Foundation for Living #9
Psalm 34 1-10
As we have been studying the last
two weeks on the subject of what the Bible teaches about prayer, one of the
first principles we understood is that Scripture teaches that if we regard
iniquity in our heart the Lord will not hear us. As a result of that, it is important for the believer to
cleanse his soul from sin, which comes as a result of simply confessing, which
means to admit or acknowledge any know sin to God, and at that instant, the
Scripture says, we are forgiven and cleansed of all unrighteousness. We always begin our study with a few
moments of silent prayer to give you the opportunity to use 1 John 1:9 if
necessary. Let’s pray.
Lord again, we express our thanks,
our gratitude for Your grace in our lives. Especially, above all, for the gift of
salvation, which comes through our Lord Jesus Christ. Father, we pray that as we study Your word this morning,
Your word that expresses His thinking, expresses to us Your plans and purpose, Father,
we pray that we might be able to understand these things, and that God the Holy
Spirit would make them clear to us, and that we would not take these things
lightly, but be challenged and strengthened in our own Christian life as a
result of this teaching. We pray
this in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen
We are continuing our study on the
basics for the Christian life. The
series in entitled Foundation for Living,
not just the foundation for life, which focused more on salvation, but the ongoing foundation for spiritual growth that gives
us that maturity where we can experience the full abundance of life that was
promised by the Lord Jesus Christ.
As believers in the Lord Jesus Christ we have two roles we fulfill, one is our priesthood, the other is our
ambassadorship. We are
starting to look at the aspects of our priesthood, what does it mean, what does
it entail, that we are a believer
priest? The first aspect of
that is that as a believer priest we are able to go directly to the throne of
God. This is unique to the church
age dispensation. It was not true
in the Old Testament. In the Old
Testament there was a formal priesthood based on descent from Aaron and those
within the Levitical tribe. But in
the New Testament, in the church age, every believer is a priest to God. That means we are able to represent
ourselves before God and go directly before His throne of grace in prayer.
We began studying prayer a couple of
weeks ago and we defined it by saying:
Prayer is that grace provision of the royal priesthood, whereby the
church age believer has access and privilege to communicate directly with God. The purpose of this communication is to
acknowledge our sin, express adoration and praise to God, to give thanks, to
intercede for others,
and to convey to God
our personal needs, and petitions, as well as to conduct intimate
conversations with God.
It is a lengthy definition, but it
incorporates all the different aspects of prayer, including the basic elements
of prayer, emphasizing that it is, fundamentally, communication with God. And this is a priority for the
believer. We looked at this in
terms of five different subjects or headings.
Last time we talked some about
procedures for prayer, and there are three. First of all, all prayer is addressed to God the
Father. It is not the focus of
prayer to pray to either God the Holy Spirit or to God the Son. One of the reasons for that is that
both the Son and the Spirit intercede for us with the Father. Scripture clearly
teaches in numerous places that prayer is to be directed toward the Father: Matthew 6:9, Ephesians 4:14, and 1
Peter 3:17, just to name three.
Second, the channel of approach to
God is through the Lord Jesus Christ as our Royal High Priest. We are to come to the Father in the
name of the Lord Jesus Christ. He
is our mediator, so we address out prayers to the Father, in the name of the
Son, and we come in the power of God the Holy Spirit, Ephesians 6:18. In terms of basic protocol for prayer,
we pray to the Father, through the Son, and by means of God the Holy Spirit.
We also looked at some of the basic
elements of prayer, using the acronym CATS, in order to
remember these elements of prayer:
C – confession
A- adoration, praise
T – thanksgiving, expressing
our gratitude to God for what He has done for us
S-
supplication, when we are presenting prayers to God, asking Him to intercede in
the lives of others or petitions on our own behalf.
Prayers can include all four
dimensions, or they can be prayers that just focus on one. Prayer can be simply confession, or
simply directed towards praise and adoration, or prayers that are simply
prayers of gratitude or prayers of thanksgiving. You can have other prayers
that simply focus on specific needs, and situations regarding others or our own
lives. Prayers can be very short
or very long. If you want to find
biblical models for prayers, go the Psalms, because many of the Psalms
expressed the prayers of the writer, usually David, but there are many other
prayers in the Psalms , either we don’t know who wrote
them , or they are by other individuals.
As we looked at this last time we
went over the principle of confession, the importance of being in fellowship
with the Lord. Psalm 66:18 says,
If I regard
wickedness in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.
The word translated regard has the
idea of seeing, if I observe, if I look inside and I see there is sin in my
life, then the Lord will not hear me. Sin breaks that fellowship with God. Another passage, for review, is Proverbs
15:29:
the Lord
is far from the wicked, but He hears the prayer of the
righteous.
In other words, no matter how religious and sincere somebody may be, no
matter how devout they may be, God will not hear their prayers if they are not
a believer on the Lord Jesus Christ, and even if you are a believer in the Lord
Jesus Christ, and you are not in fellowship, He will not hear your prayer. That being out of fellowship can
sometimes involve ongoing behavioral sins you are not dealing with. There is a particular verse I was asked
about last time that deals with one of those instances:
1 Peter 3:7 Husbands, likewise, dwell with
them, (that is, the context
is talking about wives) with understanding,
giving honor to the wife, (that
means, men, you are to have honor and respect towards your
wives, you are to treat them well,) as to the weaker vessel, as being heirs together of the grace of God.
Just because the man is in the
authority position in the home, and just because the man is the spiritual
leader in the home, does not mean he is better, superior to the wife. In many cases there are women who are
much more squared away spiritually than their husbands are. Nevertheless, he is the one designated
as the spiritual leader in the home.
So, the husband is to:
honor to the wife, as the weaker vessel, as being heirs together of the grace of God.
Why?
That your prayers may not be hindered.
In other words men, if you are not
treating your wife well, according to Scripture, if you are not being the
spiritual leader in the home, if you do not respect her, if you are not
providing that grace orientation, impersonal and personal love toward your
wife, then that is hindering your prayer life. You need to not only deal with that in terms of confession, but there also
needs to be some behavioral changes that go along with that, otherwise, you
just keep bouncing back out of fellowship and you don’t get any where in you
prayer life or your spiritual life.
The solution, as I stated earlier, is in 1 John 1:9.
If
we confess our sins, (which
means to admit or acknowledge our sins), he is faithful and just to forgive us
our sins.
That is, what we admitted to, but His grace is such
that He cleanses us from all the other sins we have committed, whether we
remember them,
whether we realize they are sins or not, God forgives us, He
wipes the slate clean, so that we are restored to fellowship There are a couple of promises in the Old Testament
that everyone should memorize, because one of the greatest hindrances in moving
forward in the Christian life after you have committed certain sins you are
weighed down by , feel guilty over, is that once you admit those sins to God,
you need to realize you are cleansed and move forward, and not feel guilty about it. It has been dealt
with, it is over with. God has wiped away those
sins.
Is. 43:25
I, even
I, am He who wipes out your transgressions
for My own sake;
And I will not remember your sins.
Again: Psalm
103:12
As far as the east is from the west,
So far has He removed our
transgressions from us.
At that instant of cleansing from sin we can move forward
in our spiritual life and not be weighed down by guilt or remorse, but focus on
the objective of spiritual maturity.
That covers the first aspect of
prayer, confession.
In the acronym CATS, the second is adoration.
This is where we focus on the grandeur of God, and we express His
magnificence, by focusing on who He is, and what He has done. A simple way to do this when praying is
to think through the essence of God.
Think about God as the Creator, as the Sovereign God, and think about
Him in terms of His righteousness, His justice, think about how it is expressed
in history, in your life, in the lives of those around you. Focus on His love, starting with how it
is expressed through the gift of the Lord Jesus Christ, as our Savior. Then
think of the many other ways in which God demonstrates His love for us. You can think about all the different
things that God provides for every single believer at the instant of salvation,
and just focus on
those. Take two or three of
those at a time, and when you are praising God in prayer, thanking Him and
focusing on what He has done and what that means. You can go through all the various attributes of God and
think about how those attributes have been expressed historically and
biblically. You find numerous examples as you read through the Psalms. It is very important for believers to
read through the Psalms because the writers are, in many cases, pouring out
their hearts to God, they are in the midst of crises and adversity; they are
struggling with the same basic issues of life we are struggling with. As we
read through those Psalms we
are reminded of many promises and principles we too can apply in those same
circumstances and situations. I
encourage you to read through certain Psalms called Praise Psalms.
There are different classifications
of Psalms in the Old Testament.
The Praise Psalms focus primarily on simply extolling the grandeur and
majesty of God. In the Praise
Psalms three elements are usually found.
They begin usually with a call to praise, where the psalmist is calling
on the people of God to praise and worship Him. Then there is a development of the cause for praise, so you
have a call to praise, a challenge for the people to praise God, followed by
the cause for praise, because God has done this or that in history or in my
life, or the lives of those around me.
In the cause for praise, the Psalmist provides the reason for
praise. Then there is a
conclusion, which is a challenge or exhortation to all those around to praise
the Lord. That is what the
word hallelujah means. It has been used so much, it has become trivialized, it
has almost become a cliché but that is the actual word found in the Hebrew, in
many of these passages. It is from
the Hebrew halal, meaning praise, then halelu the u , is the second person plural imperative,
which is translated, y’all praise, and the end, al, is God, Yahweh, hallelujah, means y’all praise God. When people say that so often, they do
not even know what it means, but it is a call to praise God and to focus on
what He has done. Some Psalms you
might want to look at and to think through in prayer are Psalms 19, 33, 36,
105, 111, 113, 117, and 135. There are other praise Psalms, but those are just
a few you can read through to gain an understanding of how biblical praise is
expressed.
Psalms 19 is one that breaks down similar to the way I
expressed it a few minutes ago.
It begins with a cause for praise.
1 The heavens declare
the glory of God;
And
the firmament shows His handiwork. (the firmament is the atmosphere
or the heavens)
2 Day unto day utters speech,
And night unto night
reveals knowledge.
3 There is no speech nor language
Where their voice is not heard.
4 Their line has gone out through all the
earth,
And
their words to the end of the world.
In them He has set a
tabernacle for the sun,
5 Which is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
And rejoices like a strong man to
run its race.
6 Its rising is from one end of heaven,
And
its circuit to the other end;
And there is nothing
hidden from its heat.
He is looking at the heavens and the
glories and the magnificence of God's creation and He says this is reason to
praise, because of how God has structured the universe, from all of the details
we see within the universe. So
this is the cause for praise. Then
he moves from that cause to praise to the person and character of God, starting
on verses 7-11, where the focus is on His glory and power.
7 The law of the LORD is perfect, (focusing on how God has revealed Himself to us) converting the soul;
The
testimony of the LORD is sure, making
wise the simple;
8 The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart;
Notice the different ways he
describes the word of God, the law of the Lord, the testimony of the Lord, the
statutes of the Lord, the commandment of the Lord, the fear of the Lord.
The commandment of the
LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes;
9 The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever;
The
judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether.
10 More to be desired are they than gold,
Yea,
than much fine gold;
Sweeter also than honey
and the honeycomb.
11 Moreover by them Your servant is
warned,
And in keeping them there is great reward.
He focuses on the revelation of God's character, the
revelation of His glory, the revelation of His person in the word of God.
Then a conclusion, which drives past
the reality and grandeur of God to a personal application:
12 Who can understand his errors?
Cleanse me from secret faults.
13 Keep back Your servant also from
presumptuous sins;
Let
them not have dominion over me.
Then I shall be
blameless,
And
I shall be innocent of great transgression.
14 Let the words of my mouth and the
meditation of my heart
Be
acceptable in Your sight,
O LORD, my strength and
my Redeemer.
See how we start off, praising God,
focusing on a cause for praise as we look at His grandeur and majesty as
expressed by His work in the universe.
Then it moves from that to His glory, and essences and person and power
as revealed to us in Scripture. As
the Psalmist moves through the praise, it drives him to a personal realization
about who God is and who he is in relationship to God, and there is a direct
application that if God is this magnificent being who created everything, and
He has revealed to us all of this in His word, then that necessitates certain
action on my part. That is the focus there. The scriptures are not just about man, but
on God. The more we focus on who
God is and what He has done, the more it drives us to change who we are and
what we do.
Psalm 117 is the shortest Psalm in
the Old Testament, and it is a praise psalm, so praise does not have to be
lengthy.
1Praise
the LORD, all nations!
Laud Him, all peoples!
Verse 1 is a call to
praise, then verse 2, the cause for praise.
2
For His loving kindness (that
is His chesed, His faithful, loyal love)
is great
toward us,
And the truth of the LORD
is everlasting.
Then there is a final, concluding
exhortation:
Praise the LORD!
This is a prayer, a praise Psalm, a simple short prayer.
.
We go from confession of sin to
adoration of God, focusing on who He is, what He has done and then there are
prayers of thanksgiving.
Prayers of thanksgiving, which
express our gratitude to God for all He has done for us. Unfortunately, at a superficial level,
what we often find people focusing on in prayers of gratitude are the material
things He has provided for us. I
am not belittling that, we need to be thankful, we need to recognize that
everything we have is from the Lord, the air we breath, the clothes
we wear, the houses we live in, the cars we drive, the civilization in which we live, the country in which we
live, the freedoms we have, all of those, but beyond that, we need to delve
into the Scriptures to find out the depths and the breadth of everything God
has done for us, the forty things God does for us at the instant of salvation,
should be a focus of our meditation and thought, realizing everything God has
given us, that He has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the
heavenlies, that we can’t even number all of these blessings. And as we think them through we need to
think about what they are and what that particular aspect means in our lives. And then how that drives us to live
differently as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. Then we give thanks for what God has provided for us. Romans 1:21
tells us part of the problem with the unbeliever is their lack of gratitude,
because that goes along with arrogance.
21 because, although
they knew God, they did not honor Him
as God, or were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their
foolish hearts were darkened.
That is typical of the pagan mindset,
to not give thanks; it is arrogance, self-absorption.
As believers we are to continually
give thanks, to be oriented to the fact that God is giving us everything, every
detail comes from the Lord. Even
those things we don’t think are very pleasant, the tests, the adversity, the hardship.
The Scripture says: For all
things and in all things we are to give thanks. For example, 1 Thessalonians 5:18 says,
in everything
give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you
That is, in every situation, in
every circumstance, give thanks.
That is always a big question; it is
one you wrestle with in the Christian life, what is God's will for my
life? Here you have these passages
such as 1 Thessalonians 5:18 that focus directly on God's will, gives thanks in
everything.
Ephesians 5:20: always giving thanks for everything
It is not always in everything, but
for everything. That gets a little
rugged at times for all of us, because we get into situations where we have to
put up with people, circumstances and situations that we would rather just wallow
around in our sin nature, and be bitter and angry about, but Scripture says we
need to be grateful for those things.
Always giving
thanks for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, even the Father.
2 Corinthians 2:14 14But thanks be to God, who always leads us in His triumph in Christ and
manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every
place.
The first reference to God is the
Father. These are verses that
support the point that prayer is directed to the Father, not the Son or the
Holy Spirit. Thanksgiving is a way
of glorifying God, an expression of grace orientation, our lack of arrogance
and recognition that God has provided everything for us as creatures. You can go to some of the Psalms to
look up thanksgiving Psalms. Some
thanksgiving Psalms you might look up are: 30, 32, 34, 40, 92, 100, 105, 107and
118. There are many more
thanksgiving Psalms, but those are a few that will give you an orientation to
how the Bible gives us examples for giving and expressing thanks to God.
We have looked at confession,
adoration and thanksgiving, and now supplication. This is what most folks think
prayer is all about, just going to God and asking for something. Like He is some cosmic Santa Claus, or
some giant genie, and if you rub Him the right way, or say things the right
way, or repeat the right prayer the same way enough times, somehow God is going
to give you every thing on your wish list. One of the most horrible, egregious, distracting, misleading
books that have come out in recent years is one that is extremely popular, it
made the New York Times best seller list, and it is called the Prayer of
Jabez. Sadly to say, it is by a man
I have met, who has produced many good works, was a graduate of Dallas Seminary
and he just completely and egregiously destroyed the concept of prayer and
focused on this prayer of this individual in the Old Testament, and said, now,
pray this prayer day in and day our every day, then God is going to give you
everything you pray for. He ripped
the verse out of context, which is one of the major errors with many alleged
prayer promise, folks don’t look at the context surrounding the promise. That can lead to misapplication and
misunderstanding.
Supplication includes two aspects; intercession for others and petition for ones self. God obviously makes intercession a
priority, to pray for others, to put others before ourselves. It is part of the priesthood of the
Lord Jesus Christ. In John 17 we
have an example of His High Priestly prayer for us that is the real Lords
prayer. Not the prayer in Matthew,
which was a model prayer for the disciples in a different dispensation. But,
John 17 gives us Jesus’ prayer as out High Priest, and shows the kinds of
things He is continually praying for on our behalf. We understand that Jesus Christ intercedes for us, and this
is affirmed in Romans 8:34:
34 Who is the one who condemns?
Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who
is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.
The reason it says also in verse 34
is because in Romans 8:26 & 27 we are told about the intercession of God
the Holy Spirit. Not only does the
Lord Jesus Christ intercede for us, so does the Holy Spirit. Hebrews 7:24&25, one of the great
expositions of the priesthood of Jesus Christ states:
24 But He, on the other hand, because He abides forever,
holds His priesthood permanently.
25 Therefore He is also able to save forever those who draw
near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for
us.
No matter what state you are in, in
fellowship, out of fellowship, in rank carnality, whatever your circumstance,
Jesus Christ is always interceding for you at the right hand of God the
Father. Intercession is a primary
part of His priestly ministry; it is a primary part of our priestly
ministry. We are exhorted and
challenged in Scripture to pray for one another. Not only does the Second Person of the trinity intercede for
us, so does the Third Person of the Trinity.
Romans 8:26: And in
the same way the Spirit also helps our weakness.
The word translated weakness indicates spiritual weakness. Sometimes we feel overwhelmed by
circumstances, situations, adversity and suffering and we don’t know quite how
to handle it, and it is God the Holy Spirit who is our strength and stay, and
enables us in out weakness. Why?
For we do
not know how to pray as we should.
Interesting point.
We really don’t have enough knowledge to know properly what to pray for. We think we do. But this Scripture states that we do
not know exactly what to pray for.
We get into circumstances and just feel overwhelmed,
we don’t know exactly what to pray for.
So we have an assistant, a comforter, a paraklete. Jesus uses the term in John 14:
The Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings
too deep for words.
Actually, that is a poor translation
in the New King James. What it
says in the Greek is, that when we are overwhelmed, all we can do is groan, we
can’t even articulate the suffering and adversity in our own lives, and we are
coming before the Lord, it is God the Holy Spirit who specifically understands
what is going on and He puts that into words, He is able to put that into
words. He is able to express
specifically and precisely what the need is and what the solution is. It is not prayer language. This is the error the charismatics come
up with, that this is some kind of special prayer language and that is what
tongues is.
They often go to 1 Corinthians 14 and try to justify that. I have had conversations with
charismatics who say, my prayer is just so much more effective when I pray in
tongues. And I ask do you know
what you pray for? And they say,
no, I really don’t. Then how do
you know it is more effective?
They are more concerned with the emotion of it all. In James 5:16 he tells us:
pray for one another, that you may be strengthened.
We have looked at confession,
adoration, thanksgiving and supplication.
These are the four elements that comprise all prayers, but any prayer
can be just one of those four. It
doesn’t have to include every one of them.
Before we wrap up our study of
prayer, I want to deal with two misconceptions on a couple of verses.
Matthew 18:19 is
a verse that I often hear folks recite and use as a prayer verse. Jesus is speaking to His
disciples.
19 Again I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything
that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in
heaven.
20: for where two or
three are gathered together in My name, I am there in
the midst of them.
You will hear people use that
language, agree with me in prayer and we will go to the Father and He has to do
it. And ‘where two or three are
gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst
of them’.
Listen, the Lord Jesus Christ
indwells every believer, you do not have to get with another believer, or two
other believers for Jesus Christ to be present. He is just as present with one believer as He is with three
or four. Let’s examine the
context. It is dealing with church
discipline, a situation where one believer has offended another believer.
Verse 15: “Moreover if your brother sins against
you, go and tell him his fault
One on one, keep it private, tell
him his fault, between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother.
16 But if he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that ‘by the mouth of two or three witnesses every
word may be established.’
That quote is a principle from the
Mosaic Law. And if he refuses to listen, then tell it to the church
Skip down to verse 19, again I say
to you, if two or three of you agree on earth concerning anything, who are the
two? They are the witness to the
conversation to the attempt to reconcile with this offending brother. This is
not talking about when two believers getting together, it is talking about a
formal situation where you are trying to go through a reconciliation with
someone who is causing problems or disturbances in life, you go privately, if that does
not work out, you take two or three others who can be confirming
witnesses. And Jesus says in verse
18, to the disciples in relation to their apostolic authority:
18 “Assuredly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in
heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.
That was rabbinical terminology for
whatever you accept or reject.
19 “Again I say to you that if two of
you agree on earth concerning anything, on
what? On whether or not this
person is to be dealt with in judgment or accepted in grace, that is what the
context is talking about, not prayer, but a circumstance of judgment.
The other verse important to
understand is Matthew 6:7:
Matthew 6:7 And when you are praying, do not use meaningless
repetition
This is not necessarily talking about formal prayer. In fact, I think some of the prayers
written in Scripture were prayers that were formal and written out ahead of
time. It is kind of a myth, people say we ought to pray extemporaneously, and
that is fine. But, if you look at
prayers in Scripture it is obvious that a lot of thought went into those
prayers, they went through various Old Testament passages, and crafted the
prayer and wrote it down and prayed it.
The Puritans were tremendous at this. The problem you get into is if that is all you do, it gets
to be rote, and you take prayers from Scripture and say them over and over and
over again and they have no meaning.
That would apply here. The
word used in the Greek, batalogia has even more significance to it. Bata was an onomatopoeic word for the
Greeks that would describe the unknown language of the barbarians, and to them
it had no meaning so it sounded like batabatabatabata, speaking in meaningless
sounds. Isn’t that what they do
when trying to pray in tongues, just speaking meaningless sounds? This is a verse that completely
destroys to concept that there is prayer language. That was a practice the Greeks and Gentiles did when they
went into various temples in the ancient world there was this glossolaic
experience encountered in the temples that the priests and priestesses of the
false God's would practice.
Matthew 6:7 is dealing directly with that.
Principles
1. Remember, prayer is the most powerful asset in the believers spiritual life.
God gives you direct access to His throne. To come to
Him immediately in any and every circumstance, in the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ, and by the power of God the Holy Spirit.
2. Prayer is a tremendous privilege that brings us directly
into the throne room of God, into the presence of the Creator of heaven and
earth and all that is in them. Do
not take it lightly; do not treat it insignificantly. This is a privilege not every believer have prior to the
church age. It is a tremendous
privilege.
3. Prayer demand concentration and thought. If you read the prayers of Scripture,
you realize that these men sat down and poured over the Scriptures. Look at Daniel in Chapter 9 when he is
praying for Israel’s recovery and to be brought back into the land after being
taken out of the land in discipline during the Babylonian captivity. And he is pouring through Jeremiah, and
he is taking Scripture, promises God has made, putting them together to build
his petition to God. So prayer
demands concentration and thought.
There may be times when we are in emotional circumstances because of
suffering and adversity, you certainly see that in many of David’s prayers,
that he is distraught, or angry, or he is fearful. You may be in an emotional
circumstance, but that is not the focus of prayer. Prayer relies on doctrine and fact and not emotion and
feeling.
4. Prayer should be the highest priority in your life after
learning bible doctrine. Prayer,
to be effective, is based on knowledge, so the first priority is to learn the
word, and the second is prayer. It
is communication to God. God’s
revelation to us is through His word, it is His communication to us. We communicate back to Him through
prayer, so that creates a two way conversation. So you have learning the word of God as
He initiates communication to us, and we pray back to Him. So if intercession
is the highest priority of Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, it should be at
the top of our priority list.
As believers our prayers fail
because we fail in our spiritual lives.
We do not understand the will and plan of God. We pray in ignorance. Remember, God always answers prayer, He says yes, no, and wait awhile. Sometimes after He says wait awhile, He
says no. He always answers; it is
just real simple: yes, no, wait awhile.
The following are a couple of prayer
promises.
One of my favorite prayer promises,
Jeremiah 33:3:
Call
to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and
mighty things, which you do not know.’
Prayer is an expression of the faith
rest drill, where we trust God. We need to be a people who trust God to provide
great things, because that is what He has promised.
Matthew 7:7 “Ask, and it will be
given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to
you. 8 For
everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds,
and to him who knocks it will be opened.
1 John 5:14 and 15:
14 Now this is the confidence that we have before Him,
that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. 15 And
if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions
that we have asked of Him.
The important phrase there is
‘according to His will’, that means you have to know the word to know how to
pray correctly and effectively.
John 14: 13And whatever you
ask in My name, that I will do that the Father may be
glorified in the Son. 14 f
you ask anything in my name, and I will do it.
John 15:7 If you abide in Me and My words abide in you, you will ask what you
desire and it will be done for you.
John
16:23 & 24 In that day you will ask Me nothing, most assuredly I say to
you, whatever you ask the Father (notice, we
pray to the Father) in My name, He will give you. 24Until now you have not asked
for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, that your joy may be full.
Prayer is foundational to our priesthood. It is a primary privilege of the believer's priesthood to go
before the throne of grace immediately and instantly.
Father we do thank you for Your grace, Your goodness, Your kindness. We thank You
for Your word that reveals everything about You to us. Father, we thank You that You have
provided us with the gracious salvation that is not based on who we are or what
we do, but it is based on who You are and what Jesus Christ did on the
cross. He died there, not as an
example, not to demonstrate Your governmental
authority, but He died as our substitute. He paid the penalty for our
sins. He paid the penalty for
every single sin in human history, past, present and future, so that all that
is necessary for us to be saved is to trust in Him, to rely upon His work and
not our work, to believe that He died for us. Scripture says this is the only condition for salvation,
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. Father, we pray that if there is anyone
here this morning who is unsure of their salvation, or
uncertain of their eternal destiny, that they will take this opportunity to
trust in Christ. All that is
necessary for you to have eternal life is to believe in Him. At the instant you
put your faith alone in Christ alone, God the Father knows exactly what you are
trusting in, and at that instant you receive the imputation of righteousness,
you are declared just, you receive eternal life which can never be taken from
you. Father we pray that You
challenge us in our prayer lives with the things we have studied, that we may
have greater, richer prayers with You as we advance in our
understanding of our priesthood and ambassadorship. We pray this in Christ's name. Amen.