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Does this remind you or your own prayers (an expression there of) at times? Taken from The Valley of Vision edited by Arthur Bennett:<br><br>O Changeless God,<br>Under the conviction of the Spirit I learn that <br>The more I do, the worse I am,<br>The more I know, the less I know,<br>The more holiness I have, the more sinful I am,<br>The more I love, the more there is to love.<br>O wretched man that I am! <br><br>O Lord,<br>I have a wild heart<br>And cannot stand before thee;<br>I am like a bird before a man.<br>How little I love thy truth and ways!<br>I neglect prayer,<br>By thinking I have prayed enough and earnestly,<br>By knowing thou hast saved my soul.<br>Of all hypocrites, grant that I may not be an evangelical hypocrite,<br>Who sins more safely because grace abounds,<br>Who tells his lusts that Christ’s blood cleanseth them,<br>Who reasons that God cannot cast him into hell, for his is saved,<br>Who loves evangelical preaching, churches, Christians, but lives Unholily.<br><br>My mind is a bucket without a bottom,<br>With no spiritual understanding,<br>No desire for the Lord’s Day,<br>Ever learning but never reaching the truth,<br>Always at the gospel-well but never holding water.<br><br>My conscience is without conviction or contrition,<br>With nothing to repent of.<br>My will is without power of decision or resolution.<br>My heart is without affection, and full of leaks.<br>My memory has no retention,<br>So I forget so easily the lessons learned,<br>And thy truths seep away.<br>Give me a broken heart that yet carries home the water of grace.

<br><br> Oh dear! It almost makes me cry to read it! I even find that often I cannot get myself into the proper frame of mind to pray rightly! In preparing myself to fall prostate before my savior, I cannot bring myself to make the pleas I need. I am so ashamed to come before Him, I cannot hide far enough away. I can only pray The Spirit knows what I want to say and understands my groaning! I feel like Paul, o retched woman that I am!<br><br>In His Hands,<br><br>Ruth

Prayer is the soul’s sincere desire, unuttered of expressed,<br>The motion of a hidden fire that trembles in the breast.<br><br>Prayer is the burden or a sigh, the falling of a tear,<br>The upward glancing of the eye, when none but God is near.<br><br>Prayer is the Christian’s vital breath, the Christian’s native air,<br>His watchword at the gates of death; he enters heaven with prayer.<br><br>Prayer is the contrite sinner’s voice, returning from his ways,<br>While angels in their songs rejoice and cry, “Behold, he prays!”<br><br>O Thou by whom we come to God, the Life, the Truth, the way,<br>The path of prayer Thyself hast trod; Lord, teach us how to pray.<br><br>……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..<br><br>My God, is any hour so sweet, from blush of morn to evening star, <br>As that which calls me to Thy feet, the hour of prayer.<br><br>Then is my strength by Thee renewed; then are my sins by Thee forgiven;<br>Then dost Thou cheer my solitude with hopes of heaven.<br><br>No words can tell what sweet relief there for my every want I find,<br>What strength for warfare, balm for grief, what peace of mind.<br><br>Hushed is each doubt, gone every fear; my spirit seems in heaven to stay;<br>And e’en the penitential tear is wiped away.<br><br>Lord, till I reach yon blissful shore, no privilege so dear shall be<br>As thus my inmost soul to pour in prayer to Thee.

My Father, if Thy mercy had bounds, where would be my refuge from just wrath? But thy love in Christ is without measure. Thus, I present myself to Thee with sins of comission and omission, against Thee, my Father, against Thee, adorable redeemer, against Thee and Thy strivings, 0 Holy Spirit, against the dictates of my conscience, against the precepts of Thy Word, against my neighbours and myself. Enter not into judgment with me, for I plead no righteousness of my own, and have no cloak for iniquity. Pardon my day dark with evil. <br><br>This night I renew my penitence. Every moniing I vow to love Thee more fervently, to serve Thee more sincerely, to be more devoted in my life, to be wholly Thine; Yet I soon stumble, backslide, and have to confess my weakness, misery and sin. But I bless Thee that the finished work of Jesus needs no addition from my doings, that His oblation is sufficient satisfaction for my sins. <br><br>If future days be mine, help me to amend my life, to hate and abhor evil, to flee the sins I confess. Make me more resolute, more watchful, more prayerful. Let no evil fruit spring from evil seeds my hands have sown; Let no neighbour be hardened in vanity and folly by my want of circumspection. If this day I have been ashamed of Christ and His Word, or have shown unkindness, malice, envy, lack of love, unadvised speech, hasty temper, let it be no stumbling block to others, or dishonour to Thy name. 0 help me to set an upright example that will ever rebuke vice, allure to goodness, and evidence that lovely are the ways of Christ.

"Of all hypocrites, grant that I may not be an evangelical hypocrite"<br><br>Whew, amen to that... I want my theology to mold my life.<br><br>"Give me a broken heart that yet carries home the water of grace"<br><br>Now that is a prayer to pray!<br><br>Semper reformanda soli Deo gloria

Dear Joe and Everyone who has replied so far,<br><br>Thanks for your posts. What an encouragement to know that others have the same struggles! Isn't it strange that so often when we are saved we determine to be the "best Christian" in our area, and yet as the years go on we slowly come to the realisation that we are probably "the worst." As a dear friend remarked to me, "I think Paul must have felt the same, as it is in his last letters that he describes himself as" the chief of sinners."<br>When I stand before His throne,<br>Dressed in beauty not my own;<br>When I see Thee as Thou art,<br>Love Thee with unsinning heart.<br>Then, Lord, shall I fully know,<br>Not 'til then how much I owe. (Andrew Bonar)<br>God bless you all.<br>Brian.<br>

Oh, how this poem has reached my heart this morning! Our hope is in the first line; O Changeless God! O, to be in this body of flesh and to feel the battle between despair and hope. <br><br>Joe, thanks for posting this. <br><br>God's hearing of our prayers doth not depend upon sanctification, but upon Christ's intercession; not upon what we are in ourselves, but what' we are in the Lord Jesus; both our persons and our prayers are acceptable in the beloved [Eph 1.6]. Thomas Brookes

These types of prayer reach the heart. I wonder why our prayers today are so shallow in comparison? I wonder why our prayers do not have this depth from the pulpit today?<br><br>PS: For those interested: The Valley of Vision, edited by Arthur Bennett is available from CVBBS and it of course, comes highly recommended. Get the leather edition, you will use it allot. For those not purchasing books at this time, here is a further sample of what is inside The Valley of Vision

Hi Joe,<br><br> In reply to:<blockquote>I wonder why our prayers today are so shallow in comparison? I wonder why our prayers do not have this depth from the pulpit today?</blockquote><br><br> Do you think it could be the overall casual attitude that seems prevalent in our churches? Along with the blue jeans and tee shirts, the prayer address is too often as if one were speaking to a friend, instead of a Thrice Holy God! <br><br> I read, not too long ago about the preparation we should do for prayer. To concentrate on the attributes of God, His awesome Holiness, Truth, Justice and such, and to make our approach suitable for such. This was something I had never read or heard about before, and I can't offhand remember where I read it. <br><br>What is your opinion on this?<br><br>In His Hands,<br><br>Ruth

Hi Ruth,<br><br>I know that you addressed this to Joe, but I will respond. When I look at the prayers in the Bible, I see the Holy Character and attributes of God proclaimed throughout, but nearly always in the beginning. For myself, when I think of preparation for prayer, I think of Isaiah's experience in the temple; he first encountered the seraphim crying, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Hosts! The whole world is full of His glory!" His response was to be undone in the presence of the Lord, and was only then able to hear and respond.<br><br>What are our petitions but laundry lists if we do not first acknowledge God's Holiness and in comparison our worthless, sinful state before Him? How else can we praise Him for the mercy and grace He has bestowed upon us? How else can we pray boldly before Him unless we first acknowledge that He has ordained those prayers that are in keeping with His will? O, how I long to be in that final state in glory when my prayers are totally un-self-conscious and made perfect before His presence! There is so much of "me" that remains.

You and Gotribe both hit this squarely on its head:<br><br><ul>1. We hear prayers in public that do not move us like these older Puritan prayers do because the person praying does not have a relationship with God the way this person of prayer had.<br><br>2. We hear prayers in public that do not move us like these older Puritan prayers do because those hearing them do not have a relationship with God the way this person of prayer had.<br><br>3. —blue jeans and tee shirts [img]http://www.the-highway.com/w3timages/icons/puke.gif" alt="puke" title="puke[/img] Down here in Florida they wear cut off shorts, baseball caps, tennis shoes, etc. (that describes one person I saw this morning in worship). This type of disrespect for God is (a) horrifying (b) dishonoring, and (c) contagious in the body.<br><br>4. As you said we have lost the perspective of who the HOLY God of all really is. I may call Him Abba, I may call Him Father, but I also MUST call Him holy, holy, holy at the same time. We have gotten away from the transcendent God and replaced Him with “only” an immanent God. We need to see Him as both, not just a balance between the two, but radically transcendent and radically immanent.<br><br>5. We tend to live thinking this is God over here and this is life over there, not realizing that God is not only concerned about every issue of our lives, but also desires to be acknowledged by word and deed as Lord over every issue. One large problem is that we think we may do anything, even what we do best, without Him.<br><br>6. We have lost the imagery and truth of “Prepare to Meet Thy God,” every second of every day![/LIST] So, what is the solution? Learn to develop a relationship with God that esteems who He really is! How will this be accomplished? Or, maybe I should say, "Do we really desire this?"

Wow! Amen, brother.<br><br>Today we sang "Nothing but the Blood" and "The Wonderful Cross." <br><br>Until we realize the only reason we can stand in the presence of Almighty God is because of Christ's shed blood on Calvary, we will not begin to grasp how unworthy we are and how worthy God is. We are indeed robed in Christ's righteousness, standing before God as the blood-washed and blood-bought redeemed.

Dear Beloved,<br>What I really love about this poem/prayer is that the author shows that there can be intimacy with the Sovereign Supreme and an absolute respect and reverence for His holiness and majestic might. We have all these songs today that reflect a superficial intimacy with Christ. But they sometimes give that intimacy a shallowness that I hope is not common with all their relationships. Today, I missed church again. This is the third week running. I just decided to pop in here and see what was going on. This poem just hits me on so many levels. But what I love most about it is that this sinner is a beggar. He is a wretch and He is crying out to God with nothing but God given faith on the table. It reaches me even in this pit that I am in. Christ is there despite my human inability to truly reach out to Him today. The whole power and majesty of the Triune God is warring for me. This was a beautiful post Joe.<br>Aaron

That little latin phrase, Coram Deo, has really been an important reminder to me that we really do live "before the face of God." Whether we like it or not, whether we acknowledge it or not, whether we are aware of it or not; we are ever before His face. Joe said, "we have lost the imagery and truth of "Prepare to meet thy God!" Sometimes I wonder if we are so drawn away by the pervasive images of this world that just living in the 21st century amidst TV, commercials, ads, so much coming at us from all sides that we do not hold the image of things above in the same measure as those saints of earlier ages. This is not an excuse, it is a reason to be ever more aware of our need to purposefully and consciously renew our minds with the things of God so that we remember who we are and Who He is!

Amen!<br><br>That reminds me of James 1:21-25<br><br>21 Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls. <br>22 But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. <br>23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; <br>24 for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was. <br>25 But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does. <br><br><br>