First Baptist Church in Fernwood, NY » prayer

Hymn

Pastor Scott Griese — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 10:27:19 +0000

To God thy way commending,
Trust him whose arm of might,
The heavenly circles bending,
Guides every star aright:
The winds, and clouds, and lightning,
By his sure hand are led;
And he will, dark shades brightening,
Show thee what path to tread.
*   *   *   *   *
Although to make God falter,
The powers of hell combine,
One jot they cannot alter
Of his all-wise design:
All projects and volition
Of his eternal mind,
Despite all opposition,
Their due fulfilment find.
No more, then, droop and languish,
Thou sorrow-stricken soul;
E’en from the depths of anguish,
Whose billows o’er thee roll,
Thy Father’s hand shall draw thee;
In hope and patience stay,
And joy will soon shed o’er thee
An ever brightening ray.
All faithless murmurs leaving,
Bid them a last good night,
No more thy vexed soul grieving,
Because things seem not right:
Wisely his sceptre wielding,
God sits in regal state,
No power to mortals yielding,
Events to regulate.
Trust with a faith untiring
In thine Omniscient King,
And thou shalt see admiring
What he to light will bring.
Of all thy griefs, the reason
Shall at the last appear;
Why now denied a season,
Will shine in letters clear.
*   *   *   *   *
Then raise thine eyes to heaven,
Thou who canst trust his frown;
Thence shall thy meed be given,
The chaplet and the crown:
Thy God the palm victorious
In thy right hand shall plant.
Whilst thou, in accents glorious,
Melodious hymns shall chant.
*   *   *   *   *
Paul Gerhard (1613-1676), translated by Frances Elizabeth Cox, in “Hymns from the German,” 1864.

Psalm 37:5-7 Commit thy way unto the LORD; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass. (6) And he shall bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noonday. (7) Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way, because of the man who bringeth wicked devices to pass.

PRAYER

Pastor Scott Griese — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 16:23:41 +0000

Study universal holiness of life. Your whole usefulness depends on this, for your sermons last but an hour or two; your life preaches all the week. If Satan can only make a covetous minister a lover of praise, of pleasure, of good eating, he has ruined your ministry. Give yourself to prayer, and get your texts, your thoughts, your words from God. Luther spent his best three hours in prayer.-

Robert Murray MCcheyne

You know the value of prayer: it is precious beyond all price. Never, never neglect it-Sir Thomas Buxton
Prayer is the first thing, the second thing, the third thing necessary to a minister. Pray, then, my dear brother: pray, pray, pray-Edward Payson

The principal cause of my leanness and unfruitfulness is owing to an unaccountable backwardness to pray. I can write or read or converse or hear with a ready heart; but prayer is more spiritual and inward than any of these, and the more spiritual any duty is the more my carnal heart is apt to start from it. Prayer and patience and faith are never disappointed. I have long since learned that if ever I was to be a minister faith and prayer must make me one. When I can find my heart in frame and liberty for prayer, everything else is comparatively easy.-Richard Newton

IT may be put down as a spiritual axiom that in every truly successful ministry prayer is an evident and controlling force-evident and controlling in the life of the preacher, evident and controlling in the deep spirituality of his work. A ministry may be a very thoughtful ministry without prayer; the preacher may secure fame and popularity without prayer; the whole machinery of the preacher’s life and work may be run without the oil of prayer or with scarcely enough to grease one cog; but no ministry can be a spiritual one, securing holiness in the preacher and in his people, without prayer being made an evident and controlling force. E.M. Bounds