Prayer - By Norman Millar

This was a talk that Norman gave at the Paeroa Methodist Church

I believe it is as necessary to witness for God as it is to read the bible. I also believe prayer to be the most powerful force in our religion. It is necessary to look for the answer to our prayers not in any spectacular way, but in our own ordinary every day life. I will endeavour to give you a few of the reasons why I believe God answers prayer; how I received direct answers to my own prayers and also how God listens to prayer, prayed for others.

First of all prayer must be earnest, they must also be urgent. When you pray for anything you must also plead for it. It may not be answered in the form you expect, but be sure it will be answered in a better one. The most earnest prayers are those uttered when we are sad, very glad, or in immediate danger. I propose to deal with the prayers of the soldiers during the great war and also the benefits received from prayers offered continually for their safety all over the world.

We may form all sorts of ideas of what warfare is going to be like before we get there, but these ideas undergo some very rapid changes. When you hear the first boom of a gun, you feel a bit nervous, and pray silently. When you see your first shell burst, you get the wind up a bit and pray a bit harder. When you get into heavy shell fire you pray very earnestly and very very urgently, because you realise no one else can protect you. If you come safely through your first barrage you hardly cease to put your trust in God.

You seldom go into any dangerous zone without silently talking to God and asking his protection. Afterwards it becomes as natural as breathing and you begin to remember what you learned in Sunday School, of the wondrous love of Jesus. I will say that once I felt the nearness of God and his willingness to help me, I lost most of my fear of machine gun bullets and shells, although I could not get used to bombs from aeroplanes. Even now I shudder at the thought of the slaughter caused by bombs, amongst men and horses at Passchendaele. I saw 50 draught horses that had been killed by a single bomb.

When I was at Messines I had for a cobber one of the hardest cases you could meet within a days march. He was never sober if he could get a drink and could swear to beat the band. He was dirty and very lazy. He and I were paired off to work filling sand bags. I did the work he looked on. Seven of us were building a gun pit ready for the advance on Messines, when Fritz opened fire on us with small shells called 'Wizz Bangs'; all you hear is wizz! before you hear bang!! We were right on top of hill 63. Five of the party made off for a dug-out down the hill. Burt said to me, "Stop here, if we go down we will have to walk up again." The five were killed before they reached the dug-out, Burt and I were unharmed. I would like to say here that Burt and I were together for about six months and not once did I mention any of his bad habits, neither would I do any of the things I dislike him doing. One by one hill vices left. He gave up smoking because I did not smoke. He stopped drinking because he would not drink alone and he stopped swearing when he was with me, although I think he found that the hardest. Lastly he stopped a piece of shell in his ankle and came back to New Zealand.

Another occasion I was one of a party unloading armoured trains near Messines. It was a pretty hot shop and often our ration cart was blown up and we had little or no food. We had to work as hard as 26.5 hours on end and some times on two meals, both of biscuits. We carried boxes containing 4 shells weighing 112 lbs. into the bush ready for the advance. Our clothes were worn through across the shoulders and the skin got tough like the palms of the hands.

One particular morning about 9 AM I was going 'home' to bed, having been at it since 9 the previous morning, when a Corp Webb asked me to help some boys push a truck of smoke shells, to the top of hill 63 on the light railway. I told him I had been going all day yesterday and all night too. He said so have these boys. We went on arguing for a while and a shell came over and landed in my 'home', a hole 2 feet deep in the ground with a few sand bags around it. Needless to say I shook the Corp's hand and helped to push the truck up the hill. Had he not stopped me I most certainly would have been at home when the shell called.

On another occasion I was at Steenwerck. Near us was an observation balloon used to direct artillery fire. I had seen German airmen come over and burn balloons on this spot several times. This particular time I was cleaning harnesses and watching the men land with parachutes from the burning balloon. Something seemed to urge me away from my harness, I stepped a few paces away and a piece of shell from an Antiaircraft burnt itself exactly where I had been standing.

One evening another chap and myself were on guard at an ammunition dump. Fritz was sending over gas shells and fire shells. We were lying down in our shelter from shrapnel. Fengy said to me go out and see where the shells are dropping. I just got out when a shell came in and went into the ground where I had been lying. Although we both felt that we had been hammered all over with a cricket bat, neither of us was so much as scratched.

On one occasion when we were on trek, a German airman flew along over our heads shooting at us with his machine gun. There was no need to say, "let us pray", I expect most of us said a little prayer. We were on horse back so could not hide. Anyway we prayed to some purpose, for although the road was packed as far as the eye could see, I did not see anyone hit on that occasion.

Sometimes I used to volunteer for special duty. A road would be heavily shelled and a party were cut off from rations. I had been hungry too often not to want to help them get something to eat. The particular time I have in mind, was when our own gunners lost their rations. They called for a volunteer to try and get through on horse back. I said I would go and duly started. I came to a village and could see bricks and clouds of dust in all directions. I was stopped by a guard who said, "you can't get through there Digger." The guard turned out to be one of my brothers, thus I met him for the first time in France. He went out 7 months before me. We talked for a while and then I got on with my job. I had reached that stage when I knew that with God all things are possible and I felt certain that he would not let me down. As I went into the village I felt that God was with me. I passed through the village and not one shell fell. I got to the gunners with rations and coming back through the the village, the road was nearly blocked with buildings blown down whilst I was away, and again no shells fell near me on the return trip. I found myself saying the words 'fear not! for I the Lord am ever with thee.' It was almost as if someone had spoken them to me.

These are just a few of the experiences I myself went through and right through can be traced the protecting hand of God answering my own prayers and the prayers offered up for soldiers, from all over the world at that time. I doubt if you could get a soldier to own up that he prayed at that time, but if you could have seen some of those supposedly hard cases looking after a wounded comrade and the tender way they would handle them with encouraging words, you would agree with me when I say, that the war made as many christians out of hard cases as it spoiled weak christians who were not game to put their whole trust in God, but fell through trusting too much in their own strength. I do believe that the grounding you get at a Sunday School will stand to you under any circumstance, or in any temptation, because I was still in my teens when I enlisted, and still could recite the words, "Away in a Manger."