Chapter IL
Three cases propounded : the first concerning prayers for the church, and for the accomplishment of such promises as may fall out in ages to come.
Now as for rules and helps to find out God s meaning towards you in your prayers, and to spy out answers, and how to know when God doth anything in answer to your prayers, this is the next thing to be handled : wherein,
first, I will answer some cases and queries which may fall out in several sorts of prayers, about the answering of them.
1. As, first, concerning prayers put up for the church, for the accomplish ment of such things as fall out in ages to come.
2. Concerning prayers made for others, of your friends, kindred, &c.
3. Concerning those prayers, whether for yourselves or others, wherein others join with you.
1. For the first:
(1.) There may be some prayers which you must be content never your selves to see answered in this world, the accomplishment of them not falling out in your time : such as are those you* haply make for the calling of the
Jews, the utter downfall of God s enemies, the flourishing of the gospel, the
full purity and liberty of God s ordinances, the particular flourishing and good of the society and place you live in. All you whose hearts are right do treasure up many such prayers as these, and sow much of such precious seed, which you must be content to have the church, it may be, in after ages to
reap ; all which prayers are not yet lost, but will have answers : for as God
is an eternal God, and Christ s righteousness an everlasting righteousness/ and therefore of eternal efficacy, Dan. ix. 24, being offered up by the eternal
Spirit, Heb. ix. 14, so are prayers also, which are the work of the eternal
Spirit of Christ, made to that God in his name, and in him are eternally accepted, and of eternal force, and therefore may take place in after ages. So the prayer that St Stephen made for his persecutors took place in Saul when St Stephen was dead. So David s prayer against Judas, Ps. cix. 8, 9, took effect above a thousand years after, as appears, Acts i. 20. So the
prayers of the church, for three hundred years, in the primitive times, that
kings might come to the knowledge of the truth, and they lead peaceable and quiet lives, in all godliness and honesty, (which St Paul, in Nero s time, exhorted unto, 1 Tim. ii. 2,) were not answered and accomplished till Constantine s time, when the church brought forth a man-child, Rev. xii. 5.
So, Isa. Iviii., after he had exhorted to, and given directions for fasting and
prayer in a right manner, he adjoineth this promise, Thou shalt raise up the foundations of many generations ; thou shalt be called, The repairer of the breach ; namely, for this, because his fasting and prayers might have influ ence into many ages yet to come, in the accomplishment of what was prayed for. And that which Christ says of the apostles reaping the fruit of St John the Baptist s ministry, and the seed he had sown, is in like manner
366 THE RETURN OF PRAYERS. [CHAP. II.
herein verified, John iv. 37, One soweth and another reapeth. And in
this sense, that which the Papists say is true, that there is a common trea
sury of the church, not of their merits, but of their prayers. There are
bottles of tears a-filling, vials a-filling to be poured out for the destruction of God s enemies. What a collection of prayers hath there been these many ages towards it ! And that may be one reason why God will do such great things towards the end of the world, even because there hath been so great a stock of prayers going for so many ages, which is now to be returned. And herein it falls out to us in our prayers as in their prophecies to the
prophets of old: 1 Pet. i. 11, The Spirit in them did signify the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things that are now revealed. And thus is it in the spirit of prayer, which is instead of the spirit of prophecy; for we pray through the guidance of the Spirit, who teacheth us what to ask, for many things that come to pass in after
ages.
(2.) Only at present in prayer it may be that thou hast revealed unto thee, by a secret impression made on thy spirit, that these things shall come to
pass, and so hast thy faith confirmed in them, and withal an evidence, that even for thy prayers, among others, God will perform them ; and that the, contribution of thy prayers doth help to make up the sum. And upon such
prayers God usually for the present also testifies the acceptation of a man s
person, and reveals himself most to him that he is his, as he did to Moses : he never revealed his love to Moses more than when he prayed most for
God s people. And haply thou hast that as one of thy best evidences of the
uprightness of thy heart, that thou canst pray for the church s good, though for a long time to come, which thou mayest never behold with thine eyes, even as David also did, and rejoiced in it.
(3.) And when they are accomplished, and thou in heaven, thy joy will
surely be the more full for these thy prayers
: as at the conversion of those thou hast prayed for, so at the ruin of the church s enemies, &c., whom thou didst pray against; for if there be joy in heaven at the conversion of a
sinner, as at the birth of a new prince and heir of heaven, then haply in a
proportion he shall rejoice most whose prayers had most hand in it, and a
special interest therein. And so as thy other works, so thy prayers follow
thee, and the fruit of them, as Jeremiah speaks, chap. xvii. 10 ; and, how
ever, yet at the day of judgment thou shalt rejoice, as well as they that en
joyed the fruit of thy prayers in their times, thou having sown the seed of
: Both he that sows and he that reaps shall then rejoice
their happiness
together, as Christ says, John iv. 36.
CHAP. III.] THE RETURN OF PRAYERS. 367