Argument 1. The first argument by which Satan would make the Christian out of love with himself and his duty, is taken from those sinful infirmities cleaving to both—his person and prayer alike. There¬by he would quash the saint’s hope of any favourable reception that his prayer hath found in heaven. What! thy stammering prayers make music in God’s ear! Will the Lord foul his fingers with thy besmeared duties? If thou wert a Samuel or Daniel, and couldst claim thy place among those worthies that are re¬nowned for the eminent service they have done God in their generation, then thou mightest hope to have the ear of God to thy suit; but thou, alas! art a puny stripling, a froward child, in whom there is more sin than grace to be found, and dost thou think to be heard? Truly, though this argument weighs little, having no countenance from the tenor of the covenant, whose privileges are not impropriated to a few favourites, more eminent in grace than their brethren, but stand open to the whole family—it being ‘a common salvation,’ and ‘like precious faith,’ that all the saints partake of; yet it is the great bugbear with which many of them are scared.
A word or two therefore to arm thee against this argument. Only this premised—which I must take for granted—that these sinful infirmities are lament¬ed and not cockered by thee—that indeed would turn infirmity into presumption; as also that thou neglect¬est not to apply the most effectual means for their cure—though, as in hereditary diseases, all the physic thou takest will not here perfectly rid thee of them: this granted, for thy comfort know thy prayers are not so offensive to God as to thyself. Thy prayers pass such a refining in Christ’s mediation, that their ill scent is taken away.
Doth thy scruple arise from the sinful failings of thy daily conversation and Christian course? To re¬move this, ob¬serve how the Spirit of God, when he in¬stanceth in Elias as a person whose prayers are ex¬ceedingly prevalent with God, doth not describe him by the transcendency of his grace above others, but by his infirmities like unto them: ‘Elias was a man sub¬ject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earn¬estly that it might not rain: and it rained not,’ James 5:17. As if God should say, Were I so curious in my scrutiny, as you fear, Elias’s prayer would have been stopped, for he was not without his infirmities. How many failings do we find in David’s unseemly carriage before Achish, for which he was turned out of the king’s presence under the notion of a madman? Yet his prayer at that time, when he betrayed so many unbelieving fears, found favour with God. ‘I sought the Lord, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears,’ Ps. 34:4. Read the title, and you shall find it, ‘A Psalm of David, when he changed his behaviour before Abimelech; who drove him away, and he departed.’
Are they the sinful infirmities which escape thee in the duty of prayer? Canst thou find more in any prayer thou puttest up, than were in the disciples’, for one so short?—where they exercised so little faith that Christ calls it ‘no faith,’ Mark 4:40. ‘Why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?’ Yea, they pray to Christ, and chide him in the same breath, ‘Master, carest thou not that we perish?’ Yet Christ could find sincerity hid, like Saul, in this stuff of their infirmities, and granted their request. It is true he rebuked them, but it is as true that he rebuked the wind also. God’s promise for hearing of prayer shall not be made void by the saint’s weakness in prayer. Yea, for thy further comfort, know, that the less pow¬er these have to shake or disturb thy spirit in expect¬ing a gracious answer, the more kindly God will take it at thy hand. ‘Abraham,’ it is said, ‘believed, not considering his own body, or the deadness of Sarah’s womb;’ and for this was highly commended, because he thereby did signally glorify the power of God, to which he believed their bodily indisposition should not be any obstacle. Truly thus it will be highly pleas¬ing to God, if thou canst rely—staggering not at thy spiritual indispositions, and that deadness of thy heart which rises up as a great objection in thy thoughts against the success of thy prayer; for by this thou givest Christ both the honour of his death, by which he purchased this free access for thy weak prayers to the throne of grace, and also of his inter¬cession, which clarifies them from all their sinful mixtures.
Argument 2. Satan draws his argument from God’s deportment to the soul in and after prayer. In this argument there are three things he commonly in¬sists upon—by them to create trouble to the Chris¬tian’s thoughts. (1.) His silence, which he would have the Christian interpret to be God’s slighting or dis¬regarding of him and his prayer. (2.) His frowns, from which he would have him conclude neither he nor his duty are accepted. (3.) His not giving the mercy in kind; and this he tells the Christian amounts to a denial.
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