O Lord! I desire to be humbled - Grace Gem

O Lord! I desire to be humbled

Under a sense of my sins and unmerited mercies,
I desire through grace, in sincerity and humility of
soul, to approach to the Author of all my mercies,
and to lay before You, O merciful Father! all my
plans--desiring Your divine direction.

And, in the first place, I confess my own sins. I
desire to be humbled under my natural proneness
to evil and aversion to good; for my many sinful
thoughts, which You, O Lord, know; for my wrong
conceptions of the great Jehovah, and the smallness
of my holy fear when in Your presence, calling on
You before whom all the earth should tremble.

I also desire to be humbled for my limiting God,
as if he were not Almighty; for not placing all my
faith and hope on Him alone, but on appearances
and probabilities; for my ingratitude to God for
His many matchless mercies to me in feeding and
clothing me, and giving me favor in the eyes of
men with whom I had to do. Providence has never
failed me, but always supplied me; yet in the time
of prosperity I sinned, and joined with sinners in
their follies, which now I lament, and desire to be
humbled for.

O to learn the language of Your rod!

O Lord! I desire to be humbled for . . .
all my prevailing lusts and passions;
my spiritual pride,
my ignorance of the things of God,
my barrenness under the gospel,
my lukewarmness about the things of Christ;
my carelessness about pious duties.

Ah! that ever I should doubt the good will of Him
who heard my cry and delivered me out of the hand
of my fierce afflictions, manifesting His mighty power.
I desire to be humbled for my earthly-mindedness
and my desire after temporal things--riches, honor,
and glory--which perish and pass away. I desire to be
humbled for that great mountain of sins accumulated
on me since my last season of prayer.

And now I desire to lay before You my petitions. And
first of all, O to be daily getting nearer and nearer You;
to be growing more and more acquainted with lovely
Jesus, increasing more and more in grace, becoming
more and more like You, and daily less conformed to
the world; to be delighting more and more in spiritual
things, given more and more to meditation on the glory
to be revealed, loving Him more and more, who loved me!

O to be delighting in God all the day long, living in His
fear as before Him always, learning more and more
submission to His disposals in providence, and more
and more persuaded of the rectitude of His will, the
equity of His law, the longness of His patience, and
His care of His own. O to get some victory over
prevailing sin, and that which so easily besets me!
O, Let never the greed for money get a hold of my
heart; keep me from covetousness.

Now, O Lord, in the hope that You will hear, I lay
all my petitions before You. Choose what you will,
cast away what you will--I will be content. I commit
myself to You. I take You as my God and Father,
for my Savior, for my Sanctifier forever. O hear!

I desire in truth, O majestic Jehovah! to call these
heavens over my head, the hills and mountains around
me, the growing grass--to be witnesses, that I this
day subscribe with my hand to be Yours, wholly
Yours. Amen, amen! So be it!

James Meikle, July, 1752.
(from a paper found among his remains)