Yet they at last prevail, and the thing desired comes; yea, and when it is come, it sets them up anew and makes them better men, though they did spend all they had to obtain it, than ever they were before.  Wait, therefore, wait, I say, on the Lord; bid thy soul cheer up and wait.  “Blessed are all they that wait for him.”

(2.) Thou must consider that great grace is reserved for great service.  Thou desirest abundance of grace; thon doest well, and thou shalt have what shall qualify thee for the service that God has for thee to do for him, and for his name in the world.  The apostles themselves were to stay for great grace until the time their work was come.  I will not allot thy service, but assure thyself, when thy desire cometh, thou wilt have occasion for it—­new work, new trials, new sufferings, or something that will call for the power and virtue of all the grace thou shalt have to keep thy spirit even, and thy feet from slipping, while thou art exercised in new engagements.

Assure thyself thy God will not give thee straw, but he will expect brick.  “For unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required.”  Wherefore, as thou art busy in desiring more grace, be also desirous that wisdom to manage it with faithfulness may also be granted unto thee.

Thou wilt say, Grace, if I had it, will do all this for me.

It will, and will not.  It will, if thou watch and be sober; it will not, if thou be foolish and remiss.  Men of great grace may grow consumptive in grace, and idleness may turn him that wears a plush jacket into rags.  David was once a man of great grace, but his sin made the grace which he had so to shrink up and dwindle away as to make him cry out, O take not thy Spirit utterly from me!

(3.) Or, perhaps God withholds what thou wouldst have, that it may be the more prized by thee when it comes.  “Hope deferred maketh the heart sick; but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.”

(4.) Lastly.  But dost thou think that thy more grace will exempt thee from temptations?  Alas, the more grace, the greater trials.  Thou must be, for all that, like the ship of which thou readest:  sometimes high, sometimes low; sometimes steady, sometimes staggering; and sometimes even at the end of thy very wits:  “For so he brings us to our desired haven.”

Yet grace is the gold and preciousness of the righteous man:  yea, and herein appears the uprightness of his soul, in that, though all these things attend the grace of God in him, yet he chooseth grace here above all, for that it makes him the more like God and his Christ, and for that it seasons his heart best to his own content; and also for that it capacitates him to glorify God in the world.

Relief in prayer.

If from a sense of thy vileness thou do pour out thy heart to God, desiring to be saved from the guilt and cleansed from the filth with all thy heart, fear not; thy vileness will not cause the Lord to stop his ear from hearing thee.  The value of the blood of Christ, which is sprinkled upon the mercy-seat, stops the course of justice, and opens a floodgate for the mercy of the Lord to be extended unto thee.