walking in the way of Jesus, together: prayer

ME

I’d probably be dead with out it

I’d be lost without it

I wouldn’t know I wasn’t alone without it

I’d be so incredibly weak with out it

I wouldn’t be a Christian without it

I wouldn’t know WHO Jesus is without it

Couldn’t survive persecution with out it

Couldn’t handle the storms of life without it

Who is God without it?

Who are we without it?

What would we even do if it was gone?

Where would the church, the message or even hope be without out it?

Collective church wouldn’t even be here without it

With out it Hannah would’ve never had a child

Without it Peter would’ve been stuck in prison

Without it jesus wouldn’t of had the strength to step towards the cross

Without it the unity that jesus wanted wouldn’t of ever happened

Without it David wouldnt of taught us lament and thanksgiving

Without it Paul wouldve given up

Where would the church be if the disciples never asked Jesus to teach them how to persevere with it…

We have to make it a priority, a first response, our go to. The way we get centered, the way we get encouraged and the way we Live… is through prayer...

WE

I know we all have a lot going on… and as a church family I know we need a lot of miracles or a move of God. but may we take this time tonight, to get our perspectives shifted back towards a foundation of prayer

MS: walking in the way of Jesus, together: prayer

PRAY

God - Matthew 7:7-11

7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.9 “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!

In these three verbs, Jesus is naming the trail markers on the common prayer journey, a path tread by men and women of faith stretching all the way back to the beginning. Prayer is a journey that starts with need and ends in relationship.

Ask

Ask refers to the requests that bring us to prayer. Most prayers are preceded by need—a diagnosis, a car accident, yet another negative pregnancy test, a holiday with the absence of a loved one, another week without a call back on a single application, a credit card bill that keeps climbing, a breakup, a divorce. Life has a way of dealing us a card or two we never saw coming and don’t know how to make sense of. We are happily humming along, content with our fragile, elusive sense of control over our lives when all of a sudden we are gut-punched, mugged in broad daylight, and robbed of the life we thought was so securely “ours.” When we find ourselves in a story we don’t recognize, with no way back to the plot we thought we were living, we pray. We “ask.”

may i ask what you’re asking God for?!

are you bold in your asking?

Seek

Seek is a word peppered throughout Scripture that often refers to God himself. We are instructed to seek God through the stories of kings and judges, the poetry of the psalms, and the cries of the prophets. By using the word seek, Jesus pointed the way along the path of prayer: we come asking and discover relationship amid the mess. We come seeking gifts, and we often get them! But the greatest gift, the One we’re really after and the One we’re guaranteed to receive, is the Giver himself.

Are you seeking the giver or the gifts?

Knock

Knock, Jesus’ final verb in this teaching on prayer in the Sermon on the Mount, is the destination of the prayer journey that begins in need. Biblically speaking, knock prompts the imagery of table fellowship.

This is a provocative image in today’s world of fast food, power lunches, and takeout dinners, but it was all the more provocative in the ancient Hebrew world, where acceptance, dignity, and equality were given by table fellowship. To dine with someone back then was not merely to tolerate their company while getting some much-needed nourishment. To share a table was the greatest affirmation of their character and the truest and deepest form of intimacy.

“The greatest illustration of prayer Jesus gave is the one he lived—the Infinite Other, the Alpha and Omega, the Holy and Infallible, welcomes us to his table. He does not simply tolerate our company or benevolently entertain our requests; he affirms our person, chooses our company, and delights in our presence.”

“Prayer enlarges the heart until it is capable of containing God’s gift of himself. Ask and seek, and your heart will grow big enough to receive him and keep him as your own,” writes Mother Teresa

YOU

read matthew 7:7-11 again

10 minutes to pray for us a church, a city, for a miracle in your life

to ask

to seek

to knock

WE

may we be united as a family in the name of jesus like he prayed for us in john 17

20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one—23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.24 “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.25 “Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. 26 I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”

as a church are so grateful that we have this new location, new beginning. but we will be a church of prayer and we will push you to be a person of prayer

“Prayer enlarges the heart until it is capable of containing God’s gift of himself. Ask and seek, and your heart will grow big enough to receive him and keep him as your own,” writes Mother Teresa