When do you pray?

Prayer is a trusting dependence on God throughout all the joys and sorrows in life.

Communion in marriage

When are are suffering

When we are cheerful

When we are sick

What is prayer in faith? (John 14:13-14; 15:7; 1 John 5:14)

Great harm has been done by promising healing to strong "faith".

Prayer offered up in willing submission to the good and kind will of God.

A medicine

A symbol of God’s presence

A sacrament of extreme unction

"What an excellent ground of hope and confidence we have when we reflect upon these three things in prayer – the Father’s love, the Son’s merit, and the Spirit’s power." Thomas Manton

Elijah as an example

Prayer brings in the kingdom of God. (Matthew 6:10)

"Prayer is a sincere, sensible, affectionate pouring out of the soul to God, through Christ, in the strength and assistance of the Spirit, for such things as God has promised." John Bunyan

What an encouragement is this to hunger after righteousness! Such shall be filled. God charges us to fill the hungry (Isaiah 58:10). He blames those who do not fill the hungry (Isaiah 32:6). And do we think he will be slack in that which he blames us for not doing? Oh come with hungerings after Christ and be assured of satisfaction! God keeps open house for hungry sinners. He invites his guests and bids them come without money (Isaiah 55:1, 2). God's nature inclines him, and his promise obliges him—to fill the hungry. Consider, why did Christ receive 'the Spirit without measure'? (John 3:34). It was not for himself. He was infinitely full before. But he was filled with the holy unction for this end—that he might distill his grace upon the hungry soul. Are you ignorant? Christ was filled with wisdom that he might teach you. Are you polluted? Christ was filled with grace that he might cleanse you. Shall not the soul then come to Christ who was filled on purpose to fill the hungry? We love to knock at a rich man's door. In our Father's house there is bread enough. Come with desire—and you shall go away with comfort! You shall have the virtues of Christ's blood, the influences of his Spirit, the communications of his love!

Thomas Watson, 1660