Heaven taken

4. Consider the need we have of those things which we ask in prayer. We come to ask the favour of God; and if we have not his love, all that we enjoy is cursed to us. We pray that our souls may be washed in Christs blood; and if he wash us not, we have no part in him^*. These are such mercies, ⟨p. 38⟩that if God deny us, we are for ever undone. Therefore what violence had we need put forth in prayer? When will a man be earnest, if not when he is begging for his life?

1. *Joh. 1•. 8.

5. Let it provoke violence in prayer to consider, those things which we ask, God hath a mind to grant. If a Son ask nothing but what his Father is willing to bestow, he may be the more earnest in his suit. We go to God for pardon of sin, and no work more pleasing to him than to seal pardons. Mercy is his delight, Micah 7. 18. We pray to God for an holy heart, and this prayer is according to his will, 1 Thes. 4. 3. This is the will of God, your sanctification. We pray that God would give us an heart to love him. How pleasing must this request needs be to God! This, if any thing, may excite prayer, and carry it in a fiery Chariot up to Heaven, when we know we pray for nothing but what God is more willing to grant than we are to ask.

5. Let it provoke violence in prayer to consider, those things which weask, God hath a mind to grant. If a Son ask nothing but what his Father is willing to bestow, he may be the more earnest in his suit. We go to God for pardon of sin, and no work more pleasing to him than to seal pardons. Mercy is his delight,