Patters of Prayer Pt. 2
Patterns of Prayer • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Context:
This is part 2…
So far, Jonah has been called to a people he hates, he runs from that call, gets on a boat in Joppa with the intent to flee to Tarshish…
But God hurls a storm onto the sea he was sailing on that was so intense the ship began to break apart.
The crew on board figures out the storm is about Jonah, tries to save his life, but when it came right down to it, you can’t fight the call of God for someone else.
Jonah was called to Nineveh, but ran from it and these men on this boat tried to help Jonah live in his escape.
That is the culture of the world right now. They would rather help people run from God than to Him.
The culture we live in would rather you abandon the call on your life, run away to have your “freedom” than to follow the plans God has for you.
The crew is upset at first when they find out Jonah was running from YHWH, but then they start making sacrifices of their own supplies trying to lighten the load so that they can still get Jonah to Tarshish!
Please don’t come to me and tell me you’re running from your calling and expect me to support you in running…
If you come tell me you’re running from your calling, my response will be, “WHY? What do we need to do to get you back on track? How can I help get you pointed in the right direction again?
But the world revels in disorientation.
The culture today would rather you be confused and not know up from down, backwards or forwards.
The culture today celebrates confusion, celebrates rebellion, celebrates when someone is unsure about what they want or who they are.
Then, they say things like, “Just be true to who you are.”
But five seconds ago you were celebrating my “bravery” for telling you I don’t know who I am!
This is the spirit of the age: that keeps people confused about who they are so they stay off track about their calling.
Do you know you are called to something greater? There’s divine power available to you as a believer!
If you’re looking for support in running away from what God is telling you, you’ll have to find it somewhere else.
In this place, we encourage you to find your calling. We do our best to help equip you for your destiny.
We grow disciples in here that embody Jesus out there!
You can go to a lot of churches and find a place to just get by, go through the motions, and leave without change. This is not one of those churches.
Here, we expect that you walk out different than you walked in.
Here, we want you to have an encounter with the God of creation.
Here, we facilitate discipleship and training so you can be most effective in your calling.
I know I’m only a month in, and I haven’t gotten to all of you yet, but I want you to know… I’m coming for you.
It is my job to help launch you into the direction God would have you to go.
I don’t want you to end up like Jonah in the scripture we are starting with today:
17 And the Lord appointed a great fish to swallow Jonah, and Jonah was in the stomach of the fish three days and three nights.
In the first point of this sermon (first sermon in the series), we looked at the prayer of the crew on the boat.
After all their toil and pain trying to get Jonah away from God,
They prayed humbly, then they released Jonah into the sea.
That was the first prayer. There are two more prayers in this story I want to look at and the second one happens while Jonah is in the belly of the fish.
The first prayer was a prayer of Humility and release.
The second prayer is a prayer of confession…
The Prayer of Confession
The Prayer of Confession
1 Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the stomach of the fish,
2 and he said,
“I called out of my distress to the Lord,
And He answered me.
I cried for help from the depth of Sheol;
You heard my voice.
3 “For You had cast me into the deep,
Into the heart of the seas,
And the current engulfed me.
All Your breakers and billows passed over me.
4 “So I said, ‘I have been expelled from Your sight.
Nevertheless I will look again toward Your holy temple.’
5 “Water encompassed me to the point of death.
The great deep engulfed me,
Weeds were wrapped around my head.
6 “I descended to the roots of the mountains.
The earth with its bars was around me forever,
But You have brought up my life from the pit, O Lord my God.
7 “While I was fainting away,
I remembered the Lord,
And my prayer came to You,
Into Your holy temple.
8 “Those who regard vain idols
Forsake their faithfulness,
9 But I will sacrifice to You
With the voice of thanksgiving.
That which I have vowed I will pay.
Salvation is from the Lord.”
10 Then the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah up onto the dry land.
This prayer is written in the form of a poem or psalm to be shared…
Notice how it begins.. Jonah 2:1-2
1 Then Jonah prayed to the Lord his God from the stomach of the fish,
2 and he said,
“I called out of my distress to the Lord,
And He answered me.
I cried for help from the depth of Sheol;
You heard my voice.
See the tense change? This is a poem to be shared…
So not only is Jonah confessing his shortcoming to God, but he intends this confession to be shared with others as well…
The bible puts a huge emphasis on confession…
In fact, confession is an element in the process of salvation:
10 for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.
9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Every true Christian is familiar with confession.
With the mouth he confesses… resulting in salvation…
There is no such thing as a private Christian faith… Christianity isn’t a hobby that is a part of your life. For a real, born again believer, this is life.
There is no part time Christianity, it is all or nothing…
This is why salvation is connected with confession.
Confession is the pathway to repentance.
Before you can ever begin the process of repentance, you must admit you need repentance. That is confession.
Confession is admitting that you are not your facade.
Confession is rolling back the curtains you hang on the windows of your soul and bearing the dark places of who you are to the one you’re confessing to.
If confession was only to God, it would be easy, but there’s another part of confession:
16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.
13 He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper,
But he who confesses and forsakes them will find compassion.
I’ve heard people, Christian people, people who have been in church for decades say things like, “I don’t talk about my sins because that is between me and God.”
And I’m going, is there a chapter and verse for that? I don’t remember reading that one…
There are some in this room that really wish I would hurry up and move on from this point because there is no way you are confessing your shortcomings, embarrassments, sins, or faults to someone else.
You’re convinced that you can just tell God, move on and forget about it.
But James is adamant! “confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.
You’ve probably heard that last part of the verse used a ton. That’s a pentecostal favorite, especially in the KJV:
“The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.”
But this isn’t even a verse by itself, it is the second half of verse 16, which is about confession!
Confess your sins to one another so they can pray for you and you can be healed, because their prayer can do much. This is about confession to one another.
Can I say it another way? This verse, put in context describes the prayer as effective and it is effective because of the confession.
Yes, God can speak to me about what is going on with you, but that’s not the instruction of James. The instruction James gives is to confess to one another so our prayers can be effective and bring healing.
The idea of an individual walk of Christianity without the community of the Body is a foreign concept to scripture.
We are always considered a part of a larger whole and are commanded to continue as a part of that Body…
2 Bear one another’s burdens, and thereby fulfill the law of Christ.
This is the key: You cannot safely confess and bear one another’s burdens if this is not a place of safety, a place of family, and a place of encouragement…
When someone walks in this room, they should be met with lovingkindness, patience, and generosity…
This is what the author of Hebrews spoke of in Hebrews 10:24-25
24 and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds,
25 not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near.
“As is the habit of some…” This idea that I can be Christian on my own isn’t new…
We are to stir each other up! This community of believers in embedded in the DNA of what the Church is supposed to be.
If we are ever to make strides in the mission God has for us, we must create a culture of love and trust where people feel safe to bring their insecurities, weaknesses, and shortcomings, without feeling judged or put down or shamed.
The truth is we all have a little Jonah in us.
We all have times where we find ourselves in a situation of our own making, consequences of our own actions…
It’s not always the devil… sometimes it’s Eythan…
Sometimes the biggest enemy is “In-a-me”
It’s in those times when we need to be able to confess to God and to those we have around us in a community like this one and be encouraged, find forgiveness, and stirred up to good works.
I can tell you why so many people see the church as a place of judgement.
It is because we have created a culture where this is the place you come when you have it all together, and if you don’t have it together you act like you do…
“Now we are going to go in this church and you better behave. I don’t want to see you running around or being loud and if those people in the back tell me you were being bad, you won’t like me when we get home…”
Because this is the place where we need everyone to believe we have it all together and everything is sunshine and roses.
I don’t need these people knowing my life is actually falling apart
and my anxiety is through the roof
and my finances are down the drain
and I’m barely able to look myself in the mirror because I’m ashamed of myself
and I don’t feel like a good mom
and I can’t talk to anyone because they will look down on me
because everyone in here looks like they have life figured out
and no one knows what I’m going through
When the truth is, we have all been in that place and we would rather someone, anyone show us something real that we can connect to!
This is why I am such an advocate of things outside of our normal services, because we need to do life together!
I need to see you when your hair isn’t perfect and your makeup isn’t done and you’re not in your Sunday best.
Discipleship happens when we do life together, not just when we come in here and look pretty and have a wonderful service, but when we get in the trenches together and actually build relationships and learn about one another.
When we share our struggles and our victories.
When we share our failures and our praise reports.
This is the basis of confession one to another, that we see one another as humans who are imperfect and still trying, stirring one another up!
When you come in here and God moves in a mighty way, and God uses someone, it is easy to think that God is using them because they are exactly where they are supposed to be and they know their calling and they have figured out their purpose, so God uses them.
When the truth is, God will use us in spite of us, and sometimes God showing up and using me is actually as much about me as it is about everyone else…
You didn’t know that I have been hurt by someone claiming to be speaking for God, so I walked away from the gift of interpretations and prophecy…
You thought that when I interpret that God just uses me because I’m a preacher or I’m called to the ministry, but the truth is much more powerful because the gifts are rooted in redemption!
How much more impactful when you see someone you know has been struggling to hear God suddenly give an interpretation or prophecy!
But this only happens with confession one to another.
Regular confession creates a culture of transparency and vulnerability.
We have a responsibility to each other to be the support and encouragement needed in a loving community, but also to be accountable to one another!
23 “Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you,
24 leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering.
Notice something in v. 23: Jesus doesn’t say, “Therefore if you remember you wronged your brother…” or “Therefore if you realize you’re the guilty party…”
Jesus doesn’t even approach the topic of blame! But if your brother has something against you… If there’s an issue… It doesn’t matter whose at fault, stop and fix it!
And look where he’s saying this happens: if you’re at the altar…
In other words, even in the most important times of spirituality and responsibility, you can stop where you are and take care of this…
According to the instruction of Jesus, it would be in perfect order for you to stop in the middle of a church service and pull your brother or sister to reconcile.
Make it right between you, then come back and worship.
Make it right, then move on and do what you were doing.
This is accountability.
Accountability only happens in a culture of confession.
If you never confess to anyone, you are not being held accountable and according to James, your healing may depend on it!
You know what I’ve found is the most difficult part of confession? Starting.
Once you start it is easier to keep going, but you have to start.
Look what happens after Jonah’s confessional prayer:
10 Then the Lord commanded the fish, and it vomited Jonah up onto the dry land.
1 Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time, saying,
The Second time… you missed it the first time, but another time has arrived…
Jonah messed up, he was disobedient. There’s no sugar coating it or justifying it, he was wrong, but after his confessional prayer the Lord spoke to Jonah again…
The second chance you’re looking for, may be waiting on your confession…
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