joyful privilege was to
be accorded to him: "Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father _in my name_ he
will give it you"[4] (1 John 16: 23). The words are equivalent to "_in
me_." The thought is not surely that of using the name of Jesus as a
password or as a talisman, but of entering into his person and
appropriating his will; so that when we pray, it shall be as though
Jesus himself stood in God's presence and made intercession. Nor is it
"as though"--it is the literal fact. We become identified with Christ
through the Spirit, now sent down, and his will is wrought within us by
the Holy Ghost, so that to ask what we desire of him is to ask what he
desires for us. We are inwilled by his will, because inspired by his
Spirit, who lives and breathes within us. Therefore we may know that
we are always heard, since we are in him who can boldly say to the
Father: "I know that thou always hearest me." It is Christ's
mediatorship with the Father, and the Holy Ghost's mediatorship with
us, that gives us this high privilege of praying in the name of Jesus,
as it is written: "For through him we both have access _in one Spirit_
unto the Father."

When therefore, under the fuller development of {148} doctrine as found
in the epistles, we read of "praying always with all prayer and
supplication _in the Spirit_" (Eph. 6: 18), and of "praying in the Holy
Ghost" (Jude 20), it is simply an admonition to use our privilege of
asking in the name of Jesus. For to be in the Spirit is to be in
Christ, united to his person, identified with his will, invested with
his righteousness, so that we are as he is before the Father.

In that fullest exposition of the doctrine of the Spirit, given in the
eighth of Romans, we see clearly that the ministry of the Comforter
consists in his effectuating in us that which Christ is accomplishing
for us on the throne. Especially is this true of prayer. In the
Epistle to the Hebrews we read: "Wherefore also he is able to save to
the uttermost them that draw near to God through him, _seeing he ever
liveth to make intercession for them_" (Heb. 7: 25, R. V.). In the
Epistle to the Romans we read: "And in like manner the Spirit also
helpeth our infirmity; for we know not how to pray as we ought, but
_the Spirit himself maketh intercession for us_ with groanings which
cannot be uttered; and he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the
mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints
accor