[4.] Meditation on the mediation and intercession of Christ, for our encouragement, is of the same importance and tendency. To this end spiritually is he proposed unto us as abiding in the discharge of his priestly office, Heb. iv. 15, 16, x. 19-22. And this is not only an encouragement unto and in our supplications, but a means to in-
CHAP. IX.] DUTIES INFERRED FROM PRECEDING DISCOURSE. 323
crease and strengthen the grace and gift of prayer itself; for the mind is thereby made ready to exercise itself about the effectual in- terposition of the Lord Christ at the throne of grace in our behalf, which hath a principal place and consideration in the prayers of all believers. And hereby, principally, may we try our faith of what race and kind it is, whether truly evangelical or no. Some relate or talk that the eagle tries the eyes of her young ones by turning them to the sun ; which if they cannot look steadily on, she rejects them as spurious. We may truly try our faith by immediate intuitions of the Sun of Righteousness. Direct faith to act itself immediately and directly on the incarnation of Christ and his mediation ; and if it be not of the right kind and race it will turn its eye aside unto any thing else. God's essential properties, his precepts and promises, it can bear a fixed consideration of; but it cannot fix itself on the person and mediation of Christ with steadiness and satisfaction. There is, indeed, much profession of Christ in the world, but little faith in him.
[5.] Frequency in exercise is the immediate way and means of the increase of this gift and its improvement. All spiritual gifts are bestowed on men to be employed and exercised ; for " the manifes- tation of the Spirit is given to every one to profit withal," 1 Cor. xii. 7. God both requireth that his talents be traded withal, that his gifts be employed and exercised, and will also call us to an ac- count of the discharge of the trust committed unto us in them. See 1 Pet. iv. 10, 11. Wherefore, the exercise of this and of the like gifts tends unto their improvement on a double account; for, — 1st. Whereas they reside in the mind after the manner and nature of a habit or a faculty, it is natural that they should be increased and strengthened by exercise, as all habits are by a multiplication of acts proceeding from them. So also by desuetude they will weaken, decay, and in the issue be utterly lost and perish. So is it with many as to the gift of prayer. They were known to have received it in some good measure of usefulness unto their own edification and that of others; but upon a neglect of the use and exercise of it in public and private, — which seldom goes alone without some secret or open enormities, — they have lost all their ability, and cannot open their mouths on any occasion in prayer beyond what is prescribed unto them or composed for them. But the just hand of God is also in this matter, depriving them of what they had, for their abominable neglect of his grace and bounty therein. 2dly. The increase will be added unto, by virtue of God's blessing on his own appointment ; for having bestowed these gifts for that end, where persons are faithful in the discharge of the trust committed unto them, he will graciously add unto them in what they have. This is the eternal law concern-
324 WORK OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN PRAYER. [BOOK VII.
ing the dispensation of evangelical gifts, " Unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance : but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath," Matt. xxv. 29. It is not the mere having or not having of them that is intended, but the using or not using of what we have received, as is plain in the context. Now, I do not say that a man may or ought to exer- cise himself in prayer merely with this design, that he may preserve and improve his gift. It may, indeed, in some cases be lawful for a man to have respect hereunto, but not [to this] only ; as where a mas- ter of a family hath any one in his family who is able to discharge that duty and can attend unto it, yet he will find it his wisdom not to omit his own performance of it, unless he be contented that his gift, as to the use of his family, should wither and decay. But all that I plead is, that he who conscientiously, with respect unto all the ends of prayer, doth abound in the exercise of this gift, shall assuredly thrive and grow in it, or at least preserve it in answer unto the mea- sure of the gift of Christ : for I do not propose these things as though every man in the diligent use of them may constantly grow and thrive in that part of the gift which consists in utterance and expres- sion; for there is a "measure of the gift of Christ" assigned unto every one, whose bounds he shall not pass, Eph. iv. 7. But in these paths and ways the gift which they have received will be preserved, kept thrifty and flourishing ; and from the least beginnings of a par- ticipation of it, they will be carried on unto their own proper mea- sure, which is sufficient for them.