I exhort therefore, first of all, that supplications, prayers, intercessions, thanksgiving, be made for all men; for kings and all that are in high places; that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in aII godliness and gravity. -1 Tim. 2:1,2.

What a faith in the power of prayer! A few feeble and despised Christians are to influence the mighty Roman emperors, and help in securing peace and quietness. Let us believe that prayer is a power that is taken up by God in His rule of the world. Let us pray for our country and its rulers; for all the rulers of the world; for rulers in cities or districts in which we are interested. When God’s people unite in this, they may count upon their prayers effecting in the unseen world more than they know. Let faith hold this fast.

How to Pray – The Prayer before God as Incense

And another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer; and there was given unto him much incense, that he should add it unto the prayers of all the saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. And the smoke of the incense, with the prayers of the saints, went up before God out of the angel’s hand. And the angel taketh the censer; and he filled it with the fire upon the altar, and cast it upon the earth: and there followed thunder, and voices, and lightning, and an earthquake. -Rev. 8:3-5.

The same censer brings the prayer of the saints before God and casts fire upon the earth. The prayers that go up to heaven have their share in the history of this earth. Be sure that thy prayers enter God’s presence.

Special Petitions

EIGHTEENTH DAY
What to Pray – For Peace

I exhort therefore first of all, that supplications be made for Kings and all that are in high places; that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and gravity. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour. -1 Tim. 2:1-3.
He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth. -Ps. 46:9

What a terrible sight! – the military armaments in which the nations find their pride. What a terrible thought!. – the evil passions that may at any moment bring on war. And what a prospect for suffering and desolation that must come. God can, in answer to the prayer of His people, give peace. Let us pray for it, and for the rule of righteousness on which alone it can be stablished.

How to Pray – With the Understanding

What is it then will pray with the spirit, and I will pray with the understanding. -1 Cor. 14: 15.

We need to pray with the spirit, as the vehicle of the intercession of God’s Spirit, if we are to take hold of God in faith and power. We need to pray with the understanding, if we are really to enter deeply into the needs we bring before Him. Take time to apprehend intelligently, in each subject, the nature, the extent, the urgency of the request, the ground and way and certainty of God’s promise as revealed in His Word. Let the mind affect the heart. Pray with the understanding and with the spirit.

Special Petitions

Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. -2 Tim. 3:5.
Thou hast a name that thou livest, and thou art dead. -Rev. 3: 1.

There are five hundred million nominal Christians. The state of the majority is unspeakably awful. Formality, worldliness, ungodliness, rejection of Christ’s service, ignorance, and indifference – to what an extent does all this prevail. We pray for the heathen – oh! do let us pray for those bearing Christ’s name – many in worse than heathen darkness. Does not one feel as if one ought to begin to give up his life, and to cry day and night to God for souls? In answer to prayer God gives the power of the Holy Ghost.

How to Pray – In Deep Stillness of Soul

My soul is silent unto God: from Him cometh my salvation. -Ps. 62:1.

Prayer has its power in God alone. The nearer a man comes to God Himself, the deeper he enters into God’s will; the more he takes hold of God, the more power in prayer. God must reveal Himself. If it please Him to make Himself known, He can make the heart conscious of His presence. Our posture must be that of holy reverence, of quiet waiting and adoration. As your month of intercession passes on, and you feel the greatness of your work, be still before God. Thus you will get power to pray.

Special Petitions

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Behold, these shall come from far; and these from the land of Sinim. -Isa. 49: 12.
Princes shall come out of Egypt; Ethiopia shall haste to stretch out her hands to God. -Ps. 68:31.
I the Lord will hasten it in his time. -Isa. 60:22.

Pray for the heathen, who are yet without the Word. Think of China, with her three hundred millions – a million a month dying without Christ. Think of Dark Africa, with its two hundred millions. Think of thirty millions a year going down into the thick darkness. If Christ gave His life for them, will you not do so? You can give yourself up to intercede for them. Just begin, if you have never yet begun, with this simple monthly school of intercession. The ten minutes you give will make you feel this is not enough. God’s Spirit will draw you on. Persevere, however feeble you are. Ask God to give you some country or tribe to pray for. Can anything be nobler than to do as Christ did? Give your life for the heathen.

How to Pray – With Confident Expectation of an Answer

Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and will shew thee great things and difficult, which thou knowest not. -Jer. 33:3.
Thus saith the Lord God: I will yet be inquired of, that I do it. -Ezek. 3:37.

Both texts refer to promises definitely made, but their fulfillment would depend upon prayer: God would be inquired of to do it. Pray for God’s fulfillment of His promises to His Son and His Church, and expect the answer. Plead for the heathen: plead God’s promises.

Special Petitions

TWENTY-FIRST DAY
What to Pray – For God’s Spirit on the Jews

I will pour out upon the house of David, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and supplications; and they shall look unto Me whom they pierced. -Zech. 12: 10.
Brethren, my heart’s desire and my supplication to God is for them, that they may be saved. -Rom. 10:1.

Pray for the Jews. Their return to the God of their fathers stands connected, in a way we cannot tell, with wonderful blessing to the Church, and with the coming of our Lord Jesus. Let us not think that God has foreordained all this, and that we cannot hasten it. In a divine and mysterious way God has connected his fulfillment of His promise with our prayer. His Spirit’s intercession in us is God’s forerunner of blessing. Pray for Israel and the work done among them. And pray too: Amen. Even so, come Lord Jesus!

How to Pray – With the Intercession of the Holy Spirit

We know not how to pray as we ought; but the Spirit Himself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. -Rom. 8:26.

In your ignorance and feebleness believe in the secret indwelling and intercession of the Holy Spirit within you. Yield yourself to His life and leading habitually. He will help your infirmities in prayer. Plead the promises of God even where you do not see how they are to be fulfilled. God knows the mind of the Spirit, because He maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God. Pray with the simplicity of a little child; pray with the holy awe and reverence of one in whom God’s Spirit dwells and prays.

Special Petitions

TWENTY-SECOND DAY
What to Pray – For All Who Are in Suffering

Remembering them that are in bonds, as bound with them; them that are evil entreated, as being yourselves in the body. -Heb. 13:3.

What a world of suffering we live in! How Jesus sacrificed all and identified Himself with it! Let us in our measure do so too. The persecuted, the Jews, the famine-stricken millions of India, the hidden slavery of Africa, the poverty and wretchedness of our great cities – and so much more: what suffering among those who know God and who know Him not. And then in smaller circles, in ten thousand homes and hearts, what sorrow. In our own neighborhood, how many needing help or comfort. Let us have a heart for, let us think of the suffering. It will stir us to pray, to work, to hope, to love more. And in a way and time we know not God will hear our prayer.

How to Pray – Praying always and not fainting

He spake unto them a parable to the end that they ought always to pray, and not to faint. -Luke 18:1.

Do you not begin to feel prayer is really the help for this sinful world? What a need there is of unceasing prayer! The very greatness of the task makes us despair! What can our ten minutes intercession avail? It is right we feel this: this is the way in which God is calling and preparing us to give our life to prayer. Give yourself wholly to God for men, and amid all your work, your heart will be drawn out to men in love, and drawn up to God in dependence and expectation. To a heart thus led by the Holy Spirit, it is possible to pray always and not to faint.

Special Petitions

I labour, striving according to His working, which worketh in me mightily. -Col. 1:29.

You have your own special work; make it a work of intercession. Paul labored, striving according to the working of God in him. Remember, God is not only the Creator, but the Great Workman, who worketh all in all. You can only do your work in His strength, by His working in you through the Spirit. Intercede much for those among whom you work, till God gives you life for them. Let us all intercede too for each other, for every worker throughout God’s Church, however solitary or unknown.

How to Pray – In God’s Very Presence

Draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you. Jas. 4:8.

The nearness of God gives rest and power in prayer. The nearness of God is given to him who makes it his first object. “Draw nigh to God” seek the nearness to Him, and He will give it; “He will draw nigh to you.” Then it becomes easy to pray in faith. Remember that when first God takes you into the school of intercession it is almost more for your own sake than that of others. You have to be trained to love, and wait, and pray, and believe. Only persevere. Learn to set yourself in His presence, to wait quietly for the assurance that He draws nigh. Enter His holy presence, tarry there, and spread your work before Him. Intercede for the souls you are working among. Get a blessing from God, His Spirit into your own heart, for them.

Special Petitions

Beginning at Jerusalem. -Luke 24:47.

Each one of us is connected with some congregation or circle of believers, who are to us the part of Christ’s body with which we come into most direct contact. They have a special claim on our intercession. Let it be a settled matter between God and you that you are to labor in prayer on its behalf. Pray for the minister and all leaders or workers in it. Pray for the believers according to their needs. Pray for conversions. Pray for the power of the Spirit to manifest itself. Band yourself with others to join in secret in definite petitions. Let intercession be a definite work, carried on as systematically as preaching or Sunday School. And pray, expecting an answer.

How to Pray – Continually

Watchmen, that shall never hold their peace day or night. -Isa. 62:6.
His own elect, that cry to Him day and night. -Luke 18:7
Night and day praying exceedingly that we may perfect that which is lacking in your faith. -1 Thess.3:10.
A widow indeed, hath her hope set in God, and continueth in supplications night and day. -1 Tim. 5:5.

When the glory of God, and the love of Christ, and the need of souls are revealed to us, the fire of this unceasing intercession will begin to burn in us for those who are near and those who are far off.

Special Petitions

TWENTY-FIFTH DAY
What to Pray – For More Conversions

He is able to save completely, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession. -Heb. 7:25.
We will give ourselves continually to prayer and the ministry of the Word . . . And the Word of God increased; and the number of the disciples multiplied exceedingly. -Acts 6:4, 7.

Christ’s power to save, and save completely, depends on His unceasing intercession. The apostles’ withdrawing themselves from other work to give themselves continually to prayer was followed by the number of the disciples multiplying exceedingly. As we, in our day, give ourselves to intercession, we shall have more and mightier conversions. Let us plead for this. Christ is exalted to give repentance. The Church exists with the Divine purpose and promise of having conversions. Let us not be ashamed to confess our sins and feebleness, and cry to God for more conversions in Christian and heathen lands, of those too whom you know and love. Plead for the salvation of sinners.

How to Pray – In Deep Humility

Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs . . . O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. -Matt. 15:27,28.

You feel unworthy and unable to pray aright. To accept this heartily, and to be content still to come and be blest in your unworthiness, is true humility. It proves its integrity by not seeking for anything, but simply trusting His grace. And so it is the very strength of a great faith, and gets a full answer. “Yet the dogs” – let that be your plea as you persevere for someone possibly possessed of the devil. Let not your littleness hinder you for a moment.

Special Petitions

Peter and John prayed for them, that they might receive the Holy Ghost; for as yet He was fallen upon none of them: only they had been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus. – Acts 8:15, 16.
Now He which establisheth us with you in Christ, and anointed us, is God; who also gave us the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts. -2 Cor. 1:21,22.

How many new converts who remain feeble; how many who fall into sin; how many who backslide entirely. If we pray for the Church, its growth in holiness and devotion to God’s service, pray especially for the young converts. How many stand alone, surrounded by temptation; how many have no teaching on the Spirit in them, and the power of God to establish them; how many in heathen lands, surrounded by Satan’s power. If you pray for the power of the Spirit in the Church, pray especially that every young convert may know that he may claim and receive the fullness of the Spirit.

How to Pray – Without Ceasing

As for me, God forbid that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to pray for you. -1 Sam. 12:23.

It is sin against the Lord to escape praying for others. When once we begin to see how absolutely indispensable intercession is, just as much a duty as loving God or believing in Christ, and how we are called and bound to it as believers, we shall feel that to cease intercession is grievous sin. Let us ask for grace to take up our place as priests with joy, and give our lives to bring down the blessing of Heaven.

Special Petitions