The Christian’s guard or watch about prayer set for him 3/3

 (1.) Meditate of Christ’s coming to judgment. Surely thou wilt not easily sleep while this trumpet, that shall call all mankind to judgment, shall sound in thy ear.  The reason why men sleep so soundly in security is, because they either do not believe this, or at least do not think of it seriously so as to expect it. The servant that looks for his master will be loath to be found in bed, when he comes; no, sits up sits up to open the door for him when he knocks.  Christ hath told us he ‘will come;’ but not when, that we might never put off our clothes or put out the candle. ‘Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come,’ Matt. 24:42.  There are indeed negative signs concerning his coming to the general judgement of the world, by which we may know he will not yet come; as the fall of Babylon, the calling of the Jews, and other prophecies, that must be fulfilled; before which he will not come.  But there are none such, from which we may conclude that his coming to any of us in particular, to take us away by death, and summon us to our particular judgment before his bar, shall not yet be.  Thou art young; thou canst not therefore say thou shalt not die as yet.  Alas! measure the coffins in the churchyard, and thou wilt find some of thy length.  Young and old are within the reach of death’s scythe.  Old men indeed go to death; their age calls for it.  But, young men cannot hinder death's coming unto them.  Thou art rich, will this excuse thee?  Rich men indeed can get others to serve in their arms here, when their prince calls them forth to war; but ‘there is no discharge in this war.’  Solomon tells us ‘Thou must personally do this.  Thou art strong and lusty, thou canst not therefore say that death will be longer at work to fell thee down.  Some indeed he cuts down by chips in consumptive diseases —they die by piecemeals; others he tears up in one night, as a tree by a tempest.  O think of this, and thy sleep will depart from thee!

           (2.) Consider the devil is always awake.  Is it time for them in the city to sleep, when the enemy without watch, and may be are climbing the walls? Our Saviour takes it for granted, ‘If the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up,’ Matt. 24:43.  Of all the nights in the year he would not then have slept. Would Saul have slept in his trench, if he had thought David had been so near?  Or Sisera have lain down to rest, if he had seen the hammer and nail in Jael’s hand to drive through his temples?  ‘Hannibal is at the gates!’ was enough to wake the whole city of Rome, and call them to their arms.  And is not diabolus ad ostium—the devil is at thy door, enough to keep thee out of thy bed of sloth and negligence? What day in all the year is no term to Satan?  What place or company art thou in, that he cannot make a snare to thy soul?  What member of thy body, or faculty of thy soul, which is not in danger to be abused by him?  Hast thou not an inmate in thy own bosom that watcheth to open the gate to him? and is there not a constant correspondence between them? O how oft doth he beat us—as Bernard saith—with our own staff; and as the thief sometimes serves the traveller, binds us with our own garters!  Shall we not always watch to pray, when he watcheth to tempt? Shall not we keep our correspondence with God, and Christ, our allies in heaven, as he doth with our flesh that is his confederate?

The Christian’s guard or watch about prayer set for him 2/3

(1.) An unwillingness and backwardness to duty. If thou findest this, it appears thou beginnest to be heavy‑eyed.  When grace is wakeful, the Christian needs not many words to persuade him into God’s presence.  ‘Thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said, Thy face, Lord will I seek.’  therefore, conclude thou mayest that some vapours have fumed up from thy corruptions, to dull and deaden thy heart to the work.  He that would run to the door, when awake, at the first knock of his dear friend to let him in, may, when between sleeping and waking, let him stand too long.  This was the spouse’s case, and it lost her the company of her beloved.  It showed plainly she was in a sleepy distemper, in that she was so backward to duty; for that was the door that Christ would have met her at.

           (2.) Formality in prayer is a certain symptom that a sleepy distemper hangs about thee.  Grace awake is full of life and activity; at least it discovers itself by making the soul deeply sensible of its dead­ness and dulness.  Vigilantis est somnium narrare. saith Seneca—it shows the man awake that tells his dream, what he did in his sleep; and it proves the soul awake that can feelingly and mournfully confess his deadness.

           (3.) Prevalency of wandering thoughts.  In sleep, fancy and imagination rules and ranges without any control.  If thy thoughts range and scatter into imper­tinences in time of prayer, and meet with no check from thee, it shows thy grace, if thou hast any, is not well awake.

4. Particular.  Express a conscientious diligence at thy particular calling in the intervals of prayer. They that sit up to watch had some need of work to keep them awake.  Idleness is but one remove from sleep.  I cannot believe that he who lazeth a day awake in idleness, should find his heart awake to pray at night; for he hath that day lived in the neglect of a duty as necessary as this, and it is bad going to one duty through the neglect of another.  There is a gen­eration of men indeed, that under a pretence of watching and praying always, betake themselves to their cloisters, and renounce all secular employments, as if it were easy to put off the world as to change their clothes, and get on a cowl or a religious habit; but the world hath found those places commonly to have proved, not so much houses to pray in, as dens to draw their prey into.  It is more like that those who are pampered with sloth and fulness of bread should be eaten up with luxury and sensuality than with zeal and devotion.  The air, when still, thickens and cor­rupts; the spirits in our body are choked with rest; and the soul needs motion and exercise as much as either.  In spiritual offices it cannot hold out without intermmittings; therefore, God hath provided our particular callings as a relief to our spiritual devo­tions.  Only, our care must be not to overdo.  The same thing may quicken and weaken, wake us and lay us asleep.  No greater help to our religious offices than a faithful discharge of our particular calling; no greater duller of the Spirit of prayer than the same when inordinately pursued.  The same oil feeds the lamp and drowns it if excessively poured on.  Hold the candle one way, and the wax nourishes the flame; turn the other end up, it puts it out.
5. Particular.  Preserve a sense of thy spiritual wants.  As fulness inclines the body to sleep, so doth a conceit of spiritual fulness the soul.  When the belly is full then the bones would be at rest—the man hath more mind to sleep than work; whereas he that is pinched with hunger, his empty craving stomach keeps him awake.  If once thou beginnest to have a high opinion of thyself, and thy spiritual hunger be a little stayed—from a conceit of thy present store, and sufficiency of thy grace—truly then thou wilt compose thyself to sleep, and sing the rich man's lullaby to thy soul, ‘Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for may years; take thine ease.’  The Corinthians are a sad instance for this purpose.  ‘Now ye are full, now ye are rich, ye have reigned as kings without us,’ I Cor. 4:8.  Paul is now nobody with you.  The time hath been you could not be without his pains.  The hungry child did no more cry for the breast than you for the word preached by him.  But now your stomach is stayed, you are full and can live without him. Whereas, God knows, it was a fulness of wind of pride, not of solid grace.  It is the nature of grace to dilate the heart and make room for more, but of pride to cloy and glut the soul.  God hath long kept open house in England; the wine-cellar door of his ordinances hath not been shut upon us; we have had free access to drink, and that abundantly, of their sweet wine.  But, alas! may it not be for a lamentation to see how many are drunk with spiritual pride, rather than filled with grace, after so long an enjoyment of them!—insomuch that some have attempted to stave the very vessels from which they have drawn this wine!  Such are they that decry all ordinances, and would down with ministers and ministry; yea, who can live without public preaching and private praying also.  Others, not so mad drunk as the former, are yet fallen asleep under the tap; they have lost their first life in and love to ordinances; they sit with sleepy eyes and dead hearts under them.  Well, Christian, if thou wouldst keep thy soul awake for this or any other ordinance, take heed thou losest not the sense of thy wants. Begging is the poor man's trade.  When thou beginnest to conceit thyself rich, then thou wilt be in danger to give it over, or be remiss in it.
6. Particular.  Retire often to muse on some soul-awakening meditations.  We seldom sleep when we are thoughtful, especially if the thoughts we muse on be of weight and importance enough to intend and occupy the mind.  Indeed, idle trivial thoughts such as have nothing to invite attention, are given as a ready means to bring a man asleep—I mean bodily sleep. That Christian who neglects frequently to med­itate on spiritual things, and lets his thoughts walk all day in the company of carnal worldly occasions, I should wonder if he finds his heart awake at night to pray in a spiritual manner.  Give me therefore leave to present a few subjects for thy meditations to insist upon, and they will be as the brazen ball which some philosophers used to hold in their hand that they might not sleep too long, or as the alarm which men set overnight to call them up to their business early in the morning.

The Christian’s guard or watch about prayer set for him 1/3

           Third. The third thing I promised was to set the Christian’s watch for him, by giving some little coun­sel and help towards his constant performing this duty of watchfulness.  In doing this, we take the fol­lowing particulars.

1. Particular.  Harbour not any known sin in thy bosom.  Sin hath two contrary effects on the con­science, and both sad enough.  Either it fills the con­science with horror, or benumbs and stupifies it; it breaks the soul’s rest, or takes away its sense.  The latter is the more common.  Suffer the devil to anoint thy temples with this opium, and thou art in danger to fall into the sleeping disease of a stupid con­science; little list then thou wilt have to pray.  Or if it hath the other effect upon thee, thou wilt be as much afraid, as now thou dost little desire, to pray.
2. Particular.  Beware of any excess in thy affec­tions to the creature.  A drunken man, of all other, is most unfitting to watch.  Such a one will be asleep as soon as he is set in his chair.  Now all inordinacy of affection is a spiritual drunkenness.  Christ joins both together, ‘Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares,’ Luke 21:34.  It is a pre­servative against drowsiness of spirit, that the day of the Lord might not take them napping.  And of the two, the drunkenness of the affection is the worse. He that is bodily drunk over-night, is sober by the morn­ing; but he that is overcharged with the cares or love of the world, rises as drunk as when he lay down; and how can he then watch unto prayer?  We have there­fore these two often joined together, ‘Let us watch and be sober,’ I Thes. 5:6; ‘Be ye therefore sober, and watch,’ I Peter 4:7.  Whatever the affection is, the in­temperance of it lays the soul under a distemper, and indisposeth it to prayer.  Is it sorrow?  Our Saviour finds his disciples ‘sleeping for sorrow,’ when they should have watched and prayed, Luke 22:45.  Is it love?  This laid Samson asleep in Delilah’s lap.  The heart of man hath not room enough for God and the world too.  Worldly affec­tions do not befriend spir­itual.  The heart which spends itself in mourning for worldly crosses, will find the stream runs low when he should weep for his sins.  If the cares of this life fill his head and heart he will have little list to wait on God for spiritual purposes.  It is no wonder that the master finds his servant asleep in the day, when he should be at work for him, if he sat up revelling all the night.

3. Particular.  Resist this spiritual drowsiness when it first creeps upon thee.  Sleep is easier kept off when approaching, than shaken off when it hath got possession and bound the senses.  This sleepy disease of the soul steals insensibly upon us, even as the night steps in by little and little.  When, therefore, thou findest it coming, rouse up thyself; as a man who hath business to do would start up from his chair to shake off his drowsiness.  Now thou mayst observe these few symptoms of this distemper invading thee.