The Second Sermon

1 Thessalonians 5:17. Pray continually.

Not to repeat what has been delivered, but to press this point on us a little further (for what is more necessary than that we should keep a constant course in this duty, since the very life of religion consists in it?), I add this to all I pressed in the morning — that if you do neglect it, it exposes you to great disadvantage, both for the outward man and for the inward man, and there are but these two that you need to care for.

For the outward man, it deprives you of the blessing. Put the case, you have never so good success in your enterprises; put the case you have outward comforts in abundance — yet still the blessing is wanting, and not only so, but it uncovers the roof, as it were, and the curse is rained down upon your tables, upon your meat and drink, upon all the endeavors and all the enterprises you take in hand. We consider not what we do when we neglect this duty — what dangers we expose ourselves to from day to day: for it is one thing to have outward comforts, and another thing to have the blessing with them.

Besides, consider what loss you suffer in the inward man when you neglect this duty at any time: for that is ready to be distempered and to go out of order; it is ready to contract hardness, to contract soil — spiritual grace is ready to decay. It falls out with man's heart as it does with a garden that is neglected — it will quickly be overcome with weeds if you look not diligently to it, and the way to look to it is constancy in this duty. That is a notable place: Job 15:4 — when Eliphaz observed some distemper in Job's affections (as he apprehended it), he tells him that the speech he used was not comely but vain and sinful. And what then? Surely Job (says he), you restrain prayer from the Lord — as if he should say, it is impossible, Job, that you should fall into these distempers if you did [reconstructed: indeed] keep your course constantly in this duty. Therefore surely (says he) you restrain prayer from the Lord. So it is with us: let us restrain prayer from God, and distempers will arise quickly in our spirits, worldly-mindedness will be ready to grow upon us, we shall be apt to be carnal, we shall forget God and forget ourselves and forget the good purposes and desires we had. And therefore, that you may keep your hearts in order, you must keep a constant course in this duty: for if you do (though your peace be interrupted) this will repair it again, it will make up the breaches again. Though there be some distempered affections that grow upon us, yet prayer will compose all. As sleep composes drunkenness, so prayer will compose the affections; a man may pray himself sober again — nothing does it sooner, nothing does it more effectually. And this you shall find: that as you either omit it or slight it over, so you shall find a proportionable weakness growing upon the inward man, as the body feels when it neglects either sleep or diet or exercise. Therefore, to end this exhortation, let us be constant in it.

Only remember this (when we exhort you thus to keep a constant course, for which you heard so many reasons in the morning — I say, remember this caution): that if it be performed in a formal or in a customary and cursory manner, you were as good to omit it altogether. For the Lord takes not our prayers by number, but by weight. When it is an outward picture, a dead carcass of prayer, when there is no life, no fervency in it, he regards it not. Be not deceived in this — it is a very usual deceit. It may be a man's conscience would be upon him if he should omit it altogether, and therefore when he does something, his heart is satisfied, and so he grows worse and worse. Therefore consider that the very doing of the duty is not that which the Lord heeds, but he will have it so performed that the end may be obtained, and that the thing may be effected, for which you pray. If a man send his servant to go to such a place, it is not his going to and fro that he regards, but he would have him dispatch the business. So in all other works, he cares not for the formality of performance, but would have the thing so done that it may be of use to him. If you set a servant to make a fire for you, and he goes and lays some green wood together, and perhaps puts a few coals under — this is not to make a fire for you; but he must either get dry wood, or he must blow till it burns and be fit for use. So when your hearts are unfit, when they are like green wood, when you come to warm them and to quicken them by prayer to God, it may be you post over this duty and leave your hearts as cold and as distempered as they were before. My beloved, this is not to perform this duty. The duty is effectually performed when your hearts are wrought upon by it, and when they are brought to a better tune and to a better temper than they were before. If you find sinful lusts, there your business is to work them out by prayer, to reason the matter, to expostulate the thing before the Lord, and not to gloss over, till you have set all the wheels of your soul right, till you have made your hearts perfect with God. And if you find your hearts too much cleaving to the world, you must wean them and take them off. If you find a deadness and unaptness and indisposition in you, you must lift up your souls to the Lord, and not give over till you be quickened. And this is to perform the duty in such a manner as the Lord accepts. Otherwise it is a hypocritical performance: for this is hypocrisy — when a man is not willing to let the duty go altogether, nor yet is willing to perform it fervently and in a quick and zealous manner. For he that omits it altogether is a profane person; and he that performs it zealously and to purpose is a holy man. But a hypocrite goes between both — he would do something at it, but he will not do it thoroughly. And therefore, if you find you have [reconstructed: scrabbled] over this duty from day to day, that you perform it in a negligent manner and perfunctorily — know that it is a hypocritical performance. And therefore, when we spend so much time in exhorting you to a constant course in this duty, still remember that you must perform it in such a manner that it may have heat and life in it, that it may be acceptable to God and do good to your own hearts, to bring them to a more holy frame of grace and to a better temper than, it may be, you found them in when you went about the duty.

And if you object now, 'Yes, but it will cost us much time to do this?'

Indeed, one common cause among the rest that keeps us off from the thorough performance of this duty is this. But (to speak to that in a word) remember this — that the time that is spent in calling upon God hinders you not in your business, though it seem to hinder you, and though it takes so much from the heap, yet indeed it increases the heap, as it is said of tithes and offerings: 'Bring them in, and think not that because you [reconstructed: lessen] the heap that you are poorer men; no,' says the Lord, 'it will increase your store, I will open the windows of heaven, and you shall have so much the more for it.' So it is true in this case. In other things you see it well enough. You know, the baiting of the horse hinders not the journey, and the oiling of the wheel and the whetting of the scythe — though there be a stop in the work for a time — yet, as our [reconstructed: old] saying is, a whet is no let, and the doing of this is no impediment.

Secondly, put the case it were — yet is it not the greater business? What is it that you gain by all your labors and travels? If it be riches, it comes not into any comparison with grace and holiness, with that riches wherewith prayer makes you rich. But say it be something [reconstructed: more] noble than that, as learning and knowledge — yet, what is that to the renewing of God's image in us? Were it not better to spend time to get grace, to make us rich toward God; to make us to get strength in the inward man, to pass through all varieties of afflictions — in getting that which is the chiefest excellence of all others? For is not that the best excellence? When Adam was in Paradise, the having of God's image, you know, it excelled all other excellencies in the world, and so it does still. And the more you pray, the more you get of this image: for a man of much prayer is always a man of much grace — it much increases those spiritual gifts which are better than all the outward things you can get by your employment and diligence in them. Therefore, I say, though it does spend you much time, yet know (as Christ said to Mary) he that prays much, though he be a great loser in other things, yet he chooses the better part.

Last of all consider this: when you come to offer sacrifice to God, would you offer that which cost you nothing? If your continuing in prayer and spending much time in it should cost you some disadvantage in your affairs, and should lose you that which another gains — that you get not so much knowledge as another man does, you do not so much in your trade, in your business, you do not set things in order as you might have done — yet know this, that it is great wisdom to make our service to God costly to us. You know David's choice: 'Shall I offer to the Lord that which cost me nothing?' — and therefore he would needs give the worth to [reconstructed: Araunah] the Jebusite for that which he bought. And therefore, since it is to a good master that sees what you do, that knows what it costs and what loss you are at, and withal is willing and able to recompense it, why should you shorten this business and post it over, because of other occasions and other business that you have to do?

Oh, but, a man will say further, I am willing to do it, but I am unfit for it, and it may be the longer I strive, the more unfit I grow.

To this I answer, first, in general: if you do it as well as you can, though you do it not so well as you would — in this case, God accepts the will for the deed, when a man puts his strength to it, when there is no negligence in him, when there is no laziness (for in that case he will not accept the will for the deed) — but when a man does his utmost, as those that would have given more and could not, their will was accepted for the deed, in 2 Corinthians 8:12. I say, when you do what you can, when you spare no labor to get your heart upon the wing, to raise and quicken it and to enlarge it in this duty, there God accepts it.

But again, I add further, there is an unskillfulness in going about this duty. Many times when we are not fit, we think to make ourselves fitter by spending time in thoughts and meditations before, which I deny not but they may be profitable. But yet this I will propound to you: that the best way to fit ourselves to this duty, when we find an indisposition to it, is not to stay till we have prepared ourselves by meditation, but to fall presently upon the duty. (I will give you the reason of it) Because, though a preparation is required for the performance of every spiritual duty, yet the remote preparation is that which is intended and meant when we say we must prepare: for, if we speak of that which is immediate, the very doing of the duty is the first preparation to it. For example, if a man were to run a race, if he were to do any bodily exercise, there must be strength of body, he must be fed well that he may have ability; but the use of the very exercise itself, the very particular act that is of the same kind with the exercise, is the best to fit him for it. So in this duty of prayer: it is true, to be strong in the inward man, to have much knowledge, to have much grace, makes a man able and fit for the duty. But if you speak of the immediate preparation for it, I say the best way to prepare us is the very duty itself. As all actions of the same kind increase the habits, so prayer makes us fit for prayer. And that is a rule: the way to godliness is in the compass of godliness itself; that is, the way to grow in any grace is the exercise of that grace.

It is a point that Luther pressed, and he pressed it out of his own experience, and this reason he uses: in this case, says he, when a man goes about to fit himself by working on his own thoughts, now he goes about to overcome himself by his own strength, and to contend with Satan alone. But when a man feels an indisposition and goes to God by prayer and rests on God to fit him, he takes God's strength to oppose the indisposition and deadness of his flesh and the temptations of Satan that hinder him, and resists him. Therefore you shall find this to be the best way to fit yourselves for prayer — namely, to perform the duty. If you seek to extricate and extricate yourselves out of your unfitness by the working of your own thoughts, commonly you involve yourselves further into those labyrinths, and are caught more and more. But this I speak by the way concerning matters of unfitness. The main answer to this objection is that which I gave you before — that if a man does what he can and does it faithfully and in sincerity, that indisposition shall not hinder him. But still remember, it must be done; it is not an excuse to us at any time, nor ought to be, that we should omit the duty wholly under pretense of an unfitness.

Thirdly, a man is ready to say again, but I find many difficulties — how shall I do to remove them?

The best way hereto is the very naming of the difficulties to you, that you may know them and make account of them. Therefore you must consider this in general: that indeed it is not an easy thing to call upon God constantly. Our underestimation of the duty, our reckoning of it, that it is a more facile and easy thing than it is, makes us more to slight it and causes us not to go about it with that intention which otherwise we would. But consider a little what it is. The duty is very spiritual, and our hearts are carnal, and it is no easy thing to bring spiritual duties and carnal hearts together.

Besides, our natures are very backward to come into the Lord's presence — partly by reason of his great glory, by reason of his Majesty who dwells in [reconstructed: unapproachable] light, and our weak eyes are apt to be dazzled with it — and partly out of an accustomedness: we are not used to it, and therefore we are ready to fly from him, as beasts that are wild and are not tamed to our hands are ready to fly from us. So backward is our nature to come into his presence.

Again, the variety of occasions hinders us — every thing keeps us back. If a man's heart be cheerful, it is apt to delight in other things; if a man's heart be sad, on the other side — if it be a slight sadness, men are ready to drive it away with company and with sports and with doing other things; and if the sadness be great, we are swallowed up with anguish of spirit, and then anything is easier than to pray, as you may see by Judas — it was easier for him to dispatch himself than to go and call upon God. So it is with men when they have excessive grief, when their anguish of heart is exceeding great. So that, whether a man has a cheerful disposition or a sad, whether the sadness be great or small, still you shall find a difficulty. If we be idle and have nothing to do, our hearts will be possessed with vain thoughts; and if we be full of business, that distracts us also and indisposes us on the other side. So still there are impediments.

But there is one great impediment among the rest, and most common, which is worldly cares and worldly-mindedness. Worldly cares hinder spiritual prayer and spiritual conference and the holy performance, almost, of every duty. And therefore, if you find a difficulty in it, look narrowly if that be not the cause.

Again, another great cause of this difficulty in prayer — of such backwardness to it, of such indisposition to it — is because we do not well consider the nature of God, we lack faith in his power and in his providence. We do not consider that he has that disposing hand which he has in every thing that belongs to us — in health, in sickness, in poverty, in riches, in good success and ill success. For, if we did see the providence of God and acknowledge it more, we should be ready to call upon him. But this lack of faith in his providence, that the Lord is not seen in his greatness and in his mighty power — this causes men to be backward to seek him, but very forward to seek to the creatures. When we have anything to do of any consequence, we are ready to post from this man to that man, and from this means to that means, but very backward and negligent to go to God in prayer to have the thing brought to pass that we desire. And this arises from lack of faith, and from ignorance of God, and our not consideration of him.

Besides, Satan hinders us exceedingly in this duty: for he knows of what moment it is and of what consequence; and therefore he does as the Arameans did — he fights not against small nor great, but against the king. He knows it is this duty which quickens every grace; it is the greatest enemy which he has; and if he can keep us from prayer, he has the upper hand of us, he has wrested the weapon out of our hands, he has disarmed us, as it were, and then he may do what he will with us.

Likewise the sins we commit, especially gross sins — they are a great hindrance to this duty and keep from the spiritual and cheerful performance of it: for sin wounds the conscience, it disjoints and dismembers the soul, and a disjointed member, you know, is unfit to do any business. Yes, when the sin is healed and forgiven, yet there is a soreness left in the heart, though some assurance of pardon should follow upon the commission of a great sin, so that that is another impediment. I must not stand to reckon up many — we shall find enough by continual experience.

Only this use we must make of it: that, if the impediments be so many, and the difficulties that keep us from a constant course in prayer and from the performance of it to purpose so great, then we must put on a resolution to break through all, and lay it as an inviolable law upon ourselves that we will not alter. Let us think with ourselves that the thing is difficult, and will cost all the care and all the intention that may be. Yes, when you have overcome the difficulties at one time, it may be the next day you shall meet with new conflicts, new distempers, new affections, new strength of lusts, and a new disposition of mind will be upon them. And therefore he that will be constant in this duty must put on a strong resolution. As it was the saying of a holy man — one of the holiest men that these latter times have had — that he never went to pray to God but he found so many impediments, that except he bound himself by an unalterable resolution, that he resolved not to break upon any occasion, he could never have kept a constant course in it; or, if he had, he should never have kept himself from a formal, customary performance of it. But I will add no more to press this upon you — there has been enough said; I beseech you consider it.

Now that which I promised in the morning to do, which is that that does exceedingly strengthen us to the performance of this duty of calling upon [reconstructed: God], of praying continually (which we are here commanded to do), is to remove certain objections which are in the minds of men, that secretly weaken the estimation of this truth and insensibly take us off when we mark them not. For, beloved, when we are so negligent in it, surely there is something that is the cause of it, and if we could find the cause and remove it, we could not spend an hour better.

The objections that are commonly in the hearts of men are many; I will name to you but these 4 briefly.

First, a man is ready to say, what need I spend so much time and be so large in the expression of my wants to God, when he knows them? I cannot make them better known to him — he knows them well enough already, and therefore what need is there of it?

To this I answer (in a word, because it is an objection that has not much weight in it) that it is true, the Lord knows your wants. But withal, he will have you to know them; because, otherwise, you will not seek to him, you will not set a price upon the things that he bestows on you, you will not be thankful to him when he has granted them. And therefore you shall find our Savior Christ uses this very argument as a means to quicken us to prayer, saying, 'Your heavenly Father knows what you have need of' — what then? Shall we not therefore pray? Yes, says he, therefore pray the more earnestly and the more importunately to him: for since he knows your wants, he will be more ready to hear your requests.

Yes, but, it will be said again, that he does not only know them, but he also means and purposes to bestow them: for he has made a promise to us, and his promise is firm and sure, and God is just and must keep his promise; and when he has fully purposed it, what need is there of so much praying to bring it to pass?

I answer, the promises of God are to be understood with this secret condition annexed: 'I will do such and such a thing for you, if you pray' — though it be not expressed. And therefore we see when God promised things in particular, yet still they prayed and prayed earnestly. When he promised Elisha that it should rain, yet we see he prayed and contended much in his prayer. When he made a promise to David that he would make him a house, yet you know David went to the house of the Lord and sat before him and made earnest prayer, as is recorded in 2 Samuel 7. So Daniel had a particular promise, and yet he prayed, and prayed long. The example of our Savior Christ is without exception — who had all the promises sure to him, yet you see he prayed, yes, he spent whole nights in prayer. And therefore you must so understand it, that though you have a promise made, though the thing be never so sure to you, yet it is to be understood with that — if you call upon God.

And why the Lord would have you do it: I showed you many reasons in the morning; we will add this to it. What if the Lord will have you call upon him, though he purposes to do the thing, even for this end, that you may worship him? For what is it to worship the Lord? You shall find this usual in the old Testament: 'The people [reconstructed: bowed] themselves and worshipped,' or, 'they [reconstructed: fell] upon [reconstructed: their faces] and worshipped.' The meaning is this: to worship God is nothing else but to acknowledge the worthiness that is in him. As when you do worship to a man, you use so much outward demeanor and observance to him as may acknowledge a worth in him above another man. Outward gesture — that is the outward worshipping of God; the inward worship is inwardly to acknowledge his attributes. Now, you shall see, prayer gives an acknowledgment of his attributes more than most any thing: for he that prays to God does, in so doing, acknowledge his omnipresence and his omniscience — that he hears, that which the idols of the Gentiles could not do, that he knows the secrets of men's hearts, that neither men nor angels can do.

Again, it acknowledges his almighty power, that he is able to do anything — for that is presupposed when we come and seek to him.

Again, it acknowledges his mercy and his goodness, that he is not only able but exceeding willing to help.

Again, it acknowledges his truth, that as he has promised, so I make account he will perform it when I go and seek to him. In a word, all the attributes of God are acknowledged in prayer. Therefore therein you worship him in a special manner — when you go and seek to him and pray to him, in so doing you acknowledge him; yes, you acknowledge him to be a Lord and a Father. As when we see a child run to a man and ask him blessing, when we see him ask him food and raiment — we say, surely such a man is his father. So this very praying to God is a worshipping of him, because it acknowledges his attributes and his relation to us, and ours to him.

But again — thirdly, it will be objected: 'Yes, but alas, what can the endeavors or the prayers of a weak man do? Can they change the purpose of Almighty God? If he does not intend to do this thing for me, shall I hope to alter him?'

For answer to this, I say this: in [reconstructed: the first place], when you do call upon God, he is not changed by your prayers, but the change is wrought in you, as we have said to you before. When a physician is sought to by his patient, the patient desires him earnestly to give him such a cordial and such medicine as is pleasing to him; the physician denies him long, yet in the end yields to it. Why? Not because there is any change in the physician, but because there is a change in the patient — he is now fitted for this; before he was not. So then the physician yields now whereas before he refused, and yet the change is in the patient and not in the physician. And therefore, beloved, when [reconstructed: you] go about to strive with God in prayer, when you contend and wrestle with him (for so we ought to do), when you use many reasons to persuade him, you alter not him but yourselves. [reconstructed: And] those arguments that you use are not so much to persuade him to [reconstructed: help] you, as to persuade your hearts to more faith, to more love, to more obedience, to more humility and thankfulness. And that indeed is the reason why prayer prevails with God — not that the very sending up is that which prevails with him, but because a faithful and spiritual prayer puts the heart in a better disposition, so that a man is now made ready to receive a blessing at God's hands that before he was not. So that, when you think you draw God to you with your arguments, in truth you draw yourselves nearer to him. As when a man in a ship pulls a rock — it seems as if he pulled the rock nearer to the ship, when in fact the ship is pulled nearer the rock. So, I say, we draw ourselves nearer to the Lord; and when we draw nearer to the Lord in prayer, and there is a spiritual disposition wrought in our hearts by the exercise of this duty, then indeed the Lord draws near to us to send us help and to grant our requests that we put up to him. And therefore that you should mark by the way: that any prayer, as it has a higher pitch of holiness in affection and as it has stronger arguments in it, so it is a better prayer — not because this prayer shall prevail with God more, or that the excellence of this prayer should move him, but because this pitch of holy affection and strength of argument works upon your hearts. For the strength of arguments moves your understanding, and the holiness of affection puts your will in a frame, and so disposes your hearts and fits you — as the [reconstructed: patient] we spoke of before is [reconstructed: fitted] when the physician is willing to give the thing he desired.

But the last objection, which indeed is more than all the rest, is this.

A man is ready to say, we see there are many men that do not call upon God, and yet enjoy many mercies. It may be a man can say with himself, when he did not use to pray, he had health and sleep and protection.

Again, on the other side, he has prayed for such and such things, and yet they have not been granted. So this objection has two parts: that a man has obtained blessings without prayer, and again he has prayed and yet has not obtained the blessings he sought for at the Lord's hands.

For answer to the first — that men do obtain many blessings that do not pray (as how many young men are there, and old men too, that have health and wealth and peace and liberty and abundance of all things, and yet either they [reconstructed: call] not to God, or if they do, yet not in a holy and spiritual manner) — and therefore this objection needs to be answered, and therefore I answer briefly.

First, though they have these blessings, yet they have them [reconstructed: uncertainly] — they have no promise of them, they cannot build upon them. Whereas they are sure mercies to the righteous man — he can build upon these blessings: for he has a Father to go to, whose love he knows, and he has sure promises to build on. The other, though he has them, yet he is in a slippery place when he enjoys them; it is an accidental thing, he has them from the hand of an enemy, and he knows not how long he shall enjoy them.

But I answer again (which is the chief answer to this objection) that there is a great deal of difference between having blessings through the providence of God, and having them from the mercy of God, and by virtue of his promise, and out of his love to us in Christ Jesus. A natural man may have many blessings of God (so God said that he made Jeroboam a king, he gave him a kingdom, and many such passages we shall find, when men come unjustly to them, as he did to the kingdom, yet God, says he, did it — that is, it was by his providence) and yet he has them not in mercy. For if you have these blessings — health and sleep and success in your enterprises from day to day — and yet your heart tells you within that you have not sought them at the Lord's hands as you ought, I say to such a man (and mark it) it were better for him that he should want them: for certainly, when he has them in this manner, he has them without a blessing — yes, he has them with a curse, and so were better off without them. As it had been better for Ahab to have been without his vineyard, and as it had been better for [reconstructed: Gehazi] to have gone without his reward that he had of Naaman the [reconstructed: Syrian] (for you know he had the leprosy with it) — it had been better for the children of Israel to have gone without their [reconstructed: quails]: for you know the curse that followed, death went along with them. So when a man shall have peace and prosperity and abundance of all things without seeking them at the Lord's hands from day to day, I say, he were better to have wanted them: for there goes death together with them. It is said plainly, that [reconstructed: prosperity] carries [reconstructed: this consequence] — that is to say, this very prosperity, this thriving notwithstanding a neglecting of prayer and of holy duties — I say, it carries death along with it. As the obtaining of the vineyard brought death to Ahab, the getting of the kingdom was the destruction of Jeroboam. And therefore men have little cause to comfort themselves with this, that they enjoy many blessings and never pray for them.

But, to answer this point more fully, I say many blessings are bestowed upon men not for their own sakes, but for the Church's sake. A man may have strength of body, he may have great gifts of mind, he may have great success in using those gifts, he may bring great enterprises to pass, so that you may truly say the hand of God is with him. All this may be done not for his sake, but for the sake of the Church and glory of God some other way — that he might do some service. As you see, it is plainly said of Cyrus, Isaiah 45:4: speaking there of Cyrus, says the Lord, 'For [reconstructed: Jacob] my servant's sake, and for Israel my elect's sake, I have called you by name, and have given you this great power and all this great success, although you yourself have not known me.' (Mark) Cyrus was a most prosperous man — God's hand was mighty with him — and yet all this was not for his own sake, but for the Church's sake. So you may think it is when men prosper: many times it is not for their own sakes, but to fulfill some other end of God's providence. And therefore, mark this and keep it for a rule: if you prosper in your enterprises, if you enjoy wealth and peace and abundance of all things, and know that you do not seek to God from day to day, that you keep not your heart right and straight and perfect before him, you do not call upon him in a holy and spiritual manner — certainly it is for one of those causes: you have it without a blessing and with a curse, you have it for other ends and not for good to yourself. And therefore you have it very uncertainly — it may be taken from you, you know not how soon. Yes, and this you shall be sure of, that it shall be taken from you then, when of all other times it will be unfittest for you. As a thief comes at a time when men least look for him, so destruction comes suddenly upon these men. God cuts them as a man — when he would have trees to die, he lops them in that season that of all others is the unfittest, when the sap is in the tree, when the lopping will cause them to wither. So the Lord will strike them in such a season. It is quite contrary with the saints: he cuts them in due season, he lops them in due time, that they may grow the better for it — it is good for them.

But now for the other part of the objection: it may be, many among you now are ready to say, 'I have prayed for such and such things, and I have been earnest, and yet the Lord has denied me.' My beloved, if we can satisfy this objection, we shall then take this impediment away that we propound in this objection, that has these two parts. Therefore to this I answer.

First, if you have not been heard in your prayer, consider if you have not prayed amiss. It is a common fault among us — when we have spent much time in prayer, and it may be we have spent time in fasting and praying, and the thing is not granted — we presently lay it upon the Lord that he has not heard, when many times the cause is our not praying as we ought. It may be you have been very earnest, and therefore you hope you have done very well. I tell you, you may be very earnest and importunate with the Lord, when it may be no more than a natural desire — when a man has need to be directed in a difficult case that much concerns him, when he has need to be extricated and taken out of such a difficulty and strait wherein he is involved, when he has need of success in such an enterprise, or anything of that nature. I say, a man may be earnest with the Lord in such a case, and yet his prayer may be amiss — it may not be a spiritual prayer, it may not be an expression of holy desires to the Lord. For they only prevail with him. Not that the natural are excluded (that is not my meaning) — for they may add winds to the sails, though holiness may guide the rudder and keep the course and make the steerage; yet natural desires may make us more importunate and may add much to it. Therefore, I say, consider your prayer.

Consider again: when you have sought so earnestly to God, whether it be not to bestow it upon your lusts, as the Apostle speaks in James 4:3. When you have a business to be performed, it may be you are earnest with God, but have you not an eye to your own glory, to your own praise and credit in it? When you were earnest for health, was it not that you might live more deliciously? When you desire wealth and success in your enterprises that tend to improve your estate — is it not out of some ambition? You know that desire is condemned: 'If any man will be rich' — is it not a desire of greatness? Would you not be somebody in your place, and set up your house and family? Such things indeed God bestows upon men, but to have our desires fixed upon them and to pray in that sense for them is amiss. And my rule for it is in 1 Timothy 6:9: 'If any man will be rich' etc. — that is, when a man desires excessively, when he desires more than food and clothing convenient for him. Now the natural affection is degenerate into a lust: for when any affection exceeds, it ceases to be an affection and begins to be a lust. And therefore where it is said, 'If any man will be rich' etc., it is said after, it is a lust.

But, you will say, how shall a man know when he prays to bestow that which he prays for upon his lusts?

I answer: if a man consult with his own heart and deal impartially with himself, he may know what his ends are. But if you cannot find it out that way, you may know it by the effect — you may know it by the bills you bring in. What is the expenditure of the things God has bestowed on you — when he has put a price into your hands, consider how you bestow it. If a steward has a great sum of money that his master has entrusted him with, and his bills show that he has bestowed so much in riot, so much in fine apparel, etc., but there has been but so much bestowed for his master's advantage — it is an argument he has spent it ill. So, when we see there has been so much health spent, so much time and so much strength in following our own plans and our own worldly business without respect to God, not serving God and men in our calling as we should do, and that there has been little time bestowed in prayer, in reading, in making our hearts perfect with God, in taking pains with them from day to day — I say, if we look upon this bill of expenditure and consider how we have bestowed our time, our health, our strength, our wits, from day to day; and our speech (for that is one resource that we have in our hands by which we may do good — it is as a bucket by which we may draw from others, and likewise it is a spring and fountain wherewith we may feed others with the waters of life) — consider how we have laid out all these things. And by that we may know how we are disposed to use the blessings we seek for at God's hands, whether we seek them to bestow them upon our lusts, or to spend those gifts to our Master's advantage. And if we find we do it for our own lusts — in this case, I say to you, go and amend your prayers, and God will amend your success. We must do in this case as an angler does: when he has thrown the bait into the river, if it stays long and catches nothing, he takes up the bait and amends it; and when he sees it is well, he then continues and waits. So we must do in this case: if you pray and pray long and have not obtained the thing you pray for, look diligently to your prayers — see whether they be right or no. If they are not, amend your prayers, and God will amend his readiness to hear you. If you find they are sincere and hearty, mingled with holy desires and not with carnal and corrupt affections — then let the bait lie still, that is, continue to pray and to wait, and the Lord will come in due time.

But this is not all — though that be one thing: when you are not heard, consider if you have not prayed amiss. It is a common fault among us that when we do not succeed in anything, we attribute it to many other things but not to our remissness and carelessness in seeking to God. If a man lacks sleep, if he finds sickness and weakness and distemper of body, he thinks that he has eaten amiss, and considers not whether he has prayed amiss. If a man has miscarried in his business, he begins to think whether he has not been improvident, whether he has not dealt foolishly, whether he has not omitted such and such means as he might have used — he never thinks whether he has prayed amiss. And that indeed is the cause of our miscarrying, and not commonly the thing which we attribute it to: for though God is not the immediate cause, you know he is the great cause. There is no ill that he has not [reconstructed: permitted]; and that which moves him is always grace and sin — that which moves him to do us good is our obedience to him, that which moves him on the contrary is neglect on our part.

But, to answer further: suppose your prayers be right — yet you must consider this, that when you think you are not heard, you are often times deceived, and therefore you must rectify that misconception. As for example: sometimes when we would have the thing in one fashion, God bestows the same thing upon us in another; and therefore you may be deceived in that. It may be a [reconstructed: man] prays earnestly that he may have a strong [reconstructed: body] to do God service withal. It may be that sickness of body makes him do him better service, because it keeps him in more awe, it weans him more from the world, and makes him more heavenly-minded. You know the case of Paul — he would fain have had that [reconstructed: thorn] taken away that is spoken of in 2 Corinthians 12:9. And why? Surely the thing he would have had was to have his heart in a holy and right frame of grace. Now, though Paul had it not that way that he looked for it, yet he had it another way — the Lord increased in him the grace of humility by it; he saw his own weakness and the power of Christ the more. And when this was discovered to him, he was content. It is all one whether a man be preserved from the blow of an enemy or have a helmet given him to keep it off. It may be a man prays for money and for estate — if God provides meat and drink and clothes immediately instead of this, is it not all one? It may be another would have a greater degree of convenience for his dwelling house and many other things — if God gives him a body able to endure that which is more coarse, all is one, as if he were provided for more delicately. It is all one whether a physician quenches the thirst of his patient by giving him drink that is comfortable to him, or by giving him something else that will do the thing as well.

It is all one whether the Lord keeps an enemy from doing us hurt, [reconstructed: or] that he gives us a strong helmet, a buckler, to keep off the injury from wounding us. I might give you more instances. Though the Lord give you not the thing in the very manner that you would have it, yet he will do it in another manner.

Secondly, as we are deceived in the manner, so we are deceived in the means, often times, in seeking to God. When a man prays, he pitches upon such a particular means and thinks truly that this is the way or none. It may be the Lord will find out another way that you never dreamed of. Paul prayed to have a prosperous journey to Rome — he little thought that when he was bound at Jerusalem and posted up and down from one prison to another, God was now sending him to Rome. Yet he sent him, and sent him very safe with a great company attending upon him; he sent him it may be in a better manner than he himself would have gone, and yet it was by such a means as he could never dream of. Also you know [reconstructed: Naaman] the [reconstructed: Syrian] — he had pitched upon a particular means, he thought the prophet would surely come forth and have laid his hands upon him. But to go and wash in [reconstructed: Jordan] — he thought his labor all lost, and the request which he made to the prophet to no purpose; for it was a thing that he never thought of, it was a weak and poor means that he made no account of, yet that was the means that God [reconstructed: provided]. So I say, we often deceive ourselves, [reconstructed: and] pitch upon such particular ways, and when these fail us, and when we have prayed that these means might be used and God does not use them, we think presently we are deceived. Joseph thought surely Pharaoh's steward should have been the means to bring the promise to pass — and after that, Pharaoh's butler he used as a means, he desired him to remember him. Yet all this was not the means, but another which he never thought of, which was a dream of Pharaoh's. The like was in the case of Mordecai — deliverance came a strange way, a way that Mordecai never imagined. Abraham thought truly that Ishmael had been the son of the promise, but God tells him he was deceived — Isaac was the son in whom he would make good the promise. So the Israelites thought that Moses should have delivered them, that it should have been presently true that the yoke of bondage should have presently been taken off from them. But we see God went another way to work — he sent Moses away into a far country, and the bondage was exceedingly increased upon them, so that they thought they were further off now than ever they were before. But in truth they were nearer: for the increase of the bondage increased Pharaoh's sin and made him ripe for destruction; again, it increased the people's humility, it made them pray harder and cry more fervently to God for deliverance, and so it made them more fit for it. And at the last, Moses was more fitted to be a deliverer after he was so long trained up and was so much humbled. So that when God seems to go a clean contrary way, yet it is the nearest way to bring it to pass. [reconstructed: And so] it is a common thing with us — we pitch upon a certain particular means, we think such a man must do it, or such a course must do it, when the Lord intends nothing less. And the reason often is because, if we should have deliverance, many times, by such means, by such men, and by such ways, we would attribute too much to the means. Therefore we see when [reconstructed: Gideon] had a great army, the Lord would not do it — it was too great for him — and therefore we see to what a small number he brought it. So often times men think, 'Oh if I had such a man's help, or if I had such a means, it would do the thing, it would bring the enterprise to pass.' When we make too much account of it, the Lord, it may be, casts away that which seemed most probable. And (even as he does most of his works — as he builds his own Kingdom by the most foolish and improbable means of all other, so) often he does our business by such means that we least dream of. Therefore be not discouraged. Suppose we pray that such a great prince should raise the churches, that such a war, that such an enterprise and project may do it — put the case the Lord will not do it so. Are we then presently undone? And is there no help, because such a battle is overthrown, because such a king did not succeed, because such a general had not success according to our expectation? It may be that is not the way. The Lord will help the church after another manner that we dream not of. And so for a man himself: he has business to be done, or he is in distress and would have deliverance, and he thinks 'this is the way or none,' and therefore he is earnest to have it done. Now it is good in this case to leave it to the Lord, to make our requests known to him; and when we have done that, to be no further anxious, but leave it to the Lord to do it his own way. He is skillful.

If you take a skillful workman and say no more to him but this: 'Sir, I pray you do me such a thing' — if it were the bringing of water or the setting up of a building — it may be he will go away to work that you know not what it means, and yet you will trust him. Why then will you not trust God and allow him to go his own way? And when you are crossed in that thing wherein, it may be of all others, you would not be crossed — it may be it is the best way of all other to bring the thing to pass that you desire.

Again, as we are deceived in the manner and the means, so likewise we mistake the time. It may be the Lord is willing to do the thing, but not in that time that you would have him. When a man prays to be delivered from such a trouble and such distress and affliction, he thinks the time very long and says he is not heard because he is not delivered presently. We would all have the smarting plaster presently taken off. But the Lord is wiser than we (as the physician knows what belongs to the patient better than himself) — though he does not do it presently, yet he will do it. Therefore say not, you are not heard. You must take heed of taking delays for denials. The Lord will defer to do the thing, yet he will do it, and do it in the best season: for this is a general rule — God's time is the best time. When you come to pray for a thing, you would have it done presently, and you think it is the best time. All the controversy between God and you is which is the fittest time to have it done. You think it may be presently; God, it may be, will do it a year hence. Surely he is the best chooser, and we shall find it so. And therefore be content to wait his leisure. He has many ends in deferring it: it may be to try your faith (as he did the faith of the Canaanite, and therefore he would not hear); it may be to increase your holiness, to put your heart into a better temper, and therefore he defers longer. He meant to do that for Jacob that he did, yet he suffered Jacob to wrestle all night, and yet he would not do it till the instant of the morning appeared. So it was with Daniel — the answer went forth when he began to pray, yet he would [reconstructed: have] him instant and continue in prayer. So, I say, the Lord has many ends why he defers — let us be content to take his own time.

Last of all, consider this: when you seek to the Lord to have anything done, it is possible that it may cross some other passage of his providence; and in this case you should be content to be denied.

But, you will say, why may not both be accommodated?

I answer, so they shall — though you see not how. It is not with God as it is with man: if a man does a good turn to one, if two become petitioners, he must needs do an ill turn to another. But God composes all for the best. As for example, David desired much to build a temple. The Lord had another end — he had resolved in his providence to make Solomon the builder of it. Indeed this was much better for David: for what more had David gotten if he had done it? The Lord gave him as full a reward as if he had done it: for he tells him that for that purpose of building him a house, he would build him a house. So David has his end to the full, though Solomon built the temple. So for Israel — the Lord kept the Canaanites among them, but it was for their profit. There are some passages of God's providence that if we knew, we would yield to this — that it were better that it should be so than otherwise. And therefore it is better in some cases that we should be denied. And so I conclude for this time.

Finis.