Mark 14:39 And again he went away, and prayed, and spoke the same words.… Hence we may gather, that it is lawful for us to use a set form of prayer: not only to ask the same petitions of God in effect and substance of matter at sundry times, but also in the same form of words, or well near the same: yea, that this may be done even in private prayer alone by ourselves, for such was this prayer now made by our Saviour. And if in private prayer alone by ourselves (where usually more liberty may be taken to vary the form of words in our prayers), then much more when we pray with others, especially in public, it must needs be lawful to use a set form of words, and to ask the same petitions in the same words. Our Saviour taught His disciples a set form of prayer, which is that we call the Lord's Prayer, appointing both them and us to use it in the very same form of words in which it is framed (Luke 11:2)...And what are sundry of David's Psalms, but set forms of prayer, used by the Church in those times?...The Church of God has always used set forms of prayer in public and solemn meetings, nor was the lawfulness of this practice ever questioned till of late times by Anabaptists, Brownists, and such like. (George Petter.) Parallel Verses KJV: And again he went away, and prayed, and spake the same words. |
    |