March 22 Daily Devotional

How to pray

... We remind ourselves of the vital importance of the right approach, for this is the key to the understanding of successful prayer. People so often say, "You know, I prayed and prayed, but nothing happened. I did not seem to find peace. I did not seem to get any satisfaction out of it." Most of their trouble is due to the fact that their approach to prayer has been wrong....

We tend to be so self-centered in our prayers that when we drop on our knees before God, we think only about ourselves and our troubles and perplexities. We start talking about them at once, and of course nothing happens.... That is not the way to approach God. We must pause before we speak in prayer.

The great teachers of the spiritual life throughout the centuries, whether Roman Catholic or Protestant, have been agreed ... that the first step in prayer has always been what they call "Recollection." There is a sense in which every man when he begins to pray to God should put his hand upon his mouth.

That was the whole trouble with Job.... He felt that God had not been dealing kindly with him, and he had been expressing his feelings freely. But when ... God began to deal with him at close quarters, when He began to reveal and manifest Himself to him, what did Job do? ... He said, "...I will lay mine hand upon my mouth." And, strange as it may seem to you, you start praying by saying nothing; you recollect what you are about to do.

I know the difficulty in this. We are but human, and we are pressed by the urgency of our position, the cares, the anxieties, the troubles, the anguish of mind.... And we are so full of this that, like children, we start speaking at once. But if you want to make contact with God, and if you want to feel His ever­lasting arms about you, put your hand upon your mouth for a moment. Recollection! Just stop for a moment and remind yourself of what you are about to do.

Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, ii, pp. 51-2
(continued on March 23)

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“Text reproduced from ‘A First Book of Daily Readings’ by Martyn Lloyd-Jones, published by Epworth Press 1970 & 1977 © Trustees for Methodist Church Purposes. Used with permission.”

Comments on D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, A First Book of Daily Readings

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