Prayer 201 (2)

Sin is a refusal to admit that God knows better than I do by doing MY will, not his. Worry is doubting that He will do what is best.

‌The devil cannot stop God from answering but he may stop you from asking Dr. David Jerrimah

‌‌‌

‌Doubtful prayer is no prayer at all.‌

John Calvin (French Reformer)

‌‌

In Max Lucado’s book “before AMEN.”

‌What Pulls Me to Pray

‌

Difficult seasons of life.

‌Jesus’ example of praying.

‌Jesus’ promises regarding prayer.

‌A desire to know God as Jesus did.

‌

Other reasons

‌

‌

What Pushes Me Away from Prayer

‌Busyness, Awkwardness (I feel as if I’m talking into space)

‌Doubt in the power of prayer.

‌My checkered history with prayer (My prayers sometimes aren’t answered)

‌Limited understanding of prayer, ‌Other reasons

In the handwritten prayer journal of Flannery O’Connor, in 1946, writing in Iowa when she was 21, she started to deepen her prayer life and struggled to become a great writer. She wrote, “I want very much to succeed in the world with what I want to do… I am so discouraged about my work…. Mediocrity is hard work to apply to oneself… yet it is impossible not to throw it at myself… I have nothing to be proud of yet myself. I am stupid, quite as stupid as the people I ridicule.” She wrote of “effort at artistry in this rather than thinking of You and feeling inspired with love I wish I had. Dear God, I cannot love Thee the way I want to. You are the slim crescent of a moon that I see, and my self is the earth’s shadow that keeps me from seeing all the moon… what I am afraid of, dear God, is that my shadow will grow so large that it blocks the whole moon and that I will judge myself by the shadow that is nothing. I do not know You, God, because I am in the way.”

‌In his book on prayer, Tim Keller said, "Prayer is the only entryway into genuine self-knowledge. It is also the main way we experience deep change—the reordering of our loves." “Prayer is how God gives us so many of the unimaginable things he has for us. Indeed, prayer makes it safe for God to give us many of the things we most desire. It is the way we know God, the way we finally treat God as God. Prayer is simply the key to everything we need to do and be in life.

‌

We must learn to pray. We have to.”

‌Today, I wanted to cover the words you use or don’t use when praying. This is the first thing the Lord wanted me to communicate with you today. Once, I got caught doing this, and God threw it into my face.

‌I said something like, “Dear Lord, I want to pray for the cops, Mayor, and Governor.”

‌

That is like flying a kite with the Holy Spirit. (At least that is what God told me right after I prayed that.) It doesn’t matter. You are shooting blanks, wasting God’s time.

‌

‌I should have said, “Dear Lord, I want to pray for all the cops—that they will all make it home to their families. I pray for the mayor—that he will listen to the people, and I pray for the governor—that she stays safe.

‌

It doesn’t matter what you need to pray for. If you don’t know the people, pray for their necks to be UN-stiffened. If you are praying for your neighbors, pray for their hearts to be opened to the need for God and that they go to church. If you Know someone needs God’s help but don’t know the need, say, “Lord, please meet them at their needs.” I have found that people seem to be very willing to share their needs.

‌

‌‌

Matthew 6:33promises, “Seek first God’s kingdom and what God wants. Then all your other needs will be met as well” (NCV).

‌

‌Ephesians says in verse 18 And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.

‌

‌“I tell you the truth, Anyone who believes in me will do the same works I have done and even greater works because I am going to be with the Father. You can ask for anything in my name, and I will do it so that the Son can bring glory to the Father. Yes, ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it!”

John 12 – 14 (NLT)

‌

‌Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need and thank him for all he has done. Then, you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus” Philippians 4:6 – 7. (NLT)

‌

ACTS Adoration Confession Thanksgiving Supplication

‌

Adoration‌

Our Father you are in Heaven, Hallowed is your name. Your Kingdom come soon, and Your will be done on earth, as it is in Heaven.

‌Confession‌

Forgive us this day for all the sins we have done

‌

Thanksgiving‌

for all that you have done we thank you for all the new members in our midst.

‌

Supplication

please Lord help our Saturate USA seed planting take fruit within our midst.

‌

In Tim Keller’s book on prayer, he illuminates the following: Scotsman George Herbert (1593- 1633) Wrote a poem titled ‘Prayer ( I )’ He wants to explore the richness of prayer with all its infinities and immensities. He does so by overwhelming both our analytical and our imaginative faculties.

‌

“Prayer the Churches banquet, Angels age,‌

Gods breath in man returning to his birth, ‌

The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,‌

The Christian plummet sounding heav’n and earth;

‌

‌

Engine against th’ Almightie, sinners towre.‌

Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear.‌

The six dates world-transposing in a houre,‌

A kinde of tune, which all things heare and fear;‌

Softnesse, and peace, and joy, and blisse,‌

Exalted Manna, gladnesse of the best,‌

Heaven in ordinarie, man well drest,‌

The milkie way, the bird of Paradise,‌

Church-bels beyond the stars heard, the souls bloud,‌

The land of spices, something understood.

‌Prayer is “Gods breath in man returning to his birth.” Many who are otherwise skeptical or nonreligious are shocked to find themselves praying despite not even formally believing in God.

‌

There is a longing in prayer that is never fulfilled in this life, and sometimes the deep satisfaction we are for in prayer feel few and far between. Prayer is a journey.

‌

There is a thing about prayer. People worldwide have been praying to/for things since time began. People prayed to idols of varying images.

‌

Rick Warren used to say “if you can complain - you can pray.”‌

When you feel disinclined to pray, let it be a sign to you that prayer is doubly necessary! Pray for prayer!‌

The Sealed Hand-A Winter Sermon, Volume 58, Sermon #3289 - Job 37:7Charles Spurgeon

‌Lay no weight on the quantity of your prayers; that is to say, how long or how many they are. These things avail nothing with God, by whom prayers are not measured, but weighed.‌

Thomas Boston (Scottish Theologian)

‌

Remember that prayer is your best means of study. Charles Spurgeon

‌

‌Self-examination is the high road to prayer.‌

David Martyn Lloyd-Jones (Welsh Preacher and Writer)

‌

And the bringer of revivals - Repentance!

‌

Prayer is a serious thing. We may be taken at our words. Dwight Lyman Moody (Evangelist)

‌

‌

Prayer is the chief exercise of faith.

‌John Calvin (French Reformer)

‌

But consider the joy of those corrected by God! Do not despise the discipline of the Almighty when you sin. Job 5:17(NLT)

‌

Our prayers are only as powerful as our lives. In the long pull we pray only as well as we live.‌

A. W. Tozer

‌

More from Tim Keller‌

The question of the book of Job is posed in it’s very beginning. Is it possible that a man or woman can come to love God for himself alone so that there is a fundamental contentment in the life regardless of the circumstances (Job 9) ? By the end of the book we see the answer. Yes, this is possible, but only through prayer.

‌

What had happened? The more clearly Job saw who God was, the fuller his prayers became-moving from mere complaint to confession, appeal, and praise. In the end he broke through and was able to face anything in life. This new refinement and level of character came through the interaction of listening to God’s revealed Word and answering in prayer. The more true his knowledge of God, the more fruitful his prayers became, and the more sweeping the change in his life.

‌

The power of our prayers, then, lies not primarily in our effort and striving, or in any technique, but rather in our knowledge of God. You may respond “But God spoke audible words to Job out of a storm. I wish God spoke to me like that.” The answer is-we have something better, an incalculably clearer expression of God’s character. “In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the profits at many times and in various ways, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son… the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being” (Heb 1:1-3)

‌Meeting God through His Word

‌

Isaiah in 55:10-11 put this theological principle more powerfully: As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the Sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that go out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

‌‌

Paul calls Christians to keep rationality as they pray “I will pray with my spirit, but I will also pray with my understanding; I will sing with my spirit, but I will also sing with my understanding”

Well then, what shall I do? I will pray in the spirit, and I will also pray in words I understand. I will sing in the spirit, and I will also sing in words I understand. 1Cor14:15 NLT

‌

We are, after all, praying in the word to the father through the Son, who is the Word (John 1:1). Martin Luther was adamant that we must never get ‘beyond’ God’s words in the Bible or we can’t know whom we are conversing with. “ We must first hear the word, and then afterwards the Holy Ghost works in our heart; he works in the hearts of whom he will, and how he will, but never without the word”

‌Last point: I could not leave you without another issue with advanced prayers: balance. J.I. Packer reminds us that “there is [indeed] a place for silence before God… after we have spoken to him, while joy at God’s love invades the soul” It is appropriate some time to admire and adore God silently because “when two people love each other there are times when they smilingly look at each other in silence, not needing to speak, simply enjoying their close rapport”.

‌

Yet even people who are deeply in love will instinctively search for words and exclamations of wonder to convey and express what they feel. Therefore, he concludes, “wordless prayer is not the pinnacle… but the periodic punctuation of verbal prayer.

‌

In prayer we are to use words, but what kind? All kinds. The Psalms reveal a great range in the modes of prayer. They include exclamations of wonder, virulent complaints, reasoned arguments, pronouncements and verdicts, appeals and requests, summonses and calls and verdicts of self-condemnation. They represent not only radically different types of discourse but of attitudes and emotions as well. Left to ourselves, to our culture and natural temperaments, there are many kinds of language that we would never use. The Psalms contain heights and exuberant outbursts that melancholic types would never produce on their own. There are depths of the heart insight that extroverted people might never discover. There are complaints and blunt questions to God of which introverted and compliant people are less capable. OK I think what he is saying is a number of us will not understand this.