Marginal prayers...

In her book Discipline: the glad surrender, Elisabeth Elliot writes about the difficulties she and her husband faced with housing matters (buying, moving, renting). She describes how she and her husband came to God with the matter, and that God answered their prayers. Jumping ahead to her then current situation, she writes:

Now we find ourselves in another situation, similar, but even more complicated. Lars is away, and as I was praying alone yesterday, along the same lines we had prayed together two years ago, I picked up a Bible and "cracked" it at random. At once my eye fell on a note I had written in the margin of Psalm 18, "Praying for renter," and the date, which was within exactly a week of being two years from yesterday. "My God will lighten my darkness.... The way of God is perfect, the Lord's word has stood the test." I wrote ditto marks in the margin under "Praying for renter," with a new date. I was encouraged to trust, bringing my disobedient thoughts--that is, my doubts and fears--into captivity. (Later note: we found renters, at exactly the right time.)

It's just such a cool technique (writing her prayer and date in her Bible) of intertwining personal prayer with Bible study. A great way to claim the Word of God and remember back on what He has done.

What a beautiful, brilliant idea.