peace, life, love, protection, friendship, all the heavenly blessings of
God's presence in God's house. In this wonderful psalm we find, no
doubt, no thought of waiting for future blessings, but a grand
outpouring of thankfulness for the present. There are no petitions, no
supplications, no reserves of praise, but simply the glad recognition
and appreciation of the omnipresence and omnipotence of Good.

"It was the same feeling, tempered with a deeper solemnity, that
prompted Jesus to say 'Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me,' as
he was about to perform the mighty miracle of raising Lazarus.

"Thanks signify the accomplishment of the desire. His request of the
Father was granted before he had even preferred it, for he knew the law
and realized it--that God is life and knows not death--but the form of
words was observed because that makes the law a visible fact.

"Father is the human naming for this divine Love that ever waits for the
spoken word in order to be revealed. To Jesus it was the dearest and
best name of all by which to address or speak to the one great Helper,
Guide, Friend. 'Father, I thank thee,' was often on his lips, and it was
to the 'Father who seeth in secret' that he bade his disciples pray.

"In the secret consciousness of oneness with the Father there may be no
reservations, no concealments, no hypocritical bigotry, no thought of
self, only a glad going out with all our heart and soul to the Father, a
trustful acknowledgment of the Good. This is the attitude of true
prayer.

"The devout soul is always praying, because it _consciously_ lives with
God. There are times of praise, adoration, extolment, when thankfulness
is more exuberant, runs over into bursting joy, and times when longing
desire carries us into the very bosom of God. We long for comfort, for
love, for peace, with an unutterable agony of longing, and are met with
an unutterable joy of satisfaction, if we but turn to Him and
acknowledge, but an indispensable preliminary to prayer is fasting. The
power of accomplishment in fasting and prayer equals a decree.

"The conditions upon which hinge our use of the divine power are,
first,'putting away iniquity'--fasting; second, turning to God--prayer.
Then comes the power to decree; then we see the truth of Jesus' promise:
'All things whatsoever ye pray and ask for, believe that ye have
received them, and ye shall have them.' Then we look into the face of
the Almighty and reflect