SQLite format 3@  ii!%%atableTopicsTopicsCREATE TABLE Topics (Title NVARCHAR(100), Notes TEXT)_Uy00 Gates of Prayer{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmuu`9Q?  rqar by John MacDuff\par \par "Prayer is a Golden Key, which should open the\par morning and lock up the evening." We can say of\par prayer, what Christian said to Hopeful in the\par dungeon, "I have a KEY in my bosom that will, I\par am persuaded, open any lock in Doubting Castle!"\par \par Each day contains two separate prayers\emdash\par one for the morning, and one for the evening.\par \par CHOICE EXCERPTS\par \par \par Heavenly Father, Almighty and Everlasting God, I approach Your gracious presence. In the extremity of my own weakness, may I lean on Your Almighty arm\emdash hold me up, and I shall be safe. Preserve me from the world's insinuating, seductive power, and from the treachery and deceitfulness of my own evil heart. Order my steps in Your word, and let no iniquity have dominion over me.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Waiting on You afresh, may I receive strength and courage for all the duties of a new day. I would confide to Your ear every need, every care, every sorrow, every cross.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Inspire me with devout acquiescence in Your will, knowing that whatever You appoint must be for the best. Preserve me from peevishness and fretfulness\emdash from petulance of temper and hastiness of speech\emdash from covetousness and selfishness.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Lord, I come, owning my great unworthiness. I come with my poverty and helplessness, my doubts and conflicts, my foes and fears, my difficulties and perplexities, my sorrows and my sins. I would lay the heavy burden of them all, at the foot of the Redeemer's cross. In that cross alone I would glory. I look away from myself to His completed work. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I have too often sought for happiness in objects and pursuits which fail to satisfy the yearnings of the immortal spirit. Lord, have mercy upon me! Save me from the sins which most easily ensnare me. From the love of the world which alienates my affections from heavenly realities\emdash from the love of self which interferes with the entire consecration of the heart to Christ\emdash from the covetousness which hardens\emdash from the impurity which debases and enslaves! From every evil lust and passion and temper\emdash good Lord, deliver me! Conscious of my own utter weakness, I would look for the supplies of Your promised grace. By it alone I stand. If I am enabled this day to resist temptation, it is all Your doing. It is You who uphold me by Your right hand. Human power is impotent to break the chains of sin and Satan.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I bless You that, as the Good Shepherd who gave Your own life for the sheep\emdash the weakest, the weariest, the most burdened of the flock can claim Your regard. You mark out our pasture for us. You know Your sheep by name and lead them out. If at times I am unable to understand the mystery of Your dealings\emdash if at times You lead along the thorny path\emdash teaching by crossed purpo ses and baffled and thwarted expectations\emdash may it be mine to confide in Your unerring wisdom. May I implicitly trust Your faithfulness; glorifying Your holy name by unquestioning submission, saying "Lord, here am I\emdash do to me, and with me, as seems best in Your sight." "Though You slay me, yet will I trust in You." Strong in Your grace, may I strive to live under the sovereignty of that loftiest motive\emdash that whatever pleases You shall please me; that whatever be Your holy will shall be mi ne.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par If the path of prosperity should be chequered\emdash if human props fail\emdash if human refuges reveal themselves to be refuges of lies\emdash if worldly substance be impaired\emdash if earthly love dies\emdash may that which is perishable and corruptible only drive me nearer to the incorruptible\emdash to seek closer and more intimate fellowship with Him in whose presence there is fullness of joy. Thus, trusting You and loving You, let me rise superior to all that i s fleeting and fluctuating around.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par O Father, I bring all my needs and sins, my difficulties and trials and perplexities\emdash and pour them into the loving ear of my most loving Father-God. Keep me from living as if this world were my final rest, and home, and portion. May I seek, rather, to live from day to day as one whose true home is above. May I trust a Father's love, a Father's hand, a Father's heart, a Father's rod; regarding Your dealings as needful discipline; a nd honoring You by simple, confiding, unreserved submission.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Adorable Redeemer, give me grace that I may be more and more assimilated to Your holy image, and more and more molded in conformity to Your holy will. Impart to me Your meekness, Your humility, Your gentleness, Your forgiveness of injuries\emdash Your tender consideration for others; that patience under provocation which made You stand as a Lamb silent before Your shearers. Make me more lowly and loving\emdash more resigned and submissive. May I live under the power of renewed affections. Raise me above all fretting cares and timid fears, above all morbid anxieties and solicitudes about trifles.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par O unchanging Savior-God, lead me to Yourself\emdash the Rock that is higher than I. Whatever is the cause of my trials, may I be enabled, in unmurmuring, uncomplaining submission to say, "Even so, Father!" In the midst of impaired health, and thwarted schemes, and disappointed hopes, and broken hearts, and voices hushed in death\emdash may it be mine exultingly to exclaim, as I look to the One who survives all blanks and losses, "They shall perish, but You remain; as a vesture shall You fold them up, and they shall be changed; but YOU are the same, and Your years shall not fail."\par \par * * * * * *\par \par O God, who is the refuge of all who seek You, may I know this day the blessedness of those who dwell in the secret place of the Most High, and who abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I rejoice that I am never a solitary moment away from Your guardianship and care\emdash that You compass my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways. Amid all changes\emdash You are the abiding One. The world's joys are shadowy and fleeting\emdash they mock the hand which grasps them; the world's refuges are refuges of lies. But in the pavilion of Your love I am ever safe and secure. Hide me there until earth's calamities be over and past. I adore You as the Supreme Disposer of all events. Your purposes no accident can change\emdash Your faithfulness no time can impair\emdash Your counsels no created being can question or resist. Blessings and trials, comforts and crosses\emdash come alike from You. You send the gourd. You send the worm. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? I adore You especially as the God of Salvation, and praise You for the riches of Your sovereign grace in Jesus.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I come to You, Blessed Lord, thanking You for all Your mercies. How manifold have been the proofs and tokens of Your kindness and faithfulness! The past has been paved with love. There is no friend in the world who has been like You, and none so willing to befriend me. You have showered me with the blessings of Your goodness. While others have been laid on beds of sickness or cut down by sudden death, I am still among the living to praise You. Above all, You have bestowed upon me the Gift of gifts\emdash that Gift which in magnitude and preciousness dwarfs and absorbs all others. Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable Gift! Life may well be a perpetual hymn of gratitude for all Your unmerited mercies, alike temporal and spiritual. I am unworthy of the least of them. It is to Your free Sovereign abounding Grace I owe them all. Not unto me O Lord, not unto me, but unto Your name I would give glory\emdash for Your mercy and for Your truth's sake.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Lord, I have to mourn my constant proneness to depart from You\emdash the instability of my best resolutions\emdash the fitfulness of my best frames and feelings\emdash the sordidness of my best motives. I confess, without reservation, my heart-sins, lip-sins, life-sins\emdash omitted duties\emdash abused mercies\emdash unsanctified warnings\emdash love of the world\emdash love of ease\emdash love of self\emdash taking Your gifts and forgetting the Giver. Blessed Savior, have mercy upon me. I confide in Your infinite power and wisdom. There is a potency in Your name to soothe every fear and to hush every sorrow. Say in the might of Your mingled omnipotence and love\emdash "Your sins are all forgiven!" I cast myself on You, alike for time and in eternity. In life, may I feel the power of Your sustaining grace; in trouble, the support of Your tender consolations; and in death the all-sufficiency of Your exceeding great and precious promises.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Fit me this day for the battle of life. Trusting to the promised aids of Your Spirit, may I be enabled to resist the world, the flesh, and the devil. Keep me from absorbing love of this world\emdash from all forbidden paths\emdash from all doubtful and debatable ground. Preserve me from the lusts which debase, the selfishness which hardens, the anger or malice which, if unchecked and unrepressed, may grow into malevolence.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par May the joys of the way and the trials of the way alike bring me nearer heaven and nearer to You.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." I go forth this day into a world of trouble and trial and conflict. In no armor or power of my own am I proof against the enemy\emdash but I take refuge in the elevating assurance that I can do all things, and suffer all things, and overcome all things\emdash through Christ who strengthens me.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Heavenly Father, Almighty and Everlasting God, You are the Supreme Disposer. There is no such thing as accident or chance in Your providential rule. Each varying scene in this varying chequered life is from You alone. In all difficulties and perplexities, enable me to commit my way implicitly unto Your better direction\emdash hearing Your voice behind me saying, "This is the way, walk in it"\emdash rejoicing in Your wise orderings, Your beneficent purposes\emdash and willing to tread, if need be, the roughest path, because it is Your sovereign will and wisdom to lead me there. Teach me ever devoutly to follow the leadings, and to imbibe the spirit, of the divine Redeemer. Keep me . . .\par from the manifestation of unholy tempers,\par from the pride which elates,\par from the worldliness which hardens,\par from all unkindness and uncharitableness.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Heavenly Father, Almighty and Everlasting God, keep me from the absorbing love of the world; from coveting earthly good rather than heavenly riches. Keep me from all that would dim, to the eye of faith\emdash the glories of the future. Enable me to live habitually, as I would wish I had been living, when the Son of man comes. Let me also anticipate with joy that day when . . .\par all mysteries will be unfolded,\par all wrongs redressed,\par all sufferings removed,\par all corruptions vanquished,\par and death itself swallowed up in eternal victory!\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I adore You, especially, for the mightiest proof which You have given of Your benignity and kindness, in the person and work of Your dear Son! Herein indeed is love! If at times unable to trace, in Your mysterious providential dealings, the footsteps of mercy\emdash if at times tempted, under baffling dispensations, to say, "Your judgments are a great deep"\emdash "Truly You are a God who hides Yourself"\emdash seated at the foot of Calvary's cross, we can joyfully exclaim, "We have known and believed the love God which has to us."\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Man's love is changing\emdash Yours is unchanging; man's love is finite\emdash Yours is infinite; man's love is the result of kindness, the return of love for love\emdash but You commend Your love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us! Thanks, eternal thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift!\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Before I engage in my daily duties, I would implore Your guidance and protection. I cannot forecast the circumstances in which I may be placed today\emdash what temptations may beset me\emdash what troubles may oppress me. Let a sense of Your presence hallow my labors\emdash that so, begun, carried on, and ended in You\emdash all may redound to Your praise and glory. Let me use, with a glad and grateful heart, the many enjoyments You have given me in this beautiful earth; but abolish the evil dominion of self and selfishness. Keep me from the beguiling and seductive love of pleasure, on which Your approval cannot rest. Write the law of kindness on my heart. Let it be my happiness and joy to minister to others. May I feel that it is better to give than to receive; better to be last than to be first. Keep me pure\emdash preserve me from false living\emdash from all artifice\emdash all underhand and dubious dealings\emdash all crooked and covetous ways. May my conversation be sincere, my conscience clear as the noonday. Serving You cheerfully here, may I become more and more fitted for the full consecration\emdash the perfect spontaneity of the heavenly world.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Teach me ever to realize what a needy pensioner I am, from day to day and from hour to hour\emdash on Your grace. Hold me up! Keep me, guide me, protect me, undertake for me. In temptation support me\emdash in danger defend me\emdash in sorrow comfort me. If You send prosperity, enable me to carry the cup with a steady hand. If You send adversity, enable me to glorify You in the midst of the fires\emdash adoring a 'taking' God, as well as a 'giving' God. As a member of the Christian priesthood, may it be my desire to offer on Your altar the continual sacrifice of a humble spirit, and a holy, pure, consistent life. Keep the lamp of faith and love trimmed and burning. Let me aim, more and more, at the crucifixion of sin and self. Should You speak at times by crossed dealings and mysterious dispensations, reading the impressive lesson of earth's corruptible and defiled and fading inheritances\emdash may I harbor no guilty suspicions of Your faithfulness, or seek to arraign the appointments of Your paternal wisdom. Let me bear, with patience, whatever You see fit to appoint. Put into my lips the! prayer, divinely taught, "Your will be done." Seeking to have no jot or tittle altered in the allotments of infinite love, may I look forward to that morning without clouds, when in Your light I shall see light, and when every shadow which now dims and darkens\emdash shall forever flee away!\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Deliver me from the enthralling power and bondage of sin in every form. As a temple of the Holy Spirit, may I be kept from whatever would defile or desecrate its hallowed courts. Pre"serve me from the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eye, and the pride of life\emdash from the power of all carnal appetites and corrupt affections. Guard the springs of thought and will. Prevent me from harboring or indulging unrighteous desires. In all I do, may I put on love, which is the bond of perfectness. Having the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, may I sit at the feet of Him who pleased not Himself.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Even when the footsteps of a God of love fail to be tra#ced\emdash may there be implicit trust in the wisdom and rectitude of inscrutable dealings.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Gracious Redeemer, You have a balm for every wound; an antidote for every sorrow.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Give the quickening energy of Your Holy Spirit, to disarm the power of temptation\emdash to dethrone self\emdash to deliver from the seductive influences of the world. Keep me from the intoxication of success\emdash and the pride of prosperity. Keep me from undue depr$ession\emdash and guilty murmuring in adversity.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par While I bear about with me continually the dying of the Lord Jesus, may the life of Jesus be made manifest in my mortal flesh. May it be my habitual aspiration, that my character be a reflection of His\emdash in its gentleness and meekness\emdash its purity and unselfishness\emdash its benevolence and sympathy.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par As the tree falls\emdash so must it lie. As death leaves us\emdash so will judgm%ent and eternity find us.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Lord, I have reason to mourn my manifold sins\emdash my disobedience and unbelief\emdash my ingratitude and rebellion. I am a wonder to myself\emdash self-destroyer that I am\emdash that You have spared me\emdash that You have not, long before now, pronounced against me the cumberer's sentence, and executed against me the cumberer's righteous doom. It is because You are God and not man, that, despite of all I have done to merit Your just displeas&ure\emdash Your anger is turned away, and Your hand of mercy and love and compassion is stretched out still.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par You are willing to bestow every needed blessing\emdash pardoning grace\emdash sustaining grace\emdash strengthening grace\emdash sanctifying grace\emdash comforting grace\emdash grace, until grace is no longer needed, but is lost and swallowed up in glory! O You who gives "more grace," hide me deeper in the clefts of the smitten Rock! Other refuge I have none\emdas'h my helpless soul depends entirely on You. Lord, save me\emdash else I perish! Save me, I beseech You, not only from the guilt, but from the power of sin. Save me from the corruptions of my own heart\emdash from the seductive influences of the world\emdash from the temptations that may be incident to my secular duties and engagements. Save me from the sin that most easily besets me\emdash save me from bringing dishonor on Your holy cause and Your holy name, by my inconsistent conduct or uneven walk. Save( me, oh, save me, from the wrath to come!\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I come pleading that Name which soothes all sorrows, heals all wounds, dries all tears; which is manna to the hungry soul, and rest to the weary. How many are now in Glory, testifying to the boundless stores of grace hidden in Christ!\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I desire to acknowledge my great unworthiness\emdash my constant and grievous departures from the path of Your commandments. I have gone astray like a lost sheep, fo)llowing too much the devices and the desires of my own heart. You might have righteously excluded me forever from the green pastures and still waters, and left me to pursue my own devious wanderings. But blessed be Your name, in the midst of abounding sin there is abounding grace\emdash the Good Shepherd\emdash He who gave His own life for the sheep, is still waiting to be gracious\emdash not willing that any of His sheep should perish, but that all should come unto Him and live. Cause me to know the way *wherein I should walk, for I lift up my soul unto You. May I have the habitual feeling that I am only safe when following the footsteps and leadings of the Great Shepherd of the flock. May the realizing sense of His presence and nearness, sweeten all joy and alleviate all sorrow.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Lord, reveal to me, more and more, the infinite evil of sin\emdash the ingratitude of such requitals of Your love and resistings of Your Spirit. Keep me pure\emdash protect me from temptation\emd+ash preserve me unspotted from the world. Give me the habit of a holy life. May my affections be more entirely surrendered to You.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par The thread of my life is in Your hand. I am no judge of what is best for me\emdash often would I choose the evil and refuse the good. But You are ever faithful and unerring. O lead me, not in my own way\emdash but in the way that I ought to go. May it be mine, amid every vicissitude, to recognize infinite wisdom in all Your allotments\emdash t,o sit at the feet of the Great Teacher, contented with the assurance, "This also comes from the Lord Almighty, who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working." Blessed be Your name for Your wise teaching in the past\emdash for all the deliverances You have given in times of danger\emdash for all the help in times of trouble\emdash for all the support in times of temptation. I would desire implicitly to trust You in the future. There is no corruption but what Your grace will enable me to subdue\emdas-h there is no cross but what Your grace will enable me to carry\emdash there is no foe but Your grace will enable me to conquer.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par "As for God, his way is perfect." I thank You, Heavenly Father, that from day to day, and from hour to hour, I am under Your wise and loving direction\emdash that it is You who set up the waymarks, and appoint the bounds of my habitation. The lot may be cast into the lap, but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord. If left to my own self, I .would often choose the evil and refuse the good\emdash I might select what was selfish and perilous and sinful\emdash what might compromise my peace of conscience, and endanger my spiritual interests. I have often erred in the past, pursuing at times devious paths on which Your blessing could not rest. I would desire to take You more as my guide and counselor for the future. Let me follow You wholly\emdash trusting Your heart, even where I fail to trace Your hand\emdash amid all vicissitudes and perplexit/ies, hearing Your voice behind me saying, "This is the way, walk in it"\emdash and writing over every dubious path\emdash every mysterious Providence\emdash "As for God, His way is perfect."\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I know that all Your dealings are dictated by unerring wisdom and unchangeable love. I would look forward, with joyful confidence, to that great Day of disclosures, when the now sealed roll shall be unfolded, and when every tongue will be brought to confess, "The Lord was righteous in0 all His ways, and holy in all His works." Meanwhile, with the fear of God within me, and the eye of God above me, and the Heaven of God before me\emdash may I prosecute steadfastly my pilgrim-way\emdash going up through the wilderness leaning on Your arm. And then, though an army should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear\emdash for greater is He who is with me, and for me\emdash than all those who can be against me. Amid the changes of the world and the instability of earth's best props and refug1es\emdash amid the tossings and heavings of this treacherous sea of life\emdash may I cling to the sure anchorage\emdash "As for God, His way is perfect."\par \par * * * * * *\par \par My every sorrow is numbered and appointed by the Man of Sorrows. May I feel how light and trivial my bitterest cup is\emdash compared with the cup of suffering He so willingly drained for me.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I have to confess and mourn my great unworthiness. How far short have I come of that holiness o2f heart and purity of life, without which no man can see the Lord. How many sinful thoughts have I harbored\emdash how many guilty words have I spoken\emdash how many duties have I omitted, or carelessly and perfunctorily performed. How little gratitude have I shown for blessings\emdash how little patience under crosses. How much pride has there been in my humility\emdash how little childlike trust in Your dealings. How have even my best resolutions to serve You, been erased by the world's oblivion-power.3 How often have I returned to those very sins I had solemnly sworn and covenanted I was to part with forever. Lord, have mercy upon me! I come anew, guilty, polluted, helpless\emdash to Him who is help and hope and portion\emdash to all who seek Him. My own repentings and tears cannot cleanse away the guilt of a single transgression. But the blood of Jesus Christ, Your dear Son, cleanses from them all.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Deliver me from the enthralling power and bondage of sin in every form4. I anticipate with joy that day when all mysteries will be unfolded\emdash all wrongs redressed\emdash all sufferings removed\emdash all corruptions vanquished\emdash and death itself swallowed up in eternal victory!\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Even when the footsteps of a God of love fail to be traced\emdash may I have implicit trust in the wisdom and rectitude of Your inscrutable dealings.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par While I bear about with me continually the dying of the Lord Jesus, may th5e life also of Jesus be made manifest in my mortal flesh. May it be my habitual aspiration, that my character be a reflection of His\emdash in its gentleness and meekness\emdash its purity and unselfishness\emdash its benevolence and sympathy.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Let me trust You in the dark. Amid all tossings and tribulations, may I see in every trial, only the appointed billow to waft my bark nearer the haven, and may I sing amid the storm\emdash "So gives He His beloved rest."\par \par 6* * * * * *\par \par Most Gracious God, how insensible have I proved to the multiplied tokens of Your love and kindness. Your mercies have been unworthily requited; my duties have been perfunctorily performed. Corruption within has responded to temptation from without. There has been too often pride where there should have been humility\emdash resentment where there should have been forgiveness\emdash unbelief where there should have been trust\emdash murmuring where there should have been submission an7d resignation. For Your name's sake, O Lord, pardon my iniquity\emdash for it is great. A sinner to the uttermost, I rejoice that, in Your dear Son, there is salvation to the uttermost. I rejoice in Him as the very Savior I need. Though omnipotence slumbers in His arm, He is touched with a fellow-feeling for all my infirmities. He can enter, with tender sensitiveness, into every temptation that crosses my path, and into every pang that rends my heart. I would lay hold anew on the blood besprinkled horns o8f the altar; and listen to Your voice of power and grace and love saying, "Your sins which are many are all forgiven you!" Give to me, I beseech You, salvation from the power, as well as from the guilt, of sin. This is Your will concerning me, even my sanctification. Keep me from all hardness of heart and contempt of Your holy word and commandment\emdash from envy and malice\emdash from pride and vain-glory\emdash from vanity and lies\emdash from tampering with temptation in any form, and thus endangering9 my present peace and imperiling my soul's everlasting interests. Guard every loophole by which any spiritual foe might enter. Give me resolute energy of will, to resist and to endure\emdash as seeing Him who is invisible.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Give me grace to look beyond the cloudy present\emdash to the stormless skies of that better land, where the pang of sorrow can neither be felt nor feared. Lying passive in Your hands, may it be mine through my tears to say, "Father, glorify Your name!":\par \par * * * * * *\par \par As a suppliant at the gates of prayer, may I feel it to be a privilege to draw near unto You. Give me filial trust and confidence. Enable me to unburden, without reserve, into Your ear\emdash all my trials and difficulties.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par How unworthy, Lord, I am of Your paternal regard and patient forbearance! How much have I done to forfeit Your favor! I have been rebellious and wayward\emdash unthankful and unholy\emdash leaving too often Your count;less mercies unacknowledged\emdash dethroning You from my affections, and giving to others the loyalty and allegiance which should be Yours alone. Give me deep contrition for an erring past. Graciously give me Your help. Lord, I feel that this struggling with sin, this conflict with temptation, is a hopeless contest without You\emdash without Your strengthening, sustaining, restraining grace. Hold me up\emdash and I shall be safe.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Let it be my habitual aim to imbibe the m for me. If there is any indication of spiritual quickening or vitality within me, it is derived from You, the source and inspiration of all energy and goodness. I can do all things through Christ strengthening me. "More grace! more grace!" may this be my constant prayer. Hold me up, and I shall be safe.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I confide in Your wisdom which never errs, and Your love which never changes.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I look forward to that glorious land, where there is no si?n to crucify\emdash where there is no corruption to subdue\emdash where there is nothing to be delivered from\emdash where the joy and the presence of the Lord will be my eternal strength.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par May Your children, who are laid on couches of sickness, manifest a spirit of unmurmuring submission to Your will; recognizing Your hand, and Your hand alone\emdash remembering that You are never arbitrary in Your dealings\emdash that even "wearisome nights are appointed." Give them stre@ngth to be silent ministers of the truth, by exhibiting the power of Your sustaining grace; looking beyond the cloudlands of earth, to the better country, where the inhabitant shall no more say, "I am sick." Thus patiently bearing their cross, may they anticipate, with calm and joyful expectancy, that blessed hour, when all the sorrows and tribulations of earth will be forgotten in the words of welcome, "Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of thAe world!"\par \par * * * * * *\par \par O Lord, forearm me by Your grace. In the battle with evil, around me and within me\emdash I would overcome alone by the blood of the Lamb. Give me grace to live under a sense of Your All-Seeing Eye; rejoicing that no distance and no locality can separate You and I.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par You can enter with tender sensitiveness into the keenest woes of humanity. I can think of You, the Prince of Sufferers, feeling for me\emdash weeping for me\emdash blBeeding for me\emdash dying for me. Three is no extremity of distress, in which Your hand is shortened, or Your ear is heavy.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par It is by Your grace alone I stand. Hold me up and I shall be safe. Shield me from the snares of a seductive world; fortify me against the assaults of temptation. Pray for me, as You did for Your erring disciple, that my faith fail not.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par It is You alone who can whisper forgiveness, quiet misgivings, quicken faith, subCdue corruption. Feeling the yoke of sin heavy and grievous, I come to You, whose yoke is easy and whose burden is light. Weary and heavy-laden\emdash in Your cross I would find rest for my soul. May I lean upon You with unfaltering dependence\emdash may I be consecrated to You in unswerving allegiance. Enable me more and more to crucify sin. May its power be subdued and its love mortified. May I set watch at every avenue by which temptation may gain entrance.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par When every oDther source of comfort fails\emdash may all my springs be in You. When in deep distress, may I adore Your sovereignty, and own Your wisdom, and trust Your love. May Christ be magnified in me whether by life or by death. May I find Him the one way to consolation and peace.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par "Everyone who has this hope in Him, purifies himself just as He is pure." Having this hope in Him\emdash the blessed hope of seeing Him as He is, and of enjoying His everlasting fellowship\emdash may I pEurify myself even as He is pure; daily imbibing more of His meek, gentle, unselfish, unworldly spirit; withdrawing my affections from things which are of the earth, earthy\emdash and consecrating them to His service. Enable me to exercise a vigilant jealousy over my thoughts, words, and actions; seeking to renounce whatever is displeasing to Him, and that would mar my peace of conscience.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par In every difficult and perplexing duty, may this always form the testing question anFd final appeal\emdash "How would my Lord and Savior have acted here?" And knowing His will, may it be my delight to do it. Strengthen the things which remain and are ready to die. Let the power of sin wax weaker and weaker, and let the power of Your grace within me wax stronger and stronger. Thus, blessed Savior, whatever may be the changes and sorrows I experience in this precarious, uncertain existence; with the conscious assurance of Your presence and love, I must be happy. If You are near to me\emdashG if You abide with me\emdash there can be no terror in trial, no bitterness in tears, no sting in death. With You for my portion, I am independent of every other. In all Your dealings towards me, may I recognize the gracious purpose and design of making me more and more fit for that glorious world, where obedience to You shall never falter, and consecration shall never fail; where every thought and wish shall be in unison with the divine.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par O You, whose heart beats responsiHve to the smallest sorrow of Your stricken people, look down in great mercy on Your sons and daughters of affliction. May they know that You have a wise and holy end in all Your discipline. May they come to feel that their greatest trials are the ladder-steps to their greatest blessings\emdash links in the chain which draws them to heaven. Whether You chasten or gladden, may they be enabled to say, "Even so, Father, for it seems good in Your sight."\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Day by day are You loaIding me with Your benefits, and giving me unceasing cause for gratitude and praise.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I acknowledge with deep humiliation my unworthiness and guilt. Each day, as it brings with it the memory of Your great goodness, brings with it also the memory of my multiplied offences. I confess my sins, alike of omission and commission; that I have done the things I ought not to have done, and have left undone those things I ought to have done. I have often no affecting sense of the ensJlaving power of sin. I have too often resorted to false and unavailing refuges for satisfaction and happiness. I have too frequently sought to slake my thirst at the world's polluted cisterns, and failed to remember that all my fresh springs are in You. Lord, have mercy upon me! Christ, have mercy upon me! It is by free, sovereign, unmerited grace, I am what I am. If I stand at last accepted before Your throne, this will be my plea, my confession, my eternal avowal\emdash "Being justified freely by His grKace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." May I live under the elevating consciousness that I stand clothed in His righteousness, and that nothing can ever separate me from His love. Once within the fold, I am in the fold forever. Loving His own at the beginning, He will love them unto the end.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Keep me from conformity to the evil maxims and practices of the world. Enable me to use its blessings without abusing them, and to live under the powers of the world toL come. May I know the conquering, transforming influence of Redeeming love\emdash raising my affections, purifying my desires, elevating my life.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Whatever the cross be, which Your suffering people are called to carry, may they enjoy the assurance, that the same Lord who died for them, lays it on, and keeps it on\emdash that no unnecessary thorn is in their chaplet of sorrow. We look forward to a sinless, sorrowless, tearless immortality!\par \par * * * * * *\par \par MBlessings innumerable have been poured into my lap, but they have often been received with an unthankful heart. Shadowing palms and wells of refreshing have studded my pilgrim path; but I have too frequently reclined under the shadow, and partaken of the refreshment, without any breathing of gratitude to the Bountiful Provider.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Defend me from every snare and danger which may beset my path. Be my Shield in prosperity\emdash my Refuge in adversity\emdash my Comforter in sorNrow\emdash my Light in darkness\emdash my Hope in death\emdash my Defender and Vindicator in judgment\emdash my Joy and Portion through all eternity.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par May the Holy Spirit, the Sanctifier, expel whatever is unholy, and transform me more and more into the image and likeness of Your dear Son.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I have to mourn the poverty of my faith\emdash the lukewarmness of my love\emdash the fitfulness of my obedience\emdash the perfunctory performance of mOy religious duties. How little the precepts of Your sacred Scriptures have been treasured in my heart, and reduced to practice in my daily walk and life. How often I have indulged in tempers and feelings inconsistent with Your revealed will, and with the character of Him who was meek and lowly in heart. I have too often yielded to the power of temptation\emdash bent like a brittle reed in the storm; dishonoring Your name and grieving Your Spirit. You might righteously have left me to reap the fruit of my Pown ways and to be filled with my own devices\emdash saying, "Ephraim is joined to his idols, let him alone."\par \par * * * * * *\par \par I desire to repose on Him who alone can speak peace to the sin-burdened and sorrow-burdened. Looking to His glorious, completed work, I can triumphantly say, Return unto your rest\emdash your peace\emdash O my soul, for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par "Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as tQhe world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid." I would seek to have no wish, and no will, and no way of my own. Do to me, and with me, as seems good in Your sight, only make me possessor of this best blessing\emdash the peace of Yours, which passes all understanding\emdash that peace which the world knows not of\emdash which the world with its riches and pleasures, its blandishments and fascinations\emdash cannot give; and which the world, with all its troubles and anxieties, itRs sorrows and its trials\emdash cannot take away.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par "Whom the Lord loves He chastens." May this prove a quieter to all fears, lull all misgivings, and repress all murmurs.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Anew I commend myself to Your gracious keeping this day. Guide me by Your counsel\emdash guard me from temptation\emdash lead me in the way everlasting. May every unloving thought\emdash every unworthy aim and aspiration\emdash give place to what is pure and unselfish andS kind.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Lord, I would plead for increased communications and supplies of Your grace. Strengthen me with all might by Your Spirit in the inner man. Keep me from all that would be detrimental to my spiritual interests\emdash all that would weaken or impair this filial confidence, and lead me to restrain prayer. Whatever be my dominant sin\emdash ease or pleasure\emdash pride or passion\emdash covetousness or ambition\emdash enable me by the promised help of Your Spirit, to sTubdue it\emdash nailing it to the Redeemer's cross. Enable me to follow His meekness and gentleness; to be kind and forgiving\emdash tender and charitable towards all. Conscious of the supreme enthronement of Your love, may life be, more than it has been\emdash an effort to crucify self and to please You. Even when there may be mystery in Your dealings, let me not wrong Your goodness and wisdom with one shadow of suspicion. Whether by giving or by taking\emdash by smiting or by healing\emdash by the sweetU cup or the bitter\emdash may it be mine to say, "Father! glorify Your name!"\par \par * * * * * *\par \par "The Lord God omnipotent reigns!" O God, I adore Your sovereignty. Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom. All space is Your dominion. You do according to Your will in the armies of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth. You count the number of the stars, and name every one. You heal the broken in heart and bind up their wounds. The sparrow's fall is appointed by You\emdash the young raVven's cry is heard by You\emdash the very hairs of our head are numbered by You. From the drop of the forest leaf, to the departure of the soul in death\emdash all is known to You and ordered by You. You appoint the bounds of our habitation. Man proposes, but You dispose; and You dispose all things well. Let it be thus ever a joyous thought\emdash that whatever concerns me, is under the control and direction of infinite wisdom and unchanging, everlasting love. I cannot forecast the future\emdash but it isW in Your hands. Even if there be cloud and tempest, it is You who walk upon the wings of the wind. Omnipotence treads the stormy waters. Omnipotence directs the roll of every billow and, when it is fit, Omnipotence utters the mandate, "Peace, be still!"\par \par * * * * * *\par \par O God, I have to acknowledge that I have not always thus realized Your constant supervision, and taken the comfort I ought to have derived from Your sovereign rule. I have too often practically forgotten the Great Supreme,X by dwelling on second causes. I have allowed myself to be disturbed and harassed with little vexations\emdash anxious thoughts for the present, and misgivings and forebodings for the future. Enable me to cast all my cares, great or small, on You; knowing that You care for me.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Forbid that I should offer at the shrine of self, or pleasure, or mammon\emdash my best; and be content with giving the remnants of worn and wasted affections to You. May I beware of any and every dYeviation from the straight path. Hold me up and I shall be safe. This day, guard me from whatever would be detrimental to my soul's good. Preserve me from the guilt of wasted hours and slighted opportunities. Enable me to renounce all evil habits\emdash all debasing compliances. May every idol that would usurp Your place be overthrown. May no corrupt thought pollute my heart\emdash no unworthy utterance defile my tongue\emdash no unholy action stain my life.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Adored be YouZr name, that all events are at Your disposal and under Your righteous ordination and control. I rejoice to know that Your dealings, though sovereign, are never arbitrary. You are my Father. Give me trust, and confidence, and filial reverence. Like as a father pities his children, so You pity those who fear You\emdash for You know our frame\emdash You remember that we are dust. Your way is sometimes in the sea, and Your path in the deep waters, and Your judgments unsearchable; but the day is coming when Yo[u will vindicate the rectitude of Your procedure, and bring every tongue to confess that You have done all things well. Let my will be resolved into Yours. Then will the trials of life be disarmed of their sting\emdash when I view them as part of Your own plan of infinite wisdom.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par Alas! the love which ought to have reigned paramount, has too often been supplanted and superseded by other affections. I have to lament my bias to sin\emdash the latent principles of corruption\\emdash the evil heart of unbelief which is ever tempting me to stray from the living God\emdash the burdens and impediments which clog the wings of faith and prevent me soaring heavenwards. Lord, elevate my affections, purify my desires, quicken me to new obedience. May my life become, more than it has been, an offering of gratitude\emdash a sacrifice of praise for all Your many mercies. Keep me from the absorbing power, the benumbing influence of earthly things!\par \par * * * * * *\par \par If You send me blessings, may I connect every gift with the Great Bestower. If You give me the full cup, may I be enabled to carry it with a steady hand. If You appoint crosses, may I have strength to bear them. If You appoint afflictions and bereavements, may I regard them as Your own special messengers sent on a mission of wisdom and mercy.\par \par * * * * * *\par \par All I ask or hope for, is in the name, and for the sake, of Jesus Christ\emdash my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } ^O God, my Heavenly Father, who has permitted me to see the light and to enjoy the comforts of a new day, I bless You for the liberty of access into Your presence. Rend Your heavens and come down; fill my heart with Your love, as I draw near to the footstool of Your Throne. I thank You for Your gracious assurance that these Gates of Prayer lead to an abounding treasury of spiritual blessing, out of which all my need shall be supplied. In Jesus, my adorable Redeemer, infinite fullness dwells; and out of His_ fullness\emdash the riches of Your glory in Him\emdash You are willing to impart even grace for grace.\par \par You have supplied all my need in the past. You have been a loving, a bountiful, and a wise Provider; satisfying me with the blessings of Your goodness, and giving help from trouble, when vain was the help of man. I look to You for guidance and direction in the future. That future is veiled and hidden\emdash but it is in Your better keeping. I would say, in simple confiding faith, "Undertake f`or me." Hitherto have You been true to Your unfailing promise "As your day is, so shall your strength be;" and over every coming need and exigency I may well write "Jehovah Jireh," "The Lord will provide."\par \par Supply that need this day. If called to do battle with evil, let me go forth in Your might, panoplied for the conflict. Strengthen me with Your good Spirit\emdash fortify me against every temptation. In the extremity of my own weakness, may I lean on Your Almighty arm\emdash hold me up, and Ia shall be safe. Preserve me from the world's insinuating, seductive power, and from the treachery and deceitfulness of my own evil heart. Order my steps in Your word, and let no iniquity have dominion over me.\par \par In the discharge of duty, may it be my effort and endeavor to subordinate the secular to the sacred. Keep me ever roused from the low dream of earth, to see, as in the patriarch's dream, the ladder of God. May Your providences be as angels traveling up and down that ladder, and beckoning bme "nearer to You." Keep me from whatever would be detrimental to my spiritual interests\emdash from all avarice and selfishness; from all malice and uncharitableness; from all indolence and sloth; from putting off until tomorrow what can be best done, and may only be done, today.\par \par If You have given me of this world's goods, may I seek to be a generous distributor of Your bounties. If silver and gold I have none, may I give You the consecration of the heart, and the answer of the life; knowing tchat You accept, according to that a man has, not according to what he has not. Forbid that my talent, be what it may, should be hid in the earth. May I ever listen to the prompting "How much do you owe your Lord?" and with a quickened sense of my responsibilities to You the Great Creditor, may I be diligent, that I may be found of You in peace, without spot, and blameless.\par \par Supply the need of those whom I love. Wherever my friends are, O ever-present God, protect and defend them by Your mighty pdower. If You send them prosperity, keep them from being intoxicated with it\emdash if You send adversity, keep them from being unduly depressed by it. Enrich them with the blessings of Your covenant grace. May we all be bound up together, on the great reaping-day of Judgment, in the same 'bundle of life'.\par \par Supply the need of those who are in sorrow. When human cisterns are emptied and human props removed, may they know You as the Portion that cannot be taken from them. May they honor You by beineg silent in the midst of perplexing dealings\emdash recognizing these as the ministers of Your will, sent on a mission of wisdom and mercy, and that while they are only planning for time, You are planning for Eternity. May they trust Your sure word of promise, that though now they may see through a glass darkly\emdash when death shall have rent with his wing the obstructing cloud, in Your light they shall see light. May the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, direct their hearts into the love of God, and into thef patient waiting for Christ.\par \par Bless the nations of the earth. Hasten the day when the nameless wrongs of a now groaning and travailing creation shall be redressed; when all heathen shrines shall be demolished; when will-worship and superstition shall cease. Turn the world's sighings into songs of gladness. Cause its sinful unbelief, the lust and tyranny of passion, the twin curse of slavery and war, to yield to the benignant scepter of the Prince of Peace. Increase the ministry of holy lives, angd loving deeds. Purify Your churches more and more. Stimulate them to greater energy in Your service. As witnesses for You may they seek with augmented and ever increasing fidelity to show forth the Word of life\emdash and may Your faithful ministers enjoy at last the blessed testimony, that they have not run in vain, neither labored in vain.\par \par Listen to these my humble prayers, and when You hear forgive and grant me an answer in peace for the Redeemer's sake. Amen.\par 1st Evening\emdash THE GRhEATEST GIFT\par \par "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life." John 3:16\par \par Almighty God, I desire to approach Your gracious presence on this the evening of another day. I bless You that I can come to the Gate of prayer and know it to be a Gate of love. If the vast creation be Your temple, this is its "Beautiful gate," for God is love. All other powers of Your universe are vassal to love. It is Yoiur nature, Your name, Your glory. No earthly friend could have loved me and cared for me like You. Man's love is finite, Your is infinite. Man's love is changing, Your is unchanging. Man's love must sooner or later die\emdash change it may\emdash perish at some time it must\emdash but Yours is unfailing from everlasting to everlasting.\par \par You have given me the mightiest proof of Your benignity and condescension in the gift of Your dear Son. His advent might have been for the world's condemnation\ejmdash but "God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved." It might have been to pronounce the woe of eternal death\emdash "but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."\par \par Lord, if such has been Your love to me; how poor and cold and inadequate has been my return to You! I have before me, this night, the memories of neglected duty, slighted warnings, broken vows, forgotten mercies, resisted grace. I feel how sin darkekns the understanding\emdash perverts and alienates the will\emdash deadens the heart\emdash depraves the affections. I acknowledge my deep creature destitution; my sins of nature, my sins of practice; my shortcomings known to my fellow creatures, my sadder failures in heart and life, in principle and in duty, alone known to You. I have too often stifled the accusations of an upbraiding conscience\emdash I have permitted the ascendency of worldly influences\emdash I have bent like a brittle reed before thel power of temptation.\par \par I flee anew to the shelter of Your love. May my faith be simpler\emdash deeper\emdash truer. May I have a humbler reliance of the efficacy of the blood of atonement; and by the loyalty I owe to my Redeemer, seek to make a fresh dedication of myself to His service. I would see too, in the gift of Jesus, the pledge of all minor blessings. Let me have no over-anxious care for the future. With the Cross of Calvary before me, may I leave the unknown tomorrow, with all its solicmitudes, in the better keeping of a faithful covenant God. "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him."\par \par Lord, mold my heart more and more in conformity with Your holy will. May I find pleasure in nothing without You; maintaining a constant and habitual hatred of those sins which have again and again severed me from Your favor. Keep me from pride and passion\emdash from fretfulness and discontent\emdash from envy and jealousy. Reprenss all inordinate and unlawful desires. May the faculties of my being and the strength of my affections be surrendered to Your service. May my soul be filled with the one absorbing passion of love to Him who first loved and so loved me.\par \par Look down in kindness on my friends and relatives. May it be theirs also, through the Redeemer's merits, to have the gift of eternal life. May they be among the number of those who love You, who are said to be "as the sun when he goes forth in his might."\par \opar I pray for all whom You have visited with tribulation. May they know that Your purpose in bringing them into the threshing floor, is to separate the chaff from the wheat. May they see the winnowing fan in Your hand\emdash preparing the grain for the heavenly garner. May all sick ones whom Jesus loves, triumph in His love\emdash may the thought that You did not spare even Your own Son, hush every repining word\emdash may they remember that every sorrow that wounds them has wounded Him. May dying ones plisten to the pleadings of the Great Intercessor, "Father I will, that they also whom You have given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory."\par \par Save Your people and bless your inheritance. It is upon a Rock You have built Your church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Be as a wall of fire around Your Zion and the glory in the midst thereof. May God be known in all her palaces for a refuge. May the watchmen on her walls be men of faith and men of prayer, who make mention of the Lord and keep not silence, until He establishes and until He makes His people a praise in the earth.\par \par I desire to compose myself to rest at peace with You, exulting in the plenitude of Your love in Jesus. O God of love and of peace\emdash be the guardian of my sleeping hours\emdash and may every night as it comes round, find me more and more fit and prepared for entering on the great heritage of everlasting life, through my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } 11_Uy00 Gates of Prayer{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 THE GATES OF PRAYER\par \p AAg1-01 Day 01{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 1st Morning\emdash ALL NEED SUPPLIED\par \par "My God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus." Phil. 4:19\par \par ]tr \par "He who spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?" Rom. 8:32\par \par O God, I come into Your blessed presence, thanking You for the rest and the refreshment of the past night. I laid me down and slept, I awaked for the Lord sustained me. You might have made my pillow a pillow of death. But I am once more among the living to praise You\emdash permitted to bend suppliant at the Gates of mercy, and to invoke the presence andu benediction of the prayer-hearing God. I bless You for Your daily bounties of creation and providence\emdash for food and clothing\emdash for health and strength\emdash for social and domestic comforts and endearments; for much that is bright and joyous in my lot. Keep me from the abuse of any of Your gifts, by permitting them to supplant the Giver\emdash may they rather be hallowed and sanctified by linking them with Yourself the Great Bestower. May I be enabled with grateful heart to say, "All my freshv springs are in You."\par \par I thank You especially for Jesus, my gracious Redeemer, the Son of Your love. I bless You that He, before whom angel and archangel, cherubim and seraphim, hymned their triumphant anthems, "laid His glory aside"\emdash assumed our nature\emdash and traveled down to this valley of tears, that He might lift us up from our state of ruin and degradation, and invest us with the glories of immortality. By all that He has done and taught and suffered; by the mystery of His holy inwcarnation; by His completed atonement and perfect righteousness; by the merits of His Sacrifice; by the virtues of His holy life as the all-perfect pattern; by His Intercessory work and mighty pleadings at the right hand of the Father\emdash accept of my unworthy person; pardon my daily sins\emdash receive the fresh consecration of soul and body to Your service. I will wash my hands (not in my own innocency) but in His, so, shall I now compass Your altar O Lord, and with the Golden key of Promise unlock txhe Gates of Prayer.\par \par After this mightiest pledge of Your love, You give me a blank to fill up as I please with all other needed benefits. You put into my lips the gracious challenge "Will You not with Him also, freely give me all things?" Deepen in my heart the sense of my obligation to so gracious a Savior. Strengthen my trust in His unutterable\emdash unalterable love. May His righteousness clothe me\emdash His blood cleanse me\emdash His grace uphold me\emdash His Spirit sanctify me. May it bye my daily and lifelong aspiration to be more and more assimilated to His glorious image. Even should I be called to suffer with Him here, may I cheerfully bear the cross, and remember that this is only a prelude to my reigning with Him hereafter.\par \par Be with me this day in my ordinary avocations\emdash whether these be household duties, or buying and selling and getting gain. Preserve me from using any means for the advancement of my own interests, on which Your blessing cannot rest. May I move unzcontaminated through the world's various scenes. When temptation assails me, give me grace to resist it. Enable me to put a restraint on all angry or resentful passions, all uncharitable thoughts or insinuations; to seek to avenge injuries with love\emdash unkindness with forgiveness\emdash manifesting patience in the midst of provocation. May I seek to defend a brother's character and extenuate his failings\emdash considering myself lest I also be tempted. Conscious of the supreme enthronement of Your lo{ve in my heart, may I be zealous in duty\emdash patient in tribulation\emdash humble and thankful; living under the sovereignty of that loftiest motive, to walk and act so as to please You. That so, when Christ shall come again, He may not find me asleep and unready\emdash but prepared to go forth joyfully to meet Him in the company of His ransomed.\par \par I pray for all the members of my household. May they be members of the household of faith\emdash heirs of God and joint-heirs with Christ\emdash ha|ving their names written in the Lamb's Book of life. I pray for friends at a distance. May they enjoy the fellowship of an ever-present never-absent God. May Jesus be their refuge in life, their strength in prosperity, their prop in adversity\emdash and may the music of His name soothe and refresh their souls in death.\par \par O You, whose heart of old bled for human misery\emdash whose pathway through the world was paved with compassion; who in Your infinite tenderness did gather around You the poor\e}mdash the helpless\emdash the sick\emdash the sorrowful\emdash the brokenhearted, and, as the Great Physician, did heal them all\emdash bend Your pitying eye on all who are in any ways afflicted or distressed in mind, body or estate. Prepare the dying for death. As they feel the chill of the falling shadow, may they think of Him who has taken the substance of death away, and left nothing but the shadow. Grant that when the silver cord is loosed and the golden bowl broken, they may enter on the full fruiti~on of those unspeakable joys which You have prepared for those who love You.\par \par Hear these my unworthy supplications\emdash and all I ask is for Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par \par \par 2nd Evening\emdash TRUST IN THE DARK\par \par "Who among you fears the Lord and obeys the word of his servant? Let him who walks in the dark, who has no light, trust in the name of the Lord and rely on his God." Isaiah 50:10\par \par Heavenly Father, I come into Your presence through the blessed gateway of Trust; desiring to repose in the name of the Lord and to stay upon my God. The name of the Lord is a strong tower, the righteous runs into it and is safe. This is Your name and this Your memorial throughout all generations\emdash the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious. You are infinite in power and boundless in resources. Yet, though You are the mightiest of all Beings, You are also the kindest and the best of all. With You, there is an ever open door of welcome, for the poor\emdash the helpless\emdash the doubting\emdash the desponding\emdash the backsliding\emdash the lost. While justice and judgment are the habitation of Your throne, mercy and truth go continually before Your face.\par \par How wondrous has been Your sparing mercy in the past! The axe might long ago have been laid to the root of the tree\emdash the mandate might have gone forth, "Cut it down." Yet with all my grievous guilt and constant backsliding, You are not "upbraiding;" Your hand of love and forbearance is stretched out still. Forbid that I should be tempted to give way to unbelieving doubts and misgivings, when You are thus waiting to be gracious. Let me not distrust the riches of Your Sovereign love and grace in Jesus, or fail to hold fast the beginning of my confidence.\par \par O You who turn the shadow of death into the morning, enable me to confide in You in the midst of dark and perplexing dealings. Your name is often "Secret"\emdash Your counsels are often "astonishing," walking in darkness Your people at times fail to observe the light. But let it be our comfort to know, that this fitful day, made up often of light and shadow\emdash clearness and gloominess, is "one day known to the Lord;" and to trust Your promise, that "at evening time it shall be light." O Lord our God, who is a strong Lord like unto You! You rule the raging of the sea\emdash when the waves thereof arise, You still them. Speak Your own "Peace be still," and immediately there shall be a great calm.\par \par Abide with me for it is toward evening and the day is far spent. Forgive, for Your dear Son's sake, all the ills I have done this day; all shortcomings in duty\emdash all selfish and unchristlike deeds\emdash all tamperings with sin and temptation\emdash all breaches and infringements of the golden rule\emdash whatever would exalt myself at the expense of others. In the time to come, go before me with Your most gracious favor and further me with Your continual help. May the Lord God be a sun and shield\emdash a sun to enlighten me in the midst of darkness\emdash a shield to protect me in the midst of trouble.\par \par Impart to me that charity which bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Deliver me from all unkind and censorious thoughts; from all reproachful and resentful words. O You who bore nameless wrongs and indignities\emdash give me grace to overcome evil with good\emdash remembering the saying of Your servant, "When you do good and suffer for it, you take it patiently, this is acceptable with God." Keep me from all corroding cares and feverish anxieties\emdash let me ever confide my troubles in Your ear. Let the blessed influences of the truth as it is in Jesus, permeate and penetrate with their leavening power every daily duty, and brace me for the endurance of every trial.\par \par I pray in behalf of all who are in sorrow; those suffering the infliction of bereavement\emdash those enduring the pang of unspoken griefs, those hearts which know their own bitterness, walking in darkness and having no light. Preserve such, also, from the indulgence of a hasty spirit under dark dispensations. Let them know that in sending into the furnace, it is for purification not for destruction\emdash to refine as the gold\emdash to fit the better for Your service here, and for Your presence hereafter. Meanwhile, let them trust in the name of the Lord and stay themselves upon their God. May they too be enabled to say "I have remembered Your name O Lord in the night and have comforted myself!" Prepare the dying for death. May they hear the voice of Jesus proclaiming\emdash "I am the resurrection and the life, he that lives and believes on me shall never die."\par \par Bless all near and dear to me. May they have the seal of the life-giving God on their foreheads. Protect the young from those snares and temptations incident to early years\emdash preserve them unspotted from the world\emdash keep them as the apple of Your eye; hide them under the shadow of Your wings; and whatever separations time and distance and bereavement may make on earth, may there be at last, for severed hearts, a glorious and deathless reunion before Your throne.\par \par Again I commend myself to Your Fatherly benediction. Watch over me during the night, granting me quiet and refreshing sleep. Let me go forth to the duties of tomorrow, and every new day, girded afresh for the conflict\emdash trusting in the name of the Lord and staying upon my God. And all I ask is for Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } 1m02 Day 02{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 2nd Morning\emdash THE OMNIPOTENT CHALLENGE\passa. 26:3\par \par O God of peace, who has brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that Great Shepherd of the sheep\emdash meet me as I now stand by the Gates of the mercy-seat, and fill me with all joy in believing. Gracious Redeemer, Prince and Purchaser of peace, draw near to me in infinite love, and say, as You did to Your disciples of old, "Peace be unto you; receive you the Holy Spirit." Grant me throughout the day Your benediction and blessing. May the peace of God which passes understanding keep my heart. May I walk in the light of Your countenance, under the sense of Your presence and favor\emdash enjoying the comfort of the divine assurance, "You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You."\par \par Lord, You know the causes of disquietude and unrest\emdash my sins and corruptions, my trials and difficulties, my struggles and burdens. I confess that the guilt and the misery of sin is all my own. You know that there has often been discontent where there should have been cheerfulness; murmuring where there should have been rejoicing; indolence where there should have been activity; self and selfishness where there should have been generous consecration to You, and a kindly interest in the well-being of those around me. If I have not been enjoying this perfect peace, O author of peace and lover of concord, in knowledge of whom stands our eternal life\emdash whose service is perfect freedom, speak Your own omnipotent word, and immediately there will be a great calm. I would bring my sins to the Great Surety\emdash I would lay bare my wounds to the Great Physician. Blessed Savior, renew and ratify to me, this morning, Your gracious gift and legacy "My peace I give unto you; not as the world gives." Looking to You, loving You, trusting You, You will prove my Shield in danger, my Refuge in adversity, my Comforter in sorrow, my Light in darkness, my Hope in death, my Defender in judgment, my Joy and Portion through eternity. O Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, grant me Your peace!\par \par If, this day, in the course of my duties, whether in the quiet of home or in the bustle of the world, there be any thwarting of my will, or crossing of my plans, or wounding my spirit\emdash let me manifest a spirit of meek endurance. Let me seek to deny myself and take up my cross and follow Christ. Give me the blessing promised "to him that walks uprightly and works righteousness." Preserve me at all times from sacrificing principle to temporal advantage. May I know the pleasure in some lowly way of doing good. May I seek to forego and conquer what pleases self, and to become more and more rescued from its iron tyranny. Enable me to struggle with my besetting sin whatever it may be; whether pride or ambition, malice or envy, indolence or sloth, lust or passion. May I seek ever higher acquisitions in the life of faith, and onward progress in the path of obedience; that so, when the hour comes which shall dissolve the tie binding me to the world, at peace with You and with all mankind, I may fall asleep in Jesus.\par \par O Great Peace-giver, impart Your own gracious gift to all who need it. Give rest to the weary, hope to the desponding, wisdom to the ignorant, salvation to the lost. Promote true unity among Your people. Let the watchmen on the walls of Zion see eye to eye. Hasten the time when the jarring and dissonant notes in the church militant shall cease, and when the bonds of brotherhood shall link nations as well as believers together. Terminate everywhere the reign of godlessness and vice, of error and superstition. Look in mercy on Your ancient people who are still beloved for their fathers' sake. May they be brought to own and welcome Him whom they have so long rejected. Let Israel's Alleluia be added to the Gentile Hosanna. Tell the daughter of Zion "Behold Your King comes."\par \par Bless all poor afflicted ones. May they be enabled in the midst of their trials to say, "If He gives peace, who then shall give trouble?" Let none despair when You smite, nor faint when You rebuke. With a rainbow of promise set in every cloud, may they be cheered with the hope that they shall before long come to look within the portal, beyond this land of drought and of the shadow of death; where the flock shall be led, forever, by the living fountains of waters, and every tear shall be wiped from every eye.\par \par These and all other needed blessings for myself and others\emdash I ask them all, in the name of Him whom You hear always, Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior\emdash to whom with You the Father, and You ever-blessed Spirit, Three in One in covenant for our salvation, be ascribed, as is most due, all blessing, and honor, and glory, and praise, both now and ever, Amen.\par \par \par \par 3rd Evening\emdash THE GREAT SUPREME\par \par "From eternity to eternity I am God. No one can oppose what I do. No one can reverse my actions." Isaiah 43:13\par \par O God, I desire to come into Your blessed presence, on this the evening of another day, adoring Your sovereignty. I rejoice in the simple but sublime assurance "The Lord reigns;"\emdash that all events are in Your hands. The sparrow's fall is watched by You; the raven's cry is heard by You; the hairs of our head are numbered by You. In Your sight there is no such thing as great or small\emdash mighty and insignificant. You open Your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing. No mistake can occur in Your dealings\emdash no shortcoming in Your wisdom\emdash no failure in Your power\emdash no faltering in Your faithfulness.\par \par I rejoice especially to think, that You who are the Infinite Jehovah, are also my Father; that with filial confidence and boldness I may come into Your presence, trust a Father's tenderness, and resign myself to a Father's will. I can look up, through Jesus Christ my adorable Savior, and call You\emdash the mightiest of all Beings\emdash by Your new best name of\emdash Love.\par \par Alas! You have abundant reason to say, "If I have been a Father, where has been my honor?" I have disowned and abused Your paternal regard. I have not given You the trust of a loving heart\emdash the obedience of a true life\emdash the sacrifice of a broken and contrite spirit. Lord have mercy upon me! In penitence and contrition of soul may it be mine to say "I will arise and go to my Father." Heal my backslidings; receive me graciously and love me freely.\par \par O You who alone works, and none can hinder it, may Your grace bring me nearer, and keep me nearer You. If You send prosperity, enable me to use Your mercies with sobriety and thankfulness\emdash if You send adversity, may I glorify You when You smite, as well as when You heal; when You take, as well as when You give; rejoicing to say regarding each and all of Your dealings\emdash "This also comes from the Lord of Hosts, who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working." Keep me from every base surrender to the power of temptation, the tyranny of self, the false maxims and principles of the world\emdash the unruly forces of evil. In all duties give me Your help\emdash in all perplexities aid me with Your counsel\emdash in all perils grant me Your protection. May it be the aim of my life to obey You, and the joy of my soul to please You. Make me kindly in thought and gentle in word, and generous in deed\emdash not rendering evil for evil or railing for railing, but rather a blessing; seeking day by day to attain a gradual conformity to the mind and image and will of the divine Redeemer.\par \par Forgive, Lord, for the sake of Your dear Son, whatever I have this day done amiss, that I may retire to rest at peace with You, and in good will towards all men. Bless my beloved friends; may they too be led to exult in Your sovereignty\emdash to rejoice that You appoint the bounds of their habitation, the length of their days, and the end of their days. Whatever be the period of existence You allot to them, may they be enabled faithfully to serve You. When the days of earth are finished, may they pass into Your blessed presence; and there, united in those ties which survive the uncertain ones of earth, may we be served heirs together to the grace of eternal life; even to "length of days forever and ever."\par \par Great God of the afflicted, draw near in infinite love to all broken hearts. Seated by the furnace, temper the fury of the flames. By the sustaining power of Your grace and the comforting influences of Your Holy Spirit, may trial be disarmed of its sting and the bread of affliction be turned into angels' food.\par \par Pity a perishing world\emdash listen to the groanings and travailings of a creation cursed with sin and riveted with the chains of corruption. Lord mitigate her sufferings\emdash redress her cruel wrongs. Stay the outpouring of vials of judgment. Come, Prince of Peace, Lord and Giver of life, take to Yourself Your great power and reign; and then shall the wilderness and the solitary place be made glad and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose. Bless Your church universal. Give efficacy to all instrumental means employed, alike for reclaiming the outcast and perishing, and for building up and establishing Your people in their most holy faith. Send times of refreshing unto Zion. May the shower come down in its season, let there be showers of blessing. If Your faithful servants hear not the fall of the rains\emdash nor watch the distilling of the dew\emdash if they see neither the fruit nor the flower; may they sow in faith, knowing that Your word shall not return to You void\emdash that it will accomplish that which You plead, and prosper in the thing whereto You had sent it.\par \par Anew I commend myself to Your guardianship and keeping. Give Your good angels charge concerning me this night, that they may encamp round about me. When the Gates of the morning are again opened\emdash may it be mine to go forth to the varied duties and occupations of another day, in fresh dependence on Your mercy and loving-kindness. And all that I ask is for the Redeemer's sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } eeC1e03 Day 03{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 3rd Morning\emdash PERFECT PEACE\par \par "You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on you; because he trusts in you." Iname is love\emdash whose tender mercies are over all Your works, draw near to me this morning and breathe upon me Your own benediction. As I am seated once more at the Beautiful Gate of Your Temple\emdash may I put my trust under the shadow of Your wings. The kindness of the kindest knows a limit\emdash but Your kindness knows no limit. You have been gracious to me in the time that is past. Your pillar of cloud has been with me by day, and Your pillar of fire by night. In difficulty You have directed me\emdash in weakness You have strengthened me. You have delivered my soul from death, my eyes from tears, and my feet from falling\emdash giving me ever new causes for gratitude, and new material for praise. Even when the shadows of affliction have fallen around me, You have mingled sweet drops in the cup, and enabled me to sing of mercy in the midst of judgment\emdash staying Your rough wind in the day of Your east wind. The retrospect of life is crowded with Ebenezers, testifying that "hitherto has the Lord helped me."\par \par O You "Sun of my soul," who is thus gladdening my existence from day to day, and who has given me the mightiest proof and pledge of Your loving-kindness in the gift of the Redeemer\emdash do enable me to trust You implicitly in the future, and to seek in all my ways to acknowledge You. My purposes and plans of life I commend to Your better wisdom. May prosperity be hallowed, and adversity sweetened, by seeing You in everything\emdash and everything in You.\par \par May all the gifts of Your bounty wear a new aspect, coming with the seal of Your covenant love stamped upon them. May that love reign paramount and supreme. May it preside over all my motives\emdash form them\emdash rule them\emdash regulate them. May all good impulses be followed and pursued into vigorous action. May my heart be Yours, my life be Yours, my work be Yours. May a sense of Your loving-kindness mold and influence my conduct towards those around me. Keep me from whatever would wrong another's feelings. Preserve me from a resentful spirit\emdash from morbidly dwelling on injuries\emdash from fretting and disquietude about imagined cares and evils. If the circumstances of my lot prevent me making any great or laborious efforts in Your cause, may I remember that the lowliest service done for You will not be rejected or disowned. Give me a conscientious fidelity over the few things\emdash if You have not made me steward over many things; and at last, through the merits and mediation of Your dear Son, may an entrance be ministered to me into Your eternal kingdom and glory.\par \par I pray for my dear friends\emdash may they also know, in their happy experience, the excellence of Your loving-kindness. May they give You, not the wrecks of a worn and withered love, but in all time of their wealth, as well as in all time of their tribulation, seek to live in Your fear and favor.\par \par O You who did of old utter the merciful apology for human infirmity, "The spirit indeed is willing but the flesh is weak"\emdash draw near in infinite compassion to those who are in any ways afflicted or distressed in mind, body, or estate. If Your dealings are mysterious\emdash as those who know Your loving-kindness, may they put their trust not only under the brightness but under the shadow of Your wings. In darkness, as well as in sunshine, may they glorify Your holy name; and regard all as a needful discipline and training. If portionless and friendless here\emdash may they be led nearer to Yourself\emdash the everlasting Friend and Portion. Let despairing guilt and trembling penitence find refuge at the feet of the Great Physician. May the balsam distilled from the Tree of Life heal their soul troubles. If the kindness of man be denied them\emdash Lord may they know the "excellence" of Yours.\par \par Promote every effort for the extension of Your Son's kingdom. May Your churches fulfill their responsibilities to those still sitting in darkness and in the shadow of death, in a spirit of faith and prayer, undeterred by difficulties, unbaffled by discouragements. If the furrows in many places be inviting the immortal seed, do send forth faithful laborers\emdash men inspired with a passionate devotion to You and Your cause, a self-sacrificing enthusiasm for Christ, and for the salvation of the world He died to redeem. May they be cheered with the promise, "In due season you shall reap, if you faint not."\par \par Anew, I commend myself, soul and body, to Your Fatherly keeping. Assist me in all my duties. Stand by me\emdash protect me\emdash shield me\emdash strengthen me. Preserve me in Your faith, fear, and love, all the day long. If temptation in any shape crosses my path\emdash by the help of Your grace may I resist it. Dwelling in the secret place of the most High, may I abide under the shadow of the Almighty. And all I ask is for the sake of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior\emdash Amen.\par \par \par \par 4th Evening\emdash THE HOLY SPIRIT\par \par "The Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered." Rom. 8:26\par \par O God, I desire to come through the opened Gates of Prayer, to the footstool of Your Throne, thanking You for all the mercies of the by-past day. Spirit of light and love! You who make intercession in behalf of the church and of every individual believer, with groanings which cannot be uttered\emdash You who feed the lamp of devotion with the oil of Your grace\emdash do replenish my vessel this night, as I venture into the presence of the Holy One. Put earnest desires into my heart\emdash enabling me to hunger for the bread which endures to everlasting life. Let me rest on the sure encouragement given by lips which cannot lie\emdash "If you, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven, give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him."\par \par Father, I have sinned against Heaven and before You, and am no more worthy to be called Your child. Times and days and ways without number, I have grieved Your good and gracious Spirit. I have too often done what might have quenched the light of His presence\emdash thwarted the drawings of His love\emdash and hushed the voice and remonstrances of conscience. I have too often permitted my heart to be the home of impure thoughts and vain imaginations. I have sought to invent unworthy apologies and extenuations for my guilt, or attempted to consign to oblivion what cannot be forgotten by You, unto whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hidden. Enter not into judgment with Your servant, for in Your sight shall no flesh living be justified. Come, Spirit of the living God, as an Enlightener, dispersing my darkness\emdash rebuking my unbelief. Come, as a Sanctifier, expelling the power and the love of sin. Come, as a Comforter, easing my doubts and unloading my burdens. Come, above all, as the Glorifier of Jesus\emdash receive of His, and show it unto me. Come, with new pledges and tokens of Redeeming love and mercy. Come, as the Spirit of adoption, enabling me with filial trust and confidence to cry "Abba! Father!" Come, in all the plenitude of Your gifts and graces, and breathe upon me and say "Receive the Holy Spirit!"\par \par Under a sense of my own weakness and insufficiency, I would resign myself to Your gracious influences. Write Your own superscription on my heart\emdash "Holiness unto the Lord." By Your indwelling power, subdue my corruptions\emdash stimulate my graces. Let me not remain fruitless amid the quickening means of grace. Faithful to whatever duties may be allotted to me in my earthly sphere, may I be fitted and prepared, by Your guidance and discipline, for the higher services of eternity, and for entering on the fulfillment and enjoyment of the lofty beatitude, "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God." Thus building up myself on the faith and promises of the Gospel, "praying in the Holy Spirit," may I keep myself in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.\par \par Bless Your church everywhere. Open the windows of heaven and refresh Your heritage when it is weary. Let the Divine Spirit come down like rain upon the mown grass and as showers that water the earth. Let no part of the fleece be dry. The Spirit of the Lord is not straitened. "Awake O north wind, come you south wind\emdash blow upon Your garden, that the spices thereof may flow out\emdash that our Beloved may come into his garden and eat his pleasant fruits."\par \par To the same gracious keeping and protection, I commend all near and dear to me. Cause them to lie down in the green pastures, lead them beside the still waters. Restore their souls, and lead them in the paths of righteousness for Your own name's sake. May all in sorrow have their sorrows sanctified. May they, lovingly and without a murmur, accept every cross, knowing that all rebukes as well as blessings emanate from You. May Your Providences prove heart-searchers\emdash strengthening the things that remain, which might have been otherwise ready to die. Thus may the shadow of death be turned into the morning\emdash and the trial of faith, being much more precious than of gold which perishes, though it be tried with fire, be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.\par \par Anew I supplicate forgiveness for the sins of the past day. Anew I would wash in the opened fountain, and plead the name which is above every name. Be my guardian through the silent watches of another night. Abide with me, for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent. As You have permitted me once more to erect my altar and to offer this my evening oblation\emdash do spare me also, in health and strength again to see the light of a new day, and to rise fitted and prepared for its varied duties.\par \par I ask these and all other needed blessings, for the sake of Him whom You hear always; who, with the Father and the Holy Spirit, ever lives and reigns, one God; world without end. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } JJ?1]05 Day 05{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fchao1=04 Day 04{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 4th Morning\emdash LOVING-KINDNESS\par \par "How excellent is your loving-kindness, O God! therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of your wings." Psalm 36:7\par \par O God, whose nature and whose rset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 5th Morning\emdash WAITING\par \par "Wait on the Lord; be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart; wait, I say, on the Lord." Psalm 27:14\par \par Heavenly Father, I desire to come into Your presence thanking and praising You for Your great goodness. Let me 'shake off dull sloth;' and in the name and merits of Your dear Son, lay upon Your holy altar an acceptable sacrifice. Glory to God who has watched over my pillow and permitted me to rise in safety. May this be an emblem of that better waking in the morning of immortality, when I shall see Your face, and be called to partake of endless life. The Lord is good to those who wait for Him\emdash unto the soul that seeks Him. Waiting on You now without distraction, may I receive strength and courage for all the duties of a new day. I would confide to Your ear every need, every care, every sorrow, every cross. May this be my prayer and my resolve, as the Gates of another morning are opened\emdash "My soul, wait only upon God, for my expectation is from Him."\par \par What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits towards me? Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless His holy name. Enable me ever to link true happiness and enjoyment with Your favor. May I know more and more Your service to be self-rewarding and self-recompensing. There be many that say, Who will show us any good? Lord lift up the light of Your countenance upon me!\par \par But, alas! I do not thus at all times wait upon You in simplicity of faith and with unwavering reliance. My fitful affections have too often been deviating from their all-glorious Center. I have allowed myself to be cumbered with much serving\emdash a slave to needless anxieties and distractions\emdash distrustful of Your providence\emdash sometimes, it may be, impeaching Your wisdom and faithfulness\emdash questioning the rectitude of Your dispensations, and tempted to look to second causes rather than to You the First Great Cause. I have not been at all times willing to accept this as the Sovereign reason and explanation of Your dealings "This also comes from the Lord Almighty, who is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working." O You who keep covenant with those who seek You, do increase my faith. Confirm my wavering resolutions. Waiting upon You afresh, may I renew my strength, and mount up as on eagles' wings. Give me the heart to love and the resolution to do. In all my worldly duties and engagements, may I have no aims but what You will approve, and no ends but what You will bless.\par \par May Your Word, with its precious lessons and elevating motives, be inweaved into my daily life, leading me to perfect holiness in the fear of the Lord. Inspire me with devout acquiescence in Your will, knowing that whatever You appoint must be for the best. Keep me from presaging and forecasting evil. Preserve me from peevishness and fretfulness\emdash from petulance of temper and hastiness of speech\emdash from covetousness and selfishness. May I take the golden rule as my guide in all transactions this day and every day\emdash "Whatever you would that men should do to you, do even so unto them." Whatever be the talent You have entrusted to me, may it be laid out for You, and may I seek to gain by it a revenue for Your glory. As a faithful steward in my Lord's household may I be diligent, that I may be found of Him at last in peace, without spot and blameless.\par \par O God of all the families of mankind, may Your way be known upon the earth, Your saving health among all nations. Bless the land of our nativity. Protect and perpetuate its civil and religious privileges. May it be more and more a center of holy influences radiating to earth's circumference. May its rulers be increasingly inspired with that fear of the Lord which is the beginning of wisdom, and be guided by that righteousness which alone exalts.\par \par Bless my beloved friends wherever they are. Unite them to You in those covenant ties which will survive the uncertain ones of earth. May they be Yours now, and Yours on the day when You make up Your jewels.\par \par May the sick and the suffering "wait on the Lord." Strengthen such as be on beds of languishing\emdash make all their bed in their sickness. May the bereaved "wait on the Lord"\emdash trusting You in the dark, and adoring Your name alike in giving and in taking. May the dying "wait on the Lord." Calm the wave of ebbing life. Turn the shadow of death into the morning. May the gates of death prove the portals leading into everlasting day.\par \par Prepare me, gracious God, for my own final hour of weakness and suffering, by consecrating the season of health and strength to You; so, called to surrender my earthly trust, I may be able in calm confidence to say, "I have waited for Your salvation, O Lord."\par \par Hear in heaven, Your holy habitation, these my morning supplications; and when You hear, forgive, and grant me an answer in peace. Through Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 5th Evening\emdash THE CROSS OF CHRIST\par \par "God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world." Gal. 6:14\par \par O God, I desire to approach the throne of the heavenly grace, rejoicing in You as a kind and beneficent Father. Your mercy is infinite\emdash unchanging\emdash everlasting. Enable me with childlike trust and confidence to bow at Your footstool. With joy, this evening, may I "go down with Your people to the Gates," and draw water out of the wells of salvation.\par \par Lord, I come, owning my great unworthiness. How weak has been my faith! how languid and fitful my best efforts to serve You! In prosperity I have too often disowned You; in adversity I have been tempted to entertain hard thoughts of You; in the world I have too often forgotten You. My own heart condemns me, and You are greater than my heart\emdash You know all things.\par \par I come with my poverty and helplessness, my doubts and conflicts, my foes and fears, my difficulties and perplexities, my sorrows and my sins. I would lay the heavy burden of them all, at the foot of the Redeemer's cross. In that cross alone I would glory. I look away from myself to His completed work. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. Seal to me the blessed assurance of pardon and peace and eternal life. From Him who bled for me as an atoning sacrifice, may I receive a passport now into the privileges of the Heavenly Kingdom; and from the same gracious lips, may I at last listen to the welcome, "Enter into the joy of your Lord."\par \par Meanwhile, may I aim at advancement in the divine life. Let me make no truce with whatever is at enmity with You. Enable me in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth to cast out every demon-sin. May His cross exercise upon me a constraining power; teaching me thus to judge, that if one died for all, then all were dead\emdash and in that He died, He died that they who live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him who died for them, and rose again. May I seek henceforth, that my heart may be a holy altar and my life a living sacrifice. Let me be vigilant and circumspect in my daily duties. Set a watch before my mouth, keep the door of my lips. Deliver me from the trouble and disquietude and shame which follow every deflection from the path of rectitude; from being arrogant, or discontented, uncharitable, or time-serving\emdash from being tempted to stoop to base compliances and unworthy equivocations. May a sense of Your presence dominate all my actions; and a holy fear of offending so kind and loving a God, repress every unholy thought and tendency. May it be my greatest pain to grieve You, and my greatest delight to do Your will\emdash whether by active duty or by passive suffering.\par \par May I feel that in common with all Your people I have some sphere allotted to me\emdash some niche to occupy in Your temple, whether it be by working or by waiting. Following the footsteps of the Redeemer with cheerful alacrity, may I know that even the taking up of the cross, when this is required, is its own reward\emdash that they have cause to rejoice who are honored thus to be partakers with Him in His sufferings, that when He shall be revealed, they may be glad also with exceeding joy.\par \par Bless my beloved friends. Bring them individually to know Christ crucified as the power of God unto salvation, and to realize, above all other things, the truth of the words, "The Redemption of the soul is precious."\par \par Hasten the time when the year of Your Redeemed shall come; when the "many crowns" shall be set on Messiah's brow, and by the attractive power of His cross all men shall be drawn unto Him. Prosper the work of Your ministering and missionary servants\emdash may they be faithful and loyal to their divine commission and to their adorable Master; hiding themselves, and glorifying Him\emdash losing themselves, as they proclaim their great message\emdash "Behold the Lamb of God which takes away the sin of the world."\par \par Bless all in sorrow. May they, too, be led meekly to bear their cross, remembering all their dear Lord so patiently and willingly endured for them. May they see the heavenly mansions shining through the mists of the Valley; and hear the divine voice declaring, "the days of your mourning shall be ended."\par \par Lord be my watchful Keeper through the silence and darkness of another night. Guard me from unquiet dreams\emdash give me peaceful rest\emdash spare me, if it be Your will, to see the light and to enjoy the comforts of a new day\emdash and grant, that during all the period of my allotted time on earth, whether I wake or sleep I may live together with You. And all I ask or hope for, is in the name, and for the sake, of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } rset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 6th Morning\emdash SUPPLICATION WITH THANKSGIVING\par \par "Be anxious for nothing\emdash but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known unto God." Phil. 4:6\par \par O God, I desire on this new day, in accordance with Your own gracious invitation, to make my requests known unto You. Blessed Redeemer, You who are the True Aaron, the Great Angel Intercessor, You who are ever pleading in love and never pleading in vain, do come forth from the Holiest of all, to the multitudes of Your waiting people, assembled this morning at the Gateway of Prayer, and bless them with peace. Breathe upon us and say, "Receive you the Holy Spirit."\par \par The retrospect of the past is a retrospect of love\emdash mercy upon mercy\emdash privilege upon privilege. For all Your providential goodness, Lord, I praise You. For health and strength, for friends and home; for powers of body and faculties of mind; for my religious privileges, for all appointed means of grace, for the glorious hope of immortality; for peace amid the manifold changes of life; for comfort in sorrow; for the assurance of victory over death\emdash the last enemy\emdash Lord, I praise You. I have to acknowledge my many and multiplied offences\emdash that in thought and word and deed I have transgressed against You, O Preserver and Redeemer of men. I have too often sought for happiness in objects and pursuits which fail to satisfy the yearnings of the immortal spirit. I have too often indulged in feelings and tempers inconsistent with my Christian profession\emdash unworthy of the love I owe to You my God, and the good-will and generosity and forbearance I owe to my fellow-men. Lord, have mercy upon me! Save me from the sins which do most easily ensnare me. From the love of the world which alienates my affections from heavenly realities\emdash from the love of self which interferes with the entire consecration of the heart to Christ\emdash from the covetousness which hardens\emdash from the impurity which debases and enslaves\emdash from every evil lust and passion and temper\emdash good Lord, deliver me! Conscious of my own utter weakness, I would look for the supplies of Your promised grace. By it alone I stand. If I am enabled this day to resist temptation, it is all Your doing. It is You who uphold me by Your right hand.\par \par Under the realized consciousness of Your sustaining presence, may I be anxious for nothing\emdash committing the unknown future to Your wise and better keeping. Burdened with no perplexing or disquieting thoughts, but rolling every such burden and anxiety on Him who cares for me, may the peace of God which passes all understanding keep my heart. With my feet on the unchanging Rock of Ages, I will rejoice, amid all trials and vicissitudes, that nothing is able to separate me from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus, my Lord.\par \par Let Your good and gracious hand be specially around me today. Strengthen me for the discharge of every duty, whether at home or in the world. Prepare me for the resisting of every temptation and for the endurance of every trial. Whatever be the talent You have committed to me\emdash whether position, or intellect, or worldly substance\emdash may I feel the sacredness of the trust, and seek thankfully to employ it for the good of others, and for the glory of You, My God. Enable me to aim at that high standard of Christian responsibility, which regards all possessions valuable, only so far as they contribute to show forth the praises of Him who has called us out of darkness into marvelous light. Living under the habitual impression that soon\emdash very soon\emdash that committed trust may be recalled, oh, give me grace to fulfill the part of a faithful steward.\par \par Compassionate those who are in trial. Listen to the loud wail of humanity; especially to that rising from the members of the household of faith. Blessed Redeemer, it is our comfort to know, that wide as the family of the afflicted is, You can say regarding every diversity of case and experience, "I know their sorrows." May Your suffering people be brought into nearer relationship and fellowship with You. Amid the mystery of present baffling dispensations, may they look forward to that day, when, in the light of eternity, they shall listen to the repetition of Your own saying\emdash "Said I not unto you that if you would believe, you should see the glory of God?"\par \par Let the cause of truth triumph over the pride and superstition and will-worship of man. Hasten the time when earth shall become one consecrated temple\emdash every heart an altar\emdash every life a sacrifice\emdash every tongue praise. Human power is impotent to break the chains of sin and Satan. But the wisdom of God is wiser than man, and the weakness of God is stronger than man. It is not by human might nor by human power, but by Your Spirit, Lord God Almighty.\par \par Anew I commend myself to You. May the love of God the Father animate me\emdash may the grace of God the Son sustain me\emdash may the fellowship of God the Holy Spirit quicken and sanctify me. O blessed Three in one! make me fit now and evermore, for the inheritance of the saints in light. Amen.\par \par \par \par 6th Evening\emdash THE UNSEEN TRUSTED\par \par "Although you say you shall not see him, yet judgment is before him; therefore trust in him." Job 35:14\par \par O God, I bless and praise Your holy name, that I am again permitted to hold fellowship and communion with You the Father of spirits. I might, like others this night, have been summoned to the Gate of death; but I am once more privileged to be a suppliant at the Gate leading to the mercy-seat, with the golden key in my hand, and the assurance that a God of mercy is waiting to be gracious.\par \par I desire to bless You for Your constant, unwearied kindness. I would seek to extract motive for gratitude from every varied token and tribute of Your love. I bless You for exemption from danger and accident, from pain and sickness and disease. I bless You for health and strength; for manifold outer comforts and domestic enjoyments. Above all do I bless You for the good hope through grace\emdash the hope full of immortality\emdash which You have given me in Your beloved Son; and that, with the Greater Gift, You will freely bestow all things needful, alike for my present peace and my eternal well-being. O Savior God, who has redeemed me with Your most precious blood, to whom can I go but unto You? I am persuaded You are able to keep that which I have committed unto You. I bless You that, as the Son of man, You came to seek and save those who are lost\emdash as the Good Shepherd who gave his own life for the sheep\emdash the weakest, the weariest, the most burdened of the flock can claim Your regard. You mark out our pasture for us. You know Your sheep by name and lead them out. If at times I am unable to understand the mystery of Your dealings\emdash if at times You lead along the thorny path\emdash teaching by crossed purposes and baffled and thwarted expectations\emdash may it be mine to confide in Your unerring wisdom.\par \par Knowing that "judgment is before You," may I implicitly trust Your faithfulness; glorifying Your holy name by unquestioning submission, saying "Lord, here am I\emdash do to me, and with me, as seems best in Your sight."\emdash "Though You slay me, yet will I trust in You." Strong in Your grace, may I strive to live under the sovereignty of that loftiest motive\emdash that whatever pleases You shall please me; that whatever be Your holy will shall be mine. If the path of prosperity should be chequered\emdash if human props fail, and human refuges reveal themselves to be refuges of lies\emdash if worldly substance be impaired, or earthly love dies\emdash may the perishable and corruptible only drive me nearer to the incorruptible\emdash to seek closer and more intimate fellowship with Him in whose presence there is fullness of joy. Thus, trusting You and loving You, let me rise superior to all that is fleeting and fluctuating around. In quietness and confidence let my strength be.\par \par Keep me from moping over fancied ills, or brooding morbidly over disappointments. Let me feel that, had it been well for me, my desires would have been gratified; but in Your better wisdom You have denied what, if granted, might have proved detrimental to my soul's interests. Preserve me from all pride and vain glory\emdash make me charitable and forgiving\emdash kind and unselfish\emdash cheerful and thankful. Give me that lowliness of mind which leads me to esteem others better than myself. O that each member of Your family who bears the name of Christian, could more heartily make the avowal\emdash "None of us lives to himself."\par \par Bless, Lord, all the children of sorrow. Some of these may be experiencing overwhelming afflictions. There may seem to them no ray in the darkness\emdash no silver lining in the looming cloud. Set Your own rainbow in it. Enable them to rejoice even under the shadow of Your wings, and to sing their "song in the night." May they, too, implicitly trust You, that You will impose no needless burden\emdash that all Your dealings are interlaced and interweaved with mercy\emdash that judgment (wise and righteous judgment) is before You. May their trials yield the peaceable fruits of righteousness.\par \par Bless Your church everywhere. Prosper her in all her undertakings for the good of man and for Your glory. Bless Your ministering servants\emdash make them polished shafts in their Master's quiver\emdash honored instruments in turning many from darkness to light. Endow them with spiritual energy, zeal, and fortitude, in days of coldness and lukewarmness, apathy and apostasy. May all Your churches, walking in the fear of God and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, everywhere be multiplied.\par \par And now, Lord, what do I wait for?\emdash my hope is in You! Pardon whatever I have this day thought amiss, and said amiss, and done amiss\emdash all commissions of sin, all omissions of duty. Abide with me for it is toward evening and the day is far spent; and when the day of life is spent, and the last shadows have fallen, may it only be to welcome in "the morning without clouds," and to enjoy forever the brightness of Your presence and the plenitude of Your love. And all I ask is for Jesus' sake, Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } U"Uu 1I08 Day 08{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 8th Morning\emdash THE HIDING-PLACE\par \par "For in the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion\emdash in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me 1u07 Day 07{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcha݁)1106 Day 06{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 7th Morning\emdash OUR FATHER\par \par "Our Father, who is in heaven, hallowed be Your name." Matt. 6:9\par \par O Lord, God Almighty, the God of my life and the length of my days, I come to You this morning, seeking to realize You in Your paternal character. I bless You if I am able to utter that gospel word\emdash that gospel name\emdash "My Father;" if I am able to feel that the Gates of prayer are the gates leading to a Father's house, a Father's presence and love. I bless You that I have the warrant of Your adorable Son in appropriating the words "My Father and your Father, my God and your God;" that I have His own encouraging assurance "If you, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask Him." I would avail myself of the privilege. I would bring all my needs and sins, my difficulties and trials and perplexities, and pour them into the loving ear of a most loving Parent. Deliver me from bondage-worship and bondage-fear, and enable me with the sweet confidence of Your children to say "Abba! Father."\par \par Lord, how unworthy have I proved myself of this holy relationship. If You have been a Father, where has been Your honor? If You have been a Master, where has been Your fear? Thus unfaithful and unfilial, You might justly have disowned and disinherited me\emdash left me an alien and an outcast from Your presence, and refused forever to "set me among the children." But adored be Your name, O Father-God, that in the midst of deserved wrath, You have remembered and are still remembering, mercy. Your hand of love and forgiveness and pity is stretched out still. Your paternal voice is still heard, "Return, you backsliding children." Although often, by reason of my own truant wanderings, I have been ready to perish for hunger, there is bread enough still in my Father's house and to spare. Lord, evermore, and more and more, give me this bread of life! Graciously forgive and forget the past, and arm me with Your grace for the future. Give me childlike repentance\emdash childlike faith, childlike obedience. Enable me to lean with calm trustfulness on You. Prevent me from inflicting any wound on my own conscience that would alienate me from Your favor. Keep me from living as if this world were my final rest, and home, and portion. May I seek, rather, to live from day to day as one whose true home is above\emdash as if on the threshold of the Father's house with its many mansions, and ready for the summons "Come up here."\par \par As a child, may I be jealous of Your honor. May I seek to make manifest the reality of my filial relationship, by meekness and gentleness, by obedience and love. Give me that charity which is the bond of perfectness. Put a sanctified restraint on my thoughts. Preserve me from uttering unkind words, or entertaining ungenerous suspicions. May I seek to hold the character and reputation of others, sacred as my own.\par \par O You who does compassionate, even "like as a father pities his children," do pity and commiserate all the members of suffering humanity, especially those who are of the household of faith. Lord, there are many sorrows no human sympathy can reach. There is nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. But You can gauge the depth of all. Impart to Your tried children, everlasting consolation and good hope through grace. Let them trust a Father's love, a Father's hand, a Father's heart, a Father's rod; regarding Your dealings as needful discipline; and honoring You by simple, confiding, unreserved submission. Prepare the dying for death. If it be Your holy will, bring back the shadow on life's dial, and utter the word "You shall live and not die."\par \par Bless all my beloved friends near or at a distance. Let them, too, become Your own children by adoption\emdash exulting in the fullness and beneficence of Your paternal love\emdash listening to Your voice amid all the changes of this changeful scene, "I will be a Father unto you, and you shall be my sons and daughters."\par \par Prosper every missionary effort. Blessed be Your name, the day has come, when "neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, do men worship the Father;" but that gracious Fatherhood extends to every region and every tongue. Give to all nations peace and concord, that the furrows of the earth may be prepared for the insertion of the divine seed. Let Your ministers be diligent sowers and abundant reapers\emdash baptize them with the Holy Spirit and with fire. Give greater unity of effort in Your cause. May this be, more and more, the motto and watchword of all Christians and all Churches\emdash "Doubtless You are our Father."\par \par Be with me throughout this day. As the Gates of the morning are now opening, may I realize Your blessing, and carry it along with me into all my duties. Hear me, Gracious Father, for the sake of Your dear Son, Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 7th Evening\emdash AN IMMUTABLE SAVIOR\par \par "Jesus Christ\emdash the same yesterday, and today, and forever." Heb. 13:8\par \par O God, who has again brought me in peace and safety to the close of another day, I bow my knees this night at the throne of the heavenly grace; beseeching You, before I retire to rest, to give me Your blessing. It is in the name of Him who holds in His hand the Key and the Gates of Prayer\emdash who opens and no man shuts\emdash that I can alone venture to come into Your presence. I rejoice to think that He has wrought out and brought in an everlasting righteousness\emdash that He has thrown the luster of a sublime vindication over every requirement of Your law. I rejoice especially in His unchanging faithfulness. While recalling, with devout gratitude and thankfulness, all He did and taught and suffered on earth; how oftentimes He delighted to minister to the sick, and support the tempted, and heal the broken-hearted, and offer peace and rest to the weary and heavy laden\emdash it is my comfort to feel assured, that, though now exalted at Your right hand, He still retains, in His glorified humanity, the unchanged human heart with its yearning love and sympathies; that, amid all other vicissitudes, there is "no variableness, neither shadow of turning," in Him. His name and memorial continues to this hour what it was, when He trod, a Pilgrim wanderer, this valley of tears\emdash "Jesus Christ\emdash the same yesterday, today, and forever."\par \par O God, before the Gates of another evening be closed, and I again lie down to sleep, grant me the forgiveness of all the day's sins, of thought, word, and deed\emdash of omission and commission. Blot them out of the book of Your remembrance; sprinkle anew the lintels and door-posts of my heart with the covenant token; hide me anew in the clefts of the Smitten Rock; seal to me anew the blessed sense of reconciliation through the blood of the cross. And while I look to this immutable Savior\emdash this Rock of Ages\emdash for pardon and peace, give me grace that I may be more and more assimilated to His holy image, and more and more molded in conformity to His holy will. Impart to me His meekness, His humility, His gentleness, His forgiveness of injuries\emdash His tender consideration for others; that patience under provocation which made Him stand as a Lamb silent before His shearers; who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered He threatened not, but committed Himself to Him that judges righteously. Make me more lowly and loving\emdash more resigned and submissive. May I live under the power of renewed affections. Influenced and guided by lofty principle, may my eye be single, that my whole body may be full of light. Raise me above all fretting cares and timid fears, above all morbid anxieties and solicitudes about trifles. Let me have the fear of God and no other fear. When heart and flesh faint and fail, may I triumph in the immutability of Him who has promised to be the strength of His people's heart, and their portion forever.\par \par Extend Your cause and kingdom everywhere. How long shall the wicked triumph? save Your people, bless Your inheritance; feed them also, and lift them up forever. I would rejoice in the thought, that Your gospel is the power of God unto salvation\emdash that as such, under its blessed instrumentality, every mountain of unbelief and error will in due time become a plain before the true Zerubbabel. Do demonstrate now, as in the previous history of Your Church, that it is not the vaunted armor of earth's great ones, but the sling of faith and the few pebbles from the running brook of truth, which will conquer the world's unbelief. Bring in Your ancient people with the fullness of the Gentile nations. Have respect unto Your covenant\emdash the oath which You did swear unto Abraham and Isaac and Jacob. Arise, O Lord, and plead Your own cause.\par \par Bless all related to me by ties of kindred or affection. The Lord watch between us when we are absent one from another. May they be among the beloved of the Lord who dwell safely\emdash may the joy of the Lord be their strength.\par \par Compassionate the case of poor afflicted ones. When their hearts are overwhelmed, O unchanging Savior-God, lead them to Yourself\emdash the Rock that is higher than they. Whatever be the cause of their trials, may they be enabled, in unmurmuring, uncomplaining submission to say, "Even so, Father!" In the midst of impaired health, and thwarted schemes, and disappointed hopes, and broken hearts, and voices hushed in death, may it be theirs exultingly to exclaim, as they look to One who survives all blanks and losses, "They shall perish, but You remain; as a vesture shall You fold them up, and they shall be changed; but YOU are the same, and Your years shall not fail."\par \par These, and every needed blessing, for myself and for others, I ask in the name of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } ; he shall set me up upon a rock." Psalm 27:5\par \par O God, who is the refuge of all that seek You, may I know this day the blessedness of those who dwell in the secret place of the Most High, and who abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I rejoice that I am never a solitary moment away from Your guardianship and care\emdash that You compass my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways. Amid all changes You are the abiding One. The world's joys are shadowy and fleeting\emdash they mock the hand which grasps them\emdash the world's refuges are refuges of lies. But in the pavilion of Your love I am ever safe and secure. Hide me there until earth's calamities be overpast. I adore You as the Supreme Disposer of all events. Your purposes no accident can change\emdash Your faithfulness no time can impair\emdash Your counsels no created being can question or resist. Blessings and trials, comforts and crosses, come alike from You. You send the gourd. You send the worm. Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? I adore You especially as the God of Salvation, and praise You for the riches of Your sovereign grace in Jesus.\par \par I acknowledge my great unworthiness. I have to mourn the constant cleaving of defilement to my nature; that while earnest in the pursuit of earthly things, I am prone to languish and grow weary in the things of God; that while I would do good, evil is present with me. In the season of prosperity, when receiving manifold gifts at Your hands, I have been too ready to forget the gracious Giver. In the hour of adversity, or even amid the fretting anxieties, and troubles, and solicitudes of life, though You have invited me to the secret of Your tabernacle, there to unburden my needs, and sorrows, and perplexities, I have too often fled to other solaces, and put my confidence in unworthy supports, or else given way to murmuring and repining under Your righteous chastisements. Lord hide me alone in the clefts of the Rock of Ages! In the finished work and glorious righteousness and exalted sympathy of the God-man Mediator, may I find the shelter I need\emdash a free and secure refuge from the storm, and covert from the tempest. Everywhere else in danger and trouble, may I feel that there I am safe. If sin has alienated me from that service in which I once delighted\emdash if my love has been waxing cold\emdash my affections becoming lukewarm and dead, revive and quicken me. Strengthen the things that remain which are ready to die. Return, O Holy Dove\emdash blessed Spirit\emdash Messenger of peace and rest!\emdash enable me to hate the sin, whatever it be, which led me to forfeit the comforting sense of Your presence. Come, breathe upon my dry bones that they may live.\par \par I know not what temptations I may be called today to encounter\emdash temptations in business, in the family\emdash in the world. In every trouble, whatever it may be, O fulfill Your own promise, and hide me in the secret of Your pavilion. Keep me from evil thoughts, evil wishes, vain imaginations. May the influence of the truth as it is in Jesus, mold and renew, control and elevate my whole being. Loving You, my God, may that love embrace all mankind. Give me that charity which is the bond of perfectness. Preserve me from the indulgence of implacable and malevolent feelings\emdash the retaliation of wrong\emdash the resenting of injuries; from all that would promote my own advantage at the expense or by the injury of others. Keep me from covetousness, from inordinate craving for mere material good\emdash and make me more solicitous about the one thing needful\emdash the only enduring riches of eternity\emdash thankful for the many blessings of the present life, and seeking gratefully to enjoy them\emdash yet living in the habitual anticipation of the Lord's second coming\emdash "that blessed hope"\emdash which, like a rainbow of promise, spans the sky of the future. May I be looking for it\emdash preparing for it\emdash longing for it\emdash living for it. The Lord grant unto me that I may find mercy of the Lord on that day!\par \par Bless my dear friends. May each one of them, too, have their feet planted on the Rock which cannot be shaken. May ties, at best precarious on earth, be rendered indissoluble by grace. I pray for all sufferers. In the time of their sore trouble, do hide them specially in Your pavilion, and as the beloved of the Lord\emdash who have the covenant mark upon them, may they there dwell safely.\par \par Have compassion on a world lying in wickedness. May abundant showers of blessing descend on those vast tracts of heathendom wherein Your faithful missionary servants are laboring. May they see the pleasure of the Lord prospering in their hands.\par \par I anew commend myself to Your gracious care and keeping. Be this day my shield, my glory, and the lifter up of my head; and when all my work on earth is accomplished, in Your own good time do receive me to Yourself, and number me with Your ransomed Church in glory everlasting. Through Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 8th Evening\emdash COMFORT IN DEATH\par \par This gate of the Lord into which the righteous shall enter\emdash\par \par "Yes, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil\emdash for you are with me; your rod and your staff they comfort me." Psalm 23:4\par \par I come to You, Blessed Lord, this evening, thanking You for all Your mercies. How manifold have been the proofs and tokens of Your kindness and faithfulness! The past has been paved with love. There is no friend in the world who has been like You, and none so willing to befriend me. You have showered me with the blessings of Your goodness. While others have been laid on beds of sickness or cut down by sudden death, I am still among the living to praise You. Above all, You have bestowed upon me the Gift of gifts\emdash that Gift which in magnitude and preciousness dwarfs and absorbs all others. Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable Gift! Life may well be a perpetual hymn of gratitude for all these Your unmerited mercies, alike temporal and spiritual. I am unworthy of the least of them. It is to Your free Sovereign abounding Grace I owe them all. Not unto me O Lord, not unto me, but unto Your name I would give glory for Your mercy and for Your truth's sake.\par \par While grateful for countless present blessings\emdash Oh, prepare me for that solemn time, when they shall come, every one of them, to be renounced\emdash when the trust of existence must be surrendered to You, the Great Being who conferred it. I bless you for Him who has abolished death and has brought life and immortality to light. In His cross, the last Enemy has been robbed of its sting and the grave of its victory. With that cross in view, may I see the Dark Valley flooded with celestial radiance\emdash the gate of the grave and the gate of heaven become one! May I see in death, the birthday of a new being, in glory everlasting.\par \par Lord, enable me habitually to bear about with me the solemnizing truth\emdash that "as men live so do men die"\emdash that as death leaves us, so will judgment and eternity find us. May it be mine to have the girded loins, and the burning lamp, and the ever-vigilant watchfulness\emdash that when my Lord comes, I may be among the waiting servants who are ready to open unto Him immediately. Let Your love, meanwhile, form the animating motive and principle in all I do. May I be dying daily to self and to sin. May I live now as I would wish I had been living when the time of my departure is at hand\emdash leaving nothing for these closing moments. May the best of life\emdash not its dregs, be given to You. Whether I live may I live unto the Lord, or whether I die may I die unto the Lord\emdash whether therefore I live or die, Lord, may I be Yours. That so, whatever be the term of existence apportioned to me here, I may at last be ushered into the enjoyment of Your presence, and into the possession of length of days forever and ever.\par \par Look down in compassion on the whole human race. May the time be hastened when from every nation of the earth the cry shall arise, "Alleluia! for the Lord God omnipotent reigns! The kingdoms of this world have become the one kingdom of our Lord, and of His Christ."\par \par I pray for all upon whom the hand of sorrow is laid. May those racked with suffering and disease, who are saying in the morning "Would God it were evening," and in the evening "Would God it were morning," look forward to that glorious time when there shall be no more pain; and to that glorious place "where the inhabitant shall no more say, I am sick." May all who have been called to witness the shadows of death gathering around those they love, rejoice that in Jesus the substance of death has been taken away\emdash that to depart and to be with Him, is indeed far better. May those now entering the final conflict gird themselves with the plighted promise of the great Vanquisher\emdash "Fear not; I am he who lives and was dead; and behold I am alive for evermore, and have the keys of the grave and of death." Commending them to the hand of a sustaining God and supporting Savior, may they have nothing to do but to die. May angels be waiting to carry their spirits into the Redeemer's bosom.\par \par Meanwhile, good Lord, be my Shepherd and I shall lack nothing. Make me to lie down in the green pastures\emdash lead me beside the still waters. Whatever be Your dealings, may these result only in restoring my soul, and leading me in the paths of righteousness. And then, when I come to walk through the Dark Valley, I shall fear no evil\emdash for You are with me supporting me with the rod and staff of Your comforting promises. May goodness and mercy, like two guardian angels, follow me all the days of my life; and may my dwelling be in the house of the Lord forever.\par \par These, and all other needful blessings for myself and for others, I supplicate in the name and through the merits of Jesus Christ\emdash my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } emdash THE FAITHFUL SAYING\par \par "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptance\emdash that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief." 1 Tim. 1:15\par \par Heavenly Father, Almighty and Everlasting God, I approach Your gracious presence, thanking You for the mercies of the by-past night and the renewed comforts of another day. O You who has anew opened the Gates of the morning, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, do shine into my heart. May no "earthborn-cloud arise," to intercept the light of Your countenance. May the morning radiance without, be to me the emblem of that inner sunshine with which You visit the souls of Your people.\par \par I come rejoicing in You as my Creator, Preserver, and bountiful Benefactor. You have never left Yourself without a witness in that You are continually doing me good. I have no memories but of Your unceasing care and kindness\emdash Your unvarying paternal love. I come rejoicing in You especially as the God of Salvation; exulting anew in "the faithful saying" which is as faithful as ever, and as worthy of all acceptance as ever, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.\par \par Lord, I have to mourn my constant proneness to depart from You\emdash the instability of my best resolutions\emdash the fitfulness of my best frames and feelings\emdash the sordidness of my best motives. I confess, without reservation, my heart-sins, lip-sins, life-sins\emdash omitted duties\emdash abused mercies\emdash unsanctified warnings\emdash love of the world\emdash love of ease\emdash love of self\emdash taking Your gifts and forgetting the Giver\emdash seeing my brother have need, and shutting up my compassion. Blessed Savior, ever living\emdash ever loving\emdash Son of Man who came to seek and to save that which is lost\emdash who does, through Your precious sacrifice, cover all claims and cancel all debts\emdash do have mercy upon me. I confide in Your infinite power and wisdom. There is a potency in Your na me to soothe every fear and to hush every sorrow. Say in the might of Your mingled omnipotence and love\emdash "Your sins are all forgiven you." I cast myself on You, alike for time and in eternity. In life, may I feel the power of Your sustaining grace; in trouble, the support of Your tender consolations; and in death the all-sufficiency of Your exceeding great and precious promises.\par \par Keep me this day, in my worldly business and avocations, from whatever would be injurious to my spiritual inter ests, or that would soil and blemish my Christian character. I know not into what unforeseen sins and temptations I may be betrayed. I know not what guilty thoughts may find expression in unworthy and hasty and sinful words\emdash defiling my conscience and dishonoring Your holy name. Keep me from whatever is mercenary and avaricious\emdash from all double dealing\emdash from seeking to accomplish any end by deceitful means on which Your blessing cannot descend. Preserve me from the selfishness that would appropriate Your gifts alone for personal enjoyment and gratification. If I have in any measure freely received at Your hands, may I feel it alike my duty and my privilege freely to give\emdash seeking to act under the lofty motive of pleasing You, and doing good unto all men as I have opportunity.\par \par Lord have mercy on the afflicted. Point wounded spirits to the Great Physician, of whom it was said that "He healed them all." May they consider Him that endured such contradiction of sinners agains t Himself, lest they be wearied and faint in their minds. May every rebellious tear be dried, as they listen to the gracious assurance\emdash "As many as I love I rebuke and chasten." Recover the sick. Provide for the fatherless and the widow, and him who has no helper. May bereaved ones hearken, amid the shadows of the Valley, to the beatitude of the heavenly voice\emdash "Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord from henceforth\emdash Yes, says the Spirit, for they rest from their labors and their works do follow them." May all sufferers in this suffering world look forward to that happy time, when not a groan shall be heard throughout Your ransomed creation\emdash but when delivered from the bondage of corruption, it shall be translated into the glorious liberty of the sons of God.\par \par Bless Your Church. May she be the honored instrument, more and more, of reclaiming those who are out of the way. Multiply the number of Your devoted servants at home, who are ready to rush with their censer and incense between the living and the dead that the plague may be stayed. Bless all missionaries abroad\emdash those who, in heathen lands, are preparing the way of the Lord, and making straight in the desert an highway for our God. May they not be afraid of evil tidings, but may their hearts be fixed trusting in You. May the faithful saying\emdash Jesus Christ, the Savior of sinners\emdash so potent in the past, vindicate, its claim still, to be the power of God unto salvation.\par \par Anew I commend myself, and all near and dear to me, to Your gracious care and keeping. Fit me for life, and for death, and for eternity. For Jesus' sake, Amen.\par \par \par \par 9th Evening\emdash NEEDED DISCIPLINE\par \par "He does not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men." Lam. 3:33\par \par O God, enable me to approach this night the footstool of Your Throne, with child-like confidence and love. Like as a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear Him, for He knows our frame, He remembers that we are dust. May the Holy Spirit\emdash the Sanctifier, the Quickener, the Comforter of His people, visit me with His gracious influences. Open the windows of Heaven, and send down some drops of the plentiful rain with which You refresh Your heritage when it is weary, that I may feel it to be good for me to draw near unto God.\par \par I desire to make acknowledgment of my many sins\emdash my rebellious thoughts, my unbelieving doubts, my heinous backslidings\emdash my murmuring under Your chastisements, my resisting of Your grace, my grieving of Your Spirit. My best motives have been mixed with self-seeking, arrogance, and vain glory. My best services have been marred with imperfection and impurity. If You O Lord should mark iniquity\emdash who would stand? But there is forgiveness with You that You may be feared. Impart to me the blessed sense of Your pardoning mercy. Restore unto me the joys of Your salvation, and uphold me with Your free Spirit. If You are on my side, I shall fear no evil. The light of Your countenance and the assurance of Your favor can compensate for all losses. Whether You send adversity or prosperity, whether You conduct by the mountain or by the valley\emdash by steep and crooked ways, or by smooth and pleasant ways, let this be my comforting assurance and rejoicing confession\emdash "All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth!" "Show me Your ways, O Lord, teach me Your paths; lead me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation, on You do I wait all the day." Should You see fit to subject me to severe and arduous discipline\emdash may I rest in the sweet confidence that it is needed; that it is a Father's rod that smites, and a Father's voice that speaks. You do not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men. Enable me to maintain the testimony of a good conscience. In simplicity and godly sincerity, may I keep myself unspotted from the world, and seek in all things to glorify Your holy name. Lift me out of the region of self. Conform me more and more to the image of Your dear Son. Keep me from all evil surmisings; from all unkind interpretations of Your dealings. Give me the sanctified use of Your dispensations; that so, when the angel of affliction comes down and troubles the pool, I may step in and be purified\emdash and thus the trial of my faith may be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.\par \par Look down in compassion on the extensive circle of sufferers, in a suffering world. O Prince of Sufferers, who alone, by experience, can gauge the depth of Your people's sorrows, draw near to all such in Your infinite mercy, and say "I am the Lord who heals you." May they listen to the reason of their trials coming from Your own lips of love\emdash "Your Father knows that you have need of all these things." Comfort them with the thought of the better world, where the pang of sickness is never felt, where the shadow of death never falls, and where the tear of bereavement never dims the eye. Strengthen and sustain the dying. Grant unto them an abundant entrance into the heavenly kingdom.\par \par Promote Your cause everywhere. Encourage the often drooping hearts of Your ministering servants at home, as well as those who are lifting up their voices amid the wastes of heathenism. Hasten the day when the wilderness and the solitary place shall be made glad for them; when the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose. Prosper all measures in this our land which tend to promote the social well-being, and the growth and spread of true and undefiled religion. May our nation continue, as in past ages, a faithful witness for the truth, and a diffuser of holy influences. As the recipient of manifold spiritual riches and blessings, may she feel more and more her duty and responsibility, to be the almoner of these to others less highly favored. God be merciful unto us and bless us, and cause His face to shine upon us\emdash that Your way may be known upon the earth\emdash Your saving health among all nations.\par \par Anew I commend myself, and those near and dear to me, to Your gracious care and keeping. May every night find us pitching our tents nearer heaven and nearer to You\emdash and at last, in the morning of immortality, may we be permitted to awake in Your likeness, and to rejoice evermore in Your presence and love.\par \par And to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, be ascribed all blessing, and honor, and glory, and praise, world without end. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } `a`% 1)10 Day 10{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched2G 1m09 Day 09{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 9th Morning\0 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 10th Morning\emdash STRONG CONSOLATION\par \par "So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us." Hebrews 6:17, 18\par \par O God, I beseech You to draw near to me in Your great mercy. My voice shall You hear in the morning, O Lord\emdash in the morning will I direct my prayer unto You and will look up. Fill my heart with Your love; that I may feel the Gate of prayer to be as the Gate of heaven\emdash the portal opening into a Father's presence.\par \par I bless You that amid all changes You are unchanging\emdash that amid the instability and insecurity of human purposes\emdash the fickleness of earthly counsels\emdash I can exult in Your faithfulness. You are the same. "The Lord lives and blessed be my Rock, and let the God of my salvation be exalted." I thank You especially, for the purchased blessings of that everlasting covenant which is well ordered in all things and sure. By two immutable things\emdash Your oath and Your promise\emdash in which it is impossible for God to lie, I have strong consolation.\par \par And yet Lord, I have to acknowledge with shame and humiliation, that I have not been living up to my privileges. I have not been realizing as I ought to have done, my position and prospects as an heir of these exceeding great and precious promises. Your mercies have been too often received with unthankfulness, and Your chastisements with repining. I have to bewail my lack of faith and lack of love\emdash my coldness and deadness\emdash the dullness of my spiritual perceptions\emdash the often surrender of my heart to objects and pursuits on which Your favor cannot rest. I have too often given to self, and the world, and sin\emdash those affections and that service which should have been inalienably Yours.\par \par Where can I look, in the hour of conscious unworthiness and demerit, but to the "strong consolation" of Your blessed Word. If I have forgotten and forsaken my first love\emdash if other lords have had dominion over me\emdash if like a vessel I have broken loose from my moorings and been drifting away from You, may that hope\emdash the hope of forgiveness now and the hope of heaven hereafter\emd ash both purchased and sealed for me in the cross of Your dear Son\emdash be as an anchor of the soul sure and steadfast, entering into that within the veil.\par \par Fit me this day for the battle of life. Trusting to the promised aids of Your Spirit, may I be enabled to resist the world, the flesh, and the devil. Keep me from absorbing love of earth\emdash from all forbidden paths\emdash from all doubtful and debatable ground. Preserve me from the lusts which debase, the selfishness which hard!ens, the anger or malice which, if unchecked and unrepressed, may grow into malevolence. Give me a spirit of watchfulness\emdash keeping vigil even in the hour of apparent security; ever listening to the needed monition "When you think you stands, take heed lest you fall." Preserve me from hard construction of Your dealings\emdash from hard construction of the doings and dealings of my fellow-creatures\emdash from censorious and ungenerous suspicions. May I strive to make charitable allowance for those wh"o injure me\emdash eschewing all hastiness of speech or temper. If exposed to unmerited wrong, may I leave my cause with You.\par \par I pray for all who may still be far from You\emdash living without God and without hope in the world. May they also be led, before it be too late, to flee for refuge and lay hold on the hope set before them in the gospel\emdash confiding in the inviolability of Your own oath and promise, "As I live, says the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death of him that dies.#"\par \par Hear the cry ascending from the dark places of the earth, full of the habitations of cruelty. Lord, how long? Let the wickedness of the wicked come to an end; let the reign of the just be established. Bless and prosper every mission cause and enterprise. May idols be dethroned and idol-worship abolished, and may men know that You, whose name alone is Jehovah, are the most High over all the earth. Bless our beloved country. Give to its rulers wisdom and prudence and energy\emdash a sen$se of responsibility to You, by whom kings reign and princes decree justice. Reform whatever is evil\emdash protect, conserve, and perpetuate whatever is good.\par \par \par \par O God of the mourner!\emdash to the fatherless be a Father\emdash to the widow a husband\emdash to the friendless a friend. May all afflicted ones know, in the midst of their sorrows, the strong consolation imparted to those who have fled to Christ for refuge. Great and manifold as are Your consolations at al%l times, You are specially a present help in trouble.\par \par I again commend myself to You and to the word of Your grace. Be ever at my right hand and I shall not be moved. As an heir of promise, may my eye be upwards and my footsteps onwards. May everything tend to promote my spiritual advancement. May the joys of the way and the trials of the way alike bring me nearer heaven and nearer to You. I ask these and all other needed blessings, in the name of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. A&men.\par \par \par \par 10th Evening\emdash GOD IS LOVE\par \par "He who loves not, knows not God; for God is love." 1 John 4:8\par \par Almighty and everlasting Father, the God of my life, the length of my days, I desire this evening, before I retire to rest, to offer the tribute of grateful praise for all Your mercies given to me, and to supplicate Your blessing and guardian care during the silent watches of the night. I adore You for the gracious manifestations 'You have made of Your name and character and attributes\emdash as the Holy and the Righteous, the Just and the True. Above all, I bless You for Your best, Your endearing name\emdash "God is love." Your outer creation proclaims it\emdash the vocal melodies of forest and grove\emdash the placid heavens above, and the bounteous earth beneath\emdash spring in its buds of promise, and summer with its wealth of beauty. In a silent hymn of thanksgiving, universal nature testifies, "The Lord is good to all, and H(is tender mercies are over all His works."\par \par But it is in the work and atonement of Your dear Son, You have given the mightiest proof and pledge of the great love with which You have loved me. It is while seated at the foot of His cross, that I can most truly exclaim, "Herein indeed is love!" I rejoice to think of the eternity of that love\emdash that it existed before the birth of time or of worlds. You loved Your people with an everlasting love. And knowing no beginning of days, neither) does it know end of years. Loving Your own who are in the world, You loved them unto the end. O You, whose nature and whose name is love, bring me to live under the power and influence of this divine perfection. May I be enabled, more and more, to love Him who has first loved and so loved me. Keep me from the guilt of requiting Your love with ingratitude. May it secure and conciliate my confidence and trust. Deliver me from every heart-sin and life-sin that would tend to intercept its gracious effluence.* By needed and salutary discipline, wean me from every less worthy object of affection. Subordinate all creature and created love to the divine. May the love of God be shed abroad in my heart by the Holy Spirit given unto me. Even should You see fit to chequer my path with trials, may these prove heart-searchers, testing the depth and reality of my devotion to Him who must do all things well, and nothing but what is well; so that I may be able to say, under every varying scene of changeful life\emdash "I +have known and believed the love which God has to me."\par \par Bathed in the element of love to You a loving God, let me seek to love all around. Give me large and generous thoughts and plans for the welfare of others. May that love of Yours, which has my own heart and the circle of my more immediate influence for its center, have the world for its circumference. Let it radiate forth to all mankind.\par \par Keep my dear friends and relatives in this same pavilion of love. May they pi,llow their heads this night on the divine assurance, "He who spared not His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things." Linked to one another and to You in these bonds of holy fellowship, may we together look forward to that daybreak of immortality when this divine affection will be enthroned supremely in every heart; when at last we shall all be able to comprehend, in some feeble measure, what is the height and depth and length and breadth, and to know -the love of Christ which passes knowledge.\par \par Bless all in sorrow. May they indulge no hard suspicions of Your faithfulness\emdash may they trace no footsteps in their darkened way but the footsteps of love\emdash may they hear no voice in their hushed chambers but the voice of love. May they listen to this explanation of Your dealings, "As many as I love I rebuke and chasten."\par \par Hasten the day, when this world, now groaning and travailing in pain and clad in the garments .of sorrow, shall be arrayed in festive attire, and be enabled to exult in the glorious liberty of Your children. Send times of refreshing unto Zion. Create upon all her dwelling-places and upon her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day and the shining of a flaming fire by night\emdash upon all the glory be a defense. Arise, O Lord, and plead Your own cause.\par \par Be pleased to forgive whatever in thought, in word, or in deed, I have committed against You this day. Before I retire to rest, sprinkle my heart with the covenant token. Oh, unslumbering Shepherd of Israel, guard my midnight hours; and when the Gates of the morning again are opened, may they be opened anew to the light of Your love, and to fresh heart-consecration to Your service and glory.\par \par I present these humble supplications, relying on nothing in myself, but trusting alone for pardon and acceptance and peace, to the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } 0You as the God of my life and the length of my days. The Lorad is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?\emdash the Lord is the strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? You are the Fountain of all excellence; Your loving-kindness is better than life.\par \par I approach You in the name of Him whom You hear always, and in whom You are ever well pleased. Come forth, O Great High Priest, in this the hour of morning sacrifice, and breathe upon me Your own benediction, "Peace be unto you!" Fill1 me with all joy and peace in believing. O Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world, grant me Your peace! I rejoice in the dignity of Your nature\emdash the fullness of Your grace\emdash the tenderness of Your sympathy\emdash the prevalence of Your pleadings. I go forth this day into a world of trouble and trial and conflict. In no armor or panoply of my own am I proof against the enemy\emdash but I take refuge in the elevating assurance that I can do all things, and suffer all things, and overcom2e all things, through Christ who strengthens me.\par \par Meanwhile, give me calm contentment with my lot. May all its blessings be sweetened, by having them in You, and You in them. Keep me from all that would foster a spirit of unbelief and rebellion and murmuring. Give me a childlike docility\emdash tenderness of conscience\emdash simplicity of trust\emdash holiness of heart\emdash obedience and consistency of life. May I be enabled to make a more entire and unreserved surrender of myself\emdash my w3ill\emdash my affections\emdash my talents\emdash my energies\emdash my time\emdash to You. Let me know that the promise is sure and unfailing, "My God shall supply all your needs out of His riches in glory by Christ Jesus." May Your fear deliver me from the sinful fear of man\emdash may Your love enable me to rise superior to the caprice and fitfulness of human friendships\emdash may the hope of being with You forever, reconcile me to the vicissitudes and trials of a changing, chequered, transient world.4 I rejoice that life's unknown future is in better keeping and disposal than in mine. I will be anxious for nothing\emdash knowing that the morrow will bring along with it from You, grace proportioned for all exigencies\emdash strength in weakness, support in temptation, patience in trial, and victory in death.\par \par Bless my beloved friends. May the joy of the Lord be their strength also. Keep them as the apple of Your eye\emdash let them repose under the shadow of Your wings. Look in great kindness5 on the afflicted. Hide them in the clefts of the Rock until these calamities are overpast. Reveal Yourself unto them in another way than You do unto the world. Show them, that You see fit at times to bring them out from themselves\emdash their own likings, and trusts, and confidences, and earthly joys\emdash that they may lean on Your arm. Show them, that in the realized possession of Your love and favor, they have what will fill all blanks and compensate for all losses. May they go from strength to stre6ngth, until every one of them in Zion appears before God.\par \par I pray for the peace and prosperity of Jerusalem. May she rise from the dust and put on her beautiful garments; a crown of glory in the hand of the Lord and a royal diadem in the hand of our God. Give to Your churches a spirit of unity and concord\emdash lead them willingly to co-operate in every good work and labor of love, so that, though there be many separate flocks, they may all look to the one Guiding Shepherd; though differing in 7outer organization, they may be all truly one in Christ Jesus. Disperse the brooding darkness of the world, and utter Your own omnific mandate, "Let there be light."\par \par Direct, control, suggest this day, all my designs\emdash my deeds\emdash my words. Let me carry the fragrance of the mercy-seat out into the world. May a sense of Your presence prove a preservative against temptation. Keep back Your servant also from presumptuous sins, and let them not have dominion over me. And all I ask is for th8e Redeemer's sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par 11th Evening\emdash THE RESURRECTION AND LIFE\par \par "I am the resurrection, and the life; he who believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live." John 11:25\par \par Most blessed God, my Heavenly Father\emdash I desire to come into Your gracious presence this night, having my heart filled with gratitude and thankfulness for all Your unmerited mercies. That I have been protected throughout the day, from danger, and accident, and disease\emdash9 that I have been shielded from sin and temptation, it is all Your doing. Your hand has been around me for good. It is You, Lord, who alone makes me to dwell in safety.\par \par I bless You for the exceeding riches of Your grace, in Your kindness towards me through Christ Jesus. I bless You for His spotless obedience\emdash His meritorious death\emdash His glorious resurrection. I bless You that I can enter by faith His vacant sepulcher, and hear the joyful assurance, "He is not here, He is risen." In t:hat gracious declaration, I have the pledge and testimony that You the Father have accepted His completed work\emdash that You, in Him, have begotten us again unto a lively hope\emdash the hope of an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fades not away. Enable me by faith to rise and walk with Him in newness of life. Risen with Christ, may I seek those things that are above, where He sits at the right hand of God. May my life now be hidden with Christ in God, that when Christ who is my life sh;all appear, I may also appear with Him in glory. May Your Holy Spirit dwell within me, quickening this life of faith in Your dear Son, and promoting the growth of every spiritual and heavenly grace.\par \par Forgive, Lord, all the offences I have committed against You this day\emdash the sins of thought and word and deed. Blot them out of the book of Your remembrance. Before I retire to rest, I would seek to wash anew in the opened fountain; and to receive anew the blessed assurance of Your pardoning losend times of refreshing unto Zion. O Lord, revive Your work in the midst of the years. Arouse and quicken the careless and ungodly. Bring into the way of truth all such as have erred and are deceived. Before the day of grace and mercy be past, may they be led to behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world; and remember the words of the Lord Jesus how He said, "He who believes in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live." Oh, teach us all to be living in habitual preparation for death and judgment and eternity; that when the cry shall be heard in the midst of the heavens, "Behold the Bridegroom comes," we may be ready, and not ashamed before Him at His coming.\par \par I ask these, and all other needful blessings, in the name of Him whom You hear always\emdash the Great Advocate and Intercessor\emdash who, with You the Father, and You the ever-blessed Spirit, Three in One in covenant for our salvation, ever lives and reigns, one God, world without end. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } ] 111 Day 11{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 11th Morning\emdash THE SECRET OF STRENGTH\par \par "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." Phil. 4:13\par \par O God, I desire to come into Your gracious presence this morning, adoring /Ad4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 12th Morning\emdash COVENANT FAITHFULNESS\par \par "For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from you, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, says the Lord that has mercy on you." Isaiah 54:10\par \par O God, I come into Your presence on this the morning of a new day, rejoicing in Your covenant faithfulness. You change not. The mountains shall depart and the hills shall be removed. Human props may Bfail; human friends may grow cold; adversity may alienate; death must separate. But You are the same. Your kindness shall not be taken from us. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God shall stand forever.\par \par How great has been Your patience towards me! Despite of all my faults and failings\emdash my backslidings and declensions\emdash Your hand of mercy and forbearance is stretched out still. You are God and not man, therefore it is that the sons of Jacob are not consumed. UncChangeableness cannot be thwarted by creature vacillation\emdash Infinite fullness cannot be exhausted by finite needs. I bless You, O Lord, especially, that I can exult in the faithfulness and immutability of Jesus\emdash that, He who of old received sinners\emdash who came to seek and to save the lost\emdash who broke not the bruised reed nor quenched the smoking flax\emdash is still as unchanged as when He lived and loved and compassionated on earth. This is His name and memorial to all generations, andD which ages and generations cannot alter\emdash "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and today and forever."\par \par Before I go forth to my worldly duties and engagements, I would desire to repair to His cross, there to have all the blessings of the everlasting covenant anew ratified and sealed. Out of His infinite fullness I would seek to derive the needed grace and strength to fit me for work and warfare. I may perhaps this day have some untried path before me. There may be some unknown temptation to eEncounter\emdash some unforeseen burden to bear. Arm me for every conflict. Amid all harassments and troubles and disquietudes, amid all taunts and provocations, let me endure as seeing You who is invisible. Having avouched the Lord to be my covenant God, may I aspire more and more after purity of heart and consistency of character. Give me grace, with a single eye to Your glory, to fill my sphere in life whatever it be\emdash doing my duty heartily as to the Lord and not unto men\emdash jealous of anythinFg that would tend to alienate my affections from You, and lead me into detrimental courses\emdash dubious and debatable ground on which Your blessing cannot rest. Let me bear upon me the lofty impress of those, born from above and for above\emdash grateful and thankful for the many means and sources of enjoyment You have given in the present life, yet seeking to live a pilgrim and stranger on the earth, having my citizenship in heaven.\par \par Compassionate a dead and dying world. Darkness is covering Gthe lands and gross darkness the people. May the summons be heard, "Arise, shine, for your light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon you." From kingdom to kingdom, and from shore to shore, let the cry in due time ascend, "O come, let us sing unto the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the Rock of our salvation." Prosper all Bible and missionary agencies. May Your servants, alike at home and abroad, be valiant for the truth. May they experience much of Your presence and witness much of Your pHower. Baptize them with the Holy Spirit and with fire.\par \par Look down in mercy on all who are afflicted\emdash tossed with tempest and not comforted\emdash on all who are mourning the sudden extinction of some star in their skies\emdash the premature withering of some cherished gourd. May they know that they can have no real loss, if they have more of Your fellowship and presence and love.\par \par I pray for all my dear friends. May they be among the beloved of the Lord who dwell safely. Bless thIem and make them blessings. Now bound up together in the bundle of life\emdash may we be found at last, without spot and blameless, when the harvest of the earth shall be reaped. The Lord grant unto us that we may find mercy of the Lord on that day. And all I ask is for the Savior's sake, Amen.\par \par \par \par 12th Evening\emdash THE LOVE OF CHRIST\par \par "The love of Christ, which passes knowledge." Eph. 3:19\par \par O God, You are making the outgoings of the evening and of the morning to Jrejoice over me, I beseech You to draw near this night in Your great mercy, as I approach Your presence through this blessed Portal of Love. You have been my watchful Protector and Guardian during another day. Give me still Your blessing. I would now retire to rest, under the shadow of Your wings, feeling that it is You alone Lord, who makes me to dwell in safety.\par \par I bless You that I am permitted to look up unto You as my covenant God and heavenly Father; that with boldness and confidence I am iKnvited to the Throne of the heavenly grace, there to unburden all my needs and difficulties, my perplexities and temptations, and to receive the twofold boon, of mercy to pardon, and grace to help. Fill me with a deep sense of the greatness and magnitude of the love of Christ. Teach me in some feeble measure to comprehend its height and depth, its length and breadth, and to experience its constraining influence.\par \par Blessed Savior\emdash You who have loved me with an everlasting love, enable me to Lfeel that I am not my own. May I seek to make a joyful and willing surrender of my soul's best affections to You, who has ransomed me with Your precious blood. May all earthly love be subordinated to Yours. Let there be no rival or competing affection. Conscious of the predominance of divine spiritual motives and purposes, may I be enabled in honest sincerity to avow\emdash 'Lord, O Great Redeemer\emdash O Great Heart-searcher, You know all things, You know that I love You.'\par \par Help me to the cultMivation of all the graces of the Christian character. Raise me above all that is base or ungenerous\emdash unkind or resentful\emdash censorious or uncharitable. Let the law of love, which has had its highest and loftiest exemplification in the doing and dying of Jesus, find expression also in my daily walk and conversation. God is love\emdash and he who dwells in love dwells in God and God in him.\par \par Bless my friends and relatives. May that same love of Jesus form the motive principle in their acNtions. O Blessed Source of all grace! as the first fruit produced by You in the regenerated heart is love\emdash do nurture in them the spirit of Love. Let them live and act, as seeing You who is invisible\emdash and when all that is fitful and changing in affection here below has terminated, may the fellowships and friendships of earth be resumed indissolubly in glory.\par \par Lord, have mercy on a fallen world. In the region and shadow of death, may the Sun of Righteousness arise. Terminate the reignO of selfishness and tyranny\emdash of error and superstition. Let the gospel of love sheathe all swords of war, unbind all chains of slavery, and unite the nations in a holy brotherhood. Let the wind and earthquake and fire of human passion pass by\emdash and let the Lord of love be heard in His own 'still small voice.'\par \par Bless Your ministering servants at home\emdash stand by all Your faithful missionaries in their varied fields of labor in distant lands. May they be the honored instruments in lPaying many trophies at the feet of their Great Master. May their bow abide in strength, and their arms be made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob.\par \par Forgive blessed Lord\emdash for the sake of Your dear Son\emdash all that I have this day spoken or done amiss. As the Gates of the evening are closing, I would anew hear Your benevolent voice of pardoning mercy, saying, "Your sins are forgiven!" As I resign myself, once more, to that which is the image of death, may I feel that it is Your kindness and mercy alone, night after night, which prevents the emblem being converted into a reality. Oh, grant, that when that reality does overtake me\emdash when I am summoned at last to a dying hour and dying pillow\emdash the last long slumber; through the merits of Your dear Son, I may have a blissful and glorious awaking in the morning of Immortality.\par \par I ask these, and all other needful blessings, for the sake of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } --Q114 Day 14{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbd-1913 Day 13{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 13th Morning\emdash THE COMMITTED WAY\par \par "Commit yoRe 1)12 Day 12{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkin@Sur way unto the Lord; trust also in him, and he shall bring it to pass\emdash and he shall bring forth your righteousness as the light, and your judgment as the noon-day." Psalm 37:5, 6\par \par O God, I desire, as the Gates of the morning are again opened, to commit my way to You throughout a new day. You are near to those who call upon You, to all who call upon You in truth. To You all hearts are open\emdash all desires known, and from You no secrets are hidden\emdash cleanse the thoughts of my heart Tby the inspiration of Your Holy Spirit, that I may perfectly love You, and worthily magnify Your holy name.\par \par You are the Supreme Disposer. There is no such thing as accident or chance in Your providential rule. Each varying scene in this varying chequered life is from You alone. In all difficulties and perplexities, enable me to commit implicitly my way unto Your better direction\emdash hearing Your voice behind me saying, "This is the way, walk in it"\emdash rejoicing in Your wise orderings, YoUur beneficent purposes; and willing to tread, if need be, the roughest path, because it is Your sovereign will and wisdom to lead me there.\par \par You know how unworthy I am to come into Your presence, or to take Your thrice holy name into my lips. If You, Lord, should mark iniquities, who could stand? But there is forgiveness with You that You may be feared\emdash with the Lord there is mercy and plenteous redemption. I come to Your footstool, through Him who has cancelled all debts and fulfilled allV righteousness; who is now exalted a Mighty Pleader at Your right hand\emdash the Prince who has power with God and must prevail. For His sake, receive me graciously and love me freely. Out of His infinite fullness may I receive for all exigencies even grace for grace\emdash sustaining grace, restraining grace, sanctifying grace. When temptation assails, may I be enabled, in a strength greater than my own, to resist. In the trying warfare of life, cover my head in the day of battle\emdash that finally I mWay be made more than conqueror through Him that loved me.\par \par Teach me ever devoutly to follow the leadings, and to imbibe the spirit, of the divine Redeemer. Keep me from the manifestation of unholy tempers\emdash from the pride which elates; from the worldliness which hardens; from all unkindness and uncharitableness. Enable me to put the best construction on the motives and actions of others; not passing harsh and censorious comments on their inconsistencies or failings\emdash but rather consideXring myself lest I also be tempted. If assailed wrongfully with the tongue of malice or slander, may I seek, like Him who was silent before His shearers, to repress the spirit of retaliation\emdash to commit myself to One that judges righteously, and who has promised to those who so trust Him, to bring forth their righteousness as the light and their judgment as the noon-day. Invigorate my drooping faith, quicken my spiritual apprehensions, stimulate my wavering purposes and languid zeal, incline me to a Ymore hearty and entire consecration of soul and body to Your service and glory.\par \par O God of all consolation\emdash the God in whom compassions flow, bestow Your tenderest sympathy on poor afflicted ones\emdash especially on those who may be mourning the loss of beloved friends. Committing too their darkened way unto You, may the words of promise contained in holy Scripture, come out as ministering angels in their night of sorrow, cheering them with hopes full of immortality. May the dying pass thrZough the gates of death to the unending enjoyment of Your presence and love. And may we be stirred by the example of those, who have fought the good fight and obtained the crown.\par \par Bless my dear friends, temporally and spiritually. Set Your covenant mark and seal on each of their foreheads. Look in mercy on Your Church throughout all the world. May the Lord create upon every dwelling-place of Mount Zion and upon her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night,[ and upon all the glory be a defense.\par \par I anew commend myself to You and to the word of Your grace. And all I ask, is for the Redeemer's sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par 13th Evening\emdash PURITY OF HEART\par \par "Blessed are the pure in heart\emdash for they shall see God." Matthew 5:8\par \par O God, I desire to come in to Your presence this night, beseeching You to give me a Father's blessing. Let my prayer come before You as incense, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacr\ifice. The most acceptable oblation I can offer, is that of the broken and the contrite heart; the sweetest incense\emdash the incense of gratitude and thankfulness. Give me this brokenness of spirit; fill me with all joy and peace in believing, that I may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.\par \par I have to confess and mourn my great unworthiness. How far short have I come of that holiness of heart and purity of life, without which no man can see the Lord. How many sinful thoughts have I ]harbored\emdash how many guilty words have I spoken\emdash how many duties have I omitted, or carelessly and perfunctorily performed. How little gratitude have I shown for blessings\emdash how little patience under crosses. How much pride has there been in my humility\emdash how little childlike trust in Your dealings. How have even my best resolutions to serve You, been erased by the world's oblivion-power. How often have I returned to those very sins I had solemnly sworn and covenanted I was to part wit^h forever. Lord, have mercy upon me! I come anew, guilty, polluted, helpless\emdash to Him who is help and hope and portion to all who seek Him. My own repentings and tears cannot cleanse away the guilt of a single transgression. But the blood of Jesus Christ, Your dear Son, cleanses from them all.\par \par While I look to Him as my only Savior, and rely alone for justification on His atoning sacrifice, enable me to make His stainless, heavenly life, my habitual model and pattern. Give me grace to purif_y myself even as He is pure. May the Holy Spirit, the Glorifier of Jesus, take of the things that are His and show them unto me; that beholding, as in a glass, the glory alike of His divine character and His spotless obedience, I may be changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit. Do confirm and strengthen every Christlike principle within me; and may principle have its outcome in deed and action. May perfect love cast out fear. When at any time assailed with tormentin`g doubts or fiery temptations\emdash may I know that He is faithful who promised "I will make my grace sufficient for you, I will perfect strength in weakness." May whatever is displeasing, Lord, to You, be displeasing to me. Give me integrity of purpose, and simplicity of service, and loftiness of aim. May I speak kindly and act gently. Keep me from uttering anything that would infringe on truth, or that would injure the absent. Let all I do, and all I say, be inspired by that charity which is the bond oaf perfectness.\par \par I commend those in sorrow to Your sympathy\emdash especially any in whom I may be more deeply interested. May they see You thus educating them for eternity. By the sanctifying use of affliction, may losses be turned into gains. Coming forth from the furnace, as gold tried in the fire, may they at last be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.\par \par Bless Your Church everywhere. Bless all the sanctuaries throughout our land. May every House ofb God be as the Gate of Heaven\emdash do there command the blessing, even life for evermore. Repress and subdue sectarian bitterness and animosity. May the alabaster box be broken in the midst of Your worshiping assemblies, and may the whole temple-courts be fragrant with the odor of the ointment. Pour the continual dew of Your blessing on the faithful ministers and stewards of Your mysteries. Anoint them with fresh oil. May they go in the strength of the Lord God; and ever hear the sound of their Master'sc footsteps behind them. Remember all devoted laborers in heathen lands. Going forth weeping, bearing the precious seed, may they be cheered with the promise, that they shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing their sheaves with them.\par \par And now, Lord, what do I wait for? my hope is in You. Abide with me, for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent. I will not let You go, except You bless me. Shield my body from danger and my soul from sin; and as each night gathers its shadows around, may it find me better fitted and prepared for the day of consummated holiness in Your presence and kingdom, and for experiencing, in all its reality, the fulfillment of Your own beatitude, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." And all I ask is in the name, and for the sake, of Jesus Christ my only Lord and Savior; to whom, with You the Father, and You the Holy Spirit, be ascribed, as is most due, all honor and glory and praise, world without end. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } el ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 14th Morning\emdash THE SECOND COMING\par \par "Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ. Titus 2:13\par \par O God, I desire to thank You that the Gates of the morning are again opened, and that I am permitted to approach the footstool of Your Throne. Pour out upon me a spirit of grace and of supplication. May I draw near to Youf with a true heart, in full assurance of faith, having my heart sprinkled from an evil conscience, and my body washed as with pure water. Before I enter on the duties and engagements of a new day, I would seek to have Your blessing and benediction resting upon me. May the pillar of Your presence go before me. You have watched over me during the silence and darkness of another night. O You who leads Joseph like a flock\emdash be in the daytime a shadow from the heat. If Your presence goes not with me\emdasgh carry me not hence.\par \par I desire to bless Your holy name for the first coming of the Redeemer; when "the Great God" became "my Savior;" when He veiled His glory, and, in the likeness of sinful flesh, tabernacled among men\emdash humbling Himself and becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. I bless You for the fullness and completeness of His mediatorial work; that He magnified Your law\emdash satisfying all demands\emdash fulfilling all righteousness, and proclaiming with triumphhant voice, "It is finished."\par \par I bless You that, from His first advent in lowliness and humiliation, I can look forward to His second coming "without the sin-offering, unto salvation;" when He shall be glorified in His saints, and admired in all those who believe. May that event ever be to me "the blessed hope"\emdash the brightest rainbow of promise which spans the sky of the future. May I be "looking" for it\emdash living habitually ready to utter the cry of joyful expectancy\emdash "Even so, icome, Lord Jesus!" "Lo! this is our God, I have waited for Him!"\par \par Meanwhile, give me grace to love Him more and serve Him better. May my belief be more simple\emdash my devotion more ardent\emdash my walk more consistent\emdash my obedience more uniform and sincere; that I may not, like many, be found at last, all unfit and unprepared for the Bridegroom's approach\emdash but rather, with loins girded and lamp burning, go forth to join the festal train, and be among the number of the waiting servjants, who, when their Lord comes, are ready to open unto Him immediately.\par \par In the prospect of that day, may I keep a sacred and watchful guard alike over my thoughts and actions. Give me that charity which is patient and kind; which seeks not her own\emdash is not easily provoked\emdash thinks no evil\emdash which rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth. May Your good hand be with me, whether in the discharge of household or of business duties. Keep me from the absorbing love of the kworld; from coveting earthly good rather than heavenly riches. Keep me from all that would dim, to the eye of faith, the glories of the future. Enable me to live habitually, as I would wish I had been living, when the Son of man comes.\par \par The same blessings I ask for myself, I implore in behalf of all near and dear to me. May they too be found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless. Attaining now a gradual conformity to His holy mind and image\emdash when He shall appear, may they be like Himl, when they shall see Him as He is. Thus united to one another, alike in ties of human relationship and in the fellowship of the gospel, may all of us, having this common hope in us, purify ourselves, even as He is pure.\par \par Bless the children of sorrow. Let them also anticipate with joy that day when all mysteries will be unfolded\emdash all wrongs redressed\emdash all sufferings removed\emdash all corruptions vanquished\emdash and death itself swallowed up in eternal victory.\par \par Let the wmorld, now groaning and travailing in pain, exult in the prospect of her coming emancipation\emdash when, delivered from the bondage of corruption, she shall be translated into the glorious liberty of the sons of God. Prince of peace! take to Yourself Your great power and reign\emdash soon may predicted voices be heard saying\emdash "The kingdoms of this world have become the one kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ; and He shall reign forever and ever!" May Your churches be more and more faithful to theinr great missionary responsibilities. Baptize every ambassador of the cross with the Holy Spirit and with fire\emdash and when the enemy is coming in like a flood, may this same Divine Spirit set up a standard to resist him.\par \par I now commend myself, soul and body, to Your gracious care, O Great God my Savior! Never leave and never forsake me\emdash guide me while I live by Your counsel, and afterwards receive me into glory. And to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, be ascribed, aos is most due, all blessing and honor and glory and praise, world without end. Amen.\par \par \par \par 14th Evening\emdash THE PROOF OF LOVE\par \par "Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." 1 John 4:10\par \par O God, my heavenly Father, who is ever waiting to be gracious, and who is more ready to hear than Your children are to ask\emdash draw near to me at this time in Your great kindness, and fill me with all peace anpd joy in believing. You have been a pillar of cloud to me by day\emdash my Protector and Guardian. Be as a pillar of fire through the silent watches of the night. It is You, the great Shepherd of Israel, who gives Your beloved sleep.\par \par I adore You, alike as my Maker and my Redeemer. You have filled the outer creation with manifold proofs of Your love, in brightness of sky, and beauty of flower; in music of stream, and song of bird. The earth is full of the goodness of the Lord. But I adore You, eqspecially, for the mightiest proof which You have given of Your benignity and kindness, in the person and work of Your dear Son! Herein indeed is love. If at times unable to trace, in Your mysterious providential dealings, the footsteps of mercy\emdash if at times tempted, under baffling dispensations, to say, "Your judgments are a great deep"\emdash "Verily You are a God who hides Yourself"\emdash seated at the foot of Calvary's cross, we can joyfully exclaim, "We have known and believed the love God hasr to us." Man's love is changing\emdash Your is unchanging\emdash man's love is finite\emdash Your is infinite\emdash man's love is the result of kindness\emdash the return of love for love\emdash but You commend Your love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Thanks, eternal thanks be unto God for His unspeakable gift!\par \par I adore the freeness and sovereignty of that love. It was from everlasting, as it is to everlasting\emdash unbought and unprocured by any poor love ofs mine. May I ever bear about with me Your own gracious declaration, as the only reason for its bestowment\emdash "My ways are not your ways, neither are my thoughts your thoughts." You are God and not man. Man's thoughts would have been condemnation, judgment, wrath\emdash but Your thoughts towards us are thoughts of peace and not of evil. How precious are these\emdash Your thoughts of love unto me, O God! How great is the sum of them! May the exceeding riches of Your grace, in Your kindness bestowed throtugh Christ Jesus, exercise a constraining influence on my heart and life. Feeling the infinite debt of obligation under which I am laid to the divine Redeemer, may soul and body be consecrated as living sacrifices to Him, who so freely surrendered and consecrated His all for me. Blessed Savior, make me Yours. I am Yours by creation, I am doubly Yours by redemption. Quicken my faith, deepen my love, stimulate my obedience. Under the guidance and influence of lofty principle, may my eye be single, that my wuhole body may be full of light.\par \par Bless my dear friends. Reward my benefactors. Pardon any who have wronged me. May I seek to conquer unkindness with kindness. Give me peace of conscience\emdash charity towards all men. If in social communion, or in any of my dealings and transactions today, I have transgressed the golden rule\emdash cherished an ungenerous thought\emdash uttered an unkind or resentful word, or harbored an unjust suspicion\emdash good Lord, forgive me.\par \par Bless Your Churcvh everywhere. Be a wall of fire around her\emdash over all the glory be a defense. To whatever outward denomination they belong, do abundantly strengthen Your ministering servants. May their speech and their preaching not be with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and with power. May those who have gone forth as Your accredited ambassadors to heathen nations, enjoy many visible tokens of Your presence and blessing. May the precious seed, sown often with a trembling hand in uncongenial soil, be watered by the dews of heaven, and yield an abundant harvest.\par \par Sanctify Your dealings to all mourners in Zion. Pity, relieve, comfort them. You heal the broken in heart and bind up their wounds. Let them see, in the love of Jesus, the pledge and guarantee of love in all that befalls them.\par \par Hear, O Lord, in heaven, Your holy habitation, this my evening prayer; when You hear forgive, and grant me an answer in peace, for Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } xr O God, Inspirer of all good thoughts, the Hearer and Answerer of prayer\emdash draw near to me in infinite loving-kindness. At this Morning-gate of Your Temple, I desire anew to ask Your blessing, and to invoke Your favor. You have graciously said, that You are good to those, who, in simplicity of faith and earnestness of trust and hope, wait upon You. "My soul, wait only upon God, for my expectation is from him!"\par \par I thank You for Your sparing mercy. While others have been laid on beds of sicykness, or prostrated by accident, or called away by sudden death\emdash I am this hour among the living to praise You. How constant and how tender has been Your care and kindness to me in the days that are past! How enduring Your long-suffering, despite of countless provocations, and in the midst of ingratitude and disobedience, declension and backsliding!\par \par I wait upon You, this morning, to implore forgiveness for the past and grace for the future. Give me the blessed sense of pardon and peace tzhrough the blood of the cross. Seal to me afresh the blessings of the new and well ordered covenant. Say, in mingled omnipotence and love, "Your sins are all forgiven you," Being thus forgiven much, may I lean upon You and trust You in the time to come; feeling that I cannot be in better or in safer keeping than in Yours. For all my joys, may I have chastened gratitude and thankfulness while they are granted; yet seeking not to invest them with a permanency which is not theirs. And when You curtail them, {or take them away, let me not dishonor You with guilty doubts and distrustful fears. May this thought silence every murmur\emdash "He who spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not, with Him also, freely give us all things." May I know and feel assured, that all things, by immutable covenant, are working, and will work together for good to those who love You. Thus do You shed hope and joy and peace around my daily path; may Goodness and Mercy, like two guardian angels, follo|w me all the days of my life, and may my dwelling be in the house of the Lord forever.\par \par Before I engage in my daily duties, I would implore Your guidance and protection. I cannot forecast the circumstances in which I may be placed today; what temptations may beset me\emdash what troubles may oppress me. Let a sense of Your presence hallow my worldly work\emdash that so, begun\emdash carried on, and ended in You, all may redound to Your praise and glory. Let me use, with a glad and grateful heart}, the many enjoyments You have given me in this beautiful earth; but abolish the evil dominion of self and selfishness. Keep me from the beguiling and seductive love of pleasure, on which Your approval cannot rest. Write the law of kindness on my heart. Let it be my happiness and joy to minister to others. May I feel that it is better to give than to receive; better to be last than to be first. Keep me pure\emdash preserve me from false living\emdash from all artifice\emdash all underhand and dubious deal~ings\emdash all crooked and covetous ways. May my converse be sincere, my conscience clear as the noonday. Serving You cheerfully here, may I become more and more fitted for the full consecration\emdash the perfect spontaneity of the heavenly world.\par \par I pray for all unsolaced, unsuccoured, and unpitied ones; all the wide circle and family of affliction. O You who bear Your people, as a man bears his own son that serves him\emdash do bear their griefs and carry their sorrows. Even when wills are thwarted and plans are crossed\emdash may they too know what it is "to wait only upon God." May the bruising in the olive-press of trial, only cause an overflow of the oil of joyful submission. Spare useful and valued lives. Let not the sun of existence go down before it is yet day. Prepare the dying for death and what is after death. May they exult in the finished work of Jesus\emdash may the music of His name refresh their souls in the closing hour; and when they are taken away, may those left to mourn their loved and lost, know that the message "You shall die and not live," comes from You.\par \par I pray for Your Church. Increase her faith, stimulate her zeal, heal her breaches. O Blessed Redeemer, who, by reason of these unhappy divisions, are wounded in the house of Your friends\emdash do bring the varied members of the household of faith nearer You, and then they shall be nearer one another. Send times of refreshing unto Zion. Pour upon her the continual dew of Your blessing\emdash may no part of the fleece be dry. Beautify Your sanctuary\emdash make the place of Your feet glorious.\par \par Anew I commend myself and all belonging to me, this day, to Your gracious keeping. Waiting upon You, may I be enabled to renew my strength\emdash and know that You never say to any of the seed of Jacob, Seek you my face in vain. And all I ask is for Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par 15th Evening\emdash THE FOURFOLD PLEA\par \par "Who is he that condemns? It Is Christ who died, yes rather, that has risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us." Romans 8:34\par \par Most blessed and everlasting God, who has been my guide and guardian and protector throughout the day, I approach the Gates of prayer tonight, with my evening tribute of gratitude and thanksgiving. Others, who rose this morning in health and strength, have been summoned without a note of warning into an eternal world. I am among the living to praise You. In my case, too, the axe might have been laid at the root of the tree, and the mandate have gone forth, "Cut it down." It is of the Lord's mercies that I am not consumed.\par \par I render unto You praise for all the outward blessings of my lot\emdash for food and clothing\emdash for bright sunshine and revolving season\emdash for social and domestic pleasures\emdash the endearments of kindred and home\emdash the fellowship of loving and congenial hearts. I bless You, above all, for spiritual privileges. I render You devout thanks for the finished work of my adorable Redeemer. Looking to myself\emdash my own guilty doings and demerits\emdash there is everything to sadden and overwhelm. But, blessed be Your name, You have put this new song with its fourfold theme into my lips\emdash 'Christ has died; Christ has risen; Christ is at the right hand of God; Christ makes intercession.' I rejoice to think, that, as the great Angel of the Covenant, he is ever pleading before the throne\emdash bearing on His breastplate the names of His true Israel. Looking to the perfection of His sacrifice, the efficacy of His intercession, the fullness and all-sufficiency of His grace, I can joyfully make the challenge, "Who is he that condemns?" "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day." Reposing on these gracious covenant assurances, I would retire to rest this night, cheered by the thought, that I am tended by the sleepless eye of Israel's unslumbering Shepherd.\par \par Forgive the sins of the past day\emdash the sins I have committed against You my God\emdash the sins I have committed against my fellow-creatures; any unkind thoughts, or uncharitable judgments or censorious sayings. Sanctify me by the indwelling of Your gracious Spirit. Risen with Christ, may I live under the power of holy principles and renewed affections; seeking to make His divine example and spotless character\emdash in His patience and meekness, His forgiveness and submission\emdash the guide and regulator in all my duties and communion. Bearing about with me continually the dying of the Lord Jesus\emdash may the life also of Jesus be thus made manifest in my mortal flesh.\par \par I pray for all on whom You have been laying Your chastening hand. May they too know the quickening power of His resurrection and the sympathetic fellowship of His sufferings. If they have been brought in sad experience to feel that change is their portion here\emdash that hopes are transient, joys insecure, friendships perishing\emdash may they look upwards to an unchanging Savior-God, and listen to His assurance\emdash "Fear not; I am He who lives and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore, and have the keys of the grave and of death." Comfort all who have been bereaved of beloved relatives\emdash grateful for the valued loan, may they resign the trust to the great Proprietor of life. Only yielding You what is Yours, may it be theirs to say, "Your will be done!"\par \par Bless Your Church everywhere. Heal divisions. Hasten the time when the watchmen on Zion's battlements shall see eye to eye and heart to heart. We know that there is a day coming, when the divine saying shall receive its joyful fulfillment\emdash "Behold how good and pleasant a thing it is for brethren to dwell together in unity." We would long, good Lord, for the realization of this holy brotherhood of Christians and of churches\emdash that blessed era, when there shall be no contrariety to Your mind; when all shall be in blessed accordance with Your will; and when, in answer to the Redeemer's prayer, His people, all becoming one, the world shall believe. Let Your word triumph over pride and infidelity\emdash superstition and will-worship. Let the people praise You, O God, yes let all the people praise You. The harvest truly is plenteous and the laborers are few. I would ask the Lord of the harvest that, He would send forth laborers to His harvest. Spirit of truth and love and peace I speed forth in Your glorious mission; and utter the divine summons over the darkened and degraded nations, "Let there be light!"\par \par Lord, I anew commend myself, and all near and dear to me, to Your gracious keeping. Lift upon me the light of Your countenance and give me peace. Watch over me during the unconscious hours of sleep; and when the Gates of the morning are again opened, may I rise, in Your strength, fitted for the discharge of the duties and employments of another day. Hear me, gracious Father, for the Redeemer's sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } __I1q15 Day 15{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 15th Morning\emdash PATIENT WAITING\par \par "The Lord is good unto those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him." Lam. 3:25\par \pawE LIVELY HOPE\par \par "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who, according to his abundant mercy, has begotten us again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fades not away." 1 Peter 1:3, 4\par \par O God Almighty, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, I thank You for all the manifold tokens of Your goodness and love. The Gates of the morning have again been opened. Do open, along with them, the Gates of Righteousness, that I may enter in and praise the Lord. Enkindle within my heart holy desires and devout affections. May these be pre-occupied with You, and with the things which belong to my everlasting peace. May I have Your blessing resting upon all my duties and engagements this day\emdash the blessing which makes rich and adds no sorrow with it. May no created good be allowed to displace the sense and assurance I enjoy of Your favor and friendship.\par \par I bless You, above all, for Your abundant mercy in the purchased, incorruptible inheritance. Change is our portion here. We are ever reminded, in the course of Your Providence, of the precarious tenure which links us to all earthly objects of happiness. But in the Resurrection of Jesus I have the pledge and earnest of enduring blessings\emdash "the lively hope"\emdash the hope "full of immortality." In His finished work alone is all my dependence placed. With quiet confidence, I desire to repose in His covenant love and in the plenitude of His promises. O Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, grant me Your peace!\par \par Teach me ever to realize what a needy pensioner I am, from day to day and from hour to hour, on Your grace. Hold You me up! Keep me, guide me, protect me, undertake for me. In temptation support me\emdash in danger defend me\emdash in sorrow comfort me. If You send prosperity, enable me to carry the cup with a steady hand. If You send adversity, enable me to glorify You in the midst of the fires\emdash adoring a 'taking' as well as a 'giving' God. As a member of the Christian priesthood, may it be my desire to offer on Your altar the continual sacrifice of a humble spirit, and a holy, pure, consistent life. Keep the lamp of faith and love trimmed and burning. Let me aim, more and more, at the crucifixion of sin and self. Should You speak at times by crossed dealings and mysterious dispensations, reading the impressive lesson of earth's corruptible and defiled and fading inheritances\emdash may I harbor no guilty suspicions of Your faithfulness, or seek to arraign the appointments of paternal wisdom. But looking beyond to that which is imperishable\emdash in answer to the question, "Is it well with you?" may I seek to be ready with the unhesitating reply, "It is well."\par \par God of Bethel\emdash the God of my fathers\emdash the God of all the families of the earth\emdash I pray in behalf of those near and dear to me\emdash beseeching You to grant them a saving interest in that same unfading heritage. Make them partakers of Your abundant mercy\emdash prepare them for Your Son's appearing and kingdom; and let nothing dim or obscure the brightness of that "blessed hope."\par \par Extend Your support and sympathy to all in sorrow. Let them bear, with patient equanimity, whatever You see meet to appoint. Put into their lips the prayer, divinely taught, "Your will be done." Seeking to have no jot or tittle altered in the allotments of infinite love, may they look forward to that morning without clouds, when in Your light they shall see light, and when every shadow which now dims and darkens shall forever flee away.\par \par Prosper Your cause and kingdom on the earth. Reveal Yourself to the nations who know You not, as a Father\emdash the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed Savior, have You not said, regarding the world You have redeemed, "The hour comes when the true worshipers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth?" Hasten the time, in Your own good way, when "neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem," nor in any exclusive "holy places"\emdash but when from the lips of ransomed humanity the cry shall be heard\emdash "Doubtless You are our Father, though Abraham be ignorant of us, and Israel acknowledge us not."\par \par And now, Lord, what do I wait for? My hope is in You. Let all my duties this day, whether private and domestic\emdash or public and in the world, be performed under a sense of Your approval, and under the consciousness of Your strengthening and upholding grace\emdash that so, when the shades of evening have again gathered, I may be enabled, in grateful remembrance, anew to set up my Ebenezer and to say\emdash "The Lord has helped me." And all I ask is for the Savior's sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par 16th Evening\emdash BELIEVING\par \par "He who believes on the Son has everlasting life." John 3:36\par \par O God, I bless You that in the multitude of Your mercies the Gates of the evening have again closed upon me in peace. May the great Angel of the Covenant descend, and mingle the fragrance of His adorable merits with the evening incense-cloud; that my prayers, mingled though they be with much imperfection and sin, may ascend before You with acceptance. Hallow my thoughts\emdash sanctify my affections; raise me above the seen and the temporal, and enable me to hold converse with the unseen and the infinite.\par \par I bless You for that free and glorious gift of everlasting life, which You have given me in Your dear Son. May I freely and lovingly receive it\emdash as it is freely and lovingly offered. Lord, I believe, help my unbelief! May I be enabled to see in Jesus the very Savior I need\emdash the Physician who heals all my diseases. To His precious blood I look for pardon\emdash to His supporting grace for strength\emdash to His tender sympathy for solace. Give me the present blessedness of those whose iniquities are forgiven and whose sins are covered. May I know the truth and reality of the words, "We who have believed do enter into rest,"\emdash "He who believes on the Son has everlasting life." Give me the preparatory rest of grace here, which is the prelude and pledge of the eternal rest of glory hereafter. Fill me even now with all peace, and joy in believing, that I may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.\par \par With that everlasting life begun, which is to be perfected and consummated above, may I purify myself even as Christ is pure. Enable me to live worthy of so glorious a heritage. Deliver me from the enthralling power and bondage of sin in every form. As a temple of the Holy Spirit, may I be kept from whatever would defile or desecrate its hallowed courts. Preserve me from the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eye, and the pride of life\emdash from the power of all carnal appetites and corrupt affections. Guard the springs of thought and will. Prevent me from harboring or indulging unrighteous desires. In all I do, may I put on charity which is the bond of perfectness. Having the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, may I sit at the feet of Him who pleased not Himself.\par \par I pray for all my dear friends\emdash number them among Your believing children\emdash make them heirs of this same everlasting kingdom. Let none be guilty of procrastination in the things which belong to their eternal peace. Let none be beguiled by the delusion of a deathbed repentance\emdash beginning the watch when the summons comes to leave the watchtower\emdash seeking a living Savior for the first time at a dying hour\emdash but may we all be living habitually in that state of preparedness, that when the midnight cry shall be heard, we maybe ready with the response, "Even so\emdash come, Lord Jesus!" Lo! this is our God, we have waited for Him!\par \par Let the dew which descended on the mountains of Zion descend on every branch of Your Church universal. Let a season of reviving and refreshing come from Your own immediate presence. Build the walls of Jerusalem. Soon may there be voices heard saying, "The kingdoms of this world have become the one kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ."\par \par Look in tender love on the children of sorrow. If You have been recently impressing upon any the solemn lesson regarding the present life, that it is even as a vapor which appears for a little moment and then vanishes away, let them rejoice in the glorious reversion they have in life everlasting; that beyond the dissolution of the earthly tabernacle, the eye of faith can rest on a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. Comfort the fatherless, the widow, the poor also, and him that has no helper. Even when the footsteps of a God of love fail to be traced\emdash may there be implicit trust in the wisdom and rectitude of inscrutable dealings.\par \par I anew supplicate Your forgiveness for the sins of the by-past day, and commit myself to Your gracious protection and guardianship during the silent watches of another night. And all I ask is for Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } oMo 1q18 Day 18{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcha{1U17 Day 17{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fchac1%16 Day 16{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 16th Morning\emdash THrset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 17th Morning\emdash THE GREAT PROPITIATION\par \par "Whom God has set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood." Rom. 3:25\par \par Most Blessed God, Father of all mercies and God of all grace, do hear in heaven Your dwelling-place these my morning supplications. When You hear forgive, and grant me an answer in peace.\par \par You have mercifully guarded me during the unconscious hours of slumber\emdash permitting me to lie down in sleep and to awake in safety. And now that I am about to enter on the duties and engagements\emdash it may be the temptations and trials\emdash of a new day, I would invoke Your presence. Give me Your benediction and blessing. If You are for me, who can be against me? I will go in the strength of the Lord God, making mention of Your righteousness.\par \par Blessed be Your name for the Great Propitiation\emdash that I can look away from myself, and my own guilty doings, to Him who has done all, and suffered all, and procured all for me. Oh sprinkle the lintels and door-posts of my heart with the covenant token. Countless multitudes have already washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, and are now before Your Throne the trophies and monuments of redeeming grace and love. To His cross I desire anew, in simple faith, to look\emdash to the horns of that bloodstained altar I desire anew to cling. I have no other Savior, and blessed be Your name, need no other. Gracious Redeemer, You are able to save and willing to save to the uttermost. You have a balm for every wound; an antidote for every sorrow. To whom can I go but unto You, You have the words of eternal life.\par \par May I be enabled, this day, to bear about with me the dying of the Lord Jesus. May that blood of sprinkling purge my conscience from dead works to serve the living God. Give the quickening energy of Your Holy Spirit, to disarm the power of temptation\emdash to dethrone self\emdash to deliver from the seductive influences of the world. Keep me from the intoxication of success\emdash the pride and alienation of prosperity. Keep me from undue depression and guilty murmuring in adversity. Forbid that I should ever take encouragement to sin from abounding grace\emdash but be led, rather, thus to judge, that if one died for all, then all were dead, and in that He died, He died that they who live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto Him who died for them and rose again. Impart to me increasing aspirations after that holiness of heart and life without which no man can see the Lord. Thus continuing, from day to day, in the enjoyment of Your fear and favor, when I come to die, may I be enabled to fall asleep in Jesus\emdash in the blissful hope of a glorious immortality.\par \par Let every blessing I ask for myself, be largely bestowed on all near and dear to me. Seal, to each of them, a saving interest in the blessings of the everlasting covenant. As the beloved of the Lord may they dwell safely. Let not one be found lacking on the day when You make up Your jewels.\par \par Speed the gospel through the nations of the earth. Give Your faithful servants everywhere grace to proclaim, in all its fullness, Your own glorious message\emdash the only remedy for a ruined world\emdash peace through the blood of the cross. Arise, Lord, and plead Your own cause. Hasten the day, when the Prince of Peace shall be welcomed to the Throne of universal empire, and when all the ends of the world shall see the salvation of our God. Bless all Your churches at home. Imbue Your ministering servants with the healthful spirit of Your grace. Restore the lost; reclaim the backslider; comfort the mourner; shield the tempted; support the sick; sustain the dying. Bless the young. Enable them to lay the green ears of early consecration on Your holy altar, and to cry, "My Father, You shall be the guide of our youth." Bless manhood in its prime. May the best energies of soul and body be willingly surrendered to Your service. Bless old age. May the hoary head be a crown of glory, found in the way of righteousness.\par \par I ask these and all other needed blessings in the name of Him whom You hear always; who has loved me, and washed me from my sins in His own precious blood; Jesus Christ\emdash my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 17th Evening\emdash VICTORY OVER DEATH\par \par "O death, where is your sting? O grave, where is your victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Cor. 15:55-57\par \par O God, I desire, as the Gates of the evening are again closing around me, to draw near into Your gracious presence, adoring You as the God of my life, in whose hands is the breath of every living thing. You have watched over me during another day\emdash protecting me from danger, guarding me from temptation, sustaining me with the blessings of Your goodness. I thank You for this great gift of being\emdash that I am still this night among the living to praise You, while others have slept the sleep of death.\par \par You are ever giving impressive intimations and remembrances of our frailty and mortality. As for man his days are as grass\emdash as the flower of the field so he flourishes. The wind passes over it and it is gone, and the place that once knew it knows it no more. I bless You that as by man came death, by man came also the resurrection from the dead. Adored be Your name, that we can look, through the bars of the grave, on hopes fall of immortality, and hear the voice of the divine Redeemer saying, "Fear not; I am he who lives and was dead, and behold I am alive for evermore, and have the keys of the grave and of death,"\emdash "I am the resurrection and the life, he who lives and believes on me shall never die." I bless You that in His cross and passion victory has been obtained over the King of terrors; that to all His true people the portals of death have been transformed into the gate of heaven, and that in His resurrection they have the pledge of their own. Grant me now, O God, a saving interest in all those spiritual blessings He died to purchase, and which He is exalted to bestow; that thus I may be enabled to look forward with calmness and fortitude to the hour of departure, whenever and wherever You see fit to call me hence. May I be so living in near and conscious fellowship with Him, that when the summons of death comes, it may be to me like an angel whispering\emdash "The Master has come, and calls for you."\par \par While I bear about with me continually the dying of the Lord Jesus, may the life also of Jesus be made manifest in my mortal flesh. May it be my habitual aspiration, that my character be a reflection of His\emdash in its gentleness and meekness\emdash its purity and unselfishness\emdash its benevolence and sympathy. In life, doing His will and imbibing His spirit; in death, ready to use His words of filial trust and self-surrender, "Father, into Your hand I commend my spirit."\par \par I pray for any who may be living unready for the great change\emdash lulling themselves in self-security, or risking their hopes for eternity on a deathbed repentance. Let them no longer remain in a state of guilt and danger; but lead them to know, in this their day, the things that belong to their peace, before they are forever hidden from their eyes.\par \par Bless all near and dear to me. May they be united to You and to one another, in the bonds of the everlasting covenant. May their lives now be hidden with Christ in God, that when their last summons also comes, they may have nothing to do but to die, and to wake up in glory everlasting.\par \par Look in great kindness on all who are in any way afflicted or distressed in mind, body, or estate. May those who are mourning their loved and lost, be enabled to sorrow, not as others who have no hope\emdash for if they believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, those also who sleep in Jesus, will God bring with Him. We pray for those who are drawing near to the gates of death. May the unwavering eye of faith be directed to death's great Abolisher. In Him, may they see the last enemy vanquished and the grave spoiled. Let them plead Your promise with unfaltering hope, "O death, I will be your plagues\emdash O grave, I will be your destruction."\par \par Pity a fallen world, still under the ghastly dominion of sin and death. Hasten the time when its ashen robes shall be laid aside. Destroy the kingdom of Satan, which is the kingdom of disorder, and set up the kingdom of Christ, which is the kingdom of peace. Bless Your Church everywhere. May the anointing oil, poured on her great Head, flow down to the skirts of her garments. Rouse all slumbering and lifeless churches with Your own summons\emdash "Awake, you that sleep, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you life"\emdash "Be watchful and strengthen the things that remain which are ready to die." Oh give us all, as individual believers, grace to be up and doing, cultivating a wakeful vigilance\emdash living dying lives\emdash remembering, that as death leaves us, so will judgment and eternity find us, and that as the tree falls, so must it lie.\par \par Watch over me, this night, during the unconscious hours of slumber. Grant me the sleep of Your beloved; and when I awake, may I be still with You. And all I ask is for the Redeemer's sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } rset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 18th Morning\emdash DESTRUCTION AND HELP\par \par "O Israel, you have destroyed yourself; but in me is your help." Hos. 13:9\par \par O God, who has mercifully permitted me to see the light and to enjoy the comforts of a new day, draw near in Your infinite mercy this morning, and bestow upon me Your blessing. Open to me the Gates of Righteousness; I will go into them, and I will praise the Lord. As the sun of the outer world once more shines, may the better Sun of Righteousness arise upon me with healing in His beams\emdash dispersing all the clouds of sin and unbelief, and revealing the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.\par \par Lord, I have reason to mourn my manifold sins\emdash my disobedience and unbelief\emdash my ingratitude and rebellion. I am a wonder to myself\emdash self-destroyer that I am\emdash that You have spared me\emdash that You have not, long before now, pronounced against me the cumberer's sentence, and executed against me the cumberer's righteous doom. It is because You are God and not man, that, despite of all I have done to merit Your just displeasure, Your anger is turned away, and Your hand of mercy and love and compassion is stretched out still.\par \par Gracious Savior, Your divine errand in coming into our world was to seek that which was lost. The Son of man came not to destroy men's lives, but to save them. All my trust is in Your finished work, and glorious atonement, and everlasting righteousness, and continual intercession. You can save\emdash and You alone! I have no help and no hope in myself. Blessed be Your name for Your own gracious and encouraging assurance\emdash "In ME is Your help." A humble and humbled suppliant at the Gates of prayer, I would utter the simple cry of faith which of old came from the lips of a believing petitioner\emdash "Lord, help me!" May I receive also the gracious response, "Be it unto you even as you will." You are willing to bestow every needed blessing\emdash pardoning grace\emdash sustaining grace\emdash strengthening grace\emdash sanctifying grace\emdash comforting grace\emdash grace, until grace is no longer needed, but is lost and swallowed up in glory. O You who give "more grace," hide me deeper in the clefts of the smitten Rock. Other refuge I have none\emdash my helpless soul depends entirely on You. Lord, save me, else I perish! Save me, I beseech You, not only from the guilt but from the power of sin. Save me from the corruptions of my own heart\emdash from the seductive influences of the world\emdash from the temptations that may be incident to my secular duties and engagements. Save me from the sin that does more easily beset me\emdash save me from bringing dishonor on Your holy cause and Your holy name, by my inconsistent conduct or uneven walk; save me, oh, save me, from the wrath to come!\par \par Compassionate a lost world. Pity the careless, reclaim the backsliding, remove every impediment to the spread of Your truth\emdash that all the ends of the earth may soon see the salvation of God.\par \par O Help of the helpless\emdash Friend of the friendless\emdash Portion of the portionless\emdash Father of the fatherless\emdash regard with pitying eye Your suffering children. There are unnamed griefs\emdash unspoken sorrows\emdash which cannot be whispered into human ears. They can alone be unburdened and confided to You. Say to each and all such, "I will not leave you comfortless, I will come to you." In the multitude of the sorrows in their hearts may Your comforts delight their souls.\par \par Give to those related to me by the ties of kindred or affection, that same promised and needed help this day. Protect and defend them by Your mighty power, and may all their doings be ordered by Your governance, that they may do always that which is righteous in Your sight. Sanctify Your true people in body, soul, and spirit; and present them at last faultless before the presence of Your glory with exceeding joy.\par \par I anew commit myself to Your gracious keeping and direction. May the Eternal God this day be my refuge, and underneath me be the everlasting arms. And all I ask, is in the name and for the sake of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 18th Evening\emdash REST IN JESUS\par \par "Come unto me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Matthew 11:28\par \par O God, I desire to approach Your presence, on this the close of another day, through this most blessed Gateway. Gracious Redeemer, You who have finished transgression, and made an end of sin, and made reconciliation for iniquity, and brought in an everlasting righteousness\emdash who Yourself, having overcome the sharpness of death, have opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers; draw near, as You did to Your disciples of old when it was toward evening and the day was far spent, and grant me Your benediction. Heaven and earth may pass away, but never will that promise be altered, that coming to You, weary and heavy laden, You will give rest and peace to the burdened soul. I rejoice that in You the conflict was endured and the victory won\emdash that there is no sin too great for Your compassion\emdash no case too extreme for Your support\emdash no sorrow too trivial for Your sympathy\emdash no tempest-tossed soul that cannot listen to Your "Peace be still." Fill me with Your own bequeathed gift of peace\emdash the peace which passes understanding\emdash peace through the blood of Your cross. Looking to Your completed atonement\emdash the fullness of Your grace\emdash the plenitude of Your love\emdash the perpetuity of Your covenant blessings\emdash may I be able to say, "Return unto your rest, O my soul, for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you."\emdash "This is the rest whereby You cause the weary to rest\emdash and this is the refreshing." Fill me with all joy and peace in believing, that I may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.\par \par Lord, quicken my dormant and languid affections. May I not only bear continually about with me the dying of the Lord Jesus, but may the life also of Jesus be made manifest in my mortal flesh. May it be my constant aim and endeavor, while resting in His love, to be imbibing His spirit and following His footsteps; obeying His will whether by active obedience or by passive endurance; that at last I may be found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless, and pass from the rest of grace to the eternal rest of glory.\par \par I bless You, Lord, for the mercies of the by-gone day. If, in the prosecution of my worldly duties and avocations, I have been kept from sin and preserved from temptation, it is all Your doing. Graciously be with me in all time to come; clothe me with the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left. Let me trust You in the dark. Keep me from over solicitude and anxiety about the future. Keep me humble, thankful, contented\emdash keep me from being deceived with fictitious good\emdash from coveting blessings which are not blessings. Let my prayer be that of Jabez\emdash "O that You would bless me indeed!" Whatever be the niche in Your temple I am called to occupy, may I fill it joyfully and with a glad heart, cherishing a sense of solemn responsibility. May I know that duty becomes a delight when done for You. Direct my heart into the love of God, and into the patient waiting for Christ; that so, when my summons does come to enter into rest, I may be ready to pass from my appointed work on earth, to engage in the ceaseless activities of the glorified.\par \par Lord, look down in infinite compassion on all who need Your consolations. May those who are in spiritual trouble, anxiety, and disquietude\emdash who maybe going about seeking rest and finding none, be brought to seat themselves at the feet of Jesus\emdash clothed and in their right mind. May those who are laid on beds of pain and sickness, manifest unmurmuring submission to Your holy will. May those stretched on beds of death, be enabled to fall asleep sweetly in Jesus. Encircle them with the bow of Your Covenant mercy. As they pass through the dark valley, may Your precious promises cluster like winged angels around their pillows; and may the Savior's words bear to them a blessed meaning and significance they never had before, "Come unto Me, and I will give you rest." Amid all tossings and tribulations, may Your afflicted children see in every trial, only the appointed billow to waft their bark nearer the haven, and may they sing amid the storm\emdash "So gives He His beloved rest."\par \par Let Your Church anew be baptized with Pentecostal fire. Spirit of the living God! O Spirit of light and Spirit of burning, kindle into new life every decaying flame\emdash feed every lamp with the oil of Your grace\emdash and may the golden candlestick with all its branches shine for Your glory, and radiate to the ends of the earth.\par \par I commend my dear friends to Your friendship. Make them the objects of Your sovereign care, and the subjects of Your redeeming love. May the Lord watch between us when we are absent one from another; and listening together now to the Savior's words of welcome from the Throne of grace, may it be ours at last to listen to His words of welcome from the Throne of glory, "Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." And all I ask is for His sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par }  one only Gateway to Your presence. Enable me to hear the voice of the Great Angel Intercessor\emdash the mighty Prince who has power with God and prevails, saying, "By Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved." I come pleading that Name which soothes all sorrows, heals all wounds, dries all tears; which is manna to the hungry soul, and rest to the weary. How many are now in Glory, testifying to the boundless stores of grace hidden in Christ. In the plenitude of that same mercy I would still exult. I rejoice that His name is called Jesus, because He saves His people from their sins.\par \par I desire to acknowledge my great unworthiness\emdash my constant and grievous departures from the path of Your commandments. I have gone astray like a lost sheep, following too much the devices and the desires of my own heart. You might have righteously excluded me forever from the green pastures and still waters, and left me to pursue my own devious wanderings. But blessed be Your name, in the midst of abounding sin there is abounding grace\emdash the Good Shepherd\emdash He who gave His own life for the sheep, is still waiting to be gracious\emdash not willing that any of His sheep should perish, but that all should come unto Him and live.\par \par Lord, reveal to me, more and more, the infinite evil of sin\emdash the ingratitude of such requitals of Your love and resistings of Your Spirit. Turn me and I shall be turned, for You are the Lord my God. Cause me to know the way wherein I should walk, for I lift up my soul unto You. May I have the habitual feeling that I am only safe when following the footsteps and leadings of the Great Shepherd of the flock. May the realizing sense of His presence and nearness sweeten all joy and alleviate all sorrow. May I know that sorrow is turned into joy with the conscious possession of His friendship, and that joy would be sorrow if bereft of that favor which is life. Keep me pure\emdash protect me from temptation\emdash preserve me unspotted from the world. Give me the habit of a holy life. May my affections be more entirely surrendered to You. Whatever I do, enable me to do it heartily as unto the Lord and not unto men, and to have the growing experience that Your service is perfect freedom.\par \par I would desire to set out, this morning, under the protection of the Shepherd of Israel, who leads Joseph like a flock. Give, O Lord, to keep me, this day without sin. May the inspired saying form the directory of my conduct\emdash may it act as a holy preservative in all time of temptation, and a blessed incentive and stimulus in pursuing the path of obedience\emdash "If you live after the flesh you shall die, but if you, through the Spirit, do mortify the deeds of the body, you shall live." Prevent me being betrayed into anger, or resentment, or uncharitableness. Make me gentle and amiable, kind and forgiving\emdash remembering the words of the Lord Jesus, how He said, "A new commandment I give unto you that you love one another." May it be my desire to lay out whatever humble talents You have conferred upon me, for Your glory and for my neighbor's good\emdash having a mind intent on pleasing You.\par \par Hasten the time when all shall avail themselves of the one all-glorious entrance; when, as there is but one Shepherd, so there shall be but one flock\emdash when at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow. Set faithful watchmen on the towers of Zion, who will not keep silence, until Jerusalem be made a praise throughout the earth. Arise, O God, and plead Your own cause.\par \par While in the personal enjoyment of health and many outward comforts, I would intercede, this morning, in behalf of the poor, the afflicted, the sorrowful, the bereaved, and the dying. May they look to God their Maker who gives 'songs in the night'. May the poor be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom of heaven. May sick ones be upheld by Your everlasting arms\emdash may bereaved ones be cheered with the thought of eternal reunions\emdash may dying ones exult in the name of Jesus\emdash may the music of that name refresh their souls as they pass through the dark valley. When I hear of others summoned, in the twinkling of an eye, to render in their final account\emdash oh may I seek to be myself dying daily\emdash realizing my position as standing each moment on the brink of immortality. With my loins girded and my lamp burning, may I not be ashamed before Christ at His coming.\par \par Anew I commend myself, and all near and dear to me, to You. "Sun of my soul" shine upon my pathway. May no "earthborn cloud arise," to obscure the brightness of Your reconciled countenance. Guide me this day, and every day, by Your good counsel while I live; and afterward receive me into glory. For the Lord Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par 19th Evening\emdash WISE TEACHING\par \par "I am the Lord your God who teaches you to profit\emdash who leads you by the way that you should go." Isaiah 48:17\par \par O God, who accepts the feeblest attempt to serve You, receive this my evening sacrifice of thanksgiving and praise. I adore You as "God only wise." Justice and judgment are the habitation of Your throne\emdash mercy and truth go continually before Your face. I bless You that every moment of my existence I am under Your loving guidance. The thread of my life is in Your hand. I am no judge of what is best for me\emdash often would I choose the evil and refuse the good. But You are ever faithful and unerring. O lead me, not in my own way\emdash but in the way that I ought to go. May it be mine, amid every vicissitude, to recognize infinite wisdom in all Your allotments\emdash to sit at the feet of the Great Teacher, contented with the assurance, "This also comes from the Lord Almighty, who is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working." Blessed be Your name for Your wise teaching in the past\emdash for all the deliverances You have given in times of danger\emdash for all the help in times of trouble\emdash for all the support in times of temptation. I would desire implicitly to trust You in the future. There is no corruption but what Your grace will enable me to subdue\emdash there is no cross but what Your grace will enable me to carry\emdash there is no foe but Your grace will enable me to conquer.\par \par I come to You, this night, with all my heavy burdens. Deliver me from the burden and the bondage\emdash from the love, and practice, and dominion, of sin\emdash from unbelieving thoughts and disquieting doubts and apprehensions from the tyranny of self\emdash from the fear of death\emdash and what is after death. May I jealously guard every avenue by which temptation may assail me, keeping watch and ward over the treachery of my own deceitful heart. Let me cherish habitual mindfulness that time is fleeting. Let not the calls of an engrossing world without, foster the procrastinating spirit within. If others indulge in slumber, may it be mine to be vigilant. If others venture to trifle and tamper with convictions, may it be mine to maintain the testimony of a good conscience; and, uninfluenced by earthly fascinations and seductions, to pursue the path of heavenly obedience. Hold me up and I shall be safe! Mold my heart in conformity with Your holy will. May duty become a delight when performed for You. Give me intensified earnestness in Your service, as well as a greater desire to benefit my fellow-men. Take away all that is unamiable\emdash and implant all that is generous, and beneficent, and kind. May I strive to be pure and sincere in speech\emdash honorable and upright in transaction\emdash temperate in the use of lawful enjoyment. And thus, whatever I do, whether in word or in deed, may I be enabled to do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.\par \par Bless Your Church throughout the world. It is our comfort to know, amid the blindness and errors, the mistakes and prejudices of human instructors, that she is under wise and infallible teaching with You. Hasten the day when all within her pale will come to see eye to eye, and unite their now discordant voices in a blended song of praise. Bound up in the bundle of life, may Your true people, by whatever name known, be gathered, at last, by the reaper-angels, into the one heavenly garner.\par \par To an all-wise God I would specially commend the children of sorrow, and any in whom I may be more deeply interested. Lord, sanctify to them the dealings of Your providence. May they see in their afflictions errands of love in disguise. May they recognize Your hand alike in bestowing the gifts and in revoking the grant; trusting the wisdom they cannot trace. Knowing that You lead them by the way they should go, may they write over the most mysterious of Your dispensations, "He disciplines us for our profit, that we may be made partakers of His holiness."\par \par Anew I commend myself to Your keeping this night. Forgive the sins of the day which is now closing. Guard me during my sleeping as well as my waking hours. And grant that I may wake up finally, from the sleep of death, to glory everlasting. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } --1e19 Day 19{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 19th Morning\emdash THE ONE ENTRANCE\par \par "By Me if any man enter in, he shall be saved." John 10:9\par \par O God, I desire, this morning, to approach by thehis way is perfect." Psalm 18:30\par \par O God, I bless You that You have spared me to see the light of another day, and once more permitted me to approach the morning gate of prayer. "My voice shall You hear in the morning, O Lord. In the morning will I direct my prayer unto You, and will look up."\par \par I thank You, Heavenly Father, that from day to day, and from hour to hour, I am under Your wise and loving direction\emdash that it is You who set up the waymarks, and appoint the bounds of my habitation. The lot may be cast into the lap, but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord. If left to my own self, I would often choose the evil and refuse the good\emdash I might select what was selfish and perilous and sinful\emdash what might compromise my peace of conscience, and endanger my spiritual interests. I have often erred in the past, pursuing at times devious paths on which Your blessing could not rest. I would desire to take You more as my guide and counselor for the future. Let me follow You wholly\emdash trusting Your heart, even where I fail to trace Your hand\emdash amid all vicissitudes and perplexities, hearing Your voice behind me saying, "This is the way, walk in it"\emdash and writing over every dubious path\emdash every mysterious Providence\emdash "As for God, His way is perfect."\par \par I know that all Your dealings are dictated by unerring wisdom and unchangeable love. I would look forward, with joyful confidence, to that great Day of disclosures, when the now sealed roll shall be unfolded, and when every tongue will be brought to confess, "The Lord was righteous in all His ways and holy in all His works." Meanwhile, with the fear of God within me, and the eye of God above me, and the Heaven of God before me, may I prosecute steadfastly my pilgrim-way\emdash going up through the wilderness leaning on Your arm; and then, though an army should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear\emdash for greater is He who is with me, and for me, than all those who can be against me.\par \par Lord, wash me anew, this morning, in the Fountain opened for sin and for uncleanness. Give me the renewed sense of Your pardoning love in Christ. Renew me by the indwelling of Your gracious Spirit. I pray not that You should take me out of the world, but that You would keep me from the evil. Disengage me from all that is perilous in its engrossments and fascinations. May I be molded by the kind and loving precepts of Your holy gospel. Knowing Your will, may I delight to do it because it is Yours. Let me not lapse into a selfish disregard of the claims of others, but strive to be, in some feeble measure, useful in my day and generation; following in this the "perfect way" of Him, who went about continually doing good. May I do nothing I would wish to have cancelled and undone at a dying hour. But be so living and walking and acting, that when that solemn season does arrive\emdash at peace with You, in charity with all mankind, and in humble, steadfast reliance on the merits of the Divine Redeemer, I may fall asleep.\par \par I pray for the sick\emdash the afflicted\emdash the sorrowful\emdash the bereaved\emdash the lonely\emdash the dying. Accommodate the supplies of Your grace to their varied necessities. In patience may they possess their souls. Amid the changes of the world and the instability of earth's best props and refuges\emdash amid the tossings and heavings of this treacherous sea of life, may they cling to the sure anchorage, "As for God, His way is perfect."\par \par Lord, compassionate a world lying in wickedness. Listen to that perpetual dirge of woe which is ascending from suffering humanity. Ease the heavy burdens, and let the oppressed go free. Emancipate the nations from the thraldom of Satanic sway. Let every power unto destruction be vanquished and overthrown by "the power of God unto salvation." May the gospel of Christ be mighty as ever to the pulling down of strongholds. Prosper all evangelistic efforts at home\emdash prosper the cause of missions abroad. Beautiful upon many mountains may the feet be of those who bring good tidings. May the Lord Himself give the word, and great shall be the company of those that publish it.\par \par I pray for all my beloved friends. I rejoice that, morning by morning and evening by evening, we can meet in spirit at Your holy altar, mingling our petitions and thanksgivings and confessions together. May our united supplications load the cloud of mercy, and cause it to burst in blessings on our heads.\par \par And now, Lord, what do I wait for? my hope is in You. Give Your angels charge concerning me, that they may encamp round about me and bear me up in all my ways. If there be arduous duties before me today, make them easy. Level every mountain of difficulty\emdash remove every threatening temptation\emdash sustain me with the blessings of Your goodness. "Show me Your ways, O Lord, teach me Your paths; lead me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation, on You do I wait all the day." And when all Your teachings and all Your leadings are completed on earth, do receive me into Your everlasting kingdom and glory, through Jesus Christ my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 20th Evening\emdash HOLINESS OF HEART\par \par "Holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord." Heb. 12:14\par \par Heavenly Father, I come to the footstool of Your throne this night, desiring to remember that You are holy. In bestowing the golden key of admission into Your presence, these are Your words of invitation and welcome\emdash "Open the gates, that the righteous, who keeps the truth, may enter in." If I regard iniquity in my heart the Lord will not hear me. May it be mine to enjoy and appropriate Your gracious beatitude and benediction, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Come, Lord, and search me\emdash come and try me\emdash come and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.\par \par Enable me ever to bear in mind the solemn attestation You have given, in the atoning work of Your dear Son, as to the holiness of Your nature and the rectitude of Your law. On the cross of Him who was made sin for us though He knew no sin, is the superscription written, "You love righteousness and hate wickedness." As the pure and spotless beings who surround Your throne contemplate the great mystery of godliness, their continual cry and ascription is, "Holy, holy, holy!" Blessed be Your name, that in Jesus You are the just God and yet the Savior. I can exult in the assurance that the holiest of all Beings is also the kindest and the best of all.\par \par Lord, make me holy as You are holy, and pure as You are pure. While I look to Christ in His perfect oblation as my Savior from sin's penalty, may I look to Him also as my great example. Let me catch the inspiration of His holy life. Give me grace to tread in His footsteps\emdash to imbibe His spirit, and to reflect His image. Let me love, as He did, whatever is virtuous and benevolent and good; subordinating my own ways and wishes to the will of my Father in heaven; patient under injury\emdash submissive under trial. May I be the possessor of that inner peace\emdash the sunshine of a good conscience\emdash which makes me independent of all outer disquietudes and troubles\emdash singleness of eye, purity of heart, integrity of purpose, consecration of life. Remove every hindrance to spiritual growth. May I take that, alike as a precept and a promise, "Sin shall not have dominion over you." Thus may I have the character of heaven, in its holiness, impressed upon me on this side of death, that, on the other side of death, I may be fitted for its lofty companionships and joys.\par \par Especially, Lord, guard and shield me in my worldly duties. Leaven the common tasks of life with Your fear. On my business and avocations may there be inscribed, "Holiness to the Lord." Whatever I do, may I do it heartily as to the Lord and not unto men. Keep me from whatever has a tendency to foster the selfish element in my nature. May I cherish no purposes but what You will own, and employ no means but what You will bless. May I know that holy living will lead to happy dying. Oh may I be so living from day to day, that when I come at last to resign the great trust of existence, I may be enabled to say, "Now, Lord, let You Your servant depart in peace."\par \par Bless all my beloved relatives\emdash bring them also to the cross of the Redeemer, that while they learn there how righteous You are, they may there too "give thanks at the remembrance of Your holiness." Make them partakers of the holy character and resurrection-life of the risen Savior\emdash purifying themselves even as He is pure\emdash that at His second coming in the glory of His Father, they may be prepared to welcome Him with joy.\par \par Look in compassion on poor afflicted ones. Let them trust, and not be afraid; believing that all is well, just because it is Your blessed will. May they know that every sorrow is numbered and appointed by the Man of Sorrows. May they feel how light and trivial their bitterest cup is, compared with the cup of suffering He so willingly drained for them.\par \par Bless Your Church everywhere\emdash refresh it with the dews of heaven. Sanctify and cleanse it, that it may be presented at last a glorious Church\emdash without spot or wrinkle or any such thing\emdash holy and without blemish.\par \par I commend myself anew to Your watchful keeping this night, O Holy One of Israel. Forgive the sins of the day, in thought, word, and deed. Give Your angels charge concerning me that they may encamp round about me\emdash and if it be Your will to spare me until tomorrow, fit me for all its duties.\par \par These needful blessings which I have asked, and others equally needed and urgent which I have omitted to ask, do bestow upon me in the all-prevailing name of Him in whom all fullness dwells; and to whom with You the Father, and the Holy Spirit, be ascribed all praise and honor and glory, world without end. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } VVQ121 Day 21{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\큣%1)20 Day 20{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 20th Morning\emdash THE SURE GUIDE\par \par "As for God, red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 21st Morning\emdash SALVATION TO THE UTTERMOST\par \par "Therefore he is able also to save to the uttermost, all who come unto God by him, seeing he ever lives to make intercession for them." Hebrews 7:25\par \par O Lord, I desire to draw near into Your merciful presence as to a most loving Father, and joyfully pay my morning sacrifice. Glory be to You for watching over me during another night\emdash giving me the refreshment of sleep, and permitting me to awake in health and strength. May this be to me the emblem of a better waking in the morning of immortality, to partake with Yourself of endless life.\par \par All my trust is in the atoning sacrifice of the Great High Priest\emdash the covenant Angel at Your right hand\emdash the ever-living, ever-loving Intercessor, who is pleading the cause I cannot plead for myself, and who never pleads in vain. May He receive my imperfect prayers into His fragrant censer\emdash that all unworthy in themselves, sprinkled with the incense of His adorable merits, they may ascend with acceptance before the Throne.\par \par Most Gracious God, how insensible have I proved to the multiplied tokens of Your love and kindness. Your mercies have been unworthily requited, my duties have been perfunctorily performed. Corruption within has responded to temptation from without. There has been too often pride where there should have been humility\emdash resentment where there should have been forgiveness\emdash unbelief where there should have been trust\emdash murmuring where there should have been submission and resignation. For Your name's sake, O Lord, pardon my iniquity, for it is great. A sinner to the uttermost, I rejoice that, in Your dear Son, there is salvation to the uttermost. "If any man sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous\emdash and He is the Propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." I rejoice in Him as the very Savior I need. While omnipotence slumbers in His arm, He is touched with a fellow-feeling for all my infirmities. He can enter, with tender sensitiveness, into every temptation that crosses my path, and into every pang that rends my heart. O Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy upon me! O Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, grant me Your peace! This is Your name and Your memorial throughout all generations, "Mighty to save." I would lay hold anew on the blood besprinkled horns of the altar; and listen to Your voice of power and grace and love saying, "Your sins which are many are all forgiven you."\par \par Give to me, I beseech You, salvation from the power, as well as from the guilt, of sin. This is Your will concerning me, even my sanctification. Keep me from all hardness of heart and contempt of Your holy word and commandment\emdash from envy and malice\emdash from pride and vain-glory\emdash from vanity and lies\emdash from tampering with temptation in any form, and thus endangering my present peace and imperiling my soul's everlasting interests. Guard every loophole by which any spiritual foe might enter. Give me resolute energy of will, to resist and to endure as seeing Him who is invisible. I rejoice that, in the extremity of my own weakness, I have the promise of Almighty strength, and that too "abundantly above all that I can ask or think." I can do all things through Christ strengthening me. In the calm and assured hope of forgiveness in Him\emdash a saving interest in His great salvation; and with the promised aids of the Holy Spirit, may I go from strength to strength, from grace to grace, from virtue to virtue, from attainment to attainment, until at length I appear before You perfect in Zion.\par \par I pray for those who are bartering so great salvation for the sins and the follies of a fleeting present. Convince them, before it be too late, of their danger, and discover to them the one thing needful, the better part\emdash the only part, which never can be taken from them. Bring all men to a knowledge of Your gospel\emdash to a saving belief of the truth as it is in Jesus. Send times of refreshing unto Zion. Bless Your faithful ministers\emdash may they be valiant for the truth\emdash polished shafts in their Master's quiver. May the day soon arrive when the glory of God shall be the supreme sovereign motive, governing every thought and feeling and action. May our own nation, as heretofore, continue the honored instrument of advancing Your cause on earth\emdash a dispenser and almoner of spiritual blessings. May the precious privileges civil and religious bequeathed to her, be handed down unimpaired from generation to generation.\par \par Pity the case of the sick, the destitute, and the bereaved. O You, who when on earth did turn aside from Your own path of suffering, to weep with those that wept\emdash bless all afflicted ones. Give them grace to look beyond the cloudy present to the stormless skies of that better land, where the pang of sorrow can neither be felt nor feared. Lying passive in Your hands, may it be theirs through their tears to say, "Father, glorify Your name!"\par \par I anew commend myself, and those near and dear to me, to You and to the word of Your grace. Lord, ever enable me so to pass through things temporal, that finally I lose not the things eternal. And all I ask is for Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par 21st Evening\emdash THE STRONGHOLD IN TROUBLE\par \par "The Lord is good, a stronghold in a day of distress; He cares for those who take refuge in Him." Nahum 1:7\par \par O God, I come this night to the Gates of this glorious stronghold. The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust\emdash my shield, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower. I rejoice in the assurance that You are good. You are a refuge in the day of perplexity\emdash a strength in the day of weakness\emdash a light in the day of darkness\emdash a stronghold in the day of trouble. May I feel it to be a privilege to draw near unto You. Give me filial trust and confidence. Enable me to unburden, without reserve, into Your ear, all my trials and difficulties. A suppliant at the Gates of prayer, may I receive fresh tokens of Your love and goodness\emdash even the blessing which makes rich and adds no sorrow with it. The Lord is good unto those who wait for Him, unto the soul that seeks Him.\par \par How unworthy, Lord, I am of Your paternal regard and patient forbearance! How much have I done to forfeit Your favor! I have been rebellious and wayward\emdash unthankful and unholy\emdash leaving too often Your countless mercies unacknowledged\emdash dethroning You from my affections, and giving to others the loyalty and allegiance which should be Yours alone. I have experienced little of the depressing consciousness, I ought to have had, of my sin and danger, and of my need of a Savior. I have little realized, as I ought to have done, the thought of death, and of the precarious tenure which binds me to the world's best blessings. You have, from time to time, been putting lover and friend far from me, and my acquaintance into darkness; yet I have been traveling as if with my back to the grave, keeping it out of sight. Careful and troubled about earth's many things, I have been sadly prone to forget the one thing needful.\par \par Give me deep contrition for an erring past. Inspire me with new resolutions for the future. Graciously give me Your help. Lord, I feel that this struggling with sin, this conflict with temptation, is a hopeless contest without You\emdash without Your strengthening, sustaining, restraining grace. Hold me up. You who have revealed Yourself to Your people, in all past ages, as a stronghold in the day of trouble and a shield in the day of battle\emdash be my defense, and my glory, the lifter up of my head. I can overcome, only through the blood and the help of the Lamb. Anew I repair, this night, to the clefts of the Rock\emdash anew I take refuge in the only sheltering stronghold\emdash anew I seek the light and direction of the only safe guiding pillar. Keep my eye single, that my whole body may be full of light. May all my duties and avocations be transfigured by the elevating Christian motive, "Whatever you do, whether in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus." Let it be my habitual aim to imbibe His meek, lowly, patient, unworldly spirit\emdash not seeking my open interests, but willing rather to surrender these, if He be honored and glorified\emdash endeavoring to bear and forbear, even under the conscious infliction and endurance of wrong. Enable me to put the best construction on motives and failings, giving heed to the monitory word\emdash "Considering yourself, lest you also be tempted."\par \par Lord, have mercy on the afflicted. May they specially recognize You as a stronghold in the day of trouble. Knowing that finite wisdom has no place in Your dealings, may they seek to bow in unmurmuring submission to Your holy will. Turn the shadow of death into the morning. Give them the sanctified use of Your dispensations. May chastisement which, for the present, is not joyous but grievous, nevertheless afterward, yield the peaceable fruits of righteousness. You know those who trust in You. May they trust in the Lord forever, for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength; and amid present affliction and sadness, anticipate the time when voices will be heard saying, "There shall be no more death, neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain\emdash for the former things are passed away."\par \par Bless my beloved friends. May they, too, trust in the name of the Lord, and stay themselves upon their God. If called at times to the endurance of trouble, may they know You and cling to You as a sure stronghold. Number each and all of them among the favored pilgrim band, who are now seeking Zion with their faces there, and who shall finally reach it with everlasting joy upon their heads.\par \par Take me, gracious Father, under Your care and keeping. I will both lay me down in peace and sleep, for You, Lord, alone make me to dwell in safety. May I repose, as under the shadow of Your wings; and may I wake tomorrow refreshed and invigorated for duty. Let each returning day of life find me better furnished and prepared for Your service on earth, and at last for the enjoyment of Your presence in glory. Through Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior, Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par }  morning, the Beautiful Gate of Your Temple. I come into Your presence in the name of Him whom You hear always, our advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous. I rejoice that He who was dimly revealed in type and vision and prophecy, has been manifested as the brightness of the Father's glory and the express image of His person\emdash that He became a sin-offering for us, though He knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. Lord, I am utterly destitute of any righteousness of my own, and of any claim to Your favor. Every hour I live might be cited as a witness against me, telling of unrequited mercies\emdash neglected opportunities\emdash unimproved warnings\emdash resisted grace. Look upon me not as I am in myself. Behold my shield\emdash look on the face of Your anointed One. My sole trust is in the doing and dying of the All-righteous One. I am absolved in Him. He has cancelled my debt and absorbed my curse; taken off my filthy garments, and clothed me in fresh clothing. May I be enabled to cleave to Him, in greater simplicity of heart and confidence, as the Lord my Righteousness. May His cross be my shelter; His wounds my healing; His death my life. I would go up and on through the wilderness, leaning on His arm; feeling that He who is with me and for me, is greater far than all that can be against me.\par \par While I look to Him for the righteousness imputed\emdash I would look to the promised grace of the Holy Spirit, for the righteousness implanted\emdash that holiness of heart and life, without which no man can see the Lord. May I put on the Lord Jesus Christ in the beauty of His divine character and example\emdash imbibing more of His spirit, and reflecting more of His image. Bestow upon me "the clothing clean and white, which is the righteousness of the saints;" and present me at last faultless before the presence of Your glory with exceeding joy.\par \par I know not what difficulties, or trials, or temptations, may be before me. Do prepare me whether for duty or for conflict. May that glorious shield of Your righteousness cover my head in every day of battle. Knowing the treachery of the heart, I desire this morning, and each morning, to receive fresh supplies of Your grace. Hold up my goings in Your paths; that thus, I may not be of them who draw back unto perdition, but of those who believe to the saving of the soul. Lord, bless me in all the relations and circumstances of my life. May I be a faithful steward in whatever has been entrusted to my keeping. If You have given me worldly substance, may I regard these gifts of Providence as a talent, not to be selfishly appropriated, but to be shared by others, for their good and Your glory. May all my business dealings and transactions be regulated by transparent honor\emdash spotless integrity\emdash unswerving love of truth. May my daily avocations prove incentives, not drags and hindrances, in running the Christian race. Give me that charity which is the bond of perfectness. May I seek to overcome evil wi th good; ever aiming at the more complete conquest of self\emdash subduing pride and restraining temper\emdash sitting meekly at the feet of Jesus.\par \par Have pity on those who are sinning away their privileges. While they "have the light"\emdash while they still enjoy gospel privileges\emdash may they be led to "believe in the light"\emdash turning from every false ground of confidence, to Him who has made reconciliation for iniquity and brought in an everlasting righteousness, and who alone can giv e rest and peace to their souls.\par \par Extend Your sympathy and love to the case of all in affliction\emdash support, support, and comfort them. Let them manifest a spirit of uncomplaining submission, saying, "Not our will, but Your will be done!" May any who have been bereft of beloved friends, see in the removal of those near and dear to them, only the coming of the Savior to fetch His children home, and to give them the promised lodgment in the "many mansions." May they rejoice in the happy assura nce, that the silver cord on earth is loosed and the golden bowl broken, only to usher into the deathless joys of a world where friendships cannot be severed, and trial can neither be felt nor feared.\par \par I pray for all mankind. Look in compassion on earth's valley of vision. Behold the bones are very many and very dry. Come from the four winds, O Spirit of the living God!\emdash breathe upon these slain that they may live. Clothe every moral desolation with the verdure of spiritual life. May the w ilderness and the solitary place be made glad\emdash may the desert rejoice and blossom as the rose; and all the ends of the earth see the promised salvation.\par \par I commend myself, and those belonging to me, to Your keeping and protection throughout this day. Lift upon us the light of Your countenance; never leave and never forsake us. And all I ask is for the Savior's sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par 22nd Evening\emdash THE GREAT LOVE\par \par "But God, who is abundant in mercy, because of Hi s great love that He had for us, made us alive with the Messiah even though we were dead in trespasses. By grace you are saved!" Ephesians 2:4-5\par \par Most gracious and everlasting God, I desire to approach the footstool of Your throne this evening, through the golden gates of mercy. You did so love the world as to give Your only-begotten Son. I adore the wonders of Your sovereign grace in Him. Scarcely for a righteous man will one die, yet perhaps for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commends His love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.\par \par Under a grateful sense of the riches of that love, I would desire to compose myself to rest. O Shepherd of Israel, who never slumbers nor sleeps\emdash guard me during the unconscious hours of night. May I rise refreshed for duty and service\emdash rejoicing to bear about with me, in the course of a new day, the elevating sense of my relationship to You, as my Covenant God and Heavenly Father. Saved by the grace and purchased by the blood of Jesus, may I yield You, not the constrained service of the bond-slave, but the spontaneous, devoted, love and obedience of Your adopted child. May a sense of the infinite obligation under which I am laid for all Your mercies, and especially for their crown and consummation on the Cross of Calvary, stimulate to greater ardor in running the Christian race\emdash to more singleness of eye and simplicity of aim. Saved by grace from the guilt of sin, may I ever remember that I am saved too by grace from the power of sin.\par \par Bring me to act more habitually under the influence of unseen spiritual realities. From the dominion of Satan\emdash from the enslavement of lust and passion\emdash from the absorbing love of the world\emdash from the deceitfulness of riches\emdash good Lord, deliver me! May the law of love, which has its highest exemplification in the life of Your dear Son, find expression in my daily walk. May I be molded, more and more, in conformity with His will, and copy more of His example\emdash in His meekness and gentleness, in His unselfish and tender consideration for others. I have no ability in myself to carry out one good or holy resolution. Undertake for me. If there is any indication of spiritual quickening or vitality within me, it is derived from You, the source and inspiration of all energy and goodness. I can do all things through Christ strengthening me. "More grace! more grace!" may this be my constant prayer. Hold me up, and I shall be safe.\par \par Prosper Your cause and kingdom everywhere. Send times of refreshing unto Zion. May she rise from the dust, and put on her beautiful garments. Stand by all Your faithful ministering servants. Clothe Your priests with salvation, let Your saints shout aloud for joy. May a spirit of unity pervade the varied branches of the Church universal\emdash that unity, which will be the prelude to the Gospel's final triumph\emdash when, in answer to the prayer of the Great Intercessor, His people shall be one, and the world shall believe.\par \par May my dear friends be savingly united to You, in the bonds of the new and better covenant. Quicken them also together with Christ, and save them by Your grace. Defend them from the temptations of a present evil world, and bring them in safety to the everlasting home above. Sanctify trial to all the family of sorrow. Many whom You love are sick\emdash make You their bed in their sickness. Draw near to every broken, bereaved heart. Give beauty for ashes; the oil of joy for mourning; and the garment of praise for a spirit of heaviness. May affliction, which, in the light of immortality is but for a moment, work out a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.\par \par I ask these and all other needed blessings for myself and others, in the name of Him whom You hear always, and to whom, with You the Father, and You the ever-blessed Spirit, one God\emdash be ascribed all blessing and honor and glory and praise, world without end. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } hh%1)23 Day 23{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0O1}22 Day 22{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 22nd Morning\emdash THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS\par \par "This is His name whereby He shall be called, The Lord our Righteousness." Jer. 23:6\par \par O God, prepare my heart for approaching anew, this Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 23rd Morning\emdash TRUST IN GOD\par \par "Trust you in the Lord forever; for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength." Isaiah 26:4\par \par O God, I bless and praise Your holy name, that You have spared me during another night\emdash permitting me, once more, to kneel at the Gates of Prayer, and to offer anew my morning sacrifice of thanksgiving. Give Your benediction and blessing. Sprinkle me afresh with the peace-speaking blood. Grant me forgiveness for the past\emdash impart grace and strength for the future. In all my ways I would acknowledge You\emdash direct my paths. That future is in Your hands. I will trust and not be afraid. O my God, when my soul is cast down within me, "I will remember You from the land of Jordan and of the Hermonites, from the Hill Mizar." I will recall former tokens and pledges of Your love and favor, and implicitly confide in You for the time to come. Your hand is never shortened\emdash Your ear is never heavy. Give me cheerful acquiescence in Your most holy will\emdash undeviating reliance in the wisdom and rectitude of Your appointments. Save me from all impatience; all fretting and disquietude. Whatever may now be crossing my wishes, or thwarting my plans, or disappointing my hopes\emdash may my faithlessness be rebuked, by the assurance from lips which cannot err\emdash "Your heavenly Father knows that you have need of all these things."\par \par Blessed Savior, in whom stands our eternal life, be my guide and protector this day. May I be enabled to maintain my temper unbroken and my conscience undefiled; to stand fast in my integrity, with a single eye to Your glory. Keep me from all deflection from the paths of purity and peace. Keep me from envy and uncharitableness\emdash from pride and ambition\emdash from discontent and dissatisfaction with the position I am called to occupy\emdash from all that would bring discredit on the religion I profess, and that would form a blot in life's retrospect at the hour of death. Let me set a watch on every questionable and wayward impulse. May Your present discipline, however mysterious at times it may be, tend the better to fit me for the duties and occupations of that blessed world, where I shall no longer need to trust You in the midst of dark dealings, but where trust shall be merged in the full and everlasting enjoyment of Your presence and love.\par \par Look in great mercy on the children of sorrow. In absolute self surrender, may they lean on You. If, when called to traverse mazy and thorny paths, they are led, in the lack of faith, to say, "Not here, Lord"\emdash may Your voice be heard, gently rebuking their distrust, "What is that to you, follow Me." May those bereft of loved ones, listen to divine accents breaking over the sleepers in the silent land\emdash "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord, from henceforth; yes, says the Spirit, for they rest from their labors and their works do follow them." Meanwhile, may they confide in a wisdom that never errs, and a love that never changes; anticipating that better time, when no angel of sorrow shall evermore come dawn "to trouble the pool;"\emdash and when their "loved and lost" shall be loved, never to be lost again.\par \par Extend the gracious influences of Christianity. Reveal Christ to many needy, sin-stricken souls, as the Physician who heals all diseases. Blessed Savior\emdash Prince of Peace! take to Yourself Your great power and reign. Hasten the day, when, by the regenerating influences of Your gospel, You shall sprinkle many nations, and kings shall shut their mouths at You\emdash when, seated on the throne of universal empire, angels shall laud You and saints shall crown You; and Your Church triumphant, gathered in from every kindred and tribe and people and tongue, shall unite in the eternal ascription\emdash "Unto Him who loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood."\par \par O God, I desire anew to commit myself, and all belonging to me, to You and to the word of Your grace\emdash rejoicing that the blessings of the covenant are in Your hands. Give us whatever You know to be good\emdash deny us whatever You know to be evil. And all I ask is for the sake of Jesus Christ, my blessed Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 23rd Evening\emdash THE FINAL WELCOME\par \par "Enter into the joy of your Lord." Matt. 25:23\par \par O God, I desire to come into Your presence on this the close of another day\emdash adoring You for the gracious welcome You ever give to the mercy-seat. Have You not said, "Knock and it shall be opened?" Have You not set Your seal to the words, that if an earthly father, in the tenderness of his love, knows how to give good gifts unto his children\emdash much more may I expect to receive a plenitude of blessings from the hands of my Father in heaven? Open unto me the gates of righteousness; and, from Your holy habitation, command upon me the blessing, even life for eve rmore.\par \par I thank You, O great Redeemer, for the reception You did accord of old in Your ministry of love on earth, to all who sought You in penitence and faith. I bless You for that welcome which You bestowed on "the weary and heavy laden"\emdash on the sin-stricken and the sorrow-stricken. No bruised reed was ever broken by You\emdash no smoking flax was ever quenched by You. The most erring sheep was pursued by You, the Great and Good Shepherd\emdash until You found it, and laid it upon Your sh!oulders rejoicing. Still it is Your blessed prerogative to welcome back the wanderer\emdash to seek and to save that which is lost.\par \par I bless You, that exulting in Your free welcome, seated on the Throne of Grace, I can also with hope and confidence anticipate Your last and most joyous welcome on the Throne of Glory. All my boldness in the prospect of that Great day, is founded on Your completed work and glorious righteousness. I would exclaim now\emdash what will form my sole plea then\emdash "B"ehold, O God, my shield\emdash look on the face of Your anointed!" I know that I have a living Redeemer, and that He shall stand in the latter day upon the earth, to plead my cause before an assembled world, and to give the glad summons\emdash "Enter into the joy of your Lord!" Keep me, meanwhile, earnestly and habitually looking for this blessed hope. Preserve me from whatever would dim or darken its elevating influences\emdash from all sloth and carelessness\emdash all frivolity and sin. May I seek to m#ake life, more than it has been, a preparation for eternity. In all my worldly duties and engagements, with the prospect of giving in my account at His appearing and His kingdom, may I hear the voice of Jesus saying, "Occupy until I come."\par \par Whatever talents You have confided to me, give me grace diligently and faithfully to improve them. Keep me from the abuse of my stewardship. If You have given me worldly means\emdash material prosperity\emdash preserve me from selfishly hoarding the gifts of $Providence, but, according to my ability, may I rejoice at being the almoner of Your bounties to others. Thus faithful over a few things, may I finally be made partaker of Your own gracious promise of abundant recompense. If You have denied me earthly good, may I strive all the more, to give You the consecration of the heart, and to lay up my treasure in heaven. Give me increasing aspirations after holiness. May I be enabled to walk in the path of obedience\emdash daily renouncing and overcoming the power% and practice of sin. Having the hope of seeing the Redeemer as He is, may I purify myself even as He is pure\emdash and thus, having obtained victory over all my spiritual enemies, may I be ushered at last into that glorious land, where there is no sin to crucify, no corruption to subdue\emdash where there is nothing to be delivered from\emdash where the joy and the presence of the Lord will be an eternal strength.\par \par Lord, have mercy on the whole world. Let the people now sitting in darkness see& a great light. On those that are in the region and shadow of death, may the Sun of Righteousness arise with healing in His beams. Adored be Your name for the assured word of promise, that the day is approaching, when alike obdurate Jew and idolatrous heathen will join their voices together in the shout of welcome\emdash "Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord."\par \par O Comforter of all who are cast down\emdash Healer of the brokenhearted\emdash Friend of the friendless, look in infinite com'passion on those who need Your pitying love. Stay Your rough wind in the day of Your east wind. May those laid on couches of sickness, manifest a spirit of unmurmuring submission to Your will; recognizing Your hand, and Your hand alone\emdash remembering that You are never arbitrary in Your dealings\emdash that even "wearisome nights are appointed." Give them strength to be silent ministers of the truth, by exhibiting the power of Your sustaining grace; looking beyond the cloudlands of earth, to the better country, where the inhabitant shall no more say, "I am sick." Thus patiently bearing their cross, may they anticipate, with calm and joyful expectancy, that blessed hour, when all the sorrows and tribulations of earth will be forgotten in the words of welcome, "Come, you blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom."\par \par Graciously accept of my thanks for the mercies of the by-past day; and give to me, this night, the sleep of Your beloved; for Jesus Christ's sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } )\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 24th Morning\emdash THE BLOOD OF JESUS\par \par "Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus." Heb. 10:19\par \par Almighty and everlasting God, draw near to me in Your great kindness this morning. You have permitted me to awake in health and strength. I would seek to enter on the duties of a new day with my mind stayed on You\emdash looking for Your guidance and direction. O You who commanded the light to shin*e out of darkness\emdash shine into my heart. The day will be happy and peaceful, if begun, carried on, and ended, with the conscious possession of Your favor and love.\par \par I come to You, relying on the one only Sacrifice, and exulting in the one sole plea\emdash that the blood of Jesus Christ Your Son cleanses from all sin. Blessed be Your name, I have boldness to enter into the holiest through this new and living way\emdash God's way to the sinner, and the sinner's way to God. Countless multitude+s have entered through the same Gate of access. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb; they are now before Your throne, to testify to the fullness and freeness of that great Redemption. And, still, there is blood for all, and grace for all, and salvation for all. Sprinkle the lintels and door-posts of my heart with that same covenant token. Have You not said, "When I see the blood I will pass over you." I have no other argument but this, and blessed be Your name\emdash ,I need no other.\par \par Lord, grant that that precious blood may not only be sprinkled on my conscience, but that it may purify me from dead works to serve You\emdash the living God. Make me holy\emdash keep me holy. Sanctify me, in body, soul, and spirit. Bearing about with me continually the dying of the Lord Jesus, may the life also of Jesus be made manifest in my mortal flesh. Further me this day, in all lawful undertakings, with Your blessing. I know not, in the course of it, what guilty thoughts- may rise, and which may find expression in unworthy and hasty and sinful words or actions, defiling my own conscience, injuring my neighbor, and dishonoring Your holy name. May I ever seek to exercise a conscience void of offence; to deal tenderly with those around me\emdash refraining from magnifying failings, or circulating the injurious report. O Lord, forearm me by Your grace. In the battle with evil, around me and within me\emdash I would overcome alone by the blood of the Lamb.\par \par Bless my .beloved friends\emdash those who are living near\emdash and those who may be separated by intervening oceans and continents. O ever-present God! be their help and friend. May Christian memories follow them wherever they go. May they live under a sense of the All-Seeing Eye; rejoicing that no distance and no locality can divide between them and You. And whatever separations may take place on earth, may there be, at last, a happy and glorious meeting-place for us before Your throne in glory, to exult togeth/er in ties that can never be dissolved.\par \par Bless Your Zion everywhere. Set faithful watchmen to guard her battlements, and to sound the trumpet of alarm. In times of doctrinal defection and laxity, and of defiant skepticism, may they earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. Prosper the cause of truth and righteousness, and hasten, in Your own good season, Your Son's coming and kingdom. Have great compassion on the afflicted. Visit in mercy the poor\emdash the widow0\emdash the solitary\emdash the unbefriended. Spare useful and valued lives. If it be Your holy will, bring back the shadow on life's dial, and utter the omnipotent words, "You shall live and not die."\par \par May those who are appointed to death have boldness in the prospect of entering Your immediate presence, through the same blood of Jesus. With His cross before their eyes, and the music of His name on their lips, may they be able to say, "We are confident, and willing rather, to be absent from the1 body and to be present with the Lord."\par \par I commend myself anew to Your gracious care, looking to You this day and forever\emdash for pardon, and peace, and eternal life, through the merits of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 24th Evening\emdash THE FELLOW-SUFFERER\par \par "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are--yet was without sin." Hebrews 4:15\par2 \par O God, my heavenly Father, I desire to approach Your sacred presence tonight, in the name of Him who is my Great High Priest\emdash the ever-living, ever-loving Redeemer. May He touch my lips as with a live altar-coal, in the hour of evening sacrifice\emdash that my prayer may ascend before You as incense, sweetly perfumed with His adorable merits. You have graciously shielded me this day by Your good Providence. Accept my humble tribute of gratitude and thanksgiving for all the unmerited tokens o3f Your love. How great has been the sum of them! and there are no small kindnesses with You, for the least of them are undeserved. Even when You see fit occasionally to mingle the cup, and to cause the shadows of affliction to fall, how little has been the proportion between the trials sent\emdash and the deserts of sin! Adversity has been alleviated by unexpected solaces, and mercy has attuned my lips to sing in the midst of judgment.\par \par O adorable Redeemer, in whom is all my hope\emdash in whose4 most precious blood alone, I rely for pardon and acceptance\emdash O pleading Angel-Intercessor, made not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life\emdash I bless You that You are touched with a fellow-feeling of all my infirmities. In coming to the Gates of Prayer, in seasons of pain and suffering, loneliness and sorrow, I can cherish the consoling assurance that, as the Brother on the throne, there is not a pang I endure but You have felt the same. When the best of e5arthly sympathy is inadequate and unavailing, You, who in the days of Your flesh did suffer the reproach of Your people to break Your heart, can enter with tender sensitiveness into the keenest woes of humanity. I can think of You, the Prince of Sufferers, feeling for me\emdash weeping for me\emdash bleeding for me\emdash dying for me. Three is no extremity of distress, when I can find You, as You did find Your disciples in Your own hour of agony, asleep. Your hand is never shortened, Your ear is never he6avy. You do not faint, neither are weary.\par \par Subdue within me whatever is inconsistent with Your mind and will. However afflictive at times may be Your Providential dispensations, Lord, may I ever deeply feel that there is no sorrow like the sorrow of alienation from Your favor\emdash that the heaviest cross I have to bear, is the cross of an unbelieving, wandering, treacherous Heart. God be merciful to me a sinner! O Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world\emdash have mercy upon me and 7grant me Your peace. You who, though sinless Yourself, did confront sin in every shape and form\emdash You whose infinite tenderness and compassion of old, dictated the merciful excuse for the unfaithful watchers of Gethsemane, "The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak," compassionate my weakness\emdash sympathize with my struggles\emdash give me the strength I have not in myself. It is by Your grace alone I stand. Hold me up and I shall be safe. Shield me from the snares of a seductive world; fortify 8me against the assaults of temptation. Pray for me, as You did for Your erring disciple, that my faith fail not.\par \par May the Lord arise and have mercy upon Zion. With the blessed gift of the Holy Spirit sent down at Pentecost and perpetuated from age to age, Your Church never can be orphaned or desolate. Cause the plentiful rain to descend, with which You refresh Your heritage when it is weary. Illuminate the world which is now in darkness. Sheathe its swords\emdash break its chains\emdash redress its wrongs. Let it welcome a long rejected Savior as its Lord and King.\par \par Shepherd of Israel, be my guardian-keeper through the silence and darkness of another night. Abide with me, for it is toward evening and the day is far spent. Let all near and dear to me share Your loving care. Lying down to rest in Your fear, may we awake in Your favor, fitted and prepared for the duties of a new day. And all I ask is for the sake of Jesus Christ Your only Son, my Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } s1E25 Day 25{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 25th Morning\emdash THE ONE WAY\par \par "Neither is there salvation in any other\emdash for there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we :U1 24 Day 24{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}(;must be saved." Acts 4:12\par \par Father of mercies and God of all grace, impotent and helpless in myself, I wait this morning at the Gate of Your temple to listen to Your divine word of pardon and healing. In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, enable me to rise up and walk. I thank You for that all powerful Name; that all sufficient Savior\emdash I thank You for that new and living way of access into the holiest of all, through His precious blood. There is no other way, and blessed be Your name I n. May I lean upon You with unfaltering dependence\emdash may I be linked to You in holy fellowship\emdash may I be consecrated to You in unswerving allegiance.\par \par Enable me more and more to crucify sin. May its power be subdued and its love mortified. May I set watch at every avenue by which temptation may gain entrance. Lord, be with me this day in all my worldly duties. Keep me from the selfishness which narrows and debases. May I stoop to no base compliances\emdash no equivocal or unworthy mean?s of bettering my circumstances. May my work and duty be done in a pious spirit; carefully avoiding whatever would interfere with the surrender of heart and soul to Your service. Let me exercise a jealousy over my motives as well as my actions; let my converse be sincere\emdash my conscience clear as the noonday. Deliver me from rashness of speech\emdash may I be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath\emdash seeking to discharge faithfully whatever trust You have in Your providence confided to me. In@ my relation to all around, give me Your own most excellent gift of love, remembering the tenderness of Him who would not break the bruised reed nor quench the smoking flax. May I consider the beam that may be in my own eye, when I detect the mote that is in my brother's.\par \par I pray for my dear friends. Unite them to You in the bonds of the everlasting covenant. If there are any who are still going about to establish their own righteousness, and refuse to submit themselves to the righteousness of CAhrist, lead them to own and to confess, that is there salvation in no other. Bring them under the Beloved's shadow. Number them with Your saints in glory everlasting.\par \par Hasten the happy period, when all the ends of the earth shall come to exult in this same salvation of God. When alike Jew and Gentile shall recognize in Messiah, the one sole way and the truth and the life, and be led to crown Him as Lord of all.\par \par I commend to Your sympathy the wide family of sorrow. When every other souBrce of comfort fails\emdash may all their springs be in You. When no longer filling their cup, but emptying them from vessel to vessel\emdash may they adore Your sovereignty, and own Your wisdom, and trust Your love. May Christ be magnified in them whether by life or by death. As He is the one way to pardon\emdash may they find Him also the one way to consolation and peace.\par \par I anew supplicate Your grace and blessing, May the Lord this day be my keeper\emdash my stay and my strength at my right hCand\emdash through the same Jesus Christ, my blessed Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 25th Evening\emdash THE PURIFYING HOPE\par \par "And everyone who has this hope in Him purifies himself just as He is pure." 1 John 3:3\par \par O God, my Heavenly Father I come this night a needy suppliant to the Gates of Prayer. Give me Your presence and benediction. Give me the golden Key which unlocks the treasures of Your grace. Let all wandering thoughts\emdash all worldly cares and disquietudes, Dbe hushed and set aside\emdash that I may enjoy a brief season of fellowship with You. Though the darkness of night has gathered around me, may it be mine to know that You are light, and that with You there is no darkness at all. "As the deer pants after the water-brooks, so my soul pants after You, O God\emdash my soul thirsts for God, for the living God."\par \par I desire to exult anew in the plenitude of Your great mercy in Christ. I bless You that I have such a Savior to flee to. Under the consciouEsness of my own utter sinfulness and unworthiness, I look alone to Him for pardon and peace. May He be formed within me, the hope of glory\emdash made unto me wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. Planted in the likeness of His death, may I be planted also in the likeness of His resurrection. May my life now be hidden with Christ in God, that when Christ who is my life shall appear, I may also appear with Him in glory. Having this hope in Him\emdash the blessed hope of seeing Him Fas He is, and of enjoying His everlasting fellowship\emdash may I purify myself even as He is pure; daily imbibing more of His meek, gentle, unselfish, unworldly spirit; withdrawing my affections from things which are of the earth, earthy\emdash and consecrating them to His service. Enable me to exercise a vigilant jealousy over my thoughts, words, and actions; seeking to renounce whatever is displeasing to Him, and that would mar my peace of conscience.\par \par In every difficult and perplexing duty, Gmay this always form the testing question and final appeal\emdash "How would my Lord and Savior have acted here?" And knowing His will, may it be my delight to do it. Strengthen the things which remain and that may be ready to die. Let the power of sin wax weaker and weaker, and let the power of Your grace within me wax stronger and stronger. Thus, blessed Savior, whatever may be the changes and sorrows I experience in this precarious, uncertain existence; with the conscious assurance of Your presence andH love, I must be happy. If You are near to me\emdash if You abide with me\emdash there can be no terror in trial, no bitterness in tears, no sting in death. With You for my portion, I am independent of every other. In all Your dealings towards me, may I recognize the gracious purpose and design of making me more and more fit for that glorious world, where obedience to You shall never falter, and consecration shall never fail; where every thought and wish shall be in unison with the divine.\par \par O YoIu, whose heart beats responsive to the smallest sorrow of Your stricken people, look down in great mercy on Your sons and daughters of affliction. May they know that You have this same wise end in all Your discipline. May they come to feel that their greatest trials are the ladder-steps to their greatest blessings\emdash links in the chain which draws them to heaven. Whether You chasten or gladden, may they be enabled to say, "Even so, Father, for it seems good in Your sight."\par \par Bless all relatedJ to me by whatever tie. May theirs be the tabernacles of the righteous, where the voice of gladness and rejoicing is heard. May none of them be among the number of the loitering and presumptuous, who say, "My Lord delays His coming." May their loins rather be girded and their lights burning. Set as gems in Immanuel's crown, may they be found unto praise, and honor, and glory, at His appearing and kingdom.\par \par Send times of refreshing unto Zion. Enlarge her borders; lengthen her cords and strengthenK her stakes. Purify the sons of Levi, that they may offer to You sacrifices of righteousness. Raise up faithful and devoted ambassadors of the cross, who will sound the trumpet whether men will hear or whether they will forbear. May the Lord give the word, and great shall be the company of those who publish it.\par \par Forgive, Lord, the sins I may have committed against You this day\emdash failures in duty, rashness of speech, covetous thoughts, infirmities of temper, uncharitable words or insinuations. If I have been quick in taking offence, or betrayed into giving offence\emdash if I have tampered with conscience, or grieved Your Spirit\emdash I would seek pardon and remission through Him who is ever waiting to be gracious, and who is alike able and willing to bestow upon me full forgiveness of all transgressions, negligences, and ignorances. Spare me, if it be Your will, to see the light and to enjoy the comforts of a new morning. And all I ask is for Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } Me to come into Your blessed presence this morning, thanking You for the mercies of the by-past night, and the renewed comforts of another day. I laid me down and slept\emdash I awaked for the Lord sustained me. Day by day are You loading me with Your benefits, and giving me unceasing cause for gratitude and praise. I bless You for my creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life. But I adore You especially for the grace of the Lord Jesus, who though He were rich\emdash rich in all the attribuNtes of Godhead\emdash rich in all the plenitude of the Divine perfections\emdash yet for our sakes He became poor\emdash stooped to the lowest depths of humiliation, that we through His poverty might be rich. I bless You that around His cross, mercy and truth have met together; righteousness and peace have embraced each other. You are, in Him, the just God and yet the Savior.\par \par I acknowledge with deep humiliation my unworthiness and guilt. Each day, as it brings with it the memory of Your great gOoodness, brings with it also the memory of my multiplied offences. I confess my sins, alike of omission and commission; that I have done the things I ought not to have done, and have left undone those things I ought to have done. I have often no affecting sense of the need of salvation, and of the enslaving power of sin. I have too often resorted to false and unavailing refuges for satisfaction and happiness. I have too frequently sought to slake my thirst at the world's polluted cisterns, and failed to rPemember that all my fresh springs are in You. Lord, have mercy upon me!\emdash Christ, have mercy upon me! It is by free, sovereign, unmerited grace, I am what I am. If I stand at last accepted before Your throne, this will be my plea, my confession, my eternal avowal\emdash "Being justified freely by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." Let me know, more and more, the blessedness of that word\emdash "No condemnation." From personal experience, may I exult in the infinite treasures Qthat are hidden in Christ; may I live under the elevating consciousness that I stand clothed in His righteousness, and that nothing can ever separate me from His love. Once within the fold, I am in the fold forever. Loving His own at the beginning, He will love them unto the end.\par \par In response to Your summons, I would desire to go forth this day, to willing work and service. Be my shield, my glory, and the lifter up of my head. Keep me from conformity to the evil maxims and practices of the worldR. While grateful for the many mercies of my lot, and for the diversified sources of pleasure and enjoyment in this beautiful earth, enable me to use its blessings without abusing them, and to live under the powers of the world to come. May I know the conquering, transforming influence of Redeeming love; raising my affections, purifying my desires, elevating my life. Keep me from all that is unworthy of my Christian profession; from all malice and uncharitableness, from all impatience and irritability. LetS me be guarded in language, tender and considerate in my dealings with others. May even unmerited reproach receive the gentle answer\emdash may I endure as seeing Him who is invisible. Let this grace of God which brings salvation\emdash teach me, that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, I should live soberly and righteously and godly in the world; looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God our Savior.\par \par Blessed Spirit of all grace! come from the four winds, and bTreathe upon earth's slain that they may live. In the might of Your omnipotence, say to every gate of unbelief and error, Ephphatha! be opened! May the Church be a reflector of You her Lord\emdash shining for Your glory. Hasten the day, when no jarring note will disturb her blissful harmonies\emdash when the watchmen on her walls shall see eye to eye, and over all the glory, You shall be a defense.\par \par Bless poor afflicted ones. If You are leading into deep waters, may the everlasting arms be undernUeath and round about. Whatever the cross be, which Your suffering people are called to carry, may they enjoy the assurance, that the same Lord who died for them, lays it on, and keeps it on\emdash that no unnecessary thorn is in their chaplet of sorrow. When the unquiet dream of earth is over, may they awake in the morning of immortality, to see and to own, that mercy and faithfulness regulated all Your earthly dealings; and to utter with fervid lip the confession, "We have known and believed the love whiVch God has to us."\par \par Anew I supplicate Your grace and blessing on myself, my family, and household this day. Lift upon us the light of Your countenance\emdash never leave and never forsake us. May the Lord be the portion of our inheritance and of our cup; the maintainer of our lot and then, the lines shall have fallen unto us in pleasant places; yes, with God, we shall have a goodly heritage. And all I ask is for Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \par \par \par 26th Evening\emdash A FAITHFUL GOD\par \Wpar "Faithful is he who calls you, who also will do it." 1 Thess. 5:24\par \par O God, I approach Your sacred presence, on this the evening of another day, through the gateway of Your tried faithfulness. Amid the vicissitudes of a changing world\emdash amid the instability of human props and confidences\emdash the fitfulness of human friendships\emdash there is no change in You. With You is the fountain of life. For the weak, the weary, the sin-burdened and sorrow-burdened, there is ever an open door oXf welcome. All Your promises are yes and amen to those who believe.\par \par I desire to utter the memory of Your great goodness\emdash to recall with heartfelt gratitude Your faithfulness in the past. My way through life has been paved with mercies. I have abundant reason to set up my Ebenezer, and to write upon it the inscription, "Hitherto has the Lord helped me." You have been the same in sickness and in health, in joy and in sorrow, amid comforts or crosses.\par \par Alas! Lord, these memories ofY Your great goodness are sadly marred and clouded by the memory of my own transgressions. I offer no extenuation for their guilt. I have sinned against light and love, against the warnings of Your providence, against the riches of Your grace. I have too often given way to rebellion and presumption, to pride and unbelief. I have not lived up to my privileges. I have not realized, as I ought, my responsibilities. Whether You have spoken to me in the whirlwind, or in the still small voice\emdash I have alikeZ been slow to listen. Blessings innumerable have been poured into my lap, but they have often been received with an unthankful heart. Shadowing palms and wells of refreshing have studded my pilgrim path; but I have too frequently reclined under the shadow, and partaken of the refreshment, without any breathing of gratitude to the Bountiful Provider. And when the palm-shade and the well-spring have been exchanged for the dry and thirsty land, where no water is\emdash when the sun of earthly joys has gone d[own, and I have been left to walk in darkness, how apt have I been to murmur under Your chastening hand, and to impeach the rectitude and wisdom of Your dispensations.\par \par O faithful, covenant-keeping God, have compassion on my unfaithfulness; heal my backslidings\emdash receive me graciously\emdash love me freely. Cast me not away from Your presence, and take not Your Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joys of Your salvation, and uphold me with Your free Spirit. You have promised "all-suffic\iency in all things;" make Your grace sufficient for me, and perfect Your strength in my weakness. Keep me lowly\emdash keep me pure\emdash keep me watchful. May I neither seek the world's applause\emdash nor dread the world's censure. My soul; wait only upon God, for my expectation is from Him. All my purposes and plans of life I leave to Your better direction. Guide me, while I live, by Your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory. Make me, at last, in Christ more than conqueror. Faithful is He who c]alls me, who also will do it.\par \par O You who had a kindly word even for the outcast's tears, look in great mercy on those who are resisting Your grace\emdash grieving Your Spirit\emdash rushing against the thick bosses of Your shield. Lord, reclaim them, before it is too late. Reveal to them the glorious name, and person, and work of Him, whose divine mission it was to seek and to save those who are lost. Amid the misery and disquiet of their alienation and guilt, may they flee to His cross, and the^re obtain rest for their souls.\par \par Have mercy on the afflicted. There is not one broken, bleeding heart among the aching children of humanity, but what is known to You. Look upon them with Your pitying eye. May they regard each trial as an angel beckoning them nearer heaven. May the thought that He who sends their afflictions is the same God who gave Jesus for them, lull all misgivings and silence all murmurings. Harboring no suspicions of Your faithfulness, may they breathe the prayer divinely ta_ught\emdash "Your will be done," and trust Him to be faithful, who promised\emdash "I will never leave you nor forsake you."\par \par Bless all my dear friends\emdash pour upon them the continual dew of Your blessing. May they be among the beloved of the Lord who dwell in safety, and who are quiet from fear of evil. Hasten the promised and predicted conversion of the world\emdash when the Gentiles shall come to Your light, and kings to the brightness of Your rising. Let Your mighty power be manifested as of old, in behalf of Your Church; that men may know that You, whose name alone is Jehovah, are the most High over all the earth. "Let the people praise You, O Lord, yes let all the people praise You."\par \par I would retire to rest this night rejoicing in a faithful God, and reposing under the covert of Your wings. Watch over me; and, if spared until tomorrow; may I rise refreshed and invigorated for the duties of a new day. And all I ask is for the Redeemer's sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } !1!26 Day 26{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 26th Morning\emdash JUSTIFICATION BY GRACE\par \par "Being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus."\emdash Romans 3:24\par \par O God, I desirLbsness\emdash I shall be satisfied, when I awake with your likeness." Psalm 17:15\par \par God Almighty, who are ever good and doing good\emdash Father of all mercies and God of all grace\emdash I thank You for the gladsome return of day. I thank You for the glories of sunshine\emdash for the varied delights of this beautiful earth\emdash for its summer and winter\emdash its seed-time and harvest\emdash its grateful alternation and vicissitude of season. You have never left Yourself without a witness, inc that You are continually doing us good; giving us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and with gladness. Your tender mercies are over all Your works. Do grant me Your benediction, as I wait upon You anew at the Gates of the morning. Shine upon me, O better Sun of Righteousness, with the brightness of Your rising. May no cloud of sin or unbelief be suffered to obscure Your radiance, or to dim the sense of Your favor and love.\par \par I desire to make a full and unreservedd acknowledgment of all my many offences. You know how apt I am to offer vain excuses for my faults; to plead my inability, when it is my unwillingness\emdash to call that my misfortune, which is my sin. Truly I have no palliation or extenuation for my transgressions. Enter not into judgment with Your servant, for in Your sight shall no man living be justified.\par \par I bless You that in Your dear Son, You are waiting to be gracious; that in Him I can even now behold Your face in righteousness. My owne heart condemns me, and You are greater than my heart. But let Your hand be upon the Man of Your right hand, on the Son of Man whom You have made strong for Yourself. Behold, O God, my Shield, and look on the face of Your anointed.\par \par And while I turn to His cross for pardon and reconciliation\emdash I would pray that Your Holy Spirit may fulfill within me all the good pleasure of Your goodness, and the work of faith with power. May it be my habitual and constant endeavor to aim after that holinesfs of heart and life, without which no man can see You or enjoy You. Keep me from, and keep from me, all that would be detrimental to my soul's interests. Deliver me from hardness of heart, from worldliness and uncharitableness, from those absorbing anxieties of earth which tend to dim and impair the spiritual vision. Make me a more loving and obedient follower of the Great Exemplar; seeking daily to walk in His blessed footsteps, and to imbibe His blessed spirit; and thus rising to the true dignity and grgeatness of redeemed humanity, to become gradually more and more fit for His full vision and fruition, when I shall be like Him, for I shall see Him as He is.\par \par While I pray for myself, I would pray, also, for all whom it is alike my privilege and duty to remember at the throne of the heavenly grace. May the voice of rejoicing and salvation be heard this day in the tabernacles of those I love. Shield their households from danger, and their souls from sin. Beholding now Your face in righteousness\ehmdash may they, too, at last wake up from the dream of earth in the morning of immortality, wearing Your likeness, and tasting the joys of Your own beatitude\emdash "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."\par \par Have mercy on the sick, the sorrowing, the bereaved; those who have secret, unspoken afflictions, with which no stranger\emdash no friend\emdash can intermeddle. If they see not yet any bright light in the cloud, may they take comfort in the promise\emdash that "at evening timie it shall be light."\par \par Bless Your Zion everywhere. Hasten the coronation day of the Church triumphant. Let the Year of Your Redeemed speedily come, when all wrongs shall be redressed\emdash all calumnies and aspersions wiped away. Return and visit the Vine which Your own right hand has planted, and the branch You have made strong for Yourself.\par \par I put myself this day under Your gracious care. I would re-enter the battle of life girded with Your strength, clothed with the armor of rightejousness on the right hand and on the left. Let me engage in nothing that will violate the dictates of conscience, or do despite unto the Spirit of Grace. May I seek that\emdash my hands may be clean\emdash my heart pure\emdash my words kind\emdash my actions unselfish. May I, and all near and dear to me, live and walk and act, from day to day and from hour to hour, as we would wish we had done, in a dying hour. With the glorious prospect of at last beholding You face to face, may this urgent question exerkcise over us an ever-present influence, "What kind of people ought we to be, in all holy conversation and godliness; looking for, and hastening unto the coming of the Day of God?" Oh may we be diligent, that we may be found by him in peace, without spot and blameless.\par \par Hear, O God, in Heaven Your dwelling-place, these my morning supplications\emdash when you hear, forgive, and grant me an answer in peace; for the sake of Him whom You hear always\emdash Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amenl.\par \par \par \par 27th Evening\emdash THE GRAND PERSUASION\par \par "For I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day." 2 Tim. 1:12\par \par Almighty God, Father of all mercies, draw You near to me in Your infinite loving kindness, as I now commend myself, soul and body, to You in well-doing, as unto a Faithful Creator. The shadows of night have again gathered around me. I would close the portals of another day withm the golden key of prayer; rejoicing that You are more willing to hear than I am to ask. I would retire to rest with Your blessing and benediction breathed upon me. May He who came of old to His disciples at eventide, and said unto them, "Peace be unto you," abide with me, "for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent."\par \par I desire to look, blessed Savior, with the unwavering eye of faith, to Your completed work and unchanging promises. I know whom I have believed. You are all I need, livingn or dying. I commit my temporal as well as my everlasting interests to Your keeping\emdash all that concerns alike this world, and the next. I rejoice that they are in safe custody in Your hands. To whom can I go but unto You? You have the words of eternal life.\par \par Deepen within me the sense of my solemn responsibilities. Keep me ever mindful of "that Day"\emdash that the Great Being who is now my omniscient witness, will shortly be my Judge. I rejoice to think that He who is then to be exalted ono a Throne of glory, is that same gracious Redeemer who is now seated on a Throne of grace. "But as for me, I know that my Redeemer lives, and that he will stand upon the earth at last. And after my body has decayed, yet in my body I will see God! I will see him for myself. Yes, I will see him with my own eyes. I am overwhelmed at the thought!" O Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world\emdash who has done all, and suffered all, and procured all on my behalf\emdash and out of whose infinite fullnepss I have the promise of receiving grace for grace\emdash do strengthen me with might by Your Spirit in the inner man. Defend me from every snare and danger which may beset my path. Be my Shield in prosperity\emdash my Refuge in adversity\emdash my Comforter in sorrow\emdash my Light in darkness\emdash my Hope in death\emdash my Defender and Vindicator in judgment\emdash my Joy and Portion through all eternity.\par \par Forgive, Lord, whatever I have said amiss, or done amiss this day. If in my worldly qoccupations there has been any turning aside from the path of duty or rectitude\emdash any tampering with temptation and sin\emdash any exhibition of temper or passion inconsistent with my Christian profession\emdash any impurity of thought or selfishness of motive\emdash Lord, forgive me. Sprinkle my erring heart anew with the covenant token. Cleanse me from secret faults. Keep back Your servant also from presumptuous sins, and allow them not to have dominion over me. Come, Lord, and search me; try me, arnd know my thoughts, and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. May the Holy Spirit, the Sanctifier, expel whatever is unholy, and transform me more and more into the image and likeness of Your dear Son.\par \par Every blessing I ask for myself, I implore in behalf of all near and dear to me. May they too be led to make this sacred, everlasting deposit, into the hands of the Great Redeemer. O forbid that His advent should overtake any of us as a thief. May we be lookinsg for it, longing for it, preparing for it, living for it. The Lord grant unto us that we may find mercy of the Lord on that day.\par \par Let the wanderer be brought back to the fold. Let the impenitent and stouthearted be subdued and humbled; and let those who love You be as the sun when he goes forth in his strength. Support the sick and the distressed. Pity the careless\emdash reclaim the backsliding. Comfort the widow, the orphan, the fatherless, the poor also, and him who has no helper. May trial tresult in the quickening and sanctifying of Your true people. May the dying be prepared for their great change\emdash may the light of Your love cheer them in their passage through the dark valley\emdash may the hour of departure be to them the birthday of glory everlasting. And may those who have recently committed their loved ones to the silence of the tomb, exult in the assurance which robs Death of its sting and the Grave of its victory\emdash that this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal immortality; and that those who sleep in Jesus, will God bring with Him.\par \par I would lie down to rest this night, at peace with You, and in charity with all mankind. O Shepherd of Israel, who never slumbers, be around my pillow during the unconscious hours of sleep. If spared until tomorrow, may I awake refreshed and invigorated for the duties of another day, and for renewed consecration to Your will and service. Through Jesus Christ my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } s1E27 Day 27{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 27th Morning\emdash VISION AND FRUITION\par \par "As for me, I will behold your face in righteouawvant loves it." Psalm 119:140\par \par O Lord, I come this morning into Your gracious presence, adoring You as God over all, blessed for evermore. You have never left Yourself without a witness. The heavens declare Your glory, the skies shows forth Your handiwork. The sun and moon and stars are silent evangelists discoursing of Your greatness. They have no speech nor language, their voice is not heard\emdash but they bear mute and ceaseless testimony to Your eternal wisdom, power, and Godhead.\par \parx I bless You that You have not left Your children to these utterances of material creation. I bless You for that sublime Revelation of Your character and attributes You have given in Your holy Word. The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul\emdash the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. I bless You, that in this favored land of religious freedom, each is permitted to sit under his own vine and fig-tree without any to make him afraid, and to read in his own tongue the marvelouys works of God. By the teaching of Your Spirit, may I be enabled duly to value the Holy Scriptures, and to know from personal experience that they are able to make wise unto salvation. O Enlightener, Teacher, Sanctifier of the whole Church, open mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things out of the Divine law, and cause it to be esteemed by me, better than thousands of gold and of silver.\par \par I desire, Lord, to acknowledge how unworthy I am of this and of every other spiritual boon and blessing. Iz have to mourn the poverty of my faith\emdash the lukewarmness of my love\emdash the fitfulness of my obedience\emdash the perfunctory performance of my religious duties. How little the precepts of Your sacred Scriptures have been treasured in my heart, and reduced to practice in my daily walk and conversation. How often I have indulged in tempers and feelings inconsistent with Your revealed will, and with the character of Him who was meek and lowly in heart. I have too often yielded to the power of tempt{ation\emdash bent like a brittle reed in the storm; dishonoring Your name and grieving Your Spirit. You might righteously have left me to reap the fruit of my own ways and to be filled with my own devices\emdash saying, "Ephraim is joined to his idols, let him alone."\par \par Lord, have mercy upon me. Forgive me, for Your dear Son's sake. I would make it my prayer, "Teach me the way of Your statutes, and I shall keep it unto the end." May I hold fast the profession of my faith without wavering. May my |worldly engagements and calling, whatever these be, be sanctified and sweetened by the consciousness of Your approval and love. Let all life's duties be pervaded by a sense of Your presence\emdash laying out my time and talents and opportunities for Your glory, and being tenderly solicitous about the happiness and well-being of others. Let me not prefer my own word, and my own will, to Yours\emdash but may all the plans of my life be framed in accordance with Your testimonies. With docility may I listen t}o their divine teachings. Amid the fretting annoyances of everyday life, may they prove my infallible counselors. Amid all earth's joys, may they be the songs in the house of my pilgrimage. Amid all earth's changes\emdash when the grass withers and the flower fades, may I know that the Word of our God shall stand forever; and at last, with it as a staff in my hand, may I cross the border river.\par \par Lord, let Your Word have free course and be glorified throughout the whole world. May it be mighty as~ ever in the pulling down of strongholds. May Your faithful missionary servants, going forth with the sling of faith and a few pebbles from the brook, overcome every foe\emdash may this be their joyful testimony\emdash "So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed." We thank You for that plentiful rain with which, from time to time, You refresh Your inheritance when it is weary. May the shower still come down in its season\emdash let there be showers of blessing. Spirit of the living God! You who can alone give efficacy to the living Word\emdash as the Dove of peace, do speed with this true olive branch from country to country and from shore to shore. May the leaves of the Tree be for the healing of the nations.\par \par Bless all who are in sorrow. May they, too, be enabled from heartfelt experience to say, "This is my comfort in mine affliction\emdash Your Word has quickened me." May they kiss the rod that smites, and adore the hand which lays them low. And by Your gracious discipline here, may they be trained for the higher services of the heavenly sanctuary.\par \par I anew commend myself, and all near and dear to me, to You this day. Deliver my soul from death, my eyes from tears, my feet from falling. Keep my tongue from evil and my lips from speaking deceit. Your Word have I hid in my heart, that I may not sin against You. Hold up my goings in Your paths, that my steps slip not; and lead me in the way everlasting. Through Jesus Christ my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 28th Evening\emdash THE GIFT OF PEACE\par \par "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you\emdash not as the world gives, give I unto you." John 14:27\par \par O God, compose my mind for venturing now into Your presence. I thank you for so precious a legacy bequeathed by the adorable Savior to all His true people. I desire, in retiring to rest, to pass through this Beautiful Gate of the Temple, and anew to repose on Him who alone can speak peace to the sin-burdened and sorrow-burdened. Looking to His glorious, completed work, I can triumphantly say, Return unto your rest\emdash your peace\emdash O my soul, for the Lord has dealt bountifully with you.\par \par Forbid that I should ever be found seeking peace elsewhere\emdash searching for forgiveness and comfort in anything short of the peace purchased and secured through the blood of His cross. O Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, grant me Your peace. It is "not as the world gives." If You give peace, who then can give trouble? May the possession of that peace preserve me calm and tranquil amid all adverse providences. May I be enabled to repose with unswerving confidence in the wisdom of the divine guidance, and in the rectitude of the divine dealings. O God of peace, who has brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that Great Shepherd of the sheep\emdash who has, in the past, caused me to lie down in green pastures, and led me by the still waters\emdash often disappointing my fears and more than realizing my hopes\emdash loading me with the blessings of Your goodness\emdash I will still go in Your promised strength. I would seek to have no wish, and no will, and no way of my own. Do to me, and with me, as seems good in Your sight, only make me possessor of this best blessing\emdash the peace of Yours, which passes all understanding\emdash that peace which the world knows not of\emdash which the world with its riches and pleasures, its blandishments and fascinations, cannot give; and which the world, with all its troubles and anxieties, its sorrows and its trials, cannot take away.\par \par Having peace with You, my God, give me that charity which is ever the associate and companion of peace. Fill me with the fruits of the Spirit, which are love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, meekness, faith, temperance. Hasten the time when the waves of this troublesome world will be rocked to rest. Promote the cause of true and universal brotherhood. Come, O blessed "Father of peace!" give to all the nations of the earth unity, and concord. Come, O blessed Prince of peace!\emdash go forth with that sword which smites only to heal, "conquering and to conquer." Come, O Holy Spirit! Dove of peace\emdash "sweet Messenger of rest!"\emdash and brood, as You did of old, over the waste of chaos\emdash bringing light out of darkness and order out of confusion.\par \par Give, I beseech You, to my beloved friends, a personal interest in the same dying legacy of the Great Redeemer. To ensure to them the enjoyment of this peace, may they look to Him for everything, and may they look to Him in everything; seeking to live day by day, under the invigorating motive, "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." I pray for those who are in any way afflicted or distressed, in mind, body, or estate\emdash tossed with tempest and not comforted. O sympathizing Savior\emdash draw near to them, and say, "Peace, be still." You will keep them in perfect peace, whose minds are stayed on You. May they know Your own gracious word of promise, that "this is the rest with which You cause the weary to rest, and this is the refreshing."\par \par I would lie down tonight in peace, and sleep, under the comforting assurance that You alone Lord, make me to dwell in safety. It is You who give Your beloved sleep. And when all earthly nights are past\emdash may I wake up to endless peace, in glory everlasting; and be made partaker of the true rest which remains for Your believing people; through Jesus Christ my Lord. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } w1M28 Day 28{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 28Th Morning\emdash THE SACRED WORD\par \par "Your word is very pure\emdash therefore Your servre the world began." Tit. 1:2\par \par O God, I desire to come to the Gates of Prayer this morning, thanking and praising You for all Your great mercies. The pleasant radiance of another day has visited my chamber. Glory be to You for the blessings of the light. You might have made my pillow last night a pillow of death. But another sun has risen upon me. You might have forbidden that sun to rise; or, as in the case of many who started life with me, it might now have been shining on my grave. But You have spared me to enjoy the blessings of existence, and the many sources of its happiness. O You who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, do shine into my heart with the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. May He who is the true Sun of Righteousness disperse all the mists of unbelief, and ignorance, and sin; and may I enjoy the elevating satisfaction of a soul at peace with You.\par \par Lord, I acknowledge how much I have done to quench the light of Your countenance, to forfeit Your favor, and incur Your righteous displeasure. I have no apology to plead for my sins. You have spoken to me in the lessons of Your Providence, and by the teachings of Your Word\emdash by the voices of the living, and the silent voices of the dead\emdash in prosperity, by Your manifold mercies\emdash in adversity, by their curtailment or withdrawal. And yet, how callous and unconcerned have I been! How careful and troubled about the many things of this life, and how prone to forget the realities of the world to come.\par \par I bless You for the revelation of this higher existence; for the hope of eternal life given by the God who cannot lie\emdash the glorious assurance that death is but the moment of transition into purer being\emdash that through Him who by His own death has been death's Vanquisher, the gates of the grave open on a limitless beatific future. May all the beneficial discipline of Your Providence wean me from earth, and train me up in a fitness for that heavenly Kingdom, whose truest rest will be the unceasing activities of Your service. Deaden unnecessary solicitude about the present. Enable me to walk through the world with a conscience void of offence both towards God and towards man. Let me strive after a closer and more consistent walk with You, and a more habitual dependence on the aids of Your grace and Spirit. I cannot soar to the region of faith without Your strength; I cannot live under the powers of the world to come, without Your teaching and guidance. Show me Your ways, O Lord\emdash teach me Your paths.\par \par Remembering that this present life of probation molds and shapes and determines the life that is to come\emdash that as men live here, so will they live forever\emdash may I be so enabled faithfully to occupy, as best I can, and while I can, whatever niche You have assigned me in Your Temple, that when I come to resign my stewardship, it may be with the humble hope that I have not been a traitor to my trust. Feelingly alive to my momentous responsibilities\emdash may I be diligent, that I may be found of You in peace without spot and blameless.\par \par Let a rain-shower of blessing descend on all near and dear to me. May they too, be enabled to know Him and to love Him, whom to know and whom to love is life eternal. Bless all in sorrow. May they lie passive in the arms of Your mercy. Raise up the sick. Be the God of the widow\emdash the Help of the poor\emdash the Friend of the unbefriended\emdash the Father of the fatherless. Conduct the dying through the swellings of Jordan. "Whom the Lord loves He chastens." May this prove a quieter to all fears, lull all misgivings, and repress all murmurs.\par \par O great Ruler of mankind, hasten the time when all shall know You, from the least unto the greatest. Extend and establish the principles and the reign of Righteousness. Scatter the people that delight in war. Let the cruel sword long slumber. Give peace in our time, O Lord, for there is none other who fights for us but You alone, O God. Let the dew of Hermon\emdash the dew which descended on the mountains of Zion, come down on the Holy Church throughout all the world. May all Your churches, walking in the fear of God and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, everywhere be multiplied. Save Your people; bless Your inheritance; feed them also, and lift them up forever.\par \par Anew I commend myself to Your gracious keeping this day. Guide me by Your counsel\emdash guard me from temptation\emdash lead me in the way everlasting. May every unloving thought\emdash every unworthy aim and aspiration\emdash give place to what is pure and unselfish and kind. And when You have finished Your course and Your purposes with me here below, may an abundant entrance be ministered into Your kingdom and glory. Through the merit and mediation of Jesus Christ, my only Lord and Savior. Amen.\par \par \par \par 29th Evening\emdash ACCESS TO THE FATHER\par \par "For through him, we have both access by one Spirit unto the Father." Eph. 2:18\par \par Blessed God, I am again permitted this night to approach the Throne of Grace, in the name of Him whom You hear always\emdash who ever stands by the golden altar with the fragrant censer in His hands. The voices of countless suppliants are at this moment ascending into His ear, but He can listen to them all, and answer them all.\par \par Give me now filial confidence in drawing near to You, my Father in heaven. Let me rejoice that the Key which unlocks these gates, admits to a Father's presence and a Father's love. Through Him who has secured this glorious liberty of access, let my prayer come up before You as incense, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.\par \par Great Keeper of Israel! Keep me under the shadow of Your wings. Gladden me with that inner sunshine which brightens and beautifies and glorifies every earthly lot, and makes Your people independent of all the varying and changing circumstances of outer life. Under the consciousness of Your friendship and blessing, may I feel that I am rich, whatever else may be lacking.\par \par But while rejoicing in this freedom of approach accorded to Your children, I have reason also to utter the confession, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before You, and am no more worthy to be called Your son." I acknowledge my great unworthiness\emdash my declensions and backslidings by reason of indulged sin, leading too often from weakness to weakness, instead of from strength to strength. I have not habitually frequented the mercy-seat as I ought to have done, and prized the privilege of unfettered access to Your presence\emdash My prayers have too often been cold and listless\emdash formal and insincere; instead of being the unburdenings and outpourings of filial confidence and trust. Where would I have been this night but for Your paternal forbearance.\par \par Blessed Savior, I desire to rest on the preciousness of Your atoning blood\emdash on the perfection of Your glorious righteousness\emdash on the tenderness of Your all-wise dealings\emdash on the prevalence of Your continual intercession. In You I have all and abound. In You, in the midst of my spiritual poverty, I am rich\emdash nothing can touch my divine patrimony. In You, I have the pledge and guarantee for the bestowment of every other needed blessing.\par \par Lord, I would plead this night for increased communications and supplies of Your grace. Strengthen me with all might by Your Spirit in the inner man. Keep me from all that would be detrimental to my spiritual interests\emdash all that would weaken or impair this filial confidence, and lead me to restrain prayer. Whatever be my dominant sin\emdash ease or pleasure\emdash pride or passion\emdash covetousness or ambition\emdash enable me by the promised help of Your Spirit, to subdue it\emdash nailing it to the Redeemer's cross. Enable me to follow His meekness and gentleness; to be kind and forgiving\emdash tender and charitable towards the weak and the absent\emdash the tempted and the erring. Conscious of the supreme enthronement of Your love, may life be, more than it has been, an effort to crucify self and to please You. Even when there may be mystery in Your dealings, let me not wrong Your goodness and wisdom with one shadow of suspicion. Whether by giving or by taking, by smiting or by healing\emdash by the sweet cup or the bitter, may it be mine to say, "Father! glorify Your name!"\par \par Bless my beloved friends. Though severed from one another by distance, we can meet in thought at the mercy-seat, and, through Christ, have access by one Spirit unto the Father. Breathe upon us and say, "I will be a Father unto you, and you shall be my sons and daughters."\par \par Compassionate all in sorrow. If there has been, with any, the thwarting of favorite schemes and the blighting of fond hopes\emdash may these, too, be met with the breathing of meek acquiescence, "Even so, Father." May the realized consciousness of Your paternal love, sustain amid adverse experiences and foster submissive trust. Stand by every couch of sickness. If it be Your will, give back loved ones. Show that, with You, all things are possible, and that to the Lord our God belong the issues from death.\par \par Bless Your universal Church. Beautify every sanctuary with Your presence; and hasten the promised day, when the wilderness and the solitary place shall be made glad, when the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose. Bring Your true people nearer one another. May the watchmen on Zion, who, by reason of present infirmity and weakness and prejudice, may be alienated and estranged, come to see eye to eye. May we all look forward to that happy time when filial love shall be perfected, and consecration of heart and service be complete; when every human will shall be in harmony with Yours\emdash the intellect purified and ennobled\emdash the memory made the repository of pure and hallowed recollections\emdash the whole soul converted into a spiritual temple, where God is all in all. For Jesus' sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } #1%29 Day 29{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 29th Morning\emdash THE HOPE OF ETERNAL LIFE\par \par "In hope of eternal life, which God, who cannot lie, promised befog the inhabitants of the earth. You count the number of the stars, and name every one. You heal the broken in heart and bind up their wounds. The sparrow's fall is appointed by You\emdash the young raven's cry is heard by You\emdash the very hairs of our head are numbered by You. From the drop of the forest leaf, to the departure of the soul in death\emdash all is known to You and ordered by You. You appoint the bounds of our habitation. Man proposes, but You dispose; and You dispose all things well. Let it be thus ever a joyous thought\emdash that whatever concerns me, is under the control and direction of infinite wisdom and unchanging, everlasting love. I cannot forecast the future; but it is in Your hands. Even if there be cloud and tempest, it is You who walk upon the wings of the wind. Omnipotence treads the stormy waters. Omnipotence directs the roll of every billow and, when it is fit, Omnipotence utters the mandate, "Peace, be still!"\par \par O God, I have to acknowledge that I have not always thus realized Your constant supervision, and taken the comfort I ought to have derived from Your sovereign rule. I have too often practically forgotten the Great Supreme, by dwelling on second causes. I have allowed myself to be disturbed and harassed with little vexations\emdash anxious thoughts for the present, and misgivings and forebodings for the future. Enable me to cast all my cares, great or small, on You; knowing that You care for me. Let me brace myself for duty or for trial under the sheltering promise, "I will make My grace sufficient for you\emdash I will perfect strength in weakness." If I enjoy the consciousness of having You on my side, who has given me the mightiest pledge of Your love in Jesus\emdash I may confidently trust Your faithfulness for lesser blessings. Every other rill of comfort may be withdrawn\emdash but if my well-springs are in You, I am independent alike of what the world may give or take away. With You as my heritage and portion, I need no other.\par \par Keep me pure and unspotted in my interactions with the world, whether in my duties or my enjoyments. Forbid that I should offer at the shrine of self, or pleasure, or mammon, my best\emdash and be content with giving the remnants of worn and wasted affections to You. May I beware of any and every deviation from the straight path. Hold me up and I shall be safe. This day, guard me from whatever would be detrimental to my soul's good. Preserve me from the guilt of wasted hours and slighted opportunities. Enable me to renounce all evil habits\emdash all debasing compliances. May every idol that would usurp Your place be overthrown. May no corrupt thought pollute my heart\emdash no unworthy utterance defile my tongue\emdash no unholy action stain my life.\par \par O mighty reigning God\emdash give peace in our time! Maintain peace among the nations; or if You should send war as one of Your four sore judgments, let the sword prepare the way for the ploughshare, and the spear for the pruning hook. If darkness be now covering the lands and gross darkness the people, may it usher in the longed-for era of millennial bliss, when the Prince of Peace shall take to Himself His great power and reign\emdash when the cry shall be heard from shore to shore and from pole to pole, "The kingdoms of this world have become the one kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ."\par \par Keep, and preserve, and comfort, all the sons and daughters of sorrow. In the spirit of weaned children may they say, "Father, not our will\emdash but Your be done." May they feel that in You they have enough for every emergency, and that they can write under each trying hour, "As your days, so shall your strength be." Compassionate those laid on beds of sickness and languishing. Assuage suffering\emdash smooth the pillow of pain. Prepare the dying for death, and what is after death. And may the living remember that they too must die.\par \par Before I now go out into the world I would cling to the horns of the altar. There I would bind with cords, my morning sacrifice of confession and penitence\emdash of gratitude and praise. The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? the Lord is the strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? Lead me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation; on You do I wait all the day. Whom have I in heaven, O Savior, but You; on earth there is none I would desire in comparison with You. My flesh and my heart fail, but You are the strength of my heart, and my portion forever. Unto You, with the Adorable Father and the Eternal Spirit, I would ascribe all blessing and honor, and glory and praise; world without end. Amen.\par \par \par \par 30th Evening\emdash THE CHASTENING OF LOVE\par \par "As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten." Rev. 3:19\par \par O God, I desire to come into Your gracious presence, thanking You for the mercies of the past day. The shadows of another evening have gathered around me\emdash may I feel that "it is not night if You are near." May "no earth-born cloud arise" to eclipse the sunshine of Your love, and deprive me of the sensible tokens of Your favor.\par \par Adored be Your name, that all events are at Your disposal and under Your righteous ordination and control. I rejoice to know that Your dealings, though sovereign, are never arbitrary. You are my Father. Give me trust, and confidence, and filial reverence. Like as a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear Him\emdash for He knows our frame, He remembers that we are dust. Your way is sometimes in the sea, and Your path in the deep waters, and Your judgments unsearchable; but the day is coming when You will vindicate the rectitude of Your procedure, and bring every tongue to confess that You have done all things well.\par \par I have no reason to wonder at any afflictions or chastisements. I have rather reason to wonder at Your patience and kindness; that the cumberer's sentence has not been pronounced, and the cumberer's doom has not been visited upon me. Blessed Redeemer, how coldly have I requited Your love\emdash how unworthily have I resisted Your grace, evaded Your pleadings, grieved Your Spirit. How often have I kept You standing at the door of my heart\emdash Your head wet with dew and Your locks with the drops of the night resigning myself to spiritual sloth and indifference\emdash allowing worldly interests and engrossments to supersede the concerns of the soul and eternity. And yet You are still waiting to be gracious\emdash Your hand of mercy and forbearance, is stretched out still.\par \par Let me trust that same love and mercy, in whatever means You see fit to employ in order to promote the life of faith, to quicken obedience, and stimulate my spiritual graces. We are apt to settle on our lees, when we are not emptied from vessel to vessel. We need at times, a thorn put into our nest, that we may not build too securely here. We need, ever and always, the monition to be sounded in our ears, "Arise and depart, for this is not your rest." Lord, by Your own beneficial discipline\emdash wean me from earth, and train me for heaven. Destroy all self-sufficiency. Give me the ornament of a meek and quiet, a peaceful and contented spirit. Keep me from being fretted by real or imagined injuries. Keep me from whatever would inflict pain on others\emdash or infringe in any way the sacredness of the golden rule. In lowliness of mind may I seek to esteem others better than myself. Preserve me from all that would generate rebellion, or foster worldliness, or deaden spirituality of heart. Whether by active work or by passive endurance, may I seek to glorify Your holy name. If You have curtailed me of some earthly good, let me feel that some higher spiritual blessing is in reversion. Let my will be resolved into Yours; and then will the trials of life be disarmed of their sting, when I view them as part of Your own plan of infinite wisdom.\par \par I pray for all the children of God that are scattered abroad. I pray for Your tempest-tossed Church. Amid environing storms, may she look to Him who rules the raging of the sea. Bring Your true people nearer one another. Hasten the time when, no longer ranged under different banners bearing the shibboleth of party\emdash they shall be found, side by side, fighting the battles of their Lord.\par \par O Help of the helpless, Father of the fatherless, Friend of the friendless\emdash O Great and Good Shepherd who gently leads the weak, the weary, the burdened of Your flock\emdash do look in especial tenderness on the afflicted. May they be enabled to sing of mercy in the midst of judgment. May they know from experience, that You ever mingle sweet ingredients in the cup of sorrow\emdash opening well-springs in the Valley of Baca, and transforming Achor into a door of hope. Be the healer of the broken-hearted, the comforter of all that are cast down. In the midst of the blighting of cherished hopes and the failure of favorite schemes, may they glorify You by unquestioning submission. Take off their sackcloth and gird them with gladness. May the assurance "whom the Lord loves He chastens"\emdash still and quiet every misgiving. Prepare the dying for death. May they pass from the cherished scenes and associations of earth, to the presence of angels and the fruition of God.\par \par Take the charge of me through the silence and darkness of another night. May I lie down to sleep with the assurance that You sustain me, and when I awake, may I be still with You. And all I ask is for the Blessed Redeemer's sake. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par } ggE1i30 Day 30{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcharset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 30th Morning\emdash A REIGNING GOD\par \par "The Lord God omnipotent reigns." Rev. 19:6\par \par O God, I adore Your sovereignty. Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom. All space is Your dominion. You do according to Your will in the armies of heaven, and amonrset0 Georgia;}} {\colortbl ;\red0\green0\blue0;} {\*\generator Riched20 5.40.11.2210;}\viewkind4\uc1\pard\sl240\slmult1\lang2058\f0\fs24 31st Morning\emdash BANISHED FEARS\par \par "He shall not be afraid of evil tidings\emdash his heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord." Psalm 112:7\par \par Heavenly Father, I desire to approach Your gracious presence through this blessed Gateway of Trust. My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed\emdash I will trust and not be afraid, for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my song; He also has become my salvation. I bless You that in this holy confidence, I can enter on the work and duties\emdash the joys and sorrows\emdash the trials and temptations of a new day. You have been in the past a refuge in the time of trouble, vouchsafing help when vain was the help of man. I will trust You still; leaning on Your arm\emdash confident in Your grace, I will go in the strength of the Lord God, making mention of Your righteousness, even of Yours alone.\par \par I come to You supplicating Your pardoning mercy. Forgive my many sins in all their heinousness and aggravation\emdash may every guilty stain be washed away\emdash may I stand now and ever in Your sight, accepted in the Beloved. Other Refuge\emdash other Savior\emdash other Righteousness\emdash I have none, and I need none\emdash I cast my helpless soul for time and for eternity on His finished work and atoning sacrifice. May the Holy Spirit\emdash the Spirit of all grace\emdash promised by Him on His departure from the world, come down to cleanse and regenerate and sanctify me, and make me fit to be partaker of the inheritance of the saints in light. Your Spirit, O God, is good, lead me to the land of uprightness.\par \par Lord, equip me this morning for Your service. May the great predominating motive, to love and to glorify You, regulate and control my actions\emdash quicken my energies\emdash and give direction to all my schemes and purposes. Clothe and panoply me with the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left. The name of my spiritual foe is "legion," for they are many. I have no might against this great multitude, neither know I what to do\emdash but my eyes are upon You. Your hand is never shortened; Your ear is never heavy. He who is with me and for me, is greater far than those who are against me. I will trust in the Lord forever, for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength. "O Lord, in You have I trusted, let me never be confounded."\par \par  And may all near and dear to me enter by this same Gate of the righteous; and exercise the same loving, unwavering confidence in Your faithfulness. If any are in trouble\emdash support them; if any are bereaved\emdash comfort them. May they know, in their happy experience, that those who trust in the Lord shall be like Mount Zion, which cannot be moved, but abides forever. If any are dying\emdash flood the dark Valley with glorious light; and when the dust returns to its dust, may the spirit return to the God who gave it.\par \par Bless this great country in its varied interests, civil and sacred. May it be distinguished for the righteousness which alone exalts. May there be more of lofty principle and sterling integrity and honor, regulating and influencing transactions between man and man. Grant us the inestimable blessing of peace. May the sword long slumber. Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will remember the name of the Lord our God.\par \par Bless Your Church throughout the whole world. Be a wall of fire around Your Zion, and the glory in the midst thereof; over all the glory be a defense. Bless Your ministering servants\emdash the ambassadors of Your Word at home, as well as Your faithful missionaries abroad. May it specially be theirs, amid manifold discouragements, to rise by faith above the fear of evil tidings, and to have their hearts fixed trusting in the Lord. May the joy of the Lord be their strength.\par \par And now, Lord, what do I wait for? my hope is in You. Hear in heaven, Your holy habitation, these my unworthy prayers; and when You hear, forgive, and grant me an answer in peace\emdash through Jesus Christ, in whom is all my trust; and to whom, with You the Father, and the Holy Spirit\emdash Three in one in covenant for my salvation\emdash be ascribed all blessing, and honor, and glory, and praise world without end. Amen.\par \par \par \par 31st Evening\emdash THE EVERLASTING LIGHT\par \par "Your sun will never set again, and your moon will wane no more; the Lord will be your everlasting light, and your days of sorrow will end." Isaiah 60:20\par \par O God, I come to You this evening, as the Everlasting Light; with whom there is no darkness at all. I beseech You show me Your glory. May the din of the world be shut out\emdash allow not its distracting thoughts and cares to intrude in this the hour of my evening oblation. Bring me under the solemnizing influence of unseen realities. May the Gate of prayer become as the Gate of heaven.\par \par I bless You for the glimpses given of the things prepared within the veil, for those who love You. I thank You for the images and emblems contained in Your most holy Word, of this future world of bliss\emdash "the rest which remains"\emdash "the kingdom which cannot be moved"\emdash "the Father's house" with its "many mansions"\emdash "the sun that shall no more go down"\emdash the moon that shall never wax nor wane\emdash a sinless, sorrowless, tearless immortality. All present joys are transient, shadowy, unreal, compared with these. Grant, Lord, that when I awake from the sleep of death, I may partake of endless life in You\emdash satisfied with Your likeness; and served heir to Your own gracious beatitude\emdash "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."\par \par Alas! the love which ought to have reigned paramount, has too often been supplanted and superseded by other affections. I have to lament my bias to sin\emdash the latent principles of corruption\emdash the evil heart of unbelief which is ever tempting me to stray from the living God\emdash the burdens and impediments which clog the wings of faith and prevent me soaring heavenwards. Lord, elevate my affections, purify my desires, quicken my new obedience. May my life become, more than it has been, an offering of gratitude\emdash a sacrifice of praise for all Your many mercies. By the blessings You are bestowing, as well as by the beneficial discipline of Your providence in curtailing or removing these, may I become gradually prepared for the enjoyment of Your presence\emdash for taking my place as a worshiper in that Temple, where my present imperfect and divided service and love will be merged in the bliss of perfect, unalloyed, uninterrupted consecration. Meanwhile, keep me from the absorbing power, the benumbing influence of earthly things. Keep me mindful that my little day is flitting fast, and that opportunities of serving and glorifying You must speedily terminate. May I be enabled so to live, that when the hour of departure arrives, I may lean with unfaltering and unwavering trust on the promised rod and staff, and pass from a death full of hope to an immortality full of glory.\par \par I pray for all mankind. Lord, pity the heathen kingdoms, still the habitations of cruelty; hear the loud cry of oppression and tyranny and wrong which is ever ascending from an enslaved world. Break these bonds asunder; and send the nations forth, walking and leaping and praising God. Prince of Peace! take to Yourself Your great power and reign. Upbuild the walls of Zion, and hasten the fulfillment of the glorious things spoken of the city of God.\par \par Have mercy on the afflicted\emdash the poor\emdash the orphaned\emdash the widowed\emdash the friendless\emdash the sick\emdash the dying. Reveal Yourself to all such as the Great Physician. May those lamenting the earthly loss of loved ones\emdash fallen asleep in Jesus\emdash rejoice that to them the shadow of death has been turned into the morning, and that the Lord their God has become their everlasting light.\par \par Bless those connected with me by ties of kindred or affection. Be to them as a pillar of cloud by day, and as a pillar of fire by night. If You send them blessings, may they connect every gift with the Great Bestower\emdash if You give the full cup, may they be enabled to carry it with a steady hand. If You appoint them crosses, may they have strength to bear them\emdash afflictions and bereavements, may they regard them as Your own special messengers sent on a mission of wisdom and mercy. However far we may be separated from one another here, may an entrance at last be ministered unto us abundantly, into the abiding Home, whose walls are Salvation, and its GATES, PRAISE.\par \par Anew I commit myself to Your gracious protection. Give me quiet and refreshing sleep, and spare me, if it be Your will, to see the light and to enjoy the comforts of another day.\par \par And now, unto Him who alone is able to keep me from falling, and to present me faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy\emdash Unto Him who loved me, and washed me from my sins in His own blood\emdash Unto Him who, Himself having overcome the sharpness of death, has opened the Kingdom of Heaven and the Gates of Righteousness to all Believers\emdash be ascribed all blessing and honor, might, majesty, and dominion, world without end. Amen.\par \pard\cf1\fs23\par }  1 31 Day 31{\rtf1\ansi\deff0{\fonttbl{\f0\fnil\fcha