Proper Attitude in Prayer
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perverted ideas of the respect and honor and reverence that should be
given to God, and feel under no obligation to honor the men of gray
hairs, the men of experience, the chosen servants of God who have
been connected with the work of God through almost all the years
of their life? I advise all who attend the schools in America or in
any other place, do not catch the spirit of irreverence. Be sure you
understand for yourself what kind of education you need, that you
may educate others to obtain a fitness of character that will stand the
test that is soon to be brought upon all who live upon the earth. Keep
company with the soundest Christians. Choose not the pretentious
instructors or pupils, but those who show the deepest piety, those who
have a spirit of intelligence in the things of God.
We are living in perilous times. Seventh-day Adventists are pro-
fessedly the commandment-keeping people of God; but they are losing
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their devotional spirit. This spirit of reverence for God teaches men
how to approach their Maker—with sacredness and awe through faith,
not in themselves, but in a Mediator. Thus man is kept fast, under
whatever circumstances he is placed. Man must come on bended knee,
as a subject of grace, a suppliant at the footstool of mercy. And as he
receives daily mercies at the hand of God, he is ever to cherish grati-
tude in his heart, and give expression to it in the words of thanksgiving
and praise for these unmerited favors. Angels have been guarding his
pathway through all his life, and many of the snares he has been deliv-
ered from he has not seen. And for this guardianship and watchcare
by eyes that never slumber and never sleep, he is to recognize in every
prayer the service of God for him.
All should lean upon God in their helplessness and daily neces-
sity. They should keep humble, watchful, and prayerful. Praise and
thanksgiving should flow forth in gratitude and sincere love for God.
In the assembly of the upright and in the congregation should
they praise the Most High God. All who have a sense of their vital
connection with God should stand before the Lord as witnesses for
Him, giving expression of the love, the mercies, and the goodness of
God. Let the words be sincere, simple, earnest, intelligent, the heart
burning with the love of God, the lips sanctified to His glory not only
to make known the mercies of God in the assembly of the saints but
to be His witnesses in every place. The inhabitants of the earth are to
know that He is God, the only true and living God.