Prayer to Seek God as the Highest Good

O gracious God! How glorious, how lovely, how perfect art Thou! To have Thee is to have all things, to know all things, to he able to do all things, yea, to possess the highest, best, and most excellent good! O do Thou engrave this truth deeply in my heart, that I may seek Thee alone, and find Thee. preserve my heart from the folly of the worldlings, who imagine that in the possession of earthly honors or riches or pleasures or magnificence they have attained the highest good. B.ow mistaken they are! These possessions desert them at death, follow them not into eternity, and comfort them not in their last hour, but let them pass into eternity naked and bare, yea, without God.

Grant, therefore, that I may carefully distinguish the true good from the transient. O Triune God, Thou alone art my highest, dearest, truest good. Thou desirest to give Thyself to me, and to unite Thyself with me. O bind my soul to Thee in time and eternity. Though moth and rust corrupt, and thieves break through and steal, and misfortunes destroy the treasures of earth, my God remains mine as my highest good. With Thee I go out and in; with Thee I journey from place to place; with Thee I lie down to rest; with Thee I enter upon a happy eternity. Whom have I in heaven but Thee? and there is none upon earth that I desire beside Thee. If I have Thee, I have the true life, the greatest riches, the true glory, the highest good, I beseech Thee, therefore, live in me, dwell in me, abide with me. Then shall I have a Helper under crosses and trials, a support in need, the greatest wealth in the midst of poverty, the best comfort in sickness, the sweetest consolation in my last hour. Then, when the worldlings are forsaken by the good they have chosen, my God will not forsake me. I shall retain Him, my highest good, when I leave this world; yea, I shall possess Him in fuller, completer measure, in unspeakable joy and bliss in the world to come. Amen.