1. The first key to standing by kneeling is to pray continually. (6:18)
2. The second key to standing by kneeling is to pray personally. (6:19-20)
3. The third key to standing by kneeling is to pray specifically. (6:21-22)
4. Conclusion (6:23-24)
This morning we’re reaching a milestone. We’re finishing Paul’s letter to the Ephesian Christians. My prayer is that these past 20 messages have been an enriching experience for you. I pray they have helped you to see the richness in the unity of Scripture. To see the depth of the teaching of Scripture. To see the beauty of consecutive study. The goal of all biblical study is to become more like Christ. I pray you can say you have been growing more like Him as a result of this study. Let’s complete this study the way we began it back in January. Let’s stand in honor of reading God’s Word.
EPHESIANS 6:18-24
A couple of years ago, a town outside of Detroit, MI made headlines all over the country. It made headlines because their local mosque was blasting the Muslim call to prayer over loudspeakers. Despite the protests of many of the townspeople, five times a day Arabic chants were trumpeted for all to hear. Chants calling all people to face Mecca and pray to a false god in the words of his false prophet, Mohammed. If you have ever been in a Muslim country, the call to prayer overrides everything. Work stops. In many places, traffic stops. Five times a day, everything ceases. People turn in to their prayer rooms, lay out their prayer rugs, bow toward Mecca and repeat their memorized, impersonal, blasphemous prayers. In those countries, the call to prayer is legally enforced. Punishments are severe for those caught violating the enforced prayer times. As we enter this time when we celebrate our nation’s independence, I thank God that we are still a free nation. We are still free to worship in the way we choose. We are free from a government that imposes false religion on us. But what do we do with that freedom? Do we use it to exercise our faith fully? Do we use it to do the things Jesus wants of us? Or do we allow our freedoms to lull us into complacency and laziness in how we exercise our faith? We need a call to prayer in our nation. We need a call to prayer in our church. We need a call to prayer in our homes. We need a call to prayer in our lives. Not one that involves government coercion. Not one that involves loudspeakers and false gods. But one that involves real commitment to the real God of the Bible. A call to prayer like the one Paul concluded Ephesians with. A call to prayer that is the key to standing as the kind of church God wants us to be. Standing as the kind of families God wants us to be. Standing as the kind of people God wants us to be. The kind of church and families and people who stand by kneeling. If you remember back to the beginning of our study, Paul began this letter with a prayer. He prayed that the Ephesian Christians would know the riches of their salvation. That they would know who Christ is and what He had done for them. And as a result, they would know who they were in relationship to each other. Then over in chapter 3, he prayed for them again. This time he prayed for their strength. Strength to walk in a manner that was worthy of their calling. In other words, for them to show their salvation in the way they lived. Now, as he closes his letter, he talks about prayer once again. This time he asks them for their prayers. He has prayed for the church, now it’s the church’s turn to pray for him. Why? Because Paul knew that intercessory prayer is the key to standing as the kind of church God wants us to be. He knew that the only way for them to experience true peace, love and grace was for them to practice church-wide intercession. That’s what I want for us this morning. I want for each of us to experience the peace, love and grace that can only come from true church-wide intercession. In order to do that, we’re going to look at three keys to standing by kneeling. The first key is to pray continually. Look with me in verse 18:
EPHESIANS 6:18
The first key to standing by kneeling is to pray continually. Paul starts this verse by telling us to pray always. Well, when is always? Is it at church? Is it before meals? Is it before bed? Is it during our quiet time? Yes! It’s all of those and more. Those are the more formal times of prayer. But the Bible tells us to always be in a spirit of prayer. We use the computer a lot. I remember a few years back when we switched from a dial-up online service provider to what’s called broadband. When we used dial-up, we didn’t use the computer much. It took a long time to get email to come up. Downloading took forever. Besides that, it took a while to get online in the first place. But things really changed when we went to broadband. Things were a whole lot faster and more convenient. Why was that? Because with broadband, the connection is always open. If the computer is on, we’re online. The communication between my computer and the server somewhere is always going on. That is the way our prayer life is supposed to be. We are always supposed to be online with God. Yes, we designate certain specific times to commune with Him in prayer. But even outside of those times, we’re plugged in with Him. Our communication with His is an “always” thing. But what does our continual conversation consist of? It consists of all prayer and supplication. The word that Paul uses for prayer here refers to general requests. Supplication, on the other hand, is specific requests. When he puts both of those words together, he’s letting us know that our continual conversation with God includes all kinds of prayer. We are to continually talk to God using all types of prayer. Prayers of praise. Prayers of thanksgiving. Prayers of personal requests. Prayers of intercession. Private prayer or public prayer. Planned or spontaneous. Sitting, standing, kneeling, lying down. Aloud or silent. Wherever, whenever—just as long as it is continual. Continual and in the Spirit. There is a lot of stuff that is called praying in the Spirit today that isn’t. Praying in the Spirit isn’t some type of unexplainable ecstatic experience. It isn’t speaking in unknown tongues. It isn’t a so-called private prayer language. Praying in the Spirit is allowing the Holy Spirit of God to shape you into praying according to God’s will. It is the same as praying in the name of Jesus. Praying in the name of Jesus isn’t some magical formula we tag on to the end of our prayers. Praying in the name of Jesus is praying in the Spirit. It is praying in a way that is consistent with who Jesus is and who He wants us to be. Praying continually also means praying with perseverance. Be steadfast in prayer. Continue on, even when the answer doesn’t seem to come. Jesus spoke of perseverance in one of His parables. Turn with me to Luke 11:5-13.
LUKE 11:5-13
Now, this doesn’t mean that we come to the Lord with our selfish requests over and over again. And it doesn’t mean that we’re going to get everything we ask for. What it means is that God uses the process of our perseverance to mould us into His will. If our request is in accordance with His will, He will grant it. If it is not in His will, He will shape our will to agree with His. But only when we persevere in continual prayer. Probably the most important part of our continual prayer is who we are supposed to be praying for. Throughout the Bible we are commanded to pray for the lost. We are to pray for our government. We are to pray for our enemies. But, here Paul specifically tells us to pray for the saints—that’s Christians—that’s each other. This is glue that binds us as a church together. We are to pray for each other—continually. Our channel is to be continually open to God in Spirit-guided, persevering prayer for each other. In order for us here at Brushfork Baptist church to stand as the kind of church God wants us to be—we must pray continually. Not only must we pray continually, we must pray personally. Look with me in verses 19-20:
EPHESIANS 6:19-20
The second key to standing by kneeling is to pray personally. Look who Paul asked them to pray for. He asked them to pray for him. Was that selfish on his part? No—because he knew that in order for them to have the kinds of churches God wanted, they needed to pray for the right person. So who was Paul to them? First, he was an apostle. That’s how he identified himself at the beginning of this letter. He was also a prisoner. He was a spiritual leader, a church planter and a missionary. But more than all of those things, Paul considered himself their fellow worker. Their co-laborer in the work of the Gospel. He spent his entire ministry raising up other leaders who would join him in the work God calls all of us to do. So, not only were they to pray for all the saints, they were to pray personally for Paul. Pray personally for those who God has specifically called out. Pray personally for your Sunday school teacher. Pray personally for your deacon. Pray personally for your pastor. But it doesn’t stop there. Pray personally for those who serve on committees. Pray personally for those who teach the youth. Pray personally for those who teach the children. Pray personally for those who keep the facilities in great shape. Pray personally for those who manage the Lord’s money. Pray personally for those who are willing to work. But how do we pray for them? Do we pray that their work will be easy? Well, how did Paul want to be prayed for? Notice that he didn’t ask them to pray that God would heal the wounds from the last time he was beaten. He didn’t ask them to pray that God would ease the pain from his last stoning. He didn’t ask them to pray that God deliver him from injustice and false imprisonment. He didn’t ask them to pray that God would supply the money for his next missionary trip. What did he ask them to pray for? He asked them to pray that he would be able to effectively communicate the Gospel to people. He had the right goal in mind. The goal wasn’t for him to be healthy, wealthy, and prosperous. The goal was for people to hear the Gospel. And he asked for strength to proclaim it boldly, clearly and without hesitation. I think it is interesting that he didn’t ask them to pray for the response. Because he knew that the response wasn’t his responsibility. His responsibility was to boldly proclaim the Gospel. To unfold and explain and teach the mysteries of the Word of God to a lost and dying world. And he knew he couldn’t do that in his own strength. The Holy Spirit of God is the only one who provides that kind of strength. And He provides that kind of strength through the personal prayers of His people. In order for us here at Brushfork Baptist church to stand as the kind of church God wants us to be—we must pray personally. We must pray continually and we must pray personally. We also must pray specifically. Look at verses 21-22:
EPHESIANS 6:21-22
The third key to standing by kneeling is to pray specifically. By and large, we are private people. We don’t like people to know our business. We’re usually pretty open to sharing small-talk. Most of the time we’re more open to sharing other people’s business than we are our own. But not Paul. He wanted his Christian brothers and sisters to know everything that was going on in his life. The Holy Spirit obviously didn’t inspire him to record all the details in Scripture. But he did feel the need to tell the Christians in Ephesus his personal affairs and how he was doing. Why did he feel the need to do that? Had they run out of stuff to talk about? Did they need some extra after church dinner conversation? Was it so they could check up on him and keep tabs on what all he was up to? No—it was so they could know how they could specifically pray for him. Paul had made it very clear that they were to pray for him personally. Pray for him personally with the focus on his mission to boldly proclaim the gospel. But he also needed them to pray for his specific needs. So he communicated his requests to them specifically. We don’t know what those specific requests were, but we do know they were “his business.” They dealt with his personal affairs and his personal well-being. We are pretty good about lifting up one another’s personal well-being. When one of us is sick or in the hospital, we are sure to offer up a prayer request. But how many times do we go to each other with our personal affairs—our personal struggles. “Brother, I’m having a problem with keeping my eyes where they need to be. I need you to pray for me.” “Sister, I’m having a problem with worry. I need you to pray for me.” Those kind of specifics are hard to share. But why are they so hard to share? Because we really don’t trust each other. It reminds me of a story I heard about three men who went out fishing together. Out in the quiet stillness of the lake, each became convicted of a personal sin. When the conviction became almost too much to bear, the first man confessed that he had a problem with alcohol. He had a little bottle hidden away that he would drink from occasionally. The confession seemed to do his heart some good, so the second man confessed that he had a problem with tobacco. He had a box of Cuban cigars that he would break into and smoke once in a while. They sat in silence for a long while. Finally, they asked the third man if he had any secret sins he’d like to confess. He leaned back and said, “Yes I do. I like to gossip. And I can’t wait to get back to town.” The only reason that’s funny is because it’s so true. The reason we don’t communicate our specific requests with one another is because we don’t trust one another. So how do we build that trust? We do it personally like Paul did. It grows out of one-on-one relationships like Paul had with Tychicus. Tychicus was his beloved brother. He was the one Paul trusted to convey his most personal requests to the people of Ephesus. And because he trusted Tychicus personally, he could communicate his requests completely. Our verse says that he would make all things known to you. Did Paul know for sure that those people would do the right thing with the personal information Tychicus delivered to them? No. But he did it anyway. He did it anyway because he knew that praying for him was for their benefit—not his. It would be a comfort to their hearts to pray for him. Paul knew that the Lord’s will was going to be done in his life. If anybody knew that, Paul did. It was to their advantage to get on board with the Lord’s work in his life. It was for their encouragement that they were to pray for him. It was to mould them and shape them into who God wanted them to be. Sometimes we seem to look at prayer as some sort of opinion poll. The more votes we get on a particular issue, the more we can get God to do what we want. When we think that way, we’ve missed the boat. Prayer is about shaping us and bending us to His will. It’s not about manipulating God to get Him to bend to our will. We’re not like the two-year old who finally wears his mommy down by begging for an hour. We won’t ever wear God down. We shouldn’t want to. We should want Him to wear us down. Wear us down into the image of His Son—Jesus Christ.
So how can we be the kind of church that God wants us to be? Is it by living in the past? Is it by forcing the future? Is it by building a bunch of things on our own strength? Is it by sitting back and doing nothing? No. The only way we can be the kind of church that God wants us to be is by standing for Him. And the only way we can stand is by kneeling. Paul opened up his letter by offering the grace and peace of Jesus to the Christians at Ephesus. He concludes his letter the same way in verses 23-24:
EPHESIANS 6:23-24
Peace, love with faith, and grace. Isn’t that what we all want? Are you like me—do you long for peace, love with faith and grace here at this church? If you do, you’ve got to pray. Pray continually. Pray personally. Pray specifically. Break out of your comfort zone and confess your sins to one another. Pray for each other. Pray for me. Pray for your deacons. Pray for your church. Not in order to make God do what we want Him to do. But in order that we might do what He wants us to do. That we might be changed. That we might be bent to His will. That we might decrease that He might increase. Oh Lord that is my prayer.
