Beecher: abstract prayer

Monday, February 21, 2011
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.”
    —Matthew 6:7-8 (NIV)
Quotation:
    It is remarkable how skilfully men will contrive to avoid all real interests, and express almost wholly those which are not real to them. A man prays for the glory of God, for the advance of His kingdom, for the evangelisation of the world; but, in that very time, he will not allude to the very things in which his own life may stand, nor to the wants which every day are working their impress upon his character. The cares, the petty annoyances, the impatience of temper, pride, self-indulgence, selfishness, conscious and unconscious; or, on the other hand, the gladnesses of daily life, the blessings of home, the felicities of friendship, the joys and success of life—in short, all the things which one would talk of to a venerable mother, in an hour of confidence, are excluded from prayer among the brotherhood.
    ... Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887), Summer in the Soul, Edinburgh: A. Strahan & Co., 1859, p. 41 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your Spirit teaches me to pray. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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