Discipline of Prayer

Isaiah 6:5 “And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!””

The Lord is inviting you - and me - to come home, to come home to where we belong, to come home to that for which we were created. His arms were stretched out wide to receive us. His heart is enlarged to take us in. For too long we have been in the far country: a country of noise and hurry and crowds, a country of climb and push and shove, a country of frustration and fear and intimidation. And He welcomes us home; home to serenity and peace and joy, home to friendship and fellowship and openness, home to intimacy acceptance and affirmation.

1: You are made to enjoy God and all His glory and exult God to all the nations

2: God has put his spirit to make us more like Jesus and empower us to be more like Him from the inside out

3: God’s Spirit Empowers us to make more disciples of Jesus: Share, Show Teach his word and serve the world

4: of all nations: Because the gospel is good news for everyone, we must go beyond our immediate circles to make disciples among people who have never heard of Christ.

5: To fulfill the Great Commission, we must help to take the gospel across the world to those who have never heard of Christ.

6: To act on our conviction that God wants the world for himself by talking to others about Jesus, praying for the lost, and learning about God’s heart for the nations.

7: Prayer and fasting can help us walk closely with God so that we can better enjoy and exalt him in the world around us.

We are going to look at two main topics when it comes to prayer and fasting:

1: Who are we praying to? or better yet who do we worship?

2: How do we pray

Who are we praying to or worshiping? : God

This may seem like an easy answer to the question but we have skewed the idea of who Jesus is. Even as I was studying for this message I had to ask God to forgive me for putting Him in a box.

Let me explain it this way: Pictures of Jesus

Why do we worship God?

The awareness that God is present and a recognition of who this God is make for meaningful worship. In other words, authentic worship of God is a function of our affirmation that he is here and our understanding of who he is.

If that is all it takes to worship God we should be good right?

but two things get in that way:

1: We tend to form our own conceptions of God

2: We suppress God’s revelation of himself. What we discover about him is too much to handle.

Hebrews 10:31 “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.”

Isaiah 6:5 “And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!””

A.W. Tozer defines an attribute of God as “whatever God has in any way revealed as being true about himself.” Scripture speaks of many of God's attributes: his self existence, self-sufficiency, eternality, wisdom, transcendence, faithfulness, goodness, justice, mercy, grace, love and sovereignty to name only some. But the one underlying overarching all-encompassing attribute of God that he reveals is His Holiness. holy is what God is in his very essence.

Isaiah 6:1–3 “In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!””

Meeting the holy, living God smashes the myths of autonomy, the myth that human beings are the final authority, our own Lords. In the presence of God we are but dust and ashes. Every breath we breathe is a gift of his grace period when a person refuses to bow in humility before the holy creator, he or she represses the truth about God in order to function

Romans 1:18–23 “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.”

Because God is Holy He is two things: Totally and wholly other than anything else. And because He is Holy it burns away sin.

Isaiah 6:5 “And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!””

If God is totally different and we should be falling flat on our faces in fear ( to answer our second question) how do we pray to God?

The holy Lord draws us to himself even in our fear and shame. Even though we feel that threat to our existence, even though we know he could annihilate us because of our sin, we still need him. He is what we have thirsted for all our lives. Isaiah senses his nothingness, both as a human and as a Sinner, yet he desires to sing with the hosts of heaven holy holy holy.

Isaiah 6:6–7 “Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.””

This tension is resolved by grace.

This verse is a fore-shadowing of the cross of Jesus Christ.

We can take refuge from God’s awesome holiness in the wounds of Jesus Christ- wounds that touch not onoly our lips but our very being with forgiveness and cleansing.

How can we pray: ACTS

We talked about this a few weeks ago but as a quick reminder here we go:

Prayer is a relationship with the One who has already declared us His beloved children and who wants to be close to us.

ADORATION: Appreciating who God is himself. Adoration lifts us out of ourselves to behold the wonder and beauty of God.

Psalm 145:1–3 “I will extol you, my God and King, and bless your name forever and ever. Every day I will bless you and praise your name forever and ever. Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable.”

CONFESSION: the natural movement of our hearts is to see the darkness of our lives in light of His radiance. By making confession a regular part of our conversation with the Lord we are giving him permission to show us our lives through his eyes.

Psalm 51:1, Psalm 51:3–4 “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.”

THANKSGIVING: Ephesians 5:20 “giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,”

We so easily lose our sense of gratitude and forget the good things the Lord has done for us. Thanksgiving is the cultivation of a memory. It is prayerfully listing the good that is in our life.

SUPPLICATION: Luke 11:9 “And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.”

While we often focus on material needs such as healing, job problems or financial matters, Paul was concerned that God would be found sufficient, that the knowledge of God’s will would fill our lives, that we would be surrounded and inundated by the love of God.

So what?

When we know that He alone is God, we fall before him in awe. When we know that he alone is perfect, we fall before him in shame. But when we know that he, the holy one, so desires our fellowship that he gave his only son to make it possible, we fall before him in gratitude and praise and sing the wonder of His Holiness and the glory of his Amazing Grace.

We are invited to know and carry on a transparent conversation with the One who accepts us as we are. Let your conversation be marked by adoration, confession, thanksgiving, and supplication.