Directionally Praying
Notes
Transcript
Introduction (vs. 5)
Introduction (vs. 5)
Prayer is the foundation of all spiritual disciplines. It is the central component of worship. It can be defined as communication with God that involves both in one speaking to God in conversation and hearing from God in return. Prayer is the most vital discipline we can participate in yet we tend to rush through it and do not approach it is in the way God desires for us to do. Over the next few weeks, we will examine various types of prayers in the Bible. The most recognized prayer perhaps in all the Bible is the Lord’s Prayer. We practice a form of it every Sunday. It is modeled after the Lord’s prayer found in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. There are a few differences and emphasizes but the principles are the same. Today we are going to look at the version from Matthews Gospel.
“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.
“This, then, is how you should pray:
“ ‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.’
In the introduction of this prayer in verse 5, we see both the motive and method that sets the framework for the rest of the prayer. The motive is to glorify God. Jesus sets this into motion being the Teacher that He by not saying if you pray, but when you pray. He is going on the assumption that the command of God is to pray and in doing so, we will glorify God.
I will praise you, O Lord my God, with all my heart;
I will glorify your name forever.
We know from many of the teachings of Jesus that was His purpose in all that He did. So, praying would not have been an exception. In fact, we see in this model prayer, that glorifying God comes into play in verse 9 with the phrase, “Hallowed be Your Name.” That should be the motive of all prayer, to glorify God.
We also notice in verse 5 that we are given a method of prayer. The method is to not be like the hypocrites that pray for show. This does not mean we cannot pray standing or in our place of worship. There too many other examples in scripture that indicate this method is prohibited. Rather, the emphasis is in the attitude of the one praying. There is a strong warning here that our prayers should be never be for show and done in a way that brings attention to anything but God. The method centers around the attitude in which the prayer is prayed.
In this model prayer, there are six specific directions that our prayer should take. We are going to look at them in the order in which they come in these verses.
First, we need to pray inward.
Inward (vs. 6-8)
Inward (vs. 6-8)
But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.
The person that prays inward begins by praying privately. The emphasis is to go into a private place to commune with God. That private place is host to only God and the secrets in which you have that God already knows and you are agreeing with Him about those things. This is a time of inward introspection that helps you focus on your need for God and His desire to make you holy. Again, prayer is not to be showy. We see in other passages of scripture where this is reminded as well. In a warning about the prayers of the pious religious leaders, Jesus said this:
They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. Such men will be punished most severely.”
One writer stated it this way: “The person who prays more in public than private is less interested in God’s approval than in man’s praise.”
Many times when one is more interested in man’s praise that God’s approval, it comes out in a public prayer. That is the emphasis in what I text in the NIV calls “babbling.” Babbling is when many excessive words are used for show. God wants us to focus on the quality not the quantity. Babbling is not the way to God. The King James Version calls this “vain repetition.” Often this is interpreted as saying the same words over and over in our prayers. However, it is not. Jesus was repetitive in His prayers. In Matthew 26:44, we read that Jesus prayed repetitive prayers.
So he left them and went away once more and prayed the third time, saying the same thing.
Babbling is a better translation of what means saying prayers in a way that promotes self and not God.
We also see that inward praying is also passionate praying. Jesus taught us to pray in a way that was meaningful and in a way that one does not give up. I am reminded of the parable Jesus taught of the persistent widow that is found in Luke 18. Luke introduces this parable by saying in Luke 18:1:
Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.
Inward praying also means that our prayer is purposeful. We have already shown that the purpose of prayer is to glorify God. It is also to not be mechanical or automatic. We need to have purpose and be real.
Do not be quick with your mouth,
do not be hasty in your heart
to utter anything before God.
God is in heaven
and you are on earth,
so let your words be few.
Prayer is to be upward.
Upward (vs. 9)
Upward (vs. 9)
“This, then, is how you should pray:
“ ‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
We are to remember in our prayers that is it to God whom we pray and we praise. It is not an intention to be one with the universe. It is not a good thought to share. It is communicating with the One who created the universe and the One who gives the capacity to think. It is in the awe of God that we bring our petitions and supplications. It is remembering His holiness. When we do this, we are relinquishing control. We are saying, “You oh God, are in control and I am not.”
When we pray upward, we will pray forward.
Forward (vs. 10)
Forward (vs. 10)
your kingdom come,
your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Praying forward is saying YOUR kingdom come, not mine. Your will be done.
And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ,
God makes known to us His will. We then have the choice to align our will with His will. Have you ever been out of God’s will? There was a man named Jonah that did not align his will to God’s will and that left him in a whale of a mess. There was a man named Samson that did not align his will with God’s will and his world collapsed around him. There all sorts of biblical characters that did not align their lives according to God’s will and it did not fair too well for them. I can say personally that I was called to preach at 10 years old and it took me 40 years to preach on a regular basis and a total of 44 to pastor a church. I assure you that in that span of 44 years my life would be so much richer had I not waited to align my life with God’s perfect will. When you pray forward, you are trusting in the wisdom of God and that He will not fail you nor forsake you.
Praying forward means that you will pray onward.
Onward (vs. 11)
Onward (vs. 11)
Give us today our daily bread.
God can be trusted to give us what we need when we need it. When we pray onward, we are showing God our dependence on Him. I deal with people often who do not feel they need to be dependent on God for anything let alone their daily bread. They tell me verbatim and with their actions that they do not need God to provide for them. Over Christmas, I mentioned in a sermon that Bethlehem, the town in which Jesus was born, means the “house of bread.” I also mentioned that Jesus said in John 6:48 that He was the “bread of life.” Bread is a form of nourishment. Think about all this. When I pray onward saying “give us today our daily bread,” I am saying that I will be given spiritual and physical nourishment to sustain me with whatever I will face or need to do.
Those folks that say they do need to depend on God will come to a time when somehow, some way their world comes to a crashing halt. They are going to long for that nourishment to sustain them only to find themselves famished.
On New Year’s Day, I received the news of two friends that passed away. One was a college friend that died at 3:00 AM in a Jacksonville, Florida hospital from COVID. The other died at 7:15 AM at his son’s home surrounded by his family. Their ages were different. Their circumstances were different. Their lives were different. However, both of them knew what it meant to pray “give us today our daily bread.” Both of these men of God transitioned from this life into the next giving their families the hope of heaven and the knowledge that they would one day be renewed because of the everlasting life Christ gives. In my words to both of these families, I could say these men had a dependence on God and He delivered them to His presence because He is dedicated to His word. Glory to God! Our dependence on His deliverance and the assurance of His dedication to keep His word allows me to be able to say give me this day our daily bread and know it will be so. The person that is not dependent on God cannot say that.
There is another direction in which we are taught to pray.
Backward (vs. 12)
Backward (vs. 12)
Forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
We are given the opportunity to pray backward. We can ask for forgiveness of the selfishness of our sin and be assured that God not only hears that prayer but indeed forgives us.
Just as we are forgiven through this backward prayer we are also able to forgive those who have sinned against us. When we do that we become more like Christ. We are strengthened. We are cleansed. We are not in part but made whole and complete. We are redeemed and therefore equipped to pray yet in another direction.
Outward (vs. 13)
Outward (vs. 13)
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.’
The path in front of us becomes a way of righteousness and we are able to distinguish between good and evil, right and wrong. We are lead away from that which destroys us and toward that which is of God. We are protected and with that protection, we have peace.
I find that when we consider the Lord’s prayer one that is directionally, we are participating in a way of praying that keeps on keeping on. We pray inward, upward, forward, onward, backward and outward and then find ourselves looking again inward at where our help and hope comes from which makes us look upward, and thus the cycle takes place again.
So, how are you praying?