[4.] The Holy Spirit of God : Jude 20, ' Praying in the Holy Ghost.' His assistance is necessary to prayer, not only to sanctify our hearts, but to excite our desires and direct our addresses to God ; so that we are enabled and raised to perform this duty with more ardency and regularity than we of ourselves could attain unto. A christian hath both flesh and spirit in him, and they remain in him as active prin- ciples, always lusting against each other, Gal. v. 17. In prayer we feel it ; for the saints speak sometimes in a mixed dialect, half the language of Ashdod and half of Canaan, both of the flesh and of the spirit, only the one overruleth the other by the power of the Holy Ghost. Take it in either property of prayer — confidence, or fervency of desire.
(1.) For confidence: Jonah ii. 4, 'I said, I am cast out of thy sight ; yet I will look again to thy holy temple.' There is a plain conflict between faith and unbelief ; unbelief's words are first out, as if we were utterly rejected out of God's care and favour ; yet faith will not sufi'er us to keep off from God, and therefore corrects and unsaith again what unbelief had said before ; ' Yet I will look again to thy holy temple,' try what God will do for me. So Ps. xciv. 18, ' When I said. My foot slippeth ; thy mercy, 0 Lord, held me up ; ' yet there is relief in God when all their own confidence and courage faileth them.
(2.) In point of fervency. The flesh valueth, esteemeth, earnestly craveth temporal mercies ; fancieth a condition of health, wealth, liberty, and worldly conveniencies, as best for us. We admire carnal happiness, Ps. cxliv; but the spirit corrects the judgment of the flesh. There is a higher and better happiness ; and that we should mainly seek after, and all our worldly interests should be subordinated there- unto. Now it is not merely the spirit or new nature in us which doth hold out in these conflicts, but the new nature assisted by the Spirit of God, who helpeth us in all our infirmities, and to whom religious manners showeth we must ascribe all that we have and do. All our faith and fervency cometh from him ; and without his assistance we should either sink under the difficulties, or be cold and careless in our requests.
2. In what sense God is said to know the mind of the Spirit.
1. By way of distinction.
2. By way of approbation.
[1.] By way of distinction. God perfectly knoweth the mind and
252 SERMONS UPON ROMANS VIII. [SeR. XXXVI.
intention of those groans wlucli the Spirit exciteth in his own children ; he knoweth what eometh from the natural, what from the canal, what from the divine Spirit ; to what principles these motions belong. For he ' weigheth the spirits,' Prov. xvi. 2 ; that is, he doth so exactly know them, as if they were put into a balance ; what principles, motives, and aims we are acted by ; and observeth not only the matter of the prayer, but the disposition of the petitioner ; whether the frame of his heart be christian and gospel-like ; humble, holy, and heavenly ; or else it hath a carnal bias upon it.
[2.] He knoweth by way of approbation, that he doth regard and accept the groans of the spirit ; for words of knowledge imply allow- ance, respect, approbation ; as Ps. i. 6, ' God knoweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked shall perish ; ' approveth, favoureth, prospereth, as the opposite clause manifesteth. ■ As Christ's not know- ing the wicked implieth their rejection, Mat. vii. 23 : so he knoweth the mind of the Sjiirit, he doth regard and accept of what is of the Spirit in prayer. The groans of believers are more than the pompous petitions of hypocrites ; it is not luscious eloquence which God regardeth, but serious devotion ; if there be holy breathings after communion with him ; if your prayers be not senseless, without a due feeling of your necessities and wants ; nor heartless, without a desire of the graces and mercies you stand in need of, God will accept you.
3. Why this is such a comfort and benefit to the children of God.
[1.] God's knowledge by way of distinction between the moans of nature and the groans of the Spirit.
(1.) Because sometimes they do not speak in prayer, but join with others ; you make it your prayer if you accompany it with your sighs and groans ; it is not the speaker only, but all that consent by the serious motions of their hearts. When the gifted prayed in the primitive church, the t'StwTT;?, the private person — we translate it ' the unlearned ' — was to say amen, 1 Cor. xiv. 16 ; and then it was his prayer as much as the prayer of him that spake ; their hearty amen was signaculimi Jidei, et voium desiderii. a hearty assent to the prayer, or a hearty expression of their earnest desire.
(2.) Sometimes they cannot speak and put their desires into a lan- guage, as oppressed with troubles. God knoweth the secret groans of our hearts, when you cannot give them the vent of expression : Ps. xxxviii. 9, ' Lord, all my desire is before thee ; my groaning is not hid from thee.' The soul is so confounded that we cannot put our desires into distinct thoughts and words ; but yet they are as formal speech before God, for he can interpret the most secret motions of our hearts : Exod. ii. 24, ' God heard their groans, and remembered his covenant ; ' Ps. xii. 5, ' For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the Lord ; ' Ps. vi. 8. ' For the Lord hath heard the voice of my weeping. ' Such sighs, groans, tears, have an intelligible language in heaven.