Two More Locks and Keys Concerning Prayer

I can't do motions and play guitar so miss Sherry's gonna come out of her heart. I mean I can use my feet.

You are my great Jesus, everything I take I give in you.

Please have mercy with some grace, everywhere I look I see your face.

You're the best that I've shown me. Oh my God, it's love, how can it be?

Alright, at this time we'll let the children and their leaders go to the classroom.

God loves the children's cry, the social scream of the American town.

We fall out of misery, God just hears the melody, beautiful the mercy of the Alex Christ and praise me God.

Better than a pot of new water.

So while the sheets are coming around I just want to share a couple of interesting things with you.

So the first is last week, Friday I believe it was, I was at Super Summer and had a strange turn of events

that led me to be at Super Summer and to actually have more time to do work than I had anticipated.

And so I was doing a lot of side work and I actually got quite a bit caught up so amazing things got done that I hadn't been getting done, that kind of thing.

And I looked online and found out that for the month of June our podcast had been downloaded 1,166 times, which is a lot for 28 days.

And 12 countries, 51 cities in the United States. So that's very significant.

And so God is doing a great thing with that. I'm very blessed by that. I just want to encourage you.

So you'll see me setting this down up here all the time. That's what this is for.

So we don't take the recording for the podcast off of the sound system. We take it off of this recorder.

Could it be better maybe music wise if it came off the sound system? Maybe.

But this recorder does a very good job of recording the lesson and the sermon and then also it records it in a format that's very easy for me to edit.

And so I have a couple of these. That's why you always see me setting it down.

And if I forget to set it down, the rest of the world doesn't get the podcast for that week.

So I try not to forget, but I think I've only forgot like once and probably what is it?

So we started podcasting originally in 2014 and then our podcast company that we did the first like five years with just disappeared.

They just quit existing and nobody knows what nobody could tell us what happened to them. And we never got all those podcasts back, all those audio programs back.

But I have a lot of saved recordings of a lot of those old programs.

And over time, I'll periodically bleed them in and put them back up online.

Today, our podcast was slash is being picked up by YouTube.

And so they sent me a message saying we're picking up your podcast and we're going to put all every episode of your podcast on there.

So you go watch them on YouTube, the videos that they create, which is just going to be like moving pictures.

It's not going to be an actual video. And they said, but it'll take a little while to get your 239 episodes up.

So I imagine because it's YouTube, a little while is probably like a day, you know, I mean, like or a few hours.

So it could be up by now. OK, all right. So that was interesting.

It would be up on YouTube today or tomorrow or whatever all 239 episodes of the podcast, as well as the fact that 1166 downloads in 28 days in 12 countries and 51 cities in the United States.

That's praise God. The only God can do that. OK, so you've already seen it.

You're looking at it. We are we are in the midst of doing the 10 locks and 10 keys of prayer.

If you would like to read more about prayer, see more things about prayer, you can get a copy of the book that is by the Kendrick Brothers.

It goes along with the movie, The Battle Plan for Prayer. If you'd like to know something about prayer that you might want to.

I'm sorry, Tommy, I did not turn that on. I did now. So anyway, if you want to know more about prayer, kind of like in real life situations, watch that movie.

It's an awesome movie. Really highly recommend it. You can you can watch it for free.

It's out there. And if you need help finding out, I'll help you. All right.

So we're going to look at just a few verses and Jesus is really our guide for every bit of this.

So I'm going to give you the choice on the top. Do you want the key first or the lock first?

Sometimes it's more fun to have the lock first and know what the problem is. But you want the key first or the lock first?

Anybody care? Going once. The lock first. OK, here we go. All right.

So the reference there, the blanks at the top is the reference. It's Matthew 6, 5.

So if you fill in Matthew 6, 5, you didn't have any of that under where it says two of each on the lock.

There's a blank, long blank, a small blank and a small blank. And it's Matthew 6, 5. OK.

And then I will grab and read to you Matthew 6, 5 and then a lot of the rest of that you could probably fill in.

We'll make a little puzzle out of it. And if teenagers get the answer, I'll throw candy at them.

So that's how we'll do it. All right. So Matthew 6, 5 says Jesus is speaking.

He's telling the disciples and he says, And when you pray, you are not to be as the hypocrites,

for they love to stand and pray in synagogues and on the street corners in order to be seen by men.

Truly, I say to you, they have their reward in full. So real quick,

somebody tell me what a hypocrite is. Let's see if we've got.

Tells you not to do something that they. That would be an example of a hypocrite.

Yeah. So a hypocrite is somebody who says one thing and does another, basically.

It comes from an old word that means actor. So you're putting on an act.

OK. And then notice their motivations, the hypocrites, their motivations, they love to stand and pray.

And so right away, if you just kind of like mess this verse up a little bit, you could say, Well, we're not allowed to stand and pray. Right.

But that's not what it means. They want to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners in order to be seen by men.

So it's about their motivations. So saying that their purpose for standing and praying in the synagogues and on the street corners is to be seen by other people.

So they're impressing people. That's our whole point. What's a synagogue?

Do we know what a Jewish church, kind of a Jewish. Yeah. It's a Jewish place of worship. Right.

So the word church is pretty unique. And so a lot of times people use church for anywhere that you can worship.

But that's not really true. Right. And it's not really a good thing to say all the time. We say we're going to church.

That's not really the best thing to say either. You say going to worship, going to service or going to the church gathering.

Say those things, because that's what's really true. Going to church. Yes.

If you may understand you're going to a church gathering, but they may not. They think you're going to the church building. Right.

In case you hadn't noticed, we don't have a church building per se. Our church has a building, but this is not really a church building.

It was a school building and our church owns it. Right. So the synagogue is a Jewish place of worship.

A couple of quick facts about synagogues in case you're interested. Takes 12 Jewish men to start a synagogue.

So they go to a city, there's no synagogue. If there's 12 Jewish men and their wives and families, they can say they can just vote amongst them

and say we're going to start a synagogue. Boom. There's a synagogue. Okay.

And they would be a synagogue at that point, even if they didn't have a building. Kind of like we're a church.

The building is not the church. We're the church. They would be the synagogue as soon as they vote. They're the synagogue.

So if people came, like had a gathering in the field, the synagogues meet in the field, people come and stood amongst them to be seen,

that would qualify. Right. If they stood up to pray. Okay.

And then the other place is on street corners. And so who would see you if you're standing up praying on a street corner?

Anybody. Right. So it's not religious at all. It could be people.

So you could not ever go to the synagogue and stand on the street corner and pray or never go to church and stand on the street corner and pray.

You'd be like one of those guys that never goes to church and stands on the street corner of the bullhorn and tells everybody they're going to hell and they need Jesus.

But they never go to church, never participate, don't have their own body.

So I don't know why they're even doing it because their doctrine's messed up. Right. Okay.

They do it in order to be seen by men. Jesus says, truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.

I submit to you, if I'm going to pray to God, I don't want my reward to be people see me and are impressed. Right.

I want my reward to be God listens and he takes care of it. All right.

So we've got a problem here. Let's see what the problem is. So it starts with the first phrase.

You don't have anything for the first word. And then you've got the Y of the second word and the P of the third word. What's that?

It is a Y. No words start with four in the English language. There are some numbers that do. Yes.

Okay. So blank YP. So the P might be easy. What are we talking about? Prayer. It's pray. The P is pray.

So blank YP. Remember the verses. I'll give you the first part again. And when you pray, say it again. When you pray.

Yeah. Okay. So it's when you pray. All right. And then you've got two blanks and then a B.

Want to take a stab at it? The teenager gets it. They don't throw candy. Do not be is correct. She stole your candy. Sorry.

Okay. When you pray, do not be. Come on, guys. LH. Like hypocrites. I didn't hear any teenagers.

We'll eventually get them the candy someway. Because it's teenager candy. When you pray, do not be like hypocrites.

Okay. All right. Now the next one starts with an L. The first word is an L. Then there's nothing in the second word.

And then the word starts with an S. Follow the logic of the verse. Do not be like hypocrites. What?

What do hypocrites do? Based on the verse we just read. What do they do? What on the street corner?

Stand. Okay. The S is stand. So what do they do? L blank. Stand. Love. Just love to stand. Okay. Love to stand. Good.

Okay. So I'm going to give Jason exactly one piece of candy. He got stand. Oh, I was close. I was on target.

Okay. It doesn't throw like a softball. Synagogues. It's S-Y-N-A-G-O-G-U-E-S. As a silent U. Okay.

Love to stand. The next word, there's an ampersand. You see the ampersand? It's on the lock. Okay.

It means and. It's a symbol that means and. We learned all kinds of stuff here, aren't we?

Okay. So we've got a big blank and two blanks. I think somebody already knew this. Synagogues and street corners.

Ah, very good. So we're moving right along. Okay. Come on, teenagers. T-B-S. We know you all got puzzle brains.

To be seen. Arden is a teenager. He was always. Nice catch. Okay. To be seen. Okay.

Now this one's hard because I had to reword it from the verse to make it kind of simple.

All right. So you've got blank in blank. Ooh, that's really close. It's rewarded in full.

So you could put paid if you want. That would also count. And then I'm going to give you the next one because it's not even in the verse.

It's put already. Rewarded in full already. Okay. Now the last part is a hint, if you will, to where we're going to the key.

And it says P and P and then a P. I'm going to take a shot at it. What are we dealing with? We're talking about prayer, right?

So the last P is prayer. The one all the way to the right is prayer. So we've got two kinds of prayer. P and P. What would you say?

Public and private. Perfect. Public and private. That is right. Man, RJ is good at word puzzles. Who knew?

Okay. He can't spell them. Yeah, he doesn't have to spell it. Public and private prayer. Okay.

So I would submit to you that what Jesus is saying is that there are some people who are really big into public prayer.

Now if you see somebody praying publicly and maybe eloquently, that means they're using their words kind of in a flowery way or whatever. Yes, ma'am?

And. It's public and private prayer. Oh, the under rewarded? Already. Already. Yep. Rewarded in full already. Okay.

So they're doing this public prayer and they're very eloquent prayers. You've heard them, right?

Sometimes I think I'm a little eloquent when I pray in public. I know some people who are much better than I am.

And so you start thinking about them and he really knows how to pray, right? That's their reward. So now they have it.

If they're not praying privately, spending time with the Lord privately, then that public prayer is really worthless.

Right. So without getting ahead to the key, I just want you to see that Jesus was contrasting public and private prayer,

to which I would say if you only have one kind, what kind do you need? Private. Private prayer.

If you only have one kind, you only need private prayer, not public prayer.

If you only have one kind and you only have public prayer, do you actually have any prayer at all?

No, because your reward is already given in full, which is impressing people.

So people see you praying, you're already go, oh, wow, he's a great. That's it. That's all you get.

I want to hear him pray. Yeah, that's it. You'll hear him pray and no one else will. God will not.

God will not answer his prayer because he's already getting his reward by praying only in public and only to be seen.

Right. And that's how you know he's only doing it in public, because if he was not only doing it to be seen,

then he could be doing it privately. But now we know he's only praying to be seen.

Therefore, he's only praying in public because that's the only place he's going to be seen.

Another way to handle that, by the way, is people say, well, I spent all night in prayer last night and then talk about it.

I spent all Wednesday praying for my cousin, you know, or I spent all last week praying for my broke down car.

And then this happened. God did a miracle. And it'll tell you all about how they spent all this time praying and everything like that.

Right. I submit to you that if a lot of people tell you, a person tells you quite often how much they're praying, they're probably lying.

Because why do they need to do that? What is the purpose of it? What is gained by that?

To teach you to pray? Isn't there like a hundred better ways to encourage somebody to pray than to say how much you're praying?

See what I'm saying? So public and private prayer, if you're only going to have one, have private prayer, spend time with the Lord.

But there's nothing wrong with public prayer. It just cannot stand alone.

If it stands alone or if it's done only to be seen, then it's worthless, essentially, beyond impressing people.

OK, so let's see the key then. So we're moving to the left of the key.

And I'll pick up the pace a little bit because we still have another lock and key to get through.

OK, so if we know the problem is when you pray, he says basically, you don't want to pray like a hypocrite.

The hypocrites love to stand and be seen in synagogues, street corners and pray, blah, blah, blah.

OK, so now we're over here and we've got NPFS, four words for the key.

Never pray for the cell.

That's exactly right. Never or not praying for, never pray for show or not praying for show, something like that.

So the key is never pray for showing. Never pray for what it looks like.

Never pray to get impressed in people, whatever.

So instead, the goal is that P is prayer. That's kind of an easy one, right? Prayer as a CC. What do you think?

It's not in the verse per se, but it is implied. If we're going to do private and public prayer,

and then you pray in public and you're not praying just to be seen, then we're dealing with prayer as a what?

OK, it's a continued conversation. OK, so you're continuing your conversation.

If I talk to Tim on Wednesday and then I talk to Tim again on Thursday, I don't forget that I talked to him on Wednesday, right?

So we go one conversation, and if you pray in public and then you walk away and go,

yeah, they saw me praying and you're feeling pretty good because they saw you praying, and that's it.

That's not a conversation with God. No conversation with God actually even took place, right?

But if you pray on Wednesday and then you pray on Wednesday night and then you pray on Thursday morning,

then Thursday afternoon somebody says, hey, I'm fighting cancer and I need your help, and you go to pray,

it's the continuing conversation that you've already been having with God. OK?

All right, and then this one is a little bit tricky, but kind of something we actually say. It's H to H.

Heart to heart. Very good. It's a heart to heart conversation. Your heart to God's heart, essentially. OK?

All right, and then we've got P-O-I-P. The first one's pray. So we're going to pray.

Pray in private?

Oh, that's really good. So he's got in private, pray, and then there's a blank there in private.

What do you think the O could be? If it's a continuing conversation, say it again.

Only?

No, not only because we're praying in public and private, but it's a continuing conversation.

Often.

Say it again.

Often?

You could put often there. That's not what I was going for. We're talking about practically how to do it.

Holly, when's the last time you heard me say nothing?

Occasionally.

Yeah, you don't hear somebody say nothing, right? So it's out loud. Out loud.

Well, OK. I almost tore my microphone off.

What was that?

It's out loud. OK? So now I'm not going to ask you, but I want you to think for a moment about how often you sat down in prayer

and you were talking to God and didn't say anything.

Now, I know and you know God can read your thoughts. That's OK.

Why do you think, stretch your brains for a second, theologically, why do you think I'm saying you should pray out loud?

Go ahead, Tommy.

Using God's name out loud, like, mentally and spiritually.

Very much. That's a good one. That's a very good one, right? So who can't hear your thoughts?

Satan.

Satan, demons, evil spirits, right? So they are made uncomfortable when you talk out loud to God.

They cannot intervene. They can't get in the way. They can't stop you. So talk out loud to God.

That's a good one right there, right? Because you chase away evil spirits by talking out loud to God.

That's just the thing. It happens.

OK. Another one is, you might be familiar with a verse in the Bible where it says it's what comes out of a man that makes him unclean.

Are you familiar with that verse a little bit maybe? So it's talking about when a man talks or the way a man behaves,

conversates, carries himself. That can make his heart unclean.

Well, why does that happen? Because what comes out of your mouth comes out of your heart.

OK. What kind of conversation are we having? We're having a heart to heart conversation.

Where is your mind in a heart to heart conversation? It's not really in the equation.

It's not a heart to mind conversation. It's a heart to heart conversation.

So what's in your heart comes out your mouth and goes to God. That's the actual train of how it works.

So do you always have to pray out loud like you're in a situation where you can't talk, but you need to pray?

No. Just talk to God in your thoughts. It's OK.

But you do want to include out loud praying in your conversations with God in private.

Because whatever comes out of your mouth is going to be what's in your heart.

So by the way, if you want to pray to God and you have a nasty dirty heart,

you're going to have a hard time praying your goodness out loud when your heart's all dirty and nasty.

All I really want is what I want. God, give me what I want. No, that's not what I mean.

God, please give me what I want. No, that doesn't sound right.

You're going to be struggling to get the words to come out in a way that's respectful to God because your heart's messed up.

At which point in time, you will repent, turn to God, say, God, help me. I've got a problem here.

I've got something wrong with my heart. And then you and God can have a good conversation after that.

So let's pray out loud in private.

So I'm just going to give you this next part to speed things up.

It's certain C-E-R-T-A-I-N elements, E-L-E-M-E-N-T-S, certain elements, but never just routine.

So what happens is we get used to praying or we think, well, God's always listening, whatever.

And we think talking to our friend is like praying.

So we think if I tell you I'm going to pray for you, that that's the same thing as if I actually prayed for you.

And that is not the case. You have to actually pray to God to be able to say you did pray for them.

Right. Or you didn't. At the same time, you don't want every time somebody says they're sick or hurting and you go,

God, help Bobby's sick and hurting. In Jesus name, amen.

And you just say the same thing every single time. Right. You want to pray along as your heart leads you.

You don't want to get in a routine. You can written prayers. We'll talk about that briefly later.

You can use words from the Bible. All of those things are possible, but you don't want to get stuck in a rut.

Matthew 6, 6 says, But when you pray, go into your inner room and when you have shut your door,

pray to your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will repay you.

OK, so the real benefit, the real bonus, the real reward, if you will, for prayer all comes out of private prayer.

Now, so we still have public prayer. We still need that. It's still part of who we are.

Still something God has commanded us to do. But the real benefits are in private prayer.

So that was the blanks there. Matthew 6, 6. And the last one says also.

Galatians, I forgot to fill in the chapter on mine.

It's the verses are seven to eight. That's a seven. Apologize for that.

And I'll get you the actual the chapter reference. We're going to move on, but I'll get it because I forgot to write it down.

Yeah, so it's chapter six. So it's Galatians 6, 7 to 8.

And basically, in a nutshell, those verses say whatever you sow, that you will also reap.

God is not mocked. If you play games with it and you just pray publicly when you have to and you don't pray privately,

spend time with God, God is not mocked. He knows what you're doing. He sees you playing games and there's no reward for you.

At the same time, if you pray publicly wanting to impress others, that is about prestige.

It's about the pride of life. And you sow to the flesh and you will reap from the flesh.

So you'll get what the flesh can give you rather than what God can give you.

Questions about the lock. It is when you pray, do not pray like the hypocrites.

Don't just be praying to be seen, but also have an ongoing conversation with God. The key is never pray for show.

Pray as a continual conversation with God. Know that prayer can have certain elements or certain things that we're supposed to do,

like adoring God, confessing our sins, thanking God, lifting up certain concerns to God, but never want it to be just routine.

And a lock keeps God from benefiting you or hearing your prayers and a key gets your prayers through to God.

That's what all of these are about. All right, so we're going to go to the next lock.

We're back in Matthew chapter six, where Jesus was teaching on prayer.

So it's Matthew six, seven to eight is the reference.

Okay, I'll read the verse and then we'll see how many of these you can guess.

We've got some really good word guessers in the group.

And when seven to eight, seven and eight really.

Chapter six, verses seven and eight. And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do,

for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words.

Therefore, do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

Okay, so you've got a P. I bet you can't. Oh, you don't have a P. The first word is praying.

Okay, so praying and then we've got an R. What could the R be? Say it again.

Nope, it's not routinely. It's repetition or repetitive. Right?

So praying, repetition or repetitive. And then we've got an E.

Which my translation actually does not have, this translation right here does not have the E in it.

So you'll have to kind of be creative.

Praying, repetition or the last one is words. The last blank is words. So what would the E be?

Oh, wow, that's a good word. Yeah, you could do extraneous if you want. But for the common man in the room, we could do empty.

Josh has got a really big vocabulary. So empty words. Yeah. Or extraneous. That's a great word.

It's spelled almost exactly like it sounds. E-X-T-R-A-N-E-O-U-S. Extraneous. Yep. But empty is fine.

So that's the lock. Remember, that's the problem. Praying repetitive or repetitious empty words. That's the lock.

Jesus said, don't do that. Okay.

All right. So this is tricky. The P is prayer. I'm going to take a guess at the rest of it. C-T-V-F.

Can take various. Various. Various what? Forms is built in on the P. Oh, you have forms. Can take various forms. Yes.

I didn't. I forgot to fill that in. Yes. Very good. So prayer can take various forms.

So in other words, you might pray a lot differently than somebody else does. Josh might pray while playing the bass.

Alicia might pray while playing the guitar. I have prayed while playing the, what's that thing called that I bought that I can't,

wire. I couldn't remember the name of it. While praying the wire. Not actual music on the wire, but musical sounds because I can't play the wire.

But I have prayed. So you can pray a lot of different ways. You can pray while painting. But if you do, you want to pray out loud some,

because we talked about that before. Your heart through your mouth to God. Pray while driving is good. Do you pray out loud? Yes.

There you go. So sometimes you pray while driving. I pray a lot while driving. I have actually caught myself closing my eyes while praying while driving.

Yes. Not a good thing. So wait a minute. My eyes are not open. So prayer can take various forms. We've got four words. But, I'll give you but.

You have it. But it. Blank N. But it is not. Now it gets hard. M-R-W. Say it again.

Repetitive is the second word. He's got one of them. Repetitive is correct. You're not allowed to yell this game of minutes.

You're going to have to start passing some to your friends. M is meaningless.

Meaningless, repetitive. Now we have words, but it's not. What kind of words? Meaningless, repetitive, and this would describe the words.

Starts with a W. Say it again. I like weak. That's not what I put. But I like weak. You could put that there. I think this is more than weak though.

This is lower than weak. Say it again. Wasteful would be good. You could do wasteful. That would be the same as this. The answer that I have was worthless.

Empty or extraneous. Both of those things mean worthless. Basically. Or too much. Or they have no value. Meaningless, repetitive, worthless.

This is tricky, but I'll give you an illustration. I think you can get it. S-T-A. Josh and I were hanging out by the water fountain in the hallway after church on Sunday.

I told him a bunch of small jokes, but I told them all in Pig Latin. I mixed up all the words of all the jokes.

About halfway through, he was totally fed up and just walked away. Didn't understand a thing I was saying. S-T-A. What do you think?

I'll give you the last one. Annoying. Annoying. What annoys? That's close. This is worse than strange. Oh boy, I wouldn't use stupid.

Stupid would also apply. Silly would also apply. Senseless. Having no value, having no meaning is senseless.

Now what do we got in the middle? Quick talk. Senseless talk annoys. Very good.

Senseless talk annoys. So, if you senseless talk God, God is going to be annoyed. That's basically what Jesus said.

The last one is, starts with a D. Disrespectful. He's God. He doesn't want to hear you muttering gibberish.

He doesn't want to hear you say the same phrase over and over again 400 times. He doesn't want to hear you telling him how awesome it would be if you had a pet.

Every day for a week. Senseless talk is annoying. He wants to have a genuine life with you. He does not want you to just keep saying stupid stuff.

To the key. Then I'll ask some questions and we'll be done.

The key is tricky because the key is not just like the first one was, don't do that. It was not praying for show.

This is what you want to do. This is phrased in a positive way. What do you actually want to do?

So it's praying according to, what? No. Praying according to?

I would submit to you that what you mean is what it actually says, but it's the spirit that shows you what?

What does the spirit show us? God's will.

And what does Jesus say if you pray according to God's will? You'll have what you pray for.

Now, is that a high standard? For a human being, for a lost person, that's a very high standard. It's an impossible standard.

It is impossible for somebody who is not saved to pray according to God's will. Bless you.

But is it impossible for Christians? What do you think? To pray?

It cannot possibly be impossible. That is correct. So you would be jumping to the appropriate conclusion.

I urge you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to God,

which is your spiritual service of worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind

that you may prove, that means test and understand, what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

If you walk in the Lord and dedicate yourself to God, your body and all that you are, you will know His will.

Say again? The reference is, I was going to give it, the reference is 12, Romans 12, 1-2.

So if you want to know what God's will is, submit you to Him, especially your body.

Soon as you start to misuse your body, you will lose track of God's will, because it's His temple.

Okay? Alright, and then we're going to real quick read 1 John 5. If I can get there real quick.

This Bible has a lot of notes, so it throws me off a little bit, I apologize.

Okay, here we go, 1 John, so the next reference is 1 John 5, and it's 14 and 15.

And that's our last reference for the day. And this is what it says,

And this is the confidence which we have before Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.

And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.

Okay, 1 John 5, 14 to 15. Alright, so the it is God's will, and you've got three of them.

And then you've got a D, an L, and an E. So the first thing you want to do with God's will is what?

Starts with a D. Nope, that comes later. Okay, no, I think even before discovering it.

What's the first thing you want to do with God's will? Say it again?

Desire it. That is correct. Good job, Carrie.

And now this next one could be discover, but I use the different word, it starts with an L, learn.

So the first thing you want to do is desire it, then you want to learn it, and then the last one starts with an E, Jason, give it to me.

It's due, but it's a tougher word. Oh, I stumped him.

No, it is not earn. Okay, execute, that's an even bigger word. It's enact.

I did it once. She did not get the right answer, but she tried, and I like people who try to get the right answer.

Okay, so desire it, learn it, enact it. Okay, all right, and then if you do that, you'll be able to blank blank new C.

What is that? Say it louder. I can't hear you.

Nope. We got everything is P here, so what's the first word? Pray, okay. Blank new blank.

It is competence, the C is competence, so we've got pray blank new competence.

Pray with new competence. I don't know if somebody else had it before you because I was having trouble sorting it, but yes.

You will pray with new competence if you desire the will of the Lord, learn the will of the Lord, enact the will of the Lord,

you will be able to pray with competence. So then when somebody says to you, oh, I'm sick, you can, instead of praying,

oh Lord, if it's your will, please heal them, you can already know and just pray. It is God's will.

God wants to heal people, and you can be confident that you're praying for the right thing, and then when you pray, you'll pray with new competence.

Okay, all right. So the next words, I did not give you any letters, and you would not have a chance of guessing them.

They are not prayer, okay. So now we're going to have a list of six things that are not prayer.

So we're going to have a list of six things that are not prayer. And we're going to take a stab at any of them.

We've got two R's, an M, a B, a W, and a D.

Whining is not prayer. That is true, but it's not on the list. It's close.

It's not a sentence. It's just a list of six things.

One of the R's is repetitive.

Repetition, I'll give you that one. It is the one in the middle on the right, repetition.

And that's straight out of the verse, so we should definitely get that one. Repetition.

Okay, anybody else want to take a stab at any of them? Five more chances.

It is not disrespectful.

Well, you're right. That would be bad prayer. Meaningless is not on the list.

So these are things that are not prayer. They're not describing bad prayer, but they're things that are not prayer.

Repetition, what I'm saying is repetition is not prayer.

Because a monk will go up on a mountain and repeat to himself, I have won with the universe a million times,

and by the time he's done, guess what? He actually is won with the universe because he died of starvation,

or because he fell off the mountain, or because he convinced himself.

None of that is prayer.

And the one above repetition is meditating, and meditating is not prayer.

Don't confuse that. People do it.

Meditating is when you think around a topic, you think through a topic, you think,

okay, Paul went to Berea. So who's Paul? I know who Paul is, I know what he's doing.

So how did he go there? Oh, he must have went on a ship because Berea's crossed the water from where he was before.

So who lives in Berea? What are the Bereans like?

And you're meditating, thinking about it.

A good way to do that is to follow the newspaper. Who, what, why, when, where.

It's a great way to meditate. Ask those questions. That's meditating.

That is not prayer. Say it again?

I don't have it. No, I didn't have it.

So far we've got meditating is not prayer. Repetition is not prayer.

Nope, but that's true. Reading the Bible is not prayer. But you can read the Bible and pray.

But you're right, that's not either.

Worship is not prayer.

I think worship often is prayer, unfortunately. I would say often that is prayer.

Do you state?

Say it again?

Do you state?

No, but that's a good word.

Demanding?

Hmm. I think you could be demanding in prayer, actually. I wouldn't think I would use that one.

Okay, let me give you a...the D is doubtful. Prayer is never doubtful.

And it never will be because you started off knowing what God wants. Right?

So you don't have to doubt that He's God. He knows what He wants. You know what He wants.

Now you pray for it and now you got it.

If you doubt that you're going to...by the way, here's a safety net for you.

If you doubt what you're going to pray for, don't pray for it.

Because that actually qualifies under senseless talk and you're just going to annoy God.

You're better off to pray...in that case you'd be better off to pray for what you can actually believe for.

Right? What you think God actually wants.

But to doubt...anything that's a doubt is not faith and therefore is sin.

Okay? So I'm just going to give it to you because we're running out of time.

The other R, rambling.

No, but that would be true. Rambling is not prayer.

Okay, I don't...it is not, but that is true as well.

Okay, so it is not. It is remembering.

Remembering is not prayer. Okay?

Why is that important? Because you will sit down to pray and you will remember where you left your car keys.

What you forgot to do. All those kinds of things in your basic life.

You will remember Bible stories. Remembering a Bible story? Not prayer. Right?

Now if God puts something in your head out of a Bible story or something, then that would be God talking to you and that's part of prayer.

You're listening, right? But if you're going like, oh yeah, that's right, I've got to do the laundry.

That's not prayer. You've just slipped right out of prayer. Right?

So the best way to protect yourself from that is to just make a quick note, jot something down in case you don't remember.

And then put it away and totally forget about it and get back to the business of prayer.

Okay? And it's the same thing with the Bible. If God shows you a story in the Bible, you say, God, is that you?

Is there something in that story that you need to be paying attention to?

Because if you think it's God, you get your Bible out right then and read the story and listen for what God is saying.

You may see something there you've never seen before. Like the charcoal fire. You know what's so cool about that?

I've been a Christian all those years. The charcoal fire at Peter's denial and the charcoal fire when Jesus fed him,

which we studied during VBS, I've never noticed that before now.

I had never noticed it and it really impacted me. The Lord really spoke to me about that,

about how he would remember and how it would connect it for him and everything.

You learned that at Super Summer. No, I didn't. I learned it at VBS.

And then I heard it at Super Summer. And that confirmed for me that God was doing something.

But Dan DeWitt mentioned it at Super Summer. And he said it was a charcoal fire, it was a charcoal fire.

The same thoughts that I had out of the Bible study from VBS and when I was praying about it,

he spoke those thoughts at Super Summer. And he and I, of course, had not talked.

And then begging. Be as begging. Begging is not prayer.

If you have to pray 74 times to God for something because you don't think he's going to do it and you're trying to convince him,

you're not praying anymore. You have gone into senseless talk and he's just going to be annoyed.

You need to stop. Can you pray for something 50 different ways?

Yeah, probably. And that might not even be an insult because it's creative.

You do it with worship. You do it while driving. You do it while cooking. You do it while cleaning.

You do it with a friend. You get together with a group. You do it in church.

All those, that might not be an insult. But if you just sit there and go again and again and again and again,

the same thing, please God, but no, please God. I hear you say no, but please God.

If God gives it to you after that, you're going to regret it.

Because it wasn't his will in the first place.

So if you beg him for a long time and then he gives it to you, you're going to regret it.

It's not going to turn out the way you want. And there are many stories in the Bible just like that.

Is the last one wasteful?

No, somebody else said that. It could be. Prayer is not wasteful. But the last one is wavering.

Prayer is not wavering.

In other words, you should be able to say to God, if your heart's in the right place and you're praying for something God wants,

you say this, God, Father, I love you. You're an awesome God.

I just want to say I come adoring you today. I confess my own weakness.

I realize I cannot make these things happen to myself. I've screwed up. Please forgive my sins.

Laura, thank you for doing that. I have this request. Would you please do this?

Thank you, Father. I'll be expecting that to be coming.

Now, is there anything else you want to talk about?

And it's that easy. You literally pray for whatever it is that you're asking for.

And you know it's what God wants to give. You have the confidence to know that He's going to give it.

And you're done. That is the perfect picture of prayer.

If you see people who are doing it, like I'm not trying to pick on anybody. If you do this, I'm not saying anything nasty.

I'm not trying to be mean. And if you're out there watching this right now,

I don't want to be blowing up on Facebook because you don't like what I'm about to say.

But the bottom line is when you hear people say, Father, Lord, please bless us.

Father, Lord, Lord, Father, Father, Lord, Lord, Father, please bless us, Father, Lord.

In the same prayer, and they say, Lord, Father, Father, Lord, like 10 times in a 1.45 second or a minute and a half,

two minute prayer, God is not pleased with that kind of praying.

God knows He's Father and He knows He's Lord. And it's okay that you want to tell Him that you also know that He's Father and that He's Lord.

But He doesn't want to hear you tell Him 10 times in 90 seconds.

Let's pray something substantive in the 90 seconds and skip the Father, Lord, Lord, Father, Lord, Lord, Father, Father, Father, Lord, Lord.

Right? Yes, sir?

That's a more broader thing. It's more for you acknowledging that rather than telling more on the ground that He is Lord.

Absolutely. And I don't disagree that we should acknowledge it.

But I say if we acknowledge it 10 times in a prayer that's less than two minutes long, that's just senseless words.

So here's the thing. We live in a day of short messages. Am I saying you should cut the amount of time that you're praying? No.

I'm saying actually we should spend more time praying in private and public, talk out loud in private, you know, follow the keys to prayer.

And if you just do repetitive or empty words, you're going to run into a lot, God's not going to like it, He's not going to listen, it's a problem.

You say, but God loves me, He listens to everything I say. No.

God doesn't listen when you insult Him because if He did, He'd smack you.

Right? So don't insult Him because He's not going to listen to that.

And I didn't say it, Jesus said it. So pray according to His will, not in repetition, not with empty words.

Right? Don't do it to be seen. Now, will we continue to have public prayer? Absolutely.

And we should. And one of the main purposes of public prayer is so that people can be guided in how to pray.

Right? So we're all supposed to be praying together. One person leads a prayer and we all pray together.

And if you're praying, and not only am I authorizing this, Scripture authorizes it, and you don't need me for this.

If you're praying and we're in service and I start praying for somebody who's sick or something like that,

and the Lord leads you to pray in a different way, then you pray in a different way.

And I would hope that in two minutes of us praying together in service, we get in about 60 minutes of praying.

That everybody's praying for the two minutes. And no two people's prayer should be exactly alike.

Right? So you don't just pray the words that I'm praying.

And if you can't come up with anything else or you don't feel led to pray anything else, then that's what you should.

You should repeat in your head every word that you hear the person praying who's leading the prayer.

And then change it as soon as God leads you to do so. Okay? Yes, ma'am.

Is it true that we're supposed to be saying we are a father because the Lord knows what's on our hearts and knows what we are?

So, no. That is not true. Okay? For two reasons.

Okay? So the first one is the Lord's prayer that he gave the disciples was very clearly a model prayer.

If you look at the apostles throughout the New Testament, you will see them praying for all kinds of things.

In fact, what you will never see in any book of the New Testament is a disciple praying the Lord's prayer.

The only person that we ever have telling us what the Lord's prayer even is, is Jesus. Right?

So Paul opens most of his books with prayer and he closes most of his books with prayer.

He never prays the Lord's prayer. But if you look at the model of the Lord's prayer, right,

you'll see that it contains basically four elements. It's adoration, confession, thanks, and supplication.

So we want to recognize who he is. That's the Lord Father. Right?

We're not going to write, or our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. That's recognizing who he is. Right?

We're confessing our need for him, our weakness, our sins. We're being transparent with him.

Please forgive our trespasses. We forgive those who trespass against us. Right?

We're thanking him for all that he's provided and for the forgiveness and for whatever.

Maybe we pray for something and then we can thank him for what we just prayed for because we believe it's coming. Right?

That kind of thing. And then supplication, whatever your needs are, whatever your concerns are.

That's the model that the apostles gave us. And I'm going to be stern on this.

If you would do that and just pray the Lord's prayer, that would fall under the terminology senseless words. Right?

If all you do is just repeat those words over and over and over again every time you talk to God, I submit to you, they don't mean much to you.

See what I'm saying? No, no, I wasn't saying you were.

You asked me, should we? And I'm giving you the reasons why we shouldn't. Right.

So if you need to teach somebody else, you have the answers. That's my purpose.

Yeah, I don't hear me being corrective. I'm not being corrective. I'm just saying we don't want that.

We don't want people to do that. In fact, do I pray the Lord's prayer on a regular basis? Absolutely.

Is it a major component in my prayer life? No.

Is it a model for my entire prayer life? Yes. It is the pillar upon which my prayer life is based.

I always want to adore him. I always want to confess, thank him and pray supplication. Right?

Which is the model of the Lord's prayer. Okay, so I think it's appropriate that we close out in prayer.

Does anybody else have any other questions? Okay, I have a question.

Natalie, if I tell you that there is something that it's important that you do when you're praying in private,

what would you tell me that thing is?

Just that you're alone with God.

Yes, absolutely. She's got it, right? Pray out loud.

I'm going to throw extra things in here because she's been very kind as well.

Okay. I'm not going to ask you any questions, Jason. You already got too much candy.

I love it. Okay.

Haley, if I said there is a certain step that you'd want to start with in knowing the Lord's will, what would that be?

If we're going to pray according to his will, first thing we have to do is what? Say it again? Desire it.

That's right. Very good. Excellent.

They're not just sitting there putting answers in their legs. They're digesting.

I really want to go to holler with you.

You could have caught at least two of those. Okay, I've got to get Caleb and then I'm done.

If I told you that a certain kind of prayer annoys God, Caleb, what kind of prayer would that be?

It's on your sheet. Oh, you put your sheet away already? Oh, he's got a sheet. Okay.

A certain kind of prayer annoys God, what would it be?

A paper. Say it again?

Annoy is only in that whole section once. Say it again?

Doubtful. No, not doubtful. Are you looking in the lock on the right side?

Prayer is not meaningless, repetitive or worthless. And then something annoys. What is it?

Jason, Jason, Jason, go back and help him find it.

I got to find it first.

No, you see the word annoys? Okay, what are the two words right before it?

There you go. Force you to digest it if we have to feed you candy.

All right, let's pray together. And then there's cookies and stuff that the ladies put together. Praise the Lord in the kitchen.

Because I was running late and they did an awesome job. Okay, I'll lead us. But you're praying, right?

Now just repeat my words. If the Lord still leads you, pray however he leads.

Father in heaven, you are an awesome, amazing father to us. A father cares for his children.

A father provides for his children. And you are that kind of father.

A father desires to hear from his children. And you are that kind of father.

A father gives away that his children can talk to him. And you have given us away.

I know that there are lost people in the world who do not understand this way.

And I think there are probably Christians in the world who do not understand this way.

And we don't want to be one of those. And when we have been, we ask your forgiveness.

We ask you to use us, to speak to us. We desire to know your will.

And then when you show it to us, we desire to pray it back to you in every instance.

Thank you for forgiving us. Thank you for building us up. Thank you for making us your people.

Lord, we ask you to bless our fellowship.

Bless those who listen to our podcast, audio program, Facebook feed, whatever.

Lord, we just ask that this word about how you want to be in touch with your people

would spread over the whole earth. And soon, and very soon, there would be not a few prayers every day

or thousands or tens of thousands, but millions and billions, Lord, that maybe so many people would go,

well, what if I did talk to God? And I pray that they will.

And I pray that they'll believe in you. And I pray that they'll follow you through your son, Jesus.

And I pray that the kingdom will advance on the earth.

I pray, Lord, that you'll get the glory. We know we do not deserve it.

We do not want to impress anyone. We do not pray for show.

We pray because we love you. We respect you. We need you.

And we're looking for what you want. So please help us, Lord.

Please help us be your people. You be our Father and we'll be your people.

And we pray this in Jesus' name. And all God's people said,

Amen. Last bonus question. What does amen mean?

So let it be. Very good. Thank you very much.