Richard Alleine: Piercing Heaven – Puritan’s Prayers

My Lord, give me your rod and staff. If my disease overtakes me, give me a stronger cure. If my reckless heart will not be tamed, put more restraints on me—load upon load, weight upon weight.

Let me never be sick of your remedy until I am cured of my disease. Let me rather suffer by the hand of a demon than perish from lust.

Do not spare me, Lord. Do not hold back from disciplining your servant, until by doing so you have struck down all my enemies.

Peace, plenty, leisure . . . to spend on my lusts, to rebel against my God? I do not want that kind of peace. I would rather have pain and trouble or be in need—anything rather than peace on those terms.

Correct me, God, but only in your judgment, not in your fury. Otherwise I would be consumed and brought to nothing.

Amen.