Note that the Spirit and prayer to God are not mutually exclusive. For:
Romans 8:26 . . . the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
Also:
1 Corinthians 14:14 . . . if I pray in an unknown tongue, my spirit prayeth, but my understanding is unfruitful.
15 ¶What is it then? I will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding also: I will sing with the spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also.
If a Christian has received an unknown tongue (1 Corinthians 14:2,4), it is okay for him to pray and sing to God both in his natural language, with mental understanding, and in an unknown tongue, by his spirit, without mental understanding (1 Corinthians 14:14-15). For it is okay for a Christian to build up both his spirit (1 Corinthians 14:4,14) and his mind (Romans 12:2), and not just one or the other. A Christian's spirit (1 Thessalonians 5:23) can know things which his mind doesn't consciously know (1 Corinthians 14:14), yet.
*******
Because it is both stricter and more merciful than the Old Covenant.
That is, Jesus Christ shows in the Sermon on the Mount how His New Covenant, Christian commandments are stricter than the letter of the commandments of the Old Covenant Mosaic law. For the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law forbade murder (Matthew 5:21, Exodus 20:13), while Jesus' New Covenant law forbids even calling people names (Matthew 5:22). And the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law forbade adultery (Matthew 5:27, Exodus 20:14), while Jesus' New Covenant law forbids even looking at another woman with lust (Matthew 5:28). And the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law permitted divorce and remarriage (Matthew 5:31, Deuteronomy 24:1-2), while Jesus' New Covenant law forbids it (Matthew 5:32, Mark 10:11-12, Luke 16:18), except for a single exemption granted only to husbands who discover that their newlywed wife is not a virgin, but had committed fornication (Matthew 19:9).
Jesus Christ also shows in the Sermon on the Mount that while His New Covenant, Christian law is stricter than the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law, at the same time it is also more merciful. For the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law required taking an eye for an eye (Matthew 5:38, Deuteronomy 19:21), while Jesus' New Covenant law requires turning the other cheek (Matthew 5:39). And the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law required hatred for one's enemies (Matthew 5:43, Deuteronomy 23:6), while Jesus' New Covenant law requires love for one's enemies (Matthew 5:44). And the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law, the ministration of death (2 Corinthians 3:7), required, for example, that adulterers be put to death (Leviticus 20:10), while Jesus showed mercy to the woman caught in adultery (John 8:4-11). And, for another example, the letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law required that anyone who does any work on the sabbath is to be put to death (Exodus 31:14, Numbers 15:32-36), while Jesus allowed His disciples to work on the sabbath, and said that they were guiltless (Matthew 12:1-8), just as Jesus Himself worked on the sabbath (John 5:17-18).
So in obeying Jesus Christ's New Covenant commandments (Matthew 5:19 to 7:29, John 14:15; 1 Corinthians 14:37), Christians, whether Jews or Gentiles, are both more merciful and loving, and also exceed in righteousness, those who mistakenly try to keep the abolished letter of the Old Covenant Mosaic law (Matthew 5:20-48, Ephesians 2:15-16, Colossians 2:14-17, Romans 7:6; 2 Corinthians 3:6-18, Hebrews 7:18-19).
*******
For people must forsake everything that they have if they are to be Jesus Christ's disciples (Luke 14:33).
When you hear Jesus say to you: "Come and follow Me" (Luke 18:22), you must walk away from everything but the clothes on your back (Luke 18:23, Luke 9:59-62, Matthew 19:29). He may have you walk only as far as the city limits and then turn around and go back home, so long as you were willing to keep going indefinitely. Or, He may ask you to keep going, until He has separated your soul from all attachment to the temporary things of this world (1 John 2:15-17; James 4:4; 2 Timothy 4:10, John 12:25-26).
Wrong. You cannot understand Scripture because you are not one of God's sheep. You haven't felt like them, been oppressed by the hard taskmaster called Egypt, and called out to God for help.
God made men and put them in different places and situations hoping they would seek him, grope for him. Some became God's sheep, most didn't. His sheep are the ones who were dissatisfied with man's situation, who searched for Him, hoping they would find Him. They knew that living in the world would cost them their soul, that which made human beings different from animals. From those as poor as Lazarus to those as rich as Warren Buffet, each found that being friends of the world would require them to ignore what their better nature told them was right. It was too high a price to pay, to slip into the ways of the world for fleeting returns.
"What does it profit a man to gain the world and lose his priceless soul? they cried. They admitted they were foreigners in this old man, and God was not ashamed to be called their God, and He built a new city, a holy city, a new man, a new humanity for them to rest in, at great cost. Available to those who are in the New Covenant . Because if Joshua had led Israel into rest, David would not have written there remained a rest
To those who cried out, He gave them to Christ. Christ is metonymy, synechdoche for revelation that God is able and willing to bring us into rest. Abraham received revelation, proof that God could and would bring him into rest, make him a blessing to the world, as promised. Joshua also. As did Christ. Israel disbelieved and did not enter rest.
But didn't Israel leave Egypt and promise to follow God, obey Him unconditionally? Israel was the tares. The wedding guest coming not to enjoy the feast (the greatest revelation of God's ability and willingness to make us blessings to the world, the death and resurrection of Christ) but to pick for crumbs like vultures, like Simon Magus, and Ananias and Sapphira.
Why did you not experience oppression? Because you have fed your fleshly nature, not your spiritual nature. Those who live according to the spirit will live, recognize Christ’s revelation. His sheep hear His voice. It resonates with them. Deep calls to deep. Only those the Father gives come to Him. The enemy sows tares and they are revealed when the voice of God calls. They do not respond. Like Israel.
Hebrews 4
1Therefore, let us fear if, while a promise remains of entering His rest, any one of you may seem to have come short of it.
2For indeed we have had good news preached to us, just as they also; but the word they heard did not profit them, because it was not united by faith in those who heard.
3For we who have believed enter that rest, just as He has said,
“AS I SWORE IN MY WRATH,
THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST,”
although His works were finished from the foundation of the world.
4For He has said somewhere concerning the seventh
day: “AND GOD RESTED ON THE SEVENTH DAY FROM ALLHIS WORKS”;
5and again in this
passage, “THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST.”
6Therefore, since it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly had good news preached to them failed to enter because of disobedience,
7He again fixes a certain day, “Today,” saying through David after so long a time just as has been said before,
“TODAY IF YOU HEAR HIS VOICE,
DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS.”
8For if Joshua had given them rest, He would not have spoken of another day after that.
9So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.
10For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His.
11Therefore let us be diligent to enter that rest, so that no one will fall, through
following the same example of disobedience.
12For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
13And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.
14Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession.
15For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as
we are, yet without sin.
16Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.