POEM: “I Prayed For” by Steve Gracie

Our featured prayer motivator quote is from Dietrich Bonhoeffer. He said: “Prayer does not mean simply to pour out one’s heart. It means rather to find the way to God and to speak with him, whether the heart is full or empty.”

My personal encouragement for you today is this: God is in Heaven waiting to hear from us through prayer. Some think God is too busy with billions of people around the world to listen to their prayer. But God is interested in hearing your prayer and He is waiting to answer your prayer. Just pray!

Our prayer motivator devotional today is titled “PRAYER AND THE WORD OF GOD” part 10 from the book, “Necessity of Prayer” by E.M. Bounds.

Psalm 119 is a directory of God’s Word. With three or four exceptions, each verse contains a word which identifies, or locates, the Word of God. Quite often, the writer breaks out into supplication, several times praying, “Teach me Thy statutes.” So deeply impressed is he with the wonders of God’s Word, and of the need for Divine illumination wherewith to see and understand the wonderful things recorded therein, that he fervently prays:

“Open Thou mine eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of Thy law.”

From the opening of this wonderful Psalm to its close, prayer and God’s Word are intertwined. Almost every phase of God’s Word is touched upon by this inspired writer. So thoroughly convinced was the Psalmist of the deep spiritual power of the Word of God that he makes this declaration:

“Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against Thee.”

Here the Psalmist found his protection against sinning. By having God’s Word hidden in his heart; in having his whole being thoroughly impregnated with that Word; in being brought completely under its benign and gracious influence, he was enabled to walk to and fro in the earth, safe from the attack of the Evil One, and fortified against a proneness to wander out of the way.

We find, furthermore, the power of prayer to create a real love for the Scriptures, and to put within men a nature which will take pleasure in the Word. In holy ecstasy he cries, “O, how I love Thy law! It is my meditation all the day.” And again: “How sweet are Thy words to my taste! Yea, sweeter than honey to my taste.”