The Christians converse with God, or, The insufficiency and uncertainty of human friendship and…

But O how much better have I found the friendship of the All-sufficient God! His Love hath not only pitied me, but relieved me: He hath not only been as it were afflicted with me in my afflictions, but he hath delivered me seasonably, and powerfully, and sweetly hath he delivered me: And when he had once told me that my afflictions were his own, I had no reason to doubt of a deliverance. My burdened mind hath been eased by his Love, which was but more burdened by the fruitless Love of all my friends. Oft have I come to man for help, and ease, and comfort, and gone away as from an empty Cistern, that had no water to cool my thirst; but God hath been a present help: Could I but get near him, I was sure of Light, how great soever was my former darkness: Could I but get near him, I was sure of warming quickening Life, how dead soever I had been before: But all my misery was, that I could not get near him! My darkened estranged guilty soul, could not get quieting and satisfying acquaintance: My lumpish ⟨p. 123⟩heart lay dead on earth, and would not stir, or quickly fall down again, if by any Celestial force it began to be drawn up, and move a little towards him: My carnal mind was entangled in diverting vanities: And thus I have been kept from communion with my God. Kept! not by force or humane tyranny; not by bars or bolts, or distance of a place, or by the lowness of my condition; nor by any misrepresentations o• reproach of man; but, alas, by my self, by the darkness and deadness, and sluggishness, and earthliness, and fleshliness, and passions of a naughty heart. These have been my bars, and bolts, and jailers; These are they that have kept me from my God: Had it not been for these I might have got nearer to him; I might have walked with him, and dwelt with him; yea dwelt in him, and he in me: and then I should not have mist any friends, nor felt mine enemies: And is it my sinful distance from my God that hath been my loss, my wilderness, my woe! And is it a nearer admittance to the presence of his Love that must be my recovery and my joy, if ever I attain to joy! O then my soul, lay hold on Christ the Reconciler, and in him and ⟨p. 124⟩by him draw near to God: And cease from man whose breath is in his nostrils: Love God in his Saints, and delightfully converse with Christ in them, while thou hast opportunity.