All too often, we find prayer to be an excruciatingly difficult discipline of the Christian life. Even the most experienced and sincere saints find it hard to contest Thomas Watson’s pithy observation, “Jesus Christ went more willingly to the cross, than we do to the throne of grace.”1
When we do bow our heads and urge our hearts heavenward, words frequently fail us. A feeling of inadequacy and a sense of uncertainty can dampen zeal and stifle the spirit. This is where the truth of God’s grace to the needy supplicant can—and should—motivate a renewal of perseverance in prayer.
Whatever difficulties, distractions, and discouragements we face in prayer, the truth is that Christian prayer—insofar as it is indeed Christian—enjoys certain perfections.
First, Christian prayer has perfect access to God in and through Jesus Christ. As our Savior, Christ shed His blood to make atonement for sin, thereby opening for us a “new and living way” into God’s presence (Heb. 10:19–22). As the immortal mediator between God and man, Christ presently stands “at the right hand of God” interceding for us (Rom. 8:34). By prayer in the name of Christ, Christian believers “draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them” (Heb. 7:25). Through Jesus Christ our “great high priest” (Heb. 4:14), in both worship and prayer, we “draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need” (Heb. 4:16). In Christ Jesus, Christians enjoy perfect access to God in prayer.
Second, Christian prayer has a perfect object in God our “Father” (Luke 11:2). Though it is certainly appropriate to address the Son or the Spirit in prayer, we pray primarily to “Our Father in heaven” (Matt. 6:9), “O You who hear prayer” (Ps. 65:2), being assured of His tender love and compassion for us in our weakness (Ps. 103:4, 8, 14). The one to whom we pray knows all things about us, even the very words on our tongues before we speak them (Ps. 139:4). He perfectly knows our need and frailty, and He invites—even commands—that we bring our petitions to Him for aid (Ps. 62:8; Matt. 7:7–8). Most comforting of all, He is almighty and perfectly able to meet our needs according to His good will for His people (1 John 5:14). In our heavenly Father, Christians have a perfect object in prayer.
Third, Christian prayer has a perfect Helper in the Holy Spirit (John 16:7). His work of spiritual regeneration is perfect, bringing conviction of sin, faith in Christ, repentance unto life, and conversion such that Christians know to approach their God by the one appointed means (John 3:5–8; 14:6; 16:8–11), “to the praise of his glory” (Eph. 1:13–14). The Spirit is our perfect Helper in that He strengthens—or comforts—and consoles us both in prayer and unto prayer (John 14:26–27). Furthermore, the Spirit instructs and partners with us in prayer. As the Westminster Larger Catechism so aptly puts it,
We not knowing what to pray for as we ought, the Spirit helpeth our infirmities, by enabling us to understand both for whom, and what, and how prayer is to be made; and by working and quickening in our hearts (although not in all persons, nor at all times, in the same measure) those apprehensions, affections, and graces which are requisite for the right performance of that duty. (WLC 182)
Indeed, “the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what the mind of the Spirit is, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God” (Rom. 8:26–27). The prophet Zechariah goes so far as to refer to the Holy Spirit as “the Spirit of grace and supplication” (Zech. 12:10, NKJV). In the Holy Spirit, Christians have a perfect Helper in prayer.
If prayer seems tedious or undesirable, it is because we have lost sight of God in this precious means of grace He has appointed for our good. What a tragedy it is when we make prayer about the mechanics of our doing rather than about His divine being and design. He is glorified whenever Christians bring their praises, petitions, and requests for pardoning grace to Him through Christ. As one saint put it many years ago,
This is prayer: when, sinking through the earthly crust, the creature seeks repose in God; when from the eternal fountain he derives the help and solace which the creature always needs, and which the Creator alone can supply.2
The perfections of Christian prayer are real and invincible because they are God’s.
- Thomas Watson, The Christian Soldier, or Heaven Taken by Storm (New York: Robert Moore, 1816 [1669]), 25.
- B.M. Palmer, Theology of Prayer (Richmond: Presbyterian Committee of Publication, 1894), 16f.