Advice for Effective Prayer
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Does God answers prayers?
I doubt there is anyone here that would say no if they were asked, does God answer prayers. But we typically add that sometimes the answer is no.
Mostly that means we didn’t get an answer to a prayer we prayed or have been praying; or maybe that is what we tell someone else when they say their prayer hasn’t been answered.
This view means that when we pray, God either says yes and gives us what we want or no and we don’t get what we want.
Sometimes we will add a third possibility which is we just need to prayer more. We say that God wants us to persevere in prayer. That we just aren’t praying enough so we should keep praying.
We pray and God either says yes, no or keep praying and I will give you my answer later.
Maybe there is another reason we don’t have an answer. If we were honest, I think most of us would say that not every prayer gets an answer; at least not every prayer we have prayed.
James 5:16 reads:
16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. A prayer of a righteous person, when it is brought about, can accomplish much.
If you want to know how you can become more effective in your prayer life, here is some advice for you.
1. Confess for Community Healing
Have you ever had an argument with your sister, brother or spouse?
Or maybe you were mad at them for something. If you are sitting there thinking I don’t have a sister, brother or spouse then put in the term friend, boss, peer; any type of relationship that you have with another.
If you are thinking I haven’t really ever been mad then let me refer you to 1 John 1:10.
For those of us who know we have had a grudge or we have been mad, think about how prayer time with that person would have gone.
You and your spouse sit down together to have prayer. As you sit down you start praying the wrath of God to fall on them and straighten them out. While they are praying for others, thinking you are praying with them you are just waiting for the lightening to hit them.
Let’s take this into the church family. You are mad, have a grudge or something, anything with or against another member and we pray. What happens then?
We can’t pray as a family if someone in the family is holding on to something against another member. The only way to pray as a family is to make sure we have confessed.
There is a common statement, “stay prayed up”. And we should stay prayed up if we pray without ceasing. But we must also stay confessed up because that grudge, that anger, that whatever you are holding on to can prevent us from being healed as a family, as a community of God.
2. Confront the Sin Barrier
If we are staying confessed up with each other, we must also be confessed up with God.
When we sin, it isn’t just against the one person. Many will consider saying you are sorry to the other person settles everything. It doesn’t. But why?
Because every sin is a sin against God.
4 Against You, You only, I have sinned And done what is evil in Your sight, So that You are justified when You speak And blameless when You judge.
Every sin is against God because everything is measured by His righteous and holy standard.
When we sin, no matter how big or small, no matter who we have sinned against, we have also sinned against God. And sin will pile up around us like a barrier.
2 But your wrongdoings have caused a separation between you and your God, And your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear.
We have a small bathroom with a shower in our downstairs.
When I say small, I mean the shower is big enough to step into but not really move around in. When we had to do some work to the walls, I wanted to expand the shower, to make it bigger. I wanted to be able to bend over without hitting my head.
The problem was that when we tore down the old walls, there was no space to expand the shower. There were steps one way, support beams other ways. It was impossible to make that shower bigger.
No matter what, we were stuck with either a small shower or no shower. There were barriers that made it impossible to expand the shower.
Sin will create barriers between us. Sin will pile up and barricade us into a small space, a space in which we can’t move.
Once, when taking a shower, I forgot to get some soap. I shouted for Susan to see if she could get me some but she didn’t hear me. In that shower, my voice wouldn’t carry so she could hear me. I had to stick my head pass the curtain and shout so she could hear me.
Sin will create a barrier so that we are blocked from God only that barrier doesn’t have a door or a curtain. We can’t stick our heads out of the curtain and shout for God to hear us. All we can do is confess our sins.
Confession is the only thing which will remove that sin barrier. Confession of sin will always break the barrier so that we can spend time with God, so that we know He is listening to us as well as we can listen to Him.
3. Cultivate Obedient Listening
Listening is very important.
I hear everything my wife says but I do not always listen to my wife. Wives, before you bruise your husband’s ribs with your elbows. It works both ways.
Listening is one of those magical things. The more and better you listen, the better your spouse can listen to you. The less you listen, the less they can listen.
Susan and I had some fun and rest this past week on our trip. However, there was one episode we had while driving in the car. And it was all about listening.
We were having a small argument. We would each start off with, you didn’t listen to me and then state our argument. Which was answered with, “you didn’t listen to me.” Because we each felt the other did not listen, we were in a loop that had no end. No way to settle the argument. There was no way for me to prove I was right.
Listening means that you hear and understand the person. It doesn’t mean you will always agree but you do hear and understand what they are saying. When you listen to the other person they will be able to listen to you.
Zechariah 7:13 says:
13 And just as He called and they would not listen, so they called and I would not listen,” says the Lord of armies;
When you pray are you talking and not listening?
Listening is important when we talk to someone. Listening is critical when we are talking with God.
Take the time to listen to God. Don’t just tell Him what you want but listen to what He says. When we develop our listening skills, then we will learn that the Righteous God is right.
Not listening to God hinders our ability to hear Him, to obey Him.
4. Clarify Pure Motives
When you pray, why do you pray?
I am not asking what you are praying for but I am asking why are you praying. Praying with wrong motives may be a reason you do not have an effective prayer life.
Thomas a Kempis wrote:
Man sees your actions, but God your motives.
Thomas à Kempis (Ascetical Writer)
A. W. Tozer wrote:
Religious acts done out of low motives are twice evil, evil in themselves and evil because they are done in the name of God.4
A. W. Tozer
When you pray, why do you pray?
In His prayer in the garden, Jesus prayed that God’s will be done. As Jesus moved even closer to His time of crucifixion, He still prayed for His Father’s will.
I think we should always remember that when we pray. James tells us that a reason we don’t get an answer to prayer is because of our motives.
3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask with the wrong motives, so that you may spend what you request on your pleasures.
I think our motives and whose will we want to follow go hand in hand.
If we are praying so that we get what we want because we want it then we are not praying for God’s will.
This doesn’t mean we can’t ask for something or pray about getting something but we need to remember, we need to pray for God’s will to be done..
5. Commit to Righteous Action
Isaiah 1:15–17
Outside our prayer life is the life we lead.
Or maybe I should say outside our private prayer life, our public life should reflect whose will we pursue.
Sometimes we get caught up in trying our best to follow the “thou shall nots.” If we can just keep doing what the Bible says not to do then we are good. Problem is we aren’t good and when we focus on the “shall nots” we tend to ignore the “shalls”.
Someone once said, if you practice the “dos” in the Bible you won’t have to for the “don’ts”. And it is true. Would you rather have a friend who spends all their time trying to not do something to upset you or one who spends their time trying to do what you enjoy?
Isaiah puts it this way.
11 “What are your many sacrifices to Me?” Says the Lord. “I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams And the fat of fattened cattle; And I take no pleasure in the blood of bulls, lambs, or goats.
12 “When you come to appear before Me, Who requires of you this trampling of My courtyards?
13 “Do not go on bringing your worthless offerings, Incense is an abomination to Me. New moon and Sabbath, the proclamation of an assembly— I cannot endure wrongdoing and the festive assembly.
14 “I hate your new moon festivals and your appointed feasts, They have become a burden to Me; I am tired of bearing them.
15 “So when you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide My eyes from you; Yes, even though you offer many prayers, I will not be listening. Your hands are covered with blood.
16 “Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; Remove the evil of your deeds from My sight. Stop doing evil,
17 Learn to do good; Seek justice, Rebuke the oppressor, Obtain justice for the orphan, Plead for the widow’s case.
18 “Come now, and let us debate your case,” Says the Lord, “Though your sins are as scarlet, They shall become as white as snow; Though they are red like crimson, They shall be like wool.
This is big. At least I think this is big; maybe one of the biggest commands for us. Stop doing evil, learn to do good.
Or as said by someone, do the dos and you won’t have time to do the don’ts.
Matthew wrote it this way.
16 Your light must shine before people in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.
And this all ties into having an effective prayer life. If we spend the time doing what God desires from us, following His will, listening to him, learning to obey and then putting all of this into action in our lives, we find our prayers becoming more effective.
Let’s pray.
