Impatience is the thorn bush that grows in the soil of pride. Pride is all about us – our desire, our preference, and our convenience reside at the center of our universe. Others revolve around us. When people don’t do what we want, when we want we react with irritation – sometimes contained in resentment and bitterness, sometimes expressed in rage and venom.
– Stanley Gale in A Vine-Ripened Life
A holy man will endeavor to shun every known sin, and to keep every known commandment.
Prayer is not an option for the believer but a divinely ordained duty, a duty done in obedience, rooted in love for God…. Such love draw the believer to the Father, leaning upon the Son, and depending upon the Spirit in prayer. The true believer prays because he has been loved and because he loves is return.
Holiness is the habit of being of one mind with God, according as we find His mind described in Scripture. It is the habit of agreeing in God’s judgment – hating what He hates – loving what He loves – and measuring everything in this world by the standard of His Word.
If we find that we are not at rest, it is because we are not resting in God’s goodness.
Prayer makes a godly man, and puts within him the mind of Christ, the mind of humility, of self-surrender, of service, of pity, and of prayer. If we really pray, we will become more like God, or else we will quit praying.
No one ever said at the end of his course that he had been too holy and lived too near to God.
One of the ways we incite joy in our hearts is to rest in the gospel, recount its wonders, and recite its truths to ourselves.
The fruit of joy is not rooted in circumstances, but in God’s goodness and ultimately in God Himself.
Our prayers may be awkward. Our attempts may be feeble. But since the power of prayer is in the one who hears it and not in the one who says it, our prayers do make a difference.
Brian J. Mikul 