Prayer (Luke 11:1-13)

Hello, friends.

This is Pastor Creighton.

Thank you for tuning in to Newsong Church's Sermon Podcast.

At Newsong Church, we want to see Jesus lifted high in Port Perry, Ontario, as we worship, grow, and serve.

You can learn more about us and find contact info at newsongportperry.ca The holy gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, according to Luke.

Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray as John taught his disciples.

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, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us, and lead us not into temptation.

And he said to them, Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, Friend, lend me three loaves, for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him.

And he will answer from within, Do not bother me.

The door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed.

I cannot get up and give you anything.

I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything, because he is his friend, yet because of his impudence he will rise and give him whatever he needs.

And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you.

Seek and you will find, knock, and it will be opened to you, for everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent, or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion.

If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more would the Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?

The gospel of the Lord.

Praise to you, Lord.

Please be seated.

Well, here I am again.

Let us pray.

Lord God, help me speak the words you want me to speak, and help these dear people to hear the words that you want them to hear.

In the name of Jesus.

Amen.

When deciding which scripture passage to preach on today, I started by looking at the passage I've just written, read, I mean, Luke 11, 1 to 13.

And I saw that it was all about prayer.

Now, since prayer is such a fundamental part of my life, a bit like breathing, I decided to read the other passages to see what they were about.

Maybe they would offer me something else to preach on.

I read Genesis 18, 20 to 33, that Jonathan shared with us earlier.

It was all about Abraham interceding with God for Sodom.

Okay, it's about prayer.

Persistent prayer.

Intercessory prayer.

Then I read Psalm 138, which starts with, I will praise you, Lord, with all my heart.

The first component of prayer is praise.

Yes, it's all about prayer.

So then I read Colossians 2, 6 to 15, thinking this will surely be something different.

Verses 6 and 7 read, so then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in Him, rooted and built up in Him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.

Another component of prayer is thankfulness.

So I concluded that God indeed wanted me to preach about prayer.

I said earlier that prayer was a fundamental part of my life, like breathing.

It wasn't always that way.

It was only after meeting Jesus at the age of 58 that prayer became such a large part of my life.

And it was only after doing a spiritual gift inventory at my latest Bible study of the time that I realized that it was a gift from God.

I think one of the inventory questions was, how long do you spend in prayer every day?

And another one was, how much do you enjoy prayer?

When I answered that I could quite happily spend over an hour in prayer at a time, the ladies in the group looked at me with astonishment.

I could still see their faces.

Now, admittedly, I was retired and had the time to spare, which some of them did not have as they were still working.

But yes, I loved to pray and I still do.

But now let's focus on Luke 11, 1 to 13.

Upon watching Jesus in prayer, one of the disciples said to Jesus, Lord, teach us to pray as John taught his disciples.

What was it about watching Jesus pray that led them to ask Jesus to teach them to pray?

Hadn't they been taught to pray in the synagogue as young boys?

Hadn't they watched the Pharisees on the street corner praying aloud with their tassels and their phylacteries?

So what was so different about Jesus' praying that made them ask him to teach them to pray?

Jesus' reply is what we know as the Lord's Prayer.

This prayer has come down through the centuries and is known by all Christians, whatever their denomination.

It is a beautiful prayer that links us together.

Here at New Psalm, we prayed every Sunday, and some may pray it every day as part of their daily worship routine.

It can also be the prayer that comes to our lips during times of great distress.

I always remember the scene in the Titanic movie where the ship is a tilt, they're starting to sink.

People are jumping off the sides of the ship into the sea, others are scrambling for a seat in a lifeboat.

But another group are kneeling on the deck, holding on tight and being led in prayer by a fully robed priest.

The priest is leading them in the Lord's Prayer as the ship goes down.

That scene will stay with me forever.

I'm not going to go into details about each line of the Lord's Prayer.

You'll hear it sung later.

The prayer in the passage starts with Father.

But I must admit I prefer our Father.

And right now let's stop on these words.

Our Father.

We are praying to our Father in heaven.

The ruler of the universe, the Lord of all creation, is also our Father.

I don't know about you, but this blows my mind.

He is our Father.

He knows each one of us, cares for us, loves us deeply, and watches over us.

And we are his adopted children.

This is through the work of Jesus on the cross.

From Galatians 4, 4 to 7, we learn that apart from Christ, we are isolated from the love and mercy of our Father.

But through the cross, we have been adopted into God's family, receiving all the benefits and blessings as his children.

Moreover, we are also full heirs of God's rich inheritance, overflowing from his grace, mercy, and love.

I like to think that Jesus said, our Father, not just Father, to his disciples.

I like to think that he was showing them and us that they, we, and he all share the same Father.

Before the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, they were watching Jesus pray.

They may not have even heard the words he was saying.

Maybe they saw something in his body language.

An intensity, a passion, a surrender, an intimacy.

Maybe this intrigued them as much as anything.

Jesus obviously had an intimate relationship with God his Father.

Though Jesus taught them words to say, I like to think that he showed them so much more.

The passage continues on with Jesus' advice to the disciples about perseverance in prayer.

I must admit I find this a difficult passage.

When I think of someone who keeps pestering for what they want, I think of kids pestering their parents for that bar of candy so strategically placed near the cashier's desk at the grocery store.

And how the parent says no at first, and then relents just to keep the peace.

Is this what Jesus meant when he tells us to persevere with prayer and wear God out with our pestering?

I don't think so.

Maybe God is testing us by not giving us something immediately.

Maybe he's wanting us to come to the realization that what we're asking for may not be in our best interests after all.

If you check your bulletins, verses 9 and 10 of Luke 11 can really cause us to stop and think.

And I tell you, ask and it will be given to you.

Seek and you will find.

Press a button and outcome, our desires granted.

It doesn't work like that.

How does it work?

What makes effective prayer?

Well, there are whole books written on this subject, but anyway, let's carry on.

Just as the disciples watched Jesus in prayer and wanted to learn how to pray, I think they were wanting to know what makes a prayer meaningful.

How does prayer become effective?

How do we get our answers, our prayers answered?

When I was growing up, we lived in a small place called Appledore in North Devon, England.

About 40 miles south of east, southeast of Appledore was Exeter, where my mum grew up and where my grandparents lived.

So we often made the journey from Appledore to Exeter to see my grandparents and to enjoy shopping in a major city.

Between Appledore and Exeter was a town called Crediton, which had an amazing fish and chip shop on the main street as we drove through.

We often stopped there to pick up a snack to eat on the way home.

I remember one instance in particular when we were approaching Crediton from Exeter, and attention began to grow in the car, especially in the back seat of the car where my brothers and I were sitting.

Would we stop for fish and chips or not?

As we approached the fish and chip shop, Andy, my brother, who couldn't stand it any longer, squeaked out, can we stop for fish and chips?

There was a hushed silence.

And then my father said, Now that sounds like a good idea.

And we all ate heartily.

In retrospect, I really think our parents wanted to stop, but weren't sure how important it was for us.

They were waiting for us to ask.

I think of Father God wanting to give us all kinds of wonderful things, but waiting to see how badly we want them.

It says in James 4.2, you do not have because you do not ask.

So how come God sometimes seems to ignore our prayers and leave them unanswered?

And other times tells us he's just waiting for us to ask him to give us all kinds of gifts, including the Holy Spirit, verse 13 of Luke 11.

Well, we can never understand the mind of God.

It's beyond our comprehension.

But through prayer, contemplation, worship, and Bible study, we can draw closer to Him.

We can develop an intimacy with God, this creator of the universe, this ruler of all.

We can strive to get to know him better every day.

As we get to know him better, we can begin to discern his will for our lives.

Our prayers will begin to align with his will, and we will begin to see them answered more and more.

Just like my brother Andy, in asking for fish and chips, was asking in alignment with my parents' will.

Now, before we get all caught up in the cosiness of our relationship with our Father God, I think we also need to take a step back and look at the next phrase of the Lord's Prayer after our Father.

The version I know in my head says, Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.

We must not cannot lose sight of the holiness of God and his authority over us and all creation.

So it is only fitting that we begin our prayer sessions with praise and thanksgiving to him for his love, for answered prayer, and also just for who he is.

This is not just to butter him up before we begin our long list of asks, but to remind us of who he is and what it cost him for us to be called able to call him Father.

The death of his only son Jesus on the cross.

So how do we pray meaningfully and effectively to God?

We do as the disciples did.

We ask Jesus to teach us.

We say the words that Jesus shows us.

We adopt the attitude that Jesus has when praying to his Father, and we learn to persevere in prayer.

But mostly we learn the disciplines that draw us closer to our Father, to become more intimate with him.

We learn to discern his will for our lives, and as we learn this, we will adapt our prayers.

Not my will, but yours be done.

Luke 22, 42.

Or as it says in the Lord's Prayer, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

We pray from a position of surrender to his will.

And lastly, we remember what it costs God for us to be able to call him Father.

We worship and thank him for Jesus and for the Holy Spirit that lives within us.

I would like to end with something of a commercial.

On Saturday, September 24th, we hope and pray that we will be visited by Doug Sprant from One Way Ministries in Ottawa.

He's coming here for a special workshop.

Creighton has attended one of his workshops in the past and found it very enlightening.

And so we have invited him here.

And he's coming.

He will be leading us all in how to become more intimate with God through teaching and a series of exercises.

This will then bring us to more effective prayer with God.

There will be more information on this event coming soon.

I'm just mentioning it now as it ties in with this sermon so that you can mark your calendars.

Saturday, September 24th.

Thank you.

Amen.

Thank you for listening today.

We worship a generous God who calls us to follow Him in giving willfully, cheerfully, and sacrificially.

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If you'd like to offer a gift towards Newsong's ministry, please visit Newsongportperry.ca slash giving for more information on how to do that.

May God bless you and keep you today and every day.