Spiritual Service and Spiritual Warfare

Spiritual Service and Spiritual Warfare

Spiritual service has its place, its time, and sphere. The closet with the closed door has its message and service. The temple and the tabernacle, the holy of holies, and the outer court, had a place of God’s appointment in the spiritual life of the Jewish nation.

The manner of spiritual service is beyond the grasp of reason until the coming of the light of regeneration, and of the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. There is blessedness proclaimed over the servant, who on the return of his master, is found giving to the servants their food in its season. The wise and faithful servant is entrusted with the care of God’s church, and he must realize that the time of the spiritual service is of Divine appointment. Towards the service, and all the demands of the sphere, there stands all the sufficiency of God, and all the fulness of grace.

Sphere of service not limited

God will not limit the sphere of any. Spiritually, no one need complain that his sphere is too narrow. But alas, too often the cause of the littleness and the cramped narrowness lies in the believer himself. It is fully possible that the simplicity of the service will be, on occasions, a death to the reputation of the prophet. The human nature craves a public exhibition of the things it looks upon as glorious, but spiritually it will not have this from God. One learns through discipline that one goes on in the spiritual life and work from simplicity to simplicity. One of the chief marks or characteristics of spiritual life is simplicity. Naaman was struck with the simplicity of the way of his cleansing. The messenger must go to the great city to preach a short sermon, a sermon composed by another. And when the sermon consists of seven words only (Jonah 3:4), there is need to be very spiritual to be content with the simplicity of spiritual service.

The simplicity of our sphere will deceive us, causing us to believe that we are out of the will of God, unless we understand. Never shall we be removed to a greater sphere, unless we have conquered all the trials and fulfilled all the duties that belong to our present one.

The Apostle Paul teaches that the members of the spiritual Body must serve not only on themselves, nor only on certain other members of the Body, but on the whole. When this is remembered, and acted upon and realized, it will keep out narrowness from the spirit and will open the sluice gates of our hearts for love to flow out toward all the saints, and will keep our spirit open for service to all.

In the spiritual life it is a law that the more Divine power a man receives, the wider becomes his sphere of service; therefore, the service should be equal to the power.

Since I have been fully given to prayer, it is marvellous how the world, the whole world, has become a sphere of vision to me. It was very sweet to me to discover new spheres in Vastness of sphere of service. The realm of prayer. But the moment I took into my sphere of prayer, the whole Church, the whole world, and all the powers of darkness, there came from my spirit with great joy the words “cageless” and free. Through this liberty I perceived that my spirit had been as an eagle in a cage, with sufficient room to move but none to fly. But now!

Oh, the joy that came to my spirit with the realization that it was cageless. Oh, how sweet it was to gather the whole world under the wings of my prayers. Oh, how sweet to serve the whole Church. Oh, how sweet the victories arising out of fighting against all the powers of darkness. Oh, the depth of the word “all.” Oh, the rest in realizing that nothing stood outside the sphere of my prayers! Because of the amount and the consistency of these I felt that they were like a broad, swift river, travelling with lightning rapidity, as it were, in their haste to reach the ocean. I felt that there was a vacuum somewhere. In the face of this I said, “I feel as if there were a great empty ocean bed, and all these rivers go to fill it up.” More than their haste was the attraction of the empty ocean bed. Nothing, as it were, to hinder their flow into it.

And yet, after praying so much, the need for prayer appeared to swallow up all this body of prayer. For a long season in my prayer life the need for prayer appeared as at the beginning. To conceive the possibilities of such a wide and comprehensive expression in prayer is nigh impossible apart from experience. All the world, and all the thousands of details to pray for and against; so much to be destroyed, so much to be constructed. Against the evil, praying the destructive prayer; and for the good, the constructive. In the former sphere one prays against the evil in man and demons, and in the latter for the protection of all good that comes from God.

There are spiritual and Divine weapons prepared for this war against sin in man, and against the evil spirits themselves. For example, it is possible to command an evil spirit to go out of man, but one can never command sin to leave him. Therefore, it is important to know all the Divine weapons prepared by God for the war against these evils.

Prayer is governed, amongst other things, by knowledge emanating from certain spiritual experiences, and in the light of this the believer is enabled to express his prayer burden quickly.

As the deeper mysteries of the essentials of prayer are unveiled, he will discover the work of praying not altogether sweet or easy, but, as he realizes the solemnity of being a watchman, he will not need an incentive to watchfulness, but will give himself absolutely and willingly to the claims of the Holy Spirit Who moves him to prayer.

Often the prayer warrior will be in the depths of wrestling, serving with groans that cannot be uttered, as he learns what it is to suffer in loneliness for the hastening on of the heavenly kingdom. He knows all this is for others, yet he desires and wills to obey the spiritual law to enable the rivers to flow out without a break.

It was never arranged for the soul of the regenerate to be a reservoir of the spiritual life; and the moment it becomes so, deterioration places its hand upon him.

Vastness of sphere of service to live for others

Not only must he be willing to lay down his life for the brethren, there is need also to understand the way of doing so will come in contact with countless spheres for prayer when living for others: The whole world, with its many divisions, the whole Church with all its difficulties, and all the powers of darkness with their hidden wiles. Out, and to others, and for the sake of others, the life must go out in prayer and work. Out in prayer for the saints, always praying with all supplication and perseverance in the Spirit, and paying attention, remembering that the house of God is a house of prayer for all nations, and going out in prayer for them, and for the sake of others wrestling against all the powers of darkness.

The believer learns quickly, after the Baptism of the Spirit, that it is an evil, and a great evil, to live to ourselves. The man that lives to himself will be as a grain of wheat that does not go to the earth—he will abide alone.

The way toward spirituality is steep in its gradient, rough to walk on, and very high in its peaks. But is it not possible to climb? We climb only by a full conformity to all the will of God, and according to his growth will understand spiritual things.