Horatius Bonar.

We have not been men of prayer. The spirit of prayer has slumbered among

us. The closet has been too little frequented and delighted in. We have allowed

business, study or active labor to interfere with our closet hours. A feverish

atmosphere has found its way into our closet, disturbing the sweet calm of its

blessed solitude. Sleep, company, idle visiting, foolish talking and jesting, idle

reading, unprofitable occupations, engross time that might have been

redeemed for prayer. Why is there so little concern to get time to pray? Why

is there so much speaking, yet so little prayer? Why is there so much running

to and fro, yet so little prayer? Why so much bustle and business, yet so little

prayer? Why so many meetings with our fellow men, yet so few meetings with

God? Why so little being alone, so little thirsting of the soul for the calm,

sweet hours of unbroken solitude, when God and His child hold fellowship

together as if they could never part? It is the lack of these solitary hours that

not only injures our own growth in grace, but makes us such unprofitable

members of the church of Christ, and that renders our lives useless. In order

to grow in grace, we must be much alone with God. It is not in society, even

Christian society that the soul grows most rapidly and vigorously. In one

single quiet hour of prayer it will often make more progress than in whole

days of company with others. It is in the 'desert' that the dew falls freshest

and the air is purest. So with the soul. It is when none but God is near; when

His presence alone, like the desert air in which there is mingled no noxious

breath of man, surrounds and pervades the soul; it is then that the eye gets the

clearest, simplest view of eternal certainties; it is then that the soul gathers in

wondrous refreshment and power and energy. Nearness to God, fellowship

with God, waiting upon God, resting in God, have been too little the

characteristic either of our private or our ministerial walk. Hence our

example has been so powerless, our labors so unsuccessful, our sermons so

meager, our whole ministry so fruitless and feeble.

We have not honored the Holy Spirit. We have not sought His teaching or His

anointing. "But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and all of you

know the truth." (1 John 2:20). Neither in the study of the Word nor the

preaching of it to others, have we duly acknowledged His office as the

Enlightener of the understanding, the Revealer of the truth, the Testifier and

Glorifier of Christ. We have grieved Him by the slight put upon Him as the

Teacher, the Convincer, the Comforter, the Sanctifier. Hence He has almost

departed from us, and left us to reap the fruit of our own perversity and

unbelief. Besides, we have grieved Him by our inconsistent walk, by our lack

of circumspection, by our worldly mindedness, by our unholiness, by our

prayerlessness, by our unfaithfulness, by our lack of solemnity, by a life and

conversation so little in conformity with the character of a disciple or the