desire of the heart which in the unregenerate longeth and lamenteth after good though it have many shrewd rubs in the way through the remainders of sin but in the unregenerate it is carried with full sway toward sinne without any resistance though it may stumble now and then upon the sting of conscience neither would I haue any by presuming to abuse this cause of Paul to sinne for none can benefit by this but such as have Pauls feelings desires and endeavours in some measure but let al such as are fervent in spirit serving the Lord though with much opposition litle or no feeling of the evidence of the spirit lay home this case to their comfort The latter particular wherein the guidance of the spirit consisteth is the quickning and increasing of grace for as by the spirit the deeds of the body are mortified so by the same spirit the graces of the soul are quickned therefore is the spirit called the spirit of grace Now the spirit of grace is joyned with the spirit of supplication as the Cause and the convertible Effect the state the demonstrative evidence of the state I will poure out saith the Lord by Zachary in the place quoted the spirit of grace and supplication or deprecation Where by the spirit of grace is meant the gracious spirit of regeneration proceeding from the grace of God guiding and quickning his own in all the waies of grace by the spirit of deprecation that spirituall immediatly infused ability as I have shewed whereby his penitents doe beg and obtain pardon of sin and all other things conducing to Gods glory and their own good Between this spirit of grace and deprecation there is a mutuall strengthning or corroboration As health is the cause of walking and by walking is strength assured and increased so grace is the internall immediate conjunct cause of prayer and is also quickned and strengthned by prayer Or as the heat of the sun reflecting upon some solid or impenetrable body is made more forcible So the radiant beames of grace exercising themselves upon that firmly framed object of prayer by a gracious reflection they become out of measure gracious If thou wouldst then excell in grace labour to excell in that eminent ability of prayer which doth not consist as I have shewed in the excellēcy of words but in the heigtht depth of the grones of the spirit which no words are able to expresse Try also by the gage or land-mark of prayer the ebbing or floing of the tide of grace for so much as thy soule is taken up with the true strain of prayer so much dost thou gain in the rich traffique of grace and so much as thou loosest in the faculty of this heavenly Oratory so much thou loosest in the stocke of grace Therefore for the keeping of both stock and interest on foot it shall be good in my judgement to put these two particular observations in practice First look what particular sin either of person or calling thou art most addicted unto in what patticular grace thou art most deficient labour to countermand and subdue the particular sin by the opposite grace and to quicken strengthen the weak and decaied grace by the speciall or proper remedies This is the wisest policy the highest point of war the richest trade and the proper imployment of our precious talent Another remarkable observation to be practised is this Let no day passe thee wherein thou dost not call thy selfe to a strict accompt of the well imployment ill imployment or misimployment of the day record as neer as thou canst thy commissions and omissions in thy calling or out of thy calling in thought word or deed against piety equity or sobriety recall thy company and conference thine or others profiting thereby or unprofitablenesse recompt the favours the frownings the cherishments or chastisements mercies or judgements towards thee and others as nigh as thou canst observe what corruption hath prevailed against thee or in what particular grace thou gettest any better footing This course deserveth neither obloquie from the wicked nor should it seem unnecessary strict or impossible to professours For the very Heathens by the guide nature have given order for it in their morals namely that wee should not suffer our eyes to sleep nor our eye-lids to slumber till wee had recompted all the passages of the former day But alas they had but a leaden rule to walke by turning all their strictest most glorious actions into glistring sinnes but we have a golden rule of trial which by a true touch will indeed turn us and our actions into the purest gold It is a double shame therefore that they in this should shame us this same point was a particular of Moses his Petition So teach us to number our daies that we may apply our hearts to wisdome There is no better waies to thriue than for a man to be a good accomptant to observe well his losses and his gaines his receits and his layings out what is owing to him what he oweth to others This gaines a wise heart or a heart of wisdome saith Moses which is more worth then all the wealth in the world This is the only meanes whereby to redeem the time in which phrase the Apostle implieth the calling a mans self to accompt and his actions as thrifty Merchants doe the Apostles words looke both backe to the time past advising us to make good one time what wee lose at another which cannot be done without reckoning with our selves and also forward to the time to come injoyning us to take all occasion and opportunity of serving the Lord with more strictnesse sincerity and alacrity then heretofore we have done suppose it be with temporall losse or incommodityt he very word Redeeme includeth this evidently that for our profits ease and pleasing of others we put off or altogether neglect the casting up of our accompts now if wee will redeeme that losse wee must be content to part with all these to become good accomptants not that men hereby should neglect their callings for this wil make them more strict sincere and diligent in their callings but as to this strict course and the attending it many incommodities are incident For you must know the Divell World Flesh and it may be some of the houshold are no friends to it So we must accompt all are for Cyphers for the furthering our accompts These strict accomptants must make this a part of their reckoning that the Crosse will follow them for the bearing whereof they must resolve upon selfe-denyall with the hatred of father and mother wife and children and life it selfe which shall be no disadvantage to them for Christs sake and life and death is to such advantage Of the necessity of our summoning up of ourselves and our wayes the Apostle gives good reasons First wee must walke strictly not declining a haires
the spirit according to that undeniable position God heareth not sinners but if any man be a worshipper of God and doth his will him he heareth viz. he heareth not nor granteth the desires of such as live in any sin but such as worship him according to his will and live accordingly have their desires granted But a party family or nation that liveth in any sin God will not hear them If I regard iniquity in my heart saith David or look upon it with a love to it God will not heare me Instances of this are innumerable in the Scripture The Lord telleth the Israelites for choosing Saul for their King that they should cry out in that day and hee would not heare them So all that set at naught the counsell of God when feare desolation and destruction commeth upon them They shall call upon the Lord but hee will not answer they shall seek him early but shall not find him Will men steale and rob commit murther and uncleannesse and conspire against God by impiety and iniquity as God saith by Ieremie yea will they hide it under their tongue and will they cry unto the Lord when unavoidable evill commeth upon them yea they shall cry saith the Lord but I will not hearken unto them For the farther confirmation of this point look these places Ezech. 8. to the 19. Micha 3. to v. 4. Zach. 7. 13. Did God ever heare the Israelites for all their teares supplications and cryes under the oppression of the Philistines untill such time as they put away their strange Gods yea their beloved Idols Baal and Ashteroth No sure witnesse the word neither will he to others till they doe the like yea God doth not onely deny to heare his people though they make many prayers but to enter so much as a parly with them till they put away the evill of their doings from before him Yea let the formalist hypocrite or hollow-hearted petitioner free from outward touch yet hiding iniquity under his tongue let him I say carry the matter as cleanly as he can yet God will not heare him witnesse that in Iob What is the hope of the Hypocrite will God heare his cry when trouble commeth upon him No sure the interrogation is a vehement negation a good reason is given of it As hee delighted not in God make what shew he can so God delighteth not in his prayers for they are not the prayers of the spirit neither hath he clensed his heart for the spirit to reside in That thou maist bee sure that thy prayer is from the spirit bee sure to walk in the Spirit submit thy selfe to the guidance of the spirit wash thy heart and make it clean wash thy hands in innocency and then compasse the Altar of the Lord with successe or as the Apostle pray every where lifting up holy hands without wrath or doubting On this place one speaketh well the hands are holy when the heart is cleane further in the Text observe three remarkable conditions of prayer holinesse in a mans self love towards his brother and faith towards God prayers thus qualified shall surely be heard for Amen hath ingaged his promise for it Iehovah is neer to all that call upō him in truth the Lord is far from the wicked but hee heareth the prayers of the righteous But some of Gods people will here object that they feel a great deale of rebellion of sin in them as carnality hate infidelity pronesse to evill aversnesse to good pride hypocrisie selfe-love and the like a world of disorder in the affections a flat repugnancy in the will an apparant impossibility of selfe-deniall In a word the whole inner and the outward man is nothing but a confused masse of sin Can the spirit govern guide such a one where there is nothing but rebellion against the Spirit And if the Spirit beare not the sway in all over all though I am somewhat affected in prayer yet I pray not by the spirit at all because I want the guidance of the spirit To this I answer As the aforesaid graces accompanying the spirit of prayer may be in a childe of God in a very weake measure without sense feeling yet true in their own nature so the lusting of the flesh against the spirit may and doth mightily domineer in them so that they are carnall and sold under sin yea they have a law in their members rebelling against the law of the Spirit whereby they are led captive to the law of sinne which thing was the matter of the blessed Apostle's complaint making him to cry out Wretched man that I am who shall deliver mee from this body of death And yet the spirit lusting against the flesh will hold his own not onely overcōming but giving good evidence from the very strife that he reignes and rules there maugre the heart of the flesh by which they come at the length to thanke God through our Lord Iesus Christ that with the mind they serve the Law of God though with the flesh the Law of sin But Paul yee will say spake this of himselfe as of his unregenerate estate For answer The Papists would have it so and some of the Fathers take it so amongst whom Austin was one of that mind but upon better consideration reversed his judgment and that upon good grounds for the Apostle speaketh of himselfe of his present estate which none can deny to be regenerate Againe to will was present with him hee delighted in the Law of God and thanked him for his deliverance all which are evidences of a regenerate estate But this is strange say you that hee should be carnall sould under sin since the Saints are bought with a price war not after the flesh For answer he was not carnall in the service of the flesh as the unregenerate are but hee was carnall in respect of his pronesse to give way to the flesh So he was sold under sin and not as Ahab who willingly inslaved himselfe to sin but as Ioseph a captive or slave against his will O but you will say if it were so then these were Pauls strong stragling motions of cōcupiscence not breaking out in effect but I am not onely troubled with the first and second motions of sin but I am foyled with the very actions of sin I answer was not that Pauls case That which I doe I allow not for what I would that I doe not but what I hate that doe I where hee sheweth himselfe often to be so foiled by his carnall desires that he did that which in the inner man he did not desire but rather hate And so it is with the best of Gods people who both in words actions crosse their inward desires Yea but where lyeth the difference of failings and falls of the regenerate and unregenerate heart I answer in the chiefe
commander routs all those rebellious thoughts yea and taking them on a sudden reserveth them in chaines for execution then he brings up or rather beateth up these disordered forces or faculties of the soul with sorrow shame enough to their neglected service which service being done then hee sheweth them what base slaves had caused them to recoile from so glorious and gainfull a service of so great a God what a commander they had forsaken and what dangerous and shamefull hazard they had brought themselves into at the consideration whereof their hearts smite them they abhorre their owne soules they weep bitterly till they leave a Bochino or place of weeping behinde them to set their feet upō their necks and doe execution upon those slavish Canaanites to whom they had shamefully inslaved thēselves which I doubt not but many have a care to doe yet when they have done all they can some will escape in a corner starting out now and then to doe them a mischiefe at unawares As they pray therefore so let them watch But with the unregenerate man it is nothing so for hee can draw nigh to God with his lips but keep his heart far enough off and yet his heart never smiteth him hee is content to have a Dove in his hand and a Hog in his heart thought is free with him and that is the mark of a slave It is one thing to let Traitors and plaguie Rogues in at doores by negligence so to bee troubled with getting them out and another thing to keep open house for them The fayrest sun-shine may bee over-clouded but darknes it selfe can never be light As for the interposition of Sathans suggestions let that be set on Sathans score Last of all some will say they are so far from the aid and assistance of the spirit in prayer that they neither can pray nor dare pray nor have they any minde to pray can those bee the children of God I answer though they bee in an exceeding great strait yet they may bee Gods children for al that for though they cannot neither dare pray yet they desire to pray though they have no desire yet they wish they might desire But we must learn to distinguish between parties in a due temper both of body and soule and themselves distempered in one or both sometimes through the distemper of black fumes of melancholy the imagination is corrupt sometimes the conscience is wounded with the sense of sin the want of grace or with the trouble of some blasphemous or wicked thoughts sometimes the Lord is pulling a sinner as a brand out of the fire leaveth sparkles of his terrible wrath in him for his greater humiliatiō sometimes the Lord may seal the heart and close up the mouth for the trial of the party himselfe the example of others and the manifestation of his owne power in keeping of thē in that case and his mercy in the inlarging of their hearts according to the time of restraint In all these cases the soule may be clear of the things the exercise of prayer barred and yet the spirit of prayer remain which may be evidenced by the fruits of the spirit which are a tendernesse of conscience a hatred of sin love to the Saints and obedience to God So much for the fourth note wherein I have been the larger by reason of the power of the spirit herein The fift evidence of Prayer made by the spirit is that spirituall vigor or fervency of it which as a consuming fire from heaven causeth the odours of the prayers of the Saints to ascend like incense To this effect is that of the Apostle The spirit maketh request for vs with grones that cannot bee expressed By these unpressible grones is meant the vehemency or fervency of Prayer being the work of the spirit which worketh after an unspeakable maner in the hearts of all that pray this is that wrestling that prevaileth with God this is that which stirreth up a man to lay hold on God this is that which layeth violent hold on him whom the soule loveth This was the practice of our Saviour Christ who in the daies of his flesh offered up prayers and supplications with strong cryes and teares Against this his own practice Christ cannot stand out witnesse that parable of the importunate prevailing widow and shall not God revenge his elect that cry day night The want of this wrongeth Gods cause maketh the enimie prevaile and our prayers to be forceles and fruitlesse yea our courses uncomfortable whereas on the fervency of prayer all the contrary effects attend This fervency was Luthers excellency and in this hee and many others found most good This smiteth and overturneth both the inward outward Amalakite If thou wilt sacrifice take fire with thee the want whereof may justly invert the saying of Abraham to thy disadvantage here is the sacrifice but whereis the fire The golden Censer receiveth no Odours without fire more or lesse to consume them and according to the height or lownesse of the fire the motion of prayer is the swifter or flower The lazie cold frozen prayer prevaileth nothing with God but by weeping and making earnest supplication we may finde God in Bethel and speak to God and prevail with God as Iacob did Let us then as Paul saith labour fervently in prayer that the power thereof may bee an evidence of the spirit in us but herein wee must take heed of the deceitfulnesse of strange fire in the heart for as a burning feaver or the fit of an intermitting Ague or a hecktick disposition may manifest more heat outwardly to the touch yea inflame the inward parts with more ardency or scorching consuming heat begetting an unquenchable thirst by drinking up the radical moisture of the Spirits then is to bee felt in a due temperature So a feverish heat or counterfeit zeale may exalt an hypocrite high in the outward action yea he may have a deceiving tast of the power of God seeming thirst of the glory of God and a preposterous desire of honour and immortality yea all this may be like to the former heat and thirst in nature an unnaturall adventitious heat not truly inlivening maintaining the life of prayer but consuming and devouring the supposed spirit of prayer Of these two if you desire to know the essentiall difference I take it to consist in these particulars First this fervency is a sanctifying saving fruit of the spirit wrought immediatly in the heart and affections whereby the understanding faculties are much sublimated and refined whereon followeth a more pure conception with a swifter directer motion of prayer because both heart and understanding are quickned and agitated by true celestiall heat Neither must you conceive that the fervency of affection must carry the understanding without information from it this were zeal without knowledge w ch the spirit