The War Prayer

It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country
was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the
holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing,
the toy pistols popping, the bunched firecrackers hissing
and spluttering; on every hand and far down the receding and
fading spread of roofs and balconies a fluttering wilderness of
flags flashed in the sun; daily the young volunteers marched
down the wide avenue gay and fine in their new uniforms, the
proud fathers and mothers and sisters and sweethearts cheering
them with voices choked with happy emotion as they swung
by; nightly the packed mass meetings listened, panting, to
patriot oratory which stirred the deepest deeps of their hearts,
and which they interrupted at briefest intervals with cyclones
of applause, the tears running down their cheeks the while; in
the churches the pastors preached devotion to flag and country,
and invoked the God of Battles beseeching His aid in our good
cause in outpourings of fervid eloquence which moved every
listener. It was indeed a glad and gracious time, and the half
dozen rash spirits that ventured to disapprove of the war and
cast a doubt upon its righteousness straightway got such a stern
and angry warning that for their personal safety’s sake they
quickly shrank out of sight and offended no more in that way.

Sunday morning came – next day the battalions would
leave for the front; the church was filled; the volunteers were
there, their young faces alight with martial dreams – visions
of the stern advance, the gathering momentum, the rushing
charge, the flashing sabers, the flight of the foe, the tumult, the
enveloping smoke, the fierce pursuit, the surrender! Then home
from the war, bronzed heroes, welcomed, adored, submerged
in golden seas of glory! With the volunteers sat their dear ones,
proud, happy, and envied by the neighbors and friends who
had no sons and brothers to send forth to the field of honor,
there to win for the flag, or, failing, die the noblest of noble
deaths. The service proceeded; a war chapter from the Old Testament
was read; the first prayer was said; it was followed by an
organ burst that shook the building, and with one impulse the
house rose, with glowing eyes and beating hearts, and poured
out that tremendous invocation –

“God the all-terrible! Thou who ordainest! Thunder thy
clarion and lightning thy sword!”

Then came the “long” prayer. None could remember the like
of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language.
The burden of its supplication was, that an ever-merciful and
benignant Father of us all would watch over our noble young
soldiers, and aid, comfort, and encourage them in their patriotic
work; bless them, shield them in the day of battle and the hour
of peril, bear them in His mighty hand, make them strong and
confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help them to crush
the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country imperishable
honor and glory –

An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless
step up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister, his
long body clothed in a robe that reached to his feet, his head
bare, his white hair descending in a frothy cataract to his shoulders,
his seamy face unnaturally pale, pale even to ghastliness.
With all eyes following him and wondering, he made his silent way; without pausing, he ascended to the preacher’s side and
stood there waiting. With shut lids the preacher, unconscious
of his presence, continued with his moving prayer, and at last
finished it with the words, uttered in fervent appeal, “Bless our
arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God, Father and Protector
of our land and flag!”

The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside
– which the startled minister did – and took his place. During
some moments he surveyed the spellbound audience with
solemn eyes, in which burned an uncanny light; then in a deep
voice he said-

“I come from the Throne – bearing a message from Almighty
God!” The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger
perceived it he gave no attention. “He has heard the prayer of
His servant your shepherd, and will grant it if such shall be
your desire after I, His messenger, shall have explained to you
its import – that is to say, its full import. For it is like unto
many of the prayers of men, in that it asks for more than he
who utters it is aware of – except he pause and think.

“God’s servant and yours has prayed his prayer. Has he
paused and taken thought? Is it one prayer? No, it is two – one
uttered, the other not. Both have reached the ear of Him Who
heareth all supplications, the spoken and the unspoken. Ponder
this – keep it in mind. If you would beseech a blessing upon
yourself, beware! lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a
neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain
upon your crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly
praying for a curse upon some neighbor’s crop which may not
need rain and can be injured by it.

“You have heard your servant’s prayer – the uttered part of
it. I am commissioned of God to put into words the other part
of it – that part which the pastor – and also you in your hearts
– fervently prayed silently. And ignorantly and unthinkingly?
God grant that it was so! You heard these words: ‘Grant us the
victory, O Lord our God!’ That is sufficient. The whole of the
uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant words. Elaborations
were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory
you have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow
victory – must follow it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the
listening spirit of God fell also the unspoken part of the prayer.
He commandeth me to put it into words. Listen!

“O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts,
go forth to battle – be Thou near them! With them – in spirit
– we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides
to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers
to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling
fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us
to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their
wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble
homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of
their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn
them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended
the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and
thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds
of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee
for the refuge of the grave and denied it – for our sakes who
adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract
their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way
with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their
wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is
the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and
friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble
and contrite hearts. Amen.

(After a pause.) “Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak!
– The messenger of the Most High waits!”

It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because
there was no sense in what he said.