Why do We Pray? | Dr. John Ewart

Hey everybody, this is Pastor John Ewart from Inglewood

Baptist Church in Rocky Mountain, North Carolina.

Thank you so much for tuning in to our podcast.

You're going to hear from God today as we share from his word

about important issues facing your life that can guide you

according to the Bible. All right, well, thanks for

joining us. Listen, we're here to talk about

how do we abide in prayer with dependence and anticipation.

I always, I, you know, when you talk about prayer, I don't know

why I feel this way. I feel like that some people

just like, oh, I don't know why I feel that way.

Maybe that's not true at all. You all obviously aren't that

way because you're here and you want to learn.

But sometimes in the Christian life, I feel like prayer is

something that I don't know why it gets diminished or it's not

done well and it's not something that people seek to grow in as

much. That may seem odd to you, Maybe

that's just stuff I've heard, but it's one of the most

important aspects of the Christian life.

And so we're going to actually talk about why.

Why do we pray? I mean, why?

Why do we even mess with this stuff?

Why do we do this? And then down the road, we're

going to talk about more of what it is and how we do that and how

the best ways to pray will be. Hopefully by the time we're done

with this series, you'll have a prayer strategy that'll actually

a personal prayer strategy that'll help you, that will be

practical for you. But over the years, Teresa and

I've been blessed by churches that I pastored that were known

for their prayer lives. But that's not always common

when, when I, when I would work with churches and you ask them,

describe yourself that you know, well, we're a praying church.

And then I would say, well, describe your prayer life to me.

And they talk about the three women who pray every other

Wednesday. And so, you know, they, so they,

they think they are, but they're not always are.

And, and so how do we actually become a praying people?

But we, we had the privilege of working with some churches that

really did pray, not necessarily because of us, but we're doing

that before we got there and and then some that we helped along

the way, I hope. But we, we really did to seek to

create spiritual impact in our communities through this.

You should have a handout that you can download or you have

here. I felt like I tried to get too

much on the handout this time. I actually apologize to Michelle

earlier for this, that I probably really did put too much

on there. So hang in, hang in there with

me. But one of the ways that we saw

this happen is the way we prayed for one another and for the

lost. And one of the mechanisms for

that was through the reach ministry that, that we

developed. And, and, and there were times,

and I've shared this with some of you and other contexts, but

there were times where we would receive between 5 and 600 prayer

requests a week from people on our city that, that wasn't that

necessarily people from the church, that would be people

from the city, because we were reaching out through our connect

our small groups with prayer requests to people out in the

community. And so we would have between

5:00 and 600 prayer requests to the point that we had this

reputation of you're that church that prays for people, aren't

you? And people would actually call

us in the church office during the week to ask us to pray for

things, people that we didn't know, people out in the, in the

towns, because we had that kind of reputation, which is 1, I was

thankful for. And, and, and so I pray we want

to grow in this. I pray we want to live for his

glory and, and impact the world. And so understanding and valuing

the pathways by which we can not only pray, but actually achieve

stronger discipleship is really important.

And so one of the ways to do that, we talk about spiritual

disciplines. And, and for us, we're using a

model here right now with 7 essentials based on Acts chapter

Acts 2 · chapter mention

2 and Acts chapter 13. And so we have kind of seven

Acts 13 · chapter mention

ideas or essentials or dimensions of discipleship that

we talk about here. But these daily habits such as

prayer, these things can transform us.

They really will. But they, they won't do that

unless they're daily habits. And so these are things that

really do need to become normal patterns in our life to where

we're drawing closer to God and are being used to fulfill his

purpose for us. So the word discipline, I just

looked up some definitions online, frankly, and you have

them there from a variety of sources.

But discipline means training that corrects, it molds, it

perfects, it means to train oneself to do something in a

controlled and habitual way. It's an activity, exercise or

regimen that develops or improves a skill.

And I liked all three of these. I stole those from three

different places. And, and I like the fact that

that this is a discipline prayer.

It does correct us. It does mold us.

It does perfect us. It's going to help train us to

do something. And these spiritual disciplines

are things that ought to be habitual.

They ought to be habits in our life.

These are exercises, These are regular regiments as a part of

our life that are going to help us improve some kind of skill in

life. And so, you know, one of the

questions that I often ask is do we, you know, do you regularly,

do you habitually practice earthly skills or talents to

perform better at work or, or in a game or on the course or out

on the boat or at the concert or in the art studio?

And I've shared this, I've been talking to the staff about this.

Think about these Olympic athletes and, and how much they

prepared for whatever seconds it was they had to perform.

And it's interesting because are we putting in the work to make

our life better here on earth, which is not a bad thing.

But how does that compare to the regular habits, the habitual

regimen of of our lives spiritually that are useful for

eternal life? And so to think about that for a

minute and how that works. First Timothy 4, verses 7 and 8.

1 Timothy 4:7

We've seen this verse before in different studies.

It says have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths.

Rather train yourself and know that these are imperatives.

You have to do this. You have to train yourself.

The Holy Spirit's not going to come train you in this context.

Now the Holy Spirit saves us, the Holy Spirit's helping us,

the Holy Spirit's empowering us to do this.

But I have to take responsibility here and train

myself for godliness. What for a while bodily training

is of some value. Godliness is a value in every

way, and it holds promise for the present life and also for

the life to come. So instead of these silly,

irreverent nonsense, we talked about this passage when we were

talking about the Bible, we're going to train ourselves.

The new American standard says discipline yourself.

The King James uses the word exercise because the Greek word

here is gymnasia, which ought to sound familiar.

And so it's a very literal translation sometimes to say

just to exercise, to train, to work out your spiritual muscles.

And that's internally important, eternally important, because

it's going to lead us not only to the best place eternally, but

it's also going to help us to live the best way now.

And but it, but it is a regular habit.

It's an exercise. Just like you would train a

muscle, you have spiritual muscles that you need to train.

And prayer is one of these key parts of this.

And often when people are honest with me about their spiritual

walk, sometimes their Bible studies stronger than their

prayer life. And, and they, they, they don't

know, they, the prayer life seems boring.

I mean, they, they don't, you know, they, it takes a while to

admit these things, but the prayer life is boring.

It's not getting above the ceiling.

It's, it's not going, They don't feel like they're getting a

result. They don't understand it.

So tonight I want us to understand what this really why

we should really do this in the 1st place.

Because sometimes I think we have the wrong goal.

And so sometimes our prayer life doesn't seem like it's working

right. But that's because we're not

seeking the right thing in our prayer life.

So we'll talk about that in a minute.

But Philippians 2 Paul writes, Therefore, my beloved, as you

have always obeyed, so now not only as in my presence, but much

more my absence. Work out your own salvation.

See again, there are these imperatives with fear and

trembling. But then there's also this

counterbalance, which is key for it is God who works in you.

Don't read verse 12 without verse 13.

So there's this interesting relationship between there's

certain things I'm responsible to do in my sanctification that

God wants me to do. He's going to help me.

I can't do it by my own strength, But God's also

miraculously, supernaturally still at work in me, and he's

going to enable me and pull things off through me that I

probably couldn't do by myself. And so it because he's working

to me both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

But notice whose pleasure that is, not my good pleasure.

And sometimes that's part of the problem in prayer.

We're going to get to that part. You know, it's why are you

praying what you're praying? What's what's your motivation?

What's your goal? And if you're only going prayer

is to get, you're missing it. You got to give in prayer just

as much as you want to get in prayer.

And that's, that's a real key. And that's what often is not

taking place in people's lives because people are rushing it.

I'm too busy to pray. I don't have time to pray.

I don't have time to read my Bible.

These are disciplines. And so if you have time to go to

the gym, if you have time to, to to study for the test, if you

have time to, you know, prepare whatever you got to prepare for

work, these are the same kind of things you have to take time

for. You have to make the time to do

these things. So train, discipline, exercise,

workout. Think of these words, these

commands in the original language.

So there's a covenant responsibility, a commitment,

responsibility toward ongoing intentional discipleship that we

have. And so we're going to draw all

this to prayer here in just a second.

So we got to put our personal faith effort in and we got to

make the time. We got to set aside the priority

and be and be very sure about this.

Now, one of the things that's really important is in this

passage, for example, and don't ever get confused by this,

Paul's writing to Christians. So he's not telling you how to

be saved. You're not working out your

salvation. That's not at all what this is

talking about in terms of being saved.

These people are already saved. Now he's talking about, so how

do you live as a Christian? How do you live in your

sanctification, in your discipleship?

Because you got to understand salvation is an event.

We're saved from our from the penalty of our sin, but

salvation is also a continuous thing.

He, he's continually saving us toward the end of time and

sanctifying us along the way. So we're not working to be

saved. We're working because we are.

And just so we want to apply this kind of action to personal

growth. So these regular work habits

like prayer, they have to be practiced.

They have to be exercised. You got to work out.

You're going to get sore. There are times you're not going

to want to do it. Satan's going to make sure you

don't want to do it, but you also have to lead us.

This will lead us to a deeper, much more intimate discipleship.

And then it's going to spill out, hopefully in works of love

toward the world as we show the gospel with others.

But simply practicing, and this is a real key point, and people

miss this because we have a tendency as human beings to

believe in works righteousness. If that's the natural default

setting for human beings, somehow I've got to earn this.

And so somehow we think in our minds that somehow I've got to

work my way up to approval by God and then I got to keep

working my way up in approval to God.

And we don't understand grace. Grace is very difficult for

humans to understand. And every other world religion

then is, that's why every other world religion is different,

because the only, the only true faith is the one that says we

don't have to do it that way, that God came to us, that God

sacrificed for us. But this also applies to our

discipleship. So we need to recognize that

simply practicing spiritual disciplines is not the ultimate

goal. Your goal is not to have a good

prayer life. Your goal is to have deep

intimacy with God. And there's a big difference

between the two. You can pray 3 hours a day and

not walk with God. You can walk through all the

rituals and all the disciplines and not have a close

relationship with God. And so we've got to recognize

that these spiritual disciplines of prayer is a means to an end.

And that's what is not the goal. It's a means to an end.

So practicing, you got to think of it in real life, out here in

the real world, practicing is not the end goal.

You don't practice sports, you don't practice music.

So you can brag about what a great all the great practice

sessions you had. You do those things and you work

hard in a rigorous, rigorously scheduled practice schedule so

you can play and perform at your very best in the real game, in

the concert. And our spiritual lives are no

different. These church disciplines help us

to actually participate in the real game, which is our walk

with Christ. So in our church membership and

our personal and intentional discipleship issues, we

ultimately seek to commune with God.

And that's an important word. I'm going to use two important

words about why pray commune. Communion is one of them.

And, and to understand what that word really means.

I don't mean the Lord's Supper. I I mean a relationship.

It's communion with God and to become more like Jesus and how

we act and how we think and how we feel.

You're not just going to automatically become that way.

You're not just going to automatically become more like

Jesus. There are things you need to do

in your life in order to help you to become more like Jesus.

And those aren't the end games. The end game is to be more like

Jesus. But, but I need Bible study.

I need prayer, I need the church, I need connect groups.

I need all these pieces that you hear me harping on you about all

the time. But all these pieces together,

because I believe and I've experienced and I've seen too

many times, I believe the Bible teaches that these things

together, if we do them the right way and we do them well,

it's going to help me become more like Jesus and to be closer

to him. So perfectly practicing

spiritual disciplines isn't even the goal.

Now, it's a good thing, I hope, but intimacy, intimacy with an

obedience to God, that these things that bring him great

glory, those are the goals. So why pray?

Why do that? So our goal, again is not a

great prayer life. Our goal is intimate communion

and authentic communication with God.

Now there's your sentence. And if that doesn't satisfy you,

you need to think about the sentence harder.

Our goal is this intimate communion and authentic

communication with God. If you had that and you really

had that, you wouldn't want to get rid of it.

I mean, you got to think about what that sentence means.

So let's talk about it for a little bit.

So personal holiness, Christ likeness, these are goals.

So prayer is an invited, but it's also a commanded communion

and communication with God. It's pretty amazing.

They didn't used to have it the way we have it.

I'm, I'm in the Old Testament in one book every day and I'm in

the New Testament in another one every day in my personal time.

And I'm reading about numbers and talking about how the

Levites were the only ones who could touch the Tabernacle.

They were the only ones who could move the Tabernacle In the

Old Testament. You couldn't just storm into the

holy of holies. You can just storm into the holy

of holies and grab a hold of the, of the the ark of the

covenant and talk to God. You'd be destroyed.

You had to go through somebody else.

Well, Jesus became to somebody else and now you have the Holy

of holies living inside of you and it's called the Holy Spirit.

So to think about the incredible privilege we have to, to not

only to not only pray because we're supposed to, but to pray

because we're allowed to. And, and that's part of the

issue. So part of our issue, part of

our issue with our prayer lives is really our, our, our, an

issue with our God life to probably understand who he is

and what we really have the opportunity to do.

So. So it's God, God, God uses all

kinds of external things in our lives to move us and to guide

us, to change us. He'll use people, he'll use life

circumstances. Sometimes he'll use crisis.

But think about it, what the one area within our own obedient

control and our own responsibility are these

spiritual disciplines. And one of those is prayer.

I control my prayer life. I control whether or not I'm

going to talk to God or not. I'm going to control whether or

not I'm going to listen to God or not.

It's pretty amazing. And so it's interesting.

We have to choose to live out the command verbs in Scripture

pointing to our obedient responsibility in this training

process, this disciple in process, this exercising

process, working out our spiritual growth, so to speak.

So I can't just blame somebody else.

Now. People do it.

I've heard it. I don't know how many times I've

heard it. I'm not being fed, you know.

So you will blame the pastor, we'll blame the church, we'll

blame the connect group leader or whoever going.

I'm not being fed. I'm not growing spiritually.

And sometimes they're horrible and sometimes there's some truth

to it. They're not doing a good job of

helping you grow. But a lot of times I it's also

because you're not growing spiritually, you're not honestly

and faithfully taking the proper personal responsibility for your

own personal spiritual life to pursue these disciplines,

including prayer. Jude I always like quoting Jude.

I don't get to quote Jude too often.

Jude one. But you, beloved, building

yourselves up. See these verbs, building

yourselves up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy

Spirit. Keep yourselves in the love of

God, waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads

to eternal life. Now again, we can't do this on

our own. Other verses are going to tell

us that we need the power of the Holy Spirit to do this.

We need this help to. So there's this incredible

partnership we saw back in Philippians that's going on,

right? But God commands us to build, to

keep, to wait to reach this highest level of spiritual

maturity. And, and so if you want to be

full of the Holy Spirit, if you want to walk in love, if you

want to walk in the mercy of God, we have to discipline

ourselves to this level of commitment, this level of

communion, this level of communication to yearn for this

spiritual maturity. You got to exercise.

So prayer is this incredible doorway to that intimate

communion. But again, back to Philippians

2, just remember that second part where he says first he says

to work out your own salvation in verse 12, but then in verse

13, for it is God who works in you.

You see the partnership. It's amazing that God allows us

to be in partnership with Him like this.

So we obediently do our part. God is always going to

faithfully do His part. The more I do my part, the more

He's going to do His part, and He guides us in His will step by

step. Engage in in practice these

personal, corporate, spiritual disciplines, especially prayer,

so that we can be become continuous conduits through

which His grace flows. Charles Spurgeon once said this.

You see it. I must take care above all that

I cultivate communion with Christ, for though that can

never be the basis of my peace, it will be a channel of it.

In other words, in other words, this is this is something that

needs to flow through me. The old Greek word methatase for

disciple, One of the, one of the meanings of that word is the

mental effort needed to think something through.

So this is a person who's constantly thinking, constantly

learning, constantly working through how to solve things.

This is a person who's constantly trying to to better

themselves. And so this is a person who

never stops learning, never stops seeking to grow.

But now listen, I know people, I know people who've been

Christians for years and I and they just seem a mild, wide and

an inch deep spiritually. Now they're in church every

week. They're they're in their Sunday

school class every week. They're going through the

motions, but there seems to be no depth of, of relationship, no

depth of intimacy, no depth of communion.

I don't sense this real truth about communication, which I'm

going to talk about a whole lot more in a minute.

But but they seem spiritually undisciplined, driven here and

there by every experience and emotion and feeling and

everything they read and everything they hear rather than

Scripture. And they're just not producing

fruit in their life. They have no spiritual power.

They, they just seem to be shifted by every changing wind

that comes along. And as Paul said back in First

Timothy 4, they, they focus on irrelevant or irreverent.

Silly Miss, I've said this to you before.

My mother was a musician, I won't go into this long, but

went to Juilliard School of Music, New York, which was a big

deal for a little girl from Tahlequah, OK.

Probably the only little girl from Tahlequah, OK who'd ever

gone to Juilliard at that point in time because in those days

there weren't a whole lot of little girls in Tahlequah, OK.

And she studied and majored in woodwinds.

I've said this to you before. She could play 12 instruments.

She was a master teacher and instrumentalist in the area of

woodwinds. Played with Benny Goodman in big

band in big band era. For those of you who are old

enough to have any idea what a big band is and who Benny

Goodman is and and play clarinet, he she played clarinet

along with Benny Goodman. And so to think about that, do

do do you think my mom just randomly picked up a clarinet

every now and then and whenever she felt like it or it was

convenient to her to master that instrument?

Of course not. I mean, it was hours and hours

and hours and days and weeks and years of practice to get to the

level that she was. And so to live in this ever

deepening, abundant, fruit producing disciple making life

that God wants us to live, to be able to commune with him this

way and communicate with him this way.

Prayer is a major, major pathway.

We'll talk later in this series about it's also a weapon, but

we'll talk about that later. So First Corinthians 2 just

reminds us of this. I mean, this is deeply intimate.

Listen to this closely. Yet among the mature we do

impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or of

the rulers of this age who are doomed to pass away, but we

impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed

before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age

understand this, for if they had, they would not have

crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written, what no

eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, and

what God has prepared for those who love him, these things God

has revealed to us through the Spirit.

For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of

God. For who knows a person's

thoughts except the spirit of that person which is in him?

So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the

Spirit of God. Now we have received not the

spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we

might understand the things freely given to us by God.

And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom, but

taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to

those who are spiritual. The natural person does not

accept the things of the Spirit of God for their folly to him,

and he's not able to understand them because they are

spiritually discerned. But the spiritual person judges

all things for him, but he himself is to be judged by no

one. For who has understood the mind

of the Lord, so as to instruct him.

But we now this last sentence is huge, but we have the mind of

Christ. I mean, what a powerful sentence

really. Because of the Holy Spirit,

because He indwells us, we have the opportunity to plug into

this, to plug into the thoughts of God, to plug into the depths

of God, to understand what God wants and to have the mind of

Christ. I mean, this is incredibly

intimate. So to understand the thoughts

and ways of God that he intends for us to understand, you can

understand that that he intends for us and our family and and

our church to understand, we have to be in constant communion

with His Spirit to have the mind of Christ.

And that connection to His Spirit is prayer primarily, and

the Word. We're going to talk about that

relationship later too. So to be that intimate, to be

that controlled by him, thinking and discerning like him, wise

like him, living like him. Now, we're never going to be

exactly like him. But this requires habitual,

intentional time and prayer. We got to go to Him even in our

anger, even in our frustration, even in our sinfulness, even in

our hurt. And we just got to be honest

with God. And we can do that in prayer.

He can. And He wants to handle your

pain. He's right there ready for it.

That that's part of what Hebrews 416 is all about.

Let let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of

grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time

of need, not just in time of joy, but in time of hurt.

In fact, the word confidence, there to go with confidence

means to come with this complete honesty.

It's the word means openness, to come with a complete openness

before God, laying it all bare before Him.

God wants us to come to Him just as we are, just wherever we're

starting with all of our junk we carry.

Because He already knows all about your junk anyway, and He

wants you to talk to Him about it.

He wants you to bring it to Him, and prayer is a vehicle for

this. So we need people who know how

to pray. We need prayer warriors as

described by Pastor Charles last time.

And I've known some, but they tend to stand out in my life

because they're so few. So we should all become like

this. First Corinthians 3 says this.

But I, brothers, could not address you as spiritual people,

but as people of the flesh, as infants in Christ.

I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you are not ready for

it. And even now you're not yet

ready. How long will it take us to be

ready? Many aren't ready.

Many are still spiritual and spiritual infants and and the

frustrating part of it is many don't even know it.

They don't even know it. They have so few mature,

discipled role models around them and examples around them

upon which to look and to learn. They don't even know what

they're supposed to look like, so they stare at and compare

themselves with each other. Well, I'm better than he is.

I'm doing better than they are, so I must be OK instead of

focusing on Christ. And many Christians settle for

well, I'm as good as he is, so I must be fine.

I'm better than they are, so I must be in pretty good shape.

And that's not your marker. That's not your measuring stick.

So they're they're not disciplined in their time.

They're not disciplined in their focus upon him and who he

desires for them to be. So in the meantime, the Bible

expects, we've seen it. We've seen it tonight.

The Bible expects, the Bible commands that we build our

relationship in him and our knowledge with him.

We built, we have to build with those proper materials like

prayer or we're going to waste this life.

And so, and we're not going to be used to our greatest

potential in this life. It's going to pass you by.

Prayer is 1 incredible strong building block.

In fact, it's also been described as the mortar that

holds all the other building blocks together.

And so it's hugely important. So we have to seek the mind of

Christ then that that's what that's our attitude in prayer.

My, my attitude in prayer is, is not, boy, did I make it through

the list? Did I get everything I wanted

from God? You know, Teresa brought in some

food for me tonight because I didn't have time to go anywhere.

And so she brought in some food and I was supposed to have fried

okra. And I opened the container and I

had French fries. Oh, yeah.

No, no, no, no. I'm going back.

I'm. I'm taking a receipt with me.

And I'm because that fried, fried okra and fried and old

French fries, they're not the same thing.

I didn't get what I wanted from you.

God, this isn't working. Prayer doesn't work.

I'm going to reorder. See if you give me what I want

next time. We've got to be careful here.

That's not what they seek. The mind of Christ.

Think about that as your prayer aspect.

I'm seeking the mind of Christ. I want to think as He thinks.

I want to see as he sees. I want to define as he defines.

I want to decide as he decides. Now we're never going to be

Jesus, but that's our marker. Philippians 25 says it.

That's not my guess. I'm not just some preacher

making this up. He says have this mind among

yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus.

Or another translation would say, let this mind be in you,

which was also in Christ Jesus. We are commanded to seek the

mind of Christ. Prayer.

Now, the word of God is also incredibly important here, but

prayer is one of the means to this incredible state of wisdom,

of maturity, of action, a state of being.

But in this is the key. But this is a key point, and

this is part of part of the problem in some people's prayer

lives. I need to pay attention to this.

You got to learn the concept of wait, why am I talking?

It's what that stands for. It's a good thing to learn in

conversation too. Why am I talking?

I've I've shared with you before, I should have brought it

tonight. I got a big sign.

It sits on the floor in my office because it's just for me.

And it says never miss a good chance to shut up.

I'm telling you, sitting right there behind my desk.

Why am I talking? And so I don't think we

understand this part of prayer. We think all prayer is a time is

us talking and it's not. You're missing it.

I'm going to make a big point about this in a minute.

We got to listen. We need to spend time meditating

on His will, listening to Him instead of just barraging God,

instead of just ambushing God with our litany of requests.

So simply going through these ritualistic motions of prayer

lists is not necessarily going to get you to your desired

destination. I'm not saying don't use prayer

lists because there's a moment for request, there's a moment

for supplication, there's a moment for intercession.

But that's not the only moment in prayer.

And if that's all you're doing in prayer, no wonder you're not

praying, right? How's that?

You're not praying so good, you're incomplete.

You're just seeking what you want in your mind.

You're not seeking the mind of Christ.

You're not seeking what He wants.

You're just seeking what you want.

That's not really prayer. We need to remember why we are

praying. Why are we doing this?

Powerful praying is communion with God.

Powerful praying is the prerequisite to knowing God's

purpose. Notice this has nothing to do

with me asking me wanting to know what I want to know.

This is about me wanting to know what God wants me to know.

Prayer is this pathway to knowing God's purpose.

Prayer is this, this thing that will produce passion for knowing

God's purpose. So it creates the building

blocks for this deep intimacy with Christ, and then that leads

you to the life He wants you to live for him.

It's a path to a stronger corporate body as well.

So for the entire church, if we begin to pray this way, God, God

will guard our hearts and minds spiritually together.

Now, the opposite of that, lack of this kind of prayer will

result in very little fruit, no power, a lack of connectivity to

the Holy Spirit, perhaps even a sense of Christianity as being a

failure or boring or restrictive.

So we need to submit to this pathway of this true intimacy

with and knowledge of Christ in prayer.

And in fact, one day the Bible tells us that we will be more

like him. But in the meantime, I'm

commanded. It's not a suggestion, it's a

command. Just like you shouldn't steal,

just like you shouldn't murder, you are commanded to pray in a

certain way, and we should do this.

We are commanded to discipline ourselves, to build and to work

towards spiritual maturity, to strive to be more like him right

now. So I need to develop these

habits of prayer in these discipline patterns.

I need the Holy Spirit. I need the fellowship of other

Christians in the church to help me.

We need to help one another. I might again, I might need a

crisis to help me. I've seen people driven to their

knees in the middle of crisis and watch God work.

So pray God will help. Pray God will strengthen you.

And again, Satan's going to do all he can.

He he does not want you to pray. Let me tell you, he's scared of

this. The Bible will tell you this is

a weapon. We'll talk about that later.

Go to Ephesians 6. This is a weapon sometime and

Satan scared of prayer. The last thing Satan wants you

to do is actually to talk to God.

See, you can talk to church, you can talk to the preacher, you

can sit and listen, but you start talking to God.

You're in the danger zone. So be careful, but pray every

day, not just for yourself, your own need to grow and your

desires, but you pray for others in the church.

You pray for unsaved. I strongly suggest you get in a

connect group where you can pray together.

Get your kids in our family ministries where they'll learn

to pray together, but you also got to spend that personal time

honestly seeking. But, but let me not only talk

about communion, but let me talk about this authentic

communication for a minute. Because one of the things I

actually teach classes on communicate, commutative theory

and cross cultural communication.

And one of the things I've understood about communication

is, is most human beings don't do it and most human beings

don't know what it is. They have real misunderstandings

of what communication really is. In fact, one of the, the old

adages came out of Broadway. So I hate to quote Broadway too

much, but and, and that is the greatest myth about

communications, that it actually took place.

And we think we're communicating, especially in

this culture when we're not. I'll, I'll explain that.

Remember that the root of the word communication is the word

common. So the more I have in common

with somebody, the more likely I should be able to communicate

with that person. Well, but don't just think about

that with another human being. Think about that, about God.

What do I have in common with God that helps me to communicate

best with God? What are the things in my life

that are godly that will help me best communicate with him?

So that I'll say a lot about our prayer life.

We carry biases, we carry prejudice into communication

even with God. And, and, and we, we sometimes

follow my words because if you've been here, you know these

words. We, we, we tend to not, not

exegete in prayer, which is what we ought to do.

We ought to be exegetical in our prayer life.

We're, we're getting out of our prayer life what God wants us to

get out of our prayer life. But we tend to isajete or

narsajete into our prayer life. We're reading into our prayer

life. We're making the prayer life

just about us. And your prayer life is not just

about you. Your prayer life is about God

and you got to acknowledge that this is a moment of worship.

In fact, this is the difference, and I've shared this with some

of you before. This is the difference between

magic and faith. The very idea of magic is, is

that I control the forces for my own benefit or to curse someone

else. I can control the forces of

nature. I can control the forces of

whatever occultic thing it is and I can control those things

through spells and incantations and and rituals so that I can

either get you or I can bless me.

And that's what some people treat prayer like.

If I say the right words, abracadabra poof, I'm going to

get whatever I want. I can name it and I can what,

claim it and it's mine according to the promises of God.

And when you ice a Jeep and take verses way out of context, you

can make the Bible support you. So even answered or unanswered

prayers can be confusing. They can be misinterpreted.

And this is really, really important.

That's why answered prayers must be in accordance with God's

Word. Prayer and the Bible must be

congruent. You can't sit there and tell me

that God told you to do something that not in this book.

I can't believe you. I'm sorry.

You're not Joseph Smith. You don't get to create your own

religion. You don't get to have your own

secret visions with special glasses and old Egyptian

hieroglyphics that you then translate into King James

English. You don't get to do that.

If you have no idea what I just said, you're OK.

And so the authority of scripture and the authenticity

of prayer must be congruent. That's a good sentence.

I don't know who wrote it, but it's a good one.

That might actually be me, I don't know, probably meditate on

the word and pray the promises of Scripture.

Charles talked about that last time too.

And so because here, here's the deal, in prayer, you must

actually communicate with God. Now that might seem dud to you,

but it's not because that's not just telling him requests.

That's not communication. Communication is not simply

telling somebody something hoping they hear you.

That is not communication. It's not.

That's lecture. Listen.

That's not communication. Well, I told them they ought to

know. No, they don't know.

They shouldn't. No, they shouldn't.

That's ridiculous. That's one of the most

ridiculous things about the pulpit.

I stand up here and I monologue to you for who knows how many

minutes, and you all endure it, and I have no idea whether you

understood a word I said or not. See, true communication is a

closed loop. The goal of true communication

is not whether you heard me. The true goal of communication

is did you understand me and do I understand you?

There's a loop of feedback that's going on here.

And so I need to not only speak to God, I need to listen to God.

We need to actually communicate in a closed loop.

So I'm seeking to know what the listener understood, and I'm

seeking to understand what the listener wants.

So I need to listen. I got to close it.

So prayer has to be this communal worship communication

experience. That's what it is.

Philippians 4, you know these verses, but don't be anxious

about anything. But in everything, by prayer and

supplication, with Thanksgiving, let your request be made known

to God, and He will give you. He will give you, or He will

grant upon you the peace of God, which surpasses all

understanding, and it will guard your heart, it'll guard your

mind In Christ Jesus. There's a loop here.

There's a loop. God wants us to come to Him,

begging, plead with Him, dump on Him.

He wants us to bring all that stuff, but then He also wants us

to receive from Him. And if all we're doing is

dumping the stuff and then kind of running away, you're treating

God like a dumpster. You're not treating God like a

God who can help you and who wants to minister to you.

Jesus described this in more detail in Matthew 7.

Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find, Knock

and it will be open to you, for everyone who asks receives, and

the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be

opened. Or which one of you?

If his son asks for bread, we'll give him a stone, or if he asks

for a fish, we'll give him a serpent.

If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your

children, how much more will your Father, who is in heaven

give good gifts to those who ask him?

So it's crucial for us to have this understanding of the will

of God before we're asking for anything.

We need to make sure that that we're asking things that are

according to the way his nature and his will are going to work.

But the way these verbs are these, these, these seek, these

knocks, these asks, but these are these are read Luke 18

sometime. It's a continuous thing.

I'm never going to stop seeking. I'm never going to stop

knocking. I'm never going to stop asking

you. I'm praying continuously,

fervently. I don't want to hear from you,

God, I'm not going to stop. I want to hear from you.

And in first John five, he writes, And this is the

confidence that we have toward him that if we ask anything

according to his will. But man, that's a big phrase.

According to his will, not my will, not my wants, not my

vision board, not whatever I've dreamed of, not ever whatever

I've manifested in my own fantasy of reality, it, it is

what God wants. He'll hear us.

And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that

we have the request that we have asked to Him.

You cannot take verse 15 without verse 14.

And how do I know? It's right here, It's right

here. Here's his will, here's his

word. So this and my prayer life have

to be partners. They have to go together.

What I learn in church, what I learn from other believers, the

truths of Scripture have to be the same thing.

Luke 11 says this. 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 I tell you, ask and it will

be given to you, and you will find knock and you will find

knock and it will be open to you.

So verse one, they're asking for that.

You see the Lord's Prayer, verse 9, he reminds them, keep doing

this. You got to keep doing this.

You got to keep doing this. We're going to study the Lord's

Prayer in a session later in detail.

Jeremiah 29. Some of you know this verse or

two. Then you will call upon me and

come and pray to me, and I will hear you.

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all of

your heart. How persistent will we be?

James very practical book talks about Elijah.

He was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently.

And I noticed Elijah didn't have a nature that wasn't like ours.

He didn't have a supernatural nature.

He wasn't different than us. He had a nature like ours.

And and he prayed fervently that it might not rain.

And for three years and six months it did not rain on the

earth. Then he prayed again, and heaven

gave rain and the earth bore its fruit.

God works in powerful ways with the people who truly seek him

and want to hear from him and want to know his will.

So prayers, communication also includes not only how we

communicate with God, but how we do this together.

Don't forget this Matthew 18. Again, I say to you, if two or

three, two or three of you agree on earth about anything, if 2 of

you, this one just says 2, if 2 of you agree on it on earth

about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in

heaven. For where two or three are

gathered in my name, there am I among them.

I was jumping a verse. So there's an agreement when 2

believers who are seeking God's will, when a group of believers

seek God's will together and they go to him seeking what he

wants. God blesses that unity of

intention. But sometimes things get in the

way. Walls, barriers.

I've listed a few, There's a lot of them that this would not be

exhaustive pride. Sometimes I don't need God or

even to be honest with you, a sense that prayer doesn't work.

That's pride. I don't think God can.

I can. God can't.

I can. I don't need God.

I don't need. I can do this.

It's pride. It's love of self.

Or maybe it's the opposite. It's a false sense of

unworthiness. I'm too sinful.

God's not going to live. Why would God listen to me?

God's not going to listen to me. We have.

We have no idea how much God loves us, how he yearns to hear

from us, how he wants us at his feet.

Faithlessness, busyness, unconfessed sin, disobedience,

ignorance, laziness, wrong motives, idols in our life, all

these things can be barriers that they make.

They're like earbuds that you put in your ears and you can't

hear anything that's being said. Psalm 66 says this.

If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not

have listened pretty straight. If you have unconfessed sin in

your life, there's a first prayer you have to pray the

prayer of confession, the prayer of repentance, the prayer, the

prayer of forgiveness, the the prayer of clean cleanliness.

You need to go before the Lord and let him set you right before

he can even listen to you. close the communication loop.

So give, don't just seek to get so you get back to God in prayer

through things like praise and Thanksgiving.

We've talked about some of these things in other settings, but we

we give back to God in prayer, we praise him, we thank him for

who he is. This Sunday morning we're going

to praise God together in Nehemiah.

We're actually going together and it's a weird spot right

there. I don't know what that is.

I'm telling you that metal plate in my head.

But Psalm 96, let me turn to Psalm 96 says, Oh, sing to the

Lord a new song, sing to the Lord all the earth, sing to the

Lord, bless his name, tell tell of his salvation from

day-to-day. That means all the time declare

his glory among the nations, His marvellous works among all the

peoples. For great is the Lord, and

greatly to be praised. He is to be feared above all

gods, for all of the gods of the peoples are worthless idols.

But the Lord made the heavens. Splendor and majesty are before

him. Strength and beauty are in His

sanctuary. Ascribe to the Lord, O families

of the peoples, ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.

Ascribe to the Lord the glory. Do His name bring an offering

and come into His courts. Worship the Lord in the splendor

of holiness. Tremble before him all the

earth. Say among the nations the Lord

reigns. Yes, the world is established.

It shall never be moved. He shall.

He will judge the peoples with equity.

Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice.

Let the sea roar and all that fills it.

Let the field exalt and everything in it.

Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy before the

Lord, before he comes. For he comes to judge the earth.

He will judge the world in righteousness, and the peoples

in his faithfulness. He deserves praise and

Thanksgiving. So I'm 100 and verse 4 is a

verse, you know. And enter his gates with

Thanksgiving, and his courts with what praise?

Give thanks to Him. Bless his name.

Or as Paul writes to the Thessalonians in First

Thessalonians 5, rejoice always pray without ceasing.

I want you to see how there's a connection between those two

things. Praise, rejoice, always be

joyful, pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all

circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for

you, no matter what, no matter when, no matter how hard, no

matter how good, sunny or rainy I am to go to God this way.

So if our Christian experience does not lead to some sense of a

deep spiritual joy and thankfulness, we would do well

to stop and to ask ourselves a whether it was ever genuine,

whether my Christian experience is even genuine or not, or at

what point I got off track. Where did where did this

building process stop? Why am I not building toward my

discipleship? I mean, if we aren't thankful,

are are we recognizing God's gospel and blessing?

If we're not grateful, do we truly understand who God even

is? God wants us to recognize Him

not only in our lives and and not simply treat Him like some

eternal Amazon ordering service, which is what I'm afraid some of

our prayer lives are like. God please bless God, please

bless God. Please bless.

Gimme Gimme, Gimme, Gimme, Gimme send.

I have Prime no delivery fee. Is that what our prayer life is

like? So being thankful like this kind

of reveals our focus. So we'll spend less time and

fear less time focusing on ourselves when we think like

this. So Ephesians 520 says giving

thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of

our Lord Jesus Christ. But that's not all we do in

prayer. We're just getting started in

prayer. God, God, God wants us to come

to him with our needs and our request.

So there's this aspect of prayer where we are asking for things

we want to get from God in prayer.

That's OK. It's just not the only OK.

God wants us to do this. And this is likely to where you

spend most of your time. How do I get stuff from God?

You wouldn't say it that way. You're more spiritual than I am.

But there are some things that you might not think about that

you need to get from God, like forgiveness, things you need to

give Him, like confession, things you need help with, like

repentance. Psalm 32 reminds us, blessed is

the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.

Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity and

whose spirit there is no deceit. For when I kept silent, my bones

wasted away through my groaning all day long, for day and night

your hand was heavy on me, my strength was dried up as by the

heat of the of the summer. But I acknowledge my sin, I

prayed, I confessed my sin to you and did not cover my

iniquity. I said I will confess my

transgressions to the Lord, and amazingly, miraculously,

graciously, you forgave the iniquity of my sin.

It's pretty amazing. We know first, John 18 and 9, if

we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth

is not in us. If we confess our sins, He's

faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from

all unrighteousness. This is written to believers.

It's not written to lost people. This is written to believers.

And so I, I can be forgiven and that and that that might need to

be the very first thing I utter. That might be the very first

part of my prayer every single day.

Confession, repentance, please forgive me.

Read Psalm 51 sometime and you'll see David doing that.

So ask the Holy Spirit to reveal sin to you.

That's part of prayer. Lord, show me when Martin Luther

was reading through Romans and he was working through an actual

conversion experience, which led to the Reformation, etcetera, he

would go to his father confessor.

He was a he was a priest. And so he would go to another

priest in the, in the, in the Catholic system and he would

ask, he would go to confession and and he would start reading

this litany of every single thing he'd done and every sort

of word he'd ever said. And the priest got so tired of

him and says, Luther, these aren't even sins you keep

bringing to me. He was overstating them, he

thought, but to Luther, they weren't.

They were failures falling short.

So ask the Holy Spirit to reveal every single sin to you.

And then confession needs to be made the moment you're conscious

of them. And so we confess them each

individually. You need to recognize this, that

that's what the Bible teaches in first John 19 when it says He is

faithful and just to forgive us our sins.

The word for sins there means specific sins, not just in some

general state of being, not just our general all.

I'm a Sinner, Lord, please forgive me.

No, no, no, this is the specific sin.

What did you do? What did you say or what did you

think that was contrary to God's word and will you need to

confess that to the Lord, seek deliverance from the source of

the sin that's causing that to happen, and then agree with God

that you've sinned that. That's what the word confession

means. And and we're willing to repent

and to follow his will again. And that true repentance, that

new commitments going to require that true replacement that I've

talked about. So we put off and we put on.

I was sharing earlier with some folks about praying through

Colossians 3. Once again, it's a good passage.

So, so don't just remove or stop some sinful behavior.

You got to fill that time. You got to fill that void with

biblical, godly things because if you don't, you're going to

fall back in your old ways again.

So we know that you need to be forgiven.

We we also need to replace things.

What are the things that need to be replaced in your life?

Those are things to pray about. But we're also here to learn

about how to forgive others. And this is often very

difficult, but the key will always be to thank God for his

forgiveness. And we use that as the basis for

the way we'll forgive. And that's always a key.

But we're still giving back to God.

We're still giving to him in this complete communication.

We're trying to close the loop with Him.

We're not just seeking things from Him.

We're also trying to give things back to Him as we seek from him.

But God also wants us to frankly come to him with our prayer

requests. There are moments of

supplication. There are moments of

intercession, much like the list you see every Wednesday night

here. A lot of these are our health

requests. A lot of these, some of these

are spiritual health requests. Most of these are physical

health requests. There's even some on there about

life crisis request if you read closely.

And so we want to pray for these things.

It's a good thing to do. It's OK to do it's right.

It's biblical for us to do this. It's just not the only thing you

need to do in your prayer life. Don't just pray through the

prayer list. So First Timothy 21 says, first

of all, then I urge that supplications, prayers,

intercession, and thanksgivings be made for all people.

There are many other passages we could go to that would talk

about praying for one another. But, but rather than trying to

move God to my point of view, I need to let God move me to his.

What do you think about this situation?

God? God burdened me with what

somebody else might need. I'm not going to hesitate to

lift them up. Lord, help me to lift them up.

Be be help me to be burdened to lift up other people, not just

stuff I want, but what I see other people going through.

How can I lift them up? Revelation 16 said And made us a

Kingdom priest to his God and Father, to him be glory and

dominion forever and ever. Amen.

And you need to latch on and understand this idea of us as

priests. It's important.

The priest in the Bible had two roles.

They were both intercessor and mediator between God and man,

and we need to recognize that. We are now a royal.

I could read out of Peter. We're a royal priesthood today.

We are all priests spiritually. So we too are intercessor and

intercessors and mediators. I intercede on behalf of the

people to God, and then I'm going to mediate between God and

the people. I'm going to share the gospel.

I'm going to tell them about God.

I'm going to teach them about God.

I'm going to help him to know God, help him to be forgiven by

God. And this is a, this is modeled

for us in the New Testament by Jesus.

Jesus is our high priest. Hebrews 8 says, Now the point in

what we are saying is this. We have such a high priest, one

who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the majesty in

heaven. Then you layer on Romans 834,

who is to condemn Christ? Jesus is the one who died more

than that, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who

indeed is interceding for us. So we have an intercessor.

See, I, I'm not just praying by myself.

Don't miss this. When I'm truly praying, I'm not

praying by myself. Jesus is interceding on my

behalf. He's helping me.

He's interceding to the Father. I, I, the Father couldn't hear

me without Jesus. He can't hear me without that

blood covering. He can't hear me without that

sacrifice. He can't hear me without that

forgiveness. But because of the filter of

Jesus Christ, he can hear me now.

Now listen. It gets better, because the Holy

Spirit's also doing it, not just God the Son, but God the Spirit.

Listen to Romans 826. Likewise the Spirit helps us in

our weakness, for we do not know what to pray for as we ought.

But the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings

too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows

what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes

for the Saints according to the will of God.

So you see the entire Trinity at play in your prayer life and in

your salvation, in your discipleship.

The Holy Spirit, the triune God, is on our side, and he's more

powerful than that stupid O devil.

And so he commands us. He invites us to come and spend

time with him. And God the Spirit and God the

Son are helping God the Father to hear us and for us to receive

what God the Father has for us. It's amazing what a miracle this

thing is, what a privilege this thing is that I get to do that

me. In the Old Testament, I couldn't

even go near without being struck dead.

But now what happened to that veil?

I can go straight in, and every aspect of God is helping me.

That's what prayer is. That's why we pray.

We're communing with that. We're intermingling with that,

We're communicating with that. This isn't just, well, I hope he

answers the prayers on these prayer lists.

Now, there's a part of it. It's a good part of it.

James says we got to pray for one another and we should

wouldn't give you the list if it was wrong.

But I hope it's just a peace. It's a personal worship,

communion, intimate communication moment that you

ought to celebrate. And so he wants to hear and He

wants us to hear him. Don't miss that.

We must hear him. But it must be in agreement with

this word. You can't have some weird

special revelation that you blame God for.

It's got to match what God's already said.

It's got to match His word in His will.

See. So over the next sessions, what

we're going to do is we're going to learn how we do this.

How do we pray? What do we pray?

What's a model for prayer? We're going to talk about the

weaponry, the conflict of prayer that it brings.

We're going to talk about all those things.

I hope you'll be here. Grab people, drag them here.

I want to tell you an old story. Many of you have heard this

before. You can finish the line before I

get to it, but don't because it makes me feel bad.

So. So a pastor went to a was asked

by an older farmer to breakfast one morning and they were

sitting around the table with the old farmer and his family at

breakfast and and the the the farmer was going to pray over

the food. And this is his prayer.

Just listen to this Lord, you, some of you know this very well.

Lord, I hate buttermilk farmer begins and the visiting pastor

kind of opened one eye glanced over there at the farmer kind of

like, where's this going? The farmer like got even louder.

Lord, I hate Lord, now the Pastor Troy getting kind of

concerned. Then the farmer went even

louder. And Lord, you know, I don't much

care for a raw white flour. But then he added.

But Lord, when you mix them all together and you bake them, I do

love warm fresh biscuits. So Lord, when things come up, we

don't like when life gets hard, when we don't understand what

you're doing or what you're saying to us.

Help us to just relax and wait until you're done mixing.

It'll probably be even better than biscuits.

Amen. So stay strong my friends,

because our Lord is mixing. I promise you, this life on this

planet is a never ending ride in the mixing bowl.

But He's mixing to put together the right ingredients to create

something even better than we could ever imagine, than we

could ever create. There's something we could ever

do on our own. My friends, my vision for

Englewood's really simple. I want God to do something here

that can only be explained because God did something here.

That's it. And we have to walk with him and

commune with him and communicate with him and be very careful

that we're doing what he wants the way he wants us to do it.

And so we need to pray and ask him about those things.

Let's pray together. Father, I'm so thankful that we

can, we can unashamedly, even maybe audacity, audacity in an

audacity fashion come to you in prayer, Lord, just to so it's an

incredible miracle. I don't, I don't deserve to talk

to you. I don't deserve to be in your

presence. There's no reason you should

waste your time listening to me. But Father, in your words, you

tell me you will if I come to you the right way, if I come to

you with the right spirit and the right will.

So Father, please forgive me. Forgive us for the ways we fail

you. Sometimes it's not even the

things we do, it's the things we don't do.

Forgive us, Father, when we're too busy to talk to you and

we're way too busy to listen to you.

We just want you to hear us talk, Father.

Sometimes that's how we treat one another, isn't it?

We're not listening to the other person.

We're just thinking about what we're going to say next.

And Father, I pray that's not how we come to you, the Father.

We would pause, we would reflect, we would read Your

word, we would pray your word. We would sing to you out of the

Psalms perhaps, and we would listen to what you want to say

to us. Father, no still moments.

That small voice that you often use in our hearts to speak to

us, to show us according to Your word, how you want us to be, how

you want us to respond sometimes, Father, how you want

us to wait. And Lord, that's hard.

So Father, forgive us. But Father, we thank you for

that. We thank you and we praise you

because you are an incredibly gracious God who tolerates so

much, so, so much from us and you still want to bless, you

still want to use, you still want to create, you still want

to save, you still want to disciple, you still want to

grow. Father, what an amazing thing

because that's who you are. Amazing.

So thank you, Father, that we could just talk about how to

talk about and to talk to you. I pray, Father, that we will put

these habits into exercise. Habitual patterns of behavior

will exercise our prayer muscles in new ways.

And Father, we might get sore. Lord, we might get tired.

But Father, let us see the result.

And Father, we know, Lord, that you tell us in your word that if

we pray this way, if we will seek you, if we will fall on

your face, that Father, you will do mighty things in our land.

So, Lord, we pray for that. We pray that your, your presence

will be so evident, that your power will be so felt, that

your, your, your growth and your production of your Kingdom,

Father, will be so visible around us that, Lord, no one

will be able to deny you. Father, thank you for that.

I look forward to the day when we stand in a place with you and

we'll talk in a different way. We'll communicate and listen

from you in a different way. But for now, Lord, this is what

you've given us. So let us be faithful.

Let us pray in Christ's name, Amen.

God bless you all. Thank you.

Thank you so much for listening today.

And I also hope that you'll go to

[email protected] as well as our app and find many

other resources that will bless you and your families.

Thank you once again.