Prayer
Notes
Transcript
Introduction: Remind about 40 days of prayer! Matthew 6:9-13
Lord’s Prayer Matthew 6:9 Prayer as worship.
Matthew 6:10 Prayer as Kingdom Partnership
Matthew 6:11 Prayer as Petition
Matthew 6:12 Prayer as Confession
Matthew 6:13a Prayer as Spiritual Warfare
Matthew 6:13b Prayer as an Expression of Hope
Broken down this way this one simple prayer shows many different types of prayer we can engage in with our heavenly Father. We can do all in the same prayer or we can engage in just one of these such as Spiritual Warfare.
But this makes me wonder - did the apostles and early Christians realize that there are different kinds of prayer mixed up in the Lord’s prayer or did they simply “pray like this,” as Jesus said to do.
No matter how much they knew or didn’t know they were devoting themselves to prayer, corporately and individually. As they prayed did they realize that it was the most important work they could be doing? Just as a core value of the Alliance says: Prayer is the Primary work of the God’s people.
Just like last week I am going to go through the What, Who When, Where, Why and How of prayer. Perhaps something I say will spark in you a desire to spend more time in prayer with your Heavenly Father.
What
Who
When
Where
Why
How
Let’s begin with the What.
What is prayer? Prayer is the practice of communicating with God. Prayer is primarily offered in the second-person voice (addressing God directly). Prayer may include petition, entreaty, supplication, thanksgiving, praises, hymns and lament.
It is a practice - we can read lots of books about prayer and learn all kinds of neat stuff about it; but when you boil it down you have to practice doing it. Since this is communication there is more than one aspect of what is happening. When we communicate with someone we speak, we listen and we do.
What do you get when one person does all the talking? A Sermon. Expand - technically we are not communicating right now - I talk you listen. Tonight, however we will communicate when we sit around the table a talk through this. If all we ever do is talk at God we may miss out on a great deal of good information. So take some time to listen.
And don’t forget the do part. When He speaks do what He says.
So praying is communicating with God, the speak, listen and do of fellowship with our heavenly Father. There is another aspect to praying that you may know by another name:
Meditation - Which is spending time in quietness and usually alone, drawing close to God and listening to Him, pondering on His word, His creation, His mighty works or other aspects of His self-revelation.
There is nothing in this definition that talks about speaking. Be still and know, be quiet before the Lord and listen for His voice. Think of meditation as a time for a spiritual download. It’s a chance for God to talk to us without us interrupting.
So remember we must pray; in other words communicate, speak, listen, and do. But we also have to meditate; just be still and listen. Put away all the distractions and listen and ponder His majesty and power. (add a picture of me on the mountain)
Who Should pray? Everyone - especially those who call themselves children of God. Remember - prayer is the practice of communicating with God.
How many of you practice communicating with the members of your family? How many of you practice communicating with your friends and neighbors? I know - it’s easy to communicate with them. They are standing in front of you or on the other end of the phone line - God isn’t. But, this is practice. We need to practice to get better at it.
If communicating with your family and friends is easy then communicating with God should be easy too. When need to make sure we do it Acts 2:42 says the believers were devoted to prayer. The apostle Paul echoed that same idea in his letter to the Roman Church. Rom 12:12 says:
12 rejoicing in hope, persevering in tribulation, devoted to prayer,
The idea of being devoted to prayer means that we earnestly and continually want to pray. We should be practicing the art of communicating with “Abba” our heavenly Father constantly.
So, be the who of prayer. Practice communicating with Abba.
When do we pray? Jesus told His disciples a parable to explain when or how often we should pray. So, Luke 18:1 says: Eph 6:18
1 Now He was telling them a parable to show that at all times they ought to pray and not to lose heart,
The parable was about a widow who went before a judge asking for help against her opponent. For a while the judge was unwilling to help because he simply didn’t care. But, after a while she kept coming to him and asking. Finally the judge gave in and granted her assistance because she kept coming to him continually and was wearing him out.
So, what was the point of the parable? Luke 18:7
7 now, will not God bring about justice for His elect who cry to Him day and night, and will He delay long over them?
God will answer, but we can’t stop coming to Him.
How many of you remember when your children were young, or even when you were young? How often did a child come to you and want something? Or for those of you who are younger did you go to your parents wanting something?
At first the answer was no, no, no, but then the answer began to change, well maybe or we’ll see. Eventually the answer becomes yes. Eventually saying no is impossible. I remember doing this to my parents. Way back in 1980 the band Foreigner came to riverfront stadium in Cincinnati. I simply had to go see my favorite band at the time. So, I started asking early and kept asking until they relented and said yes. It was probably against their better judgement but they let me go.
At the time that was important to me. What’s important to you right now? Is it something important enough for you to continually take it to the Father? Give it a try, wear Him down… Cry to Him day and night.
Follow the command from 1 Thessalonians 5:17
17 pray without ceasing;
Pray, Pray, Pray - did I say Pray enough?
So next up is:
Where do we pray? What was the command of the last verse? Pray without ceasing!!!
If you are praying without ceasing you are going to be praying everywhere and anywhere. It’s amazing the places where we can say prayers. You can say them here in The Chapel, or another church, you can be at home, at work, in your car (but keep your eyes open if you are driving), in the woods, there’s no restrictions to the idea of where to pray.
Have you ever heard of a foxhole prayer. That’s one where men in combat are fearing for their life and they call out to God when they are under fire. Lots of times this prayer is one spoken by the unsaved more than the saved. My first experience with a foxhole prayer wasn’t actually in a foxhole. I have a short video to illustrate my first experience with a foxhole prayer. Prayer in an airplane became a common occurrence - every time I put a parachute on my back I was praying. The idea of jumping out of an airplane was appealing but the actual act of doing it… Well I wasn’t saved at the time, but that didn’t stop me from praying anyway. Maybe that’s one of the reasons I am here - save me and I’ll do whatever you want me to do.
So the idea of praying isn’t so much one of where we pray, after all Jesus told the woman at the well:
23 “But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers.
In Spirit, from the heart, from deep down inside, not wishy washy prayers that don’t really mean anything. And in truth, don’t pray for something you don’t really want to see happen.
Now the big question is Why do we pray? Why - that’s a good question, Why should we pray? Well according to the definition prays can include: petition, entreaty, supplication, thanksgiving, praises, hymns and lament.
A prayer of petition, entreaty or supplication is: to beg for or request (something) - ask God for something - like a safe landing after jumping out of an airplane. Who here has asked God for something?
A prayer of thanksgiving is: the act of giving thanks; grateful acknowledgment of benefits or favors, especially to God - So when we make that petition and God comes through for us what should we do? Give thanks, alone if necessary, in public if possible.
A Prayer of Praise is: the offering of grateful homage in words or song, as an act of worship. Worship and lift up His name, acknowledge Him for the great things He has done.
A prayer of lament is: to feel or express sorrow or regret for or to mourn for or over. This is the time to cry, a time to let God know just how sad we feel when things go wrong. This goes along with Philippians 4:6 which says:
6 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
In everything by prayer. So, when we boil it down the Why of prayer covers everything. If we are practicing our communication skills with God then we don’t really need a reason why. He wants to hear everything. Look at it this way - Think about a relationship you have with other people in your life. Have you ever wanted to know what is going on with that person, have you ever wanted to know how they are feeling, the hurts they are suffering, the joy they are feeling at the moment. Have you just wanted to hear what they have to say - no matter how silly it may seem to the person you want to hear from. Take that desire of yours and make it God sized, that’s how much God desires for us to talk with Him. Now think about how much it hurts when those people in your life shut you out. They won’t even talk to you, or maybe just talk about stuff that doesn’t matter. Once again make it God sized.
I spent years not talking to my parents, it wasn’t that I didn’t want to I just didn’t get around to it. I was in foreign countries and busy all the time. Suddenly I wasn’t even able to talk to my mother because of Alzheimer’s and my father was never really one for sharing his feelings anyway. Then suddenly they were both gone, and now I miss them and won’t have the opportunity again until...
Okay -
How do we pray? Well there are a lot of different methods that people have come up with. Ways to keep your mind focused, ways to keep from saying the same thing over and over again, ways to remember who or what you have prayed for, such as prayer concern lists. So I’m going to describe a few possible methods. I already mentioned one:
Prayer lists - it’s self explanatory - make a list and pray for what is on your list. But keep track of what is happening on the list so you praise God when He answers the prayers.
Breath Prayers - Take a verse and say part of it as you breath deeply in and the other part as you let out that breath.
Pray the Word - This is method of praying scripture back to God - the corporate prayer this morning was an example of that.
Another method is praying circles around others. This method comes from Mark Batterson and his book “Praying circles around your children.” In the book he says: “Drawing prayer circles is a metaphor that simply means to “pray without ceasing.” It’s praying until God answers. It’s praying with more intensity and more tenacity. It’s not just praying for it’s praying through.”
One last method is Praying the Bible - This method helps you pray according to the words of scripture. Everyone should have gotten a book entitled “Praying the Bible” by Donald S. Whitney which describes this method. (Read introduction to the method)
Those are just a few of the methods of prayer you might choose from. There is one last method I want to mention - that’s Jesus’ method. What Jesus said was recorded by Matthew in his Gospel. Matthew 6:6-7 says:
6 “But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.
7 “And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words.
In other words go somewhere quite, get alone and let it rip. Tell Him what is on your heart. Don’t mince words, tell it the way it is. You don’t need to talk all fancy with Him and you don’t need to use a bunch of big theological words when you hardly even know what they mean. Don’t repeat the same thing over and over, He’ll get it the first time.
Just remember - He wants to know what is going on in your heart. So pray in the Spirit and in truth at all times.
Now you know.
What
Who
When
Where
Why
How
You know what prayer is - the practice of communicating with God and the primary work of God’s people.
You know Who should pray - Everyone, especially God’s children.
You know when to pray - At all times without ceasing.
You know where to pray - Where ever, on the ground, in an automobile, a train, a plane or your closet.
You know why to pray - To let the Father know what is going on in our hearts. There is no reason greater than any other reason. Every reason is a good reason. Have you ever heard someone say there is no bad dumb question or that the only dumb question is the one that was left unasked. Well it’s the same with prayer. There is no dumb reason why to pray except the one reason that was left behind.
And last of all you know How to pray: Just talk to your Father. There are lots of books describing lots of methods on how to pray. There are lots of books telling us when, where and why to pray. But don’t forget that prayer is practice that takes practice. If you know a little bit about communicating with people you will know how to communicate with God.
Speak some, listen some and do some. That is communicating. He wants to hear from you. He knows what you need, He knows what you want and He knows everything else but He wants to hear it from each one of us.
So, get busy praying and let’s see what God will do.
Pray!
