RHYTHMS: Prayer

Chris McCurley: Thank When you go to God in prayer, what is the expression on His face? How do you perceive Him when you are looking at Him in prayer? Is He moody? Is he stern? What's the reaction of God when you go to him prayer and you say, well, Chris, I have absolutely no idea. But you do, you have some idea. You're reflecting on God when you pray, I assume, and your words suggest that. Dear God, I know you're busy, but dear God, don't mean to bother you. But dear dear God, please know. that even though I haven't spoken to you in a while. Dear God, don't be mad at me. When you picture the face of God, what is the expression that He wears? Is he stirred? Is he angry? Is he determined? Do you perceive God as being aloof and distant and disinterested or maybe apathetic? When you picture the face of God, what is the expression that he wears? Is it this? It wasn't really meant to be a joke but it's funny picture right. Is it this. Maybe this? When you picture the face of God, what is the expression that he wears and how you answer that question says a whole lot about your spirituality. Many of you grew up with an image of God that was shaped by fear. God loves you, but you better not mess up because he's just waiting to turn you into a french fry for all eternity. Make sure you cross every T and dot every I. Maybe you grew up hearing hellfire and brimstone sermons that while meaningful, also scared you into submission. And so your relationship with God was more fear-based than it was love-based. I cannot tell you through 25 years in ministry how many people have come to me who suffer with what I would call spiritual PTSD. They're coming around to this idea that maybe the God that they have long worshiped or perceived is not the God that is found in Scripture. And even though they've come around to that, it's still in their psyche and it still shakes them and causes them issues moving forward to zero in on a God who is loving, who is a Father, who desires to show us mercy and grace. It's a little too touchy feely for a lot of people, for they have long believed in a God who was just trying to catch them on a technicality. There are far too many Christians that are living a less than abundant life. There are far too many Christians who are living as condemned sinners when they are actually cleansed sinners, and they are living a life that is far from abundant because they believe that God is still mad at them. They believed a version of God that is rather foreign to the Bible. And a less than fulfilling life of discipleship comes from broken relationship, which is sad because that's what this is all about. It's not about rules. It's about relationship. You get the relationship right and the rules will follow. But when you focus only on the rules, then you perceive a God that sets booby traps. That just loves catching you on a technicality so he can punish you and barbecue you for all eternity. This is about relationship. It's not about crossing every T and dotting every I. It's not about do this or else. This is about redemption and rescue and restoration and renewal. This is about God fixing broken things. A God who wants what's best for you. And you know what's best for you? A relationship with God. Which is why He sent His Son. And if you go to hell, you have to step over the cross of Christ to get there. because He has made a way for you to have a relationship with Him. So if you're a child of God, consider the expression on God's face to be something more like this. Because that is the accurate biblical depiction. When you read through Scripture, this is the picture you should perceive in your mind when you think of God and going to Him in prayer. He's a loving Father. I love the way John Mark Comer states it in his book, Practicing the Way. and talking about contemplative prayer, he says, I look at him, he looks at me and we're happy. When's the last time that's happened for you in prayer? I look at him, he looks at me and we're happy. And maybe this is a little hard for some of you to swallow because you grew up in a church setting where God was more gruff than grace field, maybe more mean than merciful. If grace was mentioned at all, it came with a disclaimer. Yeah, God gives grace, but. I think all too often we presented a God that we can't get too comfortable with. And we certainly can't get too comfortable with grace. I want you to get comfortable this morning. I want you to get comfortable going forward. I want you to revel in the glory of your salvation. I want you to bask in the glory of God. And I want you to have a smile on your face as you bound on air thinking about the future and the hope that you have, but also because the relationship you have now is reason to celebrate. Why do I bring this up? Because prayer is relational. And if you don't have the relationship right, then your prayer life is going to greatly suffer. So look with me at Luke, Chapter 11. Luke chapter 11, Jesus gives a very proactive means to develop a rhythm of prayer in our lives. Jesus tells his disciples, when you pray. In Matthew chapter six, he states, pray like this. And understand, this is not an academic exercise. Jesus is not giving a lecture on prayer. He's giving a gift. What would it look like if we prayed this way? He's giving us this prayer, which means that we need to use it now through the years for reasons unbeknown to me. Maybe you can answer this through the years. It's been said that you can't pray this prayer word for word because we don't do recited prayers, which is funny because Jesus recited the Psalms and other people in the Bible recited the Psalms. Those are definitely recited prayer, so that that doesn't hold water. But for some reason you can't recite this prayer. Well, that's ridiculous, OK? But now Jesus. May not be saying, do this word for word, although you could. But what he's saying is this is a model for prayer. Pray like this. Maybe you don't do it verbatim, but pray like this. Look at it with me. And he said to them, when you pray, say, Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread and forgive us our sins. And we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us. and lead us not into temptation. Matthew's version adds another line at the end. reads like this, our father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Back in the 60s, there was a band known as Buffalo Springfield. and they had a song that was entitled for what it's worth. Some of you know this song. Many of you know this song, even though you don't know the song, because you've heard it a time or two and you just didn't know who it was or what the name of it was. Part of the song says, I think it's time we stop. Children, what's that sound? Everybody look what's going down. You know the song? That song became an anthem for a movement. Stephen Stills, the man who wrote the song, who later would become one-fourth of Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, he wrote the song and it became a cultural movement. The song became associated with the anti-Vietnam War theme, this protesting of the Vietnam War. And songs are kind of like that, aren't they? Songs... can take us back. can transport us to a time in our lives. They can stir up nostalgic memories. All of you have a song when you hear it, you think back to a certain time in your life. What do you think about those of you who are around when the song came out? What do you think about when you hear this song? You probably think, you know, the Vietnam War. You probably think Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination. Maybe you think about Woodstock or the events that were going on at the time. Whatever it is, songs do that and songs can kind of take over a period of time and become a cultural anthem and that's exactly what happened with Buffalo Springfield's song. Stop. What's that sound? Everybody look what's going down. Did you know that this song had absolutely nothing to do with the Vietnam War? Zero. Steven Stills wrote the song and he said the song is actually. about the curfew that was implemented on the Sunset Strip back in the 60s had absolutely nothing to do with the Vietnam War. But it got hijacked because that happens. Songs get hijacked and they become a cultural phenomenon, which is exactly what happened here. So why do I bring all this up? And what does this have to do with prayer? It just goes to show that a song can ignite all sorts of feelings and emotions, even if the song didn't mean what the people actually thought it meant. Stephen Sills unintentionally wrote a song that became a theme song for a movement. And in contrast, Jesus had every intention to ignite a movement. And while it's maybe not a song, the model prayer is meant to perpetuate a movement to help his followers ignite a spark to continue this movement for years to come. He gave them a prayer. a prayer that would serve as a summary of the heartbeat of this movement. This prayer was meant to provide energy and breath for the movement. But again, it's not meant to be ritualistic. It's meant to be relational. And we see this in the structure of the prayer. There's two main sections to it. The first section addresses the father and the second section addresses the needs of disciples, which is a play off of the Shema. The Shema, you remember, love the Lord your God with all of your heart, soul, mind and strength. Love your neighbor as yourself. That is the heartbeat of this movement. You get those two things right, you've got Christianity down in a nutshell. Love God, love others. And so this plays off of that to say, love God first, and then I look out for the needs of others. Right? You see how that coincides. The model prayer reflects these two priorities. Notice how it starts. Our Father in heaven. When you pray, remind yourself who you're praying to. It's just that simple. When you pray, remind yourself who you're praying to. You're not praying to some ruthless dictator, some taskmaster that's just waiting to catch you on a technicality. You're not praying to some malevolent deity or some aloof creator that set everything in motion and just decided to say, hey, good luck. I hope you make it. No, you're praying to the Father. And for some of you, Jesus is redefining God when you read through this prayer. In fact, when you read through the gospels, Jesus is redefining God for you because Jesus is describing a God that you didn't grow up with. And you're realizing the God you grew up with is rather foreign to the Bible and to Jesus's description here. He's not some scary taskmaster who's just waiting to catch you on a technicality. He's your father. So the very first thing that Jesus wants you to do in prayer is to orient yourself toward the Father. Know who you're praying to. And if prayer is relational, then we must define the terms of the relationship. God the Father, we are His children. Prayer is a major means for fostering the most important relationship that we could ever have. And when we orient ourselves toward the Father, we bring three petitions, right? What are those three petitions? Well, he spells them out for us. Name, kingdom, and will. Look at it again. Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Every line of the model prayer reflects something that Jesus thinks that we need on a daily basis to keep this kingdom movement going. Remember that was Jesus' favorite subject was kingdom. And so that weaves into all of this. Our daily prayer should include name, kingdom, and will. You start with the name. I want you to that while we orient ourselves to the Father, we also orient ourselves to the Father's holiness. There is a sacredness to this name. Jesus is reminding us that God's name and reputation are to be kept sacred. Hallowed be your name. What does hallowed mean? It means holy. So we are not just praying to God, we are praying to a holy God. who also is our father. Have you noticed how so many things today in our culture are a copycat, are an imitation of something else, right? Whether it be movies or songs or television shows, whatever, so many things are just remakes. It's like we're just regurgitating the same things. How many Spider-Man movies are we gonna have, right? How many Superman or Batman movies are we gonna have? You think about songs. So many songs now are just remakes of older songs or they take snippets of an older song and splice them into a newer song. I don't know about you, but some things I think are just off limits. I'm a Star Wars purist. I like the first three. Sam is not here, so thank goodness he won't ⁓ call me out on this. I like the first three. I haven't watched any of the new ones except one, and it was okay. You can remake Whitney Houston, but good luck. I mean, she was the best to ever do it. That's going to be hard to do. Michael Jackson, I don't think we need to be messing with Michael Jackson's music. It had its own place in its own time. Right? You see what I'm getting at? There's certain things that are just off limits. You start to make a sequel or imitate them and you kind of run or mar the beauty of the original. And so many people in our culture have tried to remake God into someone who has fashioned in their own image. And what we have to realize is when we go to God in prayer, we're not just going to someone who is a mere magnification of ourselves. He is holy, you're not. Recognize your place in this whole relationship and where He stands in relation to you. Humanity is being redeemed and God's reputation needs to be restored. So when we address God, we are orienting ourselves toward the Father, but let us not forget that the one we are connecting with is holy. The Father is God, the Almighty, the Creator, the supreme rule of the universe. And the only reason that we are capable of coming to Him in prayer is because of who He is and what He has done. He is unique, holy, and should be treated as such. So that's name. Then you have kingdom. Now, this one is going to be a little uneasy for some of you because of the way you grew up. And that's okay. ⁓ We don't have to come to a consensus on this. But here's what I believe that the Bible is teaching when it comes to kingdom. both the now feature and the not yet. I started this research and this digging in about 10 years ago when Jesus says in the Beatitudes, blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth. What does that mean? Because Isaiah talks about that too. You see that in other places. You see it in Psalms 37. What does that mean? And you get a very spiritualized answer a lot of times depending on the commentaries you're looking at. think it means something very different and something that is life-changing for me. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. We talked about this in a class, I don't know, a year or two ago. The kingdom has come and is still to come. There is a now and a not yet feature of this kingdom. And this is key to the Jesus movement. Here is how we have often viewed eternity. So you have earth, you have us, as you can see here. We'll call this the spiritual view, it's the name that we'll give it. And the basic premise of this view is that we live in a world that was created good. However, that good was distorted because Adam and Eve ate from the wrong menu and therefore they were kicked out of the Garden of Eden. As a result, we live in a fallen world. The good news is that Jesus came. And that is the gospel. He came, He died, He was resurrected, He ascended into heaven, He is coming back. And this gives hope to a fallen world. And in the meantime, it's kind of like the Titanic. It's sinking and we go around in lifeboats trying to rescue as many people, pulling them out of the water for their drowning in sin, right? That is the spiritual view and that is the view that many, if not most, or all of you grew up with. Now, there are a lot of good points. to this view. First of all, there is an eternal home with the heavenly father. Secondly, there is a hill. Third, judgment is a reality. Fourth, Jesus is coming back. But I think the Bible presents a little bit different view than what maybe we've always thought of. And I'm going to call it the renewed view. Okay, and here's what it looks like. Heaven and earth were united. We can't argue that. That was the case. The Garden of Eden was heaven on earth. It was God living with humanity in a paradise, a utopic existence. Everything was perfect. By the way, a tabernacle or a temple is where God chose to make his present felt so that he could dwell with his people. Eden was the first tabernacle, the first temple. God and his people dwelled together and it was in perfect harmony. Heaven and earth were united. But something happened and you know what happened. Adam and Eve ate from the wrong menu and there was a split between heaven and earth. They were no longer united. God booted them out of the Garden of Eden and now heaven and earth are no longer together. They're separated. But The Bible is moving towards a time when the two come together again. You've heard me say it over and over again. The Bible starts in a garden, it ends in a garden, and everything in between is a story of redemption. The union of heaven and earth is what the story of the Bible is all about. Think about how much land is featured in the Bible, how often land is mentioned as a prominent character, how much the earth is a prominent character in the Bible. The Bible is a story of redemption. but not just the redemption of God's people. Romans 8 speaks of this. Listen to what says. For the anxious longing of the creation waits eagerly for the revealing of the sons of God. For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope that the creation itself also will be set free from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but we also ourselves having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves grown within ourselves waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body. It wasn't just Adam and Eve. It wasn't just humanity that was affected by the fall. Since Adam and Eve ate from the wrong menu, the whole creation has been subjected to futility. That's what Paul says. All of God's creation, all of it was good. But it became cursed. And Paul makes it clear that this is not the final state of creation. That the creation will be set free. That what God created was good. The curse ruined it. However, God's creation will experience the same redemption that we will experience when we are resurrected and transformed. Long ago, Isaiah talked about this very thing. For behold, I create new heavens and a new earth and the former things will not be remembered or come to mind. Peter. plays off of this same thing when he says, according to his promise, we are looking for new heavens and new earth in which righteousness dwells. And you say, but Chris Peter also said that the earth and its works will be burned up. Well, we got a little bit of a translation issue there. If you use the ⁓ NIV or ESV, it says the earth will be found. Use the New Kings James or the NASV, it says will be burned up. If you use a version that says will not be found, that version is wrong because you will not find not in any Greek manuscript. It was added later, which is a problem. But the context fits the translation of will be found, laid bare, even destroyed. Why does the context fit that? Because Peter in that same section mentions who? Noah and the flood. The earth was destroyed, right? It didn't blow up, it wasn't annihilated. But it was laid bare so that a new earth could be formed. Revelation 21, one and two informs us that the new heavens and new earth cannot be fully realized until the old world passes away. In other words, as long as death exists, the new creation is not fully realized. But the plan has been set in motion. The plan has been kickstarted. The redemption process. is started up and you and I are already a new creation, a new creature in Christ. The resurrection of Jesus was the beginning of this new creation. At baptism we received the gift of the Holy Spirit and the giving of this gift. God had already begun to transform us into little pieces of His new creation. And one day the whole cosmos will be redeemed and purified and transformed and sanctified and the renewal process has already started inside of us. We are already being made ready to inherit our promised land. Right? The story of Scripture is all about reuniting heaven and earth. That is how the story of Scripture ends. Humanity is being restored to what they were meant to be, and Jesus is the one doing it. Jesus is bringing heaven to get the hell out of earth. So we should be praying for more of heaven to take over earth. We should pray for more of Jesus to take over my life. And we should pray for the Father to restore the world and me. You see, this prayer is about what God is up to. And it's really a summary of who we are to be and what we are to be about. And the three petitions that we bring to our Father, name, will, and kingdom are followed by three things that Jesus thinks we need every day. forgiveness, and deliverance. Bread is symbolic of dependence. In the wilderness, the Israelites, if they were being taught anything, were being taught to rely on God. We need that teaching as well, don't we? It's hard lesson for us to learn as well. And even though you don't want to, think about living paycheck to paycheck because that's kind of what's being exemplified here. Bread is about dependence. Rely on God. He is your source. Everything else is a resource. He is your source. Everything else is a resource. The problem is we want to make the resources our source. Money, job, those kind of things. No, those are resources. God is your only source. Depend on Him. And then He moves to forgiveness. Which just makes sense because if you are forgiven, you are to forgive. If God has forgiven you the astronomical debt you owe him, then certainly you can forgive the poultry debt that somebody else owes you. Our knee-jerk reaction is revenge and God says, no, no, that's my job. You leave that alone. Your job is to forgive as you have been forgiven. And then Jesus encourages us to focus on deliverance. Jesus says life is tough. Expect opposition, expect temptation. I think he probably had his wilderness experience in mind here when he was tempted by the devil. He prays for God to deliver him from what he was about to experience when he was in the garden. He didn't want to go through that. Why would he? But he prayed, not my will, but yours be done. It's all pointing to the fact that following Jesus is not all downhill. that carrying a cross is cumbersome. It's difficult, especially when you're going uphill. But we need to look at this from the terms of being a winner. We win in this thing. And therefore we can handle whatever comes our way knowing that we have the victory. The model prayer is about bringing the whole of your life into the presence of God. When we ask God for daily bread, we are directing our cares and our concerns toward God the Father, the Creator, and the Sustainer of life. When we seek forgiveness for our sins, we are directing our thoughts towards the Son of God, our Savior and Redeemer. And when we ask for deliverance from temptation, we are directing our thoughts toward God the Spirit, the Comforter. The short, simple prayer takes on the whole of human life, past, present, and future, and presents them to the Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. In other words, Jesus teaches us to bring our entire lives before the fullness of God. But it's the first two words. that set the tone for all of it. Our father. who is in heaven. When we treat His name as Hallow, when you grasp the nature of His kingdom, when you understand the perfect nature of His will, when you get that He is the source of all things, when you truly understand what it means to be forgiven, then you will be a forgiver. When you comprehend just how bad the devil wants to destroy you and just how badly God wants to redeem you, then there will be a doxological response, right? You will naturally praise Him for who He is and what He has done. And there ought to be something welling up inside of you that cannot be contained. Something like this. For Yours is the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory forever. Amen. The Kingdom is Yours. His Power is Yours. His Glory is Yours forever. But none of it is Yours if you don't honor His name as Hallow. If you don't allow him to rule, if you don't rely on him, if there's no relationship. You make it about him and you get him right. You know, I think for many of us. Prayer is just a reactive habit. I like what Ann Lamott said about prayer. She said our prayer, the majority of our prayers contain three please right? Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Help me, help me, help. That's really it, right? Thank you, thank you, thank you. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Help me, help me, help me. But the model prayer gives us a rhythm. It gives us a rhythm for prayer. We remember who God is, we remember who I am, and remember who I am to each other. That's the rhythm. And so I encourage you in your prayer life to institute this rhythm. to remember who it is you're praying to. And remember that this is about relationship. Not rich. Let's pray. Most kind and gracious Heavenly Father. We thank you for being our Father. And we pray that as children of yours that we can seek to please you in all that we do that we can glorify your name. God help us to spread the great news about the gospel and the kingdom. God may we live as joyful winners. Seeking. To show others that there is a better way. We love you guys. We thank you for loving us. And it's in your son's precious name we pray. Garrison's going to come up and lead us in a song. We like to close virtually all of our lessons with an invitation. I realize that, you know, coming forward and asking for prayers can be a pretty daunting thing. So if you'd like to visit with one of our elders or myself or one of our other staff members, and certainly we can arrange that. We want to help you in any way that we can. So if we can pray with you, if we can, you know, Study with you if you'd like to learn more about discipleship or maybe you're ready to put on Christ in baptism and live a life of discipleship. And certainly we can take care of that this morning. Don't leave here this morning without being right with God. Come as we stand and as we sing.

Luke 11 · chapter mention Luke 11 · chapter mention