Prayer#

Doug Hammerskjold
Your cravings as a human animal do not become a prayer just because it is God
whom you must ask to attend to them.
Prayer
Origen
The discussion of prayer is so great a task that it requires the Father to reveal it,
His Firstborn Word to teach it, and the Spirit to enable us to think and speak
rightly of so great a subject.
Prayer
Francois Fenelon
How can you expect God to speak in that gentle and inward voice which melts
the soul, when you are making so much noise with your rapid reflections? Be
silent, and God will speak again.
Prayer
William Law
They, therefore, who are hasty in their devotions and think a little will do, are
strangers both to the nature of devotion and the nature of man; they do not know
that they are to learn to pray, and that prayer is to be learnt as they learn other
things, by frequency, constancy, and perseverance.
Prayer
William Mason
There can be no room for despair; for prayer exports wants and imports
blessings: but our dear Lord knows there is in us all at times a backwardness to
prayer; this he would remove: it arises from fainting, this he would prevent;
therefore he opposes praying to fainting, for fainting prevents praying. Have you
not found it so? When weary and faint in your mind, when your spirits are
oppressed, your frame low and languid, you have thought this is not a time for
prayer: yea, but it is: pray always. Now sigh out the burden of your heart and the
sorrows of your spirit: now, though in broken accents, breathe your complaints
into your Fathers ear: now cry to him who loveth you and careth for you with the
love and care of the most tender and affectionate father. What makes us faint?
Do troubles and afflictions? Here is a reviving cordial: Call upon me in the day of
trouble, I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me. Psalm 50:15. Does a body
of sin and death? Here is a supporting promise: Whosoever shall call upon the
name of the Lord Jesus, shall be saved. Rom.10:13. Do we faint because we
have called and prayed again and again to the Lord against any besetting sin,
prevailing temptation, rebellious lust, or evil temper, and yet the Lord has not
given victory over it? Still, says the Lord, pray always: persevere; be importunate;
faint not; remember that blessed word, my time is not yet come: but your time is
always ready. John 8:6. Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation Matt.
26:41. Note the difference between being tempted and entering into temptation.

We are assured in due time, we shall reap, if we faint not Gal. 6:9. Do we find the
spirit willing, but the flesh weak? and because of our coldness, deadness, and
langour in prayer, do we faint? You cannot pray to please yourself: you think your
prayers are irksome to God; and therefore do you faint and are ready to give over
praying? Look at David; he begins to pray in a very heartless, hopeless way. How
long wilt thou forget me, O Lord, for ever, Sec. See how he concludes; he breaks
out in full vigour of soul; I will sing unto the Lord, because he hath dealt
bountifully with me. Psalm 13:6. Above all, look to Jesus, who ever lives to pray
for you: look for his Spirit to help your infirmities. Rom. 8:26.
Prayer
D.A. Carson
A prayerless person is a disaster waiting to happen.
Prayer
Thomas Watson
The angel fetched Peter out of prison, but it was prayer that fetched the angel.
Prayer
St. John Chrysostom
The devil then lies in wait [during prayer], deceiver that he is. For since he sees
very great gain accruing to us from prayer, then most he assails us, in order that
he may disable us from our defence; that he may send us off home
emptyhanded... The devil, when he has seen us coming to the judge, drives us
away to a distance, not by any staff, but through our own slackness. For he
knows, he knows clearly, that if they have come to him in a sober spirit, and have
told the sins committed, and have mourned with their soul fervent, they will
depart having received full forgiveness; for God loves mankind; and on this
account [the devil] is beforehand with them, and debars them from access, in
order that they may obtain no one of the things which they need, [doing so] with
no compulsion, but by deceiving us, and throwing us into security.
...
Prayer
Thomas De Witt Talmage
Not one of us yet knows how to pray. All we have done has only been pottering
and guessing and experimenting... God cares not for the length of our prayers, or
the number of our prayers, or the beauty of our prayers, or the place of our
prayers; but it is the faith in them that tells--believing that prayer soars higher
than the lark ever sang, plunges deeper than diving-bell ever sank, darts quicker
than lightning ever flashed. Though we have used only the back of this weapon
instead of the edge, what marvels have been wrought! If saved, we are all the
captives of some earnest prayer.
Prayer
A. J. Gossip

Well, to begin with, you can pray. Pray!, you say scornfully, pray! I knew it would
all fizzle out, and come to nothing. I could pray! Yes, you could pray, and,
whatever you may think about it -- using it as a poor makeshift of a thing much
lower than a second-best, not really a best at all, on which men fall back only
when they can do nothing effectively, and are too fidgety to be able to do nothing
at all -- Christ holds that prayer is a tremendous power which achieves what,
without it, was a sheer impossibility. And this amazing thing you can set into
operation. And the fact that you are not so using it, and simply don't believe in it
and its efficiency and efficacy as our fathers did, and that so many nowadays
agree with you, is certainly a major reason why the churches are so cold, and the
promises seem so tardy of fulfillment.
Prayer
Benjamin Jowett
One use of prayer is to maintain in us a higher standard and prevent our
principles insensibly sinking to our practice, or to the practice of the world around
us.
Prayer
Richard C. Trench
If we with earnest effort could succeed
To make our life one long, connected prayer,
As lives of some, perhaps, have been and are;
If, never leaving Thee, we have no need
Our wandering spirits back again to lead
Into Thy presence, but continued there
Like angels standing on the highest stair
Of the Sapphire Throne: this were to pray indeed!
...
Prayer
John Owen
No heart can conceive that treasury of mercies which lies in this one privilege, in
having liberty and ability to approach unto God at all times, according to His mind
and will.
Prayer
Martin Luther
As a shoemaker makes a shoe, and a tailor makes a coat, so ought a Christian
to pray. Prayer is the daily business of a Christian
Prayer
Frederick W. Robertson
The Divine Wisdom has given us prayer, not as a means whereby to obtain the
good things of earth, but as a means whereby we learn to do without them; not
as a means whereby we escape evil, but as a means whereby we become strong
to meet it.

Prayer
Thomas Merton
Prayer and love are learned in the hour when prayer becomes impossible and
your heart has turned to stone.
Prayer
William Law
He who has learned to pray has learned the greatest secret of a holy and happy
life.
Prayer
Francois Fenelon
Such is our dependence upon God that we are obliged not only to do everything
for His sake, but also to seek from Him the very power. This happy necessity of
having recourse to Him in all our wants, instead of being grievous to us, should
be our greatest consolation. What a happiness is it that we are allowed to speak
to Him with confidence; to open our hearts and hold familiar conversation with
him, by prayer! He Himself invites us to it. Quick Notes 3/06 Blogs 9/14
Prayer
How do you know if your faith is strong if you never ask it to do something
remarkable.
Prayer
CS Lewis
It is a poor thing to strike our colours to God when the ship is going down under
us; a poor thing to come to Him as a last resort, to offer up "our own" when it is
no longer worth keeping. If God were proud, He would hardly have us on such
terms.
Prayer
CS Lewis
Sometimes he felt that prayer was liking posting letters to a non-existent address.
Prayer
C. S. Lewis
Even if all the things that people prayed for happened, which they do not, this
would not prove what Christians mean by the efficacy of prayer. For prayer is
request. The essence of request, as distinct from compulsion, is that it may or
may not be granted. And if an infinitely wise Being listens to the requests of finite
and foolish creatures, of course He will sometimes grant and sometimes refuse
them. Invariable success in prayer would not prove the Christian doctrine at
all. It would prove something more like magic -- a power in certain human beings
to control, or compel, the course of nature.
...

Prayer
George Herbert
If I be bound to pray for all that be in distress, surely I am bound, so far as it is in
my power, to practice what I pray for.
Prayer
George Meredith
Who rises from prayer a better man, his prayer is answered.
Prayer
Evelyn Underhill
The purifying worth of prayer consists in the increasing contrast which it sets up
between the holy God and the creature; subordinating that creatures fugitive
activities and desires to the standard set by this solemn apprehension of Reality.
Prayer
Corrie ten Boom
Is prayer your steering wheel or your spare tire?
Prayer
Frederick Buechner
Something terrible happens, and you might say, "God help us!", or "Jesus Christ!"
-- the poor, crippled prayers that are hidden in the minor blasphemies of people
for whom in every sense God is dead, except that they still have to speak to him,
if only through clenched teeth.
Prayer
Hudson Taylor
Since the days of Pentecost, has the whole church ever put aside every other
work and waited upon Him for ten days, that the Spirit's power might be
manifested? We give too much attention to method and machinery and
resources, and too little to the source of power....
Prayer
Jaques Ellul
Prayer is not a means of laying hold of God; that prayer precisely is not made
possible by a system, but, rather, by a free decision of grace on the part of the
one who wills indeed to listen; that prayer precisely is not addressed to one who
dwells at a distance, but is addressed to one who comes very close (even into
our hearts!); that prayer precisely is a miracle and not a technical procedure. ...
Prayer
JC Ryle
But this I do say, that not praying is a clear proof that a person is not yet a true

Christian. They cannot really feel their sins. They cannot love God. They cannot
feel themselves a debtor to Christ. They cannot long after holiness. They cannot
desire heaven. They have yet to be born again. They have yet to be made a new
creature. They may boast confidently of election, grace, faith, hope and
knowledge, and deceive ignorant people. But you may rest assured it is all vain
talk if they do not pray.
Prayer
G. A. Studdert Kennedy
We have taught our people to use prayer too much as a means of comfort -- not
in the original and heroic sense of uplifting, inspiring, strengthening, but in the
more modern and baser sense of soothing sorrow, dulling pain, and drying tears
-- the comfort of the cushion, not the comfort of the Cross.
Prayer
Patrick Henry Reardon
To relinquish any of the Psalms on the excuse that its sentiments are too violent
for a Christian is a clear sign that a person has also given up the very battle that
a Christian is summoned to fight. The Psalms are prayers for those who are
engaged in an ongoing, spiritual conflict. No one else need bother even opening
the book. ... , Christ in the Psalms
Prayer
Frederick Buechner
According to Jesus, by far the most important thing about praying is to keep at
it... Be importunate, Jesus says -- not, one assumes, because you have to beat a
path to God's door before he'll open it, but because until you beat the path
maybe there's no way of getting to your door.
Prayer
J. C. Ryle
Bibles read without prayer; sermons heard without prayer; marriages contracted
without prayer; journeys undertaken without prayer; residences chosen without
prayer; friendships formed without prayer; the daily act of prayer itself hurried
over, or gone through without heart: these are the kind of downward steps by
which many a Christian descends to a condition of spiritual palsy, or reaches the
point where God allows them to have a tremendous fall.
Prayer
Nancy Mairs
Who one believes God to be is most accurately revealedin the way one speaks
to God when no one else is listening.
Prayer
Mother Teresa
Prayer is not asking. Prayer is putting oneself in the hands of God, at his

disposition, and listening to his voice in the depths of our hearts.

Prayer
Jame Draper
There's more gossip passed around under the guise of prayer request than
anything I know.
Prayer
Charles de FoucauldPrayer, as St. Theresa tells us, consists not in speaking a
lot, but in loving a lot.
Prayer
John Cassian
We pray best when we are no longer aware of praying.
Prayer
Hugh Connolly
As the floor is swept everyday, so is the soul cleansed everyday by confession.
Prayer
Eugene Peterson
Those people who pray know what most around them either don't know or
choose to ignore: centering life in the insatiable demands of the ego is the sure
path to doom.They know that life confined to the self is a prison, a joy-killing,
neurosis-producing, disease-fomenting prison.
Prayer
AW Tozer
I am reminded that one old saint was asked, "Which is the more important:
reading God's Word or praying?" To which he replied, "Which is more important
to a bird: the right wing or the left?"
Prayer
Bo Lozoff
Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach: "Full experiences of God can never be planned or
achieved. They are spontaneous moments of grace, almost accidental."
Bo Lozoff: "Rabbi, if God-realization is just accidental, why do we work so hard
doing all these spiritual practices?"
Rabbi Carlebach: "To be as accident-prone as possible."
Prayer
David Stendl-Rast
We must distinguish prayer from prayers. Saying prayers is one activity among
others. But prayer is an attitude of the heart that can transform every activity. We
cannot say prayers at all times, but we ought to "pray without ceasing" (1 Thess.
5:17). That means we ought to keep our heart open for the meaning of life.

Gratefulness does this, moment by moment. Gratefulness is, therefore,

prayerfulness.
Prayer
John Stott
Prayer is not a convenient device for imposing our will upon God, or for bending
his will to ours, but the prescribed way of subordinating our will to his. It is by
prayer that we seek God's will, embrace it and align ourselves with it. Every true
prayer is a variation on the theme, "Your will be done." Our Master taught us to
say this in the pattern prayer he gave us, and added the supreme example of it in
Gethsemane.
Prayer
Max Lucado
God is more moved by our hurt than by our eloquence.
Prayer
Do you have a prayer as needed relationship with God or a life of prayer
relationship with God?
Prayer
John White
Prayer involves learning to detach oneself from the unending stream of thoughts
on the surface (which is by no means easy) and finding ones way down to the
meeting place with God, to the real self-in-Christ.
Prayer
Pascal
Through prayer God bestows on creatures the dignity of causality.
Prayer
Tennyson
More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy
voice rise like a fountain for me night and day.
Prayer
Martyn Lloyd-Jones
Because prayer is the soul's greatest activity, it is at the same time the ultimate
test of a man's nature. There is nothing else that tells the truth about us so much
as our prayer life. Everything else we do is easier. And direct conversing with
God is the hardest thing we do. Perhaps it is this very thing about Christ which
convinced the disciples of Christ's heavenliness.
Prayer
Francois de Sales
He prays well who is so absorbed with God that he does not know he is praying.

Prayer
JC Ryle
We spend our spiritual strength and forget to renew it. We multiply engagements
and curtail prayer...We work when we ought to pray, because to an active mind
work is far easier than prayer...The servant whom the Holy Spirit is to use must
resist the tyranny of overwork. He must resolve to be alone with God even if the
hours spent with Him appear to rob his fellowmen of his service.
Prayer
John Bunyan
True prayer is a sincere, sensible, affectionate pouring out of the heart or soul to
God, through Christ, in the strength and assistance of the Holy Spirit, for such
things as God has promised, or according to the Word of God, for the good of the
church, with submission in faith to the will of God.
Prayer
George Mueller
It is not enough to begin to pray, nor to pray aright; nor is it enough to continue
for a time to pray; but we must patiently, believing, continue in prayer until we
obtain an answer.
Prayer
Bengel
A Christian should not leave off praying till his heavenly Father gives him leave,
by permitting him to obtain.
Prayer
Alexander Whyte
Prayer worth calling prayer, prayer that God will call true prayer and will treat as
true prayer, takes far more time by the clock than one man in a thousand thinks.
Prayer
EM Bounds
Prayer which is felt as a mighty force is the mediate or immediate product of
much time spent with God. Our short prayers owe their point and efficiency to
the long ones that have preceded them. The short, prevailing prayer cannot be
prayed by one who has not prevailed in a mightier struggle of long continuance.
Prayer
Samuel Chadwick
To pray as God would have us pray is the greatest achievement of earth. Such a
life costs. It takes time.
Prayer
EM Bounds

God does not bestow His gifts on the casual or hasty comers and goers. Much
time with God alone is the secret of knowing Him and of influence with Him.
Prayer
McConkey
To know the will of God we must will the will of God. Self-will is the surest and
densest vale which hangs between us and the knowledge of God's will...We will
be amazed...to discover how much of our prayer life is an effort to win God over
to assent to, and carry out, our own will rather than asking according to His will.
Prayer
Harry Jessop
The will of God is a sphere with distinctive boundaries within which souls
consciously dwell.
Prayer
Robert Louis Stevenson
Stevenson tells the story of a storm at sea. The passengers below were greatly
alarmed, as the waves dashed over the vessel. At last one of them, against
orders, crept to the deck, and came to the pilot, who was lashed to the wheel
which he was turning without flinching. The pilot caught sight of the terrorstricken man, and gave him a reassuring smile. Below went the passenger, and
comforted the others by saying, "I have the seen the face of the pilot, and he
smiled. All is well."
Prayer
Andrew Murray
The law is unchangeable: God offers himself, gives himself away, to the wholehearted who give themselves wholly to Him.
Prayer
Richard Watson
Prayer withlout fervency is no prayer; it is speaking, not praying. Lifeless prayer
is no more prayer than a picture of a man is a man.
Prayer
Ayer
Incense can neither smell nor ascend without fire; no more does prayer unless it
arises from spiritual warmth and fervency...Cold, lifeless, and idle prayers are like
birds without wings...mere lip prayers are lost prayers.
Prayer
Adoniram Judson
A travailing spirit, the throes of a great burdened desire, belongs to prayer. A
fervency strong enough to drive away sleep, which devotes and inflames
spirit,...belongs to wrestling, prevailing prayer. The Spirit, the power, the air, and

the food of prayer is in such a spirit.

Prayer
EM Bounds
Enflamed desires impassioned, unwearied insistence, delights heaven...Heaven
is too busy to listen to half-hearted prayers.
Prayer
Samuel Chadwick
There is passion in praying that prevails. Elijah was a man of passions...All there
was of him went into everything he did...Listen to his praying in the death
chamber. Watch him on Carmel. Hear him plead the honor of God and unto the
Lord for the affliction of the people. It is always the same: Abraham pleading for
Sodom, Jacob wrestling in the stillness of the night, Moses standing in the
breach, Hannah intoxicated with sorrow, David heartbroken with remorse and
grief-Jesus in a sweat of blood. Add to that the list from the records of the
church, personal observation and expereience, and always there is the cost of
passion until blood. It prevails. It turns ordinary mortals into men of power. It
brings power. It brings fire. It brings rain. It brings life. It brings God. There is
no power like that of prevailing prayer.
Prayer
Samuel Chadwick
Intensity is a law of prayer...wrestling prayer prevails...God hates strange fire.
We must never try to work up an emotion of intensity...If the spirit groans in
intercession, do not be afraid of the agony of prayer. There are blessings of the
kingdom that are only yielded to the violence of the vehement soul.
Prayer
EM Bounds
Prayers must be red hot. It is the fervent prayer that is effective...It takes fire to
make prayers go. Warmth of soul creates an atmosphere favorable to
prayer...By flame prayer ascends to heaven. Yet fire is not fuss, not heat,
noise...To be absorbed in God's will, to be so greatly in earnest about doing it that
our whole being takes fire, is the qualifying condition of the man who would
engage in effectual prayer.
Prayer
It was Bengel who suggested we do not have God's permission to quit praying
until He gives us some answer.
Prayer
AB Simpson
The secret of success in human affairs has often been audacity. There is...a holy
audacity in Christian life and faith which is not inconsistent with the profoundest
humility.

Prayer
Nothing is beyond the scope of prayer unless it is beyond the will of God.
Prayer
Martin Luther
Prayer is indeed a continuous violent action of the spirit as it is lifted up to God.
This action is comparable to that of a ship going against the stream.
Prayer
EM Bounds
Prayers are deathless. The lips that uttered them may be closed in death, the
heart that felt them may have ceased to beat, but the prayers live before God,
and God's heart is set on them and prayers outlive the lives of those who uttered
them; outlive a generation, outlive an age, outlive a world. That man is the most
immortal who has done the most and best praying.
Prayer
Philip Henry
Be sure you look to your secret duty; keep that up whatever you do. The soul
cannot prosper in the neglect of it. Apostasy generally begins at the closet door.
Be much in secret fellowship with God. It is secret trading that enriches the
Christian.
Prayer
Robert Hall
The prayer of faith is the only power in the universe to which the Great Jehovah
yields. Prayer is the sovereign remedy.
Prayer
Richard Cecil
A man may pray night and day and deceive himself, but no man can be assured
of his sincerity who does not pray. Prayer is faith passing into act. A union of the
will and intellect realising in an intellectual act. It is the whole man that prays.
Less than this is wishing or lip work, a sham or a mummery.
Prayer
Donald Demaray
The point of prayer is to get God. Answers are most meaningful when they are
thought of least. Prayer is most meaningful when God is thought of most.
Prayer
Ralph Herring
Only a sovereign God can inspire prayer, and only a sovereign God can answer
it. A man's concept of God, therefore, determines the depth of his prayer life.
Real prayer begins and ends with God enthroned.

Prayer
Robert Murray McCheyne
A great part of my time is spent in getting my heart in tune for prayer. It is the
divine link that connects earth with heaven.
Prayer
Martin Luther
Mark this! Make your amen strong, never doubting that God is surely listening to
you. This is what amen means: That I know with certainty that this prayer has
been heard by God.
Prayer
CH Spurgeon
A prayer without penitence is a prayer without acceptance. Of no tear has fallen
upon it, it is withered. There must be confession of sin before God, or our prayer
is faulty.
Prayer
AJ Gordon
We have authority to take from the enemy everything he is holding back. The
chief way of taking is by prayer, and by whatever action prayer leads us to. The
cry that should be ringing out today is the great cry, "Take, in Jesus' great Name!"
Prayer
AJ Gordon
We can do more than pray after we have prayed, but we cannot do more than
pray until we have prayed.
Prayer
E. Stanley Jones
Asking is the symbol of our desire. Some things God will not give until we want
then enough to ask.
Prayer
CH Spurgeon
The best prayers I have heard in our prayer meetings have been those which
have been fullest of argument.
Prayer
A Murray
Let your prayer be so definite that you can say as you leave the prayer closet, 'I
know what I have asked from the Father, and I expect an answer."
Prayer
HW Hodge

The commerce of the skies.

Prayer
Andrew Murray
The effective prayer of faith comes from a life given up to the will and the love of
God. Not as a result of what I try to be when praying, but because of what I am
when I'm not praying, is my prayer answered by God.
Prayer
Henri Nouwen
The first stage of solitary prayer is like the experience of a man who, after years
of living with open doors, suddenly decides to shut them. The visitors who used
to come and enter his home start pounding on his door, wondering why they are
not allowed to enter. Only when they realize they are not welcome do they
gradually stop coming. This is the experience of anyone who decides to enter
into solitude after a life without much spiritual discipline. At first, the many
distractions keep presenting themselves. Later, as they receive less and less
attention, they slowly withdraw.
Prayer
Our prayers keep a situation tied to God. Once we start praying, God starts to
work...Do not let God get pushed out of the situation by our faithlessness to
prayer.
Prayer
CH Spurgeon
It is interesting to remark how large a portion of Holy Scripture is occupied with
the subject of prayer, either in furnishing examples, enforcing precepts, or
pronouncing promises...What does this teach us, but the sacred importance and
necessity of prayer? We may be certain that whatever God has mad prominent
in his Word, He intended to be conspicuous in our lives. If He has said much
about prayer, it is because He knows we have much need of it. So deep are our
needs, that we must not cease to pray until we are in heaven. Do you want
nothing? Then I fear you do not know your poverty. Have you no mercy to ask of
God? Then, may the Lord's mercy show you your true misery! A prayerless soul
is a Christless soul. Prayer is the lisping of the believing infant, the shout of the
fighting believer, the requiem of the dying saint. It is the breath, the watchword,
the comfort, the strength, the honor of a Christian.
Prayer
Haddon Robinson
In 1952 a doctoral student at Princeton University asked Albert Einstein, "What is
there left in the world for original dissertation research?" Einstein replied, "Find
out about prayer. Somebody must find out about prayer."
Prayer

A. Bonar
Let us be as watchful after the victory as before the battle.
Prayer
Prayer is to religion what original research is to science.
Prayer
Helmut Thielicke
Great things, small things, spiritual things and material things, inward things and
outward things--there is nothing that is not included in this prayer.
Prayer
We usually ask an expert to give us the best she has to offer. When you're with a
successful banker, you ask, "Teach me to invest." From a gifted scholar we
request, "Teach us to do research." To a professional golfer we say, "Teach us to
putt." Jesus disciples asked Him, "Teach us to pray."
Prayer
Watchman Nee
God will answer all our questions in one way and one way only--namely, by
showing us more of his Son.
Prayer
Edward Farrell
The penalty of not praying is the loss of one's capacity to pray.
Prayer
D. Bonhoeffer
Intercession means no more than to bring our brother into the presence of God,
to see him under the cross of Jesus as a poor human being and sinner in need of
grace. Then everything in him that repels us falls away; we see him in all his
destitution and need. His need and his sin become so heavy and oppressive that
we feel them as our own, and we can do nothing else but pray...To make
intercession means to grant him the same right that we have received, namely, to
stand before Christ and share in his mercy.
Prayer
David Wells
Prayer is in essence rebellion--rebellion against the world in its falleness, the
absolute and undying refusal to accept as normal what is pervasively abnormal.
It is, in this its negative aspect, the refusal of every agenda, every scheme, every
interpretation that is at odds with the norm as originally established by God.
Prayer
Alexander Maclaren
God's way of giving to us is to breathe within us a desire, and then to answer the

desire inbreathed. So, longing is the prophecy of fulfillment when it is longing

according to the will of God.
Prayer
Leonard Ravenhill
Prayer must have priority. Prayer must be our bolt to lock up the night, our key to
open the day. Prayer is power. Prayer is wealth. Prayer is health to the soul.
Prayer
There is much we can do after we have prayer, but nothing we can do until we
have prayed.
Prayer
Haddon Robinson illustrates believing prayer by recalling applying for graduate
studies. He was applying for entrance and a scholarship, unsure of either. Some
weeks later he received a letter saying both had been granted. And the chairman
of the department said if he would reapply, this time requesting a fellowship he
would also receive that. So having the word of the one who had the power to
grant the request, he filled it out believing.
Prayer
The way out is always up!
Prayer
Frederick Faber
To be straightforward with God is neither an easy nor a common grace.
Prayer
Prayer does not change God's purpose, it releases it.
Prayer
Where prayer focuses God's power falls.
Prayer
Henry Beecher
It is not well for a man to pray cream and live skim milk.
Prayer
Margaret Widdemer
Luminal is what you take
For heartbreak
That is all,
Except sometimes Allorol
Or Veronal
Prayer was used, so we hear say,

In a sentimental day;
You arose from kneeling, sure
God and you'd somehow endure.
But such gestures are for us
One would say, ridiculous,
Out of date
For the young sophisticate...
"Take it with a little water,"
Says the specialist, "my daughter,
One at night and three at day.
It will wash your griefs away."
(Hymn for Grief)
Prayer
CH Spurgeon
Put the Jew wherever you may and he will always declare that the Promised
Land belongs to his nation. There is a pride about the Jew, wherever he may be;
he believes himself still to belong to that chosen family, whose were the
covenants and the oracles. That is true of the Christian: he may be never so
poor, never so despised, but knowing himself to belong to the chosen body, he
claims that all things are his own. You may clothe him in coarse cloth, and you
may feed him on bread and water, but he will still say, "All things are mine." You
may thrust him into a dungeon and let no light come to him except through 2 iron
bars, but he will still declare "mine are the valleys and the hills; mine by sacred
right; my Father made them all." There is a royalty in a Christian which
persecution cannot burn out, which shame cannot crush, which poverty cannot
root up; there it is, and there it must be forever; and conscious of his high rights
and distinctive privileges, the Christian, the believer, will never cease to cry unto
Christ, that he may yet have his rights, and possess what his God did give unto
him.
Prayer
D. Bonhoeffer
Intercessory prayer is the purifying bath into which the individual and the
fellowship must enter every day.
Prayer
Warren Wiersbe
When we find ourselves in some kind of difficult situation, most of us pray,
'Father, get me out of this!" If nothing happens immediately, then we pray,
"Father, when will I get out of this?" But what we ought to be praying is, "Father,
what should I get out of this?"
Prayer
CS Lewis

It is no use to ask God with facetious earnestness for A when our whole mind is
in reality filled with the desire for B. We must say before Him what is in us, not
what ought to be in us.
Prayer
John Dunlap
God's delays are not denials, as Abraham saw in his son.
Prayer
PT Forsyth
Lose the importunity of prayer, reduce it to siloquy, or even to colloquy, with God,
lose the real conflict of will and will, lose the habit of wrestling and the hope of
prevailing with God, make it mere walking with God in friendly talk; and precious
as it is, yet you tend to lose the reality of prayer at last. In principle you make it
mere conversation instead of the soul's great action. You lose the food of
character, the renewal of will. You may have beautiful prayers--but as ineffectual
as beauty so often is, and as fleeting.
Prayer
Raymond Brown
PT Forsyth used to insist that prayerlessness is the root of all sin. When we do
not give time each day to earnest and believing prayer, we are saying we can
cope with life without divine aid. It is human arrogance as its worse. Jesus knew
that He had to pray and did so, gladly, necessarily and effectively. To be
prayerless is to be guilty of the worse form of practical atheism. We are saying
that we believe in God but we can do without him. It makes us careless about
our former sins and heedless of our immediate needs...To neglect the place of
prayer is to rob ourselves of immense and timely resources. For the Christian
the throne of grace is the place of help.
Prayer
E. Herman
When we read the lives of the saints, we are struck by a certain large leisure
which went hand in hand with a remarkable effectiveness. They never hurried;
they did comparatively few things, and these not necessarily striking or important;
and they troubled very little about their influence. Yet they always seem to hit the
mark; every bit of their life told; their simplest actions had a distinction, an
exquisiteness which suggested the artist. The reason is not far to seek. Their
sainthood lay in their habit of referring the smallest actions to God. They lived in
God; they acted from a pure motive of love towards God. They were as free from
self-regard as from slavery to the good opinion of others. God saw and God
rewarded: what else needed they? They possessed God and possessed
themselves in God. Hence the inalienable dignity of the meek, quiet figures that
seem to produce such marvelous effects with such humble materials.
Prayer

EM Bounds
It was claimed for Augustus Caesar that he found Rome a city of wood, and left it
a city of marble. The pastor who succeeds in changing his people from a
prayerless to a prayerful people has done a greater work than did
Augustus...And, after all, this is the prime work of the preacher.
Prayer
Stephen Olford
There is a lesson to be learned from the daily supply of manna. In studying the
account of the manna, the students of Rabbi Simeon be Jachai asked him why
the Lord did not give enough manna to Israel for a year at a time. The Rabbi
answered with a parable: "Once there was a king who had a son to whom he
gave a yearly allowance, paying him the entire sum on a fixed day. It soon
happened that the day on which the allowance was due was the only day of the
year the father saw his son. So the king changed his plan and gave th son, day
by day, that which sufficed for the day. And now the son visited the father every
morning. Thus God did with Israel.
Prayer
Robert Law
Prayer is a mighty instrument, not for getting man's will done in Heaven, but for
getting God's will done on earth.
Prayer
Warren Wiersbe
No Christian rises higher than his praying
Prayer
Grade School(Lk.11:17)
just do it
High School(Lk.11:2-4)
pray in God's will
relationships
responsibilities
requests
College(Lk.11:5-12)
children coming to their father
Graduate School(Lk.11:13)
pray for the best blessing
Prayer
Garrison Keillor
Some luck lies in not getting what you thought you wanted but getting what you
have, which once you have it you may be smart enough to see is what you would
have wanted had you known.

Prayer
Stephen Olford
Entering a hotel, a thirsty commercial traveler noticed a drinking fountain with the
invitation: "Stoop and drink." When he reached it, he put out his hand to turn on
the water, but found not handle. Then he looked for a button to press, or a plug
to switch on, but found none. The invitation seemed to mock him. Seeing no
other way, he then stooped; as he did so, the cold, clear water flowed and he
was able to drink. The fountain was controlled by an electronic eye so arranged
that when a certain beam of light was interrupted, a switch was operated which
opened the faucet.
Prayer
EM Bounds
To pray is the greatest thing we can do, and to do it well, there must be
calmness, time, and deliberation.
Prayer
God listens to prayer, not advice
Prayer
Andrew Murray
The great lesson for every time of prayer is - to see to it, first of all, that you
commit yourself to the leading of the Holy Spirit, and with entire dependence on
Him, give Him the first place.
Prayer
McCheyne
Begin at the beginning. Be faithful in the inner chamber. Thank Him that you can
reckon on Him to meet you there. Although everything else appears cold, and
dark, and restrained, bow in silence before the living Lord Jesus, who so longs
after to you.
Prayer
Gurnall
Prayer, like Jonathan's bow, when duly qualified as to the person and act, never
returns empty. Never was faithful prayer lost at sea. No merchant trades with
such certainty as the praying saint. Some prayers indeed have a longer voyage
than others; but then they come with the richer lading at last into port. In trading,
he gets most by his commodity that can forbear his money longest. So does the
Christian that can with most patience stay for a return of his prayer. Such a soul
shall never be asamed of his waiting.
Prayer
CH Spurgeon
The habit of daily prayer must be maintained. It is well to have regular hours for
devotion, and to resort to the same place for prayer as far as possible; still, the

spirit of prayer is better even than the habit of prayer. It is better to be able to
pray at all times than to make it a rule to pray at certain times and seasons.
Prayer
CH Spurgeon
Spurgeon tells of an experience in his congregation. "When one of our dear
friends, who has lately gone to heaven, was very ill, one of his sons prayed with
him. He began in a very proper way, 'Almighty Father, Maker of heaven and
earth, our Creator"-but the sick man stopped him and said, 'My dear boy, I am a
poor sinner, and I want God's mercy; say 'Lord, save him.' He wanted his son to
get to the point."
Prayer
Henri Nouwen
We have fallen into the temptation of separating ministry from spirituality, service
from prayer. Our demon says: "We are too busy to pray; we have too many
needs to attend to, too many people to respond to, too many wounds to heal.
Prayer is a luxury, something to do during a free hour, a day away from work or
on a retreat..." But to think this way is harmful...Service and prayer can never be
separated; they are related to each other as the Yin and Yang of the Chinese
Circle.
Prayer
Henri Nouwen
As we are involved in unceasing thinking, so we are called to unceasing prayer.
Prayer
PT Forsyth
Not to want to pray is the sin behind sin.
Prayer
PT Forsyth
It is better to pray over the Bible than to brood over the self.