A Meditation on Prayer

“O that we might only cleave more too God and our Saviour in inward and heartfelt prayer, and devote this opportunity for the purpose of heartily entreating God, that in order to this, he would grant us his grace and Spirit! It is by omitting prayer that we go astray from our hearts and at the same time from God; and the further we go from God, the further do we depart from our peace. O soul, consider therefore what belongs to thy peace! If we loved prayer more and practiced it more, my dear friends, we should become capable of experiencing the peace of the precious love of Jesus in our interior, in our center, and become more closely united to him. Jesus is so near us, the precious Saviour, ought we not therefore to draw near unto him and withdraw our hearts from all created things, from all distraction, from all multiplicity of thoughts concerning outwardly and earthly things, and with all the devotion of our hearts and our affections retire into Jesus in our inmost souls? By the continual drawing near to Jesus in our hearts, by a believing adherence to him, in which consists the true prayer of the heart, we attain too an ever closer union with him and peace becomes great in our souls; yea, it becomes at length an invincible peace which nothing can take away. O what Peace! How every burden and difficulty then falls away! And although we may not attain to so high a degree of union as that which many souls by divine grace attain in this life, yet still, the soul that loves prayer and inward retirement, that abides much with God in the heart, will be conscious of such a secret well-being and such a tranquility as it never can find or possess in the world or created things.

Let us consider what belongs to our peace, in order that we may have peace when we must pass over into an endless eternity.”

(Gerhard Tersteegen, Spiritual Crumbs from the Masters Table, p.18, 1837)