Prayer for the Oppressed

Human beings want – we need – our lives to count for something. We want them to be significant. The importance of prayer for the abolition of slavery, is shown from the inefficacy of other means to effect it.
"Slavery is the foe of Christianity, the enemy of souls, and it must be hateful to the God of love, who would have all men come to Christ. It is opposed to the gospel and to every evangelical work, to the tract, the Bible, the missionary enterprise. It disregards the spiritual interests of enslaved saints, and of souls perishing in their sins under its yoke. It rises above other forms of sin, as the chief perverter of the right ways of the Lord. It hinders the spread of vital godliness through this land, walling about the dominions of its chattels and excluding the preacher of the cross. "The Christianity it tolerates within its borders is not that which declares the whole counsel of God; which cries aloud and spares not, and shows the people their sins.  In this crisis our only help is in God. We must be persuaded that he will defend his gospel, and humble the slave power."