The of Heart Prayer Is Prayer of The Heart
Matthew 6:5-15
Prayer that truly touches the heart of God and changes the world comes from a heart that is passionately dependent on God. Prayer is a great privilege and a great responsibility for believers. While it is true that God is in-charge of what is happening in the world, prayer is something God allows us to participate in regarding His sovereign work in our midst.
It’s God’s desire that we seek to further His kingdom plans and purposes here on earth. It’s been said that no spiritual revival or work of God that has ever happened until God’s people set their hearts toward God and start calling out to Him. It’s important, therefore, that we keep an active prayer life, and that the spirit of prayer be alive in our hearts.
We often fall short in our prayer life because we don’t understand its importance. Jesus knows this, that is why in the middle of His sermon He took time to teach about the nature and character of prayer.
Read Matthew 6:5-15.
Jesus said, “In this manner, therefore pray.”
Jesus is giving us a model that we’re to build our prayers from. It’s a pattern by which we’re to follow, not a script to be repeated word for word. John Bunyan said, “In prayer it is better to have a heart without words, than words without a heart.”
Authentic Prayer is Practiced in Private Not Performed in Public
Mt. 6:5-6 – “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 men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. 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 says, “WHEN you pray…” not “IF you pray…” Jesus expects that those who claim to be Christ-followers will practice an authentic prayer life. But He gives a warning concerning prayer. Jesus warns against prayer motivated by public recognition and a desire to impress others.
Don’t misunderstand what Jesus is saying here. The problem is not praying in public. Jesus prayed in public at varying times: when He was healing, when He gave thanks for the 5 loaves and 2 fish, when he raised Lazarus from the dead. The problem is not praying in public. It’s praying in public with the motive to be seen and noticed by other people.
The basic principle is that if I’m not making time to talk to Him privately, then I shouldn’t be praying to him publicly. If I pray in pubic when I don’t pray privately, people might think I have a great prayer life. But it wouldn’t be true.
Jesus says that this particular practice is hypocritical. Our word hypocrite comes from a Greek term that referred to an actor who changed roles by changing masks. In its biblical application, it’s pretending to be someone in public that you are not in private.
Jesus starts this section of his sermon with this statement in Mt. 6:1 – “Be careful not to do your ‘acts of righteousness’ before men, to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.”
Who is your audience? Are you motivated by the applause of people or the applause of God? We need to be careful that our acts of righteousness do not become just a show. Prayer can become a performance.
Sometimes, if I was in a group prayer, I was too busy trying to figure out what I was going to pray that I hardly hear the prayers of the others in the group. Sometimes you have a person in the group who is extremely articulate at prayer. Then I tend to become worried about what to say when it came my turn to pray. Jesus saw how easy it is for us to begin trying to win some sort of prayer competition. We become more concerned that others see how well WE pray instead of focusing on God who hears and answers our prayers.
Authentic Prayer is Based on a Loving Relationship Not a Lifeless Ritual
Mt. 6:7-8 – “And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.”
Authentic prayers don’t have to be long prayers to be effective. Some of the most powerful prayers in the Bible are short in length but outstandingly effective. The example that Jesus gives us can be spoken in around a minute.
Jesus uses the example of the pagans as being contrary to what he is teaching us to do. The Gentiles would pray to their false gods by utilizing as many titles as they could conceive and then recite all the favors they had done for their deity and the sacrifices they had offered. They thought that by repeating things over and over again, they could move their false god to act in ways that were beneficial to them.
1. The Heart of Prayer is About Who God Is.
“Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy.” (Matthew 6:9, NLT)
Think about the significance of the name, “Father.” It should humble us to think that we can come to God as His child, and that He is our Father.
This word means:
• He’s committed to us as His children.
• He knows who we are and He’s chosen to know us intimately.
• He’s consistent. He’ll never change and He’ll always be our Father.
• He’ll provide for our needs and protects us from harm.
• He’ll listen for us when we call to Him.
• He’ll equip us to live in this word, and
• He’ll love us unconditionally, no matter what.
God is Daddy (Abba). We can come near to Him without fear.
Jesus then goes on to say, “Hallowed be Your name.”
By praying this, what we’re doing is asking God to set apart His name in our lives. But it’s more than just His name, because God’s name is virtually indistinguishable from His person.
When we say, “Hallowed be Your name,” we’re asking God to be God to us, to be God in our lives. We’re also asking that God would be honored in the way we live, and that His nature and character would be manifested within us.
Prayer is not about showing God how good we are.
Prayer is about God showing us how good He is.
In essence, we’re asking God to do whatever is necessary so that His name will be held in reverence, even in spite of our shortcomings. We’re asking God to lift up His name, for His holy names’ sake so He will be lifted up.
2. The Heart of Prayer is About What God Wants.
“May your Kingdom come soon. May your will be done on earth, as it is in heaven.” (Matthew 6:10, NLT)
Jesus tells us to pray with expectations looking forward with expectancy toward His future kingdom where Jesus will be ruling and reigning. This also means we are to pray and work for God’s present reign and rule in the world today.
“Your kingdom come. Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven.” (Matthew 6:10 KNJV)
Prayer is not asking God what we want.
Prayer is asking God what He wants.
It’s about our attitude that now should be the time God sets up His kingdom. If this is our heart’s desire then our lives should reflect this request. Are we living as though the Lord could return at any time?
If we’re sincere about wanting God’s kingdom to come, then we should stop building our own kingdoms and start asking God to set up His kingdom within us and among us. It’s asking God to tear down our kingdoms so that His kingdom would rule and reign. So, His will would be done on earth as it is in heaven.
We pray “Your Kingdom Come”:
• When we pray for the salvation of non-kingdom people
• When we pray for the growth of God’s church
• When we pray for the redemption of this world
• When we pray for God’s will to be known and obeyed.
3. The Heart of Prayer is About How God Provides.
“Give us today the food we need.” (Matthew 6:11, NLT)
Bread or food represents that which is necessary to sustain life. Our prayer is for God to give us what we need, not what we desire.
Daily we are to look to God to provide our needs. Jesus said this is what we should be concentrating upon, not tomorrow or the next day. The reason is that today has enough trials and problems on its own and we really don’t need to be adding the worries of tomorrow to our already long list of worries that we have today, Matthew 6:34.
Prayer is not be used to manipulate God for our wants.
Prayer is to be used to depend on God for our needs.
We need to realize that God owes us nothing except those which he promised. And every promise that God makes carries with it a legitimate condition:
God gives our requests and petitions:
• When we ask from a pure heart / right motives
• When we ask in accordance with His will
• When we ask in faith
4. The Heart of Prayer is About Whom God Forgives.
“Forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us.” (Matthew 6:12 NLT)
Debt is used as a metaphor for sin, and what we know from God’s word, and the reality of our lives is that we’re all sinners.
The point Jesus is trying to get across is that there is a direct relationship between the way we forgive others and God’s forgiveness of us. Jesus reinforces this later on.
“For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” (Matthew 6:14-15 NKJV)
If we want God’s forgiveness, then we need to be forgiving others what they’ve done to us.
God’s forgiveness is linked to our forgiveness.
God expects His children to seek forgiveness from Him (1 John 1:5-2:6).
God expects His children to grant forgiveness to others (Matthew 18:21-35). Because forgiven people are recipients of God’s grace and mercy, it is expected that recipients of God’s grace and mercy will be willing dispensers of the same grace and mercy.
5. The Heart of Prayer is About How God Protects.
“And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one.” (Matthew 6:13 NLT)
It’s important to understand that God doesn’t tempt anyone to sin. The Apostle James says,
“Let no one say when he is tempted, "I am tempted by God"; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone.” (James 1:13 NKJV) What we’re asking for is God’s protection from Satan during the time of temptation and trials, and that’s because it’s at these times we’re most susceptible to attack.
There is an unseen world where angelic beings are in engaged in spiritual warfare against God’s forces and against human beings. We have an unseen enemy, Satan, who is deceiver all nations and accuser of believers. Satan now roams the earth like a lion seeking to devour. He uses temptation, deception, and accusation to defeat Christians.
God provides believers with adequate defense. We need to understand and be aware of the present reign of Christ in the world despite the on-going attacks of Satan. We need to use the (1) armor of God and (2) the power of God’s Spirit as we do spiritual battle against the forces of evil.
