Edward McKendree Bounds (1835 – 1913) believed in and practiced the joyful discipline of prayer like few other men in modern times. According to Sarah Koontz: “Bounds dedicated the hours of 4 am to 7 am each morning to prayer, and it’s been said that no man could have made more melting appeals for lost souls and backslidden Christians than him.”1
Bounds was an American attorney and a member of the Methodist Church. Shortly after receiving his law degree at age nineteen young Edward decided that his true calling was in the ministry and became ordained as a minister in 1859 in the Monticello Methodist Church in Missouri. Bounds pastored several churches during his career, was an associate editor of The Christian Advocate, the official Methodist newspaper, and is best known for his many books about prayer.
During his lifetime Bounds lived in relative obscurity. Few men, however, prayed more and researched this critical aspect of Christianity than Bounds. To this humble man of God his sermons while preached in church were made in the closet of prayer. He firmly believed that if we want to make a difference in the world, we must invest heavily in the practice of prayer.
Today his books on prayer are considered classics. If you have the time I highly recommend you check out the link below which contains PDF files of seven of his books on prayer. They are free to the public.2
As I read his quotes on prayer, I could sense that Bounds was issuing a clarion call to all of us to make prayer a high priority in our Christian lives. I totally agree that we all need to seriously examine our own prayer lives and if they are lacking, pray to God first and foremost to give us a greater desire to pray. Below are some quotes on prayer by Bounds that I pray will move you to spend more time in your prayer closet.3
“What the Church needs to-day is not more machinery or better, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men whom the Holy Ghost can use men of prayer, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Ghost does not flow through methods, but through men. He does not come on machinery, but on men. He does not anoint plans, but men, men of prayer.”
“Prayer honors God, acknowledges His being, exalts His power, adores His providence, secures His aid.”
“Prayer is far-reaching in its influence and worldwide in its effects. It affects all men, affects them everywhere, and affects them in all things. It touches man’s interest in time and eternity. It lays hold upon God and moves Him to interfere in the affairs of earth. It moves the angels to minister to men in this life. It restrains and defeats the devil in his schemes to ruin man. Prayer goes everywhere and lays its hand upon everything.”
“No learning can make up for the failure to pray. No earnestness, no diligence, no study, no gifts will supply its lack.”
“Prayer is not learned in a classroom but in the closet.”
“God is waiting to be put to the test by His people in prayer. He delights in being put to the test on His promises. It is His highest pleasure to answer prayer, to prove the reliability of His promises.”
“Prayer is the easiest and hardest of all things; the simplest and the sublimest; the weakest and the most powerful; its results lie outside the range of human possibilities-they are limited only by the omnipotence of God.”
“We regard prayer no longer as a duty which must be performed, but rather as a privilege which is to be enjoyed, a rare delight that is always revealing some new beauty.”
“We ought to pray for the desire to pray; for such a desire is God-given and heaven-born.”
“The men who have done the most for God in this world have been early on their knees.”
“A holy life does not live in the closet, but it cannot live without the closet.”
“Jesus taught that perseverance is the essential element in prayer.”
“Spiritual work is taxing work, and men are loath to do it. Praying, true praying, costs an outlay of serious attention and of time, which flesh and blood do not relish.”
“The Word of God is the fulcrum upon which the lever of prayer is placed, and by which things are mightily moved.”
“The men who have done the most for God in this world have been early on their knees. He who fritters away the early morning, its opportunity and freshness, in other pursuits than seeking God will make poor headway seeking him the rest of the day.”
“Praying men are a necessity in carrying out the divine plan for the salvation of men.”
“We can never expect to grow in the likeness of our Lord unless we follow His example and give more time to communion with the Father. A revival of real praying would produce a spiritual revolution.”
“Prayer is our most formidable weapon, the thing which makes all else we do efficient.”
“No man can do a great and enduring work for God who is not a man of prayer, and no man can be a man of prayer who does not give much time to praying.”
“Prayer breaks all bars, dissolves all chains, opens all prisons, and widens all straits by which God’s saints have been held.”
“Prayers are deathless. They outlive the lives of those who uttered them.”
“Prayer is God’s plan to supply man’s great and continuous need with God’s great and continuous abundance.”
“Prayer is the language of a man burdened with a sense of need.”
1 https://livingbydesign.org/bounds-prayer
3 All these quotes are from the websites below:
Inspirational Quotes by E.M. Bounds (bibleportal.com)
E.M. Bounds Quotes (Author of Power Through Prayer)
74 E.M. Bounds Quotes | ChristianQuotes.info
37 Life-Changing E.M Bounds Quotes On Prayer | Think About Such Things