The focus of prayer is not myself;
I turn away from myself to God in the act of prayer.
We go hopelessly astray if we think of prayer as a selfish endeavor to persuade or inveigle or beg God to do us a favor, or win us a battle, or even help us when we are in pain. God is no bellhop or housemaid who jumps when we press a button or ring a bell.
God does not come to us, but we to God. Prayer does not change God, but changes the person who prays.
Our prayers are answered not when we are given what we ask, but when we are challenged to be what we can be.
If I recite what I want, it is not to remind You of my wants, O God, but only to make myself aware that things are not always in my hands alone.
True worship is not a petition to God for favors: it is a speaking and a summons to ourselves. By being benevolent, people rise to a height, they approach God. Therefore, the beginning of all true prayer is doing good.
Who rises from prayer a better person has had an answer from God.
Pray as if everything depended on God, but work as if everything depended on man.
Abraham Joshua Heschel
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