P.U.S.H “Praying Until Something Happens”
SUB-TOPIC: Keep On praying until something happens
Text:
Luke 11: 5 And he said unto them, which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him and midnight, and say unto him, friend, lend me three loves; For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him? And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee. I say unto you, though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth. And I say unto you, ask and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
INTRODUCTION:
This morning I want to drop anchor in the collection of writings called the New Testament and right behind the Gospel of Mark and right in front of the Gospel of John there you will find the Gospel of St. Luke. In the 11th chapter of Luke’s Gospel, there is a word from the Lord.
I want to talk from the subject “P.U.S.H”. I have come on a mission of encouragement. I pray that the words I speak offer both sympathy and empathy for those of us whom are hurting. I submit that it is a fact that in life sometimes our way will get dim and dark, our mountains will be high and our hills will seem harder climb, but I would that we all remember that there is power in prayer. I have come today on an assignment from God to say to the depressed, dejected, defeated and those whom are in dismay that the solution to the situation is not positive thinking, it not the accumulation of things as that the health and wealth movement advocate. What afflicts us the most can not be dealt with by pills or dollar bills. I submit that what we need to do right in the midst of our situations, right in the midst of failing health, dying love ones, divorce and various difficulties is to PUSH. Push! I know you are saying that does that mean. Most of us have spent our lives trying learn how to swim with sharks and deal with devils (the ones that walk on two legs. We have spent our lives struggling to cope with traps and tricks, responding to rejection, hiding our fears and projecting our successes. In the course of the exercise of life we face constant stress and strain and they often leaves us drain. Yet I have come on assignment today to remind us of what already know and that is that we must keep on pushing. We have to push, PUSH - Pray Until Something Happens. Yes, sometimes we have had to walk through valleys, and climb up hills and it seems that the deck was stacked, and the game was rigged for our failure. Sometimes we have been abandoned by love ones we needed them the most, and stabbed in the back by our so-called best friends. With tears in our eyes, and feeling like David we he reminded us that all of have a little rabbit in our blood system, for there are sometimes when even
the best of us want to run away from it all” Oh that I had wing like eagle I would fly away”. I don’t want to try your patience today but I have come to encourage you keep pushing remember Jesus was trying to teach us about the volatility of human nature, for his final hours demonstrated how the same people that said hosanna, hosanna one day and would cry crucify him on another day. I believe that’s Luke 18 is crucial, for it reminds us that we should always pray because prayer is the antithesis of fainting. People can and will frustrate, irritate, agitate and even at times try to intimidate us, but I have come to say in the midst of it we need to keep on pushing, we must keep on praying until something happens. We have to pray, in the morning, we have pray at noon and at night, yes, we have to pray just to make through the day. We have to push through bills and sickness; we must push thorough sickness and sadness. We have push, P-U-S-H, Pray Until Something Happens.
BODY
The custom of the day comes to bear on our text, for this parable is not about friendship, and it is improper contexulaization to compare God to the groggy and grumpy friend whom reluctantly handed over bread to get a pest away from his door, but this parable is all about Palenstian culture as it relativity to the nature of God. Middle eastern custom demanded that a host be given one unbroken loaf of bread to each person, although a conscientious one would want to put more before a guest. Yes just as a villager would arouse to keep the good name of the whole village from being embarrassed, God is intent on preserving His good name, his honor is at steak and he will answer the faintest cry, or the quietest whisper. The songwriter said Jesus is on the main line, call him up and tell him what you want. This parable is visual representation of the abstract of the incomprehensibility of the language of prayer. and yet all about the prevailing power of persistent of prayer. This parable encourages us to keep pushing, when life’s unexpected happens we should push. This parable teaches that when we have to travel in the night to get what we need, we should push.
P-U-S-H (pray until something happens).
There are several points I would that we consider from this passage:
POINTS
1st Point). We need to PUSH because the unexpected often confront us.
The unexpected can cause devastation, annihilation, and even obliteration in our lives. Come here Job Take the stand and share with these preachers. David, a man after Gods own heart, leader of Israel the Instrument that God used to let Goliath know that the bigger they are the harder they fall. Had a tragic flaw like most of us, he loved women, don’t look at me funny, God made Adam and Eve and Not Adam and Steve. David said I pulled down the blinds, I register at the hotel under Mr. and Mrs. Jones, I plotted and plan and I thought I had gotten away, put the unexpected knocked on my door and told me “ thou art the man who did this thing” Abraham prayed for a long time for a son, and after he bless God hit with the unexpected can come in the form of Ruth will tell you, I love Eblimlech, I loved that man so much that when told me honey lets move, I packed you me and my children and from the land to the land of no promises I was blinded by love, but the all of a sudden, unexpectedly he died, and latter Unexpectedly both my sons died. Ruth will tell us that unexpected knocks can knock at the door. However, she says the reaction of the host, how the host handled the unexpected. He did not point no fingers, make no faces, or call any names he took account of content of his household. so when the unexpected happens we have to admit that we have nothing. God is waiting on us to recognize that our strength is insufficient. So, according to verse six we must
A. We must recognize when we have nothing VS 6
His assessment of his inventory gave rise to actions. (Introspective Analysis) What he had. We need to look in the pantry. We need to say like the Psalmist search me lord, search me Lord turn the light from heaven on my soul and if you find anything unlike thee take it out for I want to be right, I want to be whole. What’s in your box, do you have enough? This text says he had nothing, it does not mean quantitatively, but rather qualitatively. Before we can move forward we must come clean about what we have. We must be honest and say all I have is nothing, that is what Paul was saying when he said “Not I, but Christ who dwells in me” he was saying nothing. “ He say I count it all dung” I count it loss it’s nothing. Until we get to nothing we will never feel the need to go get something.
B. We must be willing to operate in the night
His assessment gave rise to actions, what do you do when your cup is empty. He got up and when to go get bread not to find it. Midnight is a bad time to find bread, at midnight things are uncertain, unclear and unrevealed and you do not need to bumble or stumble at midnight you need to know. Do you know where to get bread? To operate in the night you have use the protocol of the day. You can’t flinch, or flex you have take the same path you been using to get to where the bread is. Don’t stop,
keep on pushing. Keep on praying until something happens
2nd Point). We need to PUSH because it’s late and some doors are shut VS 7
We must recognize that Pray is the key that unlocks ever shut door but faithfulness is the personification of prayer. In the text, the man in need believed his friend would share with him so he got up and went out into the night.
I believe this is one of the critical keys of prayer, we must believe that God will moves on our behalf when he see he sees our faith that produces work. The poet said, “ Life ain’t been crystal stare” “Into each life some rain must fall” it’s hard road to row, sometimes up and sometimes down almost leveled to the ground the song writer said “ I called on the Lord and I got answer” If we call him HE we aswner, HE may not be there when you want him but he is always on time we need to call him, the line is never busy, just call him up and tell him what we want. When we are confronted by unexpected and unanticipated needs, we need P-U-S-H pray until something happens. I submit that I have found that on those occasions where God did not change my circumstance he changed me so I could deal my circumstance. This text reminds us that our proper response to those times when we are broke and busted, and when we don’t have enough to make it through the night and we face closed doors, we need P-U-S-H (pray until something happens). When the occupational doors are shut, when economic doors are shut, when relationship doors are shut we must to draw nigh unto God and HE will draw nigh unto us.
Close
So when the unexpected happens, we it is night in our lives and we don’t have what we need. What will we do when we in our moments of need the door are closed! Well, let me close by saying I am going a keep pushing, because I am pusher and all know how to do is push. When I look Jesus I see him Pushing, I can imaging seeing him as he said “Father let this bitter cup pass from me but never the less he pushed and said not my will but thy will be done”
We push, because prayer changes things and changes us.
We push because God has granted us access to tell him all about our troubles.
We push because God we know God is in the business of meeting our needs.
