George Whitefield

“ Do thou, who calledst Matthew from the receipt of custom, call me effectually by thy grace. Grant, O Lord, that I may not stand any of my time idle, but be continually improving my talent, that whether I live, I may live unto thee, or whether I die, I may die unto thee, O Lord; so that whether living or dying, I may be thine. O never let me be like the unjust steward, ashamed to dig. Suffer me not to be slothful in business, but grant I may be always fervent in spirit, serving thee, O Lord. ”

“ Lord, do thou chuse for me, and direct me to a child of thine own, adorned with a meek and quiet spirit. O suffer me not to fall by the hand of a woman. For, Lord, thou knowest I desire to take a wife, not for lust, but uprightly; therefore, mercifully ordain, that I may have one after thy own heart. When I marry, let it be only in and for thee, O Lord. Let not lust or passion pervert or blind my eyes; but, Lord, give me to watch unto prayer, and let thy providence point out the person thou hast appointed for me. Thou didst direct Abraham’s servant; Lord, for thy mercy’s sake, direct me. ”

“ Now is there any thing more happy or reasonable in such a life as this, than in the life of Flatus? Is it not as great and desirable, as wise and happy, to be constantly changing from one thing to another, as to be nothing else but a gatherer of money, a hunter, a gamester, or a drunkard all your life? Shall religion be looked upon as a burden, or as a dull and melancholy state, for calling men from such a happiness as this? ”

“ I know, O Lord, that this is impossible with man, and that it is easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye, than for a rich man to enter into thy kingdom. But, Abba, Father, all things are possible with thee! Enable me, therefore, by the all-sufficiency of thy grace, to sell all things in affection, to deny myself, take up my cross, and follow thee every day. Give me that faith which overcometh the world. Grant that I may not indulge myself in the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, or make provision for the flesh to fulfil the lust thereof. ”

“ Examples of great piety are not now common in the world; but the misery and folly of worldly men, and vain and trifling women, is what meets your eyes in every place; and you need not look far to see, how poorly, how vainly men dream away their lives for want of real devotion.
This is the reason that I have laid before you so many characters of the vanity of a worldly life, to teach you to make some benefit of the corruption of the age, and that you may be made wise, though not by the sight of what piety is, yet by seeing what misery and folly reign where piety is not. ”

“ Be favourable, O Lord, be favourable to thy people, who turn to thee in weeping, fasting and praying; for thou art a merciful God, full of compassion, long-suffering, and of great pity. Thou sparest, when we deserve punishment, and in thy wrath thinkest upon mercy. Spare thy people, good Lord, spare them, and let not thine heritage be brought to confusion. Hear us, O Lord, for thy mercy is great, and after the multitude of thy mercies look upon us, through the merits and mediation of thy blessed Son Jesus Christ our Lord. ”

“ Keep us, we beseech thee, from striving among ourselves, as Abraham’s and Lot’s herdsmen did, about any of the concerns of this life; but grant we may be always provoking each other to love and to good works. Preserve us, we beseech thee, from envying one another, either the favour of our master, or any blessing whatsoever. Let us not seek our own, but each our brother’s welfare, as members of the same body, as disciples of the same Lord. When one of us suffers, let all suffer; when one rejoices, let all of us rejoice with him. Make us pitiful and tender-hearted to each other ”

“ A Prayer for a Person at the Beginning of a Sickness.
O ALMIGHTY and everlasting God, with whom alone are the issues of life and death, who dost wound and dost heal, who killest and makest alive, who bringest down to the grave, and liftest up again, and hast commanded us to call upon thee in the time of trouble, and thou wilt deliver us, stretch forth, I beseech thee, the right hand of thy majesty on high, and save me from the power of this present sickness, which otherwise will destroy my life. Have compassion on me, as thou hadst on Peter’s wife’s mother, when she lay sick of a fever. ”

“ Help me to sanctify thee my Lord God in my heart, and bring me safe at last to thy heavenly kingdom, through Jesus Christ, my only Advocate and Redeemer. Amen.
A Prayer before Singing of Psalms.
O ALMIGHTY God who out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast perfected praise, open our mouths, that our lips may shew forth thy praise. Let our souls be filled as with marrow and fatness, and out of the abundance of our hearts, let our mouths speak. Enable us to sing with the spirit, as well as with the understanding, and to make melody in our hearts unto thee, O Lord. ”

“ Though I am poor, let me not be tempted to steal; but strengthen me, I beseech thee, against Satan’s assaults. Let me know, that man doth not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of thee, my God. Though poor as Lazarus, yet, when I die, let me be carried by angels into Abraham’s bosom. And however thou mayest be pleased to deal with my body, Lord, feed my soul, I beseech thee, with that bread which cometh down from heaven. Though poor in this world, O let me be rich in faith. Suffer me not to stagger at thy promises through unbelief. ”

“ May I always behave as a stranger and pilgrim upon earth, and when my appointed time is come, may I not need, like the rich fool in the gospel, to have my soul required of me, but chearfully give up the ghost, and be translated to join with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and all the other spirits of just men made perfect, to praise thee for ever and ever. Grant this, O Father, for thy dear Son’s sake Jesus Christ our Lord. ”

“ If a Bishop should be a man of great address and skill in the art of preferment, and of a quick understanding how to raise and enrich his family in the world, but should have no taste or sense of the maxims and principles of the saints and fathers of the church; if he did not conceive the holy nature, and great obligations of his calling, and judge it better to be crucified to the world, than to live idly in pomp and splendor; who would scruple to charge such a Bishop with want of understanding? ”

“ Why do the clergy encourage frequenting of taverns, alehouses, and gaming by their own example? Are not such practices in this canon supposed to be quite contrary to the purity of life and excellency of example which may be justly required from them? And if such things are unseemly in a clergyman, are they not in a degree equally unseemly in laymen, whose privilege as well as duty it is, to be “holy in all manner of conversation and godliness,” and who are universally commanded “to shine as lights in the world amidst a crooked and perverse generation?” ”

“ He is our peace, who hath made both one, and broken down the middle wall of partition, promising to give us the same degree of happiness in his own due time, which is already enjoyed in thee. For thus he hath declared, that they who are worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection from the dead, shall be equal unto the angels. O Jerusalem, the eternal habitation of the eternal God! may’st thou be the second darling of my soul, and only he be preferred before thee in my affection, who shed his blood to make me worthy of thee. ”

“ O take us poor negroes for thine inheritance, and bless all those who endeavour to teach us thy will. Prosper, O Lord, the work of their hands upon them, O prosper thou their handy-work. Grant they may turn thousands and ten thousands of us to righteousness, and shine as the stars in the firmament for ever and ever. May we be their joy and crown of rejoicing in the day of the Lord Jesus, and join with them for ever and ever in singing praises to thee, O Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, to whom, as three persons, but one God, I desire to give all praise, now and for evermore. ”

“ Surely, was the Apostle Paul to rise from the dead, and read over, or hear of such strange positions, his spirit, as once at Athens, would again be stirred in him; to see a writer thus attempting to erect an altar for the public worship of an unknown God: I say, an unknown God. For how is it possible, in the very nature of the thing, for us, who are by nature carnal and sold under sin, ever to worship God, who is a spirit, in spirit and in truth, without some inward manifestations of grace and spiritual knowledge, superadded to the light of external revelation, to enable us so to do? ”

“ I observed before, dear Sir, it is not always a safe rule to judge of the truth of principles from people’s practice. And therefore, supposing that all who hold universal redemption in your way of explaining it, after they received faith, enjoyed the continual uninterrupted sight of God’s countenance, it does not follow, that this is a fruit of their principle: for that I am sure has a natural tendency to keep the soul in darkness for ever; because the creature thereby is taught, that his being kept in a state of salvation, is owing to his own free will. ”

“ When you suppose a man to be a saint, or all devotion, you have raised him as much above all other conditions of life, as a philosopher is above an animal.
The greatest spirits of the heathen world, such as, Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, Epictetus, and Marcus Antoninus, owed all their greatness to something they possessed, that resembled devotion. Their wisdom and deep contemplations, tended only to deliver men from the vanity of the world, and the slavery of bodily passions; and had they been endowed with the revelation of Jesus Christ, they might have justly been stiled great and devout men. ”

“ Is there any folly like the folly of our manly state, which is too wise and busy to be at leisure for these reflections?
When we consider death as a misery, we generally think of it as a miserable separation from the enjoyments of this life. We seldom mourn over an old man that dies rich, but we lament the young, that are taken away in the progress of their fortunes. You yourselves look upon me with pity, not that you think I am going unprepared to meet the Judge of quick and dead, but that I am to leave a prosperous trade in the flower of my life. ”

“ If you should desire, Reverend Sir, a definition of Methodism itself, as well as of a Methodist, you may easily be gratified. It is no more nor less than “faith working by love. A holy method of living and dying, to the glory of God.” It is an universal morality, founded upon the love of God shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost: or, to keep to the exact terms made use of in the last collect of our excellent liturgy, it is “the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost;” ”

“ Do you find any one command in the gospel, that has the least tendency to make people forget their relative duties? Do you not read, that servants, and as many as are under the yoke of bondage, are required to be subject in all lawful things to their masters, and that not only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward? Nay, may not I appeal to your own hearts, whether deviating from the laws of Jesus Christ, is not the cause of all the evils and miseries mankind now universally groan under, and of all the vices we find both in ourselves and others? ”

“ I confess, O Lord, I am unworthy of the crumbs which fall from any rich man’s table. Wast thou to deal with me according to my deserts, I should now be lifting up my eyes in torments. But in the midst of judgment, remember mercy. Thou, O Lord, art the preserver of the body. Thou hast declared, that godliness has the promise of the life that now is, and that if we seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, food and raiment shall be added unto us. ”

“ And happy is that soul, which, refusing to be detained by low and viler objects, directs its flight to the noblest and most exalted, and, like the eagle, builds its nest in the top of the rocks, and keeps its eye steady upon the Sun of righteousness; for no beauty is so charming, no pleasure so transporting, as that with which our eyes and mind are feasted, when our greedy sight and eager affections are determined to our God and Saviour, as to their only proper center ”

“ And in respect to contempt, and sufferings for the gospel, does not our Lord command us to expect, to prepare for, and rejoice in them? Nay, does he not bid us to leap for joy, and be exceeding glad, when we have all manner of evil spoken against us falsely for his name’s sake? In obedience to this command, did not the great Apostle of the Gentiles declare, that he took pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake? ”