Travail as unto birth

For whom and what do we travail?

The purpose or meaning of prayer is answer, not conformity.

Rees Howells heard something similar in his early years as he was learning what it meant to tarry before the throne of God as an intercessor, “The meaning of prayer is answer and of all that I give you, see that you lose nothing.”

Set aside the example of Mr. Howells for a moment, and still we will find there is far more Biblical evidence to support the former, yet so often we adopt the latter because we do not know the reality of answered prayers.

Why not? Why don’t we know more about answered prayers? It’s for these two reasons - One, because our prayers are general, not specific, and two, because we do not pray as we ought.

General prayer

General prayers feel like praying, and indeed we are talking to God, but if you were to be asked, “Has that prayer been answered?” For many of us, we would have to say, “I’m not sure.” When our prayers stay general, we grow reliant on a doctrine of “I know God answers prayers,” but we are unable to bear witness to the reality ourselves and on a regular basis.

Or worse than not knowing if an answer has come, our prayers are so general that we cannot even remember them once we are done and on our way for the day. “Can a woman forget her nursing child?”¹ And yet here we are, forgetting the prayers nearly as soon as they leave our lips.

Do our prayers and the manner of our praying bear witness to the fact that we cannot live without them being answered? Perhaps we would like an answer, but by our lack of persistence, we demonstrate that we are happy either way? With or without it - it makes very little difference to us. These are general prayers of fleeting thoughts, half-asked, lacking the travail of childbirth.

As we ought

Secondly, “as we ought,” what can this mean except to pray in a way in which God answers us. What is this manner then?

“Likewise the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.”²

Yes, the Spirit Himself intercedes, yet we cannot excuse away the description, “We do not know what we should pray for as we ought.”

An old hymn, written in 1889 by Thomas Benson Pollock, laments upon this idea:

We have not known thee as we ought, nor learned thy wisdom, grace and pow'r; the things of earth have filled our thought, and trifles of the passing hour. Lord, give us light thy truth to see, and make us wise in knowing thee.

Too often we pray blindly, repeating words upon words (upon words), but refusing to know what it is to groan, to labor, to come to the end of ourselves, to approach the Spirit in our weakness, to admit that we do not know how to pray as we ought and we that we desperately need the Spirit to intercede on our behalf.

Too often, we pray not as we ought, we pray wrongly.

We pray to be seen before men.

“And when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites. For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward.” Matthew 6:5

We pray for our own pleasures.

“You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.” James 4:3

We pray without purity.

“Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, ‘The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously?” James 4:4-5

These are prayers that God will not answer.

I feel we must touch on this phrase once more before we move on, “as we ought.” It implies another way. It is not conclusive, as if it were to say, “You will never know how to pray as you ought,” or, “don’t expect to ever get beyond your weakness in prayer.” Instead, we do not pray as we ought, or in other words, we do not know what to pray for as as we should.

Continuing on in the story of Rees Howells will help us in understanding this point, “Effectual praying must be guided praying, and that he [Rees] was no longer to pray for all kinds of things at his own whim or fancy, but only the prayers that the Holy Ghost gave him.”³

Do we pray in this manner? Do we pray as we ought? Do we travail as unto birth? What does it even mean to travail in prayer?

• Travailing looks like sorrow for a time, and then remembered no more. “A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.”⁴

• To travail is to feel the pains of birth again and again, over and over, until the answer has come. “My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you.”⁵

• Travail involves the deepest of pain and anguish, laboring until deliverance comes. “Be in pain, and labour to bring forth, O daughter of Zion, like a woman in travail: for now shalt thou go forth out of the city, and thou shalt dwell in the field, and thou shalt go even to Babylon; there shalt thou be delivered; there the Lord shall redeem thee from the hand of thine enemies.”⁶

For whom or what do we travail? For whom or what do we willingly pray in such a way as to, “feel the pains of child birth, to experience them, either literally or figuratively.”

Or do we still travail according to the flesh - what we will wear, what we will eat, will we have enough, will we be seen favorably before men? We all travail for something. Some in vanity, striving for the wind, some towards eternity, as children of the promise.

Another story from the Welsh Revival of 1904-1905 does well to stir us in this area of travail. At this point in the revival, the people were awakened, the Spirit of God was moving mightily in meetings, and the entire country was feeling the effect of being quickened. Yet, in one meeting, a small group of young men came in to mock the proceedings, and even issued a public declaration, “I am quite prepared to be convinced of the existence of God, if some tangible proof were given.”

“This challenge greatly agitated the meeting, and especially Mr. Evan Roberts, who cast himself on his knees and began to wrestle for these two with the most terrible anguish of soul that I can conceive of. It was as though he were a father in agony for the life of his only son. His outcries were heartrending to listen to, and a friend of mine started a chorus to drown them.

There was no effort at display, no unreality, no false emotionalism, but just travail of soul. Shame on us that so few have known it! That we have so callously considered the hardness of impenitent sinners! That our eyes have so seldom been fountains of tears!”⁷

No effort, no emotionalism, just travail of soul. Shame on us that so few have known it.

Will you allow yourself to be stirred by this story and by these examples? As you meditate upon these words this week, examining your own prayer life, I encourage you to listen also to this short 8-minute clip from Paul Washer.

He begins with a question, “How much do we tarry before the throne of God every day?” And then goes on to ask, “Do we even believe anymore that the Presence of God can come into a place and lay every person low? Do we know the power of the Holy Spirit? Do we know the Presence of God in such a way that it seems to literally disintegrate us and then put us back together again?”

Take the time to listen. (click this link to hear the 8-minute clip on Soundcloud or you can play it right here by pressing the play button)

O Lord, help us travail as unto birth. Help us to know what it is to tarry before Your throne day and night. Help us to pray as we ought.

In love,

Derek

1. Isaiah 49:15

2. Romans 8:26

3. Rees Howells, Intercessor. p.41

4. John 16:21 KJV

5. Galatians 4:19

6. Micah 4:10

7. Report of Reverend F.B. Meyer, “The Great Revival in Wales”