We’re learning about private prayer from the writings of the puritan pastor Thomas Brooks. He begins his teaching with:
Matthew 6:6 (NKJV) — 6 But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.
“THESE words of our Saviour are plain, and to be taken literally, and not allegorically, for he speaketh of shutting the door of the chamber. In this chapter there is a manifest opposition between the Pharisees praying in the synagogues and corners of the streets, and others praying in secret.
In the text you have a positive precept for every Christian to pray alone: ‘But thou, when thou prayest.’ He saith not, when you pray, but thou, ‘when thou prayest, enter into thy closet,’ &c., as speaking not so much of a joint duty of many praying together, as of a duty which each person is to do alone. The command in the text senalds us as well to the closet as to the church; and he is a hypocrite in grain that chooses the one and neglects the other; for thereby he tells the world he cares for neither, he makes conscience of neither.”
That last line from Brooks has a sharp point on it, does it not? We love prayers in our church services and churchy circles, but where is the time spent alone with the Father? Jesus does bring out the two types of praying–with others and alone. Can we love one, practice one, partake of one and neglect the other and not be the hypocrite Jesus refers to in Matthew 6:5? I’ll leave that for you to contemplate.
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Brooks, T. (1866). The Complete Works of Thomas Brooks. (A. B. Grosart, Ed.) (Vol. 2, p. 162). Edinburgh; London; Dublin: James Nichol; James Nisbet and Co.; G. Herbert.
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