Today's encouragement comes from Colossians 4:2, where we read these words:
"Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving . . . "Prayer is the practical, daily life of faith. Every regenerate soul prays. Prayer keeps us *consciously* "connected" to the Lord. Without it, we would grow complacent, self-sufficient, and dull. With it, we stay in vital relationship with our God—through our living union with our Lord Jesus Christ.
These things we know about prayer: it is always to be made to God only, through the Name and sacrifice of Christ, in the fullness of the Holy Spirit; it is to be an honest expression of our hearts; and it is to be a means of demon-strating gratitude to the Lord for all He has done for us. Let us not ever give up praying. To do so is to prove that we are lost in sin.
[Puritan quote of the day: "The heroic deeds of those great Biblical worthies do not comfort us so much as their falls and bruises do.” —Richard Sibbes, in, "The Bruised Reed"]
