«　WEEK 3　DAY 1　»

　　Matt. 6:9-10 …Pray in this way: Our Father who is in the heavens, Your name be sanctified; Your kingdom come; Your will be done, as in heaven, so also on earth.

　　Jude 20 But you, beloved, building up yourselves upon your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit.

　　Eph. 6:18 By means of all prayer and petition, praying at every time in spirit and watching unto this in all perseverance and petition…

　　What is the meaning of prayer? Many people, upon hearing the term prayer, immediately think that it means man coming before God to make supplication. Because man is in want and needs material supply, or is sick and needs healing, or has other problems and needs some solution, he goes before God, asking Him to supply his needs, heal his sickness, and solve his problems. Men consider these as prayers… We dare not say that such a definition is wrong, but it is too superficial and lacks both depth and accuracy.

　　Prayer is not just man contacting God; it is the mutual contact between man and God. This matter of the contact between God and man is a very great subject in the Bible… The purpose of man’s living is to be God’s vessel. In the universe God is man’s content, and man is God’s container. Without man, God has no place to put Himself—He becomes a homeless God. I do not understand why this is so, but I know that it is a fact. In the universe God’s greatest need is man. God as an entity in Himself is complete, but as far as His operation in the universe is concerned, He still needs man to fulfill that operation. (CWWL, 1959, vol. 4, “Lessons on Prayer,” pp. 17-18)

　　God create[d] a spirit for man in the depths of his being… because God wants man to receive Him, who is Spirit. In the same way, He created a stomach for man because He wants man to take in food. Consider this: suppose God did not create a stomach for man—how could we take in food? Because we have a stomach, we can receive food into us, enjoy it, digest it, and assimilate it into our being, making it our constituent. In the same manner, since we have a spirit within us, we can receive God into us and assimilate Him, making Him our very constituent.

　　In the first two chapters of Genesis, when God created man to be His vessel, He made these two steps of preparation: one step was to create man to be like Him, and the other was to put a spirit within man so that man might receive Him. After He had made these two preparations, He placed Himself before man in the form of the tree of life in order that man might receive Him and obtain Him as life. Brothers and sisters, it is in man’s spirit that the contact between God and man is made. Once there is such a contact between God and man, God enters into man to be his content, and man becomes God’s vessel to express Him outwardly. Thus, God’s eternal intention is fulfilled in man.

　　Please remember, real prayer is the mutual contact between God and man. Prayer is not just man contacting God but also God contacting man. If in prayer man does not touch or contact God, and God does not touch or contact man, that prayer is below the proper standard. Every prayer that is up to the standard is one which is a mutual flow and contact between God and man. God and man are just like electric currents flowing into one another. It is hard to say that prayer is solely God in man or solely man in God. According to the fact and experience, prayer is the flowing between God and man. Every prayer that is truly up to the standard surely will have a condition of mutual flowing between God and man so that man may actually touch God and God may actually touch man; thus, man is united with God, and God with man. Therefore, the highest and most accurate meaning of prayer is that it is the mutual contact between God and man. (CWWL, 1959, vol. 4, “Lessons on Prayer,” pp. 19-20)

　　Further Reading: CWWL, 1959, vol. 4, “Lessons on Prayer,” ch. 1