The Word on Prayer: A Season of Prayer
June 3, 2007 various Scriptures (NLT)
Intro:
We are in a season of prayer, so this morning I want to spend our sermon time returning to Scripture for instruction on prayer. This is actually a sermon my brother, who preaches for fun as a lay person in his church, preached a couple of years ago and which I’ve modified for us this morning. The sermon is almost all Scripture, which is consistent with our desire as a church to spend more time in Scripture and raise the profile of the Word of God as our authoritative source for hearing and seeing God in our lives. It flows in a question/answer format.
What is prayer?
• “Prayer is conversation with God.” - Clement of Alexandria.
• “Prayer is the chief exercise of faith, by which we receive God’s benefits.” – John Calvin.
• “What you love you worship; true prayer, real prayer, is nothing but loving: what you love, that you pray to.” – Augustine of Hippo.
When should we pray?
If we follow Jesus’ example:
• morning (Mk 1:35): “Before daybreak the next morning, Jesus got up and went out to an isolated place to pray.”
• evening (Mk 6:45-46): “45 Immediately after (feeding the 5000), Jesus insisted that his disciples get back into the boat and head across the lake to Bethsaida, while he sent the people home. 46 After telling everyone good-bye, he went up into the hills by himself to pray.
• all night (Lk 6:12): “12 One day soon afterward Jesus went up on a mountain to pray, and he prayed to God all night.”
• In other words (1 Thess 5:17): “Never stop praying.”
Where should we pray?
• not here (Matt 6:5): “When you pray, don’t be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth, that is all the reward they will ever get.”
• but here (Matt 6:6): “But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father, who sees everything, will reward you.”
What about when we don’t get an answer, when we have already prayed about something, when we feel like giving up?
• Lk 18:1-8: “One day Jesus told his disciples a story to show that they should always pray and never give up. “There was a judge in a certain city,” he said, “who neither feared God nor cared about people. A widow of that city came to him repeatedly, saying, ‘Give me justice in this dispute with my enemy.’ The judge ignored her for a while, but finally he said to himself, ‘I don’t fear God or care about people, but this woman is driving me crazy. I’m going to see that she gets justice, because she is wearing me out with her constant requests!’” Then the Lord said, “Learn a lesson from this unjust judge. Even he rendered a just decision in the end. So don’t you think God will surely give justice to his chosen people who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly!”
What about our feelings?
• Jas 5:13-16: “Are any of you suffering hardships? You should pray. Are any of you happy? You should sing praises. Are any of you sick? You should call for the elders of the church to come and pray over you, anointing you with oil in the name of the Lord. Such a prayer offered in faith will heal the sick, and the Lord will make you well. And if you have committed any sins, you will be forgiven. Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results”
Why should we pray?
A bigger question than when or where, why should we pray?
• to avoid temptation (Matt 26:41): “Keep watch and pray, so that you will not give in to temptation. For the spirit is willing, but the body is weak!”
• to find forgiveness and freedom (1 Jn 1:9): “if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.”
• to receive from God (Lk 11:9-13): “And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. You fathers—if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not! So if you sinful people 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.”
Are there any “rules”, anything to avoid? or… How Not To Pray:
• don’t babble (Matt 6:7): “When you pray, don’t babble on and on as people of other religions do. They think their prayers are answered merely by repeating their words again and again.”
• don’t pray carelessly (Ecc 5:1-2): “As you enter the house of God, keep your ears open and your mouth shut. It is evil to make mindless offerings to God. Don’t make rash promises, and don’t be hasty in bringing matters before God. After all, God is in heaven, and you are here on earth. So let your words be few.”
• don’t pray with selfish motives (Jas 4:3): “when you ask, you don’t get it because your motives are all wrong—you want only what will give you pleasure.”
Does anything keep God from hearing/listening to our prayers?
• disobedience and rebellion (Deut 1:42-45): “But the Lord told me to tell you, ‘Do not attack, for I am not with you. If you go ahead on your own, you will be crushed by your enemies.’ “This is what I told you, but you would not listen. Instead, you again rebelled against the Lord’s command and arrogantly went into the hill country to fight. But the Amorites who lived there came out against you like a swarm of bees. They chased and battered you all the way from Seir to Hormah. Then you returned and wept before the Lord, but he refused to listen.
• secret sin in our hearts (Ps 66:18): “If I had not confessed the sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.”
• stubbornness and hardness and refusal to obey (Zech 7:8-13): “Then this message came to Zechariah from the Lord: “This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies says: Judge fairly, and show mercy and kindness to one another. Do not oppress widows, orphans, foreigners, and the poor. And do not scheme against each other. “Your ancestors refused to listen to this message. They stubbornly turned away and put their fingers in their ears to keep from hearing. They made their hearts as hard as stone, so they could not hear the instructions or the messages that the Lord of Heaven’s Armies had sent them by his Spirit through the earlier prophets. That is why the Lord of Heaven’s Armies was so angry with them. “Since they refused to listen when I called to them, I would not listen when they called to me, says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.”
Then How Should We Pray?
• Matt 6:9-13: “Pray like this: Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy. May your Kingdom come soon. May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. Give us today the food we need, and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us. And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one.”
• pray humbly (2 Chron 7:14-15): “if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and restore their land. My eyes will be open and my ears attentive to every prayer made in this place.”
• pray whole-heartedly (Jer 29:13): “If you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me”
• pray with boldness and confidence and in obedience (1 Jn 3:22-23): “we can come to God with bold confidence. And we will receive from him whatever we ask because we obey him and do the things that please him.”
• pray with the Holy Spirit (Rom 8:26-27): “the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words. And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God’s own will.”
Make Sure to Listen:
• Jn 10:27-28: “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they will never perish. No one can snatch them away from me”
And Finally…
• Eph 6:18: “Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere.”
