Title: Does Prayer Even Work?
Text: Matthew 6:5-13
Bottom Line: Prayer isn’t a wish list, it’s the foundation to a relationship.
Intro
A couple years ago I was asked to be in a wedding in Iowa. An other buddy of mine was also in the wedding and we decided we would fly out a day or two early and hang out. We asked the groom what airport to fly because my only experience with Iowa was the smell. And we were told Minneapolis and Iowa City were both an hour an a half away. We figured Minneapolis had less corn, so that was the better choice to spend a day in.
We flew in, got our rental car and spend the evening exploring the area. Later that night in our hotel room I decided to look up the directions for the next day to the wedding venue… Turns out we were 5 and half hours away from the wedding venue… Iowa City, was 40 minutes from the venue. To make matters worse Minnesota has an extra tax on out of state drivers for rental cars upwards of $800…
I don’t know about you but nothing drives me more crazy then being told the wrong information… And that’s why we decided to do this Misquoted series. Because there’s a lot of people that have been told something that Jesus never said. They have the wrong information.
And I think this has been a great series. Because there are so many misquotes and misconceptions about Jesus floating around it’s really important that we as a church, and individually, examine ourselves to make sure that we are standing on what Jesus actually said. Because if we don’t we will leave a trail of hurt people behind us.
And the reality is there are some of you in this room that you’ve been hurt by these things. For the rest of us, maybe you haven’t been personally effected by these. But you have people in your life that have. We want to address some of these things and talk about what Jesus actually did say.
This series is especially important for the season that we are heading into as a Church. As we figure out what our new normal looks like it’s really important that we focus on what Jesus said and make sure our foundation is off his words.
Today we are going to talk about prayer. There’s a lot of crazy ideas out there about prayer. Just do a quick google search and you will see a myriad of thoughts and beliefs on what prayer is and how it works. Some are good, and a lot are crazy. That’s left a lot of people confused and lead astray, because they’ve been told prayer is something different then what it really is.
Tension
Many of us in this room would probably admit that our prayer isn’t where we want it to be. It might not be bad, but there’s probably room for improvement. Let’s be honest how many of our prayers lives look like this… God, thank you for today, thank you for providing, please be with… Did I forget to paint that spot on the wall? I think I’m out of clean shirts… I can’t forget to pick up milk later… And the next thing you know you are replacing your screen that has a whole in it, right? Come on be honest, how many of you have done that?
I’m guessing for most of us when we pray today it feels more like a check list then it does a conversation. Many of us start praying but a few minutes in we start thinking about work, or a conversation you had earlier, or how awesome the Super Bowl was this past year and how great Tom Brady is… Or is that just me?
Or maybe prayer is tough for you because one time you prayed for something really big and nothing happened. Or what happened was exactly what you prayed wouldn’t happen.
When I was 9 my dad was diagnosed with terminal cancer and was given three months to live. And at that age here’s what I knew. God loved me and God listened to me when I prayed. So my assumption was if those two things are true, then he has to answer my prayer the way I want. Because God loves me and I love my dad, surely he won’t take him away. And I knew that God listened to my prayers so this one has to be answered.
But exactly what I prayed for not to happen, did. At a young age it left me confused about prayer was even for and if it even worked. If God loves me why didn’t he answer that prayer? Did I do something wrong? Maybe I didn’t believe enough, or maybe I didn’t have enough faith?
So I bought into this misconception about prayer… If I had had more faith God would have answered my prayer, my dad would have been healed. I think that’s many our beliefs here this morning. That if we just had more faith, God would have answered our prayer.
Here’s our misquote for today… Jesus never said “If you have enough faith all your prayers will be answered.” If you just believe than you will receive. If you just say the right words you will get want you want. If just annoy me enough, I’ll cave and give you want you want. The reason you didn’t get that answer was because you lack faith.
Jesus never said that… The Bible never promises that if we have enough faith all our prayers will be answered. But so many people have thought that or been told that.
And that’s lead to a lot of us praying because we feel like we have too and not because we want too. That’s not right, but that’s the reality that many of us have faced. Maybe that’s the reality of your life right now. This misconception that if we just had more faith God would answer our prayers has left many of us confused on why some prayers get answered and others don’t.
What we are going to see today is that Jesus never actually taught this misconception that we have. And we are going to see Jesus take something we thought we understood, prayer, and tell us what it really means. He’s going to show us a better way. He’s going to show what prayer was actually created for.
Truth
Jesus talked a lot about prayer, maybe the most prolific teaching we from Jesus on the topic of prayer is found in the sermon on the mount in Matthew 6.
Go ahead and turn your Bibles over and we are going to start in Matt 6:5… We are going take a look at what Jesus actually said.
5 “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 others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.
There was this common practice in Jesus’ day that when the Pharisees, the religious leaders, would pray they would do so in public. And they would say these big extravagant prayers and use these big words that only they knew the meaning of. They did this so others would look at them and think wow they most be really righteous to say a prayer like that. Their hope was that other people would see them and think they were better and more spiritual then they really were.
These guys did the right thing, but for all the wrong reasons. Jesus is saying when you pray so that others can hear you, then you will get want you want. But they are the only ones that will be listening.
Jesus continues…
6 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.
?Jesus isn’t saying that we shouldn’t pray in public. Otherwise things would look very different around here. He’s saying that when we pray we are praying to God not for the approval of others. In other words when we pray, pray to God and not for anyone else.
7 And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. 8 Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.
The word that most of our Bibles translate as “babbling” some of your translations might use the phrase empty words is very interesting. Here’s the literal translation: Do not use vain repetitions. Don’t babble repetitive, long winded, prayers trying to get God to do what you want.
In Jesus day there was common teaching both in Judaism and in the pagan world that if you just said the right words in the right way then God, or your god, would answer your prayers. But what Jesus is saying is that’s not who prayer works. Those repetitions are in vain. They are empty, longwinded, nonsensical, and just hollow chatter.
This isn’t unique to their culture… I went to Amazon and searched for books on prayer. Book after book came up about find the secret key to prayer and unlocking the key to prayer. All of them claiming that there is some type of formula that if you just say these words, pray in this way, believe that God actually can, if you just follow this specific method then God will have to answer your prayers.
Listen Church, There is no secret key to prayer. You don’t need a “unlock” the power of prayer. What Jesus said to those listening 2000 years ago is still true for us today.
To get a better understanding I want to look at the Message translation… Eugene Peterson wrote the Message translation of the Bible. In which he takes the big idea of the Bible and puts it in modern wording. It’s not a literal translation but it can provide a unique look at scripture as it would be understood today. Here’s how he puts this passage:
The world is full of so-called prayer warriors who are prayer-ignorant. They’re full of formulas and programs and advice, peddling techniques for getting what you want from God. Don’t fall for that nonsense. (The Message)
There’s no secret words that will convince God to give you want you are asking for. In fact God already knows what you need. That means that when you ask God for something, He’s saying this is not new information to me.
So if you are like me you are probably then we are asking the same question right now. If God already knows what I need, why am i praying? Why even bother asking? And if God really knows what I need why don’t I have it?
Here’s where our misconception about prayer really comes into the picture. Most of us pray when we need something or when we are about to eat something really unhealthy so we ask God to bless the food… But prayer isn’t a wish list of things we need from God. That’s not the point of prayer.
That’s where this misquote of Jesus that if you just made more faith your prayers would be answered comes from. Because we think that if we just had more faith our loved one would have made it, if I just believed then I would be healed, if I just say the right words God will give me the money I need, if I just believe then God will fix my problems… It all comes from this misconception, that prayer is just a wish list. Pray is just an exchange of information. Listen Jesus never taught that. And in this passage Jesus is teaching about what prayer really is.
The point of prayer is not the information exchanged. Jesus already knows that.
Jesus goes on to give us an example, a template, of what our prayers should look like.
9 “This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, 10 your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 11 Give us today our daily bread. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’ Matthew 6:9-13
You’ve probably heard this prayer before. Maybe you grew up in a church that would read this every week or you’ve heard it quoted in movie. But if you are like me you never really understood what Jesus was teaching us. ??Jesus isn’t teaching us that we have to pray this specific prayer, although that’s not a bad thing. He’s teaching us to pray like this. And if you were to go examine Jesus’ most famous recorded prayer in John 17 you would notice that Jesus follows the same structure that he lays out here. He prays in the same way, just in different words.
What Jesus is teaching us is what prayer is really about. In this teaching Jesus teaches us two things:
Prayer is about the conversation
Think about your relationships, your spouse, your friends, especially your children. When you care about someone you want to know about their day. You might already even know about their day, but you still want to hear it right? Parents I could tell you the exact lesson plan that is being taught to your kids right now in Kids Church. I could tell you every activity your child is going to do. I could even tell you what snack they are going to eat. But when you go pick them up and get in the car, your still going to ask them “What’d you do today?” Because you want to hear from them. You don’t need the information, you want the conversation.
God already knows what you need before you pray it. God doesn’t need the information you are going to tell him, he wants the conversation with you. God wants to hear about our dreams, our fears, our struggles, our hopes, our wants and our needs. He doesn’t need the information, he wants to conversation.
?In this conversation we can start to see that God cares for us. And when we see that our trust in him is build. We can look back on our prayers and see how God brought us through, how God provided. Maybe not the way we thought, or the way we asked, but when we engage in a conversation we see God’s hand caring and guiding us.
Prayer is about the relationship not the results.
When we believe that if we just had more faith our prayer would be answered we are focused solely on the result. But prayer is much bigger then that. Prayer is about building a relationship.
So does this mean we shouldn’t ask for what we need? No, in a relationship you talk about what’s on your heart, what your thinking, what your feeling, what you hope for, what need. God wants a relationship with you, so tell him good, bad, or otherwise what’s going on in your life.
Look back at the prayer Jesus taught us to pray like. We pray for our needs and our hopes, and what we are struggling with. But the purpose is not on getting results it’s on building a relationship. We tell God what we are going through and what are needs are. And we trust Him to provide, because He already knows what we need.
Application
We need to shift our focus on prayer. Many of us treat prayer as a time to get what we want from God. And when we don’t get it we think we didn’t have enough faith. We must not really believe. That’s left many of us confused and hurt wondering if God really cares about us.
Not only that, but the Church has taken this belief and taught it to others. That if they just believe and have faith then God will work things out for their good. So in a time of desperation they tried. They threw up a hail mary and prayed for their situation. But it didn’t work, at least not the way they had hoped.
This belief that the Church has been selling has hurt those inside the Church and those outside. And it’s time that we change that. By misquoting Jesus on what it means to pray. Too many people have been hurt and taught someone contrary to what Jesus taught us.
So here’s the 3 simple ways we can pray the way Jesus taught and showed us.
Connect With God Regularly
Sometimes I think it’s a shame that we lump prayer in with the Spiritual disciplines. I get why it’s there, but I think we miss something huge about prayer when we view it as a discipline. We see it as something that we have to do and we feel guilty when we don’t pray as much as we should. Gallup conducted a study finding 9 out of 10 Americans pray regularly. Yet in a separate study where 678 people who prayed regularly were polled only 23 felt satisfied with their prayer life. Could it be that our approach to prayer is wrong?
When we view prayer as something we have to do, as a Spiritual Discipline I think this leads us to the wrong idea of prayer. I would rather think of it as my favorite author, Philip Yancey, says a spiritual privilege. We don’t have to pray, we get the privilege of having a relationship with the creator of the universe. You shouldn’t feel guilty when you don’t pray.
And in order for that relationship to grow we have to connect with God regularly.
Think about it this way… When I was dating my wife we would go out on dates and just talk about everything. It was easy, painless, and we enjoyed it. It was fun to go for a hike, try a new restaurant, go mini-golfing, or just hang out with friends. And everywhere we went we would talk about life, hopes and dreams, difficult things we’ve been through, struggles, and the various experiences we’ve had.
It came easy… But something happened after we got married, over time it took more work to connect. It no longer flows as easily. We have to intentional create space to connect and talk about life and what’s going on. And if we want our marriage to last and be strong then we have to make sure we are regularly connecting.
I suspect our relationship with God is the same. In the beginning, for most of us, it was easy to find time to pray. It was new and exciting. But then life happened, right… It became a struggle to find time to pray and slowly day by day you prayed less and less.
And just like a marriage relationship, if you want your relationship with God to be strong then you have to connect regularly. If you don’t your relationship will fall apart.
Jesus didn’t just teach this, this is what He modeled. He connected with God regularly. Over and over in the NT we see Jesus praying… Here’s a few…
Mark 6 “He left for the mountain to pray.”
Luke 6 “He went off to the mountain to pray, and He spent the whole night in prayer to God.”
Mark 1 “In the early morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house, and went away to a secluded place, and was praying there.”
Luke 5 “But Jesus Himself would often slip away to the wilderness and pray.”
Matthew 14 “He went up on the mountain by Himself to pray; and when it was evening, He was there alone.”
I could go on, but you get the point. Jesus prayed regularly at all times. You and I have the privilege of connecting with God, are you taking advantage of that?
Prayer is about the relationship. And if we want a relationship to grow then we have to connect regularly. You will have to carve time out of your schedule, as you would to grow any relationship. But if you pray regularly your relationship with God will grow.
So set a reminder on your phone to pray for a few minutes each day. Buy a prayer journal. Go for a walk each evening and pray. Find an activity you can do while you pray. There’s no “right” way to pray, just whatever works for you. Find a place and a time that you can regularly connect with God.
Pray Honestly
Many of us have been taught that when we pray we have to clean up our language and use fancy words since we are talking to God. And that’s just not true. In the Lords Prayer Jesus used the term “father” which was the simplest and informal way of addressing God. The people listening would have been shocked and applaud that Jesus would address God so causal. But that’s the point Jesus is trying to make.
God doesn’t want some fancy scripted prayer. He doesn’t want you to say the “right” words, whatever those are… He wants to know what’s going on inside your head. He wants to know what you are struggling with. He wants to know your desires, your fears, your hopes, and your dreams. He just wants your heart.
Nobody better lived this principle out than David who wrote many of the Psalms. He recorded some of the most honest, raw, and heart wrenching prayers. Here’s one:
My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, but I find no rest. Psalm 22:1-2
Maybe that sounds familiar, Jesus said the same words as he hung on the cross. David didn’t bother to clean up his language, he just said what he was feeling. Good, bad, and ugly, he brought it to God.
Sometimes my prayers contain words that I could not say on this stage. Maybe that makes you a little uncomfortable, but that’s where my heart is. I try to pray what I’m thinking and feeling. Good, bad, or ugly. I have found that God cannot change my heart until I give it to him. And sometimes what is on my heart is messy and painful and the only word I think to describe what I’m feeling has four letters. And that’s okay, because that’s where my hearts at and that’s what I want to give to God. And once he has my heart he can change it.
I worry that we try to clean ourselves up before we approach God. God doesn’t want that, he wants us where we are at. Be honest when you pray. Be like David as he prayed. David does not hide his emotions. And he used some blunt language. When David screws up you see how his heart breaks as confesses and begs for forgiveness. When David is happy you can see the excited jump off the page. When David is in a difficult season you see him question why God is letting this happen.
It’s okay to tell God what’s going on in your heart, even if it’s ugly. And until you give him your heart he cannot change it.
Don’t script your prayers or try to say what you think God wants to hear. Just say what you are thinking. Raw and honest.
Trust God to Provide
I’m really good at giving God advice. In most situations in my life I’m quick to tell God how I think He should handle things. When I come to a problem my first reaction is to go to God and tell him how I think he should handle it. Anybody else?
But when I pause and reflect I recognize that the only reason I am in the spot I am in today is because God has been good to me in the past. The only reason I have a job I enjoy, a beautiful wife, a house to live in, clothes to wear, and food to eat is because God given those things to me. The only reason I am where I am today is because God was good to me in the past. I don’t doubt what God’s done in the past, I’m just not sure that He will continue to be good to me in the future.
Come on, you’ve thought that right? God I know that you’ve provided for me in the past, but will you provide now? And will you provide in the way that I want you to provide.
That’s why Jesus says “your Father knows what you need before you ask him.” We can trust God because He knows our needs better then we do. This is probably the hardest step for most of us. Because at some point we feel like God didn’t come through. The money of that bill never came, the cancer didn’t go away, what we wanted to happen didn’t. And know we aren’t sure if God is trustworthy.
I can’t stand here and tell you why God answers some prayers and not others. I wish i could but I can’t. I don’t know why my dad had to die when I was 9. I know God could have taken the cancer away, but he didn’t. So I can’t stand here and tell you that if you pray than everything will work out the way you want. I know for me I have had some big prayers answered the way I want and others the opposite of what I wanted to happen happened. I don’t know why, you will have to take that up with God. But here’s what I do know…
Jesus understands what you are going through. Even He had prayers go unanswered. His most agonizing prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane He asked for God to take away the pain he was about to experience. He begged and was under so much stress about what was to come it caused him physical pain… Have you been there? Begging God for something? Under so much stress you that you feel like you can’t make it? Jesus has been there, wanting so bad to skip what was about to come. But God said no. You have to go through this.
We can learn something from this… Sometimes God says no. But God’s plan is trustworthy even through the no’s. And sometimes we just have to trust that what God has on the other side of the pain is better.
I love how Philip Yancey says it:
At the instant of pain, it may seem impossible to imagine that good can come from tragedy — it must have seemed so to Christ at Gethsemane — We never know in advance exactly how suffering can be transformed into a cause for celebration. But that is what we are asked to believe. Faith means believing in advance what will only make sense in reverse. Philip Yancey
I can tell you that in my life that God has always brought me through every difficult season. Maybe not the way I expected, or even wanted, but he’s brought me through it. And in the end I’m glad I trusted Him, because His ways are better than mine. And looking back I can see that his way was better then mine.
Conclusion
Prayer is not about getting what you want from God. It’s about God giving you what you need. It’s not about changing God’s heart, it’s about change our heart. It’s not a time of empty words, it’s a conversation of pouring out our hearts to God. It’s not a time to say the right words. It’s a time to be really and honest with how we are feeling.
Prayer connects us with God. It’s transforms our heart. It strengthens us. It allows God to work in our lives. Prayer is probably the most misunderstood and misused, yet most powerful tool we have in connecting with God.
Maybe for you that means spending a few minutes in the quiet morning. Maybe for you that means a stroll around the neighborhood at night. Maybe for you that’s locking yourself in the closest because that’s the only way you can get away from your family. Maybe you need to go buy a journal. Maybe you need to get away in nature. Maybe you need to color as you pray. Maybe you need to start being honest with God about how you feel.
There’s a lot of misconceptions and people have misquoted Jesus a lot on what prayer is for. But Jesus gave us clear examples of how we should prayer and model it with his life by regularly connecting with God. If you want your relationship with God to grow. If you want to be strengthen through the difficult seasons. If you want to have your heart transformed then you have to regularly get alone with God. You have to connect with him.
So that’s what we are going to do right now. We are going to give you the opportunity right now to pray an honest prayer to God. To give your heart to God.
Maybe your prayers will look like: Thank you for providing… What do you want me to do next? How can I be a better follower of you? Thank you for making me new…
Or maybe they will look like this: You know what, it really sucks that you let this happen to me… God I’m afraid… I don’t know what to do… I don’t understand… I’m confused… I’m not good enough… I’m not sure I can trust you anymore. God I’m tired of feeling like ___, where are you?
Whatever is on your heart, good, bad, or ugly give it to God… The band is going to come out and for a few minutes just play some instrumental music. Use this opportunity to approach God with the real you, maybe for the first time.
Say a prayer to God. Write down on your bulletin, or record it in your phone. Get down on your knees and cry out or go stand in a corner and say a prayer. Whatever you need to do, just give your heart to God.
Let’s pray…
