In this Fundamentals of the Faith Lesson, Mark Twombly overviews the Bible’s teaching on prayer and its central place in the life of a true believer.
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well good morning welcome Calvary to uh our continuation in fundamentals of the faith I alternately say foundations of the faith I think either one of them works so if you have your workbook with you today um we are in we are on page lesson eight which begins on page 59 so uh if you follow along there um either with the blanks that you filled in or fill in as you go that will really help so I’m going to walk through the lesson today and hopefully have some time for uh for questions at the end but but as you know when I teach I always invite uh interaction so interruptions are welcome just so you know okay great um this is our memory verse and uh this is a one that you may have committed to memory uh if you haven’t I I certainly recommend it this is a this is a goto verse for me more times than I can count be anxious for nothing but in everything by prayer and petition with Thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God and the peace of God which surpasses all comprehension will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus and I’ve highlighted the word everything everything means everything and so I as I look at this two things come to mind that I probably don’t take advantage of this command and promise as I should I uh a common pattern for Me Maybe is for you I I I work myself up in a panic and then when I can’t do anything else I pray it’s the last thing I do often when if we’re reading this properly I think it should be the first thing that we do amen the other thing I noticed is something that my dad taught me King on that phrase with Thanksgiving how do we apply that and I noticed the pattern of prayer for my dad as we pray together as a family he would say something like father I thank you in advance for what you’re going to do right and that has really stuck with me uh we pray in a hopeful way expecting God to answer and expecting the promises in this verse to happen you know I think sometimes God puts things in our lives so that we’ll sense our need and we’ll go to him and draw close to him which I think is the whole point Brothers and Sisters of the Christian Life is that we draw near to him great segue from last week says we talked about the Holy Spirit this connection between the Holy Spirit and prayer and then next week we’re going to get into the body of Believers how how we Fellowship together and it’s all so perfectly um integrated and and related uh in our Lord’s Providence Romans 8:26 and 27 and in the same way the spirit also helps our weakness for we do not know how to pray as we should but the spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words and he who searches the hearts knows what the mind of the spirit is because he intercedes for the Saints according to the will of God we’re going to get into each of these Concepts um pretty deeply today we do not know how to pray as we should anybody here relate to this uh I read this verse and and um and I think of what a pastor friend of mine would emphasize he said prayer is perhaps our greatest area of weakness for me I feel that it certainly is I feel whing inadequate to teach you on it because I am not a prayer Warrior by any means this is an area of struggle for me and an area of hard discipline for me anyone else have that right and I think I read this ver personally the Lord knows this he knows this about us and so the spirit intercedes for us now what I would like to do is say Okay Spirit you intercede you got this I can move on and and I think God has more for us than that right we do have a responsibility in prayer but notice that those phrases there the mind of the spirit and according to the will of God understanding the mind of God and praying according to the will of God is absolutely fundamental to vital prayer and that’s a lot of what we’re going to talk about about today how how do we do that how do we do that so uh before we continue I’m going to go back on that it’s my little humor portion let me pray for us um father God we praise you for your goodness to us um I pray that today we would understand our weakness and our need for you that we would see your strength and your provision in prayer that we would pray as Jesus taught us to pray and as he set an example for us that we would see these wonderful patterns in the scriptures um and compare how we pray with how we ought to pray and when you move us along and grow Us in this area that we would commit to this joyful struggle and discipline marveling that it is even possible to approach you and grow closer and closer to you Moment by moment we pray all these things in Jesus name amen amen so I put this in here any Back to the Future fans here um as I prepared this lesson I I really wanted to do a little bit more with the graphics and pretty this up a little bit but I wasn’t able to so this quote came to mind please excuse the crudity of this model I didn’t have time to build it to scale or to paint it so I’d appreciate that if you keep that in mind as we go through these slides they’re not that pretty um but hopefully the the content of the word of God will shine through for us today okay in your books um right at the very beginning I thought I just put this here this is directly from your workbook the purpose of prayer is to to express our submission to the sovereignty of God and our trust in his faithfulness prayer is the means by which we express all that is in our hearts to our loving and wise Heavenly Father pray is not to give God information because God knows everything prayer brings us into reverent commune communion with God worshiping him and acknowledging him as a giver of all things this is kind of an issue that people talk about with regard to reformed theology is like if God is Sovereign and his degrees decrees always come true why do we pray and I think we understand hopefully we’ll understand more deeply by the end of this lesson that we don’t not pray because God’s Sovereign we pray because he’s Sovereign because he can do things and he is doing things and he invites us into what he is doing through prayer so I hope you understand that um and it’s a bit of a mystery right because God does respond to prayer yet his decree is fixed right right he he is working I think prayer is a means by which he draws us into his heart and his plans does that make sense and so it’s a wonderful thing that that’s even possible right it’s an amazing thing honestly so uh our outline today we’re going to talk about the nature of prayer the practice of prayer and the struggle of prayer it’s a very very real struggle that honestly I feel uh every day you just a word of personal testimony I I sometimes have trouble sleeping and and and that gets me a little bit angry you know I wake up in the middle of the night there just a thought I can’t get um out of my head or just something I’m struggling with and I’ve come to not 100% but mostly recognize that that is the Lord doing that getting my attention about something and he wants me to struggle in prayer with him um and so those have been some of the sweetest times uh sometimes I can’t even get peace I’m not even able to sleep unless I do that I don’t know if that’s an experience for some of you U but so it’s it’s like a lot of things in the Christian Life it’s something that that I would otherwise resent that I see as a wonderful gift from God and so we want to really Embrace that together today so let’s talk a little bit about the nature of prayer um prayer is a learning experience that we that must be developed into a spiritual discipline um so I remember Pastor Dave preaching to us from 1 Timothy 4 about the phrase excuse me verse 7 discipline yourself for the purpose of godliness and I noticed that um particularly with our children as we’ve discipled them and try to cultivate in them um a a the spiritual disciplines right first and foremost of a devotional life of time in the word every day the conversation has gone something like this that that seems like a chore right and it does um but but I think over time the Lord has worked in Betty and I to express it it’s not so much a sure as as it is a discipline right think about anything in your life where you want to grow right uh no discipline at at the moment seems uh joyful but sorrowful sorrowful our Lord says in Hebrews 12 but afterwards it yields fruit and so we know this in our lives uh if you want to get in shape if you want to lose weight if you want to learn a particular skill for work right it requires discipline that’s just the way life works it’s sewing and reaping and so in that sense prayer is very much like that but in another sense the spiritual disciplines are very much not like that because they are the means that God uses to transform us right in in physical disciplines you you kind of get out what you put in in spiritual disciplines you get out so much more than you put in and I want to encourage Us in that so so think about this um one of one of the things that we mentioned earlier was the uh praying according to the will of God um just a couple thoughts that we’ll that I’ll just throw out there that we’ll get into a little bit later is in John 15:7 I want you to really think about this um like you to Commit This to Memory if if you haven’t already if you abide to me Jesus said and my words abide in you ask whatever you wish and it shall be done for you by this is my my father’s glorified that you bear M much fruit and prove to be my disciples right so we key on the ask whatever you wish and think really is that true notice the condition if you abide in me right I think we’ll get it I think it’s probably in the slide here I’m getting ahead of myself and my words abide in you ah then we are we are immersed in his heart and his will from his word and we will be more likely to pray things that he will answer because they are according to his will so um the disciples said Lord teach us to pray and I feel like this is a constant learning experience right I’m continuing to learn how to pray more effectively so how do we go from desire to learning to discipline so we quoted Romans 8 earlier about having uh the spirit intercedes according to the will of God and having the mind of Christ look with me if you will at um 1 Corinthians 2 and I think this tells us some very important things about uh the will of God and the mind of God as revealed to us uh in a very specific way so I’m going to go ahead and read that First Corinthians 2 verses 10-6 but to us God revealed them right that is his Revelation his his word through his Spirit through the spirit for the spirit searches all things even the depths of God for who among men knows the depths of a man except the spirit of the man which is in him even so the depths of God no one knows except the spirit of God now we have received not the spirit of the world but the spirit who is from God so that we may know the depths or the things graciously given to us by God of which depths we speak also speak not in words taught by human wisdom but in those taught by the spirit combining spiritual depths with spiritual words but a natural man does not accept the depths of the spirit of God for they are foolishness to him and he cannot understand them because they are are spiritually examined but he who is spiritual examines all things yet he himself is examined by no one for who has known the mind of the Lord that he will direct him but we have the mind of Christ amazing right I think this gets to the heart of how do we have the mind of Christ how do we pray according to the will of God it’s by his Spirit as he illumines his word in our hearts right so I would put it this way that our need to hear from God is infinitely more important than his need to hear from us Fair he doesn’t need to hear from us right but he invites us to and that should but I think think in any conversation think about the Dynamics of you know be quick to hear slow to speak slow to anger right this really applies in our relationship to God we should hear from him I think first right primarily before we speak to him let him in form our thoughts so that we pray according to his will that make sense so you know in my um in my spiritual disciplines I’m much more of a word guy I’m much more comfortable getting in the word than I am praying I mention how weak I am at that um even so I put my time in the word first so that my heart and my mind are in the right place and then I I work that discipline of pouring my heart out to him so I I think prayer for us then can be really an adventure of Discovery in learning God’s will not just generally in his word but specifically in our lives as we examine our lives in light of his word so prayer is pretty basic communication with god let’s look at a couple verses here uh according to Psalm 34:15 Psalm 1422 and 1 Peter 57 what are we to bring to God um interesting hopefully you’ve looked at these but um it’s so interesting to me that God calls us to pour out our hearts before him but this is not a casual thing right Psalm 34:15 um the eyes of Yahweh are open are toward the righteous and his ears are open to their cry for help right um we go to uh we seek Him for help and to receive Mercy in our time of need when is our time of need right If we’re honest it’s constant right I think of uh you know um as if you’re a parent you have this this uh this experience of watching your child really struggle to do something or to learn something you’re standing right there eager and ready to help and he’s ignoring you right and then finally says oh would you help me well how often do we maybe do that with our Lord we’re striving in ourselves and he’s just there just waiting for us to ask for help probably should do that a little bit sooner wouldn’t we say Psalm 142:2 I pour out my complaint before him I declare my distress to him right God God invites this he welcomes this um let us take advantage of that um more often and then 1 Peter 5:7 casting all your anxiety upon him for he cares for you anybody have anxiety my mind is riddled with anxiety often um some of you who know me know and I’ve been pretty transparent about this that anxiety and depression are kind of the backdrop of my life it’s something that I fight every day um and I think in one sense it’s a gift from the Lord to keep me humble I’m not humble enough yet to keep me holy I’m not holy enough yet right and to to depend on him so um let’s look at the next one Danny personally cast your anxiety oh man um how do I personally cast my anxiety upon him um well I should know where this is in the Psalms when when my anxious thoughts multiply within me your consolations Delight my soul my anxious thoughts can multiply in me very quickly right I I’ve shared with you that I I wake up anxious I if I don’t get with the Lord and get um uh pray and get in his word immediately it’ll go south from me very quickly and I will not only um drag myself down but I will drag others down with me it’s not good so I feel this um every day so um try to be more disciplined at taking the specific things that I’m worried about remember Philippians 4 uh in everything by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving let your request be excuse me be made known to God um and just do that that’s just one example yeah and then think through um how the promises of God stack up right my anxieties and your anxieties are often not based on truth while the feelings are real they’re not based based in reality Fair yeah and so we need to fight and and and compare the truth of what worth of God’s word to the false falsehood of what we’re thinking right that’s a little bit General maybe we’ll we’ll talk more on that later I’d love to hear from from some of you about how you do that as well Ecclesiastes 5:2 says this uh do not be Hasty with your mouth or impulsive in your heart to bring up a matter in the presence of God for God is in heaven but you are on the earth therefore let your Words Be Few right in Matthew 6 uh in in our Lord’s instructions he said the Gentiles think that they will be heard for their many words just this meaningless rep repetition right and this as if it’s an incantation that will be some sort of magic spell that will unlock god to do something I think about the prophets of Baal right with with Elijah doing all that right just this frenzy God does not value that right and this is this is why I think it’s so important for us to hear from him first in his word word immerse ourselves in his his word before we speak with some reverence right think about that Hasty with your mouth impulsive in your heart being Hasty or impulsive are not virtues yet at the same time we are not to hesitate to bring our burdens before him so it’s a bit of a tension there does that make sense so uh this is the counsel of of the word and 1 Peter 56 right um there it’s humble you know it’s it’s humility right uh you younger men be subject to your ELD elders and all of you clothe yourselves with humility toward one another for God is opposed to the proud right but gives grace to the humble humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God that he may exalt you at the proper time and then verse seven casting all your anxieties upon him because he cares for you so our our approach our communication is a is a humble a humble communication so that’s really uh some things to keep in mind as we approach the Lord and then thirdly prayer is effective to change situations and people interesting interesting um acts 12 5-7 let’s take a look at this um I I loved this thinking about this I I looked at this and I thought you know I probably don’t ask God for enough right uh this is when Peter was in prison you know and and the Roman guards you know it’s no it was no joke right so to pray that Peter would be released from prison kind of an audacious prayer right you think well they’ve captured him that’s that acts 12 starting at verse 5 so Peter was kept in the prison but prayer for him was being made fervently by the church to God now on the very night when Herod was about to bring him forward Peter was sleeping Between Two Soldiers bound with two chains and guards in front of the door were watching over the prison seems pretty secure right verse 7even behold an angel of the Lord suddenly appeared and a light Shone in the cell and he struck Peter’s side and woke him up saying rise up quickly and his chains fell off his hands and it goes on and Peter was released sometimes prayers seem are are we afraid sometimes to ask God for some pretty audacious things Philippians or Ephesians 3 I think 21 says that he’s able to do far more abundantly all that we ask or imagine maybe we should explore that a little bit James says that we have not because we ask not right I’m really challenged by this maybe we should ask him for more as an expression of our faith in him um that’s a bit conditioned right we saw Philippians I’ll get i’ll get to that in a minute Philippians 4 right in everything everything by prayer and supplication with Thanksgiving right is the answer always yes no it’s not no it’s not and we’re going to explore why that is so what kinds of things are we to pray for right I think we established all things and as we’ll see further in our lesson at all times prayer should be a constant rhythm in our lives like all spiritual disciplines you don’t just do it it’s not compartmentalized you don’t just do this for 5 10 15 60 Minutes whatever you do and then move on with your life like prayer is a continual dialogue with the Lord as I was uh uh getting dressed this morning and getting ready I was thinking about what are some songs on prayer and I’m I’m dating myself a little bit there’s a a song from the 90s Steven Curtis Chapman called let us pray you guys know this song let us pray let us pray everywhere and every way in every moment of the day it is the right time for the father above is listening in love and he loves to answer us so let us pray right um and uh as I as I listened to the song it was immersed with so much of the scripture that we’re studying today so I just want to encourage us to take advantage of this maybe more than we are doing at all times the scriptures say okay and then finally perseverance in prayer right uh this is um I think a challenging and and a vexing thing because um we live in such an instant Society you know I remember when Amazon starting doing next day delivery or same day delivery it’s like look I don’t need it that quick it’s okay right I remember the first time they delivered something on Sunday it’s like I don’t need it on a Sunday like you can go back right this is a little strange but we’re used to things happening quickly right uh prayer brothers and sisters is not like that it’s not like that and it as I think we’ll see it’s a beautiful gift from the Lord that we do persevere and we look back at Luke 181 now he was telling them a parable to show that at all times they ought to pray and not to lose heart anybody discouraged in prayer anybody pray for something over a long period of time and you’re still waiting for the answer if you’re a parent I’m looking at some of you right we know this is true we know this is true and we keep praying we keep at it pray without ceasing pray without ceasing 1 Thessalonians 5:17 have we really thought about that yeah it says constant dialogue I remember um a missionary I don’t even know who who it was um shared this concept that prayer for the believer is like breathing right it’s just a constant thing constantly keeping that Lifeline with the Lord and we need to breathe to live right this a an interesting concept to think about with prayer Ephesians 618 praying at all times with all prayer and petition in the spirit we’re going to get back to that because the verses that precede this inform why this is so important I’m going let you think about that if you remember what is in Ephesians 6 10-18 but we pray at all times in the spirit right that’s where we started when we’re praying in the spirit we’re praying the mind of Christ informed by his word look with me at a at a at a verse that I I encourage you to to keep in mind keep in your back pocket or maybe your front pocket or keep right in front of you is Psalm 62 particular particularly verse 8 U I think you’re noticing a pattern here in the scriptures at all times everything right prayer is a is an immersive thing Psalm 62 62 628 says trust in him at all times oh people pour pour out your heart before him God is a refuge for us read that again trust in him at all times oh people pour out your heart before him God is a refuge for us prayer is a means by which we trust in him pour out your heart before him God invites that God invites that so we see this tension we are not to to be impulsive or Hasty impulsive in heart or Hasty in our words to come before God yet we are to freely pour out our hearts before him Glenda you go back to when they were praying for Peter in prison they were pay I guess they were praying with a whole heart but when the answer came came they just couldn’t believe so to me they were praying they were praying but they were still doubting they wanted the answer but they were still doubting because when the answer came they said no it’s not him it’s a ghost it’s a ghost so then re they didn’t really they were praying but I don’t think they were really really saying it would it would happen so sometimes we are like that pray for something and then we pray for something then we’re surprised that it’s answered right yeah were because times went back and there no know it’s a ghost so we are like that sometimes yeah PR for answer and when the answer come oh yeah that prayer and acts is wonderful GL out that you can pray and still doubt that’s keep but keep doing it this is this is kind of like a regular conversation that I have with Betty like I I will Marvel that a prayer was answered and she’ll just look at me like okay this surprises you right I I I think you’ve picked up on the fact that Betty’s level of faith is Way Beyond multiple times Beyond me so praise the Lord for that yeah isn’t that interesting we pray but then surprised that God answers maybe we shouldn’t be surprised and maybe up it a little bit in terms of what we pray for that’ be a good thing us teach us how to pray no I was going to say in the side by side in James we were just talking about When you pray and doubt why do you think the Lord’s going to answer let’s look at that let’s when we pray and doubt don’t think that so J we had a couple things here in James that wasn’t one of them but where is that Noel which verses oh yeah verse chapter one um so good starting in verse 5 James 1 but if any of you lacks wisdom anybody anybody here lack wisdom I think we’re going to all if you don’t raise your hand I’m going to come after you um let him ask of God who gives to all generous ly and without reproach and it will be given to him do we doubt the generosity of God we’re going to get into that a little bit more with some of our other verses God is generous beyond what we can imagine and we should take advantage of it more if we lack wisdom let him ask of God who gives to all generously and without reproach it will be given to him but he must ask in faith doubting nothing for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea driven and tossed by the wind for that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord being a double-minded man unstable in all his ways yeah that’s a that’s a rebuke to us that’s a rebuke to us yeah yeah I think about where double-minded shows up in the in the scriptures I think it was Elijah Elijah or Elisha I get them confused talking to Israel how long will you waver between two opinions if God Elijah thank you if God if the Lord is God follow him if if baale is God follow him God must have us have that consistent growth in Faith Lord give us Faith trust in God at all times not in doubt thank you Noel that’s was great yeah and then perseverance let’s talk more even more about that um Luke 11 turn there there’s a lot to pick up in Luke 11 I’m going to spend just a few minutes there unpacking that in the context so I say to you ask and it will be given to you seek and you will find knock and it will be open to you for everyone who asks receives and he who seeks finds and to him who knocks it will be opened if you pick up nothing from this passage pick up that prayer is not passive right neither in the asking nor in the follow through of what we do after we ask let’s understand this let’s unpack this a little bit more actually let’s let’s go back I’m going to read the whole sequence I’m going to go back to verse five and I’m going to read through verse 13 and again think about the nature of of God here what what do we what does this passage tell us about our Lord and his posture toward us this is Jesus and then he said to them which of you has a f has a friend and will go to him at midnight and say to him friend lend me three loaves for a friend of mine has come to me from a journey and I have nothing to set before him and from inside he aned and says do not bother me the door has already been shut and my children and I are in bed and I cannot rise up and give you anything I actually had a situation this actually happened to me woke me up interesting I tell you even though we he will not arise and give him anything because he is his friend yet because of his persistence he will get up and give him as much as he needs so I say to you ask and will be given to you seek and you will find knock and it will be open to you excuse me for everyone who asks receives and he who seeks finds and to him who knocks it will be opened I want you to really think about this next portion here brothers and sisters but what father among you if his son asks for a fish will give him a snake instead of a fish or if his son asks for an egg and will give him a scorpion if you then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children how much more will your heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him right and the other gospel says give what is good to those who ask him equ quit in the Holy Spirit to what is ultimately good now I remember appreciating this verse as a single person but I remember distinctly after we had our first child Lauren reading this verse and thinking about it if you then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children how much more and as a parent now understanding that a little bit more what I wouldn’t do for my child multiply that by infinity and this is what we have in our heavenly father and it just blew up for me and I feel like I’ve been spending the rest of my life and maybe into eternity coming to grips with the generosity of God do we recognize how insanely generous God is both in in every way that he answers our prayers in the yeses and and in the nose really interesting look with me if you will at Psalm 5 verses 1 through three this is a great pattern for us in how we pray and some of you have personally encouraged me with this verse and texted it to me kind of right when I needed it so I appreciate that what do we do when we pray give Year to my words oh Yahweh consider my meditation give heed to the sound of my cry for help my king and my God for to you I pray oh Yahweh in the morning you will hear my voice in the morning I will order my prayer to you and eagerly watch we pray with expectancy right we pray expecting God to respond perfectly so what we see here in this passage in Luke back to uh Luke 11 is we see the example of the persistent friend right God values our persistent our persistence now this isn’t the this isn’t the repetition of words that we are urged against but it’s just a persistently asking him we express great faith in him by doing that knowing that he can answer and by the way by doing that that keeps us in close connection with him draws Us close to him in his heart which I think as I’ve said before is the point of the Christian Life right The Nearness of God is my good the psalmist said so that alone that alone is a wonderful answer to prayer drawing close to God and then we notice the expectation the expectation of a generous God do we expect God to answer perfectly abundantly more than we all we can ask or think a similar sentiment is expressed in Romans 8:32 which John Piper says is perhaps the most important verse in the Bible he did not spare his own son right but delivered him up for us all how will he not also with him freely give us all things he didn’t spare his son I think we really need to think about that and come to grips with that we tend to think of God I think naturally as a stingy God as a God who with withh holds from us maybe you have models in your life of parents or other people in your lives who were stingy you know I know for my dad his father was very much like that and withheld quite a bit intentionally right and so uh as I as I process process this with my own father uh you know he has he has really struggled to come to grips with that and but also it’s given him a heart to be a more generous father and he has been right and so we we talk about this what is our expectation of a generous God who will give only good things only good things um I think it’s in Psalm 84 the Lord God is a sun and a shield the Lord gives Grace and Glory no good thing does he withhold from those who walk uprightly isn’t that incredible so brothers and sisters let us let’s rejoice in that let’s rejoice in that okay so let’s get a little bit more into the pattern I think I need to pick the pace here a little bit what does Jesus teach us as a requirement for answered prayer we talked about this earlier I’ll just recap it if you abide in me my words abide in you ask whatever you wish and it shall by shall be done for you um by this my fathers please that you bear much fruit and so prove yourself to be my disciples so important condition right us abiding in him that is remaining in him walking with him Us in his word his his word in us right these will inform our prayers right and we can have confidence if we do that that we are praying according to his will secondly what is our confidence as we pray let’s look at this this is a I think this is a a complimentary verse to John 15:7 and one that I I think is worthy of our consideration today um 1 John 5 verses 14 and 15 and this is the confidence which we have before him that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us and if we know he hears Us in whatever we ask we know that we have the requests which we have asked from him wow how do we pray according to his will and it goes back to John 15 his word abiding in us his word abiding in us I hope you’re picking up and I and I’d like you to really think about this more if you haven’t already think about the instructions and the patterns of prayer that we see in the scriptures and compare them to how you pray and I pray and the examples of prayer we see around us you know like evangelism I think the patterns that we see around us are are just very different and if I would they very much deviate I think from the patterns we we see in scripture it’s very very different um and so I think it’s worthy of consideration how do we pray compared to how the Lord instruct us to pray and the example that he set always thinking about that are we following are we following that example yeah his Sovereign will is always accomplished right so praying according to his will both his moral will and his Sovereign will so important so important uh let’s look at the Lord’s Prayer I think we’d be remiss if I had a a lesson of prayer if we didn’t do that so look look with me at Matthew 6 we’ll just unpack this and you’ve got a chart uh in your book that unpacks this and this is where I didn’t get a chance to do the kind of Graphics that I would have liked to do but we’ll we’ll enjoy the content here Matthew 69-13 pray then in this way Our Father who is in heaven Hallowed Be Your Name Your Kingdom Come your will be done on Earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors and do not lead us into temptation but Deliver Us from Evil from the evil one for yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever amen there’s a lot here particularly as we think about forgiveness that’s something to really think about forgive us as we also have forgiven I’ll just kind of throw this sin is our willingness and our forgiveness of others is an indication of how God has forgiven us right I’m sorry my grandson’s distracting me over there um yeah yeah and and it’s an indication of how we have understood his will so if we have withheld forgiveness that’s something to really examine examine in our own lives but let’s walk through this first and foremost we pray to God right Our Father who is in heaven that seems fundamental but sometimes have you ever been in prayer settings particular group settings and I’ve struggled with this am I praying to God or am I praying to the people around me so the you know so that is my orientation to how it comes across to them or how it goes to God I’m sure I’m not the only one who struggled with this some of you avoid it entirely but not praying in groups which I don’t think is that helpful right uh but that’s one of the wonderful things that we can do um a raw honest prayer to God is infinitely Superior than an eloquent prayer to others make sense so it’s to him you’re in heaven father we’re oriented toward you exalt him Hallowed be your name right and sometimes we just park right there and offer um offer prayers of praise to him submit to him right you your kingdom come your will be done we’re going to get into this as we see this exemplified particularly in the life of Jesus and the life of Paul your will be done all of our prayers for our will is subject to his will which means the answer isn’t always going to be yes right according to his will leaving that to him so I’ll give a very practical example of that some of you know may know that my mom died of ovarian cancer at the age of 47 I was just 26 years old and that was rough beyond what I can describe as we prayed through this as a family we felt that it was important that we acknowledge God’s ability to heal her in a moment if he wanted to yet at the same time that he may have a different plan and Lord you do what you will with us you get the difference right so like really struggle with I and I felt like as my uh as some of my family members were praying he like well where’s your faith God can heal her let’s pray for that you know now they had lived with her and seen her decline over time and so they kind of saw reality in a different way than I did right but still there’s this tension Lord you do what you want but you can do anything right um and so that’s uh and as I look back I see you know when it says in the Psalms precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his Godly ones it’s often quoted at funerals and and I look back and I had to have some some brothers and sisters come alongside me and point out to me all the wonderful things that God was building and growing in our lives through the death of my mom things that couldn’t have happened any other way and you look you look back and I’m just AED by that so I just want us to keep that in mind as we pray what God is doing sometimes and is no answers to prayer or maybe a different God has a different agenda sometimes than you have you noticed that right we we wish that God would get in line with our agenda you know and that’s not how that goes it’s just it’s a wonderful gift that we get in line with his what he does is always good and so that’s a that’s a comfort for us and I just share that personally that that that would encourage you look to him right give us this day our daily bread right our ve our very sustenance is is up to him now we live in a in a very prosperous country where even the poorest most of us probably aren’t lacking that much um yeah um in him all things hold together it says in Colossians are you aware of that the level to which you and I are dependent upon Him is beyond what we can understand confess to him confess to him forgive us our debts our sins yes depend on him right do not lead us into temptation right um of course we know that God tempts no one I think it says that in James right but we ask that we would not be overcome overcome by Temptation and then trust in him Deliver Us from Evil right we need his protection um one of the verses that’s become precious to me is Isaiah 65:24 where it says that before before they ask I will answer right and then in the beattitudes the Lord knows what you need before you ask him think about the wording of that he knows what you’re going to ask but even even deeper than that he knows what you need before you ask him you might not know what you need but he knows and he’s going to answer according to your need not your wants sometimes they’re the same but often they’re not often they’re not so let’s recognize this so again think about this and how often do our prayers follow this pattern maybe not as often as we would like to think what are some hindrances to prayer if I regarded iniquity in my heart Psalm 6618 says the Lord will not hear right Isaiah 59 talks about God’s arm isn’t too short that he cannot save his ear not too deaf that he cannot hear but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God so that he does not hear right so when I think about this I think this is something we need to take maybe a little bit more seriously than we do maybe not jump in so quick so unconfessed sin wickedness in our hearts right these are hindrances to prayer and we may have to face the fact that that may be why in some cases we are not receiving what we’re asking for um and then I think further on it talks about this in James 4 right um You have not because you ask not right fair enough but then we go on because you ask let me just read it I have not committed This to Memory yet although I should James 4:3 you ask and do not receive because you ask with wrong motives so that you may spend it on your pleasures now this is a big issue in the broader confessing church with the Prosperity Gospel right subjecting God’s desires to our desires how small is that right I I feel in a sense I think God’s just up there thinking stuff that’s all you want is you want stuff I have so much more for you so much more I want to give you myself and you’re you’re saying no to that and yes to the stuff where I have said you know be content with you with what you have for I will never leave you nor forsake you the Lord says is is that not enough right um in Matthew 6 right um You cannot serve two masters you cannot serve God and well for this reason I say to you do not worry about your life right God has so much more for us than this so selfish motive so um when we we think about this so some of you may have seen this acronym before adoration right um praise God for his attributes confession um ask God to search your heart and be honest with him uh about your sin right um and I have a little bit of a a Twist on this but let’s just go through it um Thanksgiving right Express thankfulness for his many blessings he offers a sacrifice of Thanksgiving honors me God says in Psalm 50 give thanks to him bless his name for the Lord is good psalm 100 wonderful stuff there and then supplication that’s the last thing we often start with what we want right uh and I think maybe that’s the last thing specific requests for others for others first and then for self 1 Timothy 21 talks about all kinds of prayers for all kinds of people I hope you’re picking up on this pattern at all times all things right God God invites that now if I were to I I think a um a better acronym is cats which doesn’t flow as well right I think I think honestly brothers and sisters starting with confession is is more important if what we just read earlier about hindrances to prayer is true right then we need to get our hearts right with him and confess sin before we do anything else so I would really commend that to you as a as a better pattern because because if God doesn’t hear what good is is is praise if we haven’t confessed sin right empty words right empty words um couple um admonitions on that uh and this is a pattern that I’ve had for many years my kids know this I could probably have them come up here and tell you this um I start my day with two biblical prayers Psalm 139 23- 24 familiar to you search me oh God and know my heart try me and know my anxious thoughts see if there have been any hurtful way in me and Lead Me in the way Everlasting this prayer has a couple very distinct advantages one is you start your day with answered prayer see if there be any hurtful way in me there’s always a yes to that there’s always something right I don’t I haven’t run out of things to confess and to repent of and I don’t think you have either so that’s a beautiful thing just just asking God to examine and just sometimes I’m I’m sitting on that for you know a little bit of time right um and then uh Psalm 50 vers verses 11-13 uh create in me a clean heart oh God and renew a steadfast Spirit within me do not cast me away from your presence and do not take your Holy Spirit from me restore to me the joy of your salvation and sustain me with a willing Spirit then I will teach transgressors your ways and sinners will be converted to you and as my brother Danny pointed out to me that’s a verse that informs our evangelism that not only restores us to a relationship with God but but it makes us effective I think in evangelism then I will teach transgressors your ways and sinners will be converted to you if i’ if I’m right with God that’s a prerequisite to helping others to become right with God so I really I really commend I commend that to you okay coming to the end here prayer is a sacrifice I think we just need to acknowledge that we talked earlier about a discipline right um back to Luke 18 now he was telling them a parable to show that at all times they ought to pray right um I’m going to just do this fairly quickly and I commend it to you for further consideration Luke 6:12 uh is the sequence where our Lord was agonizing in the garden right uh and he said he said this now it happened that this time he went off to pray and he was spending the whole night in prayer to God right um so and there’s a couple times where we see Jesus do this um focused focused time in prayer and then in Luke 22:44 here’s what’s interesting guys um did Jesus need that kind of prayer I think you could say that he probably didn’t as as the perfect man but he did because he was a man as an example for us so if he needed to pray like that how much more do we need to pray Luke 22:44 familiar verse to us and and being in agony he was praying very fervently and his sweat became like drops of blood falling down upon the ground he said earlier if you are willing remove this cup from me yet not my will but yours be done yeah yeah Jesus experienced an emphatic no to a prayer because it wasn’t it it wasn’t God’s will um Colossians 4:2 some of you know this we emphasize this whenever we do um the mall evangelism um pray at all times in the spirit keeping Alert in it with an attitude of Thanksgiving right there’s an alertness that we need to have in prayer um the disciples fell asleep in their prayers and uh I don’t know about you but sometimes it I think there’s one time in prayer meeting um I kind of I kind of dozed off yeah and it happens it’s something that it’s just it’s something that we do um I do Comm in to Ephesians 6 10-18 and I’m sorry we’re probably not going to have that much time for interaction but I appreciate the inter interaction that we’ve had um I just want to commend to you this this idea of prayer as spiritual warfare I’m just going to read verses 10 through 18 in Ephesians 6 finally be EXC excuse me strong in the Lord and in the might of his strength put on the full armor of God so that you will be able to stand firm against the schemes of the devil for our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers against the authorities against the world forces of this Darkness against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the Heavenly places therefore take up the full armor of God so that you will be able to stand to resist an evil day and having done everything to stand firm stand therefore having GED your loins with truth and having put on the breastplate of righteousness and having shed your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace in addition to all having taken up the shield of Faith with which you will be able to extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one and receive the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit which is the word of God praying at all times with all prayer and petition in the spirit and to this end being on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints I will commend to you that prayer is spiritual warfare and there’s a reason why it’s hard because it’s battle right and so let’s not stop at verse 17 when we think about spiritual warfare let’s continue and press through having armed ourselves um to go to the Lord in prayer this is again where I my dad has been a great example to me where he actually pray he says I put on the armor every day I start my day praying through this in my mind putting on and literally that the um the Greek really means to sink into right sink into our armor as part of our identity right so I really commend that to you as part of our discipline um just a couple words and I’ll send out these slides but you have your workbook as well battling discouragement to pray at all times and to not lose hard anybody here discouraged in prayer yeah why am I doing this nothing’s happen happening right apparently apparently God knows you know we’ve been going through Exodus and one of the things we’ve been thinking about is there’s the Earthly realities of what we see happening which are very discouraging slavery and such right but there’s the Heavenly realities of what God is doing through that waiting and prayer I think helps us to remember that even though I don’t see it yet God is doing something yeah um the example of David I’ll just come out to briefly David was a just read through the Psalms you know um it seems like there’s a lot more lament and strife than there is praise but there is both um David continued to pour out his heart to him and then trusting in God’s sovereignty we talked about Jesus uh praying not my will but yours be done and the answer was no Paul in 2 Corinthians 12 let’s look look at that briefly um Second Corinthians 12 because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations for this reason to keep me from exalting myself there was given to me a thorn in the flesh a messenger of Satan to torment me to Keep Me From exalting Myself anybody need help not exalting themselves yeah concerning this I pleaded with the Lord three times that might leave me and he has said to me my grace is sufficient for you for power is perfected in weakness most gladly therefore I will rather boast in my weaknesses so that the power of Christ May dwell in me therefore I’m well content hear this brothers and sisters I am well content with weaknesses with insults with distresses with persecutions and hardships for the sake of Christ for when I am weak then I am strong God had much more in mind for Paul than relief you get this right he had himself right he had himself to give to them boast in weakness um there’s a book by Packer ji Packer called weakness is the way that really explores this we don’t like that we would like to be strong and have others impressed with our strength that’s not how God does it that is not how God does it he is glorified in our weakness and so when we think about praying according to the will of God what is God’s will for us that we become like him more than anything else right Romans 8:29 says that that’s what he has predestined us for so if nothing else think about that when you pray right because if God just kind of gave us what we wanted and made things a little easier would we draw close to him like we need to would we become like Christ like we need to God loves us too much and this is part of his generosity brothers and sisters that the the no answers or the different answers are a tremendous gift for us this is how generous God is he disciplines us the word says for our good that we might share his Holiness I’m going to end with that um I I uh there’s a couple prayers that I commend to you to pray regularly I am so weak in prayer like I have this I have this list of things things that I pray for regularly and scriptures that I pray regularly these are like crutches for me because I’m just not strong at it and I and I need that I really commend to you praying the prayers of scripture and there’s a few that I’ll I’ll give you here and again I’ll send these slides this is one of them Colossians 1: 9-12 if you want to write this down but it’ll be in the slides Colossians 1 9-12 Philippians 1:9 and10 um Ephesians 314- 21 I’m sorry um yeah Ephesians 314- 21 and 1 15-23 I may have those in Reverse but when we pray the scriptures when we pray scriptural prayers we can be very confident that we’re praying according to to the will of God and so I really commend those to you and with that I think we’ll have to end um maybe I’ll take one question if anybody has a question or a thought and then we’ll close in prayer jod yeah yeah God is too small yeah no that’s beautiful Jody as our vision of God grows our prayer Life Changes so I just commend to you these three things to consider as we go the Primacy of heart preparation I really urge those are the two passages that I mentioned I really urge you if you don’t take that seriously take that very seriously um your lack of heart preparation and confession may be a hindrance to you in your prayer life um the priority of prayer right taking the time for it both individually and corporately I know everyone’s got different different um schedules and obligations but but I’m I’m intrigued that our our weekly prayer meetings are so sparsely attended I really do I never want to go I’m so weak in in prayer and it’s it’s always so inconvenient but when I push through and do that um it is such a blessing so so I really encourage you to consider that uh as we pray together as a body really really important and then prayer is spiritual warfare embrace the discipline embrace the struggle there’s there’s sweetness Beyond Compare at the end in him father we praise you for these marvelous beautiful sweet instructions we’ve received not only instructions but examples uh particularly in our savior Jesus father you’ve you you didn’t just teach us how to pray in words you showed us how to pray incredible father and help us to embrace the reality that if that you are a generous God if we being evil know how to give good gifts how much more how much more will you give what is good to those who ask and so may we ask in faith may we grow in this area in your will and your way in Jesus name amen thank you