Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-04-29
CHRISTIAN ENDEAVOR HOUR
Conducted by Grace Livingston Eli.
For Sunday. April 80. 1905.

Abroad'-I Timothy, 2:1-S.
| 1. Exhort. therefore that, first of all sup
| pdcations, prayers, intercessions and CIV
| ing of thanks be made for all men;
! 2. For kings, and fer all that are in au-
| thority; that We may lead quiet and
peaceable life in all goodness and honesty.
| 8. For all this is good and acceptable in
| sight of God our Savior;
| 4. Who will have all men to be saved and
to come unto the knowledge of the truth.
| 8. For there is one God and one mediator
| between God and men, the man Christ
] Jesus;
! 6. Who gave himself ransom for all, to
| be testified in due time
| Z. Whereunto | am ordained a preacher
and an apostle Il speak the truth in Christ,
| and lie noD, teacher of the Gentiles in
| faith and verify.
8. l will therefore that men pray every
where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath
| and doubling,
The Lesson.
| For long time electricity was known to
men, yet it. of very little service to
| them. They did not know whence it came
| nor how to employ it. To be sure, they do
| not thoroughly understand everything about
| 1t now, but they do know how to produce
| it and how to employ it.
1t is just so with the power of prayer
which God has given to us, as He has given
| all His other good gifts. We have known
| about 1t all our lives. Some OF US have al
most an awe of it. We come solemnly and
even perfunctorily to it night and morning,
| going through the forms mothers
taught US, but for making daily, hourly
| use of it, we scarcely dare. We have heard
| saints and loved ones who lived near to
| Christ tell of answers to prayer, and we
| have believed for them, but one will be-
in nrt of S1jr.,1 hot ,rtrINf
occasionally for the benefit of one unusually
| deserving but somehow we manage to get
! along and live our lives without making
much use of prayer for our own daily needs.
The Bible tells of wonderful things that
prayer will do. We read about removing
mountains very much in the same spirit as
the old woman who had annoying little
hill in front of her parlor window which
hood. She read the verse and knelt down
| to pray that the hill might be removed;
then, running to the window to see if the
answer had come, she exclaimed: There,
knew it would be there, just the same!'
1t would be well if took time occa-
SiOnally to go over all the promises con-
corning prayer, that our weak faith might
be strengthened, or at least that our curl
osty might be excited to try some of those
promises and prove them true for ourselves.
There was once man who had lived all
his life in the back country. He suddenly
became very rich, and desiring to enjoy his
money as well as to help benefit the world
he went to Il beautiful town and bought a
new and elegantly appointed home. 1t was
fitted with all the latest improvements and
was well located He could not but think
as he walked up to the door how beautiful
it would look to the passersby to have
every window blazing with light at night,
and as ii was in the midst of a long block
surrounded by trees, the light would serve
to brighten and cheer the whole street.
But the first night in the new house the
whole place was in total darkness, and the
ma q 90 n
the dark, because, although the house was
thoroughly wired and fitted out with cleo
tical fixtures, the man was used to can
dleS and did not know how to turn the lit
tie key that would have made his house a
blaze of brilliant light from basement to
attic.
We sometimes think that it is almost aw-
full, especially during a thunderstorm, to
realize that we are attached to the great
lightnings of Gods heaven. and that we are
daring to use His lightning for our little
evening needs. But after ALL isn't it a
great deal more wonderful that He allows
us to attach our. feeble faith to His great
throne by means of prayer? And are we
not more foolish than the man from the
country who went TO bed in the dark be-
cause he did not know about the electric
lights? For we know about prayer-and
how seldom do take its great power in
our hands for our very own? IF ye ask
anything in my name ! will do it Can
anything be more simple or explicit than
that?
You have often felt when there was mis-
sonary meeting how very little there
that you could do beyond putting few pen
MES or dollars into the colleC ton When some
one suggested that you could pray for mis-
sions you thought it strange that that could
do any good for the missionaries many
thousands of miles away. Nevertheless it
is true. Study the history of missions Ex-
anime the records of the prayer circle and
the quiet bands of Woodworking, home
keeping women who pray daily for some
quarter of the globe and the success of the
Christian religion there and then look
abroad upon the wonderful growth of mis-
sions during the past few years. Can you
doubt it? Can you doubt Gods promise?
Touch the electric button of His promise,
and in heaven If not here, you will see the
flood of light you helped to turn upon the
world Hitherto have ye asked nothing in
my name; ask, and ye shall receive, that
your JOY may be fulfilled
DO you know how many Christians all
over the Christian world stand pledged to
pray for missions at home and abroad every
day of their lives? Do you know that the
missionaries draw much strength from this
fact and that they feel that their weary
hands are being upheld by this very fact?
Do you know, do you understand the great
power of prayer any more than you under
stand the power of mesmerism or any other
mystery of God?
A number of years ago a missionary in
India begged the Christians at home to set
apart a week of prayer for their work, and
week of prayer began. Is 1t strange
week of prayer for ourselves also, and has
come to be for US the season of revival of i
spiritual power?
Applied Truth.
A little church near Philadelphia was be-
ing choked rapidly to death by wordliness.
few earnest workers talked the matter
over piteously at the close of a small gath
ering In a private house Some one sug-
gested that, though there seemed nothing
that such feeble few could do to help
bring about a better state of affairs, they
might at least pray; and one and another
instanced the wonders that had been
brought about by prayer. Then and there
they all knelt and each in turn prayed for
an outpouring of Gods blessing upon their
church and their community. AS they rose
they took a upon themselves to pray
daily for this one object, and appointed a
little prayer meeting in one of the church
IN he hal at Ia of C,,o