The Seeker's Prayer

  
How should lost people pray in order to be saved? Today we tell people to say a quick prayer and really mean it.  Then we congratulate them because they are now in the family of God.  This has not always been.  What you are about to read may shock you.  Dr. John Gerstner , Edwardian Scholar, from volume 3 of The Rational Biblical Theology of Jonathan Edwards presents a Seeker's Prayer.  This is radically different than a Sinner's Prayer.  This is NOT a prayer for salvation, but a prayer that God would lead you to salvation.  You may wish to read Eph. 2:1-10 when you are finished. 
 

Dear God, whom I hate with all my being precisely because you hate and threaten me with hell, I hate this punishment perhaps even more than I hate you.  Or, maybe I should say that I love my comfort even more than I hate you.  For that reason I am asking a favor of you.  I want you to make me love you, whom I hate even when I ask this and even more because I have to ask this.  I am being frank with you because I know it is no use to be otherwise. You know even better than I how much I hate you and that I love only myself. It is no use for me to pretend to be sincere. I most certainly do not love you and do not want to love you.  I hate the thought of loving you but that is what I'm asking because I love myself. If you can answer this 'prayer' I guess the gift of gratitude will come with it and then I will be able to do what I would not think of doing now—thank you for making me love you whom I hate.  Amen.