope.” Oh, it is grand praying when our mouth is full of God’s Words, for there is no word that can prevail with Him like His own! You tell a man, when you ask him for such-and-such a thing, “You yourself said you would do such-and-such.” You have him then! And so when you can lay hold on the Covenant Angel with this consecrated grip, “You have said! You have said!” Then you have every opportunity of prevailing with Him. May our prayers, then, spring out of our Scriptural studies—may our acquaintance with the Word be such that we shall be qualified to pray a Daniel prayer!