Pester Him

In the course of one of his sermons on revival, Lloyd-Jones spoke of the great value of reading the biographies of men God has used in revival in the past. He said--

You will find this same holy boldness, this argumentation, this reasoning, this putting the case to God, pleading his own promises. Oh, that is the whole secret of prayer, I sometimes think. . . .

Do not leave him alone. Pester him, as it were, with his own promise. Tell him what he has said he is going to do. Quote the Scripture to him.

And, you know, God delights to hear us doing it, as a father likes to see this element in his own child who has obviously been listening to what his father has been saying. It pleases him. The child may be slightly impertinent, it does not matter, the father likes it in spite of that.

And God is our Father, and loves us, and he likes to hear us pleading his own promises, quoting his own words to him, and saying 'in light of this, can you refrain?' It delights the heart of God.

--Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Revival (Crossway, 1987), 197

'If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.' --John 14:14