A
Guide to Prayer
by
Isaac Watts
The
Banner of Truth Trust
P.
O. Box 621
Carlisle,
PA 17013
2001
186pp Hard Cover
Issac
Watts (1674-1748) is best known as the author of several familiar hymns among
them A@When I Survey the Wondrous Cross@
and AO
God, Our Help In Ages Past.@ He was pastor of Mark Lane Chapel from 1702 to his death in
1748. In addition to his work as
pastor he wrote a total of over 600 hymns.
In this book, first published in 1715,
Watts wrote about what prayer is. The Preface is an introduction to the
practice of prayer. Of this book he wrote, AMy
design in this treatise has been to write a prayer-book without forms. And I
have sought to maintain the middle way between the distant mistakes of
contending Christians.@
The book is divided into five chapters: First comes
the Nature of Prayer, then The Gift of Prayer, next the Grace of Prayer followed
by the Spirit of prayer. The last
chapter is devoted to Persuasive Arguments To Learn to Pray, Afor as Watts says, there is little use in
knowing how to pray if one does not
use that knowledge.
The
book is reader friendly and small enough to slip into a purse of pocket, making
it easy to have for use at times
when one is not in the study.
