Psalm 109:4 For my love they are my adversaries: but I give myself to prayer. This is the great resource of God's children. Observe the disjunctive particle "but" with which the text begins. Let others do this or that (he would say), "but I give myself unto prayer," or, as it stands in the original, But I — prayer; as though he meant to imply that prayer was everything to him; — I have no other resource, and I need none. What shall we do, asks the pious parent, to secure our children, who will soon be beyond the control of parental authority, and will have to encounter the snares of a world which "lieth in wickedness"? Give yourselves unto prayer. Let us take another case; namely, the feelings and anxieties of the junior touching the senior members of the household. Here I desire to speak a word in favour of family prayer. Give yourselves unto prayer, as Abraham did, who wherever he went, "there he builded an altar unto the Lord, and called upon the name of the Lord." The opening of the new year calls for a review of the past, and that review is fraught with matter for humiliation. Be humbled: yet let not humiliation take the gloomy and unbelieving character of despondency. And in order to prevent this, give yourself unto prayer. (T. E. Hankinson, M.A.) Parallel Verses KJV: For my love they are my adversaries: but I give myself unto prayer.WEB: In return for my love, they are my adversaries; but I am in prayer. |
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