And Daniel alone saw the vision [of the postincarnate Christ]: for the men that were with me saw not the vision; but a great quaking fell upon them, so that they fled to hide themselves. (Daniel 10:7)

Although others were with him, “Daniel alone” saw the vision. It is evident from many recorded incidents that only the Holy Spirit can identify Christ for men, and that is what he did for Daniel. The Lord Jesus said,

He shall glorify me; for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew it unto you. (John 16:14)

The apostle Paul had a similar experience on the road to Damascus:

And the men which journeyed with him stood speechless, hearing a voice, but seeing no man. And Saul arose from the earth; and when his eyes were opened, he saw no man: but they led him by the hand, and brought him into Damascus. (Acts 9:7, 8)

Paul was blinded—he had seen the glorified Christ. Therefore I was left alone, and saw this great vision, and there remained no strength in me; for my comliness was turned in me into corruption, and I retained no strength. (Daniel 10:8)

Daniel was left alone. That is the marvelous, wonderful experience of the man of God, and many have shared eagerly and joyfully a like experience. Abraham left Ur, and finally his kindred, and he was alone with God.

Moses was sent to the backside of the desert of Midian, and at the burning bush he was alone with God.

Elijah was disciplined by the Brook Cherith, and God was with him.

Jeremiah walked a lonely path, but God was with him. John the Baptist was in the desert alone, but God was there.

Paul had two years of solitary confinement on that same desert—that was God’s opportunity to train him.

The apostle John was exiled on the lonely isle of Patmos. But God was with him.

There are so many people who want to get together to have a great prayer meeting or other great gatherings. Have you ever tried being alone? That is where God will meet with you. Take the Word of God and go off alone with Him.


HIS GRACE AND PEACE,
ROSE

Matthew 26

36 Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and He told His disciples, Sit down here while I go over yonder and pray.

37 And taking with Him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, He began to show grief and distress of mind and was deeply depressed.

38 Then He said to them, My soul is very sad and deeply grieved, so that I am almost dying of sorrow. Stay here and keep awake and keep watch with Me.

39 And going a little farther, He threw Himself upon the ground on His face and prayed saying, My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass away from Me; nevertheless, not what I will [not what I desire], but as You will and desire.

40 And He came to the disciples and found them sleeping, and He said to Peter, What! Are you so utterly unable to stay awake and keep watch with Me for one hour?

41 All of you must keep awake (give strict attention, be cautious and active) and watch and pray, that you may not come into temptation. The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.

42 Again a second time He went away and prayed, My Father, if this cannot pass by unless I drink it, Your will be done.

43 And again He came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were weighed down with sleep.

44 So, leaving them again, He went away and prayed for the third time, using the same words.

45 Then He returned to the disciples and said to them, Are you still sleeping and taking your rest? Behold, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of especially wicked sinners [whose way or nature it is to act in opposition to God].

46 Get up, let us be going! See, My betrayer is at hand!


Even Jesus, when He wanted and needed support from His friends and followers was let down at the time He needed them most! We should never be dismayed or surprised if we experience the same things in Life from friends and Family! The Spirit is willing, but truly the Flesh Is Weak!!! Sometimes the Lord allows it so we can Truly be Alone with Him!

This preface is taken from a book by Andrew Murray, called: Holiest Of All. This was written more than 100 years ago.



"When first I undertook the preparation of this exposition in Dutch for the Christian people among whom I labor, it was under a deep conviction that the Epistle [to the Hebrews] just contained the instruction they needed.

In reproducing it in English this impression has been confirmed, and it is as if nothing could be written more exactly suited to the state of the whole Church of Christ in the present day.

The great complaint of all who have the care of souls is the lack of whole-heartedness, of steadfastness, of perseverance and progress in the Christian life. Many, of whom one cannot but hope that they are True Christians, come to a stand-still, and do not advance beyond the rudiments of Christian life and practice. And many more do not even remain stationary, but turn back to a life of worldliness, of formality, of indifference.

And the question is continually being asked, What is the want in our religion that, in so many cases, it gives no Power to Stand, to Advance, to Press on unto Perfection? And what is the Teaching that is needed to give that health and vigor to the Christian life that, through all adverse circumstances, it may be able to hold fast the beginning firm to the end."

"The Teaching of the Epistle (HEBREWS) is the Divine answer to these questions. In every possible way it sets before us the Truth that it is only the Full and Perfect Knowledge of what Christ IS and DOES for us that can bring us to a Full and Perfect Christian life.

The Knowledge of Christ Jesus that we need for Conversion does not suffice for Growth, for Progress, for Sanctification, for Maturity.

Just as there are two dispensations, the Old Testament and the New, and the Saints of the Old, with all their Faith and Fear of God, could not obtain the More Perfect life of the New, so with the two stages in the Christian life of which the Epistle speaks.

Those who, through sloth, remain babes in Christ, and do not Press on to Maturity, are ever in danger of hardening their Heart, or coming short and falling away. Only those who Hold Fast the beginning Firm to the end, who give Diligence to enter the Rest, who press on unto Perfection, do in very deed inherit and enjoy the wonderful New Covenant Blessings Secured to us in Christ. And the great object of the Epistle is to show us that if we will but follow the Lord Fully, and yield ourselves Wholly to what God in Christ is ready to do, we shall find in the Gospel and in Christ everything that we need for a life of Joy and Strength and Final Victory."

"The cure the Epistle has for all our failures and feebleness, the one preservative from all danger and disease, is – the Knowledge of the Higher Truth concerning Jesus, the Knowledge of Him in His Heavenly Priesthood. In connection with this Truth, the writer has three great mysteries he seeks to unfold. The one is that the heavenly sanctuary has been opened to us, so that we may now come and take our place there, with Jesus in the very Presence of God.

The second, that the new and living way by which Jesus has entered, the way of Self-Sacrifice and Perfect Obedience to God, is the way in which we now may and must draw nigh.

The third, that Jesus, as our Heavenly High Priest, is the minister of the Heavenly Sanctuary, and dispenses to us its Blessings, the Spirit and the Power of the Heavenly life, in such a way that we can live in the world as those who are come to the Heavenly Jerusalem, and in whom the Spirit of Heaven is the Spirit of all their life and conduct; the Heavenly Priesthood of Jesus, Heaven opened to us day by day, our entering it by the new and living way, and Heaven entering us by the Holy Spirit.

Such is the Gospel to the Hebrews the Epistle brings, such is the life to which it reveals the Way and the Strength. The Knowledge of the Heavenly Character of Christ’s Person and Work is what alone can make Heavenly Christians, who, amid all the difficulties and temptations of life on earth, can live as those whom the Superior Power of the upper world has possessed, and in whom it can Always give the Victory."

"In offering these Meditations now to a wider circle of readers, I do so with the Prayer that it may please God to use them to Inspire some of His children with new confidence in their Blessed Lord, as they learn to know Him better and give themselves up to expect and experience All that He is able to do for them.

I have not been afraid to continually repeat the one thought; Our one need is to know Jesus better; the one cure for all our feebleness, to look to Him on the Throne of Heaven, and really claim the Heavenly Life He waits to impart."

Andrew Murray September 13, 1894

Alone with God by ANDREW MURRAY

`But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thine inner chamber, and having shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret, and thy Father which seeth in secret shall recompense thee'--Matt. vi. 6.

AFTER Jesus had called His first disciples, He gave them their first public teaching in the Sermon on the Mount. He there expounded to them the kingdom of God, its laws and its life. In that kingdom God is not only King, but Father, He not only gives all, but is Himself all. In the knowledge and fellowship of Him alone is its blessedness. Hence it came as a matter of course that the revelation of prayer and the prayer-life was a part of His teaching concerning the New Kingdom He came to set up. Moses gave neither command nor regulation with regard to prayer: even the prophets say little directly of the duty of prayer; it is Christ who teaches to pray.

And the first thing the Lord teaches His disciples is that they must have a secret place for prayer; every one must have some solitary spot where he can be alone with his God. Every teacher must have a schoolroom. We have learnt to know and accept Jesus as our only teacher in the school of prayer. He has already taught us at Samaria that worship is no longer confined to times and places; that worship, spiritual true worship, is a thing of the spirit and the life; the whole man must in his whole life be worship in spirit and truth. And yet He wants each one to choose for himself the fixed spot where He can daily meet him. That inner chamber, that solitary place, is Jesus' schoolroom. That spot may be anywhere; that spot may change from day to day if we have to change our abode; but that secret place there must be, with the quiet time in which the pupil places himself in the Master's presence, to be by Him prepared to worship the Father. There alone, but there most surely, Jesus comes to us to teach us to pray.

A teacher is always anxious that his schoolroom should be bright and attractive, filled with the light and air of heaven, a place where pupils long to come, and love to stay. In His first words on prayer in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus seeks to set the inner chamber before us in its most attractive light. If we listen carefully, we soon notice what the chief thing is He has to tell us of our tarrying there. Three times He uses the name of Father: `Pray to thy Father;' `Thy Father shall recompense thee;' `Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of.' The first thing in closet-prayer is: I must meet my Father. The light that shines in the closet must be: the light of the Father's countenance. The fresh air from heaven with which Jesus would have it filled, the atmosphere in which I am to breathe and pray, is: God's Father-love, God's infinite Fatherliness. Thus each thought or petition we breathe out will be simple, hearty, childlike trust in the Father. This is how the Master teaches us to pray: He brings us into the Father's living presence. What we pray there must avail. Let us listen carefully to hear what the Lord has to say to us.

First, `Pray to thy Father which is in secret.' God is a God who hides Himself to the carnal eye. As long as in our worship of God we are chiefly occupied with our own thoughts and exercises, we shall not meet Him who is a Spirit, the unseen One. But to the man who withdraws himself from all that is of the world and man, and prepares to wait upon God alone, the Father will reveal Himself. As he forsakes and gives up and shuts out the world, and the life of the world, and surrenders himself to be led of Christ into the secret of God's presence, the light of the Father's love will rise upon him. The secrecy of the inner chamber and the closed door, the entire separation from all around us, is an image of, and so a help to that inner spiritual sanctuary, the secret of God's tabernacle, within the veil, where our spirit truly comes into contact with the Invisible One. And so we are taught, at the very outset of our search after the secret of effectual prayer, to remember that it is in the inner chamber, where we are alone with the Father, that we shall learn to pray aright. The Father is in secret: in these words Jesus teaches us where He is waiting us, where He is always to be found. Christians often complain that private prayer is not what it should be. They feel weak and sinful, the heart is cold and dark; it is as if they have so little to pray, and in that little no faith or joy. They are discouraged and kept from prayer by the thought that they cannot come to the Father as they ought or as they wish. Child of God! listen to your Teacher. He tells you that when you go to private prayer your first thought must be: The Father is in secret, the Father waits me there. Just because your heart is cold and prayerless, get you into the presence of the loving Father. As a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth you. Do not be thinking of how little you have to bring God, but of how much He wants to give you. Just place yourself before, and look up into, His face; think of His love, His wonderful, tender, pitying love. Just tell Him how sinful and cold and dark all is: it is the Father's loving heart will give light and warmth to yours. O do what Jesus says: Just shut the door, and pray to thy Father which is in secret. Is it not wonderful? to be able to go alone with God, the infinite God. And then to look up and say: My Father!

`And thy Father, which seeth in secret, will recompense thee.' Here Jesus assures us that secret prayer cannot be fruitless: its blessing will show itself in our life. We have but in secret, alone with God, to entrust our life before men to Him; He will reward us openly; He will see to it that the answer to prayer be made manifest in His blessing upon us. Our Lord would thus teach us that as infinite Fatherliness and Faithfulness is that with which God meets us in secret, so on our part there should be the childlike simplicity of faith, the confidence that our prayer does bring down a blessing. `He that cometh to God must believe that He is a rewarder of them that seek Him.' Not on the strong or the fervent feeling with which I pray does the blessing of the closet depend, but upon the love and the power of the Father to whom I there entrust my needs. And therefore the Master has but one desire: Remember your Father is, and sees and hears in secret; go there and stay there, and go again from there in the confidence: He will recompense. Trust Him for it; depend upon Him: prayer to the Father cannot be vain; He will reward you openly.

Still further to confirm this faith in the Father-love of God, Christ speaks a third word: `Your Father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask Him.' At first sight it might appear as if this thought made prayer less needful: God knows far better than we what we need. But as we get a deeper insight into what prayer really is, this truth will help much to strengthen our faith. It will teach us that we do not need, as the heathen, with the multitude and urgency of our words, to compel an unwilling God to listen to us. It will lead to a holy thoughtfulness and silence in prayer as it suggests the question: Does my Father really know that I need this? It will, when once we have been led by the Spirit to the certainty that our request is indeed something that, according to the Word, we do need for God's glory, give us wonderful confidence to say, My Father knows I need it and must have it. And if there be any delay in the answer, it will teach us in quiet perseverance to hold on: FATHER! THOU KNOWEST I need it. O the blessed liberty and simplicity of a child that Christ our Teacher would fain cultivate in us, as we draw near to God: let us look up to the Father until His Spirit works it in us. Let us sometimes in our prayers, when we are in danger of being so occupied with our fervent, urgent petitions, as to forget that the Father knows and hears, let us hold still and just quietly say: My Father sees, my Father hears, my Father knows; it will help our faith to take the answer, and to say: We know that we have the petitions we have asked of Him.

1 Samuel 3 (Amplified Bible)

1 NOW THE boy Samuel ministered to The Lord before Eli. The Word of The Lord was Rare and Precious in those days; there was no frequent or widely spread Vision.

2 At that time Eli, whose eyesight had dimmed so that he could not see, was lying down in his own place.

3 The Lamp Of God had not yet gone out in the Temple of The Lord, where the Ark Of God was, and Samuel was lying down

4 When The Lord Called, Samuel! And he answered, Here I am.

5 He ran to Eli and said, Here I am, for you called me. Eli said, I did not call you; lie down again. So he went and lay down.

6 And The Lord Called again, Samuel! And Samuel arose and went to Eli and said, Here am I; you did call me. Eli answered, I did not call, my son; lie down again.

7 Now Samuel did not yet Know The Lord, and The Word Of The Lord was not yet Revealed to him.

8 And The Lord Called Samuel the third time. And he went to Eli and said, Here I am, for you did call me. Then Eli perceived that The Lord Was Calling the boy.

9 So Eli said to Samuel, Go, lie down. And if He Calls you, you shall say, Speak, Lord, For Your Servant Is Listening. So Samuel went and lay down in his place.

10 And The Lord Came And Stood And Called as at other times, Samuel! Samuel! Then Samuel answered, Speak, Lord, for Your Servant Is Listening.