It has been well said, “If thou prayest for thyself alone, thou prayest for thyself alone:” that is, if we are always looking on our own things, and unmindful of the things of others, we are in the end great losers. We gradually fail of the perfect grace of God in which we are set, and become incapable of receiving or communicating the blessings God would, through such exercises of heart before Himself, cause us to partake of and enjoy. The Word shows, by many examples, how God the Almighty governs the world; it having in it His witnesses, remembrancers, and servants, through whose prayers He puts forth His glorious power according to His own will. I will only refer to Joshua, Elijah, Hezekiah, and Samuel of old, as examples of this; and if Paul so earnestly desired the prayers of “all saints,” he no less lovingly and perseveringly presented supplications on their behalf. If, indeed, my heart knows brotherly love and charity, which is the bond of perfectness, it must turn, without effort, and naturally as it were, to such holy and blessed exercises. I can conceive nothing more acceptable to God in the way of service, who has so wrought to bring it about., than the mingling together, and coming up before Him through Christ, of this most sweet incense, mutual intercessions in the love of the Spirit.
The apostle James says, “The inwrought, fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” This expression, “inwrought,” brings before us the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, the Spirit of grace and of supplications, dwelling in us, within the deepest depths of our spirit, the power which worketh in us to will and to do of God’s good pleasure, lifting up our poor hearts into fellowship with the Father and the Son, and thus making intercession for the saints according to the will of God. What a wonderful disclosure this is of the ways of God in the Church and in the world! The beginning of those ways by means of which He is linking together, in oneness and under one Head― Christ―those things and those beings which sin had disunited from Himself and from one another. Prayer and intercession does indeed greatly glorify God; because, in attending to it and answering it, He puts forth His glorious power and wisdom. He, by such manifestations, comes forth from that light which no man can approach, and descends in tempered majesty, grace, and blessing, upon the creatures or works of His hand. To know that the desires of my heart can enter into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth, and that He will act in accordance with them, is an overwhelming thought. I feel sure―nay, it is sure, because it is written (Dan. 9) ―that those saints who dwell most in the secret place of the most High abound most in intercessions. We are not heard for our much speaking. It does not require bodily exercise, which profiteth little, to accomplish this service. The heart which loves all saints in the bowels of Christ Jesus can in very few words make request with joy for all: can, through only an emotion of holy love and desire, present all before God and our Father in the name of the Lord Jesus: ― “Father, do good unto all saints, according to thine own perfect love towards all, for Christ’s sake. Amen. Amen.” By this sweet lifting up and pouring out of heart, all are at once remembered, and none overlooked by us, and we and they together bound up afresh in the love of the Father and of the Son, by the Holy Ghost.