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IIO
SINS AND SORROWS SPREAD
BEFORE GOD.
tSERM.
4I.
not
unbosom
my
whole self to
him
?
Shall
I
check the
devout appetites and
affections
of
my
heart,
because
I
do
not
find
words in
my
Prayer
Book fit
to
express them?
Shall
I quench
the
blessed
Spirit
thus,
and
limit
my
con
-
'verse
with
God
?"
I
allow forms
of
prayer
well
composed,
to
he useful
helps
for
younger, or
meaner christians;
or,
indeed,
for
all persons, when
the spirits are
low
and
languishing,
and
the
heart
in
a heavy
or
cold
temper
:
But at
such a
glorious
season
to
confine
a
holy soul tó
a
few
good ex-
pressions,
written
down before,
how
great
an injury
would
it
be to its
divine
pleasure
and profit?
REFLECTION
.IV.
How comfortable a consideration
may he
drawn
from
my discourse,
by
those
that
have
never
a
friend upon
earth,
that
there
is
a friend
in
heaven,
to whom they
may
tell
all
their
circumstances,
and
all
their
sorrows'.
There
are
some persons, in this world,
so
mean and
so
wretched,
that
they
are
ready to think,
at
least,
that
they have never
a
friend,
and are
apt
to
complain
that
they are altogether
friendless.
But there
is
a
God, one
that
they
may
be
sure
is
their everlasting friend,
when
they are
willing to
enter into
a
state of friendship
with
him
:
when they have commenced friendship
with him
by the blood of Jesus, the
great
Reconciler, and
by
the
working
of
the reconciling
Spirit;
then
let
them improve
this consideration
with sweet
jdy.
They
have
a
friend,
in
heaven, before
whom
they
can
spread
all
their
sor-
rows,
though
they be friendless on
earth;
though
they
are
forced to
say
of their
souls,
"
There
is
no
refuge
for
them
in
the
world,"
yet they can
say,
God
is
their
re-
fuge
:
They
can
express
to him
their
various
sufferings,
and their
several
difficulties,
and they can
be
sure
of
a
helper
in
heaven.
REFLECTION
V.
Lastly,
That
future
state
of
glory must be blessed in-
deed, where
we
shall be ever
near
to
God,
even
to
bis
seat, and have no sorrows to
tell
hiin
of.
If
it
4e
so
delightful a thing
to come
near to the seat
of
Go[
here
upon earth,
to
mourn before
him,
and
to tell him
all
our
circumstances, and
all
our sorrows;
how
pleasura-
ble.
a
blessedness
must
that
of
heaven
be,
where
we
shall
be
ever rejoicing
before
him, as
Christ Jesus
was
before