October 8

Be definite in prayer

“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you” (Matt. 7:7).
“Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them” (Mark 11:24).

Be definite in prayer to God. How wearisome indefiniteness is! Some of you who stand behind the counters in drapers’ shops know what a nuisance an indefinite woman is. She comes and looks at half-a-dozen articles, and turns everyone of them over, but she cannot find what she wants. At last she does find what she wants, but she cannot make up her mind to pay the price for it. Oh, let us be businesslike with God in this matter. He has paid the price, all we have to do is to “ask and receive.”
—Reader Harris.

I am watching for the answers to the prayers which
I have made.
I am eagerly expecting all the things for which
I prayed!
But I know if they appear not in the form I
Thought they would,
It is just that He is planning for me
Something extra good!
Aye, I’m certain, and I trust Him;
He has heard, and He will give.
Let me then “Pray without ceasing”
And in “watching” ever live.
—F. M. N.

Mr. Finney tells of a church in which there was a continuous revival for thirteen years. At last the revival stopped, and everybody feared and questioned why, till one day a tearful man arose and told how for thirteen years he had prayed every Saturday night till after midnight for God to glorify Himself and save the people. But two weeks before, he had stopped this praying, and then the revival had stopped. If God will answer prayer like that, what a tremendous responsibility rests on us all to pray!
—Samuel Logan Brengle.

Prayer is the key to Heaven; the Spirit helps faith to turn the key.
—T. Watson.

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