Kind of a Big Deal

Welcome

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Intro

This evening we will be doing a deep dive in to prayer! - Someone tell me what prayer is.

God warms his hands at man's heart when he prays. — John Masefield

A lot of times though, we are told how powerful prayer is and that it is important, but many people don’t know where to start.

I want us to look at 3 things today:

How to pray

Why we pray

How God responds to our prayers

Read

Luke 11:1–4 ESV

1 Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.” 2 And he said to them, “When you pray, say: “Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. 3 Give us each day our daily bread, 4 and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation.”

Luke 11:9–13 ESV

9 And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. 11 What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; 12 or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

Teach

1. How do I Pray (vv. 2-4)

I won’t spend a ton of time on the in depth study of this text because Pastor Irvin has spent the past couple of weeks leading our church through a series on this couple of verses.

Rather, I want us to look at the structure of this prayer and give you a few tools to help jump-start your conversations with God.

Think of it like this...

When I was in middle school, I was AWKWARD. Like the weirdest of the weird. I had zero social skills and could not carry a conversation to save my life. I tried so hard to find a picture for you guys, but unfortunately, I no longer have access to my Myspace account.

But I was awkward. So when I would literally have this internal dialogue with myself to try to hype myself up to say “hey” to someone. Then right before I would say anything, I would clam up and walk away. *Demonstrate*

But the reality is, some of us are the say way about our prayer life and it’s not your fault. Maybe nobody has ever taught you how to pray and you just don’t know what you don’t know.

P.R.A.Y

P- Praise

Psalm 150:6 ESV

6 Let everything that has breath praise the Lord! Praise the Lord!

What has happened in your life that you are thankful about. How have you seen God move and work in your life? How have you seen him answer prayer?

R- Repent

1 John 1:9 ESV

9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Scripture teaches that God is so holy, He cannot even look upon sin (Hab. 1:13). Further, if we accept sin in our lives instead of continually turning away, the Lord doesn’t even hear our prayers (Ps. 66:18). In fact, in order to approach God, He requires that we are perfect—and none of us are. But Jesus is!

In order for us to approach this incredibly Holy and Righteous God, we must get rid of the sin in our life. How do we do that? We tell God about it and ask him to forgive us for what we have done.

A- Ask

Philippians 4:6–7 ESV

6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

God wants us to come to him and ask Him for what we need. He cares about us because he made us.

Y- Yield

James 3:17 ESV

17 But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.

If I am being honest, this is the hardest part of praying for me because I despise silence, but it it absolutely necessary for us to stop talking, complaining, and asking in order to hear the voice of God.

Jesus’ prayer is the most familiar prayer in the world—what we call the Lord’s Prayer. It is a model prayer which Jesus used as an outline for teaching His followers. These are the ideas we should focus on in our prayers:

• Praise: God is holy, and although it doesn’t have to be the first thing we do when we pray, we are called to make a priority of recognizing and expressing the worth of God’s name and character.

• Purposes: God’s kingdom is present wherever Jesus reigns. We are to pray that sin and its consequences would be abolished, and instead that people would live in submission to Jesus and according to His purposes. Further, we are to be active in bringing these things about.

• Provision: Many times, we think we have the things we need because we work for them. But the truth is we depend on God for everything, even the simplest things. Everything in the universe belongs to God, and we have only what He chooses to give us, and we are called to continually express our dependence on Him.

• Pardon: We’ve all sinned. In fact, because we will struggle with the flesh as long as we’re in this life, we continue to sin. When we do, we’re responsible to ask God for forgiveness—not just generally, but for every specific sin. When we confess and turn away, God is kind to offer forgiveness for sins both big and small, and we’re called to forgive in the same way.

• Protection: We’re caught up in a spiritual battle, and the souls of all people—including our own—are on the line. Because our flesh is weak and tempted toward sin, we need God’s strength and protection against the forces of evil which are set on our destruction.

2. Why should I Pray (vv. 9-10)

I really do beleive that

It connects you with your source of power. It connects your with the only life source that exists.

To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing.

Martin Luther

Because prayer is in no way shape or form passive and neither are any of your other relationships.

I am just really out here exposing myself tonight. But I remember when I had my first girlfriend my freshman year of High School, equally if not more weird than me. But long story short, I didn’t send her the “Good Morning” text one morning. She spent the whole rest of the day ignoring me, didn’t talk to me between classes, didn’t talk to me in the one class I had with her, didn’t talk to me at lunch. I am busted up and pleading with her to figure out what is wrong.

She finally tells me that she is mad because I didn’t text her good morning. So what happened next? Well she got the axe, because I was a real gangster and I don’t play no games.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Relationships don’t thrive when there is no effort put in to them.

If we look at the language in verses 9 and 10, we will see the kind of relationship that Jesus is describing in reference to prayer: (Ask, Seek, Knock)

There is nothing passive about Jesus dying on the cross for us, so why do we sit back and think, “I’ll just sit back and let God come to me”.

Jesus is basically saying get off your do nothing and do something!

God want’s to do big things in your life and in your heart, but it requires action on our part.

We are ineffective at best without prayer in our life.

Tool Illustration

We are not effective if we aren’t connected to our source of power.

But as soon as we are connected to that source, we are now full of our full potential

3. How does God respond to our prayers? (vv. 11-13)

Luke tells us that God is pleased when we pray to Him and that He wants to give us His Holy Spirit, which is the best gift possible.

Think about it, it is literally the insanely Holy presence of God that fills us whenever we come to our Heavenly father in prayer.

Have you heard of the 5 love languages?

Words of Affirmation, physical touch, acts of service, quality time, and gifts.

Well nobody in our house has the love language of “gifts” and i don’t think that I have fully got that concept yet. So every Christmas and birthday, I go ALL out on presents for my family. I literally love buying gifts and I am good at it.

But God says that even though those of us who are no stranger to sin know how to give good gifts, then how much more does God know how to give good gifts?

Sermon Recap

Prayer is kind of a big deal because:

When we learn how to pray we not only realize how important it is, but how God responds to our prayers.

Respond