Question Fourth. But why is extraordinary prayer to be superadded by the Christian to his ordinary exercise of it in his daily course?
Answer 1. Extraordinary prayer is superadded in obedience to the command of God. He commands not only that we should ‘pray always,’ but ‘with all prayer’ also, and extraordinary prayer is one kind among the rest. And let none of us say it is not enough to pray once or twice every day, but we must upon some occasions devote a whole day also, to the damage of calling and family? O what niggards would some be towards God, were they left free to devote what time they thought fit for his worship? This cavil sounds too like that of Judas: ‘To what purpose is this waste? For this ointment might have been sold for much, and given to the poor,’ Matt. 26:8, 9. ‘But this he said, not that he cared for the poor; but because he was a thief.’ Truly so, when I hear some carnal wretches cry out against this waste of time in praying and fasting—‘how much might the improvement of that time, if laid out in their callings, have advantaged their families, wives, and children’—I am ready to think it is not because they have such a care of their relations as they pretend (for they who grudge a day for prayer can throw, some of them, many away at the ale-house or in idleness), but they carry thievish hearts in their bosoms, which love to rob God of his due, and care not how little service they put him off with. Is he a loyal subject that pays the ordinary tribute to his prince, but, if occasion of state requires a subsidy, refuseth this, or doth it grudgingly? God’s commands are none of them, no not this which carries some outward severity on it, so grievous, that any should need to groan or grumble under them. Those yokes—duties and commands, I mean—whose outside seem most hard have the softest lining within. What seem harder than suffering? and yet when are the saints fuller of heaven's joy? What duty more austere than this of fasting and afflicting our souls? and yet in the breast of this lion, that scares sensual wretches, the Christian finds the sweetest honey-comb of inward comforts. Temple-work is sure to be well paid if well done; though it be never so little work in his house, God will not have it done gratis. None shall kindle a fire on his altar for naught. And therefore he takes it in great disdain at their hands who durst say, ‘What profit is it that we have kept his ordinance, and that we have walked mournfully before the Lord of hosts?’ Mal. 3:14. Whereas the fault was not in the duty, but in themselves, that they got no more by it. As if a naughty servant should bring himself by his riot and excess to poverty, and then give out a hard master hath undone him.
Answer 2. It is superadded to comport with the providence of God, by a suitable return of duty to his actings and dispensations towards us. When God is extraordinary in his providence, he expects his people should be more than ordinary in seeking of him. What else means that of the prophet? ‘Thus will I do unto thee, O Israel: and because I will do this unto thee, prepare to meet thy God, O Israel,’ Amos 4:12. Here God alarms them by his extraordinary proceedings intended against them, to take the hint of this warning, and apply themselves speedily to the solemn practice of repentance and humbling their souls, as a suitable posture to meet God in, and keep off the storm of his wrath now gathering against them. Is it not high time for a nation to betake them to their defensive arms when a mighty host is marching against them? So, Isa. 26:20, 21, ‘Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee,’ &c. Here he sends his people to their chambers and closets, that they may, by afflicting their souls and fervent prayers, find a hiding in the day of his indignation. And why must they do thus? ‘For behold the Lord cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity,’ ver. 21. The rising of God out of his place imports some notable enterprise he is about to do; and when the master riseth, it is not manners for the servant to sit still, but to rise also and prepare to follow him where he goes. God takes special notice how we behave ourselves and comport with is dispensations of judgment or mercy, ‘In that day did the Lord God of hosts call to weeping, and to mourning;’ Isa. 22:12, that is, he called them by the voice of his providence as well as his prophets, the nature of which was such, that had not their lusts bunged up their ears and made them deaf, they could not but hear and understand that now was the time, if ever, that God expected to see them in sackcloth and tears humbling their souls before him. Now see how heinously he takes their security and profane slighting of his providence, ‘And it was revealed in mine ears by the Lord of hosts, Surely this iniquity shall not be purged from you till ye die, saith the Lord of hosts,’ ver. 14. Few sins more provoke God than this. ‘Because they regard not the works of the Lord, nor the operation of his hands, he shall destroy them, and not build them up,’ Ps. 28:5. So, ‘And thou...O Belshazzar, hast not humbled thine heart, though thou knewest all this,’ Dan. 5:22. This lost him his life and kingdom, as the contrary saved Ahab’s for a time, though it was not so sincere as it ought. A temporal humiliation got him a temporal benefit.
Answer 3. It is superadded for the great influence that this extraordinary duty solemnly performed would have upon our whole life and course of godliness. To keep the body healthful requires not only daily food, but now and the physic also; for in the soundest constitution, and that advantaged with the best care and temperance, there will, in time, such a quantity of superfluous humours gather, that nature without help cannot digest. And truly the temper of the soul is as infirm and needs as much tending as the body. Ordinary prayer is the saint’s food. He can as little miss the constant returns of it as his usual meals. But extraordinary is his physic, to clear and discharge his soul of those distempers which it contracts, and cannot conquer by the use of ordinary means; as also to advance and heighten the Christian’s graces unto a further degree of strength and activity. As God hath, in his wise providence, ordered one star of great influence to be at a certain season of the year in conjunction with the sun, for the more effectual ripening of the harvest in these colder parts of the world; so hath he, in the same wisdom, appointed for the Christian's spiritual advantage and help in this cold climate of the world, that this solemn duty should now and then be taken into conjunction with our ordinary exercise of devotion; for want of which it is that many ripen slower both in their graces and comforts than some of their fellow-saints who sit often under the influences of this powerful quickening ordinance.
