LIFE CHANGING PRAYER compiled by Debra Maffett

If we do not guard the mind, it will learn to wander in quest of
novelties. It will set more value on original thoughts than devout
affections. It is the business of prayer to cast down imaginations
which gratify the natural activity of the mind, while they leave the
heart unhumbled.
We should confine ourselves to the present business of the present
moment. We should keep the mind in a state of perpetual
dependence. "Now is the accepted time." "Today, we must hear his
voice." "Give us this day, our daily bread." The manna will not keep
until tomorrow. Tomorrow will have its own needs, and must have its
own petitions. Tomorrow we must seek the bread of Heaven afresh.
We should however avoid coming to our devotions with unfurnished
minds. We should be always laying in materials for prayer . . .
by a diligent course of serious reading,
by treasuring up in our minds the most important truths,
and by a careful and solemn self-examination.
If we rush into the divine presence with a vacant, or ignorant, or
unprepared mind, with a heart filled with the world — we shall feel
no disposition for the work we are about to engage in, nor can we
expect that our petitions will be heard or granted. There must be
some congruity between the heart — and the object; some affinity
between the state of our minds — and the business in which they are
employed, if we would expect success in prayer.
We are often deceived both as to the principle and the effect of our
prayers. When from some external cause the heart is glad, the spirits
light, the thoughts reasonable, the tongue voluble — a kind of
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