Jude 20.
It is by the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of Adoption, that all true Christian experience is regulated, and the whole tenor of it is determined. As sons we suffer, and as sons we rejoice. If we know our standing, we find it to be purely filial. Hence the Holy Ghost, who bears us witness of this blessed assurance, becomes the forming power of Christian character. For He is not only the original communicator of life to our souls, but also the active power of its sustainment and its exercise. It is for this reason that all these varied sentiments and emotions which distinguish the believer from the natural man, are attributed in Scripture to the Spirit as their effective cause.
As praise is the just expression of that peace and joy which the knowledge of the God of hope excites in our hearts (Rom. 15:13; Heb. 13:15), so the natural utterance of spiritual desire is prayer. The vague and sorrowful expression of inward conflict and distress is aided by the groaning sympathy of the Spirit of grace (Rom. 8:26). Whether, while reminding us of our personal necessities, or those of the suffering body of Christ at large, or while animating our hope and stirring within us more zealous desires for the glory of God, the Holy Ghost invariably leads the suppliant, whose heart He fills, to Jesus.
True prayer in the Spirit must embrace, as its final object, the fulfilment of the purposes of God. Its scope, therefore, will vary with the progress of the children in the way of God. By showing us the things of Christ, He makes us know the hope of our heavenly calling as a present truth, while He enables us to also anticipate the future manifestation of the glory of Jesus, in fulfilment of the sure word of prophecy. The world to come — the liberation of the groaning creation — such things being comprehended in the promises of God, are a part of the natural aliment of the believing soul. They form, therefore, subjects for prayer in the Spirit; for all that pertains to Jesus must be the desire of the heart, in which the Spirit of adoption dwells.
It is remarkable, that while the exhortation to continual prayer is addressed repeatedly in Scripture to the saints, it is in this passage only, that the full expression "Praying in the Holy Ghost" is found. If we observe the context in which it stands at the commencement of that striking valedictory exhortation with which Jude closes, his stern prophetic warning of the Christian apostasy, we can hardly fail to see that there is a highly characteristic force in this expression. The faith in which we are there exhorted to build ourselves up, is called emphatically "our most holy faith." The prayer by which we are to make known our requests to God, in the midst of the growing evil of the times, is to be "in the Holy Ghost." The distinctive truth of the Christian dispensation is the presence and power of the Holy Ghost in the church, as the divine Witness of the glory of the ascended Saviour. With the progress of spiritual corruption in that dispensation, there would naturally be a growing insensibility to the nature and value of this characteristic doctrine. At its close, the spirit of error will, with a fearful though most just retributive effect, possess itself completely of the minds of those who could not be persuaded to the love of saving truth. In willing ignorance of His first acts of judgment, they will deride the Spirit's Warnings as a weak and fabulous tradition. It is in the midst of the common prevalence of men's unbridled evil, that those who are beloved of God are so earnestly exhorted to prayer in the Holy Ghost.
But prayer in the Holy Ghost implies a full subjection both of heart and conscience to the word of God. And so, because that word is, to the believer, evermore the word of grace, not only needed warning, but also a more abundant fulness of consolation, will be received by those who, instead of living in pleasure upon the earth (James 5:5), are awaiting in sure hope and long tried patience the coming of the Son of God from heaven (Heb. 10:36-39). To be holding truth doctrinally, and even founding right expectations on such views, is not enough. If faith is not active, edification is impossible.
Prayer is not always an impulsive thing. It is more usually regarded in Scripture as a deliberate action of the spiritual understanding. Thus it is often found associated with ideas of labour, of perseverance, striving, etc. Like every other genuine spiritual exercise, it has its origin in the heart, in which the Spirit dwells. Faith in God is its producing cause. The known Will of God must, therefore be its regulating principle. While, therefore, it is shaped and coloured by the particular exigencies which call forth from time to time the sympathies of the believer, whether as a member of the one body of Christ, or as an isolated man of God in the midst of a mixed world, prayer in the Spirit must be a habit of the really spiritual man. In point of earnestness and fervour, its flow will be languid or abundant, as the Christian is himself accustomed to be much or little in conscious fellowship with God. A. (1854).