Some people pray
just to pray and some people pray to know God--Andrew Murray
There
is a mighty lot of difference between saying prayers and praying--John G. Lake
You may pray
for an hour and still not pray. You may meet God for a moment and then be in touch with
Him all day. --Fredrik Wisloff
I
have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had
absolutely no other place to go. --Lincoln
Always
respond to every impulse to pray. The impulse to pray may come when you are reading or
when you are battling with a text. I would make an absolute law of this--always obey
such an impulse.--Martyn Lloyd-Jones
One
can believe intellectually in the efficacy of prayer and never do any praying.--Catherine
Marshall
Is prayer
your steering wheel or your spare tire?--Corrie Ten Boom
leave it
to Spurgeon not to mince words:
There is a general kind of praying which fails for lack of precision. It is as if a
regiment of soldiers should all fire their guns anywhere. Possibly somebody would be
killed, but the majority of the enemy would be missed. --Charles Haddon Spurgeon
When a
Christian shuns fellowship with other Christians, the devil smiles. When he stops studying
the Bible, the devil laughs. When he stops praying, the devil shouts for joy. --Corrie Ten
Boom
this is a
personal favorite:
When I pray, coincidences happen, and when I don't pray, they don't. --William
Temple
Do you know
what prayer is? It is not begging God for this and that.
The first thing we have to do is to get you beggars to quit begging until a little faith
moves into your souls. --John Lake
Pray
often, for prayer is a shield to the soul, a sacrifice to God, and a scourge for
Satan.--John Bunyan
Of all the
duties enjoined by Christianity none is more essential and yet more neglected than prayer.
--Francois Fenelon
We
must alter our lives in order to alter our hearts, for it is impossible to live one way
and pray another.--William Law
The
Third Petition of the Lord's prayer is repeated daily by millions who have not the
slightest intention of letting anyone's will be done but their own.--Aldous Huxley (yes,
that Huxley of A Brave New World)
Those who
know God the best are the richest and most powerful in prayer. Little acquaintance with
God, and strangeness and coldness to Him, make prayer a rare and feeble thing.--E.M Bounds
(the man who wrote the book--or seven books on prayer)
How
often have we prayed something like, "Oh, Lord, be with cousin Billy now in a special
way"?
Have we stopped to consider what it is we're requesting?
Imagine that you are a parent who is preparing to leave your children with a babysitter.
Would you dream of saying,
" O Betsy, I ask you now that you would be with my children in a special way"?
No way. You would say,
"Betsy, the kids need to be in bed by 9PM. They can have one snack before their
baths, and please make sure they finish their homework. You can reach us at this number is
there is any problem. Any questions before we go?"
We are very specific with our requests made to our babysitters. We want them to know
specifics. It should be no different with prayer. –David Jeremiah
Pray,
and let God worry. --Martin Luther
If you can't
pray a door open, don't pry it open.--Lyell Rader
There
are more tears shed over answered prayers than over unanswered ones. --Teresa of Avila
There is
nothing that makes us love a man so much as praying for him. --William Law
Rich
is the person who has a praying friend. --Janice Hughes
Prayer is
not so much an act as it is an attitude--an attitude of dependency, dependency upon God.
--Arthur Pink
Prayer
does not fit us for greater work; prayer is the greater work. --Oswald Chambers
and this
from the man who, more than any other, stopped slavery in Great Britain:
I must secure more time for private devotions. I have been living far too public for me.
The shortening of devotions starves the soul; it grows lean and faint.
I have been keeping too late hours. --William Wilberforce
Men
may spurn our appeals, reject our message, oppose our arguments,
despise our persons, but they are helpless against our prayers.
--J. Sidlow Baxter
God never gives us discernment in order that
we may criticize, but that we may intercede.--Oswald Chambers
and finally,
this from the man who wrote "Let Go" several centuries ago:
Tell God all that is in your heart, as one unloads one's heart, its pleasures and
its pains, to a dear friend.
Tell God your troubles, that God may comfort you;
Tell God your joys, that God may sober them;
Tell God your longings, that God may purify them;
Tell God your dislikes, that God may help you conquer them;
Talk to God of your temptations, that God may shield you from them:
Show God the wounds of your heart, that God may heal them.
If you thus pour out all your weaknesses, needs, and troubles, there will be no lack
of what to say.
Talk out of the abundance of the heart, without consideration, say just what you think.
Blessed are they who attain to such familiar, unreserved intercourse with God. --Francois
Fenelon
