Prayer Quotes - Page 180

Let us think of a Christian believer in whose life the twin wonders of repentance and the new birth have been wrought. He is now living according to the will of God as he understands it from the written Word. Of such a one it may be said that every act of his life is or can be as truly sacred as prayer or baptism or the Lord's Supper. To say this is not to bring all acts down to one dead level; it is rather to lift every act up into a living kingdom and turn the whole of life into a sacrament.

When I am praying the most eloquently, I am getting the least accomplished in my prayer life. But when I stop getting eloquent and give God less theology and shut up and just gaze upward and wait for God to speak to my heart He speaks with such power that I have to grab a pencil and a notebook and take notes on what God is saying to my heart.

Prayer doesn't work because someone out there is listening, it works because someone in here is listening. I've paid attention. I've pictured what I want to happen in my life. I've meditated extensively on my family, my future, my past actions and what did and didn't work for me about them.

The issue of prayer is not prayer; the issue of prayer is God. One cannot pray unless he has faith in his own ability to accost the infinite, merciful, eternal God.

Prayer is our humble answer to the inconceivable surprise of living.

Overall, my books represent a kind of shared communion and meditation with my fellow human beings... The books are also a part of what I call the great continuum of spiritual literary dialogue that I feel has been in progress since human beings first gave in to the urge to pray to their sense of something greater than themselves and interpreted certain signs or events or silences as responses to those prayers.

Meditation is a huge part of my life. And prayer.

Loving, like prayer, is a power as well as a process. It's curative. It is creative.

Long, long time ago, I declared that all my works are a form of a prayer/a wish.

Biodiesel seems to be the answer to a lot of our prayers. Not only can it help the U.S. economy, our unwanted dependence on foreign oil, and the gasping environment, it could also help the family farmers out of this tragic dilemma they have found themselves in through no fault of their own.

Good God, the souls of all my tribe defend From jealousy!

I think thy horse will sooner con an oration than thou learn a prayer without book.

Bow, stubborn knees, and, heart with strings of steel, Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe. All many be well.

If yon bethink yourself of any crime Unreconcil'd as yet to heaven and grace, Solicit for it straight.

His worst fault is, he's given to prayer; he is something peevish that way.

We, ignorant of ourselves, Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers Deny us for our good; so find we profit By losing of our prayers.

Now my charms are all o'erthrown, And what strength I have's mine own, Which is most faint: now, 'tis true, Or sent to Naples. Let me not, Since I have my dukedom got And pardon 'd the deceiver, dwell In this bare island by your spell; I must be here confined by you, But release me from my bands With the help of your good hands: Gentle breath of yours my sails Must fill, or else my project fails, Which was to please: now I want Spirits to enforce, art to enchant, And my ending is despair, Unless I be relieved by prayer, Which pierces so, that it assaults Mercy itself, and frees all faults. As you from crimes would pardon'd be, Let your indulgence set me free.

I do not know What kind of my obedience I should tender. More than my all is nothing; nor my prayers Are not words holy hallowed, nor my wishes More worth than empty vanities; yet prayers and wishes Are all I can return.

God likes to listen favorably to the prayers of His faithful, particularly when they look at Christ's body

Not every hour, nor every day, perhaps, can generous wishes ripen into kind actions; but there is not a moment that cannot be freighted with prayer.

That acknowledgment of weakness which we make in imploring to be relieved from hunger and from temptation is surely wisely put in our daily prayer. Think of it, you who are rich, and take heed how you turn a beggar away.

Perhaps there cannot be a better way of judging of what manner of spirit we are of, than to see whether the actions of our life are such as we may safely commend them to God in our prayers.

But petitional prayer is only one department of prayer; and if we take the word in the wider sense as meaning every kind of inward communion or conversation with the power recognized as divine, we can easily see that scientific criticism leaves it untouched. Prayer in this wide sense is the very soul and essence of religion.

Ten minutes spent in the presence of Christ every day, aye, two minutes, will make the whole day different.

He who ceases to pray ceases to prosper.