| Making the Most of Life |
Chapter 4 |
Page 4 |
We need not trouble ourselves, therefore, if we cannot get our wishes into words when we pray, for God hears wishes, heart longings, soul hungerings and thirstings. The things we cannot say in speech of the lips, we may ask God to take from our heart’s speech. There is not the feeblest, faintest glimmer of a desire rising on the far away horizon of our being, but God sees it. There is not a heart hunger, not a wish to be holier and better, not an aspiration to be more Christ like, not a craving to live for God and be a blessing to others, not the faintest desire to be rid of sin’s power, but God knows of it. St. Paul has a wonderful word on this subject: God, he says, “Is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think.” When our heart is stirred to its depths, what large, great things can we ask in words? Then how much can we put into thoughts of prayer, into longings, desires, aspirations, beyond the possibilities of speech? God can do more than we can pray either in words or thoughts.
Our truest praying is that which we cannot express in any words, our heart’s unutterable longings, when we sit at God’s feet and look up into his face and do not speak at all, but let our hearts talk.
“Rather as friends sit sometimes hand in hand,
Nor mar with words the sweet speech of their eyes;
So in soft silence let us oftener bow,
Nor try with words to make God understand.
Longing is prayer; upon its wings we rise
To where the breath of heaven beats upon our brow.”
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