"You ask, and receive not, because you ask amiss." (James 4:3)
So wrote the apostle James in his letter to the church. Thus it is with a great many prayers that are offered today. "If we ask anything according to His will, He hears us." (1 John 5:14)
But the majority of prayers that are offered are not asked "according to His will," but according to the will of man. A notable instance of this is now before the public. The committee on religious congresses at the World's Fair have issued a request for universal prayer on behalf of these great religious conclaves, in which we find this paragraph: "It is suggested that on one day in September the religious teachers of the world call public attention to this first great effort of mankind to realize their common religious fraternity. And the request is earnestly preferred, and sent out to all those who believe in a divine order and the government of the world, and to work and wait for a kingdom of God on earth, that during the month of September in 1893, at some special time and places of public worship, devout supplication should be made that this historic meeting of the children of one Heavenly Father may be blessed to the glory of His name, to the advancement of spiritual enlightenment, to the promotion of peace and goodwill among the races and nations, and to the deepening and widening of the sense of universal human brotherhood."
Thus all sounds pretty good, but we can have no faith whatever in any prayer that is offered to God with the spirit and the understanding that the Christian religion can unite with pagan systems of worship and be placed on a level with them in a common religious fraternity, or in behalf of the enterprise which seeks to bring this about. Nothing of this kind can be according to the will of God; for the will of God is revealed in His word, which makes a difference as high as the heavens between the Christian religion and all other religions whatsoever.
We would suggest that this great congress be opened by reading these words from: "What fellowship has righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? or what part has he that believes with an infidel? And what agreement has the temple of God with idols?" (2 Corinthians 6:14-16)
Pending the answers to these questions, it will be in order to entertain a motion to adjourn sine die. [Sine die: without any future date being designated (as for resumption); indefinitely.]--Present Truth, September 14, 1893.