Praying as Jesus taught - Luke 11:1-13

If you were here last week you’ll remember we saw the importance of spending time at the feet of Jesus.

To make time for him.

How have you been going at that?

Of course, it should be no surprise that having encouraged us to spend time with Jesus, Luke should move next to prayer as he does in our reading today.

Instructing us on how to be people of prayer.

But before we dive in I want you to take a moment and think about...

Awkward moments

Whether you’ve ever had one of those awkward moments where you meet someone and you don’t know what to do or say? And so you just say or do the worst possible thing?

Mr Bean meeting the queen.

He lines up and practices all he needs to do. Then he realises that when you meet the queen you need to be in tip top shape. He hasn’t polished his shoes, or dealt with his bad breath or got a pocket hankerchief! He gets himself all sorted just in the nick of time but is so nervous that as he bows he headbuts the queen and knocks her out.

Mr Bean is right to want to get himself in good order before meeting the Queen. She’s a pretty important lady! And of course, when it comes to approaching God, perhaps there are some things we need to consider?

The disciples are right to ask Jesus for some tips! And in doing so we can see we learn a few things about prayer:

Prayer is important!

Note: Jesus is at prayer

Luke 11:1- “One day Jesus was praying in a certain place...”

Jesus was constantly at prayer. His disciples have noticed this so they ask for some help on how they ought to pray!

Luke 11:1 - “WHen he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray...”

And Jesus responds by teaching them, What to say, and how to say it. (Content and attitude).

What to say - Content (Luke 11:1-4)

The disciples want to know how to pray. Not only that. But they want a prayer that will shape them as Jesus’ followers. Just like John the Baptist taught his followers to pray, so the disciples want Jesus to teach them. So he does. And first he teaches them the content, or what it is they should pray:

This is what you should say when you pray (v2)

I think there are five aspects here:

Intimacy with respect

Mission

Provision

Forgiveness

Protection

Intimacy with respect

Father, hallowed be your name (2)

Jesus invites them into this beautiful communication with a loving Father.

God is not distant in prayer. But He is close. We speak to him like a child to her dad.

This is one of the beautiful things about God.

In India I had the chance to go to a few different Hindu ceremonies as a tourist. I have a very vivid memory of one particular service. It was very loud. Loads of banging on drums and shouting. I asked our guide what was going on. He said they are waking up the God so he will hear them and hopefully answer them.

Not only do the Hindu God’s need waking up, they need food. And you make deals with them. If you give me what I want need, I promise to go on a really long walk to a temple. So we’d occasionlly drive past people who were walking along the road and every 10 steps would lie down and roll on the ground because they’d made a deal with their God.

We don’t serve a God like that.

We serve a loving Father who is holy and whom we must respect, he is the creator of the world. But who comes near to us. These opening words of the prayer remind us of God’s intimacy (his closeness to us) “Father”... and his transcendence (his distance and difference from us) “hallowed be your name”.

Mission

Your kingdom come (2)

We pray first for God’s mission to be done on earth. Jesus brings the kingdom. The rule and reign of God to bear on the earth. We start our prayer with prayer for God’s kingdom to come and to grow and expand because this is what we’re called to as disciples. To join with God in his kingdom mission.

So often we pray for ourselves first. But Jesus reminds us that our first priorities should be his kingdom. If we are people who sit at the feet of Jesus like Mary back in CH 10, then we will be people who are all about the kingdom!

Provision

Give us each day our daily bread (3)

After we pray for the kingdom. We pray for God’s provision of our needs. Not more or less. Just enough for today.

We’ve seen God’s provision for our church.

I’ve seen God’s provision on the mission field in Cambodia. Abraham is constantly in need of money. And he is constantly provided with it!

I’ve seen God provide in my own life. When I was a full-time theological student and we lived off Ellisa’s wage and spent more than half her salary on rent, it was stressful! But God provided!

God will provide for us so we don’t need to worry. We can focus instead on the mission he is calling us to.

Forgivenss

Forgive us (4)

Our greatest need is in fact forgiveness. Jesus teaches us to pray for forgiveness to remind us that we are not perfect.

And he teaches us to pray so that we will remember to extend the same grace of God to others in forgiving them too.

This is the ethic of God’s people. In relationship with the God of the world, On mission, trusting God’s provision and humbly admitting to God and each other our need for forgivenss as we inevitably get it wrong!

Protection

Lead us not into temptation (4)

Finally there is a prayer for protection from the devil. Protect us from temptation. From getting distracted from our Father’s glory and mission. From failing to trust and failing to forgive.

As God’s kingdom people there is nothing Satan would like more than for us to be tempted off task. So we ask God to protect us as we go.

Isn’t it amazing that we can call the creator of the world Father. That we can come before him and seek his will, his provision, his forgiveness and his protection.

Well Jesus doesn’t just leave it at what we say, he also goes on to teach us how to say it, or what kind of attitude we should have when praying.

How to say it - Attitude (Luke 11:5-13)

He starts with a hypothetical story:

Luke 11:5–8 NIV

5 Then Jesus said to them, “Suppose you have a friend, and you go to him at midnight and say, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread; 6 a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have no food to offer him.’ 7 And suppose the one inside answers, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is already locked, and my children and I are in bed. I can’t get up and give you anything.’ 8 I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the bread because of friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity he will surely get up and give you as much as you need.

Because you’ve been bold enough to knock and ask a friend for help at such a late hour, he will help you.

You know what that’s like don’t you? When someone does something crazy bold and you think wow I’m so impressed I’m going to do something I don’t want to do?

The best example I could think of was when Israel Folau raised 2 million bucks for his legal case in a day and half a few months ago that was an example of shameless audacity. Regardless of whether you agree with him, for many I think the boldness in standing up after getting sacked and then shut down by Gofundme led to a generous response from many.

Jesus says, like the friend at midnight, be bold when you pray.

Because, unlike the neighbour in the middle of the night who’s response is probably half hearted and begrudged. God is ready and waiting to respond!

We simply need to ask, seek and knock!

Not a blank cheque. But God will listen to us and provide for us with all our spiritual needs.

With all we need for his mission, for our daily needs, for our forgiveness for our protection. This are the things we come before God and boldly request.

As Bock says:

The IVP New Testament Commentary Series: Luke Looking to God: A Call to Pray (11:1–13)

As disciples bring their spiritual requests to the Father, they know that he is ready to help them. He longs to work in them and supply the Spirit for their needs. Like a father who feeds his child, so the Father will supply his disciples with the Spirit they need to be guided in their spiritual life. At the foundation of all discipleship is trust in the Father’s goodness. He loves to provide for all our spiritual needs.

Ultimately God will give us His Spirit so that we can enjoy relationship with Him and be empowered to live for him.