3. Take it and employ it vigorously till your life’s end.—“His sword was in His hand.” “There is none like it.”—Ibid.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Verses 18–20.

The Programme of Prayer.

I. Prayer should be constant and varied in its methods.—“Praying always with all prayer and supplication” (ver. 18). The Christian warrior is armed from head to foot with the girdle, the breastplate, the greaves, the shield, the helmet, and the sword; no weapon of defence or offence is wanting; it would seem as if nothing was needed to complete the equipment. The one essential now is the spirit and courage to fight, to use the spiritual weapons with dexterity and effect; and the power to do this is secured by prayer. Prayer should be constant; the soul should be ever in a praying mood; and supplication, earnest entreaty, should be used in the special emergencies that occur in the battle of life. “Praying always with all prayer”: all kinds and methods of prayer should be employed—prayer in public aided by the sympathy and inspiration of numbers, in private when alone with God, in the family, in the whirl of business, in the stress of battle, in the intervals of recreation, in the heart without a voice and with the voice from the heart. The earnest and needy soul will find its own way of keeping up a prayerful intercourse with God. “Some there are,” said Wesley, “who use only mental prayer or ejaculations, and think they are in a state of grace and use a way of worship far superior to any other; but such only fancy themselves to be above what is really above them, it requiring far more grace to be enabled to pour out a fervent and continued prayer than to offer up mental aspirations.”

“Warrior, that from battle won,
Breathest now at set of sun;
Woman, o’er the lowly slain,
Weeping on his burial plain!
Ye that triumph, ye that sigh,
Kindred by one holy tie:
Heaven’s first star alike ye see—
Lift the heart and bend the knee.”—Hemans.

II. Prayer is prompted and sustained by the Divine Spirit.—“Praying . . . in the Spirit” (ver. 18). The Spirit is the author and element of the believer’s life in Christ. It is He who gives the grace and power to pray; He helps our infirmities, and intercedes for us and in us. Prayer is one of the highest exercises of the soul, and achieves its loftiest triumphs under the inspiration and help of the Spirit. He suggests topics for prayer, proper times and seasons, imparts urgency and perseverance in supplication, and He alone makes prayer effectual.

III. Prayer should be accompanied with persevering vigilance.—“Watching [keeping awake] thereunto with all perseverance and supplication” (ver. 18). We must not only watch and pray, but watch while we pray. Watch against wandering thoughts, against meaningless and insincere petitions, against the seductive suggestions of the tempter, and against the tendency to trust in our prayers or in our earnestness rather than in God, whose help we supplicate. “With all perseverance” means a sustained, unsleeping, and unresting vigilance. The word implies stretching out the neck and looking about in order to discern an enemy at a distance. Without watchfulness prayer and all the spiritual armour will be unavailing. The best-appointed army, over-confident in its strength, has suffered inglorious defeat by neglecting to watch. The wakeful and earnest suppliant must persist in prayer, undaunted by opposition and unwearied by delay.

IV. Prayer should be offered on behalf of the Church in general.—“For all saints” (ver. 18). Prayer that in its nature is generous and comprehensive is apt to become selfish and narrowed down into despicable limits. The man prays best for himself who prays most earnestly for others. “Prayer for ourselves must broaden out into a catholic intercession for all the servants of our Master, for all the children of the household of faith. By the bands of prayer we are knit together—a vast multitude of saints throughout the earth, unknown by face or name to our fellows, but one in the love of Christ and in our heavenly calling and all engaged in the same perilous conflict. All the saints were interested in the faith of the Asian believers; they were called with ‘all the saints’ to share in the comprehension of the immense designs of God’s kingdom. The dangers and temptations of the Church are equally far-reaching; they have a common origin and character in all Christian communities. Let our prayers at least be catholic. At the throne of grace, let us forget our sectarian divisions. Having access in one Spirit to the Father, let us realise in His presence our communion with all His children” (Findlay).

"The saints in prayer appear as one,
In word and deed and mind;
While with the Father and the Son
Sweet fellowship they find.
"Nor prayer on earth is made alone—
The Holy Spirit pleads;
And Jesus on the eternal throne
For sinners intercedes."—J. Montgomery.

V. Prayer should be definite and special in its petitions.—1. For the preacher of the Gospel in unfavourable circumstances. “And for me . . . an ambassador in bonds” (vers. 19, 20). An ambassador, being the representative of his king, his person was in all civilised countries held sacred, and it was regarded as the greatest indignity and breach of faith to imprison or injure him. Contrary to the rights of nations, this ambassador of the King of heaven was put in chains. Even Paul, with all his magnificent endowments, felt the need for the prayers of God’s people and craved for them. The fortunes of the Gospel were bound up with his life, and he was now suffering for his courageous defence of the truth. It was of immense importance to the early Church that he should be true and faithful in this crisis, and he asks for the prayers of God’s people that he may be sustained and the Gospel victorious. Here was a definite and special theme for prayer. Occasions of great peril evoke the spirit of earnest supplication. It is an aid to devotion to have some one specially pray for.