SECRET AND PERSONAL PRAYER.
By American Messenger
"Enter into thy closet," says the Saviour, "and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly." And how wonderfully in the history of the Bible has this gracious promise been fulfilled! How multiplied the examples of those who prevailed in prayer when they were alone with God! Abraham was alone when he pleaded with God for Sodom, and so far as he failed, it was "because he ceased to ask before God ceased to grant." Moses was alone when God communed with him from the burning bush and appointed him the deliverer of Israel. Joshua was alone when the angel of the covenant came to him as an armed man; and Gideon and Jephthah were alone when commissioned to deliver Israel. When Elijah raised a child from the dead, and when afterwards Elisha did the same, each were alone pleading with God in prayer. Daniel was alone praying in his chamber, and alone when his soul went up in supplication from the den of lions, from which he was so divinely delivered. Cornelius was alone when the angel appeared to him, Peter alone on the house-top in prayer when divinely taught to make known the gospel to the Gentiles; one John alone in the wilderness, and another alone in Patmos, when God was specially near to them. And in every age it is found that when God's children are wrestling with him in the closet, they seem to draw nearest to him, and to receive the richest blessings from on high, both for themselves and others. The closet may be the upper chamber, as with Elijah; or the open air, as with Jacob; or the house-top, as with Peter; or the lions' den, as with Daniel; but so it be a place where the soul goes out in earnest, and longing personal communion with God, there he will meet the suppliant and grant special blessing to the soul that thus waits on and pleads with him. "Then, my soul, in every strait
To thy Father come and wait;
He will answer every prayer,
God is present everywhere."
—American Messenger.