What is needful IN extraordinary prayer 1/2

2. Requisite.  That necessary to be observed in the performance of the duty of extraordinary prayer. Because those directions will serve here which are given in another place for the duty of prayer in general, I shall name but a few, and those briefly.

           (1.) When the time to engage thyself in this extraordinary duty is come, beware thou settest not upon it in the confidence of thy preparation, whatever thy care success therein hath been.  What a worthy doctor directed ministers {to do} as to their preach­ing, is applicable to Christians as to their praying—he bade them study for their sermons as if they expected no divine assistance in the pulpit, and when they came in the pulpit to cast themselves upon divine assistance as if they had not studied at all.  Thus prepare before thou comest to fast and pray, as if thou wert to meet with no further assistance in the duty; but when thou comest to the performance of the duty, cast thyself wholly upon divine assistance as if thou hadst not at all prepared.  I know not which of the two doth worst, he that presumes upon God’s as­sistance in this great work without preparation, or he that presumes on his preparation, and relies not after he hath done his best endeavour on the gracious as­sistance of God.  The first shows he hath but mean thoughts of this solemn ordinance, yea, low and un­worthy thoughts of the great God with whom he hath to do in it; and the other too high thoughts of himself.

           What though now, Christian, thou marchest in goodly array and thy heart in order; how soon, alas! may all that preparation be routed, and thy chariot-wheels, which thou hast taken so much pains to oil, be set fast or knocked off!  Now thy thoughts are unit­ed, thou thinkest; dost thou know where they will be a few minutes hence, if thy God help thee not to keep them together?  Thou canst as easily hold the four winds in a bag, as keep the thoughts of thy fluid mind from gadding.  Now thy affections are wound up to some height, but canst thou hold the pegs from slip­ping?  Cannot God wither thy hand while thou stretchest it out in prayer; make thy tongue falter when thou wouldst make use of it; yea, suffer a sud­den damp to fall on thy spirit that shall chill all thy affections and leave thy heart as cold as a stone in thy bosom? ‘Surely man at his best estate is vanity.’  And this in regard of the temper of his spirit as well as in the constitution of his body and other {of} his world­ly advantages.  How oft do we see the gifts of his mind and the vivacity of his graces fade and wither in one duty, which at another, when the Spirit of God vouch­safed his gentle breath to quicken them, did flourish and send forth their fragrant spices in abundance!  O do not then applaud thyself in thy gourd, which may so soon be smitten, neither commit so great an ad­venture as the success of this duty is in the leaking bottom of thy own preparation.

           (2.) Pray often rather than very long at a time.  It is hard to be very long in prayer and not slacken in our affections. Those watches which are made to go longer than ordinary at one winding do commonly lose towards the end.  The flesh is weak; and if the spirits of the body tire, the soul that rideth on this beast must needs be cast behind.  Our Saviour, when he prayed for his life, we find him praying rather often than long at once.  He who, in a long journey, lights often to let his beast take breath, and then mounts upon him again, will get to his journey’s end may be sooner than he that puts him beyond his strength.  Especially observe this in social prayers. For, when we pray in company we must consider them that travail with us in the duty; as Jacob said, ‘I will lead on softly,...as the children are able to endure.’  Yet I speak not this that you should give any check to the Spirit of God in his assistances, which sometime come so strong that the Christian is, as it were, carried with a full fore‑wind, and hath the la­bour of tugging at the oar saved him.  The ship of the soul goes with most facility when with most speed.  Such assistances lift both the person praying and those that join with him—if gracious, and under the same quickenings—in a manner above all weariness. The Spirit brings spirits—affections, I mean—with him. Such a soul is like a vessel that runs full and fresh—what pours from him is quick and spiritful; whereas at another time, when the Spirit of God de­nies these assistances, his prayer tastes flat to his own palate, if not to others’.