Just Pray
I am not good at praying…well, when I hear that others spend 30 minutes or longer each day in dedicated prayer…compared to them I am not good at praying.
I do spend time talking to God and listening to Him as I read His Word... but to sit still and talk, I need to work on it.
I have read books on prayer and a couple from one author are my favorites. Here are a few quotes from those two.
Reading these phrases you could easily see them being written about today’s society as more and more things occupy our time and steal it from our conversations with God.
But these phrases were written in the mid to late 1800s by E.M. Bounds
At age 19, he became the youngest practicing lawyer in the state of Missouri. But a personal encounter with God in a brush arbor revival meeting led by Evangelist Smith Thomas, Bounds closed his law office and moved to Palmyra, Missouri to enroll in the Centenary Seminary. Just two years later at the age of 24, he was ordained by his denomination and was named pastor of the nearby Monticello, Missouri Methodist Church.
Then, just two years after that, 1861, …our country was divided, literally, North against South, brother against brother.
Although E.M. Bounds did not support slavery and through a unique set of circumstances he served during the War Between the States as a chaplain in the Confederate States Army (3rd Missouri Infantry CSA).
During the Second Battle of Franklin, Franklin, TN, Bounds suffered a severe forehead injury from a Union saber, and he was taken, prisoner. On June 28, 1865, Bounds was among Confederate prisoners who were released upon the taking of an oath of loyalty to the United States.
Upon his release as a prisoner of the Union Army, he felt compelled to return to war-torn Franklin and help rebuild it spiritually. His primary method was to establish weekly prayer sessions that sometimes lasted several hours. These prayer meetings evolved into and launched a Methodist church in that community.
Prayer guided Bounds through war, injury, and even to start a church. He was dedicated to it and we find in his story and what he wrote the reason. Prayer was where he felt closest to God. Prayer was where he found direction for his decisions and even through prayer we witnessed miraculous actions.
Someone wrote about Bound’s praying...
"While on speaking engagements, he would not neglect his early morning time in prayer, and cared nothing for the protests of the other occupants of his room at being awakened so early. No man could have made more melting appeals for lost souls ... than did Bounds. Tears ran down his face as he pleaded for us all in that room."
Bounds did not just write about prayer…he lived it out.
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From what I confessed in the first sentence to what wrote about E. M. Bounds I can find three points to challenge myself and maybe you as you.
To really know God, we must spend time with Him
There is no set guidelines of time to be spent in prayer.
We will lead our families and be more effective at work when we spend time in prayer.
I leave you with some encouragement from God’s Word about prayer because there is nothing stronger and wrap up this post with a prayer from my heart.
16 Always be joyful. 17 Never stop praying. 18 Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
6 Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done. 7 Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:6-7
Prayer:
God I am thankful that you allow us to come to you in prayer through the reconciliation of sins through Your Son.
I confess, I need you.
I confess, I am not as faithful to pray as I should be. Forgive me.
Check my heart when I find things to occupy my mind rather than talk to you.
Just as Rev. Bounds wrote a long time ago…we can be more, do more and lead more effectively when we pray.
Tune our hearts to hear your voice.
Give us the boldness to speak our minds to you.
Give us the wisdom to listen.
We pray these things in the name of Your Son, who conquered death, and the grave and gives us Life.
AMEN
““I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.” Romans 15:13 NLT ”
