Search -
The Book of Private Devotion, a Series of Prayers and Meditations
The Book of Private Devotion a Series of Prayers and Meditations Author:Hannah More Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAP. II. ON THE NEGLECT OF PRIVATE PRAYER. How lamentable is it that a duty so obvious, a privilege so great, a means of grace so enriching to the soul, e... more »ver should be neglected! What are the causes to be assigned for it? If the neglect be total and permanent, m- penilency of heart may be suspected as the cause. To perceive no necessity for secret prayer—to have no mind, no will, no heart to such a duty—to make no effort to discharge it, and to feel no remorse of conscience for neglecting it, are fearful signs of an unhumbled, unrenewed, impenitent heart. Whilst the cause remains, the effect win continue; therefore, let such" beseech God to grant them true repent' ance, and his Holy Spirit," that their indisposition to call upon him in private may be removed, that their secret prayers may be accepted, and openly rewarded, by him, ''and that the rest of their hfe may be pure and holy, so that at the last they may come to his eternal joy, through Jesus Christ our Lord." If the Keglect be temporary and voluntary, some sin, or sins, committed against light and knowlidge may be the cause Such sins load the conscience with guilt, weaken the spiritual strength of the Christian, becloud his evidences of grace, make him a terror to himself, and afraid of realizing the Divine Presence, Then he is shy of drawing near to God in secret; and as our first parents, from conscious guilt, would have "hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God. amongst the trees of the garden;" so he, by neglecting the positive and known duty of secret prayer, flies, as it were, from the Lord's presence, to forget his transgression and acquire his former confidence, by occupying his time and thoughts with the affairs of this world. —But this is folly. To add sin to sin— the sin of omissio...« less