"When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realised that the Lord doesn’t work that way so I stole one and asked Him to forgive me." – Emo Philips

  1. A nun I know once told me she kept begging God to take her character defects away from her. After years of this prayer, God finally got back to her: I'm not going to take anything away from you, you have to give it to Me. -- Anne Lamott
  2. I prayed the Lord would sort (my prayers) out and answer as needed. Above all that he would hurry. -- Leif Enger
  3. I don't pray really, because I don't want to bore God. -- Orson Welles
  4. I've seen prayers answered. But often, in my experiences, if you get what you pray for, you've really shortchanged yourself. -- Anne Lamott
  5. Thank God for forgiveness of my sins. -- Lailah Gifty Akita
  6. a prayer marched through my head, though prayer is not the right word to describe that march. I wasn't humble before God. I didn't even believe in God. My prayer was not: Please, God, take mercy on us. I -- Cheryl Strayed
  7. Prayers and promises. The one his sister made to him. The unspoken one I made to my sister. Prayers are promises, too, and these are the days of broken promises. -- Rick Yancey
  8. I prayed over and over again that God would spare me, not because I cared that much about my own life
    but because I cared about hers. -- Rachel Van Dyken
  9. I am profoundly grateful to God that He did not grant me certain things for which I asked, and that He shut certain doors in my face. -- D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones
  10. Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved, so I took Him at His word, begged for His pardon, and asked Jesus to come into my life. -- Louis Zamperini
  11. For this reason I tell you: When you pray and ask for something, believe that you have received it, and you will be given whatever you ask for. -- Anonymous
  12. I was drunk: Christian and drunk. They just don't go together. But that's what happened. And the next day, obviously God had honored those prayers and healed me of alcoholism. -- Jim Hamilton
  13. I was adept at fooling the deity. I prayed immediately after all crimes until eventually prayer and crime became indistinguishable to me. -- F Scott Fitzgerald
  14. I once ask God for the world, It was placed upon my shoulders, I supose that means it is mine.... -- Dollar Bill Mcgonigle
  15. I used to pray to be made stronger; now I pray to be made grateful. Every -- Hope Jahren
  16. I don't pray for anything, but I have used affirmations in the past a few times. They are really a bit more like realizations in that on some level they have already happened. -- Eckhart Tolle
  17. So now, out of desperation, I'm back to prayer. I'm back to prayer, sheepishly, because I couldn't make my life work without it. I pray out of sheer lack of options. -- Shauna Niequist
  18. I have had prayers answered - most strangely so sometimes - but I think our Heavenly Father's loving-kindness has been even more evident in what He has refused me. -- Lewis Carroll
  19. Usually if you pray from the heart, you get an answer - the phone rings or the mail comes, and light gets in through the cracks, so you can see the next right thing to do. That's all you need. -- Anne Lamott
  20. Rich or poor, strong or weak, who among us has not begged God for a second chance? -- Joseph Conrad
  21. Oh shit, you had to be bloody careful when you invoked God; He could amuse Himself by granting what you'd prayed for ... -- Ariana Franklin
  22. I don't pray. When I was young, I vowed I never would be caught begging God. If I want something I get it for myself. I go to church only to show the old hens they don't get me down. -- Louise Erdrich
  23. Prayer has been the saviour of my life. Without it I should have been a lunatic long ago. -- Mahatma Gandhi
  24. There is literally nothing that I ever asked to do, that I asked the blessed Creator to help me to do, that I have not been able to accomplish. -- George Washington Carver
  25. God received from me something He didn't have on His own. My sin. I received something from God I didn't have on my own. His righteousness. -- Johnny Hunt
  26. Many times I have been driven to prayer. When I was in Bible school I didn't know what to do with my life. I used to walk the streets ... and pray, sometimes for hours at a time. In His timing, God answered those prayers, and since then prayer has been an essential part of my life. -- Billy Graham
  27. I never prayed sincerely and earnestly for anything but it came at some time; no matter at how distant a day, somehow, in some shape, probably the least I would have devised, it came. -- Adoniram Judson
  28. When we have been hurt, slighted, or wounded unfairly, we are not left alone to bear it. We can get on our knees and ask for the Lord's help to forgive. -- Virginia H. Pearce
  29. And finally i prayed for the mouse-I prayed that he didn't get hurt when he went flying out the door of the open arms baptist church of naomi. I prayed that he landed on a nice patch of grass. -- Kate Dicamillo
  30. I have been benefited by praying for others; for by making an errand to God for them I have gotten something for myself. -- Samuel Rutherford
  31. These incidents of answered prayer are not more wonderful or more worthy of record than multitudes the world over could testify to, but they are written and sent out simply and only because I had to write them or disobey God. -- Rosalind Goforth
  32. Whenever I'm in trouble, I pray. And because I'm in trouble all of the time, I pray almost constantly. -- Isaac Bashevis Singer
  33. I wasn't entitled to pray for God to do his job, because it wasn't his job to make things easy for me. -- C.D. Reiss
  34. God, why have you done this to me? My little prayer goes unanswered. -- Katherine Owen
  35. I thank the Lord for the great principle of repentance and forgiveness. -- Gordon B. Hinckley
  36. I'm a hopeless pray-er. I think somewhere in there I spend a great deal of time at it. -- Frederick Buechner
  37. When God forgave me, I figured I'd better do it too. -- Johnny Cash
  38. I prayed for her to leave so I could breath again.
    I prayed for her to buy a book so I would have to talk to her. -- Maggie Stiefvater
  39. God has not always answered my prayers. If He had, I would have married the wrong man
    several times! -- Ruth Graham
  40. God loves it when His children pray BIG, BOLD PRAYERS. Don't be afraid to ask your Father for anything! -- Christine Caine
  41. In the evenings, before I went to sleep, and in the mornings, in the moment I woke up, I realized I was praying for rain. -- Makoto Shinkai
  42. Did you ever try to pray for somebody? That their lives might be changed? -- Edgar Cayce
  43. So I do not pray. I accept the means at my disposal for working out my destiny. It seems to me that I have been given a mind and will power for that very purpose. -- Zora Neale Hurston
  44. I was reminded of the old man who used to go into a large city church every day and just sit there. One day the minister asked him what he did each day. The old man smiled and said, 'I look at Him, and He looks at me.' That's real prayer! -- Alexander Cameron
  45. I looked up at the dark sky and prayed to God for a better break in life and a better chance to do something for the little people I loved. -- Jack Kerouac
  46. I cried to the Lord. He heard my tears of prayer, from His holy hill. -- Lailah Gifty Akita
  47. You pray and pray and pray and nothing changes, like for example I prayed for a real house and good clothes and a bicycle and things for a long, long, time, and none of it happened, not even one little thing, which is how I know that all this praying for Father is just people playing. -- Noviolet Bulawayo
  48. Don't ever pray for love and health, Mother said. Or money. If G-d hears what you really want he will not give it to you. Guaranteed. When my father left my mother said, get down on your knees and pray for spoons -- Jennifer Clement
  49. I am unable to believe in a God susceptible to prayer. I simply haven't the nerve to imagine a being, a force, a cause which keeps the planets revolving in their orbits, and then suddenly stops in order to give me a bicycle with three speeds. -- Quentin Crisp
  50. I put everything in God's hands, asking him to give me strength and understanding. I asked him to help me to be strong for my family and that he would continue to take care of us. One day, shortly after that, I woke up really inspired. -- Aaron Watson
  51. I don't know what heavy penance I would not have gladly undertaken rather than practice prayer. -- Saint Teresa Of Avila
  52. Forgive a wrong done you by your neighbor; Then your sins will be pardoned when you pray. -- Anonymous
  53. How often I failed in my duty to God, because I was not leaning on the strong pillar of prayer. -- Teresa Of Avila
  54. I prayed for freedom for twenty years, but received no answer until I prayed with my legs. -- Frederick Douglass
  55. Is prayer your steering wheel or your spare tire? -- Corrie Ten Boom
  56. Well when I was a kid, I asked Santa Claus for some toys. Santa Claus wrote me a letter that he lost his bag. He said he'd get back to me next year. -- Benicio Del Toro
  57. Do not forget this: the Lord never wearies of forgiving! We are the ones who weary of asking for forgiveness. -- Pope Francis
  58. When I was seven I believed in God so I told Him I was sorry about kicking my sister and to "please not condemn me to eternal suffering in the interminable fires of Perdition for my transgressions. -- Emma Rose Kraus
  59. I have never been disappointed when I asked in a humble and sincere way for God's help. I pray often. I think I pray more often since January 12th. -- Jimmy Carter
  60. When facing the apparent denial of my request, God gave me the opportunity to honor him by trusting His Word. -- Charles Spurgeon
  61. What I've learned the more time I've spent following Jesus is that God delights in answering our impossible prayers. -- Bob Goff
  62. My prayer to the Lord every day, is this-I have been a great sinner. I do not deserve Heaven. Let me stay here. -- Andres Segovia
  63. Most of us have hoped and prayed for something to happen a certain way, but it didn't. And when this happened, we had a choice to make: to react with offense toward God or to trust Him anyway. -- Joyce Meyer
  64. Prayer did not come easily to me for I always feel that prayer is a silent things, and opening of the heart. To ask for earthly benefits, to reel out a list of requirements and expect them to be supplied is not prayer. It is putting God in the same category as an intelligent grocer. -- D.E. Stevenson
  65. Every day I pray about all I do. -- Dolly Parton
  66. I have everything I prayed for. I know most would condemn me and think I've lost my soul, but I know in my heart that I have not. What can be more precious than to find true love. -- Patty G. Henderson
  67. I never prayed for no money, and I never prayed for no fame. I said, 'I'll take care of that myself. You just keep me healthy and I'll do all I can to try to turn people around, to try to steer 'em in the right direction.' That's the whole trip in life, ya know. -- Wolfman Jack
  68. Oh you're one of those people are you? The people who ask God for something and when they get it, they tell God to forget about answering that particular prayer because it's just happened. That's one of my pet hates, I'm sorry. -- Elizabeth Newton
  69. To pray is to change. This is a great grace. How good of God to provide a path whereby our lives can be taken over by love and joy and peace and patience and kindness and goodness and faithfulness and gentleness and self-control. -- Richard J. Foster
  70. I tried desperately to put my thoughts into the forms of prayers, but I didn't know how. If God was real, I figured He was powerful enough to know what I wanted without me actually saying the right words. -- Richelle Mead
  71. The moment I stopped praying, God, save me, and instead prayed, God, use me, I felt free. -- Kenneth Bae
  72. 17For I cried out to him for help, praising him as I spoke. 18If I had not confessed the sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. 19But God did listen! He paid attention to my prayer. 20Praise God, who did not ignore my prayer or withdraw his unfailing love from me. -- Anonymous
  73. God had promised He would never leave me nor forsake me. That held true on a city street, in a rural teacherage, or in a remote part of the North. -- Janette Oke
  74. Prayer is not an act I perform, words I recite, a behavior I strive to maintain. It is a returning. It is a broken life finding healing, a misplaced soul recognizing home. -- Micha Boyett
  75. When you are weary of praying, and do not receive, consider how often you have heard a poor man calling, and have not listened to him. -- Saint John Chrysostom
  76. All I ever wanted was to sing to God. He gave me that longing and then made me mute. -- Peter Shaffer
  77. Ask," promised Jesus, "and it will be given to you" (Matthew 7:7). "You do not have because you do not ask," said James (James 4:2). Even though there is no limit to God's goodness, if you didn't ask Him for a blessing yesterday, you didn't get all that you were supposed to have. -- Bruce H. Wilkinson
  78. I pray to the architect that designed me. I'm grateful. -- John Feldmann
  79. I never went to bed in my life and I never ate a meal in my life without saying a prayer. I know my prayers have been answered thousands of times, and I know that I never said a prayer in my life without something good coming of it. -- Jack Dempsey
  80. I couldn't get to sleep at night without saying the Lord's Prayer because, when I was young, I felt I was touched by the hand of Jesus, and hated myself for challenging it. -- Bruce Parry
  81. I've learned ... That I can always pray for someone when I don't have the strength to help him in some other way. -- Andy Rooney
  82. One day I realized, without God, nothing matters. So, I asked Him into my heart. -- Esther Earl
  83. I'm Catholic. I don't pray, I just ask for forgiveness after. -- Abigail Roux
  84. What a mercy was it to us to have parents that prayed for us before they had us, as well as in our infancy when we could not pray for ourselves! -- John Flavel
  85. Praise God for that which draws you to pray. -- Amy E. Tobin
  86. All I did was pray to God, every day. In prison camp, the main prayer was, 'Get me home alive, God, and I'll seek you and serve you.' I came home, got wrapped up in the celebration, and forgot about the hundreds of promises I'd made to God. -- Louis Zamperini
  87. Tell you, all the things you pray and ask for - believe that you have received them, and you will have them. Mark 11:24 -- Beth Moore
  88. Who did you pray for?"
    I stared down at the lake. "I prayed for Mandy."
    "That's so sweet."
    "Yeah, I asked God to make her less annoying. -- M.K. Schiller
  89. I have been praying, too, for the first time in my life. That parson, Tugwell, he helped me see - not the error of my ways, for I knew them all to well already - but what was wanting in me. I am far from perfect, I know, but I am changed and changing still -- Julie Klassen
  90. I started out by believing God for a newer car than the one I was driving. I started out believing God for a nicer apartment than I had. Then I moved up. -- Jim Bakker
  91. Pray for anything you like, if it is for the good of us all.
    -I pray for beer, for meat and for a new wife with hard hands. You can share the wife. -- Ernest Hemingway,
  92. I once asked God what I could give him. "Your problems," he said. "I've got everything else. -- Lionel Blue
  93. As time passes, you will look back with twenty-twenty hindsight, and you will say, 'Thank God He did not answer my prayers' or 'Thank God He answered my prayers,' whichever the case may be. -- Greg Laurie
  94. Use God's word to acknowledge what He did for you. -- Monica Johnson
  95. I grabbed my mom and I went to the couch and I said, 'Mom I want to ask Jesus to come into my heart.' And I got on my knee and I asked Jesus to come into my heart, forgive me of my sins, and make me a child of God. -- Tim Tebow
  96. The wonderful thing about praying is that you leave a world of not being able to do something, and enter God's realm where everything is possible. He specializes in the impossible. Nothing is too great for His almighty power. Nothing is too small for His love. -- Corrie Ten Boom
  97. Know that whatever God prays to
    He asked it to help Him make something of worth.
    He woke from His dreams scraped the soil form the spaces inside Himself made you and was happy.
    You make the Lord happy. -- Anis Mojgani
  98. Beware of begging God for things you don't have to have. -- James Macdonald
  99. I got in a really bad accident in a Toyota vehicle, but I feel like the safety of the vehicle and God really saved my life. -- Lance Gross
  100. A good deed is the best prayer. -- Robert Green Ingersoll