Thoughts for Life: #5 Personality in Prayer

Samuel Chadwick: It is not other people's prayers that make a man of prayer. All true prayer that prevails, is personal, intimate, and original.

Hannah protested that she had poured out her soul to God. That is prayer, and yet it is not the whole of prayer. Receptivity is as real a part of prayer as expression. (Google image, Hannah, praying)

Saul of Tarsus had been a praying man from his youth, but he never really prayed till he met the Risen Lord on the Damascus road. From the heavenward side the whole change that had been wrought was summed up in the words: "Behold, he prayeth."

The secret of Elijah's power in prayer was that he "prayed in
his prayer." That is the translation given in the margin of the Authorized Version. He "prayed earnestly" is given in the text, and "fervently" in the Revised version, with the note in the margin that says the Greek literally is "with prayer."

He prayed with prayer; he prayed in his prayer. That is to say, he really prayed his prayers. He did not say prayer; he prayed in praying.

His whole personality was in his supplication. He really wanted what he asked and fervently meant what he said. Can that kind of prayer be taught?

It is the prayer that prevails. Formal routine of temple service and the regular reading of words of secondhand inspiration and no understanding are neither acceptable to God nor profitable to man.
They are vain repetitions. There is much praying that avails nothing, so far as we can judge.

During the Baccarat Scandal, W. T. Stead computed the number and value of the prayers offered every day in the Anglican Church for the Prince of Wales, and the computation of value was not in proportion to their number.

He was probably wrong, for prayer is not accounted in terms of arithmetic. The real problem is not there. Prayers are measured neither by time nor by number, but by intensity.

There are prayers that are impassioned and there is no answer, and there are things for which we know we ought to pray in an agony of prayer and there is no power to pray. We do not know how to pray.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Used by the permission of

www.cliffcollege.ac.uk

(Emphasis by Jean)

THE PATH OF PRAYER

Let's pray-

Father, our using the written prayers of other people won't make us folks who prevail in our prayers with any personal, intimate and original intent.
Help us to pray prayers that ask fervently what our needs and desires are. Any secondhand inspiration with no understanding, is not acceptable to You, and proves unprofitable for anyone we pray for.
We have to admit that our impassioned prayers do not bring favorable results. We evidently do not know how to pray in agony with power in our praying.
Therefore, we ask for Your Spirit's help to become effective in our praying, so as to accomplish Your will.
In the name of Jesus we ask this. Amen.

Today's Bible verses-

1 Peter 3:12 (NKJV) "For the eyes of the LORD
are on the righteous, And his ears are open to
their prayers; But the face of the LORD is against
those who do evil."

Ps. 118:24, 29 (NKJV) "This is the day which the
LORD has made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.
(v. 29) Oh, give thanks to the LORD, for He is good!
For His mercy endures forever."

Ps. 118:5, 8 (NKJV) "I called on the LORD in distress;
The LORD answered me and set me in a broad place.
(v, 6) The LORD is on my side; I will not fear. What can
man do to me? (v. 8 ) It is better to trust in the LORD
than to put confidence in man."

Today's quote-

~ Charles H. Spurgeon- "Can two walk together, except they be agreed?" (Amos 3:3). "Are we agreed this day as to our utter helplessness in this work? I caught a good sentence the other day. Speaking with a Wesleyan minister, I said to him,

'Your denomination during the past year did not increase: you have usually had a large increase to your numbers. You were never so rich as now; your ministers were never so well educated; you never had such good chapels as now, and yet you never had so little success. What are you doing? - knowing this to be the fact, what are you doing? How are the minds of your brethren exercised with regard to this?'

He comforted me much by the reply, He said,

'It has driven us to our knees: we thank God that we know our state and are not content with it. We have had a day of humiliation, and I hope,' he said, 'some of us have gone low enough to be blessed.'

There was great truth in that last sentence, "low enough to be blessed." I do fear that some of us never do go low enough to be blessed. When a man says, 'Oh! yes, we are getting on very well, we do not want any revival that I know of.'

I fear he is not low enough to be blessed; and when you and I pray to God with pride in us, with self-exaltation, with a confidence in our own zeal, or even in the prevalence of our own prayers of themselves, we have not come low enough to be blessed.

A humble church will be a blessed church; a church that is willing to confess its own errors and failures, and to lie at the foot of Christ's Cross, is in a position to be favored of the Lord. I hope we are agreed, then, with God, as to our utter unworthiness and helplessness, so that we look to Him alone."

[Taken from Herald of His Coming newspaper, Vol 78, No 1 (925), p. 3. Used by permission.]

Today's popular post-

#19 You will Regret Prayerlessness

Wesley L. Duewel: The regret of prayerlessness begins in this life when we suddenly need to prevail in prayer and then realize how far we have drifted, how casual our relation to Him is, and how weak our prayerlessness has left us.

Marriage Monday

Mark: You’ve had one of those days, I’m sure. The days where you can’t seem to make your spouse happy. Everything you do is wrong. They’re impatient, easily frustrated, and just plain old fussy.

Jill: It’s easy to think that their mood has something to do with you. However, it’s entirely likely it has NOTHING to do with you.

Mark: A few weeks ago, we talked about recognizing when this is happening inside of ourselves and letting our spouse know “I’m just a little bit off today.” (By Jill and Mark Savage)

Upcoming posts-

#6 Prayer Learned by Praying
24th- Thursday's post by Samuel Chadwick

Holiness or Wholly-ness
26th- Saturday's post by Lee Forbes

#7 Trained in Prayer
29th- Tuesday's post by Samuel Chadwick

#8 Praying in Secret
31st- Thursday's post by Samuel Chadwick