Oh, impenitent soul, have you ever tried the power of prayer?  God says:  “He is loving, and faithful, and patient.”  Do you believe that?  You are told that Christ came to save sinners.  Do you believe that?  You are told that all you have to do to get the pardon of the Gospel is to ask for it.  Do you believe that?  Then come to Him and say:  “Oh, Lord!  I know Thou canst not lie.  Thou hast told me to come for pardon, and I could get it.  I come, Lord.  Keep Thy promise, and liberate my captive soul.”

Oh, that you might have an altar in the parlor, in the kitchen, in the store, in the barn, for Christ will be willing to come again to the manger to hear prayer.  He would come in your place of business, as He confronted Matthew, the tax commissioner.  If a measure should come before Congress that you thought would ruin the nation, how you would send in petitions and remonstrances!  And yet there has been enough sin in your heart to ruin it forever, and you have never remonstrated or petitioned against it.  If your physical health failed, and you had the means, you would go and spend the summer in Germany, and the winter in Italy, and you would think it a very cheap outlay if you had to go all round the earth to get back your physical health.  Have you made any effort, any expenditure, any exertion for your immortal and spiritual health?  No, you have not taken one step.

O that you might now begin to seek after God with earnest prayer.  Some of you have been working for years and years for the support of your families.  Have you given one half day to the working out of your salvation with fear and trembling?  You came here this morning with an earnest purpose, I take it, as I have come hither with an earnest purpose, and we meet face to face, and I tell you, first of all, if you want to find the Lord, you must pray, and pray, and pray.

I remark again, you must seek the Lord through Bible study.  The Bible is the newest book in the world.  “Oh,” you say, “it was made hundreds of years ago, and the learned men of King James translated it hundreds of years ago.”  I confute that idea by telling you it is not five minutes old, when God, by His blessed Spirit, retranslates it into the heart.  If you will, in the seeking of the way of life through Scripture study, implore God’s light to fall upon the page, you will find that these promises are not one second old, and that they drop straight from the throne of God into your heart.

There are many people to whom the Bible does not amount to much.  If they merely look at the outside beauty, why it will no more lead them to Christ than Washington’s farewell address or the Koran of Mohammed or the Shaster of the Hindoos.  It is the inward light of God’s Word you must get or die.  I went up to the church of the Madeleine, in Paris, and looked at the doors which were the most wonderfully constructed I ever saw, and I could have stayed there for a whole week; but I had only a little time, so, having glanced at the wonderful carving on the doors, I passed in and looked at the radiant altars, and the sculptured dome.  Alas, that so many stop at the outside door of God’s Holy Word, looking at the rhetorical beauties, instead of going in and looking at the altars of sacrifice and the dome of God’s mercy and salvation that hovers over penitent and believing souls!