The Practice of the Presence of God - Excerpts

The Revell text  has been modified,  paraphrased, and edited 
by Jim the Teacher
for easier reading and understanding.
Modified version © J R Andrews.

In the winter, when I saw a tree stripped of its leaves, I realized that within a short time the leaves would come back and the flowers and fruit would reappear, which made me to know just how powerful God is.
 
We should live our lives with a sense of God’s Presence by continually talking with Him.
 
We should make a habit of continual conversation with Him, with freedom and in simplicity.
 
We need only to recognize God as being intimately present with us to address ourselves to Him every moment.
 
He requires no great matters of us; a little remembrance of Him from time to time; a little adoration;
 
Sometimes pray for His grace,
sometimes offer Him your sufferings, and
sometimes thank Him for the favors He has given you, and still gives you, in the midst of your troubles. 
Console yourself with Him as often as you can.
 
Lift up your heart to Him, even at your meals and when you are in company.
The least little remembrance will always be acceptable to Him.
 
We need to talk to God even when we are having periods of dryness, apathy, or irritability,
even when we may not be sure that God really loves us.
 
We do not need to cry very loud,
as He is nearer to us than we realize.
 
When we fail in our duty, we only need to confess our faults, saying to God, “I can never do otherwise if You leave me to myself. It is You who must keep me from falling and mend what has been imperfectly done.”
 
After this, we should give ourselves no further uneasiness about it.
 
We should be very sensible of our faults, but not discouraged by them.
We should confess them to God, but not plead for God to excuse them.
When we finish our confession, we should peacefully resume our usual practice of love and adoration.
 
The goodness of God should assure us that He will not completely forsake us,
but will give us the strength to bear whatever evil He permits to happen to us.
 
When we have an opportunity to do something good, we should address ourselves to God, saying, “Lord, I cannot do this unless you give me the ability to do it.”
Then we will receive more strength than is necessary to complete the task.
 
We ought to reach out to God in the greatest simplicity, speaking to Him frankly and plainly, imploring him to give us His assistance in our affairs, just as they happen.
As we do, God will never fail to help us.
 
Knowing that God is in control, we should not trouble ourselves about the hurtful things of the world.
 
As for the miseries and sins that we daily hear of in the world, we shouldn't wonder about them at all. In fact, we should be surprised that there are not more, considering the hurtful things that sinners are capable of.
 
Therefore, we should pray for them, knowing that God will remedy the mischief that men do when He pleases.
 
We should be pleased to take up a straw from the ground for the love of God, seeking Him only and nothing else, not even His gifts.

In doing work that we would normally dislike, we should make a habit of doing everything for the love of God, praying on all occasions for His grace to do his work well. Then we will find that everything will go much easier.
.

Set times of prayer should be no different from other times. We may retire from human company to practice certain methods of prayer, but we don't need to do so, because even the greatest business shouldn't divert us from God.
 
All bodily mortifications and other exercises of self-deprecation are useless, except as they serve to arrive at the union with God through love.
 
As for depriving ourselves of all possible things to make ourselves better, if such acts are void of the love of God, they cannot erase a single sin.
 
The shortest way to God is to go straight to Him in a continual exercise of love, and by doing all things for His sake.
 
We should not be overly troubled with pangs of conscience.
When we fail in our duty, we should readily acknowledge it, saying, “I am used to doing so: I will never do otherwise if I am left to myself.”
 
When we do things well, we should give God thanks, acknowledging the strength comes from Him.
 
We ought to make a great difference between the acts of the understanding and those of the will, the first being of comparatively little value, and the others of the greatest importance.
 
The greatest pains or pleasures of this world are not to be compared with what we will experience when we are practicing His Presence.
 
Therefore, we should not be anxious about anything and should fear nothing, desiring only one thing of God, that that we might not offend Him.
 
We should accustom ourselves to a continual conversation with Him, with freedom and in simplicity.
 
We need only to recognize God as being intimately present with us to address ourselves to Him every moment.
 
Then we may beg His assistance in knowing His will concerning the things that are not sure of.
 
With His help, we can correctly perform those things which we plainly see that He requires of us, offering them to Him before we do them and giving Him thanks when we are done.
 
In our conversations with God, we should also be praising, adoring, and loving Him incessantly for His infinite goodness and perfection.
 
We should not be discouraged on account of our sins, but should pray for His help with a perfect confidence that we can rely upon the infinite goodness of our Lord Jesus Christ to help us.
 
Our prayers should be nothing else but a sense of the presence of God, with our souls at that time being insensible to everything but Divine love:
 
We should not wonder if, in the beginning, we often fail in our endeavors, but at last we will develop habits which will naturally produce acts of devotion in us, without our care and to our great delight.
 
We cannot escape the dangers which abound in life without the actual and continual help of God.
Let us then pray to Him continually for His help
 
To know God, we must often think of Him.
 
How can we pray to Him without being with Him?
 
How can we be with Him unless we think of Him often?
 
And how can we often think of Him unless we form a holy habit of doing so?
 
We must know before we can love.
 
As we come to love Him, we shall think of Him often, for our heart will be with our treasure

Bowling Green Chapel
            -Bowling Green, VA-

“The Practice of the Presence of God”