| I HAVE read with care and no little profit, this new work on The Power
of Intensified Prayer. There is the pulse of life in it, and no serious
soul can read it without a spiritual impulse to seek a deeper life of prayer.
It contains some of the most powerful illustrations on the prayer-life I
have ever read. Dr. Payne has not dwelt so much upon the rules and regulations
of the prayer-life, but has taken us back to the Bible, and in a striking
manner calls attention to the kind of prayers which God answers. He shows
us how it is possible to bring the apostolic prayer-life up to date. His
object is not to give the hungry soul an analysis of bread, but the pure
bread itself. Readers are made to breathe the breath of prayer as they read.
A book like this cannot be measured in its influence upon the prayer-life
of a thoughtful reader. It encourages the heart, it strengthens the spirit
of all who are engaged in this spade-work of the churches. "Thus saith
the Lord, Make this valley full of ditches." How few there are who
can cut a trench! How shallow are some of the trenches cut in most of the
prayer-life! The depth of the ditch is the measure of expected blessing.
"Let some droppings fall on me" is not deep enough for a deep
trench digger. How few there are who dig deep enough for "floods upon
the dry land"! How is this? All prayer-life is hidden. It is behind
a closed door. The best spade diggers go down into deep ditches out of sight.
There are numbers of surface workers, but few who in self-obliteration toil
in prayer alone with God. Such a book as this gives inspiration; it nerves
the believer to greater efforts in the life of intercession.
I wish it God-speed on its heaven-sent mission.
SETH JOSHUA |