Section I. — First, Because without this, it is not a reasonable service, for we know not what we do. God calls for your reasonable service, Rom. xii. 1, which some oppose to the legal sacrifices which they offered up ; in the gospel we are to offer ourselves. The soul and spirit of a man is the man. Why did not God lay a law on beasts to worship him, but because they have not a rational soul to understand and reflect upon their own actions ? And will God accept that worship from man, wherein he doth not exercise that faculty which distinguisheth him from a beast ? ' Shew yourselves men,' Isa. xlvi. 8. And truly he that worships the true God ignorantly, is brutish in his knowledge, as well as he that prays to a false god. Secondly, Because the understanding is the leading faculty of the soul ; the inward worship of the heart is the chief work ; and the other powers of the soul are disabled if they want this guide. As for those violent passions of soiTow and joy, which sometimes appear in ignorant worshippers, they are spurious. Christ's sheep, like Jacob's, conceive by the eye. The saint's eye is enlightened to see the majesty and glorious holiness of God, and then it mourns before him in the sense of his own vileness. 'Now mine eye seeth thee : wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes,' Job xlii. 5, 7. Again, by an eye of faith he beholds the goodness and love of God to poor sinners in Christ, and in particular to himself, and this sight affects his heart to love and rely on him, which it is impossible the ignorant soul should do.
Section II. — But you say. What is necessary for the praying soul to know? First, That he to whom he directs his prayer is the true God. Religious wor- ship is an incommunicable flower in the crown of the Deity, and that both in- ward and outward. We are religiously to worship him only, Avho, by reason of his infinite perfections, deserves our supreme love. He must have the crown, that owns the kingdom ; 'the kingdom and jJower' are God's, therefore the glory of religious worship belongs to him alone. Matt. vi. 13. Angels are the highest order of creatures, but we are forbid to worship any of the host of heaven : Dent. xvii. 3, ' Who would not fear thee, O king of nations? For to thee it doth appertain.' Where fear is put for religious worship, as appears by the place. "Tlie want of this knowledge filled the heathen world with idol- atry, for when they found any virtue or excellency in the creature, they adored and worshipped it. Secondly, There is required a knowledge of this true God, what his nature is. * He that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him,' Heb. xi. 6. A . perfect knowledge of the Divine perfection is not to be gained by a finite being. He was right who said, none indeed knows God thus, but God himself; yet a scripture knowledge of him is necessary to the right performance of this duty. The want of understanding his omniscience and infinite mercy, is the cause of vain babbling, and a conceit to prevail by long prayers, which our Saviour charges upon the heathen, and prevents in his disciples by acquainting them with these attributes. Matt. vi. 7, 8. They came rather to revere God, than to beg. The ignorance of this glorious Majesty is the cause why many are so irreverently familiar with God in their expressions. We are bid to 'be sober, watching unto prayer!' Truly, there is an insobriety in our very language, when we do not clothe the desires of our hearts with such humble expressions, as may signify the awe and dread of his sacred INIajesty. In a word, the rea- son why men dare come reeking out of the adulterous embraces of their lusts, and stretch forth their unwashed hands to heaven in prayer, is because they know not God to be of such infinite piu-ity as will have no fellowship with the workers of iniquity : 'Thou thoughtest I was altogether such a one as thvself,' Psa. 1. 21. Thirdly, We must understand the matter of our prayers, without which we cannot in faith say Amen to our own prayers, but may ask that which neither becomes us to desire, nor is honourable for God to give. This Christ rebuked, when she in the gospel put up her ambitious request for he.v
IN THE SPIRIT. 745