Snippets from the Secret of Adoration
by Andrew Murray
#5 Silent Worship
Truly my soul waiteth upon God. . . . My soul wait thou only upon God, for my expectation is from Him (Ps 62:1, 5 KJ).
My soul is silent unto God. . . . My soul be thou silent unto God, for my expectation is from Him (Andrew Murray’s translation of the Dutch version of Psalm 62:1, 5).
When man in his littleness and God in His glory meet, we all understand that what God says has infinitely more worth that what man says. And yet our prayer so often consists in the utterance of our thoughts and of what we need, that we give God no time to speak to us.
Our prayers are often so indefinite and vague. The great lesson we need to learn is to be silent unto God. It is the secret of true adoration.
Let us remember this promise:
In quietness and confidence shall be your strength (Isaiah 30:15 KJV)
Then let us make the following promises to the Lord:
And I will wait upon the Lord . . . and I will look for Him (Isaiah 8:17 KJV).
I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait, and in His Word do I hope (Psalm 130: 5 KJV).
It is as the soul bows itself before Him to remember His greatness and His holiness, His power and His love, and seeks to give Him the honour and the reverence and the worship that are His due, that the heart will be opened to receive the Divine impression of the nearness of God and the working of His power.
O Christian, do believe that such worship of God—in which you bow low and ever lower in your nothingness, and lift up your thoughts to realize God’s presence, as He gives Himself to you in Christ Jesus—is the sure way to give Him the glory that is His due. It will lead to the highest blessedness to be found in prayer.
Do not imagine that it is time lost. Do not turn from it if at first it appears difficult or fruitless. Be assured that it brings you into the right relation to God.
- It opens the way to fellowship with Him.
- It leads to the blessed assurance that He is looking on you in tender love and working in you with a secret and Divine power.
And as at length you become more accustomed to it, it will give you the sense of His presence abiding with you all the day. It will make you strong to testify for God.
Someone has said:
No one is able to influence others for goodness and holiness beyond the amount that there is God in him.
Men will begin to feel that you have been with God.
The Lord is in His holy temple: let all the earth keep silent before Him (Habakkuk 2:20 KJV).
Be silent, O all flesh, before the Lord; for he is raised up out of His holy habitation (Zechariah 2:13).
Reference
Murray, Andrew, The Secret of Adoration. London: Marshall Morgan & Scott 1914.
