Did not Jesus say, "I am the door of the sheepfold"? What to us is the sheepfold, dear children? It is the heart of the Father, whereunto Christ is the Gate that is called Beautiful. 0 children, how sweetly and how gladly has He opened that door into the Father's heart, into the treasure-chamber of God! And there within He unfolds to us the hidden riches, the nearness and the sweetness of companionship with Himself.
Johannes Tauler
Biography
At the times when you remember God, increase your prayers, so that when you forget Him, the Lord may remind you.
Anonymous
Early African converts to Christianity were earnest and regular in private devotions. Each one reportedly had a separate spot in the thicket where he would pour out his heart to God. Over time the paths to these places became well worn. As a result, if one of these believers began to neglect prayer, it was soon apparent to the others. They would kindly remind the negligent one, "Brother, the grass grows on your path."
Anonymous
Authoritative intercessors are men and women, whose eyes have been opened to the full knowledge of their place in Christ. To them the Word of God has become a battle chart on which is detailed the plan of campaign of the hosts of the Lord. They realize that they have been appointed by Him for oversight of certain sections of the advance, and they have humbly accepted His commission. Deeply conscious of their own personal unworthiness and insufficiency, they yet believe God's statement concerning their identification with Christ in His throne power.
John A Macmillan
What should we set as our ultimate goal in this life? The answer: the most perfect worshipers of God we can possibly be.... I sought no more than how to be God's and God's alone. My goal made me resolve to give my all for the All.... Always I worshiped Him as often as I could, keeping my mind in His holy presence. When I wandered I brought Him back to my mind.... At all times, every hour, every minute, even at the busiest times. I drove away from my mind everything capable of spoiling the sense of the presence of God.... I just make it my business to persevere in His holy presence... My soul has had an habitual, silent, secret conversation with God.
Brother Lawrence
Biography And Works
If my prayer is centred in myself, if it seeks only an enrichment of my own self, my prayer itself draws my attention and longing away from God and toward myself. I am left rich and alone and nothing can assuage my hunger. The most dangerous spiritual violence is that which carries our will away with a false enthusiasm which seems to come from God but which is in reality inspired by passion.
Thomas Merton
Website.
More Thomas Merton Materials
The soul which has come into intimate contact with God in the silence of the prayer chamber is never out of conscious touch with the Father; the heart is always going out to Him in loving communion, and the moment the mind is released from the task upon which it is engaged, it returns as naturally to God as the bird does to its nest. What a beautiful conception of prayer we get if we regard it in this light.
Edward McKendree (E. M.) Bounds
Public Domain Texts
Do everything in its own time; do everything in earnest; if it is worth doing, then do it with all your might. Above all, keep much in the presence of God. Never see the face of man until you have seen his face, who is our light, our all.
Robert Murray M'Cheyne
Online Information
Pray with your intelligence. Bring things to God that you have thought out and think them out again with Him. That is the secret of good judgement. Repeatedly place your pet opinions and prejudices before God. He will surprise you by showing you that the best of them need refining and some the purification of destruction.
Charles H. Brent
Brief Biography
Moses, after being forty days in the mount with God, shone with the same kind of light as the disciples saw in their master on the Holy Mount; and there is a spiritual beauty bestowed in some degree on all God's saints who pray much which is of the same nature and is the most precious of all answers to prayer. Character flows from the well-spring of prayer.
James Stalker
Writings
God.... is longing for a time of communion with His children. Specifically, He longs to meet with you. He knows you know that He loves you. But still, He wants to say it again. He knows you know that He is faithful, but He wants to show His faithfulness once again.
Anonymous
Watch the morning watch. Do not see the face of man until you have seen the face of God. Before you enter on the day with its temptations, look up into His face and hide His Word in your heart.
Frederick Brotherton (F. B.) Meyer
Online Works
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Six Secrets to a Powerful Quiet Time: Discovering Radical Intimacy with God By Catherine Martin Founder of Quiet Time Ministries Catherine Martin shares her celebrated methods of turning quiet time into a radically intimate and meaningful relationship with God. Each manageable chapter leads readers to experience the transforming power of quiet time when they:
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I have Him, not only what I have room for, but that which I have not room for, but for which I shall have room, moment by moment, as I go on into the eternity before me. I am like the little bottle in the sea, as full as it will hold. The bottle is in the sea, and the sea is in the bottle; so I am in Christ, and Christ is in me. But, besides that bottleful in the sea, there is a whole ocean beyond; the difference is, that the bottle has to be filled over again, every day, evermore.
A. B. Simpson
Biography and Bibliography
The holy and most glorious God invites us to come to Him, to converse with Him, to ask from Him such things as we need, and to experience what a blessing there is in fellowship with Him. He has created us in His own image and has redeemed us by His own Son, so that in prayer with Him we might find our highest glory and salvation.
Andrew Murray
Biography And Works
Christ is not a reservoir but a spring. His life is continual, active and ever passing on with an outflow as necessary as its inflow. If we do not perpetually draw the fresh supply from the living Fountain, we hall either grow stagnant or empty, It is, therefore, not so much a perpetual fullness as a perpetual filling.
A. B. Simpson
Biography/Bibliography
Give yourselves to prayer and the ministry of the Word. Give yourselves to prayer and the ministry of the Word. If you do not pray, God will probably lay you aside from your ministry, as He did me, to teach you to pray.
Robert Murray M'Cheyne
Online Information
Lord, teach me to listen. The times are noisy and my ears are weary with the thousand raucous sounds which continuously assault them. Give me the spirit of the boy Samuel when he said to Thee, "Speak, for Thy servant heareth." Let me hear Thee speaking in my heart. Let me get used to the sound of Thy voice, that its tones may be familiar when the sounds of earth die away and the only sound will be the music of Thy speaking. Amen.
A. W. Tozer
The Works of A. W. Tozer
Communication with God - prayer - is a two-way conversation! It is not just the voice of praise and petitions, but oftencommunion . Sitting in silence with God, listening for whatever He may want to say. Simply enjoy the fact that He is, and you are, and you have a relationship with Him. These special moments with God are when His fresh breezes can enter your heart and refresh you.
Anonymous
Prayer is talking with God and telling Him you love Him, conversing with God about all the things that are important in life, both large and small, and being assured that He is listening.
Neil Strait
If you have not much time at your disposal, do not fail to profit by the smallest portions of time which remain to you. We do not need much time in order to love God, to renew ourselves in His Presence, to lift up our hearts towards Him, to worship Him in the depths of our hearts, to offer Him what we do and what we suffer.
Francois Fenelon
Francois Fenelon Biography
Tell God all that is in your heart, as one unloads one's heart, its pleasures and its pains, to a dear friend. Tell Him your troubles, that He may comfort you; tell Him your joys, that He may sober them; tell Him your longings, that He may purify them; tell Him your dislikes, that He may help you conquer them; talk to Him of your temptations, that He may shield you from them: show Him the wounds of your heart, that He may heal them; lay bare your indifference to good, your depraved tastes for evil, your instability. Tell Him how self-love makes you unjust to others, how vanity tempts you to be insincere, how pride disguises you to yourself and others.
Francois Fenelon
Francis Fenelon Biography
Give yourself to it,[the call to prayer] yield to it; and you will find not only that you have not been wasting time with respect to the matter with which you are dealing but that actually it has helped you greatly in that respect. You will experience an ease and a facility in understanding what you were reading, in thinking, in ordering matter for a sermon, in writing, in everything which is quite astonishing. Such a call to prayer must never be regarded as a distraction; always respond to it immediately, and thank God if it happens to you frequently.
Martyn Lloyd-Jones
Martyn Lloyd-Jones Website
There is hardly ever a complete silence in our soul. God is whispering to us well-nigh incessantly. Whenever the sounds of the world die out in the soul, or sink low, then we hear these whisperings of God. He is always whispering to us, only we do not always hear, because of the noise, hurry, and distraction which life causes as it rushes on.
Frederick W. Faber
Biography
Contemplative prayer is to read with special attention to the Gospel. It is often helpful to take one sentence or word that offers special comfort and repeat it a few times so that the whole content can be brought to mind and allowed slowly to descend from the mind into the heart.
Henri J. M. Nouwen
Nouwen Centre
A little child often runs to its mother and exclaims: 'Mother! Mother!' Very often the child does not want anything in particular, he only wants to be near his mother, to sit upon her lap, or to follow her about the house, for the sheer pleasure of being near her, talking to her, hearing her dear voice. Then the child is happy. His happiness does not consist in asking and receiving all kinds of things from his mother. If that were what he wanted, he would be impatient and obstinate and therefore unhappy. No, his happiness lies in feeling his mother's love and care, and in knowing the joy of her mother love." "It is just the same with the true children of God; they do not trouble themselves so much about spiritual blessings. They only want to sit at the Lord's feet, to be in living touch with Him, and when they do that they are supremely content.
Sadhu Sundar Singh
Short Biography
Why grow we weary when asked to watch with our Lord? Up, sluggish heart, Jesus calls thee! Rise and go forth to meet the Heavenly Friend in the place where He manifests Himself.
Edward McKendree (E. M.) Bounds
Public Domain Texts
The man who gazes upon and contemplates day by day the face of the Lord Jesus Christ, and who has caught the glow of the reality that the Lord is not a theory but an indwelling power and force in his life, is as a mirror reflecting the glory of the Lord.
Alan Redpath
Brief Biography And Bibliography
A man may study because his brain is hungry for knowledge, even Bible knowledge. But he prays because his soul is hungry for God.
Leonard Ravenhill
Archives and Articles
Without prayer we become deaf to the voice of divine love and become confused by the many competing voices asking for our attention. When we try to become very still, we often find ourselves so overwhelmed by our noisy inner voices that we can hardly wait to get busy and distracted again. Our inner life often looks like a banana tree full of jumping monkeys! But when we decide not to run away and stay focused, the monkeys may gradually go away because of lack of attention, and the soft gentle voice calling us may gradually make itself heard.
Thomas Aquinas
Biography
He who runs from God in the morning will scarcely find him the rest of the day.
John Bunyan
Online Library
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Quiet Times for Those Who Need Comfort By H. Norman Wright Millions of people struggle with a sense of hopelessness when experiencing a significant loss. They become mired in a sea of sadness and lack a clear sense of direction on how to get back to daily living. Working through more than 60 insightful devotions, readers will explore how to clarify their feelings of loss, establish a healthy outlook on the future, find strength in the arms of their Heavenly Father, and much more. Thoughtful questions, soul-searching statements, and encouraging anecdotes will refresh and renew a spirit of hope for those who long for peace. Biblically based and solution-oriented, this book is a must-have for anyone. |
Do you long to know how you may always experience deliverance from the sin of prayerlessness? Here you have the secret. Believe in the Son of God, give Him time in the inner chamber to reveal Himself in His ever present nearness, as the Eternal and Almighty One, the Eternal Love who watches over you.... It has not entered into the heart of man what God can do for those who love Him.
Andrew Murray
Biography and Works
When all nature is at rest, not a leaf moving, then at evening the dew comes down — no eye to see the pearly drops descending, no ear to hear them falling on the verdant grass — so does the Spirit come to you who believe. When the heart is at rest in Jesus — unseen, unheard by the world — the Spirit comes, and softly fills the believing soul, quickening all, renewing all within.
Robert Murray M'Cheyne
Online Information
Feed on Christ, and then go and live your life, and it is Christ in you that lives your life, that helps the poor, that tells the truth, that fights the battle, and that wins the crown.
Philips Brooks
Biography
Fall on your knees and grow there. There is no burden of the spirit but is lighter by kneeling under it. Prayer means not always talking to Him, but waiting before Him till the dust settles and the stream runs clear.
Frederick Brotherton ( F. B. ) Meyer
Online Works
A quiet time, to me, is just an established time to go to my Source, to the Father, and spend time with Him. It doesn't matter what you've done, or who you are, or how you've screwed it up, but you have a Father who likes to spend time with you. To go before God, to know what I've done and thought and to expect that He's going to strike me with a lightning bolt - but to be hugged instead - creates great astonishment. We mature Christians, we get so we're not astonished any more.
Steve Brown
Key Life Network
Oh, how few find time for prayer! There is time for everything else, time to sleep and time to eat, time to read the newspaper and the novel, time to visit friends, time for everything else under the sun, but - no time for prayer, the most important of all things, the one great essential!
Oswald J. Smith
Biography
Just as in prayer it is not we who momentarily catch His attention, but He ours, so when we fail to hear His voice, it is not because He is not speaking so much as that we are not listening. We must recognize that all things are in God and that God is in all things, and we must learn to be very attentive, in order to bear God speaking in His ordinary tone without any special accent. A man must not stop listening any more than praying when he rises from his knees. No one questions the need of times of formal address to God, but few admit in any practical way the need of quiet waiting upon God, gazing into His face, feeling for His hand, listening for His voice. "I will hearken what the Lord God will say concerning me." God has special confidences for each soul. Indeed, it would seem as though the deepest truths came only in moments of profound devotional silence and contemplation.
Charles H. Brent
Brief Biography
If we can, by God's grace, turn ourselves entirely to Him, and put aside everything else in order to speak with Him and worship Him, this does not mean that we can always imagine Him or feel His presence. Neither imagination nor feeling are required for a full conversion of our whole being to God. Nor is intense concentration on an idea of God especially desirable. Hard as it is to convey in human langage, there is a very real and very recognizable (but almost entirely undefinable) Presence of God, in which we confront Him in prayer knowing Him by Whom we are known, aware of Him Who is aware of us, loving Him by Whom we know ourselves to be loved.
Thomas Merton
Website.
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Dear Abba: A Ten-Week Journey to the Heart of God By Claire Cloninger Do you truly picture yourself as a child of God? Sitting in the lap of your Father, embraced in His loving arms, and communicating with Him the desires of your heart? If not, embark on a 10-week journey where you'll learn to trust the heart of your Father, hear His voice, and converse with Him. This unique journaling experience uses love letters between your heart and God's to draw you into a lasting intimacy that only comes from an encounter with the eternal Father. Each week offers an illuminating chapter to read, five daily devotionals, and five guided prayer journal entries.. Recommended Christian Devotional Books Recommended Christian Books on Prayer |
... rose early to seek God and found Him whom my soul loveth. Who would not rise early to meet such company?
Robert Murray M'Cheyne
Online Information
After a hard day scrambling to find your way around in the world, it's assuring to come home to a place you know. God can be equally familiar to you. With time you can learn where to go for nourishment, where to hide for protection, where to turn for guidance. Just as your earthly house is a place of refuge, so God's house is a place of peace.
Max Lucado
Upwords
In place of our exhaustion and spiritual fatigue, God will give us rest. All He asks is that we come to Him...that we spend a while thinking about Him, meditat ing on Him, talking to Him, listening in silence, occupying ourselves with Him--totally and thoroughly lost in the hiding place of His presence.
Charles (Chuck) Swindoll
Insight for Living
I throw myself down in my chamber, and I call in and invite God and his angels thither, and when they are there, I neglect God and his angels, for the noise of a fly, for the rattling of a coach, for the whining of a door.
John Donne
Website
If you thus pour out all your weaknesses, needs, troubles, there will be no lack of what to say. You will never exhaust the subject. It is continually being renewed. People who have no secrets from each other never want for subject of conversation. They do not weigh their words, for there is nothing to be held back; neither do they seek for something to say. They talk out of the abundance of their heart, without consideration they say just what they think. Blessed are they who attain to such familiar, unreserved intercourse with God.
Francois Fenelon
Francis Fenelon Biography
There are beautiful birds in the air, and twinkling stars in the heavens, but if you desire pearls you must plunge down into the depths of the ocean to find them. There are many beautiful things in the world around us, but pearls can only be discovered in the depths of the sea; if we wish to posses spiritual pearls we must plunge into the depths, that is, we must pray, we must sink down into the secret depths of contemplation and prayer. Then we shall perceive precious pearls.
Sadhu Sundar Singh
A Short Biography
That is the secret of true prayer, of true power in prayer, of real, living, face to face fellowship with God, and of power for service. there is no true, deep conversion, no true, deep holiness, no clothing with the Holy Spirit and with power, no abiding peace or joy, without being daily alone with God. What an inestimable privilege is the institution of daily secret prayer to begin every morning. Let it be one thing that our hearts are set one.
Andrew Murray
Biography And Works
It is impossible to live the life of a disciple without definite times of secret prayer. You will find that the place to enter in is in your business, as you walk along the streets, in the ordinary ways of life, when no one dreams you are praying, and the reward comes openly, a revival here, a blessing there.
Oswald Chambers
My Utmost for His Highest
Those who complain that they make no progress in the life of prayer because they "cannot meditate" should examine, not their capacity for meditation, but their capacity for suffering and love. For there is a hard and costly element, a deep seriousness, a crucial choice, in all genuine religion.
Evelyn Underhill
Evelyn Underhill Association
In recent times it has become fashionable in Christian spirituality to put great emphasis on service to our neighbour and to equate service with prayer. There is much truth in this idea, but it is a half-truth. There can be no substitute in the spiritual life for being alone with God. There must be that part of spirituality which is private and individual - secret between me and my God. It is that daily attempt to become increasingly aware of the presence and the action of God in our lives and to know the growing desire within us for some kind of closeness to him.
Basil Hume
Obituary
There is absolutely no substitute for this secret communion with God. The public Church services, or even the family altar, cannot take the place of the 'closet' prayer. We must deliberately seek to meet with God absolutely alone, and to secure such aloneness with God we are bidden to enter into thy closet.' God absolutely insists on this 'closet'-communion with Himself. One reason, no doubt, that He demands it, is to test our sincerity. There is no test for the soul like solitude. Do you shrink from solitude? Perhaps the cause for your neglect of the 'closet' is a guilty conscience? You are afraid to enter into the solitude. You know that however cheerful you appear to be you are not really happy. You surround yourself with company lest, being alone, truth should invade your delusion.
Gordon Cove
Online Article
Quotes on Personal Devotions and Quiet Times Page 1
Quotes on Personal Devotions and Quiet Times Page 2
Quotes on Personal Devotions and Quiet Times Page 3
Quotes on Prayer in General
Quotes on The Christian Discipline Of Fasting
Examples of Prayers by Various Christians
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