To be a vessel of prayer implies a good deal more than the practice of ordinary professors of religion in having a few daily seasons of prayer for their own salvation or their temporal needs. A vessel of prayer, in the true sense of it, is where a soul has come into full union with the Holy Spirit, so that God can call it to a mission of prayer, making such an one a partner with Christ in his life of intercession. There are many degrees of prayer, and each degree may be diversified in numberless ways.

The first stage of prayer, in many instances, is that of moral necessity, where the soul cries out in great distress for help and deliverance, such as, “God be merciful to me, a sinner,” or “Lord, save, I perish.” The next stage of prayer is a more thoughtful seeking of God to supply one’s needs, either in the spiritual life, or in temporal or physical blessings.

Then comes the widening of the spirit of prayer for larger interests, such as the family, or intimate friends, the neighborhood, or those concerns that touch our personal sympathies. Beyond this is a deeper state of prayer, where the soul thirsts for God and yearns for inward holiness, for the Spirit, for victorious communion with God. As a rule it is after all these stages of prayer have been more or less experienced that there comes a launching out into God, a life of universal, holy love, and the real ministry of prayer.

1. Among the principles involved in this condition of spiritual life is a definite inward call which the soul has to a life of prayer.

There comes upon such a soul a sweet, constraining conviction that God wants to use it in a special ministry of divine communion and intercession, and make it the channel of divinely inspired petitions. It is no longer the emergency prayer of necessity, nor the prayer of special self-interest, nor confined to things of local and proximate importance, but the soul is sweetly drawn out to lend itself unlimitedly for the uses of prayer that shall be selected and in-breathed by the Holy Spirit.

It has no particular choice of objects, or localities, or persons; but looking upon prayer as a vast spiritual kingdom, the soul abandons itself to the Holy Spirit, as a heavenly soldier, to be assigned to any department of prayer, or to any object of prayer, that God may choose for it.

God has so organized His creation that only a few things are accomplished except through the prayer of His creatures, and when the Holy Spirit has complete dominion over a soul He will assign to it burdens of prayer for persons, places, or things according to His wisdom.

Hence deeply spiritual people cannot pray ipse dixit, that is, from their own choice, or for any thing they please for, having surrendered their liberty to the Lord, they ask Him for their prayers as for their daily bread, but not in such a way as to contravene any true scriptural prayer for self or others. The Holy Spirit can pray only through His union with creatures, and as Jesus prays through His humanity, so the third person in the Godhead prays through His body, the true regenerated church of God. Still He does not pray through all the members of that body with equal power and efficiency, for as the blood does not flow through all the members of our body with the same volume and force, so in like manner those saints in closest union with heart and head of Christ have a larger, warmer, and more fruitful current of the spirit and prayer of Christ flowing through them. The call to a life of prayer in the sense here indicated seems to be very rare among Christians, and though all Christians must pray more or less, yet to be led by the Holy Spirit to give one’s self up to the ministry of prayer is one of the highest and choicest vocations to which God ever calls a soul.

There are multitudes who feel called to preach, or teach, or do mission work, and all such need to pray a good deal; but occasionally we find those who have given themselves to the ministry of prayer. This is one of the highest offices of service for it brings the worker into very blessed and deep union with Christ, and it is a service which allows of no field for external gifts, or showing off of talents, like singing, or preaching, or writing, and hence must be united with the hidden life of God; it is also a service of the highest fruitfulness, as being more spiritual than other forms of service.

2. One who is a vessel of prayer will be honored of the Lord by receiving many requests for prayer and intercession on behalf of others.

In times of revival, one of the premonitions that the Spirit is going to move on the people in power will be the number of requests for prayer that are made. Revival efforts without earnest requests for prayer accomplish but little. The same principle applies to individuals.

When you receive requests from many people, both near and remote, either by word or letter, requesting your prayers, it is a great honor God is putting on you which should be duly appreciated, and if you deliberately take the time in private prayer to spread such requests before Him, pleading the promises and merit of Jesus, you will be surprised to learn of the remarkable answers that will be granted, and also at the enlargement and sweetness that will come to your own heart. If you are unfaithful in this ministry of intercession the requests for prayer will decrease, and your inner life will grow arid and tiresome. So let us look for God’s providential calls to service in this direction, and let us appreciate every opportunity and privilege as a direct favor from our Lord.

3. To be a vessel of prayer, in the scriptural sense, admits the believer into a region of great spiritual light and intuitive understanding of divine things.

This is what Paul prays, that the saints in Ephesus might have the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Christ, and the eyes of their understandings enlightened, that they might know the hope of their calling, and the riches of Christ’s glory in His inheritance in the saints, and the exceeding greatness of His power, which involved partnership with Christ in His resurrection, His exaltation over all things, and His dominion in the coming age. There is a place in the spiritual life into which God has admitted people of humble and prevailing prayer in all generations, where the soul has the spirit of prophecy, and of remarkable insight into the divine personalities, the heavenly world, the movements of divine providence, especially in connection with the true church of God, the coming of Jesus and His kingdom. There have always been plenty of false prophets and deluded visionaries who make loud predictions which never come to pass; but in spite of all these things God has always had His humble and anointed ones, close enough to Him as to perceive and feel the oncoming of divine things. This region of heavenly revelation belongs especially to a life of prayer. The highest office a soul can fill is that of taking hold on God through the grace of Jesus for the things which He has promised to mankind. It is not the office of prayer to change God’s nature, or reverse His purpose, but to unite with His nature, and to meet the conditions of His purposes, and take hold upon His willingness to accomplish great and mighty things. Our fruitfulness in the kingdom of Heaven as what we persuade the Lord to do in harmony with His promises.

Elijah was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly, that is, with a divinely inspired prayer, that it might not rain; and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. And again he prayed, and the heaven gave rain and the earth brought forth her fruit Elijah’s closet of prayer is still open for candidates to enter in.