PRAYER POWER UNLIMITED

J. Oswald Sanders

Pleading the Promises

His precious and magnificent promises (2 Pet 1:4)

The original owners of the fabulous Mt. Morgan gold mine in Queensland, Australia, toiled for many years on its barren slopes, eking out a frugal living, unaware that beneath their feet lay one of the richest mountains of gold the world has ever known. Their potential wealth was incalculable, but they lived on the wealth they possessed. The same is true of many Christians. In the promises of Scripture we have “unsearchable riches” (Eph 3:8, KJV); but because we fail to appropriate them, we live in comparative spiritual poverty. This is the subject of our next lesson.

“Every promise of Scripture is a writing of God,” said Charles Haddon Spurgeon, “which may be pleased before Him with his reasonable request, ‘Do as Thou hast said.’ The Creator will not cheat the creature who depends upon His truth; and far more, the heavenly Father will not break His Word to His own child.”¹

WHAT IS A PROMISE?

A promise is a written or verbal declaration that binds the person who makes it to do or forbear a specified act. When used of God, it is His pledge or undertaking to do or refrain from doing a certain thing. Such promises form the basis of the prayer of faith. It is through prayer that these promises are turned into the facts and factors of one’s Christian experience.

The validity and dependability of a promise rest on the character and resources of the one who makes it, just as the validity of a bank check depends on the probity and bank balance of the one who signs it. The holy character and faithfulness of God make His promises credible. “He who promised is faithful,” testified the writer of the letter to the Hebrews (10:23). “Not one word has failed of all His good promise,” said the kneeling Solomon (1 Kings 8:56).

God’s promises are thus bound up with His character, and rest on four of His divine attributes: (1) His truth, which makes lying impossible; (2) His omniscience, which makes His being deceived or mistaken impossible; (3) His power, which makes everything possible, and (4) His unchangableness, which precludes vacillation or change.

So when we come to God armed with one of His promises, we can do so with the utmost confidence. We can share Abraham’s unstaggering trust. “With respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief, but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what He had promised, He was able also to perform” (Rom 4:20-21).

THE RANGE OF THE PROMISES

One of the astonishing features of the Bible is the wide range and variety of the promises it contains. Peter calls them “His precious and magnificent promises” (2 Pet 1:4). Some diligent but anonymous Bible student claimed that there are no fewer than thirty thousand such promises awaiting appropriation. Whether this claim is true or not, it is certain that the larger proportion of these verses relate to prayer.

It is worthy of note that all the universal terms of the English language — whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, all, any every — are repeatedly used in connection with prayer, as though to encourage one’s timid faith. In your reading, watch out for these inclusive and expansive words.

God’s promises thus cover the whole range of human need. There will be no conceivable circumstances of life for which there is not an appropriate promise waiting to be claimed. They are keys that will open every lock, for they cover the whole realm of human experience.

There are heights of sweet communion that are awaiting me,
There are ocean depths of mercy that are flowing full and free;
There are precious pearls of promise that can ne’er be priced in gold,
There’s a fullness of my Savior that has never been told. J. STUART HOLDEN

When reading Scripture, we should be alert to discover what God has promised to do, and then we should lay hold of His promise. “The man who desires to have power wit God and prevail, cannot make too sure of the pleas and promises which undergird his supplications.”²

We shall discover promises for adversity and prosperity; promise of peace, guidance, protection, strength, deliverance, joy, and a hundred other blessings. John Bunyan made the intriguing comment that the stepping stones of Scripture run through every Slough of Despond.

But there is a yawning gap between the vast range of God’s promises and our experience of their fulfillment simply because we have not bestirred ourselves to claim them. Are we claiming our inheritance? God assures us that we are “heirs according to the promise” (Gal 3:29, KJV).

Think of the blessings assured in some of the great prayer promises. (1) Anything is possible that is within the will of God. “All things are possible to him who believes” (Mark 9:23). (2) Adequate grace is available for every need. “My God shall supply all your needs” (Phil 4:19). (3) Immediate help is assured in time of need. “Before they call, I will answer; and while they are still speaking, I will hear (Is 65:24). (4) The limitless ability of God is at our disposal. He “is able to do exceeding abundantly beyond all that we ask or think” (Eph 3:20). (5) Tranquility flows from prayer. “In everything by prayer and supplication … and the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, shall guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Phil 4:6-7).

We are not authorized to claim in prayer things that God has not promised. This seeming restriction is greatly offset by the variety and comprehensiveness of the promises. We should therefore make sure that our petitions come within the scope of what has been offered. James and John, in asking the Lord to grant them places of honor on either side of Him, were asking for something for which they had no warrant, and their request was not granted (Mark 10:35-40).

In the practice of prayer, it is important to distinguish between promises and facts. They may often look alike, but a more careful reading will reveal an important difference. In spiritual experience, the distinction is much more than academic. Indeed, it can prove life-transforming.

We are to believe and accept as true every revealed fact of God’s Word.

We are to plead and claim the fulfillment of every promise of God’s Word.

If there is a clear statement of fact, faith accepts it without question. If there is a promise, faith fulfills any conditions that are attached and then pleads it in full confidence of its being fulfilled.

A fact calls forth our patience.

A promise calls for our claiming.

The function of faith is to turn God’s promises into facts. Let us consider two examples.

“Where two or more have gathered together in My name, there I am in their midst” (Matt 18:20, italics added). Is this a promise or a fact? It is usually treated as though it were the former. Actually, it is not a promise for us to claim, but a simple assertion of fact. Jesus said, “There I am,” not “There I will be if you claim My promise.” What point is there in pleading with Christ to be present when He says He is already there?

“God … has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ” (Eph 1:3, italics added). Promise or fact? Paul does not say that God will bless us if we lay hold of the promise, but He asserts that God has already blessed us, and we have simply to believe it and enjoy the reality of it in our experience.

Seeing the terrible aftermath of violence and suffering that followed Cambodia’s fall to the Khmer Rouge in 1975, a magazine writer asked: “How does one relate this tragedy with God’s promise that when He opens a door, no man is able to shut it? Has God failed?”

The answer is twofold: (1) The text quoted, “Behold, I put before you an open door which no one can shut” (Rev 3:8), is not a promise, but a statement of fact. There is therefore no question of God’s failing to keep His promise. (2) In the previous verse, the Lord had said that He is the One who “opens and no one will shut, and who shuts and no one opens” (italics added). Although no one can shut a door that God has opened (v 8), He reserves the sovereign right to shut a door Himself when His purpose has been fulfilled (v 7), and He did so in the case of Cambodia. The problem is solved when a statement of fact is differentiated from a promise.

But because He shut the door, does that mean that His purposes for Cambodia had failed? Despite the tragedy, within a few weeks of Cambodia’s fall this report was received:

Jimmy Rim, a Korean, reports that 600 Cambodians have turned to Christ in a refugee camp in Thailand. In northeast Thailand John Ellison has led over 100 refugees to Christ. Norman and Marie Ens saw 21 come to Christ recently in Bangkok. Merle Graven spoke in the Indiantown Gap Refugee Center, and 123 Cambodians responded to the invitation. At Camp Pendleton 118 persons have accepted Christ. Andrew Way of OMF is training 170 for baptism in South Thailand. Within a period of approximately three months, about 1000 Cambodian refugees have accepted Christ.³

The significance of all this will be seen when it is remembered that five years ago there were only six hundred Christians in Cambodia.

PROMISES MUST BE CLAIMED

The promises of God must be claimed in faith. It was “by faith that the patriarchs “obtained promises” (Heb 11:33). In many cases there is a condition attached to the promise. Our part is to fulfill the condition, claim the answer, and confidently wait for it. It is here that we often have to do battle with our adversary the devil. Faith is always tested, and he will do all in his power to dislodge us from the plane of faith. “Satan comes and takes away the word” (Mark 4:15).

John Bunyan graphically described his experience as he endeavored to claim the promises. “Satan would labor to pull the promise from me, telling me that Christ did not mean me in John 6:37. He pulled, and I pulled. But God be praised, I got the better of him.”

OUR ATTITUDE TO THE PROMISES

We can adopt one of three attitudes to God’s promises.

1. We can “come short” of them by devaluing them to the level of our past experience (Rom 3:23, KJV). It is possible for us so to tone them down that we come far short of what God is offering us.
2. We can “stagger” or “waver” in unbelief because the risk involved seems too great or because the promise seems too good to be true (Rom 4:20, see also KJV). But he who wavers misses the blessing.
3. We can be “fully assured,” and receive the promises. Abraham, the man of faith was “fully assured that what He had promised, He was able also to perform” (Rom 4:21).

The Lord has promised good to me,
His Word my hope secures;
He will my shield and portion be
As long as life endures. JOHN NEWTON

With God, promise and performance are inseparable. “For as many as may be the promises of God, in Him they are yes; wherefore also by Him is our Amen to the glory of God through us” (2 Cor 1:20).

When God makes a promise, that promise is His yes, and Jesus is the guarantee of its fulfillment. The yes is God’s. “Amen” is my response by faith — my expression of confidence that the promise will be fulfilled. I say amen in this sense when I cash a check signed by another person.

It is a poor compliment if we respond to God’s gracious yes with a flattering amen.

PRAYER

O Lord Jesus Christ, who hast said that Thou art the way, the truth and the life; suffer us not at any time to stray from Thee, who art the way; nor to distrust the promises, who art the truth; nor to rest in any other thing but Thee, who art the life; beyond which there is nothing to be desired, neither in heaven nor on earth; for Thy Name’s sake.

QUESTIONS

1. Go through one of the briefer epistles and distinguish the promises from the facts in it.
2. What is taught concerning the relationship of God to His promises in the following Scriptures: Psalm 105:42; Romans 4:21; Hebrews 10:23; 2 Peter 3:9.

Notes

¹E. M. Bounds, The Possibilities of Prayer (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1936), p 50
²H. S. Curr, “Prayer and the Promises” (New York: Revell, 1923), p 24
³Report received by the O.M.F.