Magnificent Prayer #27
Magnificent Prayer #27
With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith.
2 Thessalonians 1:11
[The following words were taken from the journal of Edward Payson, one of the church’s largely unheralded prayer warriors of the nineteenth century.]
I was favored with a spirit of prayer beyond all my former experience. I was in great agony and wrestled both for myself and others with great power. God seemed to bow the heavens and come down and open all His treasures, bidding me, take what I would.
EDWARD PAYSON
Pray About It: So persistent in prayer was Payson that next to his bed where he prayed were deep grooves in the hardwood floor where his knees had left their indentations. And the effect of his prayers? He often experienced the reality of Christ that can only come through prayer. “I seemed carried out of myself into the presence of God,” he once wrote.
Numerous revivals characterized by “a depth and power seldom seen” were birthed under Payson’s ministry. His congregation was often overwhelmed and reduced to tears by the presence of Christ in their midst. Has that happened in your church lately?
Payson’s advice to his colleagues in the ministry was, “Prayer is the first thing, the second thing, and the third thing necessary to a minister. Pray then, my dear brother, pray, pray.”
And for us today, it’s also true. Pray, pray, pray.
To be much for God, we must be much with God.
LEONARD RAVENHILL
From the book
