Matt 26:39 ...He fell on His face and prayed, saying, My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will. (42) Again, going away a second time, He prayed, saying, My Father, if this cannot pass away unless I drink it, Your will be done. (44) And leaving them, He went away again and prayed a third time, saying the same word again.
[Part 1 of 2] If a person only knows how to seek after himself and his own desire, he may pray, but he is not a man of prayer. A man of prayer must become such that in all the universe he only cares for God and His will, having no other desire besides this. We can see this characteristic very clearly in our Lord Jesus when He lived as a man on this earth. When He was praying in Gethsemane, He fellowshipped with God the matter of His death saying, If it is possible, let this cup pass from Me. But then He also said, Yet not as I will, but as You will (Matt. 26:39). Three times He told God, I want Your will, not Mine. Ordinarily we think that when a person prays he asks God to do something for him. For example, he has a desire, so he prays according to his desire and asks God to fulfill it for him. But in Gethsemane we see One Who prayed thus: Not as I will, but as Thou will. In effect, the Lord Jesus was saying, Although I am praying here, I am not asking You to accomplish something for Me; rather, I am asking that Your will be done. I seek nothing for Myself in this universe. My only desire is that You may prosper and that Your will may be carried out. I am such a One Who only wants You and Your will. Again, let us look at the model prayer with which the Lord Jesus taught His disciples how to pray; it is according to the same principle. At the very outset He said, Let Your name be sanctified; Let your kingdom come; let your will be done, as in heaven, so on earth (Matt. 6:9-10). These words of prayer tell us clearly what His inner desire was. Brothers, if we know only how to pray for our own living, business, and family, then our prayers really fall short. This proves that we are not single and pure before God, but that we are still rather complicated and mixed within -- we desire other things besides God. (Continued tomorrow)
Bible verses are taken from the Recovery Version of the Bible and Words of Ministry from Lessons on Prayer by Witness Lee, pp. 36-37. Both are published by Living Stream Ministry, Anaheim, CA. Please visit us at www.emanna.com. Send comments to: [email protected].
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