Powerful Prayer: Is and Is Not

Sharing good news of great joy to all people,

Elation Church. Today we're starting a new series.

That series is called Powerful Prayer. Everybody

say, Powerful Prayer. That's something about

us is we can pray and we can talk to God. Everybody

say, Talk to God. We can talk to God. See, sometimes

we just get so used to things that it's not a

big deal anymore. But we can talk to the God

who created everything that you know is real.

We can talk to the God who owns everything. It's

all His. The earth is the Lord's and the fullness

thereof. He is set up and tabernacled in us.

We can talk to him. We can walk with him. We

can know him. Everybody say relationship. In

order to have a relationship with someone, you

have to communicate with them. I mean, we're

going to talk about some basic things. It's okay

to talk about basic things. Oh, we're going to

dig deep through the series. We're going to dig

deep. deeper than maybe you've ever experienced

or encountered before. But some of the things

are going to be very basic. You know why we need

to talk about the basics a lot? Because we don't

always act in what we know. We don't always apply

what we know. We don't always experience and

enjoy what we know. Because we get distracted

by everything else around us where our prayer

life becomes the least important thing in our

lives. When it should be one of the most important

things in our lives is talking to God. And encountering

God is real. It's real. He's real. The communication

is real. And when it's real, it's powerful. When

it's not just a religious exercise, it can become

powerful. It can make a difference in your life.

So Mark 1, 35. Just going to start out by introducing

several verses that talk about how important

prayer was to Jesus. And listen, if prayer was

important to him, how much more important should

it be to us? It says before daybreak the next

morning, Jesus got up and went out to an isolated

place to pray. That's how important it was. Giving

up some sleep for it. Here we go. After sending

them home, Matthew 14, 23. This is after he sent,

you know, I believe it's after he sent 5 ,000

people home from feeding them. After sending

them home, he went up into the hills by himself

to pray. Night fell while he was there alone.

Can you imagine ministering to 5 ,000 people

all day and not just wanting to go to bed? I'm

not sure how true it is, but among preachers

they say, well, preaching one hour is equivalent

to your body, especially if you're emotionally

and physically engaged in your preaching. It

does the same thing to your body as eight hours

of manual labor. So Jesus has been out there

all day. I'm sure he was tired. Like one time

he got in the boat and went to sleep pretty quick.

But this was like, I need to spend some time

with my father. You guys go on ahead. But I need

some personal time. If we had more personal time

with God, we... We might be in a better place.

Might be more powerful in the earth. And this

wasn't just those two examples. I mean, it's

in the scripture over and over again. But I liked

Luke 5 .16 that says this. Jesus often. Everybody

say often. Regularly. All the time. Jesus often.

to the wilderness for prayer. He often stepped

away from whatever his normal daily routine was.

He often stepped away to spend intimate prayer

and time with the Father. And he's God. Notice

that Jesus said, you know what, I don't say anything

that my father doesn't say. You familiar with

that? I don't do anything that my father doesn't

do. How do you think he downloaded that information?

It was in this personal time with the father.

That's where it got downloaded. Luke 11 .1, once

Jesus was in a certain place praying, we don't

know where that was, but we know he did it often.

As he finished, one of his disciples came to

him and said, Lord, teach us to pray. So what

does that tell us? The guys around him noticed

something powerful when Jesus would go spend

time with the Father and then he would come back.

Things would be different than they were before

he went. So they wanted to tap into this. They're

like, this is so important to you, Jesus. We

need some instruction. How can we pray like you?

How can we have that kind of prayer life? And

Matthew 6 is... His answer is in Matthew and

in Luke. But today's technical title, if today's

message has a title, it's what powerful prayer

is and is not. That's why I'm switching over

to Matthew. Because some of us might think that

prayer or powerful prayer is something that Jesus

says is not. Just because of our religious experience.

So, Jesus talked to his disciples and he said

this. He said, when you pray, he didn't say if

you pray, he said when you pray. When you pray,

don't be like the hypocrites. Everybody say hypocrites.

Don't be like the hypocrites who love to pray

publicly on street corners and in the synagogues

where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth,

that's all the reward that they will ever get.

So this tells us what prayer is not. It's one

of the things that we're going to look at. What

is not powerful prayer? Power for prayer is not

being hypocritical. Now that word hypocrite,

I don't have the word up here and all that, but

the word hypocrite, when you see it in the Bible,

it's referring to this. This is what that word

means. It means play actor. Everybody say play

actor. That's what a hypocrite is. It wasn't

necessarily a bad word in their life. I mean,

it's not like hypocrite. You're all just a bunch

of hypocrites. I'm not going to church because

there's a bunch of hypocrites. Well, there's

a bunch of hypocrites in Walmart too. I don't

want to stop you from going to Walmart. But hypocrites

are play actors. Often in this time for entertainment,

there would be plays, right? No TV. People write

things. And you've seen the masks, the drama

masks, right? So what they would do, because

I guess good actors were hard to find, sometimes

an actor would play two or three parts in the

same play. Sometimes they would even talk to

themselves. They'd put up a mask. How are you

doing today? Put up the other mask. I'm doing

fine. How are you? They're talking to themselves.

But here's the deal. They're being somebody.

An actor is somebody who's different than who

they actually are. Okay? A play actor. So Jesus

said when we pray, we don't just get up in front

of everybody and try to be somebody that we're

not. Because some of these Pharisees would stand

out on the street corner and pray these big lofty

prayers. And they weren't even talking to God.

They were just putting their spirituality on

display. They weren't talking with God to have

communication with God and be in relationship

with God. It was just a construct of their religion.

Powerful prayer is not being hypocritical. It's

not trying to be somebody that you aren't to

impress somebody else. Are you with me? Powerful

prayer is not just suddenly breaking out in this

old English. Now, most of the people in this

room may not have encountered this or experienced

it. But if you've been around church very long,

people start talking different when they pray.

Start talking in King James English when they

pray. It's like, that's hypocritical. If you

don't talk in King James English when you talk,

don't talk in King James English when you pray

because you're just talking to God. You're trying

to put on some kind of... False spirituality.

You start saying these and thous and putting

STs on the end of your word. Jesus himself is

saying, don't pray like that. Don't pray like

that. and we kind of covered this, but it's not

a public display of your super spirituality.

You know? Some people want to appear spiritual

for some reason, and they're not really spending

time with God and talking with God, but if all

of a sudden they think they have an opportunity

to get with somebody and pray when they hadn't

even prayed and talked to God all week, and then

now you're going to go pray with somebody? That's

not powerful. Are you with me? Some of you are

looking at me funny. It's like, this is basic.

Right? This is very basic. Jesus said, don't

be like that. Look at the person beside you and

tell them, don't be like that. Don't try to be

like that. We've been in over 800 churches. I

know I've shared this before. I've been in some

interesting prayer moments at church. Because

we would go to a different church almost every

week, you know. At one time, we were like 280

services in a year. That's a lot of services.

So we were doing church a lot. We were the guests

leading. You know, when we got up to like the

mid -280s, I looked at, Gannon and Jeffrey and

I said, we can't do this anymore because I'm

so squeezed out. I ain't got nothing else to

squeeze out. I mean, I'm just so worn out from,

so I said, then we backed it up. We started,

up until that point, we always said yes for anybody

who called. After that, it was like, I can't

say yes all the time anymore. We got to back

it up. I'll say yes. I'm not going to say no,

but I'll say yes for next year, not this year.

Right? But during those church revivals, on Sunday

morning, you know, the pastor kind of handled

everything. But then when we got on Sunday night,

Tuesday night, Monday night, Wednesday night,

all of a sudden he'd just turn it over to me.

So we'd be up there. We'd be singing. It'd be

time to receive the offering. You know, the pastor

didn't even come up for the offering. It's just

like the guest speaker and music team is just

running the whole service. and the ushers would

come forward. You might have been in a church

like this. The ushers come forward, and normally

one of the ushers will pray for the offering.

Has anybody been to a church service like that

before? Sometimes there's even a microphone down

there for one of them to take the microphone

and pray. Well, they didn't ever plan it out.

When I was there, for some reason, the ushers

didn't plan who was going to pray. So in the

services I've been in, you know, the pastor would

just nod at one of them and they would pray.

I can't tell you how many times I nodded at one

of them and they go, and I nodded another one.

So guess who would just go ahead and pray? I'll

never forget one particular prayer. Because this

guy, you know, he broke out in King James English,

Old English. And he got so twisted up in his

memorized phrases. You know what I'm talking

about? There's memorized little phrases that

you, you know, to sound super spiritual to everybody

else in the room, you got to use those. You got

to lock in on those spiritual phrases when you're

praying. And all of a sudden, he got twisted

up. See, I don't guess anyone in the room was

listening to what he was praying to agree with

him. Because when somebody prays in public in

a church, you need to be listening and you need

to be agreeing, saying like, yes, Lord. Yes,

Lord. I agree with that. Amen. I agree. This

guy, praying for the offering, he says, Lord,

you know that we are bringing you today more

than you deserve. That's what he said. We just

got twisted up in his little prayer sayings.

When he said that, I went... He still had his

eyes closed. Everybody else's eyes were closed

in the whole church and I'm just like... I felt

like, you know, I'm a nice guy. Aren't you glad

I'm a nice guy? Because I should have said, what

do you mean? No one in this room has ever brought

God more than he deserved. There's another service

where at the end of the service, you know, the

pastor would normally call on somebody in the

church to dismiss us in prayer. Have you been

to a service like that? It was time for the service

to be over. He called on brother so -and -so.

The pastor said, brother so -and -so, would you

dismiss us in prayer? And here's what he said.

I declined. And it shocked the preacher so much,

he said, what? And then he said it again, I decline.

So the preacher prayed. So I've had some interesting

prayer moments, to say the least. I wanted to

share some of those with you. Because those would

be in line with what Jesus was talking about.

And as he continues on what is not prayer. But

when you pray, go away by yourself. Shut the

door behind you and pray to your Father in private.

Then your Father who sees everything will reward

you. That's a good promise, right? So I don't

care if you're praying in front of people in

a worship service. Whether you're praying in

a restaurant, whether you're praying at home,

whether you're praying while you're walking or

working or whatever, just know that it's always,

when you're praying, it's always between you

and God. Now, when you're praying in a service

kind of situation, You're praying between you

and God, but you're also many times praying on

behalf of those who are in the room and bringing

up that prayer to God, but you're never praying.

See, his heart, I've got to tell you, I've been

guilty of it at times where you just kind of

throw in a few more sermon points during your

prayer. That's not the way you pray. It's not

how we're supposed to pray. Because our communication

is not with... Each other, when we're praying,

our communication is with God. Is everybody okay?

Y 'all are looking at me just like... This is

just very simple stuff, I thought. I thought

this was like just super simple. But we need

to be reminded of these things, right? Jesus

continued. When you pray... Don't babble on as

the Gentiles do. They think their prayers are

answered merely by repeating their words again

and again. Don't be like them. For your Father

knows exactly what you need even before you ask

Him. There's a lot in this. A lot in this. I'm

going to focus in on the Babylon. Here's what

prayer is not. Are you with me? Prayer is not

mindless and meaningless repetition. I'm going

to say that again. Prayer, you might call it

prayer. People call it prayer. But prayer is

not mindless and meaningless repetition. That's

not talking to God. Sometimes I think, even,

sometimes I catch myself. Now, I'm the preacher,

so I know if I catch myself, you ought to be

able to catch yourself every once in a while,

too. Hello? We need to stop ourselves. When we

find ourselves in mindless and meaningless repetition

when we're talking to God, we need to say, whoa,

and we just need to shake and say, I'm talking

to God. I'm not doing some kind of religious

exercise. I'm talking to God. Because it's easy

for us to say the same things over and over and

over and over and over. See, here's the problem.

It's not just using, the same phrase or thanking

God for the same thing. It's just dropping out

of you mentally being engaged with what your

mouth is saying. Or are you just like a robot

all of a sudden? I grew up having to pray. I

was the youngest one, so I had to pray every

meal. Maybe you've prayed like this before. God

is great. God is good. Let us thank him for our

food. By his hands. I'm hoping I'm remembering.

We all are fed. Give us, Lord, our daily bread.

I'm not telling you not to teach your kids to

pray. But that prayer can be just as powerful

as, Twinkle, twinkle, little star. If all we're

doing is memorizing something and repeating it,

we're not talking to God. Unless our minds are

engaged in what we're doing. So I encourage you.

Teach your kid the thankfulness part of it as

you're teaching him the prayer. Not just a good

bread, good meat, good God, let's eat. Maybe

you've never prayed that one before. But prayer

is not mindless and meaningless repetition. Then

Jesus goes on. He says, you know, you want me

to teach you how to pray? Don't do all those

things. Everybody say, don't do that. But pray

like this. Pray, listen, like this. Jesus did

not say, pray this. Some of you just got mad

at me. I've had people get all over me. Why don't

we pray the Lord's Prayer every service we get

together? People have been mad and upset with

me over that. Well, when I tried to tell them,

I said, Jesus didn't say pray this. He said pray

like this. It's okay to pray this. I'm going

to go ahead and tell you that. But it's not okay

to pray this if it's just mindless, meaningless

repetition. Because even this prayer can become

Bible. Pray like this. That word prayer, I looked

it up in this words help in the Bible hub. I

think it's what it's called. I keep forgetting

what it's called. Go to just select. The summary

and go down and word helps. I'm finding some

really cool things. Prashukamahi. I can't get

the right accent on the right syllable, but anyway.

Prashukamahi. Maybe that's close. This is what

I found in word helps. Now get this. This is

so good. To interact with the Lord by switching

basically your human wishes or ideas for his

wishes as he imparts faith. Divine persuasion.

Have you ever thought about prayer being, I'm

just going to get with God? And I'll tell him

my wishes and my ideas, but what I really want

to do is get with him and know what his wishes

are. Has anybody ever thought about prayer like

that, that that's what it is, us getting together

with God to find out what he wants? Well, if

Jesus always said, you know, What I say is what

my father said and what I do is what my father

does. He was getting what the father wanted somewhere.

It's probably because he often went. Got by himself

with God. To interact with the Lord by switching

your human wishes and ideas for his wishes as

he imparts faith. Because when we get on... When

we get on track with His will and His wishes,

that's when faith can get involved. Pray like

this, huto, which means like this, in this manner,

in this way, or fashion, in accordance with this

description, or along this line. So it wasn't

about the specific words. If it would have been

about the specific words that Jesus said, we

should all have memorized this prayer in Koine

Greek and say it just like Jesus said it. The

Lord's prayer should be seen as a pattern. Everybody

say a pattern. A guide. Everybody say a guide.

Or a model. Everybody say a model for prayer.

And just to put it back, I've already said it

once, but the memorized Lord's Prayer can easily

become mindless and meaningless repetition. Look

at the person beside you and say, don't do that.

Don't do that. Then we're going to continue.

Oh, we're going to dig deep. This series may

last 10 or 11 weeks. We've been mapping it out.

He says this, Our Father in heaven, may your

name be kept holy. Everybody say pattern. So

in this pattern, what's happening first? If we're

looking at the pattern, what's happening first?

Praise is happening first, right? We're acknowledging

God. Who He is. We are esteeming Him. We're honoring

Him. Who He is. He's God. He's God. It's easy

for us to get into a track where our prayer is

like our Christmas wish list for God. And that's

the only time we talk to Him is... when we have

a list of things that we want Him to do for us,

right? So we just come to Him, God, I need you

to do this today. I want you to do this today.

God, will you please do this today? We need to

acknowledge who He is. We need to be in awe of

who He is. We need to honor who He is on a regular

basis. May your kingdom come soon. Your kingdom

come. Your will be done. May your will be done

on earth as it is in heaven. What are we saying?

Well, we're saying, God, and Jesus knew this

firsthand, God, your will is always done in heaven.

Is that a shock to anybody? God's will is always

done in heaven. But God's will is not always

done on earth. So what does that tell us about

God's in control? God just has some kind of mysterious

plan for everything to happen this week. You

know, God planned it. Got a good Greek word for

that, baloney. It's not a Greek word. Why would

Jesus ask us to link up with God's will in the

earth if it was already happening? It's not.

May your kingdom come soon. May your will be

done on earth. And then some people take this

and other verses to say, oh, I've got to give

this blanket statement to my prayer because I

don't know what God's will is. I don't know what

He wants. I haven't spent time with Him to find

out what He wants. And I'm going to tell Him

what I want, but then I'm going to say, Not my

will, but yours be done. Give some kind of blanket

for my ignorance, for my word ignorance. The

Bible tells us so many things that God's will,

God wills. And if we link up with Him and pray

according to His will, we don't have to end with,

and thy will be done, not mine. Because we're

praying His will. We don't have to have some

kind of blanket thing for our doubt. You know,

for our lack of faith. Well, God, you know, I

think you might, you know, you might could do

this. I really want you to do this. I don't know

if you really want to do this, but this is what

I want you to do. But your will be done. Your

will be done. So prayer, like that word study

that I saw, it's linking up to what, it's linking

up with God to see what he wants, to see what

his will is, to see what he desires to happen.

in your life, in your community, in our church,

in our fellowship. I don't know if we'll ever

encounter that with just, boy, God, you know

I'm in such a hurry today, so bless my day, bless

my family, bless my business, bless my... Okay,

I'm gone now. I'll see you. I'll see you for

30 seconds tomorrow. Trying not to dig deep.

Trying my best not to over -prepare. Because

when I over -prepare, I preach a long time. Give

us today the food we need. I'm going to go ahead

and say it's okay to present your request to

God. In everything that I'm saying, I'm not saying

don't ever present any request to God. Because

Gaynor reminded me before we started dating,

if you ask not, you will have not. Now she was

quoting it out of context because she was wanting

me to ask her out on a date. You have not because

you ask not. The good thing is I asked and 41

years later we're still married. It's okay to

present your request to God. It's okay. It's

also okay to know what he has provided for you,

which would be according to his will, and pray

in agreement with what he's already promised.

That's the powerful angle. And then Jesus starts

talking about forgiveness. What? Wait a minute,

Jesus. You've talked about forgiveness before.

You've given us some amazing parables on forgiveness

before. So why is this in the middle of a prayer?

And forgive us our sins, our trespasses, as we

forgive those who trespass our sin against us.

Forgiveness is a big deal to God. It's a big

deal to God. Unforgiveness will inhibit you from

receiving anything from God. He even says, go

get it right, then come back. Doesn't he? Go

get it right, then come back. Get it right. So

if we're living our lives in unforgiveness towards

everybody else, that means that we're not living

in love because love forgives. Hello? I thought

I'd get at least a little amen on that. If we're

not living in forgiveness, we're not living in

love because love forgives. It doesn't mean that

whatever that person did to you, You're not validating

their behavior, but you're being like God. And

if you want to pray powerful prayers, you got

to deal with unforgiveness first. I mean, that's

what... I guess I could call it like the fruit

of the gospel is you being forgiven. Right? That's

how important it is to God. Then he goes on.

And don't let us yield to temptation, but rescue

us from the evil one. Here's what we need to

know. We can't fight against the evil one and

withstand temptation without God being involved.

You can't just work this up. You can't work up

some kind of elevated morality just within yourself.

We need help. As we continue after Matthew 6,

13, on the other side of the cross, we find out

some things like we've been studying at Life

Group and even in our worship services. So don't

let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from

the evil one. We need to constantly acknowledge

our in Christ position. On this side of the cross.

See, the blood of Jesus is how we overcome. That's

what Revelation says. We overcome the enemy.

We overcome evil in this world by the blood of

the Lamb. Jesus' blood had not been shed at the

point of this prayer. But now it has. Look at

the person beside you and say, now it has. So

we overcome by the blood of the Lamb and the

word of our testimony is what the Bible says

in Revelation. So on this side of the cross,

we need to acknowledge that Jesus has helped

us and he is helping us. Sin is not our master

anymore. We find in Romans over and over again.

Sin's not our master. It has no control over

us anymore in Christ. Hello? So Jesus did something

about that. And when we're talking to God, we

need to acknowledge what Jesus did. And then

verse 13. I believe every one of us who've ever

memorized the Lord's Prayer have memorized His

ending to it. For yours is the kingdom and the

power and the glory forever. Amen. And at least

all of us old people. Now, some of you might

look at your Bible and you read the Lord's Prayer

and you say, well, what happened? People are

trying to steal God's word from us. All these

newfangled translations, they're just leaving

out stuff because they're trying to make, you

know, take away from what God said. Here's the

deal. That last sentence does not appear in any

manuscript. We've got a lot of good manuscripts

that are older than the 8th century now. We didn't

at one point. But that sentence doesn't appear

in any of the oldest manuscripts. So it doesn't

appear as part of the Lord's Prayer until the

700 years after Jesus said it is when it starts

popping up. Okay? But I'm going to go ahead and

tell you this. We're not memorizing the prayer

word for word for vain repetition anyway, right?

We're looking at a pattern. I'm just going to

go ahead and free you up from all that debate

over manuscripts and different things like that.

Look, more praising God doesn't hurt anything.

Never will hurt anything. Acknowledging, esteeming,

and honoring who God is, that's never going to

hurt anybody. So we can add that to the pattern

because it started with that pattern. It's okay

to end with that. It's just a pattern. It doesn't

have to be in order. It needs to be what we do.

It needs to be our pattern. So many people, when

they begin to pray, they're like, well, I would

probably pray more if I knew what to pray. I

just don't know what to pray. Other than thanking

God for the food three times and asking Him to

be with me today, I ain't got nothing else. And

I know at one point, there might be some people

in the room who've grown spiritually to where

that's not a problem anymore, but I dare say

everybody went through that at some point in

your Christian journey. You might be there today.

I would pray more, but what in the world am I

going to say? Other than God is great, you know,

now lay me down to sleep. What are we going to

say? What are we going to talk to God about?

We all do. Look, again. We're building a relationship

with the living God. And I'm going to go ahead

and free you up. You don't have to always do

all the talking. It might not hurt you to do

some listening. It might not hurt you in your

prayer to say, God, you know what I feel. You

know what I'm going through. God, I just want

to spend time with you. In some points in our

life, it might be, I don't know what I'm going

to do. I don't know what I'm going to say. I

don't know what the next move is. But God, I

just want to hang out with you and fellowship

with you and know you and listen for you to speak

to me. And then you open up your Bible and you

read these verses from this message today because

you took good notes. I was hoping at least two

or three people would laugh. And you read these

verses. You say, God, I really don't know what

to say about this situation that I'm in, but

I know you're God. And I know you know a whole

lot more than I do. I know you know a whole lot

more to do. You know a whole lot more about a

family should function than I will ever know,

God. You know. You made me. You created my mind,

will, and emotions. God, you know more about

that than I will ever know. You know more about

that than any doctor will ever know. You know

more about my flesh than any doctor will ever

know. So I want to spend some time with you.

I want to spend some time with you. I want you

to speak to me. Give me the steps. Speak to me.

Because you know. You know so many things that

I... We'll never know. And when we acknowledge

him as God and his creator, as all -knowing,

hello? The only wise God, and when we spend some

time with him, more than just a five -minute

quick, or 30 -second quick little prayer, I believe

we're going to hear him. Because he wants that

relationship with you more than you want that

relationship with him. Should I say that again?

He wants that intimate relationship with you

more than you actually want that intimate relationship

with him. Like I said, we're going to keep digging.

That's just a very basic introduction. We're

going to keep digging. Let's pray together. God,

thank you. Thank you for your word. Thank you

for your truth. Thank you for your love. Thank

you for all that you're doing. God, we want to

connect with you. We want to experience you.

We want to encounter you. Help each one of us

to taste and see that you're good. In Jesus'

name, amen. This online worship experience was

brought to you by the friends and partners of

Elation Church.