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{The Application
Application for the Godly
The Right Performance of Holy Duties
Directions for the Duty of Prayer
Come to Prayer with Actual and Great Expectation}
Come to prayer with an actual and great expectation of obtaining help and grace from God. Do not barely impose this duty upon yourself as a task. Rather, excite and encourage yourselves to it by looking for a return. Think what it is that you would have and look to receive it. The reason why we obtain no more in prayer is because we expect no more. God usually answers us according to our own hearts. Narrow hearts and low expectations usually get as little as they look for or desire. Large expectations are ordinarily answered with large returns. Expectation will put life into the work of prayer; you will pray with most enlarged hearts when you are most full of hopes. The reward that is looked for in the evening will much encourage and quicken the labor of the day. Do not fear to expect too much from Heaven. Do not think narrowly of God’s mercy and compassion and you will not find God’s mercy and compassion to be narrow. Open your mouth wide and He will fill it. God will never upbraid His beggars for looking for too great alms. He has enough to supply them and He has a heart to bestow it. God will never say to you, “You are too bold. You ask for too much, too much grace and too much holiness. Why cannot less content you?” God has given you a commission to ask what you want, not up to one half, but up to the whole of His kingdom. The kingdom you will have if no less will meet your need. Christians, be thankful for every little gift you receive, but look for much. Be thankful for every little thing; every little thing received from God is much. A drop from that spring is worth the world, but do not content yourselves with some drops when, if you wish, the spring may be yours. The King of Glory loves to give like a king and will never say, “This is too much for a king to give or for a beggar to receive.” Since He has given you leave, do not fail to speak; enlarge your desires and let your eye be as big as your belly. God has promised you, and therefore you may promise yourselves. Whatever you ask, if it is good for you, you will not ask in vain. Oh, if we had a large amount in our eye when we came before the throne of grace, we would be there more often, and yet still return with our load of gifts. So Christians, remember this whenever you come to beg: look to receive. Do not go to prayer as to a dry breast that is likely to yield no milk or as to an empty cistern that will hold no water.
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