"Your Father knows the things you need, before you ask Him." Matthew 6:8
And He said unto them, When you pray, say --
MY FATHER in heaven, regard me this morning with Your gracious favor. You invite me into Your presence, and with filial trust to make known to You my varied needs. I do not need to enumerate them. You are intimately acquainted with all my ways. There is not a thought in my heart, not a word on my tongue, but, lo, O Lord, You know it altogether! Yet it is my privilege thus to come and unburden -- my soul's necessities, my sins, my sorrows, my weaknesses and infirmities.
There are blessings especially promised to those who frequent the mercy-seat. When "in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving" our requests are made known unto You, we have the annexed sure promise that the peace of God, which passes all understanding, shall keep our hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
How little do I realize this privilege as I ought! How little, when approaching the throne of grace, do I feel my own urgent needs! How little am I actuated by the predominating motive of love to You, and a supreme desire to show forth Your glory! O omniscient One, graciously forgive my erring past, and grant me strength and trust for the unknown future. Let that future be left to reveal and unfold itself. Let me not needlessly strive to predict it, or to anticipate needed help and grace; but rest in the paternal promise, that there will be strength assigned and proportioned for each day, and sufficient to meet all my necessities. Meanwhile, let me exult in the assurance, that though the lot may be cast into the lap, the whole disposing thereof is by You.
Let me know the gladness and joy of sanctified prosperity -- the many unmerited blessings You have bestowed upon me. And when You see fit to revoke the gracious loan, grant that I may, in lowly reverence and submission say, "Even so, Father -- for so it seems good in Your sight!" Help me in every unexpected difficulty. Arm me in every conflict. With the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, may I be loyal to You and to the dictates of my conscience; and thus be so enabled to pass through temporal things -- that I lose none of the eternal things.
I pray for the whole world. Arise, O Lord, and let not man prevail. Arise, O Lord, and plead Your own cause. Give efficacy to the gospel, the glad tidings of great joy. May the leaves of the Tree of Life be for the healing of the nations.
Let Your Fatherly love embrace all in whom I am interested. Bless the aged. Make the autumn of life golden with Your presence and with the light of unsetting suns. Bless the young. Let them lay the green ears of early consecration on Your holy altar. Bless the lonely and desolate. May they look to You who sets the solitary in families. Bless and comfort the bereaved. Turn their night of weeping into a morning of joy. Bless and sustain the dying. As they watch the approaching footsteps of death, may they only recognize Jesus coming to fetch His pilgrims home -- and to fulfill His own promise regarding the Father's house and the many mansions.
I supplicate anew, for Your presence and blessing this day. Strengthen me with all might by Your Spirit in the inner man. Grant me to fear You -- and be conscious of no other fear. May my best affections be centered on You, my sure portion and chief joy; so that when the supreme hour of death overtakes me, I may be able to take up the triumphant song which my Redeemer has given me the right to sing, "O death, where is your sting? O grave, where is your victory?"
I ask these, and every other needed blessing, in the name of Him whom You always hear. To You be ascribed all blessing and honor, and glory and praise!
"MY Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. May Your kingdom come. May Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our sins, just as we have forgiven those who have sinned against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one."
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Eighth Evening
"They can no longer die; for they are like the angels. They are God's children, since they are children of the resurrection." Luke 20:36
I will arise and go to my Father, and will say unto Him --
MY FATHER, I come to You this night, trusting in the name and merits of the great Angel-Intercessor. Into His golden censer, full of precious incense, I would place my imperfect prayers. May they ascend before You with acceptance, being sprinkled with the incense of His adorable merits. Make me Your child now by grace, that it may be mine at last to enter on all the glorious privileges and blessings of the "children of the resurrection."
O You who are Yourself the Resurrection and the Life, who has given us, in Your own rising from the dead, the pledge of our resurrection, draw near to me, as You did on the first resurrection evening of old, and breathe upon me and say, "Peace be unto you! Receive the Holy Spirit!" Risen with Christ, may I seek those things that are above, where Jesus sits at Your right hand. May my life now be hid with Christ -- that when Christ, who is my life, shall appear, I may also appear with Him in glory. His finished work is my only plea for acceptance. It is by looking to Him, who having Himself overcome the sharpness of death, has opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers, that I can appropriate the gracious words of this morning, spoken by his own lips, "Neither can they die any more!" "Thanks be to You O God, who gives me the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!"
I would seek to make confession of my manifold transgressions. "If You, O Lord, should mark iniquities -- who could stand? But there is forgiveness with You, that You may be feared." Our sins reach unto the clouds -- but Your mercy is high above the heavens. I rejoice in Your willingness and ability thus to forgive my guilty past. Being justified by faith, may I have peace with You.
Bestow upon me the power of Your Holy Spirit. Give me strength equal to my day. Left to my own resources, I would often be compelled to lose the conflict. But You have graciously promised to give adequate grace in the hour of trial or temptation. Lead me more and more to distrust myself. Reveal to me -- my own emptiness and weakness and liability to fall. Keep me from doing anything that would be unworthy of my Christian profession, inconsistent with Your holy mind and will, and detrimental to my own peace. Deliver me from pride and selfishness, from envy and malice, from hatred and uncharitableness. If I see frailties in others, may I consider myself, lest I also be tempted. May I be ever ready to listen to the apostolic monition, "Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ." I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!
Have mercy on the human race. Speed everywhere the proclamation of Your blessed gospel. May the cross of Christ, and the message it carries with it, loose all chains, and redress all wrongs, and dry all tears. Beautify the place of Your sanctuary.
Sanctify providential dealings to Your sons and daughters of affliction. May they come forth from the furnace, as purified gold. Spare useful and valued lives; and may those appointed to death fall sweetly asleep in Jesus, in the sure and certain hope of a resurrection to eternal life.
Anew I commend myself this night to You and to the word of Your grace. Ever hold up my goings in Your paths, that my footsteps do not stumble. Enable me to look forward to the time when, in an unsinning world, there shall be nothing to mar or impede the interchange of communion with You; but where, as children of the resurrection, we shall be one forever and ever in our living Lord and King. Watch over me during the defenseless hours of sleep. Let the curtain of Your protecting care be drawn around me! And when I awake, may I be still with You, ready anew to greet You with the words of adoring reverence -- ""MY Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. May Your kingdom come. May Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our sins, just as we have forgiven those who have sinned against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one."
