Closet-prayer a Christian duty, or, A treatise upon Mat. VI, VI. tending to prove that worship of God in secret is the indispensible duty of all Christians ... together with a severe rebuke of Christians for their neglect of, or negligence in, the duty of closet-prayer, and many directions for the managing thereof ... / by O. Heywood.

SECT. IV. The last Reason is drawn from Gods rewarding openly.

4. LAstly, The Text saith, Thy Father that seeth in secret will reward thee openly: This Reason is

drawn from Gods munificence: Wherein we have, 1. The promise, that's a reward, 2. The manner of performance openly: This is a comfortable Circum∣stance, 'tis worth something to know that our labour is not lost, it shall be rewarded, yea it shall be rewarded by God, whose rewards are great like himself, yea it shall be rewarded by thy Father. A Father takes in good part a little service from an obedient child, and gives a great reward for a little work; yea Closet-Prayer shall be openly rewarded. The observableness of the mercy inhanceth the rates of it; tending more to the Christians comfort, example to others, incouragement to right worshippers, and glory to God: All these things might take up much time, but I shall only hint what is that open reward that God gives to such as are constant in Closet-Prayer: That's these four wayes.

1. By returning a visible answer to secret Prayer: None saw Jacobs wrestling hand to fist (as it were) with the Angel; but all might observe the loving embraces betwixt that good man and his hostile brother Esau: There was no witness of Moses's intercession for Israel in the Mount; but all the congregation and the whole world, may bear witness of Gods hearing his Prayer, for spa∣ring an offending people: When Eli observed Hanna's lips move, and heard no voice, he misjudged her to be a drunken woman: but the truth is, she was busie with her God in earnest Prayer; and though he knew no∣thing of it then, yet afterwards he saw the effect, 1 Sam. 1.13. with ver. 27. For this child I prayed; and the Lord hath given me my petition which I asked of him: (Ecce signum) behold a sign of his favour! behold an evident token that I prayed in truth! Many a time, yea many a time was I provoked by my scoffing adversary Peninnah, and as often did I make my moan to my Hea∣venly

Husband; and see here the fruit of my sincere de∣votions in a corner: None saw my Tears, all may see my Child; none heard my cryes in Prayer, but the voice of my Samuel may be heard by all Israel: He shall carry the memorial of answer to secret Prayer in his name to the grave: And cannot many a soul speak the same language? Cannot you seal to the same or like experiment? Cannot some of Gods children say, This mercy I got from God in such a Room, Chamber, or Closet? No creature upon earth knew what I did there. But now all may see the happy effects of my hard tra∣vel, I find that 'tis not in vain to seek God in private; none knows the meaning of the mercy but my self. I may call it Napthali, for with great wrestlings have I wrestled with my God and prevailed. This mercy bears a double price to all the rest, for 'tis won by Prayer, and now may be worn with praises and triumphing; so that a soul may say, This is my God, I have waited for him, he will save me, this is [my God] Jehovah, I have waited for him, I will be glad and rejoyce in his salvation: Lo here he is, I can now make my boast of my God. Wicked men are wont to say, Where is thy God? Now I can answer them, Lo this is he that returns such answers to my Prayer, that, ap∣pears so gloriously for me, This is my God in whom I have trusted, on whom I have called, and he hath an∣swered, I am not disappointed: Blessed be God, these appearances are the visible returns of my secret prayers.

2. God rewards secret prayer openly, by discrimi∣nating Providences in a common calamity: God usual∣ly takes them into the chambers of his protection that retired themselves into chambers of devotion: They that enjoy most of God, shall be best secured by God: Psal. 91.1. He that

dwelleth in the secret place of the most High, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty: i. e. He that by faith and prayer hath got most intimate communion with God, is lodged in the safest shelter in the day of dan∣ger: And who is so likely to enjoy God as that Chri∣stian that waits much upon God in secret; he gets into Gods secret place, who is much with God in secret pla∣ces: David put up many a hearty prayer in solitary caves; and how remarkably doth God secure him in the day of apparent hazard, to the conviction of Saul and his Courtiers? We find the mourners in Sion la∣menting secretly the abominations committed openly, and God sets an obvious character upon their foreheads, seen discernably by the destroying Angel, and known apparantly by the effects thereof to the world in their exemption from the general stroak of desolation, Ezek. 9.4, 6. Jeremiahs soul weeps in se∣cret for the pride and prophaness of Israel; and he was strangely secured in the day of Israels dreadful destruction: 'Tis very re∣markable, what's recorded in Gen. 19.29. God remem∣bred Abraham; and sent Lot out of the midst of the over∣throw: Why, what did Abraham? The former Cha∣pter tells us, that Abraham had been with God in Pray∣er in secret, and this was the effect of it, God will snatch Lot out of that dreadful burning as a return of secret Prayer: God takes a time to put a difference be∣twixt his praying people and others: Faith and Prayer are two feet of the soul, whereby the righteous run into the Name of the Lord which is their strong Tower and are safe: A soul hid with God, cannot be hurt by men: If any be secured in a day of danger, 'tis those that are most with God in a corner: Floods of great Waters, shall not come nigh to praying Saints. Psal 32.6. Hence saith Da∣vid, ver. 7. Thou art my hiding place, thou shalt preserve

me from trouble: Some way or other God will attest and testifie the integrity of his pray∣ing servants before the World: Thus he dealt in the case of Job: God's Children may be long concealed from the view of men, both as to their persons and actions; but in God's good time he brings them out with honour, as he did with Elijah: Sometimes God gives clear demon∣strations of his tender affection to his despised Saints in the view of the world: Rev. 3.9. — I will make them to come, and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee: This is not a religious adoration, but a civil reverence due to real Saints as an evidence of re∣pentance, or special respect; as dogs fawn upon their Masters, laying themselves at their feet: As the word imports. Natural conscience sometimes doth homage to the image of God in the Saints: However, this is a well-known truth, that as God hath brought forth wicked mens secret works of darkness, into open light, to their confusion in this world: So he hath clearly discovered his Saints upright services in secret corners, to their ho∣nour and safety in the nick of time: Jaddus hearing of Alexander's approach to Jerusalem, set himself to pray; then put on his priestly garments and met the Conqueror, who fell down on his face before him. Par∣menio askt him, why he adored the Jews High-Priest, when as other men adored him; Alexander answer∣ed, I do not adore him, but that God whom the High-Priest worshippeth; for in my sleep I saw him in such an habit, when I was in Macedonia: — But examples of this nature are frequent everywhere, what strange effects prayer hath brought forth, both for defence to the

Saints, and offence to their Enemies; so that the clear evidence hereof hath wrested from many stout opposers, that acknowledgment of the Queen of Scots, that she feared more the prayers of John Knox, than an Army of ten thousand fighting men: But this is the second branch of this last reason. God openly rewards by ma∣nifest deliverances in time of danger.

Notes

• Gen. 32.24. with Chap. 33.4.
• Exod. 32.10, 11, 14.
• Gen. 38.8.
• Isa. 25.9.
• Isa. 26.20.
• Jer. 13.17. with Chap. 39.11.
• Prov. 18.10.
• See Psal. 31.19, 20, & 91.15.
• 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 Sese ad pede•• alicu∣jus subjectionis causa provolvere; qualiter catelli heris suit ad∣blandiuntur.
• See Clarks general Martyrol, Fol. 5.