"Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ." 1 John 1:3
And He said unto them, When you pray, say --
MY FATHER, blessed be Your name, that Your children are ever permitted to enter Your presence and invoke Your favor. Let me this morning approach the gates of prayer with filial confidence and holy reverence. Keep me from vain distractions and disturbing thoughts. Let me know and feel somewhat of that divine fellowship realized by Your servant and apostle. Make my soul receptive of spiritual influences. Open the windows of heaven, that a shower of blessing may descend. May I see everything around me transformed and transfigured in You, all wearing the print and impress of a Father's love, and gladdened with the memories of a Savior's redeeming work and salvation.
Alas! I have to own that I am the ungrateful recipient of much divine kindness. I have not the humiliating sense I ought to have of sin in general, and of my own sins in particular. My best resolutions, how frail! My best affections, how divided! My best services, how mingled! My best aims and aspirations, how far short of Your glory! Your love and patience and forbearance are as wondrous as they are undeserved. It is of Your compassions alone, that I am spared the cumberer's sentence and doom.
I would lie low at the foot of the cross, disowning all trust and confidence in anything I have done, in anything I can do. I would look alone to Him who is able to save, and willing to save to the uttermost, and through whose merits and mediation, I am now, and shall be at last, more than conqueror.
Deliver me from the dominion, as well as from the guilt of sin. Deliver me from this present evil world. Amid its legion foes, may I stand panoplied in the armor of righteousness, faithful to You through good report and through bad report; so that, at last, an entrance may be ministered to me abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of my Lord and Savior.
Deepen in me a sense of responsibility for the use of every entrusted talent. Let me seek to lay them out for the good of men, and for Your glory. Let me enter on no duty without invoking Your sanction, and seeking to hear Your voice amid all perplexities, "This is the way -- walk in it."
May Your gospel triumph over the pride and superstition and will-worship of man. Darkness is still covering the earth, and gross darkness the people. May the joyful mandate soon be heard, "Arise and shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon you."
May trial have the blessed effect of bringing me nearer to You. Direct broken hearts and weeping eyes to that bright world where nothing shall mar or interrupt everlasting harmonies -- the rest which remains for Your people.
May all varied duties and engagements this day be sanctified. Fit me for work and warfare. May I ever realize that Your pure eye is upon me! And so, when the shadows of evening gather around, I may not have the saddened sense of a day lived and spent in vain, but rather of having enjoyed somewhat of this gracious fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. Leaning with a more simple and entire dependence on divine grace amid all changes and checkered experiences, may it be ever mine with filial love and confidence to say -- "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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Eleventh Evening
"So that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe!" Philippians 2:15
I will arise and go to my Father, and will say unto Him --
MY FATHER, the shadows of night are again gathering around me. Abide with me; for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent. Graciously forgive whatever I have done amiss in thought or word or deed. Before I close my eyes in sleep, I come anew to the opened fountain, and plead anew the all-sufficient atonement of the divine Redeemer.
Let me more deeply realize my filial covenant relationship to You, rejoicing that all which concerns me is in Your hand, and under Your divine, sovereign control. For the manifold blessings of this life, may I feel a chastened gratitude and thankfulness while I have them; and when You, the great Giver and Disposer, see fit to revoke the grant, may it be mine, with filial self-surrender, to say, "Yes, Father, because this was Your good pleasure."
Alas! O God, I have to confess how far I am living beneath my privileges and responsibilities! How inadequately I realize my spiritual deficiencies and shortcomings! How little consciousness I have of my need of the Redeemer and of His great salvation! How little have I attained to the "purity and blamelessness" of Your children! how much in my temper and conduct and daily walk is unworthy of those who are called to shine as lights in the dark world!
Lord, may this be more and more, my habitually aspiration -- to shine for You; to manifest daily, the elevating, sanctifying, transforming precepts and principles of Your gospel; that I may live blameless and pure, without fault, my conduct unmarred and unblemished by inconsistency. Let me enter on no engagement unsanctioned by Your approval. Preserve my purity of thought, purity of word, purity of deed.
Whatever Your dealings and discipline towards me are, whether in the way of prosperity or adversity, may it be my single desire that You may be glorified. Thus cultivating a pilgrim spirit, may I be prepared, whenever You see fit to call me hence, to enter Your presence and home above; where, fully purged from the dross of earthliness, with no bias to evil, no contrariety to Your divine mind and will -- I shall be permitted to serve You forever and ever!
Have mercy on Your afflicted children. If Your dealings with them are apparently harsh and mysterious, may they hear also Your gracious undertones of love. May they trust the Father-heart of their heavenly Parent, and feel assured, whatever the complexion of their trial is, that all things, joyful or sorrowful, prosperous or adverse, are working together, and will work together, for their eternal good.
Bless my beloved friends. May they too count it their highest privilege and happiness to be among the blameless and harmless sons and daughters of the Lord Almighty, testifying for You, Your cause and kingdom and glory, in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. Lord, how long shall the wicked -- how long shall the wicked triumph? Save Your people; bless Your inheritance; sustain them also, and lift them up forever.
Meanwhile, I would present my evening petitions, and close them, with the conviction of a divine and gracious reality in the words -- "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."
