Notwithstanding our ultimate aloneness and individuality, evident in the final core of freedom and responsibility in each of us, we are all bound up in the "bundle of the living" (1 Samuel 25:29). And even at the most individual and most free and responsible pinnacle of our being, we are open to being helped and brothered by other souls.
Intercession is the most intensely social act of which the human being is capable. When carried on secretly, it is mercifully preserved from, in fact, almost immunized against, the possible corruptions to which all outer deeds of service for others are subject.
— Douglas V. Steere, Dimensions of Prayer