Quotes on Prayer
Prayer
We are all children of God. He loves us and knows our needs, and He wants us to communicate with Him through prayer. We should pray to Him and no one else. The Lord Jesus Christ commanded, “Ye must always pray unto the Father in my name” (3 Nephi 18:19). As we make a habit of approaching God in prayer, we will come to know Him and draw ever nearer to Him. Our desires will become more like His. We will be able to secure for ourselves and for others blessings that He is ready to give if we will but ask in faith.
We speak with our earthly father. He is our dear friend, our protector, the one who usually supplies our food and clothing and home. But we also speak to our Father in Heaven. We do this with prayer. I hope that every night and every morning you get on your knees and speak with your Father in Heaven. I hope that in the morning you will express thanks for the night*s rest, for warmth and comfort and the love you feel in your home. I hope that you will ask Him to watch over you and bless and guide you throughout the day. I hope that you will pray for your father and mother and brothers and sisters, and that you will remember all who are sick and in need. I hope you will remember the missionaries of the Church as you pray.
In the evening before you go to sleep, I hope you will again get on your knees and thank Him for the blessings of the day. Thank Him again for your parents and for your teachers. Ask Him to bless you with good sleep and to bless all others, and particularly those in need and who do not have enough food or a good place to sleep.
It is not asking too much, is it, to take a few minutes of each day to speak with your Father in Heaven when you know that you are a child of God?
Gordon B. Hinckley, *Come Listen to a Prophet*s Voice: You Are a Child of God,* Friend, May 2003
*Heavenly Father * wants you to pray to Him every day. He wants to help you because He loves you, and He will help you if you pray to Him and ask Him for His help. In your prayers, also thank Him for your blessings. Thank Him for sending our oldest brother, Jesus Christ, into the world. He made it possible for us to return to our heavenly home. Thank Him for your family. Thank Him for the Church. Thank Him for this beautiful world you live in. Ask Him to protect you. In your prayers, ask Him to help you know what to do in your life. When you make mistakes, your Heavenly Father still loves you. So pray to Him, and He will help you try again to do right.*
Ezra Taft Benson (1899*1994), Thirteenth President of the Church
Meditate for a while on the things for which you really are grateful. * They don*t have to be grand or glorious.
Thinking of things we are grateful for is a healing balm. * It changes our focus from our pains and our trials to the abundance of this beautiful world we live in.
We should express our gratitude for the small and simple things like the scent of the rain, the taste of your favorite food, or the sound of a loved one*s voice.
Think of those things you truly need. Bring your goals and your hopes and your dreams to the Lord and set them before Him.
Approach Him with reverence and humility. Don*t worry so much about whether your words are polished or not. Worry instead about speaking from your heart
From *Improving Our Prayers,* Ensign, Mar. 2004, 26*27.
Elder Joseph B. Wirthlin of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles shares some of his thoughts on this subject
One day my father, who was bishop of our ward, left my brother and me to do some work. We thought he would be gone for some time doing his church work. But he returned sooner than we had expected and found us riding calves.
When he called us over, I will never forget how he looked at me and said, *My boy, I thought I could depend on you!*
That was a great lesson, a severe punishment, to me. I made up my mind then that neither he nor anyone else would ever have reason to say that again to me as long as I lived.
I remember so well how my father would talk to the Lord when he used to call us together for family prayer. He didn*t just say a few words and then send us off to the fields. Instead he knelt with us and told the Lord about some of our weaknesses and some of our problems where we had failed.
*Eldon didn*t do exactly what he should have done today. We are sorry that he made this mistake. Kindly forgive him, and we feel sure, Heavenly Father, that he will try to do what is right. Let thy Spirit be with him and bless him so that he can be a good boy.*
In the mornings Father used to pray, *Let thy blessings attend us as we go about our duties so that we may do what is right and return tonight to make a report.* This always gave us greater strength to meet and overcome temptations, for we knew that we would be reporting to the Lord at night.
I am going to report to the Lord tonight, I used to think. And this thought helped me to live a better life during the day.
Father always thanked the Lord for our crops and flocks and home, for the country in which we lived, for one another, and for many, many other things.
He used to tell us about Joseph Smith*s prayer*how he went out into a grove to pray and how God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, appeared to him. Then Father would say, *That*s the kind of God we are talking to, boys.* We knew it as he prayed, and we too learned to pray.
As a child I learned to pray for my parents. When children pray for their parents, they become more appreciative of them. In our family and personal prayers, we should always pray for one another. Then we will feel closer to each other and feel more a part of a happy family.
I am grateful that my father taught me to pray and to be dependable. Today when my family and I kneel together, we know we are praying to a personal God who is interested in us, who will hear and answer our prayers, and who has given us the gospel that can lead to eternal life. N. Eldon Tanner
, *Friend to Friend: Reporting to Father,* Friend, Jun 1973
*There is a power greater than you who can help you. You never need be ashamed of praying. Get on your knees as the day starts. Get on your knees as the day closes and offer prayer unto the Lord, and ask Him to bless you in dealing with your problems, to bless you in your schooling, bless you in all you do, and remember before Him those who are less fortunate than you, others who are in trouble and need and desire His blessings. Be prayerful! There is something wonderful, there is something noble, there is something upstanding and good about an individual who prays. Don*t forget to pray.*
(Ensign, June 2000, page 19.) President Gordon B. Hinckley
*When our oldest son was about three, he would kneel with his mother and me in our evening prayer. I was serving as the bishop of the ward at the time, and a lovely lady in the ward, Margaret Lister, lay perilously ill with cancer. Each night we would pray for Sister Lister. One evening our tiny son offered the prayer and confused the words of the prayer with a story from a nursery book. He began: *Heavenly Father, please bless Sister Lister, Henny Penny, Chicken Little, Turkey Lurkey, and all the little folks.* We held back the smiles that evening. Later we were humbled as Margaret Lister sustained a complete recovery. We do not belittle the prayer of a child. After all, our children have more recently been with our Heavenly Father than have we.*
(Ensign, October 1999, page 2.) President Thomas S. Monson
*A fervent, sincere prayer is a two-way communication that will do much to bring the Spirit flowing like healing water to help with the trials, hardships, aches, and pains we all face. * As we pray, we should think of our Heavenly Father as being close by; full of knowledge, understanding, love, and compassion; the essence of power; and having great expectations of each of us.*
(Ensign, January 1999, page 2.) President James E. Faust
There Is Power in Couple Prayer
“There is great power in prayer. I strongly encourage personal and family prayer, which are important in building strong families. . . . I’m wondering if many of you parents, you couples, have lost that essential moment of kneeling together at the end of the day, just the two of you, holding hands and saying your prayers. If that has slipped away from your daily routine, may I suggest you put it back—beginning tonight!”
Find Periods of Quiet Time
“He [the Lord] will always hear your prayers and will invariably answer them. However, His answers will seldom come while you are on your knees praying, even when you may plead for an immediate response. Rather, He will prompt you in quiet moments when the Spirit can most effectively touch your mind and heart. Hence, you should find periods of quiet time to recognize when you are being instructed and strengthened.”
Passing through Our Trials
“As we pass through the trials of life, let us keep an eternal perspective, let us not complain, let us become even more prayerful, let us serve others, and let us forgive one another. As we do this, ‘all things [will] work together for good to [us] that love God’ (Romans 8:28).”
Family Prayer Is Indispensible
“With the influences of evil that surround our children, can we even imagine sending them out in the morning without kneeling and humbly asking together for the Lord’s protection? Or closing the day without kneeling together and acknowledging our accountability before Him and our thankfulness for His blessings? Brothers and sisters, we need to have family prayer.”
Topics: Prayer
Young Single Adult Gems – 22 October 2010
There Is a Power Greater Than Ours
“Recognize that there is a power greater than ours, that no matter how good a man is, he is not good enough, that no matter how wise he is, he is not wise enough, that no matter how strong he is, he is not strong enough for all of the things which he will face in life, and that there is a source of power to which he can go with the assurance that he will be listened to and that there will be a response.”
God’s Love Will Strengthen the Youth
“We live in the last dispensation, the dispensation of the fulness of times. The priesthood will never be taken from the earth again as we prepare for the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. No one knows when He will come. We are told in the scriptures that Satan will tempt us in the last days before the Savior comes again. For this reason, our children need to know that God and Jesus Christ will always love them and answer their prayers. This knowledge will bring them abiding strength.”
Improved Prayers
“A key to improved prayer is to learn to ask the right questions. Consider changing from asking for the things you want to honestly seeking what He wants for you. Then as you learn His will, pray that you will be led to have the strength to fulfill it.”
Teach Your Children to Pray
“When we teach those we love that we are spirit children temporarily away from a loving Heavenly Father, we open the door of prayer to them. . . .
“I can promise you that no joy will exceed what you would feel if a child of yours prays in the hour of need and receives . . . an answer.”
Teach Children to Pray
“Parents should teach their children to pray. The child learns both from what the parents do and what they say. The child who sees a mother or a father pass through the trials of life with fervent prayer to God and then hears a sincere testimony that God answered in kindness will remember what he or she saw and heard.”
We Should Pray More Regularly
“You who pray sometimes, why not pray more regularly, more often, more devoutly? Is time so precious, life so short, or faith so scant? . . . Do you pray occasionally when you should be praying regularly, often, constantly? . . . Do you just speak, or do you also listen? . . . Do you give thanks or merely ask for favors?”
Prayers Must Be in Harmony with Heaven
“For prayers to be efficacious, they must be in harmony with the plan of heaven. The prayer of faith bears fruit when such harmony exists, and this harmony exists when prayers are inspired by the Holy Spirit.”
Prayer and Scripture Study Aid Revelation
“Many answers to difficult questions are found by reading the scriptures because the scriptures are an aid to revelation. Insight found in scripture accumulates over time, so it is important to spend some time in the scriptures every day. Daily prayer is also essential to having the Lord’s Spirit with us. Those who earnestly seek help through prayer and scripture study often have a paper and pencil nearby to write questions and record impressions and ideas.”
Language of Praye
“A revelation given in 1830, the year the Church was organized, directs that the elder or priest who administers the sacrament ‘shall kneel . . . and call upon the Father in solemn prayer, saying:
” ‘O God, the Eternal Father, we ask thee in the name of thy Son, Jesus Christ.’ (D&C 20:76–77, 79.)
“The prayer offered at the dedication of the Kirtland Temple in 1836 is another model that illustrates the language of prayer used by the Prophet Joseph Smith:
” ‘And now, Holy Father, we ask thee to assist us, thy people, with thy grace, in calling our solemn assembly, . . .
” ‘That thy glory may rest down upon thy people and upon this thy house, which we now dedicate to thee, that it may be sanctified and consecrated to be holy, and that thy holy presence may be continually in this house.’ (D&C 109:10, 12.)
“This prophetic model of the language of prayer has been faithfully followed in all of the sacred petitions by which the prophets have dedicated temples to the Lord. Exactly one hundred years ago this week, at a spot not far from where I stand, President Wilford Woodruff began the dedicatory prayer of the Salt Lake Temple with these words:
” ‘Our Father in heaven, thou who hast created the heavens and the earth, and all things that are therein; thou most glorious One, . . . we, thy children, come this day before thee, and in this house which we have built to thy most holy name, humbly plead the atoning blood of thine Only Begotten Son, that our sins may be remembered no more against us forever, but that our prayers may ascend unto thee and have free access to thy throne, that we may be heard in thy holy habitation.’ (As quoted by Gordon B. Hinckley, Ensign, Mar. 1993, p. 2.)”
Persist in Prayer
“Ponder deeply and diligently in the scriptures and in the words of living prophets. Persist in prayer for the Holy Ghost to reveal to you the nature of God the Father and His Beloved Son. Plead that the Spirit will show you what the Lord wants you to do. Plan to do it. Promise Him to obey. Act with determination until you have done what He asked. And then pray to give thanks for the opportunity to serve and to know what you might do next.”
Prayer
“Learn to pray. Pray often. Pray in your mind, in your heart. Pray on your knees. Prayer is your personal key to heaven. The lock is on your side of the veil. And I have learned to conclude all my prayers with ‘Thy will be done’ (Matthew 6:10; see also Luke 11:2; 3 Nephi 13:10).”
He Is Reachable Any Time and Any Place
“Access to our Creator through our Savior is surely one of the great privileges and blessings of our lives. I have learned from countless personal experiences that great is the power of prayer. No earthly authority can separate us from direct access to our Creator. There can never be a mechanical or electronic failure when we pray. There is no limit on the number of times or how long we can pray each day. There is no quota of how many needs we wish to pray for in each prayer. We do not need to go through secretaries or make an appointment to reach the throne of grace. He is reachable at any time and any place.”
He Hears and Answers Our Prayers
“There is a knowledge that our Father in Heaven wants each of us to have, and that is a personal knowledge that he hears and answers our prayers.”
The Savior Told Us to Have Family Prayer
“The Savior told us, ‘Pray in your families unto the Father, always in my name, that your wives and your children may be blessed’ (3 Nephi 18:21). In our day, the Church urges us to have family prayer every night and every morning. . . .
“Family prayer is a powerful and sustaining influence.”
The Answers to Our Prayers
“He [Heavenly Father] is our perfect Father. He loves us beyond our capacity to understand. He knows what is best for us. He sees the end from the beginning. He wants us to act to gain needed experience:
“When He answers yes, it is to give us confidence.
“When He answers no, it is to prevent error.
“When He withholds an answer, it is to have us grow through faith in Him, obedience to His commandments, and a willingness to act on truth.”
Family Prayer Is Not an Out-of-Date Practice
“As a people, aren’t we grateful that family prayer is not an out-of-date practice with us? There is no more beautiful sight in all this world than to see a family praying together. There is real meaning behind the oft-quoted ‘The family that prays together stays together.’
“The Lord directed that we have family prayer when He said, ‘Pray in your families unto the Father, always in my name, that your wives and your children may be blessed’ (3 Nephi 18:21).”