Direction 9

And ninth, above all things pray, and get others also to pray for you — for God often restores comfort to such at the request of those who mourn for them (Isaiah 57:18). But especially be earnest and fervent in pouring forth your own complaint, for though the speaking of friends may somewhat further your case, yet it must be worked out between God and you alone in private, and his good will must be obtained by wooing him in secret. This counsel the apostle gives in James 5:13: 'Is any man afflicted? Let him pray.' And because of all other afflictions, this of darkness in a man's spirit most of all needs prayer. Therefore David composed a psalm on purpose, not for his own private use only but for the benefit and use of all others in the like distress, as appears by the title: Psalm 102, 'A prayer for the afflicted, when he is overwhelmed and pours out his complaint before the Lord.' And this, says David, is my constant practice when my soul is overwhelmed: 'I pour out my prayer to you' (Psalm 61:2). And it was Christ's also, for in his agony 'he prayed yet more earnestly' (Luke 22:44).

When at any time therefore your sins and God's wrath meeting in your conscience make you deadly sick, as Isaiah speaks, then pour forth your soul, lay open and confess your sin. As it will ease you (as vomiting is accustomed to do), so also it will move God to pity and to give you cordials and comforts to restore you again. Thus David in Psalm 38:18, being in great distress (verses 2-5): 'I will declare my iniquity and be sorry for my sin' — and he makes it an argument to God to pardon him. When his bones were broken (Psalm 51): 'Cleanse me from my sin' (verse 2), 'for I acknowledge my transgressions' (verse 3). And when he had confessed (verses 4-6), then he cries: 'Make me to hear of joy and gladness' (verse 8), and 'Restore unto me the joy of your salvation' (verse 12). And what was the chief ingredient, the main and principal motive that worked most effectually with him to confess and mourn and bring all up? 'Against you, against you' — he puts it twice, as much of the consideration of this as of any other element to make his heart mourn. That chiefly, if not only, melted and dissolved him. And in your confessions, let the same thing work mainly with you. 'Against you, against you, have I sinned' — thus often, thus grievously, thus presumptuously — against you, a God so great, and yet at the same time so good, so kind, so willing to receive and pardon, if my heart were but as willing to turn to you. And when your case is as Job's was in chapter 10:15-17 — that you are full of confusion, so full that you think your heart could hold no more, and yet it increases and he fills you fuller yet — then pour out your complaints to him as he pours in confusion to you. And when he hunts you, as Job complains there, like a fierce lion, fall down and humble yourself like a poor and simple lamb. If you die, die at his feet, mourning, bleeding out your soul in tears. And when he hunts you up and down and pursues you with blow after blow, follow hard after him wherever he goes with complaint after complaint. And when yet he leaves you not but again and again returns — after some intermission showing himself terrible to you day after day, night after night — yet look again and again toward his holy temple, as Jonah did. And when he begins to bring in new sins, new indictments against you (as in verse 16): 'You renew your witnesses' — and when you thought he had done with you, he brings out new rods and enters into new quarrels and old reckonings long since past and forgotten: 'Changes and war are against me' — alternating armies of disquiet, and when one army is overcome new ones appear in the field. Then fall upon your knees and say as Job at last does: 'I have sinned, I have sinned; what shall I do to you? Oh you preserver — and not the destroyer — of men, these and these abominations I have done and I cannot now undo them; and what shall I do to obtain your favor?' Alas, nothing that can satisfy him. Only confess your sin and accept your punishment. Go and strip yourself, and with all submission present a naked back to him, and though every stroke draws not only blood but well-nigh your soul away, yet complain not at all of him. Put your mouth in the dust (Lamentations 3:29-30) — be still, not a word — but only such words as express your complaints and acknowledge your deserving of ten thousand times more. And say as Micah 7:9: 'I will bear your indignation patiently, for I have sinned against you.' Bear witness still to every stroke that it is not only just but also less than you have deserved, and that it is his mercy you are not consumed and cut off by every blow. And the heavier he lays on, do not struggle — he will let you down the sooner. The higher he lifts up his hand to strike, the lower let your soul fall: 'Humble yourselves under his mighty hand.' And still kiss the rod when he has done. And then take up words of pleading for yourself — it is for your life. Desire him to remember what he has been thinking of from everlasting — thoughts of peace and mercy toward us, whose number cannot be told (Psalm 40:5), which he has been thinking of with the greatest of delights (as his Son tells us in Proverbs 8:31). And plead as David and other saints of God have done: 'What has now become of all your thoughts of mercy? Are they restrained? What, are all these on the sudden forgotten? Laid aside, which you have been thinking of so long? Have you forgotten your own ancient delights?' Ask him if he has forgotten his own name — to be gracious and abundant in kindness, that is his name. Say: 'Did the very intention of showing mercy so infinitely beforehand possess you with delight, and now when you should come to put it in execution and have so fair an opportunity of doing it — to a soul as full of misery, the object of mercy, as ever — have you now no heart, no mind to it?' And further, say that you have been given notice of an infinite and all-sufficient righteousness in his Son, laid up in him by his own procurement, of which his Son never had nor can have any need himself (being God blessed forever) — and for whom then was it appointed, but for the sons of men; those who are weary, wounded, sick, broken, lost? These his Son has put into his will, who still lives to be his own executor. And say further also to him that it has come to your ears that his Spirit is the Comforter, a God of comforts, and that his Son has bought all comforts — his whole supply and all his cordials and all his skill — and is anointed with this Spirit on purpose to pour him forth into the hearts of those who are wounded and sick and broken, and the whole have no need of them. If it is said to you, 'Yes, but you are most unworthy' — answer: 'But he professes to love freely.' If the greatness of your sins is objected against you, plead again that 'plenteous redemption is with him' (Psalm 130:7) — and if you have not enough to pardon me, say, 'I am content to go without.' If that you are ungodly — say, 'I believe on him who justifies the ungodly' (Romans 4:5). If he puts you off — as Christ did for a while with the woman of Canaan — and says he has no need of you, say that you have need of him and cannot live without him, for 'in his favor is your life' and without it you are undone. If he seems to rebuke you, asking how you dare press to him who is the high and lofty One — a sinful man to him, whose name is holy — say, 'I have heard you yourself say: Thus says the high and lofty One whose name is holy, that he dwells with him that is of a contrite spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble' (Isaiah 57:15). And be further bold to tell him that there are but few in the world who seek him, and if he were to turn away any who do seek him he would have fewer — for who would fear him if there were no mercy in him and no plenteous redemption?

If still he pursues you and his wrath lies heavy on you, ask him what he aims at. Is it to have the victory and to overcome when he judges — as Romans 3:4 says, which David also knew when he humbled himself (Psalm 51:4)? Freely tell him that you are willing to give it to him, to yield to him, to stand out against him in nothing, but are content to submit to his commanding will in all things and to his condemning will also if it so pleases him. Say that it would be just (as David there acknowledges) if he were to condemn you. Justify him while he is condemning you. Say that at the last day he shall need no other judge against you than yourself. Only beseech him to consider what honor it will be to him to pursue dry stubble and to break a poor dried leaf that crumbles under his fingers if he but touches it — as Job pleads (Job 13:25) — to break a reed that is already broken.

Say, 'You are not a fit match for me, and you have said you will not contend forever' (Isaiah 57:16) — especially when he sees anyone to lay down their weapons, as you are content to do.

Or is it, ask him, that he aims to have glory out of your eternal condemnation in hell? Tell him it is true, he may, and that this is some comfort to you — that he may have glory out of your death and destruction, who never yet had it out of your life. But yet desire him to consider this before he thrusts his sword into you: that he did first sheath it in his Son's side (Zechariah 13:7). And that he may show as much power in overcoming his wrath as in venting it, yes and have even greater glory thereby. Plead that you are never able to satisfy him, though he should throw you down to hell — he may cast you into prison, but you can never pay the debt. 'What profit therefore is there in my blood?' (Psalm 30:9). And therefore if satisfaction to his justice is his end, he might better accept what his Son made for him, and so he shall be sure to be no loser by you. Thereby he shall not only receive the glory of his justice but show the riches of his grace and mercy also, and so double the revenue of his glory in you.

Or is it, Lord, that you aim to have more obedience from me than you have formerly had? Plead that this is the way at present to disable you for service — for while you suffer his terrors you are as one among the dead, listless not to his business only but to all things else. Distracted with terrors (as Heman pleads in Psalm 88:15), the powers and forces of your soul are scattered and dissolved and cannot attend upon their duty. And besides this distraction in your spirit, plead that it consumes your strength also, as David often complains and makes an argument of it (Psalm 39:10-13): 'Remove your stroke away from me; I am consumed by the blow of your hand. When you rebuke a man for sin, you make his beauty to consume away as a moth. Oh therefore spare me, that I may recover strength, before I go hence and be seen no more.' And further remind him that if he were to go on thus dealing with you, you would not be able to do him much service, nor to do it for long. 'How long, Lord, will you hide yourself? Forever? Shall your wrath burn like fire? Remember how short my time is' (Psalm 89:46-47, compared with Psalm 39:12). Tell him that for the little time you have to live, the more joy you have the more service you will be able to do him and the more lively and strongly you will go about his work — 'for the joy of the Lord is our strength' (Nehemiah 8:10) — and more acceptably also, for he loves a cheerful giver (2 Corinthians 9:7). Therefore entreat him to restore you to the joy of his salvation — then you will be able to do him more service in a week than in a year at present (long trouble of mind being like long sickness, which makes all your performances weak) — and it is to his disadvantage to have his servants lie long sick on his hands.

And if it is objected against you that if you were to be trusted with much assurance you would abuse it and turn it into license, reply that if it pleases him he can prevent it by preparing your heart beforehand for these cordials so that they shall work most effectually on you. By writing a law of love toward him in your heart, which when his love shed abroad shall join with, will work most strongly. And one grain of it will have more force to purge out sin, to constrain and strengthen to obedience, than a pound of terrors. And say that though you have indeed a stubborn and self-loving heart, yet he can make his loving-kindness overcome it, for it is stronger than death (Song of Solomon 8:6). Say, 'You have love in me — which runs out enough to other things — if you would be pleased to win it to yourself.' Suggest how that soul mentioned in Isaiah 57 had as stout and stubborn a heart as yours, and went on perversely notwithstanding all the terrors. And yet, Lord, you took another course with him and healed him again — and by comforts: 'I will heal him,' says God there, 'and restore comforts to him' (verses 17-18). And so, if he pleases, he may deal with you.

And if light and mercy yet do not come, but still God seems as it were to cast you off, then call to mind if you have ever had any true communion with him, and thereupon begin to challenge him. So does the church in Isaiah 63:16, when in your case — when his mercies were restrained from her — she says yet: 'Doubtless you are our Father.' She saw God was angry, her heart hard (verse 17), yet she thought she should know him: 'Doubtless he is my Father — and where is your zeal, the sounding of your heart?' So challenge him, upon that old acquaintance you have had and held with him in former times. Say: 'Doubtless you are my Father and my husband, however strange you may carry yourself toward me now. Do you not remember what has been between me and you in prayer, in such a room, at such a time?' Have you no fragment of a broken pledge between him and you, no love token that could not have passed between him and any whom he had not betrothed himself to in kindness? Produce it at such a time as this. And if you should discern no grace in yourself, yet desire him to look into your heart, and be bold to inquire of him if he can see nothing there which he himself wrote — never to be blotted out. If there is not some spark of love to him and his fear which he himself put there, ask him if he knows his own hand. And for your comfort know that when you cannot read it — your graces being much blurred — yet he can read his own hand at any time, and will not deny it.

You may be yet bolder. Desire him to look into his own heart and to view the thought he had of you, and those secret ancient purposes he bore toward you from all eternity. And if at first he seems yet silent at this, then desire him to look upon you again and ask him if he does not know you, and if he has not known and taken you for his from everlasting, and engraved you in the palms of his hands and on the tablet of his heart with such deep and lasting letters of loving-kindness as are not yet — indeed which will not forever be — blotted out. Tell him you dare refer yourself wholly to what passed between him and his Son concerning you, and let his own heart settle it. Appeal to Christ as your surety and a witness on your behalf, who was privy to all his counsel, as to whether you are not one of those he gave to him with a charge to redeem and save. And desire him to look into Christ's heart also, to see if your name is not written there with his own hand, and if Christ did not bear your name written upon his heart — as the high priest bore the names of all the tribes — when he hung upon the cross and when he ascended into the Holy of Holies. Thus Habakkuk, putting up a prayer in the name of the church, has taught us to plead in Habakkuk 1:12: 'O Lord, are you not from everlasting my God, and my Holy One?' It was a bold question, yet God does not disapprove of it but approves it, and presently assents to it in a gracious answer to their hearts before they went further — for their next words, abruptly spoken by reason of a sudden answer, are an assurance of this: 'We shall not die.' God being thus challenged, and his own thoughts being spoken, could not deny it; he acknowledges it was true. And thus, while you may be speaking blindfolded as it were, casting anchor in the dark, yet speaking his very heart, he may own you and fall upon your neck and kiss you.

And if yet after continual praying thus you still find no comfort, no answer from him, but he seems rather to shut your very prayers out (as in Psalm 22:2-3), then expostulate as David does in Psalm 88:14: 'Why do you shut out our prayers and will not hear us pray? For alas, we have nothing else to help us in the time of need but prayer. And if prayer will do no good, I am undone.'

And if through all these discouragements your condition proves worse and worse, so that you cannot pray but are struck dumb when you come into his presence (as David in Psalm 77:4: 'I am so troubled I cannot speak') — then fall to making signs when you cannot speak. Groan, sigh, sob, chatter as Hezekiah did (Isaiah 38:14), bewail yourself for your own unworthiness, and desire Christ to speak your requests for you and God to hear him for you. Christ is an advocate with the Father, and pleads no bad case, nor was ever cast in any suit he pleaded (1 John 2:1).

And if still, perhaps after many years, he owns you not, and it grows darker and darker — suppose even until your death approaches, or to such extremities that he seems to you to cast you off forever — so that your distress boils up to such thoughts as these: that there is no other remedy but you and he must part. Then in the midst and depths of such sad fears and apprehensions, down upon your knees once more. And notwithstanding, fall to blessing him for all those glorious excellencies of holiness, kindness, grace, and wisdom which are in him — the beauty of which first took your heart and made you enamored with him — though you should be never like to be the better for them. Bless him for all the mercy he shows to others, by which they have occasion to magnify him, though you should be found unworthy. Bless him and those who shall forever live with him, who stand about him and see his face and enjoy him forever. Whatever sins you think you shall be condemned for by him, condemn yourself for first, and still ask forgiveness of them. Whatever service you have any way done him that he had any glory by, get your heart to say you do not repent of it, but are glad of all done for him, and wish it had been better. Whatever mercies you have tasted from him, confess yourself unworthy of, and thank him, though you should never partake of any more. (Such dispositions as these in such extremities often appear in the hearts of God's children.) And desire him that he would but preserve good thoughts of him in you, that you may not blaspheme him. And when you are as it were sinking into hell in your own apprehensions, see if he does not call you back again.

See what he himself says in Jeremiah 31:18-20. Ephraim is his son, his dear son, his pleasant son — as he says there. And yet he began to speak against him as bitter and sharp words as ever he has done against you, and took him up severely and looked sternly on him as if he meant never to have mercy on him. Upon this Ephraim falls a-crying, being thus rebuked, and bemoaning himself — as I have taught you to do — being yoked as you are, to tame him. He acknowledges it was justly done, having been a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke. And Ephraim began to be ashamed, confounded, not able to look up for sinning against God. He seeks repentance, and that from God — without whose help he was not able to turn to him: 'Turn me, and I shall be turned.' And challenges God and his eternal love: 'You are the Lord my God.' Well, says God, though it is long since I spoke against him and I have suffered him long to lie plunged in misery, yet I remember him still. His tears and sighs will never go out of my mind. And though he thinks I had forgotten him, yet I remember him, and my heart is troubled for him as much and more than he is for himself. And I can forbear no longer — I will surely have mercy on him. And had he condemned him, his heart would have been troubled for him indeed, all his days.

Ninth, above everything else, pray — and get others to pray for you as well, for God often restores comfort to those in distress at the request of those who mourn for them (Isaiah 57:18). But especially, pour out your own complaint to God with earnestness and intensity — for though the prayers of friends may help your case along, the matter must ultimately be worked out between God and you alone in private, and His good will must be obtained by seeking Him in secret. The apostle gives this counsel in James 5:13: 'Is anyone suffering? He should pray.' And of all afflictions, this one — darkness in the spirit — is the one that most needs prayer. Therefore David composed a psalm for precisely this purpose, not for his own private use only but for the benefit of everyone else in the same distress, as its title shows: Psalm 102, 'A Prayer of the Afflicted when he is faint and pours out his complaint before the Lord.' And David says this is his constant practice when his soul is overwhelmed: 'From the end of the earth I call to You; lead me to the rock that is higher than I' (Psalm 61:2). It was Christ's practice as well, for in His agony 'He prayed more earnestly' (Luke 22:44).

So whenever your sins and God's wrath collide in your conscience and make you desperately sick — as Isaiah describes — pour out your soul, lay everything open, and confess your sin. It will relieve you, as bringing up what has made you sick relieves the body; and it will also move God to have compassion and give you comforts and strength to restore you. So David in Psalm 38:18, being in great distress (verses 2-5): 'I will confess my iniquity; I am full of anxiety because of my sin' — and he makes that confession an argument to God for pardon. When his bones were broken (Psalm 51): 'Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity' (verse 2), 'for I know my transgressions' (verse 3). And having confessed (verses 4-6), he then cries: 'Make me to hear joy and gladness' (verse 8), and 'Restore to me the joy of Your salvation' (verse 12). And what was the main thing, the chief motive that worked most powerfully in him to confess, mourn, and bring everything up? 'Against You, against You' — he says it twice, putting as much weight on this consideration as on any other. That thought chiefly — if not solely — melted and broke him. Let the same thing work powerfully in your confessions. 'Against You, against You, have I sinned' — so often, so seriously, so presumptuously — against You, a God so great, and yet at the same time so good, so kind, so ready to receive and pardon, if only my heart were as willing to turn to You. And when your case is as Job's in chapter 10:15-17 — that you are full of confusion, so full you think your heart can hold no more, yet it increases and He fills you fuller still — then pour out your complaints to Him as He pours in distress to you. And when He hunts you as Job complains there, like a fierce lion, fall down and humble yourself like a poor and gentle lamb. If you die, die at His feet, mourning, bleeding out your soul in tears. And when He hunts you from place to place and pursues you with blow after blow, follow hard after Him wherever He goes with complaint after complaint. And when He does not stop but returns again and again — showing Himself terrible to you day after day, night after night after some intermission — yet look again and again toward His holy temple, as Jonah did. And when He brings in new sins, new charges against you (as in verse 16): 'You renew Your witnesses against me' — and when you thought He was finished with you, He brings out new measures of discipline and raises old reckonings long past and forgotten: 'Changes and war are against me' — waves of disquiet alternating, and when one is overcome a new one rises in the field. Then fall on your knees and say as Job finally does: 'I have sinned, what shall I do to You, O Watcher of men? Why have You made me Your target? These and these are the things I have done and I cannot now undo them; what must I do to obtain Your favor?' Alas — nothing that can satisfy Him. Only confess your sin and accept your punishment. Strip yourself and with complete submission present a bare back to Him, and though every stroke draws not only blood but nearly your soul away, do not complain of Him at all. Put your mouth in the dust (Lamentations 3:29-30) — be still, not a word — except words that express your grief and acknowledge that you deserve ten thousand times more. Say as Micah 7:9: 'I will bear the indignation of the Lord because I have sinned against Him.' Testify to every stroke that it is not only just but less than you have deserved, and that it is His mercy you are not consumed and destroyed with every blow. And the harder He strikes, do not struggle — He will let you down the sooner. The higher He lifts His hand to strike, the lower let your soul fall: 'Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God.' And when He has finished, still kiss the rod. Then take up words of pleading for yourself — it is for your life. Ask Him to remember what He has been thinking of from eternity — thoughts of peace and mercy toward us, too many to count (Psalm 40:5), which He has contemplated with the greatest delight, as His Son tells us in Proverbs 8:31. Plead as David and other saints have done: 'What has now become of all Your thoughts of mercy? Have they been restrained? Have all these been suddenly forgotten? Set aside — after all the time You have spent thinking them? Have You forgotten Your own ancient delight?' Ask Him whether He has forgotten His own name — to be gracious and abundant in lovingkindness, for that is His name. Say: 'Did the very intention of showing mercy from so far in eternity fill You with delight, and now when You have come to the very moment of carrying it out — with so great an opportunity before You, with a soul as full of misery, as fit an object for mercy, as ever — have You now no heart for it?' And further, say that you have been told of an infinite and all-sufficient righteousness in His Son, stored up in Him by His own accomplishment, of which His Son never had or can have any need Himself, being God blessed forever — and for whom then was it appointed, if not for the sons of men: those who are weary, wounded, sick, broken, lost? These His Son has included in His will, and He still lives to be His own executor. Say also to Him that you have heard that His Spirit is the Comforter, the God of all comfort, and that His Son has purchased every comfort — His full supply, all His remedies, all His skill — and is anointed with this Spirit expressly to pour Him out into the hearts of the wounded, the sick, and the broken, and the healthy have no need of Him. If it is said to you, 'Yes, but you are most unworthy' — answer: 'But He professes to love freely.' If the greatness of your sins is raised against you, plead again that 'with Him is abundant redemption' (Psalm 130:7) — and say, 'If You do not have enough to pardon me, I am content to go without.' If you are told you are ungodly — say, 'I believe in Him who justifies the ungodly' (Romans 4:5). If He seems to put you off — as Christ did for a time with the Canaanite woman — and says He has no need of you, say that you have need of Him and cannot live without Him, for 'in Your favor is my life' and without it you are undone. If He seems to rebuke you, asking how you dare approach the high and lofty One — a sinful person before One whose name is holy — say, 'I have heard You Yourself say: Thus says the high and lofty One whose name is holy, that He dwells with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble' (Isaiah 57:15). And be bold to add that there are few in the world who seek Him, and if He were to turn away those who do, He would have fewer still — for who would fear Him if there were no mercy in Him and no abundant redemption?

If He still pursues you and His wrath lies heavy on you, ask Him what He is aiming at. Is it to have the victory and to be proved right when He judges — as Romans 3:4 says, which David also understood when he humbled himself (Psalm 51:4)? Tell Him freely that you are willing to give Him the victory, to yield to Him entirely, to resist Him in nothing — that you are content to submit both to His commanding will in all things and to His condemning will as well, if that is what pleases Him. Say that it would be just, as David acknowledges there, if He were to condemn you. Justify Him even as He is condemning you. Say that on the last day He will need no judge against you but yourself. Only ask Him to consider what honor it brings Him to pursue dry stubble and break a withered leaf that crumbles at His touch — as Job pleads (Job 13:25) — to break a reed that is already broken.

Say, 'You are not a fitting match for me — and You have said You will not contend forever' (Isaiah 57:16) — especially when He sees someone laying down their weapons, as you are willing to do.

Or ask Him: is it that He aims to have glory from your eternal condemnation in hell? Tell Him it is true, He may — and that this is actually some comfort to you, that He can have glory even from your death and destruction, who never yet had much from your life. But ask Him to consider this before He drives His sword into you: that He first sheathed it in His Son's side (Zechariah 13:7). And that He may show as much power in overcoming His wrath as in venting it — yes, and have even greater glory from the former. Plead that you could never satisfy His justice even if He cast you down to hell — He may throw you into prison, but you can never pay the debt. 'What profit is there in my blood?' (Psalm 30:9). And therefore if satisfying His justice is His aim, He might more fully achieve it by accepting what His Son offered on your behalf — and in so doing He would be no loser. He would receive not only the honor of His justice but the glory of His grace and mercy as well, thus doubling the honor He receives from you.

Or is it, Lord, that You aim to receive more obedience from me than You have had before? Plead that this present course is actually disabling you for service — for while you bear His terrors you are like one of the dead: listless not only toward His work but toward everything else. Distracted by terror (as Heman pleads in Psalm 88:15), the powers and energies of your soul are scattered and dissolved and cannot attend to their duty. Beyond this distraction, plead also that it is consuming your strength, as David often complains and uses as an argument before God (Psalm 39:10-13): 'Remove Your stroke from me; I am consumed by the blow of Your hand. You rebuke and discipline a person for sin; You cause his beauty to waste away like a moth. Oh, spare me, so that I may regain strength before I depart and am seen no more.' And add that if He continues dealing with you this way, you will not be able to serve Him well or for long. 'How long, O Lord? Will You hide Yourself forever? Will Your wrath burn like fire? Remember what my lifespan is' (Psalm 89:46-47, compared with Psalm 39:12). Tell Him that for the little time you have left to live, the more joy you have the more service you will be able to render Him, and the more earnestly you will go about His work — 'for the joy of the Lord is your strength' (Nehemiah 8:10) — and more acceptably as well, for He loves a cheerful giver (2 Corinthians 9:7). Therefore ask Him to restore to you the joy of His salvation — then you will be able to do more service for Him in a week than in a whole year at present, long distress of mind being like long illness, which makes all your work weak — and it is to His own disadvantage to have His servants lie long sick in His hands.

And if it is objected that if you were trusted with much assurance you would abuse it and turn it into license, reply that He can prevent this by preparing your heart beforehand for these comforts so that they work most effectively in you. By writing a law of love toward Him in your heart — which, when joined with His love shed abroad, will work most powerfully. One grain of it will do more to purge out sin, constrain to obedience, and strengthen for it than a pound of terrors. And say that though you do have a stubborn and self-loving heart, He can make His lovingkindness overcome it, for it is stronger than death (Song of Solomon 8:6). Say: 'There is love in me that runs out freely toward other things — if only You were pleased to win it to Yourself.' Point out that the soul mentioned in Isaiah 57 had as stubborn and stiff a heart as yours, and went on stubbornly despite all the terrors. And yet, Lord, You took a different approach with him and healed him — and through comforts: 'I will heal him,' God says there, 'and I will restore comfort to him' (verses 17-18). And so, if it please Him, He may deal with you in the same way.

And if comfort and mercy still do not come, and God still seems to cast you off, then call to mind whether you have ever had any true communion with Him — and on that basis begin to challenge Him. So the church does in Isaiah 63:16, when in this same situation — with God's mercies withheld — she still says: 'You are our Father.' She could see that God was angry and her own heart was hard (verse 17), yet she thought she should still know Him: 'Surely You are our Father — where is Your zeal, the stirring of Your heart?' Challenge Him on the basis of the old acquaintance you have had and kept with Him in former times. Say: 'Surely You are my Father and my husband, however strangely You may be acting toward me now. Do You not remember what has passed between You and me in prayer, in that room, at that time?' Do you have any fragment of a broken keepsake between you and Him — any token that could only have passed between Him and someone He had betrothed to Himself in love? Produce it at a time like this. And if you can discern no grace in yourself, ask Him to look into your heart — and be bold enough to ask whether He can see anything there that He Himself wrote, never to be erased. Ask Him whether there is not some spark of love for Him and fear of Him that He Himself placed there, and ask Him if He recognizes His own handwriting. And for your comfort, know that even when you cannot read it — your graces being much blurred — He can always read His own hand, and will not deny it.

You may be yet bolder. Ask Him to look into His own heart and consider the thoughts He had of you — those secret, ancient purposes He bore toward you from all eternity. And if He at first seems still silent, ask Him to look at you again and ask whether He does not know you, whether He has not known and claimed you as His own from everlasting, and engraved your name on the palms of His hands and on the tablet of His heart with letters of lovingkindness so deep and lasting that they have not yet been — indeed never will be — erased. Tell Him you are content to leave yourself wholly to what passed between Him and His Son concerning you, and let His own heart settle it. Appeal to Christ as your guarantor and witness on your behalf — One who was present at all His counsel — asking whether you are not one of those He gave to Christ with the commission to redeem and save. Ask Him to look into Christ's heart as well, to see if your name is not written there in His own hand, and whether Christ did not bear your name on His heart — as the high priest bore the names of all the tribes — when He hung on the cross and when He ascended into the Most Holy Place. So Habakkuk, offering a prayer in the name of the church, has taught us how to plead in Habakkuk 1:12: 'Are You not from everlasting, O Lord, my God, my Holy One?' It was a bold question — yet God does not rebuke it but endorses it, and presently gives an assurance to their hearts before they go further, for their very next words — spoken abruptly, as if from a sudden answer received — express that assurance: 'We shall not die.' God, being challenged and His own thoughts quoted back to Him, could not deny it — He acknowledged it was true. And so while you may be speaking as if blindfolded, casting anchor in the dark, yet speaking His very heart, He may own you and fall upon your neck and kiss you.

And if even after continual praying like this you still find no comfort, no answer from Him, and He seems rather to shut out your very prayers (as in Psalm 22:2-3), then reason with Him as David does in Psalm 88:14: 'Why do You reject my soul and hide Your face from me? For alas, I have nothing else to help me in my time of need but prayer. And if prayer does no good, I am undone.'

And if through all these discouragements your condition grows worse and worse, so that you cannot even pray but are struck mute when you come before Him (as David in Psalm 77:4: 'I am so troubled that I cannot speak') — then make signs when you cannot speak. Groan, sigh, sob, and murmur as Hezekiah did (Isaiah 38:14); bewail your own unworthiness, and ask Christ to speak your requests for you and God to hear Him on your behalf. Christ is an advocate with the Father, pleads no losing case, and has never been turned away in any suit He has argued (1 John 2:1).

And if still — perhaps after many years — He does not acknowledge you, and it grows darker and darker, perhaps until death draws near, or to such extremes that He seems to you to have cast you off forever — so that your distress rises to thoughts like this: that there is no other way but that you and He must part. Then in the midst and depths of such dreadful fears, get down on your knees one more time. And notwithstanding everything, fall to blessing Him for all those glorious excellencies of holiness, kindness, grace, and wisdom that are in Him — the beauty of which first captured your heart and made you love Him — even though you might never benefit from them. Bless Him for all the mercy He shows to others, by which they have occasion to magnify Him, even if you are found unworthy. Bless Him and those who will forever live with Him, who stand before Him and see His face and enjoy Him forever. Whatever sins you believe you will be condemned for, condemn yourself for them first, and still ask forgiveness for them. Whatever service you have at any time rendered Him that brought Him any glory — get your heart to say you do not regret it, that you are glad for all done for Him, and wish it had been better. Whatever mercies you have received from Him — confess your unworthiness of them and thank Him, even if you were never to receive any more. (Such qualities as these in such extreme situations often appear in the hearts of God's children.) Ask Him only to preserve good thoughts of Him in you, so that you will not blaspheme Him. And as you find yourself sinking into hell in your own perception — see if He does not call you back again.

See what God Himself says in Jeremiah 31:18-20. Ephraim is His son, His dear son, His pleasant child — as He says there. And yet God began to speak against him in words as sharp and bitter as anything He has said against you, and dealt with him severely and looked on him sternly as if He meant never to have mercy on him. Upon this Ephraim begins to weep — rebuked as I have taught you to be — and to mourn for himself, having been yoked as you are, to be tamed. He acknowledges it was justly done, having been like an untrained ox, unaccustomed to the yoke. And Ephraim began to be ashamed and confused, unable to look up because of his sin against God. He seeks repentance — and seeks it from God — knowing he was unable to turn to God without His help: 'Turn me, and I shall be turned.' And he challenges God and His eternal love: 'You are the Lord my God.' Well, says God: though it has been a long time since I spoke against him, and I have let him lie in misery a long while, I still remember him. His tears and sighs never leave my mind. And though he thinks I had forgotten him, I remember him still — and My heart is troubled for him as much as, and more than, he is troubled for himself. I can hold back no longer — I will surely have mercy on him. And had He condemned him, His heart would have been troubled for him indeed, all His days.