received them, and ye shall have them."--MARK xi. 24.

Here we have a summary of the teaching of our Lord Jesus on prayer.
Nothing will so much help to convince us of the sin of our remissness in
prayer, to discover its causes, and to give us courage to expect entire
deliverance, as the careful study and then the believing acceptance of
that teaching. The more heartily we enter into the mind of our blessed
Lord, and set ourselves simply just to think about prayer as He thought,
the more surely will His words be as living seeds. They will grow and
produce in us their fruit,--a life and practice exactly corresponding to
the Divine truth they contain. Do let us believe this: Christ, the
living Word of God, gives in His words a Divine quickening power which
brings what they say, which works in us what He asks, which actually
fits and enables for all He demands. Learn to look upon His teaching on
prayer as a definite promise of what He, by His Holy Spirit dwelling in
you, is going to work into your very being and character.

Our Lord gives us the five marks, or essential elements, of true prayer.
There must be, first, the heart's _desire_; then the expression of that
desire in _prayer_; with that, the _faith_ that carries the prayer to
God; in that faith, the _acceptance of God's answer_; then comes _the
experience_ of the desired blessing. It may help to give definiteness to
our thought, if we each take a definite request in regard to which we
would fain learn to pray believingly. Or, perhaps better still, we might
all unite and take the one thing that has been occupying our attention.
We have been speaking of failure in prayer; why should we not take as
the object of desire and supplication the "grace of supplication," and
say, I want to ask and receive in faith the power to pray just as, and
as much as, my God expects of me? Let us meditate on our Lord's words,
in the confidence that He will teach us how to pray for this blessing.

1. "What things soever _ye desire_."--Desire is the secret power that
moves the whole world of living men, and directs the course of each. And
so desire is the soul of prayer, and the cause of insufficient or
unsuccessful prayer is very much to be found in the lack or feebleness
of desire. Some may doubt this: they are sure that they have very
earnestly desired what they ask. But if they consider whether their
desire has indeed been as whole-hearted as God would have it, as the
heavenly