Prayer is a sincere, sensible, affectionate pouring out of the heart and soul to God, through Christ, with the strength and assistance of the Holy Spirit, for such things as God has promised, or according to the Word, for the good of the church, with submission, in faith, to the will of God. In this description are seven things that we need to consider:
1. Prayer is to be sincere.
Prayer is a sincere pouring out of the soul to God. Sincerity runs through all the graces of God in us, and influences all the actions of a Christian, or else our actions are not really from God. It is the same with prayer, as shown when David speaks about prayer, “I cried out to [the Lord] with my mouth; his praise was on my tongue. If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened [to my prayer]” (Psalm 66:17, 18).
Part of the exercise of prayer is sincerity, without which God will not look upon it as prayer in its proper sense. God says in his Word, “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart” (Jeremiah 29:13). The lack of this sincerity made the Lord reject the prayers in Hosea 7:14, where he said, “They do not cry out to me from their hearts,” that is, in sincerity, “but wail upon their beds.” Their prayers were only a fake, a hypocritical show, only to be seen by men, and applauded by them.
Tags: Bunyan, John Bunyan


















