SERMON BRIEF
Date Written: February 2003
Date Preached: February 5, 2003
Church: BBC (PM) Wednesday
FOUNDATIONAL ELEMENTS
Series: What the Bible Says…
Title: About Prayer
Text: Matthew 6:5-13
Introduction:
When we say that we are seeking God’s guidance on any particular thing in our lives what is the one thing that we Christians share with each other and the world on HOW we can get guidance from God?
We tell each other and the world that we PRAY about it. I truly and wholeheartedly believe that prayer is HOW we can know what God desires for our lives.
But just what is prayer? Can you describe prayer to a non-believer? To say that prayer is simply communicating with God is a huge understatement and over simplifies the action.
Prayer is SO much more than merely talking to God. Prayer is the deepest desires of our very soul being laid bare to the Creator who made us. Prayer is our way of coming into an intimate relationship with this Creator, God of the Universe.
Prayer creates within the believer an astute awareness of just how close God is…and just how easy it is for His children to get to the very throne of God.
Prayer is the only way for an unbeliever to recognize and ask for forgiveness of the sins in his/her life. Prayer is the only way for a believer to confess those sins and accept the salvation that God has offered to the world, through His Son Jesus Christ.
Prayer is how the believer brings the anxieties of the heart to the feet of our Lord. Prayer is the ultimate way that a believer can show his/her thanks to God for what God has done and continues to do in their life.
We can find prayer describe, explained and illustrated all throughout the Bible. I believe the most prolific demonstration of prayer in the Word of God is the life of Jesus. We can see many examples and records of when and how Jesus prayed to God.
In the NT we find the disciples coming to Jesus and asking Him, “Lord SHOW us HOW to pray!” They were really unsure, as it seemed that Jesus prayed in a way they had NEVER seen before.
We can see in this passage that Jesus gave His disciples some great guidelines as to how He prayed, and instruction on how THEY should be praying. What we do NOT see here in this passage is anything spoken by Jesus that makes the words of this prayer special… for it is not the words but the attitude of the heart that matters to God.
Tonight I want us to look at and consider 6 general requirements that we MUST adhere to for our prayer to be effective. I also want to look at 4 requirements of a personal nature that will lead to an effective prayer life.
Finally, tonight I want us to look at the very “parts” of a prayer… or in other words, now WE can break our prayer into sections and NEVER ever leave anything out.
First, let’s look at some of the general requirements for prayer in the Christian life. In v.14 of tonight’s passage we can see who Jesus believed that the 1st requirement is that we have a heart that is forgiving. In other words, we must have a forgiving spirit.
Now why is forgiveness so hard for us? It is b/c our nature thrives on retaliation, or getting even. WE often find ourselves seeking vengeance rather than doing what God is leading us to do.
For us to TRULY forgive someone means that we have to be able to ‘let go’ of things that hold us in bondage. We have to be willing to forgive. Unwillingness to forgive can and will eventually overwhelm us and that creates a barrier between us and God. If you really look at it, our forgiveness of other people is really an outpouring of God’s forgiveness in our own lives…
For an effective prayer life, not only do believers need a forgiving spirit, but I can also see that they need simplicity in their prayer.
When we look at v.5-6 we see Jesus speaking about the Pharisees and how their prayer was a kind of performance to impress those around them. This is NOT to say that one person cannot lead in prayer as others follow along in silent prayer.
Entering the closet is really not a literal action but a figurative one. It suggests the closing out of what the world is trying to put INTO your lives. It suggests shutting out any pettiness, jealousy or anxieties that you may have in your heart.
We shut these things out and we can then focus and concentrate on our communication with God on a one-on-one basis. So really this prayer can be prayed ANYWHERE…even in a crowded marketplace.
Simplicity and a forgiving spirit are the 1st 2 general requirements to effective prayer, but we can also see in Luke 18:10-14 that for our prayer to be effective we must be humble and repentant at heart.
Both the Pharisee and the publican (tax collector) in this parable can represent a lost person. The tax collector prayed the only prayer that God will hear from a sinner, and that is admission and confession of sin in his/her life, a cry for repentance and the yearning heart crying out for salvation.
The prayer of the Pharisee in this passage in Luke describes a person who considers what he does and how he lives to be GOOD enough to earn God’s respect and salvation.
There is NO humility on the part of the Pharisee and there is certainly NO repentant attitude in the heart of the Pharisee. He believes that it will be his good works that gets Him into heaven.
For prayer to be effective another general requirement from the one praying is a unity of believers. Prayer to God for a specific request is NOT a bad thing, but it is when we begin to pray for OUR will to be done and not the will of God that makes this decision so vital.
WE must be unified as believers that God is going to meet our needs and that our focus cannot be on the prayer need but on God’s direction and focus.
Another general requirement that I can see is that of intensity. The intensity of the believer must be directed toward his/her focus on God and serving God to their fullest abilities.
The exercise of faith is so important to the Christian believer, as it carries with it a cleansing affect on the soul. It prepares us to “hear” the message of God and what He desires for us to hear. It allows us to face life in seeking God’s desires and not our own.
Finally I can see in the general requirements realm that for effective prayer we must prayer without ceasing as Paul indicates in 1 Thess 5:17.
We must keep the lines of communication with God open and free of all obstacles. Our very attitude in life should be a total expression of prayer to God. This unceasing communication with the Father God of the Universe, will foster a beautiful and cherished ‘natural’ bond with God in our prayer life.
We have looked at the 6 general principles that apply to all people everywhere. Tonight I want us to look at 4 very personal requirements for the believer so they can have what is called effective prayer.
The very 1st personal requirement that we can see in this passage is that we have to have a purity of heart in our prayer. If we look at Ps 24:3-5 and 66:18-19 we can see that God thru the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, will reveal sin when it exists in the lives of His people.
If we as “believers” then choose NOT to deal with that sin, God will abort our prayer. When we approach the throne of God we must approach it with a pure heart and pure motives. Clean hands here indicate that our actions are open for God to see and that any sin in our lives is confessed and out in the open with God.
But not only do we need a pure heart when we pray, but the 2nd personal requirement we can find is FAITH. We must have faith. It is sad, but every Christian who prays, does not believe that their prayer is heard or will be answered. They simply do not have the faith that God has the power to answer their prayer.
To truly believe with intensity of faith requires that believers must cultivate this gift of faith that was given by God at the moment of salvation.
We all have faith given to us by God, it is how we use it that determines how BIG our faith can grow to be. Faith is like a muscle, the more it is used the larger and tougher it gets, but unlike our muscles…it will never wear out on us.
The 3rd personal requirement for effective prayer is that we pray in the Name of Jesus Christ. Looking in John 14:13 we find Jesus saying, “…and whatever you ask in My name, that is what I will do…” Now I want us to realize that this is NOT some formula that we use to complete our prayers, but it is a recognition that the source of all good things is Jesus Christ and we receive NOTHING good unless we receive it from Him.
And it is the NAME of Jesus that represents to the world WHO He is! The 4th personal requirement for an effective prayer life is submission on the part of the believer to the will of God.
In 1 John 5:14 we find the Bible telling “…and this is the confidence that we (believers) have in Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us…”
We have looked at 10 requirements that believers must have to have an effective prayer life. We looked at 6 very general requirements and we looked at 4 very personal requirements. Finally tonight I want us to look at the prayer itself and how it can be broken down to help us say what needs to be said during prayer time.
For me this is really simple b/c I use the ACTS method when I pray. I think about the word ACTS like the book of ACTS and my prayer is built from there.
The A in ACTS stands for Adoration. Our prayers should always begin with praise and adoration of our God for WHO and WHAT He is. Let’s look at Ps 103 and then at the beginning of this prayer Jesus said to use as an example. Read verses Adoration of God lifts Him up and places us in our proper place.
The C in ACTS stands for Confession of sins. We are promised in 1 John 1:9 that if we confess our sin, God is faithful to forgive that sin! After we adore God for who He is, we must confess our sin to Him and seek His forgiveness.
The T in ACTS stands for THANKSGIVING. Looking at this prayer and also what Paul wrote to the Philippian church, we can see that the sin of ungratefulness is most common sin among believers. It is too often that we take God for granted.
Finally tonight lets look at the letter S in ACTS it stands for Supplications/ Intercessions for ourselves and for other people.
These are earnest requests brought to the feet of God on our behalf and on the behalf of other people. We are called to intercede for those who are sick and less fortunate in life.
Prayer is a very integral part of the life of a believer. We must engage in secret prayer, in family prayer, in group prayer and in public prayer for we are called to share God with the world.
The prayer life of a Christian is the source of spiritual nutrition for that believer, when it suffers, the believer suffers! We must learn to pray as God desires us to pray.
To effectively pray, we must come to God with:
A forgiving spirit
Simple and forthright
Humble and Repentant
With unity of believers
With intensity in our prayer
Unceasingly
With a pure heart
With faith
In the name of Jesus, and finally
In submission to the will of God
How do you pray today? PRAY and go to prayer list.
