Many years ago, Matthew Henry, a well-known Bible scholar, was once robbed of his wallet. Knowing that it was his duty to give thanks in everything, he meditated on this incident and recorded in his diary the following:
Let me be thankful, first, because he never robbed me before; second, because although he took my purse, he did not take my life; third, because although he took all I possessed, it was not much; and fourth, because it was I who was robbed, not I who robbed.
Will you help me to be less quick to judge
……and less righteous in my indignation?
Will you help me to be more open to life
……and to other people?
Will you give me confidence enough to be less defensive
…..and less ready to react to rebuffs?
Give me steadiness and firmness
…..and true commitment to the life of faith. Amen.
–A Book of Uncommon Prayer
Kenneth G. Phifer
“Lord, teach us to pray.”
(Luke 11:1)
Love is kindled in a flame, and ardency is its life. Flame is the air which true Christian experience breathes. It feeds on fire; it can withstand anything, rather than a feeble flame; but when the surrounding atmosphere is frigid or lukewarm, it dies, chilled and starved to its vitals. True prayer must be aflame.
–E.M. Bounds, “The Necessity of Prayer”
“If men would pray as they ought to pray, the marvels of the past would be more than reproduced. The Gospel would advance with a facility and power it has never known. Doors would be thrown open to the Gospel, and the Word of God would have a conquering force rarely if every known before.”
–E. M. Bounds
I found Foster’s prayer refreshing. I’m making it my prayer today…perhaps it is yours as well…
Blessed Savior,
I pace back and forth at the altar of commitment. I really do want a fixed habit of prayer. At least, that is what I want right now. I’m not sure if that is what I will want two weeks from now. I do know that
without some kind of consistent communion with You I will not know holy obedience. So, as best I can, I promise to set aside time regularly for prayer, meditation and spiritual meditation. Strengthen me in this covenant. Help me to so delight in Your presence that I will want to come home to You often.
In Your Name and for Your sake I make this covenant.
Amen.
–Richard Foster, Prayer: Finding Your Heart’s True Home, p77 (Chapter Seven: “Covenant Prayer”)
“You do not have because you do not ask.”
(James 4:2)
Sometimes you will hear people stand up in a meeting, not so frequently perhaps in these days as in former days, and say, “I am trying to serve God in my poor, weak way.” Well, if you are trying to serve God in your poor, weak way, quit it! Your duty is to serve God in His strong, triumphant way. But you say, “I have no natural ability.” Then get some supernatural ability.
The religion of Jesus Christ is a supernatural religion from start to finish, an we should live our lives in supernatural power, the power of God through Jesus Christ; and we should perform our service with supernatural power, the power of God ministered by the Holy Spirit through Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit is promised to every believer in order that he may obtain the supernatural gifts which qualify him for the particular service to which God calls him (1 Corinthians 12:11). It is ours to have the power of God if we will only seek it by prayer in any and every line of service to which God calls us.
–R.A. Torrey (successor to D.L. Moody, Moody Memorial Church, Chicago)
Ask? You Have Not Because You Ask Not
“For our God is a consuming fire.”
(Hebrews 12:29)
There comes a time in the life of faith when Jesus must die. For many people, the Christ who dies is an amalgam of their fantasies and our culture’s fancies. In our time, that often means this: Jesus is the nicest person we can imagine. He is a kindergarten teacher of humanity that is as vulnerable as a group of five-year-olds. So, of course, He does not raise His voice. He affirms and re-affirms our fragile self-esteem…
…This Jesus puzzles us, of course. He seems so nice; we can’t imagine why He doesn’t answer all our prayers or why He allows evil to run free. Consequently, we have our doubts, like everyone else in this age, wondering how a congenial Lord can be, well, so inattentive. Maybe He’s not really in charge after all. Then suddenly our faith is bolsetered by an inspirational best-seller about the best life of the purpose-driven life or the border-expanding life, and we’re ready to be patient with Jesus a little longer—as long as He keeps us feeling good about ourselves and optimistic about the tomorrow…
…Our culture would have us put our faith in a Jesus who is a mere bed of carnations. Interesting. Pretty. He adds color and fragrance to life and little more…The vision of the true Jesus compels reverence, silence and, yes, fear.
…We should be afraid…But we are nonetheless drawn near to the very thing that can hasten our death if we are not careful. We are sane to be afraid. And we would be fools not to draw closer.
–Mark Galli
Jesus, Mean and Wild: The Unexpected Love of an Untamable God, pp175-9
“Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man…”
(Luke 5:8)
Humility also requires that we recognize the childish pride hidden in our breasts when we demand God’s presence…When after the miracle of the catch of fish, Peter recognizes who Jesus is, he says, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man” (see Luke 5:1-11). When the centurion needs Jesus to heal his servant, he entreats Him not to come into his home because he is unworthy…For such people, to be in the presence of God was not a right but a privilege…
…We indeed have a relationship with God but that relationship cannot deepen—we cannot know God’s presence—if we treat Him as an equal or, even worse, as a servant of our every spiritual whim who must be available to us on demand.
The relationship may be mutual, but it needs to be grounded in the reality of who is relating to whom. When we get that wrong, no wonder we experience God’s absence, for we are no longer seeking after the true God—the holy and glorious Creator of heaven and earth—but a mirror of our spiritual egos. We are doing nothing more than shouting into the empty vacuum of the self, and we are only hearing the echo of our own whiny voice.
–Mark Galli
Jesus, Mean and Wild: The Unexpected Love of an Untamable God, pp169-70
“Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.”
(James 4:8)
If we could mechanically draw Him into an encounter, force Him to meet us, simply because we have chosen this moment to meet Him, there would be no relationship and no encounter. We can do that with an image, with the imagination, or with the various idols we can put in front of us instead of God; we can do nothing of the sort with the living God, any more than we can do it with a living person. A relationship must begin and develop in mutual freedom.
If you look at the relationship in terms of mutual relationship, you will see that God could complain a great deal more than we about Him. We complain that He does not make Himself present to us for the few minutes we reserve for Him, but what about those twenty-three and a half hours during which God may be knocking at our door and we answer ‘I am busy, I am sorry’ or when we do not answer at all because we do not even hear the knock at the door of our heart, of our minds, of our conscience, of our life.”
–Anthony Bloom
Beginning to Pray, p29
“Even now, behold, my witness is in heaven, And my advocate is on high.”
(Job 16:19)
Brother, are you fainting in prayer? Look up. Your blessed Advocate has already claimed your answer, and you would grieve and disappoint Him if you were to give up the conflict in the very moment when victory is on its way to meet you. He has gone in for you into the inner chamber, and already holds up your name upon the palms of His hands; and the messenger, which is to bring you your blessing, is now on his way, and the Spirit is only waiting your trust to whisper in your heart the echo of the answer from the throne, “It is done.”
–A. B. Simpson
Recent Comments