Document: /pub/resources/text/Our.Daily.Bread: db931229.TXT
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    OUR DAILY BREAD                    Wednesday, December 29, 1993
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    Read:  Matthew 6:9-13

                          UNDERSTANDING PRAYER

                         Lord, teach us to pray.
                               --Luke 11:1

    What a privilege it would be to talk privately with the president
    of  the United States!  Yet believers can choose at any  time  to
    enjoy an infinitely greater privilege -- fellowship with the King
    of kings.

    Prayer is not simply a matter of rushing into God's presence with
    our  requests.  Supplication is a valid element of prayer, to  be
    sure,  but  fellowship  and  communion  are  far  more  important
    elements.  Prayer  includes adoration, praise, thanksgiving,  and
    intercession for others, as well as asking for the supply of  our
    own needs and legitimate desires.  Prayer is not only talking  to
    God;  it is also listening to Him as He reminds us from His  Word
    what He wants us to do.

    In   Alexander  Solzhenitsyn's  `A  Day  in  the  Life  of   Ivan
    Denisovich,'  Ivan  endures all the horrors of  a  Soviet  prison
    camp.  One  day he is praying with his eyes closed when a  fellow
    prisoner notices him and says with ridicule, "Prayers won't  help
    you get out of here any faster."  Opening his eyes, Ivan answers,
    "I do not pray to get out of prison but to do the will of God."

    Prayer  is  not  manipulating  God  to  get  what  we  want   but
    discovering  what  He wants us to do, and then  asking  the  Holy
    Spirit to enable us to do His will.

    Author:  Vernon C. Grounds

                    Praise His blessed name forever!
                    There is naught that can compare
                       To the glories of a contact
                   With the Mighty God through prayer.
                                 --Anon.

    THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:
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    Prayer  is  not a way to get what we want but the way  to  become
    what God wants.

    THE BIBLE IN ONE YEAR:  Revelation 13-15

          
          










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