"New Year's Resolutions: Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13)" | 1/1/23
Matthew 6:9-13 | 1/1/23 | Will DuVal
Read one book a month… Lose 10 pounds… Quit social media… What are YOUR “New Year’s Resolutions”? It seems like the idea of making resolutions has gone out of style in recent years; like we fell short of REACHING our goals, KEEPING our commitments, so we just stopped setting ourselves up for failure. But it’s a very BIBLICAL idea; there are whole sections of the OT Law outlining instructions for “taking OATHS”, “making PLEDGES” before God (Num 30:2; Dt. 23:23, et al). And even in the NT, where Jesus commands us NOT to swear oaths anymore, but simply “Let your ‘Yes’ be “Yes’ and your “No’ be “No’” (Matt 5:37), notice he presupposes that we are still making COMMITMENTS - “Yes” to the gym; “No” to fast food - we just don’t need to swear by God’s throne on it.
So pausing to take stock and examine our lives, recalibrate our routines, and resolving to be more intentional going forward - that is a good and godly endeavor. Not just at New Year’s; ANY time of the year. But it is ESPECIALLY appropriate here at the beginning. So in 3 weeks, as promised, we’ll start our study of the Book of Exodus that should take us the better part of the next 6-8 months to finish. But for the next 3 weeks, I want us to consider together what God might be calling us to RESOLVE to - to prayerfully put our minds and hearts into - in this year to come.
This could easily be a 10 or 12 week series; there are TONS of worthy resolutions we could and should consider making - memorizing Scripture, keeping a weekly Sabbath rest day, prioritizing disciple-making in our relationships - any NUMBER of good, God-honoring pursuits. But I want to focus in on just THREE in particular. And there’s a reason for each of these 3 resolutions I’m gonna be commending to you.
Back in August, we asked 30 of you to take the “NCD (Natural Church Development) survey” that helps churches identify our greatest strengths to celebrate, and our weaknesses to address. And overall, we got VERY high marks, especially on important categories like “Loving Relationships” and “Gift-based Ministry”. We scored off the charts on individual questions like “I know why I come to worship services” and “In our church, it is possible to talk with others about personal problems.” Lots to be encouraged by!
But there were also a few results that troubled us. Of the 91 questions asked, here were the 3 questions we scored LOWEST on:
Q77: “Times of prayer are an inspiring experience for me.”
Q36: “Our church tries to help those in need (food, clothing, education, counsel, etc.).”
And Q70: “I know of a number of individuals in our church who have the gift of evangelism.”
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So in October, we recruited two “church strengthening” teams: one to address our collective PRAYER-life here at West Hills, and the other to focus on our “Need-oriented Evangelism”. And I want to thank those of you who are serving on one of those teams, and especially Bill & Ana Konyk and Terry Weaver, for LEADING those respective teams. And you’re going to be hearing more FROM both those teams in the weeks and months to come, as they continue to meet and discuss and eventually propose a plan of ACTION to us elders, for church-wide execution.
And quickly on that note, since we’re talking about PRAYER this morning, the prayer team needs your help. So I could get ALL of you to pull out your smart phones now… camera… QR code… go ahead and pull up that survey NOW, but fill it out later, before you leave… only take 5 min… but that would really help us out!
Our mission statement here at West Hills is “to glorify God by living in community with one another, growing in spiritual maturity as disciples of Jesus, and serving the world missionally with the love of Christ.” So as a CHURCH, we’ve already MADE our resolutions for the new year, and for EVERY year - we are resolved to glorify God in 3 ways: BY loving Jesus, by loving one another, and by loving those outside the church with the love of Jesus. And by God’s providence, our NCD results just naturally lent themselves to one sermon each on each one of those 3 big picture priorities we have as a church.
Because what IS prayer, really? At its heart, prayer is the MEANS by which we cultivate a love relationship with Jesus. They say the key to a healthy relationship is COMMUNICATION. Speaking of prayer: you can PRAY for me and Polly; our relationships is NOT the healthiest it’s ever been, at the moment. I’m getting REAL honest with ya this morning - we got issues as a church we gotta address; I got issues in my MARRIAGE I gotta address. But what it boils down to is this: for the past MONTH now, since Bo was born, Polly and I have just felt like passing ships in the night. Like roommates who just happen to share a bed (and even THAT’s only for the half of the night when one of us isn’t up OUTTA bed, FEEDING the baby!). But we’re not COMMUNICATING, we’re not CONNECTING.
And I wonder if for MANY of us, that analogy doesn’t accurately describe our SPIRITUAL lives as well. Maybe you and God have just become passing roommates. The best way to KNOW, is to take a closer look at your PRAYER LIFE this morning, because prayer IS: communicating, connecting… with GOD. And if we had more time, I’d preach this sermon on prayer, and then next week’s on the importance of SCRIPTURE too, because just like ANY relationship, our relationship with God is a 2-way street: Prayer is (mostly) us talking to God; when we open the Bible, God’s word, we expect to hear Him speaking to US. So it is AT LEAST AS important that we stay in - or GET in! - God’s word this year; that we are consistently hearing from Him. Get in a Discipleship group, or a life group, with brothers and sisters who are gonna hold you accountable to that; it’s not too late - we’ll plug you in! We’ve got some Bible reading plans printed off and available at the Info Bar this morning - start the new year off right by RESOLVING to be in God’s word every week - every DAY! - this year… and then DO it; that’s a resolution worth keeping! But because as a church we scored 35 points HIGHER on the NCD questions about time spent in SCRIPTURE than we did time spent in PRAYER, that is the direction of communication that we’re gonna focus on today.
And of all the places IN the Bible we could turn to for help in our prayer lives, NONE is better than Matthew ch6, and the prayer above ALL prayers; the prayer our Lord TAUGHT us to pray. Most of us are no doubt familiar with the Lord’s prayer; many of us, I’m sure, have it memorized. Some 6 years ago now, I preached a 4-part mini-series exclusively on this prayer. But so often we think of the Lord’s Prayer as a MODEL for prayer; it teaches us HOW to pray. And it DOES; Jesus says as much, as we’ll read in just a moment in v9; he instructs us to “Pray then like this”.
But we could also translate that Greek phrase “Pray then along these lines” or “Pray then FOR THIS REASON”.
So this morning, I want to give you not so much the “HOW” of prayer, but the “WHY”. Not “7 Practical How-To Tips for Prayer”, but “7 Reasons WHY we WANT to pray”. Because at the end of the day, the determining factor between the resolutions you will KEEP - HONOR this year - and the ones that will fall by the wayside, is your HEART. Our hearts ALWAYS trump our heads, don’t they? You can know, cognitively, that it’s in your best long-term interest to stop by the gym on the way home, for a quick 20-min workout, instead of stopping by TACO BELL to pick up 20-dollars of TAKE-out (that’s a LOT of Taco Bell, btw; please don’t do that to yourself - you are LOVED, your body is a TEMPLE… ugh!) - but here’s the thing: the only way you’ll choose the WEIGHTS over putting on the weight, is if you DESIRE to look and feel good, MORE than you desire tacos that TASTE good. Because ultimately, our priorities are set by our HEART’s DESIRES. Polly and I could have a great, intimate relationship right now; we would just have to WANT it more than we want a healthy baby (because ya know, the “experts” say it’s not good to let a newborn scream his head off for an hour, cuz we just needed some “US” time; sorry Bo…).
But with ALL that said: I want to spend the rest of our time together reminding you WHY it is that you WANT to pray. If you’re a believer, an adopted child of God by virtue of your faith in Jesus, then you WANT to pray. You may not yet want it more than you want that extra SLEEP! You may not yet want prayer more than you want that alone time with your SPOUSE. You may not yet want it more than you want that half hour before bed to just veg out in front of the TV instead. But I’m gonna spend the next half hour trying to convince you - and I’ll be honest again: trying to convince MYSELF! - that we SHOULD desire to pray every bit as much as we desire those other things… and MORE!
But ultimately, all I can do is convince our HEADS; GOD is the only one who can change our HEARTS; who can CAUSE us to desire Him - relationship with Him - above all else. So let us hear now from Him on the matter, from His word, and then let’s go to him together, in prayer, asking him to change us from the inside out this morning.
SCRIPTURE: Would you to STAND with me… Matthew 6:9-13:
[And Jesus said] “Pray then like this:
“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 this day 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 evil.”
This is the word of the Lord… Let’s pray…
#1 - The first reason we WANT to pray, as believers, is that prayer reminds us that we have a CARING FATHER (v9a), who HEARS us from heaven.
All THREE of those words, in Jesus’ opening line here, point us to a unique and ASTOUNDING truth about prayer; let’s work our way backwards:
First, prayer reminds us that the God we’re praying to is “in heaven”. He oversees EVERYTHING! When the Bible talks about God’s being in heaven, it is to emphasize His absolute SOVEREIGN GOVERNANCE and RULE over everything UNDER heaven.
Ps 115:3 “Our God is in the heavens; [therefore WHAT?] he does all that he pleases.”
Ps 103:19 “The Lord has established his throne in the heavens, and his kingdom rules over all.”
Daniel 4:35 “All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, but [GOD] does according to his will among the host of heaven… and none can stay his hand or say to him, “What have you done?””
So the first MIRACLE of prayer, then, is that THAT same God, the God in heaven - who CREATED the heavens and the earth and who rules OVER it all - that HE even CARES about our prayers. Some people don’t pray because they think SURELY God must have more important things to worry about than my job interview, than my dog’s surgery. But Jesus assures us that not a sparrow falls to the GROUND without God taking notice; that God even numbers the hairs on our HEADS - THAT’s how much He cares about every minute detail of your life (Matt 10:29-30). That’s why King David prayed: “O Lord… When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers… what is man that you are mindful of him… that you care for him?” (Ps 8:3-4) It is astounding.
And not only does he CARE for us; according to Jesus, He cares for us as a “FATHER,” Abba, “Daddy”. As your PASTOR, I care for each and every one of you here; I really do. But honesty time again: my care for YOU, and my care for my own CHILDREN, are LIGHT-YEARS apart… Orders of magnitude apart. Sophie’s choice: ALL 300+ of you, or my 3 kids… and I’m sorry, but I’ll see y’all in heaven when I get there - you can say “Hey” to Jesus for me - because I’m choosing my kids 100% of the time.
Brothers and sisters: do we realize that this is the way our heavenly Father cares for us? With a ZEALOUS, jealous, unconditional and unstoppable LOVE.
Before Jesus, NO ONE thought of God as their “Father”, much less ADDRESSED Him that way. God called HIMSELF Israel’s “Father” a dozen or so times in the OT, but no human would have EVER thought to call Him “Daddy”. We’re talking about the omnipotent CREATOR, the sovereign SUSTAINER, the utterly transcendent God “who dwells in unapproachable light” (1 Tim 6:16), the infinitely eternal God who exists outside of time and space!
According to Jesus, THAT God, is your “Papa”.
Or at least He CAN be; and that brings us to the FIRST word of Jesus’ prayer: “OUR”.
Not only is God PREEMINENT (“in heaven”).
Not only is God PATERNAL (“Father”).
But God is also PERSONAL: he’s not just ANY father; he is “OUR” Father. I’ll never forget, as a little kid, visiting my dad in his office. Doing rounds with him, and hearing nurse after nurse tell me how amazing my Dad was - the “greatest doctor I’ve ever worked for”. Hearing patient after patient tell me stories - it seemed like just about every time we went out to EAT together as a family, SOMEONE in the restaurant would inevitably come up to our table to thank my Dad again, and then turn to me and say, “You know, your Daddy saved my LIFE 5 years ago…”
And what blew me away wasn’t just that he was that important and outstanding…
And it wasn’t just that a guy like that could ALSO be a FATHER, in the abstract, and care about his children even more than this profession where he got to literally save people lives…
It was that he was MY father. That he cared about ME that much, personally.
Brothers and sisters, prayer reminds us that a God infinitely MORE important and outstanding than my father or your father or ANY earthly father cares about YOU, personally. SO much so, that He sent and sacrificed His only BEGOTTEN son, Jesus, in order to reconcile you to Himself, and adopt you into his heavenly family.
Why do we want to PRAY? Because we have a caring Father who INVITES us to. “Cast all your cares on [ME], because [I] care for you” (1 Pet 5:7).
Because we understand what an unbelievable, unmerited PRIVILEGE it is that we have not only the EAR of Almighty God, but that we have His HEART as well; the perfect, holy, all-seeing, all-knowing, all-powerful, all-ruling God of the universe not only HEARS us, but He LOVES us, as His own. That’s why we pray.
But the SECOND reason we pray - #2 - is that this same Caring Father is ALSO our HOLY LORD. (v9b)
Jesus teaches us to pray THIS, specifically, TO our caring father: “hallowed be your name”. To “hallow” is “to regard or honor as holy”. So we’re asking God to MAKE his name - which is ALREADY objectively holy - to cause it to be HONORED as such; by whom? By US! “God: help ME to honor your holy name; help ME regard you rightly, in all your HOLINESS.”
Lest we get TOO comfortable and CASUAL chatting with our “Daddy”, let’s not forget that He is ALSO a “consuming fire” (Heb 12:29)! When we DO get into Exodus this year, we’ll discover that the God who loved His people so much that He personally delivered them from slavery in Egypt, is the SAME God who was so holy, that He FORBID them to even step FOOT on Mt. Sinai while He was delivering His commandments to Moses, lest they be struck DEAD in their sinfulness. And that’s not just an OLD Testament thing; God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. So the same JESUS - God in human flesh - who loved the folks everyone else despised - the prostitutes and tax collectors - so much that he earned himself the nickname “friend of SINNERS”, He’s the SAME Jesus who ALSO told them to “go and sin no more”. And who also instructed US to treat self-professing, fellow “Christians” who are living in unrepentant sin AS “Gentiles and tax collectors”; to kick them OUT of the church (Mt 18:17). Because we are to “be HOLY, as I am HOLY,” declares the Lord (1 Pet 1:16).
So when we pray “hallowed be your name”, we’re reminded that because God is our caring Father, He loves us enough to want the best life possible for us, which is a life free of SIN. A HOLY life. A life that honors HIM, God, as holy. And as LORD. That title “Lord” is used of Jesus more than ANY OTHER in all the NT - more than “Savior”, “Messiah”, “homeboy”; you’ve seen those t-shirts: “Jesus is my Homeboy”. Well, he’s never called that anywhere in Scripture. But Jesus IS called our “LORD”, kurios, over 700x in the Bible. It was a term used in the slave-trade, synonymous with “MASTER”. Adoption ain’t free! If we are Father God’s adopted children now, it is only because we have been PURCHASED by the Lord JESUS. His blood BOUGHT us… SO THAT we might be “a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that [we] may proclaim the excellencies of him who called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light” (1 Pet 2:9). We have been saved to serve. Freed to follow.
And prayer is so important because it REMINDS us of that. That we are NOT gods unto ourselves. That we are NOT the center of the universe; prayer re-centers us, on the One who is truly at the center of it all. Hallowed be HIS name!
It ALSO, #3 - reminds us that God is a WISE RULER. (v10)
V10: “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”
In our FLESH, our hearts naturally cry out: “MY kingdom come, MY will be done”; it is only by FAITH, by the SPIRIT, that our hearts can genuinely pray “THY Kingdom come, THY will be done,” and MEAN it.
It is only by FAITH that we can come to see God’s SOVEREIGNTY, God’s RULE, His REIGN, as not just a “regrettable reality”, but as a GLORIOUS GIFT to us.
When I very first came to faith, there was a short period of time when I’ll be honest: I almost LAMENTED Christ’s Lordship. When I was starting to learn to pray “THY will” instead of “MY will”, but I didn’t LIKE it yet. There was a sense of settled, somber resignation in my heart. I hate losing. And I hate quitting. But that’s what faith in Christ IS: it’s Jesus conquering you (your old, sinful self), because you finally SURRENDERED to Him. But I almost surrendered begrudgingly, like “Well, Jesus, I’ve tried being the Lord of my OWN life for 27 years now, and I’ve gotten more miserable every single ONE of them, sooo… I GUESS I’ll let you have a shot…”
If you want to think about it in business terms, it’s kind of like a company ACQUISITION. My stock just kept plummeting year after year, and yet DESPITE that, along comes this massive, amazing corporation who wants to “buy me out”, not just for a “fair price”; but for far BETTER than a fair price; actually, for an UN-fairly GENEROUS price! And yet DESPITE all of that, there was this short period of time when I can remember being a bit SADDENED by the transition to new “ownership”.
…UNTIL I began to realize… began to EXPERIENCE all the BENEFITS! Perks like “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness…” Until I realized how much INFINITELY better GOD’S plan, HIS kingdom, HIS will for my life is, than my OWN was. If God had let MY will be done, there’s no TELLING where I’d be right now. Certainly not HERE, in the pulpit; this wasn’t MY plan. Certainly not voluntarily losing sleep and losing hair for the 3 amazing kids He’s blessed me with; they weren’t MY plan. My plan probably would have landed me face down in the gutter somewhere. Ultimately, my plan would have landed me in HELL - THAT was my plan: “Who needs God; I’m gonna live however the Hell I WANT!” And I should have gotten the Hell I deserved. But for the grace of God.
He is a good, gracious, WISE ruler - God knows what He’s doing. We can TRUST Him. And prayer reminds us of that - “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done” - that’s such a LIBERATING prayer, because it means we don’t HAVE to be the “masters of our own fate”. Friends: that’s a burden far too heavy for you to carry; let GOD be God. You’ve got enough trouble being HUMAN; don’t try and be GOD on top of it. He’s really good at being God; you’re not. So LET Him be. Not just begrudgingly, but enthusiastically! Gratefully.
#4- Prayer reminds us that God is a GENEROUS PROVIDER. (v11)
V11: “Give us this day our daily bread”.
Now why do we PRAY that? Let’s be honest: I know most every one of you in this room, and I don’t know a SINGLE one of you who doesn’t know where your next meal is coming from. If that WERE the case, I’d expect you to TELL me, so the church could help you out! So what business do a bunch of people living in the affluent suburbs of the most affluent country, in the most affluent epoch in the history of the WORLD - we are the 1% of the 1%! - what business do WE have praying “give us this day our daily bread”?
Well, we pray that for TWO reasons. First, to KEEP our affluence in check. Because if you are truly a follower of Jesus, you can only build your mansion SO big… you can only buy SO many sports cars… you can only amass so many “0”s at the end of your bank account statement… and STILL have the audacity to ask God for your “daily bread”. There comes a point where there’s just too much cognitive dissonance there. That’s why Proverbs 30 teaches us to pray “[Lord,] give me neither poverty nor riches;
feed me with the food that is needful for me,
9 lest I be full and deny you
and say, “Who is the Lord?”
or lest I be poor and steal
and profane the name of my God.” (vv8-9)
Speaking of PRAYER, when was the last time you prayed THAT one: “God, please don’t let me get TOO rich! Cuz I don’t wanna become so comfortable that I DELUDE myself into thinking that I no longer NEED you”; have you prayed that lately? We should - we’re the 1% of the 1%.
But the SECOND reason we pray “Give us this day our daily bread” is that it reminds us that no matter HOW much bread we have - whether we’ve got just enough for this day, or honestly, and thankfully, we’ve got MORE than enough bread to last us MANY days - we are reminded that ALL of it is the gracious GIFT of a generous GOD.
That “Every good gift… comes down from the Father above” (James 1:17)
Because “GOD owns the cattle on a thousand hills” (Ps 50:10); ALL of it belongs to Him; we’re just stewarding HIS resources for HIS glory.
Deuteronomy 8:18 reminds us that even “the power to get wealth”, the ability to MAKE the money to then go to the store and BUY the bread - that ability was a gift “given” to us by a BOUNTIFUL God.
It’s a reminder that because “The Lord is our shepherd; we shall not want.” (Ps 23:1) We have a Generous Provider.
And #5- Prayer reminds us that God is also a MERCIFUL SAVIOR. (v12)
If you thought it was convicting that folks as WEALTHY as us would pray for our “daily bread”, now consider how people as UNFORGIVING as we can sometimes be could possibly ask God to “forgive US our debts”.
Jesus’ answer is: we CAN’T. Hence, his second line here: “forgive us our debts… as we also have forgiven our debtors.” God: forgive me to EXACTLY the same extent that I have forgiven others. Talk about dangerous prayers! And just in case we thought he was being hyperbolic, Jesus expounds on this line ALONE in the verses that follow his prayer, in Matthew 6; if we had kept reading on, Jesus says, “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil…. [But then he comes BACK to this point about forgiveness and says:] For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”
How can we possibly PRAY this? Two reasons: First, once again, it keeps us in check. If praying for “daily bread” keeps our affluence in check, praying for forgiveness keeps our OWN UN-forgiveness in check. See, Jesus told a parable once about a servant who owed the king 10,000 talents. 1 talent was equivalent to 20-YEARS salary for a common laborer. So we’re talking somewhere in the ballpark of like 6 BILLION (with a “B”) dollars. But incredibly, the king FORGAVE this man’s massive debt. But then that servant went out and tracked down another servant who owed HIM 100 denarii; a denarius was a single day’s wage for a laborer, so maybe $10,000 today - Still a sizable debt - But nowhere NEAR the 10,000 TALENTS he had owed; this guy had been mercifully forgiven a debt 600,000x greater just the day before. And yet he refused to forgive the 100 denarii. What will be DONE to such a man, Jesus asked? “In anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”
I met with one of you for counseling this week, who’s having a really hard time forgiving a family member for something TERRIBLE they did. And it was BAD. I can’t go into the details for confidentiality reasons, but I mean… BAD! $10,000 debt - sizably bad. But I had to gently remind this sister of the fact that she was drowning under 6 BILLION dollars of spiritual debt before her merciful savior so MAGNANIMOUSLY forgave her.
YES, forgiveness is sometimes a process, that doesn’t always happen overnight.
NO, forgiveness doesn’t always mean “forgetting”, or “trusting again”, or “repaired relationship” - that’s not always possible.
But forgiveness IS. The decision not to hold this person’s sin against them any longer… not to let them be completely defined by the sum total of their worst sins - that IS a decision we can make. That we MUST make.
Brothers and sisters - we of ALL people should be PROFESSIONAL forgivers. Because of how much WE ourselves have been forgiven. We know personally the crushing weight of debt, and we also know the liberating FREEDOM of forgiveness. Our sins, they were indeed MANY - too many to even NUMBER! - but Jesus’ MERCY was indeed MORE. “Marvelous, infinite, matchless grace,
Freely bestowed on all who believe!
Grace, grace, God's grace
Grace that is greater than all our sin!”
#6- Quickly here, Prayer ALSO reminds us that God is our GUIDING DELIVERER. (v13).
V13: “lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.”
The same Savior who delivered us from PAST sins and their rightful penalty, also now continues to deliver us from otherwise potential FUTURE sins and their just consequences as well. God loves us enough not just to GET US out of trouble, but to KEEP us out! And he promises in 1 Corinthians 10:13 that “No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.” He can and will and DOES deliver us from evil, and lead us in paths of RIGHTEOUSNESS instead for His name’s sake, if we will but ASK Him, and then obediently FOLLOW His lead.
Here’s your final, BONUS reason to pray: because God is a WORTHY CLAIMANT.
The way MOST of us memorized the Lord’s Prayer, it ends with a line that actually only appears in a few of the later New Testament manuscripts, but is nevertheless undoubtedly TRUE and BIBLICAL and worth INCLUDING:
“For thine is the kingdom, and the POWER, and the GLORY forever, Amen.”
Have you ever considered how AUDACIOUS it is that God desires - that He DEMANDS - all our heart, all our mind, all our SOUL, all our STRENGTH - that God lays claim to every PART of us?! How can He DEMAND it all? Because He alone deserves it all! And according to the Book of Revelation (4:11), for the rest of ETERNITY, we will gather around his throne and cast our crowns down at his feet, crying ““Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive ALL glory and honor and power”.
Friends: Why do we PRAY? I’ve given you the 45 min version; just in case you MISSED any of it, here’s the 5 SECOND version: we pray to get GOD. Unbelievers pray when they’re in the trenches, to get STUFF from God. We pray at ALL times - “without ceasing” - not to get God’s stuff, but to receive the greatest treasure of ALL: God HIMSELF.
HE is our caring father.
HE is our holy Lord.
HE is our wise Ruler.
Our generous Provider.
Our merciful Savior.
Our guiding Deliverer.
And He is worthy of every second of every day that we will spend talking to Him, listening to Him… CONNECTING with Him, in prayer… and He’s worthy of all the seconds we FAIL to do that as well. He is worthy of it ALL. Come to Him this morning, this new year, in PRAYER.
CONCLUSION: I want to leave you with 3 quick take-home questions:
1) What RESOLUTIONS is God calling you to this year? Maybe you honestly connected most with the first third of the sermon; maybe it was my passing references to Sabbath, Scripture memorization; even the non-spiritual examples of reading or exercising more; maybe God brought something to mind I didn’t even mention: start serving at church, start giving financially, start serving OUTSIDE of church together as a family. Don’t miss this opportunity today to prayerfully take stock and recalibrate.
2) Which of the 7 points about why we want to pray hit home most with you? In what way is God calling you to be more resolute in your prayer life this year? Perhaps you approach God too formally - “O Eternal, Holy, Almighty Lord…” and this is the year God is gonna teach you to simply call Him “Father”. Perhaps you’re guilty of approaching Him too flippantly, and you need to have God’s HALLOWEDNESS impressed upon you this year. Perhaps your prayers are pretty SELF-centered; they’re mostly about what you can get from God: “MY kingdom come, MY will be done…”, and you need to repent and learn to pray GOD-centered prayers this year.
3) Lastly, What are you gonna do, PRACTICALLY, TANGIBLY, as you leave here this morning, to make sure - to RESOLVE - that you will NOT be HEARER ONLY of God’s word when it comes to prayer, but you’ll be a DOER? Maybe that means setting an alarm right now, to REMIND you tonight, 15 minutes before your USUAL bedtime, to stop whatever you would NORMALLY be doing 15 minutes before bed, and PRAY instead. Setting TWO alarms - one for tomorrow morning, to START your day with 15 min of prayer; there’s no better way to start the day! Maybe it’s having a conversation on the ride home, as a COUPLE, as a FAMILY, about what you want your new rhythms of prayer to look like in this new year. Maybe it’s less about HOW MUCH God wants you to pray, and more about HOW he wants you to pray. Quality over quantity. A couple years ago a pastor in a book I was reading suggested praying OUT LOUD, even when you’re praying alone, that it helps focus your mind and heart better. I’ve been doing that ever since. Around the same time, I was convicted by the fact that I was frequently telling people “I’ll be praying for you…”, but then frankly, FORGETTING to actually pray for them. So I resolved that I was just gonna start praying for people WHEN they mentioned their prayer request. Pull them aside quickly right here in the church lobby, pray with them before we even get off that phone call. Maybe God’s calling some of you to be more MISSIONAL in your prayers - there are some loved ones in your life who are LOST spiritually, and you need to resolve to pray for them consistently this year, like we did LAST year with the 1:8 Prayer Initiative. Or you’re resolving to share the gospel more this year (we’ll talk more about that in 2 weeks!) but prayer can be an AMAZING tool in your evangelism. If you want to share the gospel more, but you’re not sure how, just start by asking everyone you meet: “How can I pray for you?” Your server at lunch today: “How can I pray for you?”. Your employee at work: “How can I pray for you?” And just SEE where God takes the conversation, and the doors He opens for witnessing.
The possibilities are ENDLESS. But our time together is not. So let’s close together in PRAYER.