Jesus Prayed 27th May

Lk 11:9-13“So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish? Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!”

The disciples had watched Jesus pray – sometimes all night – they knew the ritual of prayer 3 times a day in the temple – they all saw the Pharisees standing on the street corners praying out loud – but when Jesus prayed it was different, they knew He talked with God. So they asked Him to teach them to pray and He taught them the form of the Lord’s prayer going on to teach about persistence – with the man going to his friend at night and asking for bread.

Then Jesus goes on and says this – It is the promise of answered prayer – ask and you will receive, seek and you will find, knock and it will be opened – but there are a couple of things here we should notice --- First He taught them that prayer is really like children asking some thing of their father – an attitude of the heart – “Our Father” – the whole thing of honouring God above all things – Hallowed be Thy Name etc. – then learning persistence ---

But another element to this whole teaching – is the things the “children” asked for – They didn’t ask their father for a new watch, or a car or a favoured position, they didn’t ask for money or fame or anything, other than that which was necessary for life – for bread, for fish and an egg! Then Jesus goes on to compare asking for these life giving necessities with asking God for the Holy Spirit ( life giving spirit?) – but there are other points in the teaching.

If we are asking for the right things, the necessary things for life and relationship with our Father – He is not going to give us things that will cause us harm or even death, like stones and serpents and scorpions! I find this an intriguing parable when Jesus aligns it with asking and receiving the Holy Spirit from our Holy, Heavenly, Hallowed Father!! If we are asking for the right things God will never give us anything that will ultimately lead to our harm.

Jas 4:1-6 Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”? But He gives more grace. Therefore He says: “God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.”

Perhaps the greatest hindrance to answered prayer is not so much what we ask for – but the motive behind the asking – Jesus also taught us that our heavenly Father knows what we have need of before we even ask or think – We are taught by the Holy Spirit that our faith will be tested and tried that we may become perfect lacking nothing – but if we are asking for things to be spent on our own pleasures – noticed and accepted by the world – those things will lead to

Our harm and God will not give them – no matter how carefully the words are caged!! We can sometimes fool our own hearts but we cannot fool God – He reads the hearts and minds of His children and I’m sure that if we had received all the things we have asked of God up until this point many of us would be healthy, wealthy and famous in the world and heading for hell!!

I fear for the church of this age – and I think I have the Spirit of God – but we have been led away and are being lead away from the truth – and it is the truth that sets us free. Jesus said I am the truth!! There is only ONE Truth – this Truth cannot be diluted, compromised, liberalised or modernised or even post-modernised!! – O but there is an eroding of the absoluteness of this Truth that is Jesus Christ and it does not even need to be subtle any more!!

We have stropped asking for bread and life – ( Jesus said I am the bread of life he who comes to me will never hunger) this life is in the Son he who has the Son has life -- but it’s like we are asking for stones and serpents and scorpions and we think they are bread! We are asking for the very things that kill and we think it is life giving.

Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

Can you see that so much of what we are asking for in prayer in this day is based upon how we are going to be perceived by our friends and families and neighbours – that what has become most important to us is what others think of us! We have a mind set that is shaped by the worlds view of success and performance and we switch that into the very reading of the Word of God – so we read about leadership as being powerful, apostles and ministries –

Mt 23:10-12 And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ. But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

Jesus teaches us the exact opposite! We have a whole mindset that tells us “The Church” is about us, about man and our comfort – the place where we can find out what God will do for us – bless us and prosper us and give us ministry and power. We are taught that our lives are to be vision fed and purpose driven – and that we are to seek excellence and power and public voice – in fact much of our motivation is based around being noticed!!

But you know Jesus said of John The Baptist that there was no man born of woman that was greater than he – Jesus’ own words – and yet we know John was in the desert till the time of his ministry – formed and shaped by God in secret – and then when he finally began to minister, just when he reached his peak – he was flowing in power and the Holy Spirit people were coming out to him from every city all Judea! – Then he saw Jesus coming towards him

This was the whole fulfilment of his ministry – the voice of one crying in the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord and then the Lord comes! – this is glory! This is ministry satisfaction! Prophesying and declaring and preaching and rebuking and then the very Promise is fulfilled, publicly – do you know for all of us this would be the launching pad for a world wide ministry – TV appearances invitations, fame and publicity, our own promotion!!

But John – who Jesus said was the greatest man the world has seen --- when he saw Jesus arrive – said I am not worthy to tie His sandals and went on to say :--

Jn 3:30-31He must increase, but I must decrease. He who comes from above is above all; he who is of the earth is earthly and speaks of the earth. He who comes from heaven is above all.

Paul the apostle years in the wilderness after meeting with Christ on the Damascus road – hidden and yet revelation upon revelation and Jesus appearing to Him not once! –

Ascending somehow to the third heaven – yet with all wisdom never speaking of what he saw there – knowing it was forbidden to glory in such things – but I think that very knowledge of what lay ahead motivated his whole life to the very end – I don’t think there is anyone in all history that saw the things Paul saw and experienced the closeness of Christ, the power, the ministry and he was a world traveler – and yet he writes this : ---

Eph 3:8-9 To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ;

We read before that God gives grace to the humble – you can see it in John, and in Paul, and of Moses it was said there was no more humble man in all the earth! – Yet we are believing for, and pressing in for, and asking for, and praying for, the exact opposite much of the time – and it is not the truth – it is a lie and so we are actually praying in untruth – for things that God cannot and will not answer.

because He will not give a stone that we might throw it at someone in our pride – and He will not give a scorpion because He knows it will be our death – and a serpent – He holds that old serpent the devil at bay on our behalf knowing that if He gave us much of what we asked for the devil would so firmly have us in his camp of materialism, compromise and liberality we would never escape - Ah but He gives grace to the humble. Oh how we must pray the TRUTH.

Heb 1:1-3 God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds; who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,

In these days God has spoken to us by His Son – by Jesus – there is no other doctrine, no other way, no new thing, no fresh revelation – Jesus is the way the truth and the life – everything is in Christ – there is no other gospel save that which has been preached to us – I believe this is the greatest danger to the church of all history – this great and sustained attack upon the truth that is in Christ – upon the truth that IS Christ Jesus our Lord!

Ga 1:6-10 I marvel that you are turning away so soon from Him who called you in the grace of Christ, to a different gospel, which is not another; but there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other gospel to you than what you have received, let him be accursed. For do I now persuade men, or God? Or do I seek to please men? For if I still pleased men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.

Can you see how far away from this we have drifted – even in our understanding – the least, the humble, the unassuming, the poor in spirit, the mourners, the meek, the hidden ones seeking for the glory of Christ alone??

There is no other gospel – Jesus became sin for us that we might not have to bear it before God – it is in Him and to Him and by Him we live and move and have our being. O that Jesus might be glorified in us – individually and corporately.

There was an article written recently in the Challenge that at one point says if we were to go into a Baptist Church, an Anglican, Pentecostal, Brethren or most of any other denominations or persuasions there would be nothing to tell the difference between them –

no speaking in tongues, prophesy, falling under the power of the Spirit or anything else!! But we believe in Pentecost and in this gospel of Christ as Lord and the Promise of the Holy Spirit poured out – we long for and wait for revival and Jesus said : ---

Lk 11:9-13 “So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.

The only reason we are not seeing this as we hope and desire is that we have been asking amiss – but I think God is calling us in right now.

Calling us back to the very beginning of Jesus’ teaching when the disciples asked Him teach us how to pray : --

Lk 11:2 So He said to them, “When you pray, say: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven.

Hallowed be Your Name – O Father that You might be revered – held in awe, that like in heaven when the cherubim cry Holy, Holy, Holy the we might know and live that glory on earth.

If only we could understand that in this prayer all the things we might ever want or dream of are fulfilled – not just answered but outworked – When God is glorified, man is most satisfied. Remember it was John who cried out – just as it was prophesied of him ---

Is 40:3-6 The voice of one crying in the wilderness: “Prepare the way of the Lord; Make straight in the desert A highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted And every mountain and hill brought low; The crooked places shall be made straight And the rough places smooth; The glory of the Lord shall be revealed, And all flesh shall see it together; For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” The voice said, “Cry out!” And he said, “What shall I cry?”

I think we should cry out with King David : ---

Ps 72:18-20 Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel, Who only does wondrous things! And blessed be His glorious name forever! And let the whole earth be filled with His glory. Amen and Amen. The prayers of David the son of Jesse are ended.