Quotes & Sayings About A Man Who Prays

One of the greatest crimes committed by this present Christian generation is its neglect of the gospel, and it is from this neglect that all our other maladies spring forth. The lost world is not so much gospel hardened as it is gospel ignorant because many of those who proclaim the gospel are also ignorant of its most basic truths. The essential themes that make up the very core of the gospel - the justice of God, the radical depravity of man, the blood atonement, the nature of true conversion, and the biblical basis of assurance - are absent from too many pulpits. Churches reduce the gospel message to a few creedal statements, teach that conversion is a mere human decision, and pronounce assurance of salvation over anyone who prays the sinner's prayer. — Paul David Washer

Man is a marvelous curiosity ... he thinks he is the Creator's pet ... he even believes the Creator loves him; has a passion for him; sits up nights to admire him; yes and watch over him and keep him out of trouble. He prays to him and thinks He listens. Isn't it a quaint idea? — Mark Twain

God warms his hands at man's heart when he prays. — John Masefield

There is no way of learning to pray but by praying. No reasoned philosophy of prayer ever taught a soul to pray. We know not what we should pray for as we ought, and if prayer waits for understanding it will never begin. We discover by using. We learn by practice. Though a man should have all knowledge about prayer, and though he should understand all mysteries about prayer, unless he prays he will never learn to pray. — Samuel Chadwick

Just as the pious man prays without speaking a word and the Almighty hearkens unto him, so the artist with true feelings paints and the sensitive man understands and recognizes it. — Caspar David Friedrich

A man may study because his brain is hungry for knowledge, even Bible knowledge. But he prays because his soul is hungry for God. — Leonard Ravenhill

The Prophet Muhammad said : "The action of man stops when he dies except three things: continuous charity, knowledge (that he shares/teaches) or a pious child who prays for him." [Muslim: 4223] — Muhammad

You can graduate a man's progress in religion by the amount of prayer, not by the number of hours perhaps, but by the earnest supplication that he puts up to God. There is no exception to the rule. Show me a man who prays and his strength and his power cannot by exaggerated. Just give to a man this power of prayer and you give him almost omnipotence. — Thomas De Witt Talmage

He prays best who, not asking God to do man's work, prays penitence, prays resolutions, and then prays deeds
thus supplicating with heart and head and hands. — Theodore Parker

Without temptations, it is not possible to learn the wisdom of the Spirit. It is not possible that Divine love be strengthened in your soul. Before temptations, a man prays to God as a stranger. When temptations are allowed to come by the love of God, and he does not give in to them, then he stands before God as a sincere friend. For in fulfilling the will of God, he has made war on the enemy of God and conquered him. — Isaac Of Nineveh

Whilst a man is persuaded that he has it in his power to contribute anything, be it ever so little, to his salvation, he remains in carnal self-confidence; he is not a self-despairer, and therefore is not duly humbled before God, he believes he may lend a helping hand in his salvation, but on the contrary, whoever is truly convinced that the whole work depends singly on the will of God, such a person renounces his own will and strength; he waits and prays for the operation of God, nor waits and prays in vain — Martin Luther

The wise man in the storm prays to God, not for safety from danger, but for the deliverance from fear. It is the storm within that endangers him, not the storm without. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

The man who never fasts is no more in the way to heaven than the man who never prays. — John Wesley

When man listens, God speaks; when man obeys, God acts; when man prays, God empowers. — E. Stanley Jones

Whatever a man prays for, he prays for a miracle. Every prayer reduces itself to this: Great God, grant that twice two be not four. — Ivan Turgenev

There's a wonderful old Italian joke about a poor man who goes to church every day and prays before the statue of a great saint,'Dear saint-please, please, please ... give me the grace to win the lottery.' This lament goes on for months. Finally the exasperated statue come to life, looks down at the begging man and says in weary disgust,'My son-please, please, please ... buy a ticket. — Elizabeth Gilbert

Such is the Forgotten Man. He works, he votes, generally he prays - but he always pays - yes, above all, he pays. — William Graham Sumner

His intercession was not only solidarity but identification with us: he bears all of us in his Body. And thus his whole life as a man and as Son is a cry to God's heart; it is forgiveness, but forgiveness that transforms and renews. I think we should meditate upon this reality. Christ stands before God and is praying for me. His prayer on the Cross is contemporary with all human beings, contemporary with me. He prays for me; he suffered and suffers for me; he identified himself with me, taking our body and the human soul. And he asks us to enter this identity of his, making ourselves one body, one spirit with him because from the summit of the Cross he brought, not new laws, tablets of stone, but himself, his Body and his Blood, as the New Covenant. — Pope Benedict XVI

Not what he wishes and prays for does a man get, but what he justly earns. His wishes and prayers are only gratified and answered when they harmonize with his thoughts and actions. — James Allen

A man protects his fish from rats by keeping it under a cat's watch. How wise!
Another buys a gun for security reasons, but decides to kill a ghost with it. How smart!
One prays to God for safety, as he climbs a palm tree with sewing thread. How intelligent!
Man does not want the truth, and God does not want lies, yet there is no third option.
One pretends to be rich, yet has nothing. That's pride. Another pretends to be poor, yet has great wealth. Humility!
Not all that glitters is gold, and not all gold glitters. Watch, with the eyes, and also with the heart.
Just because all things are lawful, don't make them expedient. And because a thing is right doesn't mean it edifies.
With Faith, Wisdom comes highly recommended! — Olaotan Fawehinmi

Whatever man prays for, he prays for a miracle. Every prayer reduces itself ... — Ivan Turgenev

Is this how you will die? Is this what you were meant for? To simply be bled out like a pig?
A spark of rage flickers, an antidote to despair.
Will you not even try to survive? Did the scientists make you too stupid even to consider fighting for your own life?
Emiko closes her eyes and prays to Mizuko Jizo Bodhisattva, and then the bakeneko cheshire spirit for good measure. She takes a breath, and then with all her strength she slams her hand against the knife. The blade slices past her neck, a searing line.
"Arai wa?!" the man shouts.
Emiko shoves hard against him and ducks under his flailing knife. Behind her, she hears a grunt and thud as she bolts for the street. She doesn't look back. She plunges into the street, not caring that she shows herself as a windup, not caring that in running she will burn up and die. She runs, determined only to escape the demon behind her. She will burn, but she will not die passive like some pig led to slaughter. — Paolo Bacigalupi

The Forgotten Man ... works, he votes, generally he prays-but he always pays-yes, above all, he pays. He does not want an office; his name never gets into the newspaper except when he gets married or dies. He keeps production going on ... He does not frequent the grocery or talk politics at the tavern. Consequently, he is forgotten ... All the burdens fall on him, or on her, for it is time to remember that the Forgotten Man is not seldom a woman. — William Graham Sumner

One man doesn't believe in god at all, while the other believes in him so thoroughly that he prays as he murders men! — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

The man who prays ceases to be a fool — Oswald Chambers

What a miserable creature man is that he prays in fear to the skies and begs help from the unknown every time he falls down to the ground! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

A man does not serve God when he prays, for it is himself he is trying to serve — Thomas Paine

The man or woman at home who prays often has as much to do with the effectiveness of the missionary on the field, and consequently with the results of his or her labors, as the missionary. — R.A. Torrey

To the man who prays habitually (not only when he feels like it-that is one of the snares of religion-but also when he does not feel like it) Christ is sure to make Himself real. — James Stewart

Jesus assumes, as it were, the fall of man, lets himself into man's fallenness, prays to the Father out of the lowest depths of human dereliction and anguish. He lays his will in the will of the Father's: "Not my will but yours be done." He lays the human will in the divine. He takes up all the hesitation of the human will and endures it. It is this very conforming of the human will to the divine that is the heart of redemption. — Pope Benedict XVI

The forgotten man ... He works, he votes, generally he prays, but his chief business in life is to pay. — William Graham Sumner

The man who prays, the prayer, and the God to whom he prays all have reality only as manifestations of the Self. — Ramana Maharshi

Jesus flips the tables.

A poor man spends day and night praying in front of a golden statue. He begs that his family be freed of poverty. The priest says to him to pay his tithe on the way out.

Jesus flips the tables.

A poor man goes to a place he calls home. He invites his neighbours, friends and family. He opens the good book and prays direct to God.

Jesus flips the tables. — David Holdsworth

The man who prays is the one who thinks that god has arranged matters all wrong, but who also thinks that he can instruct god how to put them right. — Christopher Hitchens

The wise man in the storm prays God not for safety from danger but for deliverance from fear. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Fasting is calculated to bring a note of urgency and importance into our praying, and to give force to our pleading in the court of heaven. The man who prays with fasting is giving heaven notice that he is truly in earnest. — Arthur Wallis

Man of faith is a stable man looking in only one direction for the wisdom he needs. He knows that the God to whom he prays is able and willing to respond to his need. As — David Jeremiah

If we could imagine such a man, that is a man who could invent the fly and send him out on his mission and furnish him with his orders: Depart into the uttermost corners of the earth and, diligently do your appointed work. Persecute the sick child, settle upon its eyes, its face, its hands, and gnaw and pester and sting, worry and fret and madden the worn and tried mother who watches by the child and humbly prays for mercy and relief with the pathetic faith of the deceived and the unteachable. — Mark Twain

It is a great good to be given over to the will of God. Then the Lord alone is in the soul, and no other thought, and she prays to God with a pure mind. When the soul is entirely given over to the will of God, then the Lord Himself begins to guide her, and the soul learns directly from God ... A proud man does not with to live according to the will of God. He likes to direct himself, and does not understand that man does not have enough understanding to direct himself without God. — Silouan The Athonite

He who has learnt to control his tongue has attained self-control in a great measure. When such a person speaks he will be heard with respect and attention. His words will be remembered, for they will be good and true. When one who is established in truth prays with a pure heart, then things he really needs come to him when they are really needed: he does not have to run after them. The man firmly established in truth gets the fruit of his actions without apparently doing anything. God, the source of all truth, supplies his needs and looks after his welfare. — B.K.S. Iyengar

If a man prays God for some virtue, and at the same time gives himself up to negligence, acquiring no definite means to gain this virtue, and making no effort towards it, truly this man tempts God, rather than prays. Thus the divine James says: 'The effectual prayer of a righteous man avails much' (Jms. 5:16). What avails to make prayer effective? is when, besides begging a saint to pray for him about something, the man also prays about it himself and with all diligence does everything necessary for obtaining his request. — Lorenzo Scupoli

A man who prays without ceasing, if he achieves something, knows why he achieved it, and can take no pride in it ... for he cannot attribute it to his own powers, but attributes all his achievements to God, always renders thanks to him and constantly calls upon him, trembling lest he be deprived of help. — Dorotheus Of Gaza

He recognized his own fear in them, and now that he knows what it looks like he sees it everywhere - in the man who pumps gas across the street, in the teenage girls who stumble down the sidewalk, in the transvestite prostitute who steps forward and back, indecisive, at the intersection while Andres prays for the light to turn green. It is a fear that he can't get away from, and seeing it in others doesn't make him feel any safer. — Natalia Sylvester

Man is naturally a religious being. His heart instinctively seeks for God whether he reverences the sacred cow or prays to the sun or moon; whether he kneels before wood and stone images, or prays in secret to his Heavenly Father, he is satisfying an inborn urge. — Spencer W. Kimball

Radicals have value, at least; they can move the center. On a scale of 1 to 5, 3 is moderate, 1 and 5 the hardliners. But if a good radical takes it up to 9, then 5 becomes the new center. I already saw it working in the American Muslim community. For years women were neglected in mosques, denied entrance to the main prayer halls and relegated to poorly maintained balconies and basements. It was only after a handdful of Muslim feminists raised "lunatic fringe" demands like mixed-gender prayers with men and women standing together and even women imams giving sermons and leading men in prayer that major organizations such as ISNA and CAIR began to recognize the "moderate" concerns and deal with the issue of women in mosques.
I've taken part in the woman-led prayer movement, both as a writer and as a man who prays behind women, happy to be the extremist who makes moderate reform seem less threatening. Insha'Allah, what's extreme today will not be extreme tomorrow. — Michael Muhammad Knight

A man can preach no better than he prays. — Charles Stanley

The man who sows wrong thoughts and deeds and prays that God will bless him is in the position of a farmer who, having sown tares, asks God to bring forth for him a harvest of wheat. — James Allen

If you want to know the religion of a man, do not look at how much he prays and fasts, rather, look at how he treats people. — Ja'far Al-Sadiq

If a man prays to Thee with a yearning heart, he can reach Thee, through Thy grace, by any path. — Ramakrishna

Everyone needed someone in the world who was like his other hand. You can't hold much or do much with one hand only. It is with both hands that a man lifts the garnered gold of the wheatsheaf and the brimming bowl of milk, with both hands that he builds his house, with both hand, clasped together, that he prays. — Elizabeth Goudge

The man who prays grows, and the muscles of the soul swell from this whipcord to iron bands. — F.B. Meyer

A devotee who can call on God while living a householder's life is a hero indeed. God thinks: 'He is blessed indeed who prays to me in the midst of his worldly duties. He is trying to find me, overcoming a great obstacle
pushing away, as it were, a huge block of stone weighing a ton. Such a man is a real hero. — Ramakrishna

Every man prays in his own language. — Duke Ellington

For support, I fall back on my heart. Has a man any fault a woman cannot weave with and try to change into something better, if the god her man prays to is a mother holding a baby? — Haniel Long

Whatever God can do faith can do, and whatever faith can do prayer can do when it is offered in faith. An invitation to prayer is, therefore, an invitation to omnipotence, for prayer engages the Omnipotent God and brings Him into our human affairs. Nothing is impossible to the man who prays in faith, just as nothing is impossible with God. This generation has yet to prove all that prayer can do for believing men and women. — Aiden Wilson Tozer

The common man prays, 'I want a cookie right now!' And God responds, 'If you'd listen to what I say, tomorrow it will bring you 100 cookies. — Criss Jami

Humility and ascetic hardship free a man from all sin, for the one cuts out the passions of the soul, the other those of the body. This is what the blessed David indicates when he prays to God, saying, "Look on my humility and my toil, and forgive all my sins" (Ps. 25:18). — Maximus The Confessor

I am nothing like my father. While he prays for war, I pray for peace.
And now we go our separate ways, each believing that we are right.
My father has made his choice, and I have made mine.
I am, at last, my own man.
I can live with that. — Omar Bin Laden

A man who prays much in private will make short prayers in public. — Dwight L. Moody

Many readers are familiar with the spirit and the letter of the definition of "prayer," as given by Ambrose Bierce in his Devil's Dictionary. It runs like this, and is extremely easy to comprehend: Prayer: A petition that the laws of nature be suspended in favor of the petitioner; himself confessedly unworthy. Everybody can see the joke that is lodged within this entry: The man who prays is the one who thinks that god has arranged matters all wrong, but who also thinks that he can instruct god how to put them right. Half-buried in the contradiction is the distressing idea that nobody is in charge, or nobody with any moral authority. The call to prayer is self-cancelling. — Christopher Hitchens

The Forgotten Man ... delving away in patient industry, supporting his family, paying his taxes, casting his vote, supporting the church and the school ... but he is the only one for whom there is no provision in the great scramble and the big divide. Such is the Forgotten Man. He works, he votes, generally he prays-but his chief business in life is to pay ... Who and where is the Forgotten Man in this case, who will have to pay for it all? — William Graham Sumner