Latest / Reformed Thinking / Prayer | J. C. Ryle

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Prayer | J. C. Ryle · Reformed Thinking

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  You eat, you sleep, you go to work.
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  You know, every single day without fail.
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  Right, the daily grind. Yeah, you hydrate.
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  You maintain this massive list of daily habits just to keep
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  your physical body alive and well, your schedule running on
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  time. Oh for sure, it's a lot to
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  manage. It is, and if you are anything
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  like me, you probably roll over and check your smartphone
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  messages before your feet even hit the floor in the morning.
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  Guilty as charged. We are hyper connected.
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  We really are. We're constantly communicating,
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  but how often do you speak to the creator of the universe?
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  That is the big question. It is so welcome to reform
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  thinking. Today we are opening up a 19th
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  century text that makes a well a terrifyingly blunt claim.
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  It really doesn't pull any punches.
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  No it doesn't. It basically says that if you
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  are not speaking to God in private, your spiritual life is
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  already dead. Yeah, that is a heavy statement
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  process. OK, let's unpack this.
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  We are looking at JC Ryles classic work, Practical
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  Religion, and specifically we are focusing on his extensive
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  chapter on the subject of private devotion.
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  Right. And Ryle is a prominent
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  churchman. His writing, it hits like a
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  hammer. It really does he.
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  Views this private, unseen habit as the single most critical
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  subject in practical Christianity.
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  He puts it above everything else.
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  Right. He does.
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  He places it above reading the Bible, above hearing sermons,
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  above attending public worship. Wow.
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  Yeah, he asserts right out of the gate that a prayerless
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  person is on the road to ruin. What's fascinating here is how
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  he connects this straight back to the theology of election and
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  grace. Right, because for anyone
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  listening who knows Reformed theology, we know salvation is a
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  totally free gift. Absolutely.
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  And Ryle holds that grace as strongly as anyone.
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  He states clearly he would gladly offer a free and full
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  pardon to the greatest Sinner that ever lived.
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  But there's a catch. Well, he draws a hard line.
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  While salvation is an entirely unearned gift, that grace always
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  produces a voice. A voice?
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  Yeah, a change changed heart always results in a speaking
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  tone. OK, so before we get into the
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  actual mechanics of how to do this, we really need to
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  establish why he insists it is an absolute necessity for the
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  soul. Right, the baseline.
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  Yeah, he sets a baseline early on, he clarifies.
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  He is not talking about infants or, you know, those lacking
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  mental capacity. Sure, that makes sense.
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  And he isn't trying to settle the eternal state of those who
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  have never heard the gospel. He is targeting those who
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  actively call themselves Christians.
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  And to them, he says, no one can be saved without asking for it.
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  Faith without this private communication is a sheer
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  contradiction, Ryle says. It is like being alive without
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  breathing. That analogy of breathing is
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  brilliant. Why do you think it works so
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  well? Well, because breathing is not a
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  conscious chore for a living Organism, right?
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  It is the autonomic proof of life.
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  Oh, I see. It is the universal mark of all
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  God's children. Just as a baby's first sign of
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  life is crying out, a new believer's first act is crying
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  out to God. So there is no such thing as a
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  silent spiritual birth. Precisely if you have made alive
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  by the Spirit, you will breathe the air of heaven.
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  He also makes this highly practical point about how there
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  is no proxy in religion. Yeah, you cannot hire someone to
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  do your living for you. Right, he says.
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  No man can eat, drink, or sleep by proxy.
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  No man can get the alphabet learned for him by another.
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  If you want to know the alphabet, you have to sit down
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  and study the letters yourself. Yeah, if you want a healthy
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  body, you have to eat the food yourself.
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  You cannot pay a personal trainer to do the pushups for
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  you and expect to get the muscles that.
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  Would be nice, but no. And just like that, no one can
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  repent or reply to Christ for you.
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  That leads to his conclusion that the Lord has no dumb
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  children, and by dumb he means mute or voiceless.
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  Right, using the language of his day, yeah.
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  When the Holy Spirit makes someone a new creature, he works
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  in them the feeling of adoption. He gives them a tongue to cry.
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  ABBA Father. They see their immense need for
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  mercy, they feel their own emptiness, and they simply must
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  speak. They cannot do otherwise.
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  It is a fundamental shift in their nature.
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  But wait, I'm stuck here for a second.
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  Let's look at this from the listener's perspective, OK?
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  Lay it on me. If grace is a totally free gift,
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  an unearned act of divine favor, this feels contradictory.
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  Well. By saying I absolutely must do
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  this, aren't we just slipping a required human work through the
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  back door? I see what you mean.
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  It sounds like we are earning the grace by saying the right
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  words. I think of it like receiving a
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  massive unearned inheritance. OK, run with that.
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  The money is yours totally free, but you still have to make a
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  phone call to the bank to claim it.
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  Is Ryle saying the phone call earns the money?
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  No, the phone call does not generate the inheritance.
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  But think about the psychology of the situation.
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  Oh, OK. If you truly, fundamentally
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  believed that an infinite inheritance was sitting in a
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  bank account with your name on it, and all that was required
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  was a phone call to access it, you would inevitably make the
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  call. I would be on the phone right
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  now, right? If you never make the call, it
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  does not mean the bank took the money away, It means you never
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  actually believed the money was there in the first place.
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  Oh, that is a great distinction. Weil was saying the habit does
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  not earn the salvation, but the total absence of the habit
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  proves a total absence of superior life.
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  He points to a specific biblical example to illustrate this
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  doesn't. He does.
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  When God wanted to prove to Ananias that Saul of Tarsus, a
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  man who had been violently persecuting the early church,
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  had actually changed, God did not point to Saul's new
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  systematic theology, right. He did not point to Saul's
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  sudden desire to do good works or give to the poor.
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  The sole proof God offered was simply Behold, He prayeth.
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  Behold, he prayeth not behold he is reading scrolls, or behold,
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  he is attending synagogue. Yeah.
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  The definitive mark of Saul's conversion, the absolute proof
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  that the grace of God had invaded his life, was private
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  communication with God. And Ryle broadens this by
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  looking at global missionary reports from his era.
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  Yes, he notes that whether the reports come from Africa, New
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  Zealand or Hindustan, people of wildly different backgrounds,
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  cultures and languages all share 1 immediate trade upon.
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  Conversion. They speak to God.
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  Right. They might disagree on secondary
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  theological issues. They might use different
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  liturgies, or no liturgy at all. Their cultures might be
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  completely alien to one another, but the changed heart
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  universally responds by seeking out the Creator.
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  So if speaking to God is as natural as breathing for a
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  Christian, and if it is the universal mark of a changed
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  heart, we run into a massive glaring contradiction in the
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  modern church. A.
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  Huge one. Ryle moves to a very sobering
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  observation. Here he believes private, unseen
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  communion with God is the most neglected private duty in
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  existence. He observes an abundance of
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  public religion that completely masks a vast empty in private
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  devotion. You can have packed churches,
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  loud outward professions, busy religious schedules, endless
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  volunteer activities. But behind closed doors, a total
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  vacuum. Yeah, the outward machinery of
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  religion is humming along, but the inward engine is dead.
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  He notes that people treat private communion with God as a
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  matter of course or everybody's business, which is really just a
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  polite way of saying nobody actually does it when.
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  Something is universally assumed.
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  It is universally neglected. Spot on.
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  Thousands Eat, drink, sleep, walk on God's earth, breathe
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  God's air, and yet never speak a single word to the one holding
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  their actual physical life in His hands.
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  For those who do engage in something resembling the
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  practice, many rely on wrote thoughtless forms.
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  Right, Ryle points out. People muttering A childhood
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  rhyme like Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.
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  Bless the bed that I lie on. Or scrambling through a few
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  hasty sentences while washing their face in the morning.
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  Or drifting off to sleep at night.
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  Let's talk about the modern equivalent of that.
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  OK, imagine you had a direct hotline to a billionaire venture
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  capitalist who had promised to fully fund your startup and
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  solve every financial problem you would ever have.
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  That sounds like a dream setup. Right, but the only requirement
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  was that you check in daily to discuss the business.
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  You would not call that hotline while brushing your teeth,
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  mumble A prerecorded generic script and hang up.
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  No, you would prepare. You would speak with absolute
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  precision. If we leave a generic heartless
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  voicemail for our spouse every single day without ever having a
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  real conversation, the relationship Withers instantly.
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  It wouldn't survive a month. Why do we treat the creator of
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  the universe worse than a venture capitalist or a human
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  spouse? Ryle calls it mere lip work and
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  tongue work. Words said without the heart are
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  totally useless. When you look at why we avoid
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  this, there is a brutal psychological truth at play
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  here. Rile lists severe reasons for
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  this massive neglect. Right.
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  First, it is not natural to the carnal mind, and we have to
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  unpack what the carnal mind means in this context.
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  Go for it. It is the innate human instinct,
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  inherited from the Fall, to hide from absolute moral authority.
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  We want to hide. Yeah, the natural desire of the
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  human heart is to get far away from God.
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  We see this with Adam and Eve in the garden.
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  The moment they send, their instinct was not to run to the
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  father for help, it was to hide in the bushes.
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  Exactly. I mean, the natural feeling
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  toward him is fear, not love. So logically, why would a person
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  willingly seek out someone they fear and wish to avoid?
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  Our default setting is to prefer the illusion of autonomy.
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  We want to be the captains of our own destiny, even if the
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  ship is sinking. And acknowledging God in private
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  means acknowledging we are not in control, which is terrifying
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  to the human ego. Second, he notes, it is not
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  fashionable. Men would rather storm a
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  military breach, face cannons and musket fire then publicly
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  admit they spend time on their knees.
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  The pride of life makes us terrified of looking weak or
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  dependent. We praise self-reliance.
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  We praise the self-made man. Admitting you need daily,
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  constant help from an unseen God runs completely counter to the
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  cultural narrative of strength. 3rd it contradicts A sinful
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  lifestyle. Oh, this is a big one.
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  Ryle states bluntly that praying and sinning will never live
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  together in the same heart. One will inevitably consume the
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  other. You cannot continually plunge
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  into worldly pursuits, harbor hidden sins, nurse grudges, and
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  feed your own pride while simultaneously maintaining an
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  honest, transparent dialogue with a holy God.
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  The friction is simply too great.
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  The psychological dissonance will tear a person apart.
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  Either the hidden sin will choke out the desire to speak to God,
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  or the honest dialogue dialogue with God will burn away the
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  desire to sin. Because you cannot bring your
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  rebellion into the throne room of heaven and pretend everything
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  is fine. The sheer blazing light of that
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  communion exposes every dark corner of the heart.
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  So true. So if we spend our whole lives
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  hiding from God, what happens when we finally run out of time?
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  This is where Ryle brings up this terrifying psychological
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  reality about deathbeds. He says deathbeds are a great
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  revealers of secrets, Yes. The way a person approaches the
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  end of their physical life often reveals the true nature of their
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  private habits over the previous decades.
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  He shares a haunting anecdote about a dying lady, right?
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  He does. She was highly anxious and
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  desperately wanted a minister to visit and pray with her.
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  But when the minister arrived and asked her what specific
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  things she wanted him to ask God for her soul, she had no idea.
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  She was utterly unable to name a single thing.
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  She just wanted the form of a minister's prayers.
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  She wanted the outward religious comfort, like a superstitious
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  charm, to ward off the fear of the unknown.
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  She wanted the charm because she had no personal vocabulary for
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  the divine. Neglecting private communion
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  makes the Creator feel like a complete stranger at the end of
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  life. There is a terrible awkwardness,
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  A shyness, a rawness in their endeavors to approach him on a
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  deathbed. They act as if they need a
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  formal introduction to God because they have never actually
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  talked with him before. Arriving at the threshold of
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  eternity and realizing you were about to meet a complete
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  stranger is the ultimate tragedy.
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  We spend our entire lives preparing for retirement,
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  preparing our wills, preparing our estates.
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  But we completely neglect the relationship with the one we are
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  actually going to meet when the heart stops beating.
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  But Ryle does not leave us in that bleak landscape.
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  Thank goodness. Yeah, the conversation shifts to
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  the massive incentives God has provided.
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  God has removed every conceivable barrier to
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  approaching Him. We have no excuse for treating
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  him like a stranger. Ryle stresses that God has made
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  all things ready. The holiness and justice of God,
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  which rightly terrify the carnal mind, do not need to frighten
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  sinners away. Jesus.
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  'S atoning blood acts as an infallible passport.
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  Right, in Reformed theology we talk about double imputation.
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  Break that down for us. Christ takes our sin and we
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  receive His perfect righteousness because of that
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  exchange. A person only needs to plead
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  that blood and they will find God on a throne of grace, ready
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  and willing to hear. The legal barrier has been
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  completely obliterated. And it isn't just a passive open
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  door either. We have active help.
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  Jesus is the Advocate who mingles our weak, broken words
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  with His flawless, almighty intercession.
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  I. Absolutely love the analogy Ryle
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  uses here. He compares our words to a
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  banknote. A piece of paper with some
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  numbers scribbled on it is completely worthless on its own.
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  Right, if I write 1 $1,000,000 on napkin and hand it to a bank
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  teller I am getting laughed out of the building.
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  But if that exact same piece of paper is endorsed by a verified
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  signature at the bottom, suddenly it carries massive
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  weight. Our prayers are feeble,
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  stuttering, and often mixed with selfish motives.
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  But once endorsed by the hand of the Lord Jesus, they avail much
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  in the courts of heaven. He also provides a historical
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  illustration that brings this concept to life.
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  The Roman officer, right? Yes, he talks about a specific
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  officer in the ancient city of Rome whose doors were
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  permanently open to any Roman citizen needing help.
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  That officers entire job, his sole function in the government,
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  was to be accessible to the public.
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  And Ryle uses this as a parallel to Christ's accessibility.
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  The ear of the Lord Jesus is ever open.
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  It is his designated office as our High Priest to help those
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  who cry out for mercy. He is not bothered by our
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  requests, it is his actual role to receive them.
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  We also have the Holy Spirit. We do not even have to come up
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  with the right words on our own. Think about how intimidating it
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  is to draft an e-mail to someone highly influential.
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  You said they're deleting and rewriting sentences.
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  Worried about the tongue? Oh.
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  Constantly. Ryle notes that the Holy Spirit
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  provides the very thoughts and words we lack.
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  Acting is the spirit of grace and supplications dwelling
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  within the believer. The Spirit translates our
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  groanings. With all these massive
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  encouragement, the blood of Christ, the intercession of the
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  Son, the internal translation of the Spirit, the specific
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  promises of Scripture, Rile argues that diligence in this
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  practice becomes the single differentiating factor between
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  Christians. It separates stagnant believers
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  from those who achieve immense spiritual growth.
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  He draws a stark contrast between two types of Christians.
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  He calls the stagnant ones the Gibeonites.
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  For the listener who might not know the Old Testament
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  reference, the Gibeonites tricked Joshua into a peace
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  treaty by wearing worn out clothes, old clouded shoes, and
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  carrying dry, moldy bread. They pretended to be from a
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  distant land so the Israelites would not destroy them.
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  Ryle says some believers are just like that.
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  They get inside the fold, They're saved by grace, but they
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  remain spiritual babies their whole lives.
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  You see the same old besetting sins year after year.
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  They never seem to gain victory over their temper, their pride,
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  or their greed. Their spiritual bread is always
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  dry and moldy. Then he contrasts them with the
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  Gideon's. Gideon and his men were
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  described in the Book of Judges as faint, yet always pursuing.
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  These believers grow like grass after a heavy summer rain.
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  They are always adding grace to grace.
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  Their hearts seem larger, their spiritual stature taller, their
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  endurance stronger. And Ryle insists that the
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  difference between a moldy Gibeonite and a pursuing Gideon
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  in 19 cases out of 20 comes down to their private habits on their
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  knees. The mechanism of spiritual
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  growth is directly tied to the frequency and honesty of their
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  private communion. He backs us up with the
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  undeniable historical force of the practice.
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  He points to the reformers, the martyrs, men like Luther and
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  Moses and Daniel. He even quotes Mary, Queen of
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  Scots, who famously said she feared John Knox's prayers more
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  than an army of 10,000 men. Think about the gravity of that
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  statement. An army of 10,000 men is a
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  tangible, terrifying physical threat.
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  It means siege warfare, starving and slaughter.
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  But the Queen recognized a greater, unseen force at work in
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  the private devotion of one single man.
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  The courses Goddess history was altered not just by Nazis public
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  preaching, but by his private pleading.
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  That historical weight leads Rile to a very sobering
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  diagnosis of spiritual failure. If engaging with God creates
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  Gideons, what happens when believers let the habit slip?
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  Ryle argues that neglecting this private duty is the root cause
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  of almost all backsliding. And we need to define
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  backsliding carefully. It is a slow erosion of
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  spiritual strength. It is a miserable thing, the
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  worst state that can befall a person short of hell itself.
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  Ryle says. A stranded ship, a broken winged
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  eagle, a beautiful garden entirely overrun with weeds.
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  These are sad sights, but a backslider is sad or still.
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  We often look at massive public moral failures in the church, a
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  famous pastor falling into a scandal, or a strong Christian
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  suddenly walking away from the faith, and we think it happened
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  overnight. Beryl says public falls are
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  always preceded by private failures.
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  People fall in private long before they fall in the eyes of
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  the world. Bibles read without asking for
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  guidance, sermons heard without preparation of the heart.
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  Marriage is contracted and major life journeys undertaken without
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  seeking divine counsel. These are the hidden downward
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  steps. He mentions biblical examples of
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  this failure. He calls them lingering lots,
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  unstable Samson's wife, idolizing Solomon's inconsistent
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  assass, and pliable Jehoshaphats.
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  Let's break down the actual mechanism of this failure.
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  How does a private omission, just hitting snooze on your
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  alarm and forgetting to spend 10 minutes in devotion translate
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  into a public catastrophe like Samson losing his strength or
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  Solomon turning to literal idolatry?
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  It seems like a massive leap from skipping your morning
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  routine to denying your faith, right?
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  The mechanism is the subtle shift towards self-reliance.
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  When a believer stops casting their burdens on God, they
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  instinctively start carrying those burdens themselves.
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  Self-reliance breeds spiritual blindness.
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  You start trusting your own intellect, your own moral
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  compass, your own willpower. And when you are relying on your
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  own willpower, you are entirely fairly vulnerable to the
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  pressure of the world, the flesh, and the devil.
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  Your defense system is deactivated.
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  Ryle unpacks a terrifying historical example.
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  To illustrate the sequence, he brings up Origen, a highly
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  prominent early church father from the 3rd century.
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  Origen was a brilliant theologian, A prolific writer
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  and a staunch defender of the faith.
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  Yet during a period of intense Roman persecution, Origen
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  apostatized. He offered incense to a Pagan
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  idol to avoid a punishment worse than death.
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  Offering incense to an idol was the ultimate public denial of
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  Christ in the Roman era. It was the absolute capitulation
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  to the Empire. The heathen triumphed greatly at
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  his cowardice. They paraded his failure around
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  because if the Great Origin could be broken, anyone could be
• 19:30
  broken. But the heathen did not know the
• 19:32
  secret cause of his fall. They assumed it was the physical
• 19:35
  torture that broke him. Origen himself later confessed
• 19:38
  that his fall actually began that very morning.
• 19:40
  He had but hastily left his bedchamber without finishing his
• 19:43
  usual private devotions. The timeline is crucial here.
• 19:47
  The self-reliance started in the bedroom, the spiritual blindness
• 19:50
  set in by noon, and the collapse happened in the public square.
• 19:54
  The public catastrophe was just the visible fruit of a private,
• 19:58
  unseen neglect. The moment he walked out the
• 20:00
  door, relying on his own strength, he was already
• 20:03
  defeated. The idol worship was just the
• 20:05
  final symptom of the disease. Ryle describes the resulting
• 20:09
  backsliding conscience, a memory full of intense self reproach, a
• 20:14
  spirit broken with inward accusation as a taste of hell on
• 20:18
  earth. That is heavy, Noah.
• 20:20
  You deny the Lord not because the enemy was too strong, but
• 20:22
  because you neglected to put on your armor.
• 20:24
  But Ryle immediately pivots to the antidote.
• 20:27
  He says that bringing every trouble to God is the ultimate
• 20:30
  receipt for contentment in a world overflowing with sorrow,
• 20:33
  sickness and disappointment. He contrasts Origins devastating
• 20:37
  fall with the story of a persecuted Christian Negro in
• 20:39
  the West Indies. When this man was threatened and
• 20:42
  severely punished by his masters for practicing his faith, he did
• 20:45
  not rely on his own strength to resist.
• 20:48
  He did not form a complex theological defense or plot of
• 20:51
  physical rebellion. He.
• 20:53
  Simply responded to his tormentors.
• 20:55
  I must tell the Lord. That was his entire defense
• 20:57
  strategy. I must tell the Lord, he didn't
• 21:00
  say. I must debate you or I must
• 21:02
  fight you. He took the injustice directly
• 21:05
  to the Supreme Judge. Rile explains the casting
• 21:08
  burdens in this way prevents believers from trying to carry
• 21:11
  the gates of Gaza on their own shoulders.
• 21:13
  In the Old Testament, Sampson miraculously carried the
• 21:16
  massive, heavy city gates of Gaza up a hill that was a feat
• 21:21
  of supernatural physical strength.
• 21:23
  But believers constantly try to replicate that feat emotionally.
• 21:26
  They try to carry the massive weight of their own anxieties,
• 21:29
  financial stresses, family illnesses and career fears on
• 21:32
  their own shoulders. And it eventually crushes them.
• 21:35
  If they would only unbosom their sorrows to the friend who
• 21:37
  perfectly knows the heart of man, they would find peace even
• 21:41
  in a dark prison or on the brink of the grave.
• 21:44
  Having outlined the bleakness of neglect and the extreme danger
• 21:47
  of backsliding, we transition from Ryals theological
• 21:51
  observations to his intense direct appeals.
• 21:53
  He addresses different states of the human heart, starting with
• 21:56
  with the prayerless, and he systematically dismantles every
• 22:00
  single valid excuse we try to offer.
• 22:02
  He anticipates the objections perfectly.
• 22:05
  You say you lack learning. You feel you do not have the
• 22:07
  vocabulary to speak to the Creator.
• 22:10
  A baby does not need advanced book knowledge to cry for food.
• 22:14
  A beggar on the street does not wait to find fine poetic words
• 22:18
  before holding out his hand for alms.
• 22:20
  Distress has its own eloquence. You say you lack a private
• 22:24
  place. We hear this constantly today.
• 22:26
  I live in a small apt, I have roommates, my kids are always
• 22:29
  around. Ryle says any place can become a
• 22:32
  closet. Jonah found a private place in
• 22:34
  the belly of a whale. Isaac prayed walking in a field.
• 22:38
  Peter went up on a housetop. If the heart is seeking God, it
• 22:41
  will find a physical. Space.
• 22:43
  You say you lack time. This is the modern favorite.
• 22:45
  My schedule is too packed. I have meetings back-to-back.
• 22:47
  Daniel ran the complex political affairs of the massive
• 22:50
  Babylonian Empire, a superpower of the ancient world.
• 22:54
  Yet he managed to pause and retreat to his room 3 times a
• 22:57
  day. King David ruled a mighty
• 22:59
  warring nation, managed armies and court politics, and did the
• 23:03
  exact same thing. Time can always be found when
• 23:06
  the heart truly desires it. We find time to scroll on our
• 23:09
  phones for two hours a day. We can find time to speak to
• 23:12
  God. And the most theological excuse
• 23:15
  you say you do not have a new heart or true faith yet, so you
• 23:18
  must sit still an wait for God to sovereignly give them to you.
• 23:22
  Ryle calls that adding sin to sin.
• 23:25
  He says waiting to fix yourself before approaching Christ is
• 23:28
  like staying away from the doctor because you feel too
• 23:30
  sick. The worse your condition is, the
• 23:31
  more desperate need you have to apply to the great physician.
• 23:35
  This brings up a massive issue regarding the nature of seeking
• 23:38
  God. Ryle zeroes in on what he calls
• 23:40
  the dumb devil, the specific temptation from the enemy to
• 23:43
  remain silent because you feel completely unworthy.
• 23:46
  The enemy whispers. Look at what you did yesterday.
• 23:49
  You cannot talk to God today. You need to clean yourself up
• 23:52
  first. Waiting to be good enough to
• 23:54
  approach God is entirely unscriptural.
• 23:57
  Jesus stated explicitly He came to call sinners not the
• 24:01
  righteous. Ryle urges the seeker to take
• 24:03
  the initial step out of spiritual Egypt the very moment
• 24:06
  they speak to Christ from the heart, even if that
• 24:08
  communication is just a sigh or a groan of distress.
• 24:11
  He uses an architecture analogy that really clarifies the scale
• 24:14
  of this. Oh, the Temple of Solomon.
• 24:16
  Yeah, it was a massive, intricate structure covered in
• 24:20
  gold, a marvel of the ancient world, but it did not appear out
• 24:24
  of thin air. It started on a specific day
• 24:27
  when one huge rough stone was laid at the foot of Mount
• 24:30
  Moriah. Noah's Ark took 120 years to
• 24:33
  build, but that massive construction project started
• 24:36
  with one single axe blow on a piece of Gopher wood.
• 24:40
  Similarly, the building of the spirit in a person's heart
• 24:43
  starts with one honest, private plea.
• 24:46
  You just have to lay the first stone.
• 24:47
  For the listener who does practice this duty, who has laid
• 24:50
  that first stone and wants to build the temple, Ryle offers a
• 24:53
  master class on how to avoid the trap of stunted dwarfish clipped
• 24:58
  communication. He provides 12 specific marks of
• 25:01
  effective communion. We are going to break down the
• 25:03
  most striking of Riles brotherly councils to help us understand
• 25:06
  the mechanics of this habit. The first one he hits is praying
• 25:10
  spiritually. He warns against becoming a
• 25:12
  horse in a mill. A horse in a mill walks the same
• 25:15
  circular beaten path all day long, grinding grain, taking
• 25:19
  thousands of steps, but never actually going anywhere new.
• 25:23
  It is pure mechanical repetition.
• 25:25
  Ryle warns that we can insensibly get into the habit of
• 25:29
  using the fittest possible words, completely orthodox
• 25:32
  petitions stringing together correct theological phrases.
• 25:36
  But doing it all by rote, without any actual feeling in
• 25:39
  our souls. He talks about using a book of
• 25:41
  prayers. He says using a book is like
• 25:43
  using crutches. Crutches are great if you have a
• 25:46
  broken leg and are just recovering from an injury.
• 25:48
  It is far better to walk with crutches than not walk at all.
• 25:51
  You've need a book to help guide your thoughts when you were
• 25:53
  distracted. Use it.
• 25:55
  But if you see a man relying on crutches his entire adult life,
• 25:59
  you do not congratulate him. No, you want to see him grow
• 26:02
  strong enough to throw the crutches away and speak from his
• 26:05
  own heart, walking on his own 2 spiritual legs.
• 26:08
  Next, he highlights perseverance.
• 26:10
  He does not mean you have to be physically kneeling in a room 24
• 26:14
  hours a day. He advocates for sending up what
• 26:16
  the older writers called ejaculatory prayers.
• 26:19
  Now, Riley uses a word here that we really need to translate for
• 26:22
  a modern audience, because if you read the original 19th
• 26:25
  century text, you might do a double take.
• 26:27
  Right in his era, ejaculatory simply meant short, sudden dart,
• 26:32
  like winged bessengers sent up to God.
• 26:35
  It implies a quick, spontaneous burst of communication
• 26:38
  throughout the normal activities of the day.
• 26:40
  He uses the example of Nehemiah in the Old Testament.
• 26:43
  Nehemiah was the cupbearer to King Artaxerxes.
• 26:46
  The king asked him a direct high stakes question about why he
• 26:49
  looks so sad. In the split second between
• 26:51
  hearing the question and opening his mouth to answer, the king,
• 26:55
  Nehemiah silently shot a dart like petition up to heaven for
• 26:58
  wisdom. He didn't drop to his knees in
• 27:00
  the throne room. He maintained an ongoing,
• 27:02
  unbroken internal connection with God while navigating a
• 27:06
  complex real world conversation. Then there is earnestness.
• 27:10
  A cold, sleepy, lazy request achieves absolutely nothing.
• 27:14
  Ryle uses the story of Demosthenes, the famous Greek
• 27:17
  orator. A man came to Demosthenes
• 27:19
  wanting to hire him to plead his cause in a legal dispute, but
• 27:24
  the man told his story in a flat, monotone voice without any
• 27:28
  emotion or urgency. Demosanese listened and said I
• 27:31
  don't believe you were wrong. The man got furious, his face
• 27:34
  turned red and he yelled the details with true anxiety and
• 27:38
  passion. And Demosanese smiled and said,
• 27:41
  Ah, now I hear the voice of a man who was actually injured.
• 27:44
  I believe you now. It wasn't the volume that
• 27:47
  convinced the great orator, it was the obvious reality of the
• 27:50
  man's distress. The emotion matched the severity
• 27:53
  of the request. Ryle says God knows when we do
• 27:56
  not really want the things we are asking for.
• 27:58
  Our words might be correct, our theology might be flawless, but
• 28:02
  our hearts are lukewarm. If we ask God to help us
• 28:05
  overcome a sin, but we say it with 0 urban see, it proves we
• 28:08
  actually still love the sin. Another mark is faith and
• 28:11
  expectation, Weil says. We should operate like a
• 28:14
  merchant sending ships out to sea.
• 28:16
  A merchant does not load a ship with expensive cargo, wave
• 28:19
  goodbye as it leaves the harbor, and then completely forget about
• 28:22
  it. He calculates the journey.
• 28:24
  He watches the horizon for weeks.
• 28:26
  He looks for the return cargo because his livelihood depends
• 28:30
  on it. Yet many believers send up
• 28:32
  petitions and are almost shocked when God actually intervenes and
• 28:35
  answers them. We treat our requests like
• 28:38
  throwing coins into a wishing well, hoping for the best but
• 28:41
  expecting nothing. Ryle calls it a sure mark of
• 28:44
  trifling when men are careless about what they get back.
• 28:46
  If you are not looking for the answer, you didn't really care
• 28:49
  about the request. Then he talks about fullness.
• 28:52
  This is a brilliant Old Testament reference that
• 28:54
  illustrates our lack of ambition in spiritual matters.
• 28:57
  He warns against being like Joash, the king of Israel, who
• 29:00
  visited the prophet Elisha. The prophet told the king to
• 29:03
  take a bundle of arrows and strike the ground.
• 29:05
  The king lazily struck the ground three times and stopped.
• 29:09
  The prophet was furious and said the king should have struck 5 or
• 29:13
  6 times, then he would have completely consumed his Syrian
• 29:17
  enemies. Because he stopped at 3, his
• 29:19
  victory would be limited. The King's lack of zeal
• 29:22
  artificially limited his own victory.
• 29:24
  Rile applies this directly to our spiritual lives.
• 29:27
  Many Christians complain they do not grow in grace.
• 29:29
  They complain they are stuck. But the reality is, they have
• 29:33
  exactly as much grace as they ask for.
• 29:35
  Wait. Their requests are diminutive
• 29:37
  and narrow. They strike the ground three
• 29:39
  times when they should strike 6. They ask for enough grace to
• 29:43
  survive the day instead of asking for enough grace to
• 29:46
  conquer their deepest flaws and change their families.
• 29:49
  That ties directly into his point on particularity.
• 29:53
  You should not just offer vague generalities.
• 29:56
  Do not just say Lord I am a Sinner.
• 29:58
  Name the exact sins. Do not just say Lord I'm in
• 30:01
  trouble. Name the exact trouble.
• 30:03
  The medical analogy here is perfect.
• 30:05
  If you go to a specialist doctor, you don't just sit in
• 30:08
  the examination table and say, Doc, I'm sick.
• 30:10
  If you do that, the doctor cannot help you.
• 30:12
  You have to point to where it hurts.
• 30:14
  Describe the exact symptoms. You say my chest hurts when I
• 30:18
  breathe in and I have a fever of 1 and 2.
• 30:20
  You must do the exact same thing with the physician of the heart.
• 30:23
  You have to specify the disease. Lord, I was incredibly arrogant
• 30:27
  in that meeting today. Or, Lord, I am harboring bitter
• 30:30
  resentment against my brother. It demonstrates unreserved
• 30:33
  trust. Think about human relationships.
• 30:37
  A. Wife, who tells her husband she
• 30:38
  is unhappy but refuses to specify the cause, is hiding a
• 30:42
  secret. She is maintaining a wall of
• 30:44
  defense. Christ is the Bridegroom of the
• 30:46
  soul, and hiding secrets from Him creates relational distance.
• 30:50
  You cannot have intimacy without particularity.
• 30:52
  Then there is boldness. He is not advocating for a
• 30:56
  disrespectful familiarity, but a holy, reverent boldness.
• 31:00
  He points to mazes who boldly challenged God about his own
• 31:03
  reputation. When the Israelites rebelled and
• 31:06
  God threatened to destroy them, Moses stepped into the gap and
• 31:09
  pleaded. Wherefore should the Egyptians
• 31:11
  speak and say for mischief? Did he bring them out to slay
• 31:13
  them in the mountains? Moses appealed directly to God's
• 31:16
  own glory and name among the Pagan nations.
• 31:18
  He argued with God based on God's own character.
• 31:21
  Ryle also quotes a description of Robert Bruce, a 17th century
• 31:25
  Scottish divine. Bruce's words were described by
• 31:27
  his contemporaries as bolts shot up into heaven.
• 31:30
  There was a heavy reverence recognizing God as sovereign.
• 31:34
  He had an absolute confidence, as if he were speaking with a
• 31:37
  loving, attentive father who would promise to listen.
• 31:40
  We do not realize our own privileges because of the blood
• 31:44
  of Christ. We are allowed to shoot those
• 31:46
  bolts into heaven. We do not have to cower in the
• 31:48
  corner. And finally, the mark of a
• 31:51
  public spirit through intercession.
• 31:53
  We are selfish by nature. That is just human reality, and
• 31:57
  that selfishness easily sticks to us even after conversion.
• 32:01
  We tend to just think about our own spiritual conflicts, our own
• 32:04
  career progress, our own families.
• 32:06
  But Ryle insists we must broaden our scope.
• 32:08
  We should bear in our hearts the whole world, the church, the
• 32:12
  nation, our household, and even our enemies.
• 32:14
  Interceding for others is what oils the machinery of the gospel
• 32:18
  worldwide. Those who intercede on the
• 32:20
  mountain, like Moses holding up his hands, do as much for the
• 32:23
  cause as those who fight in the valley, like Joshua swinging the
• 32:26
  sword. It expands the heart and
• 32:28
  conforms us to the image of Christ, who as our High Priest,
• 32:31
  constantly bears the names of his people before the Father.
• 32:34
  The wheels of all machinery for extending the gospel, every
• 32:37
  missionary endeavor, every church plan, every conversation
• 32:40
  about faith, they are all oiled by unseen people pleading in
• 32:44
  private. You might feel totally useless
• 32:46
  in the grand scheme of things, stuck in a quiet life, but your
• 32:49
  private intercession is moving the actual Gears of history.
• 32:53
  It changes the entire perspective on what actual
• 32:56
  spiritual labor looks like. The real work is often hidden
• 32:59
  from public view. So as we wrap up this deep dive
• 33:02
  into Ryles practical religion, let's summarize where this text
• 33:06
  is taken. Private communication with God
• 33:08
  is the absolute core of all practical religion.
• 33:11
  It is the vital breath of the soul that proves spiritual life
• 33:13
  exists in the first place. It is the endorsed banknote of
• 33:16
  grace that brings heaven's massive resources to bear on our
• 33:20
  daily earthly struggles. It is the ultimate defense
• 33:22
  against the downward spiral of backsliding, the antidote to
• 33:26
  self-reliance, and the only true comfort against the crushing
• 33:29
  sorrows of this world. Without it, public religion is
• 33:32
  just a hollow shell, a theatrical performance.
• 33:35
  With it, a believer grows. It was like Gideon, faint yet
• 33:38
  always pursuing. Ryle leaves his readers with the
• 33:41
  concluding analogy that acts as a diagnostic tool for the soul.
• 33:45
  He calls private devotion the spiritual weather glass and the
• 33:49
  spiritual pulse. By checking a physical pulse, a
• 33:52
  doctor tests the immediate health of the heart.
• 33:54
  By looking at a weather glass, a sailor knows whether a deadly
• 33:58
  storm is approaching long before the clouds appear.
• 34:00
  A weather glass never lies about the atmospheric pressure.
• 34:03
  It gives you the objective truth, regardless of how sunny
• 34:06
  the sky looks at that exact moment.
• 34:08
  Precisely. The external appearance can be
• 34:10
  deceiving, but the internal pressure reveals the reality.
• 34:14
  So this leaves the listener with a final reflection to Mull over
• 34:18
  as they go about their day. If an outside observer, someone
• 34:21
  completely blind to your church attendance, your charitable
• 34:23
  giving, or your outward moral actions, could look solely at
• 34:27
  your private, unscripted moments with God over the last 48 hours.
• 34:31
  What specific reading would your weather glass show?
• 34:34
  Would it indicate A vibrant, growing, breathing life?
• 34:37
  Or would it reveal a soul in a dangerous silent drought,
• 34:40
  relying entirely on its own strength?
• 34:42
  That is a quiet, unavoidable question we all have to answer
• 34:45
  for ourselves. Thank you for joining us on this
• 34:47
  deep dive on reformed thinking and keep seeking truth.