fully believe that every blessing which is asked will certainly be granted. She tries, therefore, as she listens to the words of the prayer, to believe this. Perhaps the first request is, that God would pour out His Spirit upon all present, and purify them, and keep them that day devoted to His service, and free from all sin. Now she thinks it right to pray for this: she sincerely desires it, but she cannot really believe that it will in every case be fully granted. Then she reproves herself for her unbelief. She struggles against the feeling that it is improbable all present will be perfectly pure and holy during that day : she struggles against it, but she cannot conquer it. Belief rests on evidence, not on determination. The next petition is, for a powerful revival of pure religion in that neighbourhood; that, by a divine influence exerted over their hearts, Christians may be led to love their Maker more and to serve him better; and those who are living in sin may universally be awakened to a conviction of their guilt and danger, and be persuaded to serve Jehovah. Now our young Christian sincerely desires this: she hopes for it; but she is distressed, because she cannot cordially believe that it will certainly come; and she considers this feeling as a want of faith. She rises from her posture of devotion anxious and unhappy, because she does not feel absolutely sure that what she has asked will certainly be granted. Now all her difficulty arises from misunderstanding the nature of the faith which ought to be exercised in prayer. The remarks made, meant, or they ought to have meant, that we are to come to God confident that He will do what is on the whole for the best—not confident that He will do exactly what we ask. God never has given assemblies of Christians authority to mark out a course for Him to pursue, in such a sense as that He shall be necessarily bound to pursue it. He has promised to give us 66 what we ask; but still, the exceptions universally understood to be implied by this language in other cases are attached to it in this. We must offer our petitions trusting in God; believing, as the Bible expresses it, that He is, and that He is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him; but after we have offered our most earnest requests, we must leave the matter with Him. This is what is meant by the prayer of faith, so often alluded to by Christian Ministers. And this was the kind of faith our Saviour required of those who came to Him to be healed. Believest thou," he said, "that I am able to do this?" not, that I shall do it. When the Apostles and Brethren came together to pray for Peter, they were so far from believing that their prayer for his deliverance would be granted, that they were incredulous when they saw him. They trusted in God, and believed that He would do what was right. This confidence in Him was the faith they exercised. Believing that ye shall receive them, then, must mean, believing that God is able and willing to grant, except in those cases where imperious reasons compel him to deny. He sees many material considerations in every case which are entirely beyond our view; and we must leave Him to decide. It is very often said, that prayer for spiritual blessings will always be heard and granted. But we can be no more absolutely certain in this case, than in any others. God does often withhold the influences of his Spirit, as we all know full well. Who of us can tell what are the causes? Look at yonder mother. She has an only son. Her first prayer in regard to him, was, that God would make him His. She consecrated him to his Maker's service, at his earliest breath. She rocked him to sleep in infancy, singing a hymn of acknowledgment that he was the Lord's. As soon as he could understand the lesson, she taught him his duty to his Great Creator. She has often knelt with him in prayer; and her whole heart is set upon having her only son devoted to the service of God. But all her efforts are fruitless, and her prayers are not answered. Her son grows up in indifference about God; which perhaps becomes, when he has arrived at maturity, open hostility. How many such mothers there are! She was praying, too, for spiritual blessings-for the conversion of a son to God; but the Sovereign Ruler leaves him, notwithstanding these supplications, to his own chosen way. Yes, God is a Sovereign. He dispenses all His favours as he Himself thinks best. He listens to our requests, and takes them into kind consideration; but he reserves to Himself the right to make the ultimate decision. Let us then come to Him with real sincerity, and with a deep sense of our need of the blessings we ask; but always with this humble feeling, that God sees further than we, and can judge better; and that He will Himself make the ultimate decision in regard to every thing we ask. And we must remember, that this is just as true with regard to spiritual blessings as to any other. The cause of religion advances in the world in a manner which we cannot predict nor account for. I do not pretend to say precisely how far and in what respects this progress depends upon the agency of man, and how far upon power which is in the hands of God: but every one, whatever may be his ideas of the boundlessness of human freedom, acknowledges that a most important agency, in determining where the Gospel shall triumph, and where it shall fail, and in regulating its progress throughout the earth, rests in the hands of the Supreme. But who can understand the principles which guide Jehovah in the exercise of the power which he keeps in His own hand? How many secretly think that the sudden conversion of a whole city to God would be a glorious achievement of the Redeemer; and fancy, that, if we had the power over the heart which God possesses, we would produce the effect at once, and exhibit the magnificent spectacle of the undisputed reign of holiness and peace in a community of a hundred thousand!-Suppose now every real Christian in some great city were to unite in a sincere and heartfelt prayer that God would pour out His Spirit universally among them, and in a single day awaken all the multitudes around them to piety. It is indeed true, that if this united prayer should be offered, and be accompanied by the efforts which sincerity in the prayer would ensure, most uncommon effects would probably follow. But who believes that the whole city would be converted in a day? No one.-Why? Because this is not according to the analogy of God's working, in spreading the Gospel.— And why does he not work according to this analogy, converting whole communities at once; leading them to him, as he now often leads individuals in an hour of silence and solitude? Why does not God work in this manner?-Some one may say, Because Christians are so cold and negligent in duty.-Why, then, does not the power which raised up Paul raise up thousands like him now, and, enkindling within them the spirit and devotedness of the great Apostle, send them forth to bring the world at once to Him?-Who can tell? No; we cannot direct. God guides, by His own wisdom, the chariot of His coming. We can ask, but we cannot dictate. If we attempt to take the reins, He holds them up far above our reach, and the wheels roll on where God points the way. The experienced Christian who reads these remarks— which are intended to shew that God really controuls and directs every thing relating to the progress of piety in the world-will probably here say, How liable we are to pervert this truth, so as to excuse our own neglect of duty!" 66 Yes; it is so. Men are everywhere so prone to throw off responsibility from themselves, that the Minister of the Gospel is often almost afraid to describe fully and cordially God's supreme power over the heart, for fear that men will lose their sense of their own responsibility. A mother will ask, that God will change the hearts of her children; and sometimes wait, as she expresses it, for God's time to come; while she, in the mean time, does nothing; or, at most, she goes through the same formal round of duties, without acting with the spirit and enterprise and ingenuity which she would exercise, if she knew that something depended upon her own efforts. But this perversion of Scripture truth is not necessary or unavoidable. However difficult it may be for us to understand how man can be fully free and accountable, while God retains so much direct power over his heart as the Bible distinctly describes, it is possible cordially to feel the accountability, and at the same time sincerely to acknowledge the dependence. Look at the case of that Christian Teacher. She prays most earnestly that God would come and bless the school to which she belongs. She brings individual cases in secresy and solitude before God. She prays that faults may be forgiven-froward dispositions softened—and all brought under the influence of Christian love. She asks that God will pour out His Spirit, and diffuse peace and happiness over the school-room, improving every character, purifying and ennobling every heart, making the dejected happy, and the happy happier still. She has seen such an influence diffused over a school-she knows it is from above-and she looks to Him who rules human hearts, to come into her circle, with His benign influences, once more. Now does she, after this, go away and spend her time in inaction, on the ground that God only can change the heart, and that she has done all in her power by bringing the case to Him? No; she |