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Joy
and thankfulness are the
secret
ingredients to
all successful prayer.
unattributed |
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prayer - prayer
2 - prayer 3
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Prayer isn’t just a spiritual version of
Santa’s toy sack. God
never
intended my prayers to be wish lists filled solely
with my requests
for what I think I need.
Rather, prayer is a vehicle by which I can
miraculously pursue intimacy with the all-powerful God.
So, in that
sense, I suppose something happens every
time I pray. I
make contact
with eternity.
I get a chance to let God know how I feel, to laugh
and
cry in my Father’s presence, and to trust God no
matter how life’s
circumstances turn out.
Perhaps instead of saying, “I prayed, nothing
happened,” I need to learn how to simply say, “I prayed.
That’s enough.”
Mike Nappa
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Prayer is not a monologue.
It speaks to God and to the community. In the last analysis, religion is not what goes on
inside a soul. It
is what goes
on in the world, between people, between
us and
God. To trap
faith in a monologue, and
pretend that it
resides
solely inside the self, undermines
the
true interchange of
all belief.
David J. Wolpe
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What discord we should bring into the universe if
our prayers
were all answered.
Then we should govern the world and
not God.
And do you think we should govern it better?
It gives me only pain when I hear the long, wearisome
petitions of people asking for they know not what. . . .
Thanks-giving with a full heart--and the rest
silence and
submission to the divine will!
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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Right prayer is not escape from action, it is
equipment for action.
It
is not idle luxury, it is no luxury at all. . . . It is not
a waste of time.
The
hours spent in communion with God, make better, more
effective,
the hours spent in action. It is not an effort to get God to do what we
ought to do, but
to let God equip us for the doing, and help us in the
doing
and finally to do only what we alone cannot do.
Albert E. Day |
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I have to be honest in asking myself:
Do I really want to know and do God’s
will?
Or is it rather that I want God to do my will?
Do I go to God
with the assurance that I want only to
know and do his will?
Or do I rather first make my own plans and then insist
that
God make my dreams come true?
John Powell
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Today, as never before, prayer is a binding
necessity in the lives
of people and nations.
The lack of emphasis on the religious sense
has
brought the world to the edge of destruction.
Our deepest source
of power and perfection has been
left miserably undeveloped.
Prayer,
the basic exercise of the spirit, must be
actively practiced in our private
lives. The neglected souls of people must be made strong enough to
assert
themselves once more.
For if the power of prayer is again released and
used
in the lives of common men and women; if the spirit declares
its aims
clearly and boldly, there is yet hope that our
prayers
for a better world will be answered.
Alexis Carrel (1941) |
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If you would have God hear you
when you pray,
you must hear him when he speaks.
Richard J. Needham |
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Nothing is too small a subject for
prayer,
because nothing is too small to be the subject
of God's care.
Henry T. Hamblin |
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The journey of prayer is nothing
more or less
than a gradual awakening to the reality of
recognizing what is already there.
Delia Smith |
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It is a travesty to pray daily
"Thy kingdom come"
and then do nothing to help bring it to pass.
Alice B. Rice |
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Prayer is not a stratagem for occasional use, a
refuge to resort to
now and then.
It is rather like an established residence for
the
innermost self. All
things have a home: the
bird has a nest,
the fox has a hole, the bee has a hive.
A soul without
prayer is a soul without a home.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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Prayer works in the mind as a healing force.
It calms the patient,
enlightens the physician,
guides the surgeon, and it often victoriously
applies the
power of the spirit when all seems lost.
It proves, over and
over again, the truth of
Tennyson’s words: “More
things are wrought
by prayer than this world dreams of.”
Prayer puts us on God’s side.
It aligns us with life’s higher purposes, aims, and
ideals. Prayer
is
dedicating our thought, feeling and action to the
expression of goodness.
It is to become like a window through which the light
of God shines.
Wilferd A. Peterson |
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A mother was tucking her young son into bed.
“Have you said your prayers?”
she asked.
“No,” the boy replied.
“Why not?” the mother asked.
“Because
there was nothing I wanted.”
We may smile at this story, but children
aren’t the
only ones to treat prayer as primarily a way of getting what
they want. God
does want us to bring our needs to him in prayer,
but prayer
is more than that. We come in prayer not to get God to do
our will, but to open
ourselves to doing his will.
Lyn Klug
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When praying for healing, ask great things of God
and expect great
things from God.
But let us seek for that healing that really matters,
the healing of the heart, enabling us to trust God simply,
face God honestly, and live triumphantly.
Arlo F. Newell
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It
is an immature concept to think of prayer for personal gain.
It takes from one the responsibility of the conditions of
one's life.
Everything in creation is based on universal laws.
Cause and
effect work perfectly in accordance with this law. Yet
humankind
attempts to escape the hurt brought on by our disobedience
to higher law by praying to God to violate his own laws.
Cheryl
Canfield |
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Prayer
is not a way to get what we want to happen, like the remote
control
that comes with the television set. I think that
prayer may be less about
asking for the things we are attached to than it is about
relinquishing our
attachments in some way. It can take us beyond fear,
which is an attachment,
and beyond hope, which is another form of attachment.
It can help us remember
the nature of the world and the nature of life, not on an
intellectual level but
in a deep and experiential way. When we pray, we don't
change the world,
we change ourselves. We change our consciousness.
Rachel
Naomi Remen |
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The
Sufis have a saying: "Praise Allah, and tie your
camel to a post."
This brings together both parts of practice: pray,
yes,
but also make sure that you do what is necessary in the
world.
Jack
Kornfield |
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Prayer
changes things. Prayer changes us. Prayer
changes life.
Sometimes an event has been manifested that needs to be
stopped,
midair. Don't pray just when you're in trouble.
Pray every day.
Surround yourself with prayer. You never know
when you might need an extra miracle.
Melody
Beattie |
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I
remember reading years ago a little tract written by
Frank Laubach, a great man of prayer, in which he
described one of his prayer practices. When he is
on a journey, even on a streetcar going a few blocks,
he tries to spot somebody on the car who seems to him
to be in distress, or perhaps just tired or lonely,
and to direct his prayers toward that person as though
the Divine possession were streaming out
from him to this other person.
H.L.
Puxley |
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Prayer has great power which a person makes
with all his or her might.
It makes a sour heart sweet, a sad heart merry, a poor heart
rich,
a foolish heart wise, a timid heart brave, a sick heart
well, a blind heart
full of sight, a cold heart ardent. It draws down the
great God into
the little heart; it drives the hungry soul up into the
fullness of God;
it brings together two lovers, God and the soul,
in a wondrous place where they speak much of love.
Mechtild of Magdeburg |
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Everyone
prays in their own language, and
there is no language that God does not understand.
Duke
Ellington |
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There
is probably no richer, more rewarding experience that I can
have
than that of supporting others with prayer. As I pray,
I may or may not
know the immediate needs of the people I am praying
for. I am, however,
affirming that the love of God is blessing them with peace,
wholeness, and
understanding. The one who benefits most from my
prayers for others
may be me. The experience of prayer connects me at a
deep and fulfilling
level with the love of God, with the people I know, and with
all humanity.
unattributed |
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When
I pray for one person from a heart of love, I pray for
all people. Praying for others is as easy as
holding loving thoughts and knowing that God is within
each one of them. My prayers do not have to be formal
or lengthy. A declaration such as "I love
you," or "I see you healthy, happy, and
whole" is a prayer from my heart. I pray,
envisioning people everywhere filled with and
expressing the love of God. I include leaders of the
world, animals, and the planet in my prayers. My every
prayer is an affirmation of God's unconditional love
within all and for all.
unattributed |
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