Praying Beyond Words | Ayren Nelson

Well hope. Uh, how are you doing, man? I listen.

I hope you've had a better week than I have ,

if I'm completely honest with you. Uh, I'm, I'm just gonna tell you, uh,

how my week started off. Actually, I'm not gonna embellish here.

I'm gonna go back to, to last weekend. It was last Saturday,

and I went to a baby shower. I promise there's more than that,

but that should already let you know that for me. If you know me,

that's like the first step to a terrible weekend. But no,

I actually had a really, really good time. We went to a baby shower. Uh,

it was for someone on my, uh, my wife's side of the family.

So we drove down to Wilmington. And so we went there Saturday, uh, afternoon.

And, uh, it was good, man. We helped set up things. We had the food out.

We had a good time with everybody. We got to hang out with people and talk.

See people we hadn't seen in a really long time. But, uh,

that was Saturday and Sunday morning, I had to be back here to preach.

So we weren't able to spend the night like we normally do. Instead,

we loaded up the car, we drove back and about 20 minutes away from Fuqua,

I just,

something didn't feel right now to try to help keep me awake for the ride.

I had a cup of coffee. And so I just assumed, okay,

this is just nature taking its course. We'll be okay.

We're 20 minutes from home, be there in no time. Everything will be okay. Uh,

but we get home. I take my time. I get my wife and my daughter inside the house.

We unload the car, everything like that. And just after a few minutes, I'm like,

Hey, listen, I gotta go take care of something.

So I leave and I go to the restroom, and after a few minutes, I'm like,

something just doesn't feel right. Like, I pull out my phone and I,

I text Morgan, my wife, and I'm like, Hey,

something just feels a little bit off. Well, I won't give you all of the like,

nitty gritty, gross details, but to summarize, uh,

I ended up with the worst case of food poisoning I've ever had in my entire

life. Uh, again, without painting too much of a visual for you, uh,

I lost 13 pounds over the course of four days.

That's how rough this thing had started taking over my body.

And I just remember that first night when things were getting really bad.

There was a moment when, um, I was, I was in my bathroom and I'm,

I'm sitting there and I'm on the ground and I am like, I'm, I'm crushed.

Like I'm my, my wife, my my sweet wife. She's there trying to offer support,

and she's just like, I just felt so bad for you, but I I wasn't gonna touch you.

I was gonna stay away . You know? Um,

and so I'm sitting there and there's just this moment when I'm like,

I'm pounding my hands on the ground. I'm like gasping for air.

I'm weeping. There's just this moment. And in this moment, I'm just,

I'm crying out to God. I'm like, God, please, like, just take this away.

Make it be over. Like I don't have anything else left. Like,

just make this stop.

And I could just feel my insides turning partially because of the desperation

that I felt.

Im partially because of the ham sandwiches that I think started this entire

thing. And somewhere in the middle of all that,

I'm sitting there and my head and my,

my face is literally touching the bathroom floor. Like,

I just don't care about anything at this point. And I felt like in this moment,

God told me something. Now I wanna take a quick moment and just say,

I have conversations with a lot of people and they ask me, Aaron,

how do I know when God's talking to me?

Versus how do I know if it's just me like talking to myself?

And I usually tell them one or two things. I say one. Uh, usually, uh,

God's gonna tell you something that sounds like something you would never try to

convince yourself of. Like, it makes sense, you know,

it's probably the right thing,

but you've been trying to avoid that for a long time.

The second thing is usually his timing,

like when he chooses to tell you something,

when he chooses to speak to you usually will stand out, right? Okay.

So just kind of take that, put it in your back pocket,

back to my bathroom floor. I'm sitting here and I'm crying out to God,

and I'm praying, God, make it stop. Take it away. I don't want this anymore.

And I just felt like in this moment, God was spoke to me and said,

when was the last time you prayed like this?

And the only thing I thought was, dude, not right now. Please. Like,

I don't wanna have this conversation.

I don't wanna do intensive soul work right now, God, like, I just need you to,

to take this thing away. But it, it genuinely,

that question has stuck with me all week long,

and I've been thinking about it ever since. Man,

when was the last time that I prayed so hard that my whole self got

involved?

When was the last time that I prayed so intentionally that it brought me to my

knees? When was the last time that in the case of like this food sickness,

that's something bothered me so much that it actually caused me some sort of

physical reaction, this spiritual thing, uh,

kind of manifesting itself in this physical way?

When was the last time that I prayed with so much investment that it not only

affected what was going on inside of me, but outside of me as well?

See, what brought me to prayer in that situation and in prayer like that,

that gritty gross on the ground, just letting it all out sort of prayer,

was that there was something inside of me that felt like words couldn't contain.

Like there was something where just a,

a gentle bowing of the heads wasn't enough.

There was beating of the fist and tears coming from my eyes,

and I just cried out to ask God, why? And I think that was totally okay,

because my outer po posture had finally started to reflect my inner

posture.

I prayed with my whole self at whatever cost.

And this is something that we see, uh,

consistently throughout scripture all the time. I'm,

I'm gonna show you a biblical example that's a little more exciting,

and it involves a lot less bodily fluids. Okay? So if you have your Bible,

turn to Second Samuel chapter six. Um, and while you're getting there,

I'll just kind of set this up a little bit for you.

So what's happening in this passage is we're looking back at the people of

Israel who we've been talking about for the past couple of weeks, right?

They tend to come up a lot. And if you were here last week,

you remember hearing me talk about this space called the Holy of Holies. And so,

uh,

this was the place where God's presence would come and meet his people once a

year.

And inside of that room was this big golden box called the Ark of the Covenant.

If you've ever seen Indiana Jones, you probably know what I'm talking about,

right?

And so the Ark of the Covenant was kind of this physical representation of the

presence of God. Now, Israel had kind of started misusing it.

They started treating it like a, a lucky rabbit's foot or like some sort of, uh,

good luck charm.

And this flippant use of it or this view of that thing, uh,

led to them losing it. In two Samuel chapter four,

they go into a battle with the Philistines. And in that battle,

the Philistines actually capture that thing.

And Israel has this moment of coming to their senses of like, man,

we've been mistreating, uh, this representation of the spirit of God.

And so the Philistines have it now, and they don't want it for very long,

because while they have it, these curses come upon them. Uh,

these plagues come upon them. And so they actually willingly give it back to,

uh, to Israel. And so David is king, uh, of Israel at this time.

And as it's starting to make its way back,

it takes a quick pit stop at a guy named Obed Ed's house.

You can read about that in two Samuel chapter six.

But I want us to pick up in verse 16. Um, I'm sorry.

Actually go back to verse 12. We're gonna pick up in verse 12 here.

As it's being returned, it says, and it was told King David,

the Lord has blessed the household of Obed Edam and all that belongs to him

because the Ark of the Covenant had been there.

So David went and brought up the Ark of God from the house of Obed Edam to the

city of David with rejoicing. And when those who bore the Ark of the Covenant,

um, Ark of the Lord had gone six steps,

he sacrificed an ox and fattened and a and a fattened animal, excuse me.

And David danced before the Lord with all his might.

And David was wearing a linen ephod. This was just, uh,

what the priests wore at that time. It was a ceremonial rope.

So David and all the House of Israel brought up the Ark of the Lord with

shouting and with the sound of the horn, verse 16,

as the ark of the Lord came into the city of David McCall, the daughter of Saul,

who by the way was also David's wife, uh,

looked out of the window and saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord.

So the, the arc is making it way into the city. And this woman is looking out,

she sees her husband and he's, I don't know,

hitting the grid or something outside of the window, right?

Like he's getting excited, he's getting down. And look at how,

what her response was, it says he was dancing before the Lord, before the Lord,

and she despised him in her heart,

and they brought in the arc of the Lord and set it in its place inside the tent

that David had pitched for it.

And David offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the Lord.

And when David had finished offering the burnt offerings and the peace

offerings, he blessed the people in the name of the Lord of,

of hosts and distributed among all the people, the whole multitude of Israel,

both men and women, a cake of bread,

a portion of meat and a cake of raisins to each,

then all the people departed each to his house. Verse 20. And then it says,

David returned to bless his household, but McCall, the daughter of Saul,

his wife, uh, came out to meet David and said,

how the King of Israel honored himself today,

uncovering himself today before the eyes of his servants,

female servants as one of the vulgar fellow shamelessly uncovers himself.

So she's like, dude, what were you doing?

You're out there acting a fool in front of all these people.

You're supposed to be the king, and you're out here embarrassing yourself.

And look at how David responds. In verse 21, David said to McCall,

it was before the Lord who chose me above your father and above all his house,

to appoint me as prince over Israel, the the people of the Lord.

And I will celebrate before the Lord.

I will make myself yet more contemptible than this,

and I will be a base in your eyes,

but by the female servants of whom you have spoken by them,

I should be held in honor. I love the way that other translations put this.

It says, uh, uh, McCall comes to David and says, Hey,

why were you being so undignified? And David's response is literally, woman,

I was praising Jesus. I'll get even more undignified than this if I want to.

And I just love that level of zeal for the Lord.

David was so celebratory and he was so authentic before

God. They, and he wanted to let that be known so much that he's like, listen,

I don't care how embarrassed I am in the process.

I'm having a moment with my heavenly Father and man,

that's what prayer can be like.

We can have these moments where we don't have to worry about how we look or how

we sound, or are we using the right words.

Prayer can be a whole bodied expression of what our words

can't express.

It can be messy and joyful and full of tears or laughter or on a

walk or on our knees or dancing.

And I'm just so afraid that so many of us have missed out on some level of

intimacy with God because we lack authenticity in front of God.

I'm afraid that so many of us may have missed out on the potential of an aspect

of our relationship with Jesus, because well, if we're completely honest,

listen all this dancing and crying and hooping and hollering, like,

isn't that a Pentecostal thing? like, isn't that what,

what the other churches do? Like is, is hope, that type of church,

am I that type of Christian? And to that, I just want to ask you,

are you willing to just be yourself?

Are you willing to dance before the Lord because of his goodness?

Because that's, that's how he made you. He's placed that joy inside of you.

Like you don't have to hide an aspect of who you are from the God who created

you. You can be authentic. You can let out those tears.

You can cry, you can dance, you can sit, you can kneel,

you can raise your hands to heaven without any fear of anything. Why?

Because it's just simply being authentic. And so maybe your pushback is, man,

this all just feels like a bit much, it just feels theatrical.

Like does prayer really require all that? And to that, I will say yes and no.

Does prayer require performance? Absolutely not.

But does it require authenticity? Absolutely, yes.

In fact, Jesus makes this distinction in Matthew chapter six. Uh,

he's given his sermon on the Mount, and, uh, he's talking to,

to his followers or just people who have gathered to hear what it is that he has

to say because they're interested in this way of life that Jesus is talking

about. And I wanna read, um, these verses. This is Matthew chapter six,

verses one through eight, where Jesus is,

is talking about ultimately this idea of authenticity before

your spiritual Father. Starting in verse one, Jesus says,

beware of practicing your righteousness before other people

in order to be seen by them.

For then you will have no reward from your father who is in heaven,

thus when you give to the needy. So he,

he's starting to give some examples here. When you give to the needy sound,

no trumpets before you,

as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets,

that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you,

they have received their reward. I call this like the good news,

bad news paradox of hypocrisy , because the bad, the good news is,

is that these people are seeking a reward.

And the good news for them is that they do get a reward. But the bad news is,

is that it's not what they genuinely want. They're not getting the, the, the,

uh, uh, relationship with the father. Instead,

all they're settling for is mere praise from humans that'll fade in a heartbeat.

And so he keeps on going. He says, when you give to the needy,

do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing so that you're

giving may be done in secret.

And your father who sees in secret will reward you. Verse five,

he switches the conversation over to prayer. He says, and when you pray,

you must not be like the hypocrites.

For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners that

they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they receive their reward.

They've gotten all they're gonna get out of it. But when you pray,

go into your room and shut your door and pray to your father who is in secret,

and your father who is in secret, I'm sorry.

And your father who sees in secret will reward you. And when you pray,

do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do for they think that they will be

heard for their many words.

Do not be like them for your father knows what you need before you ask them.

Jesus is clear here. None of this that we're talking about these,

these different postures, these uh, uh,

different ways of expressing ourselves through prayer, like they're not for,

they're not a performance. However,

there is an audience and that is an audience of one.

And there's just such a freedom and a relief that comes in that when you realize

the beauty of the one that you stand before,

when you realize that you're in front of the God who loves you and made you and

called you and sees you authentically as you are,

and knows all the insides and the outsides about everything that you are, man,

there's just a safety there.

And it's in that place where you can just breathe easy and say,

God, prayer doesn't have to be this thing.

It's just me presenting myself to you authentically.

And however that comes out, so be it.

And the thing that I love about these, these postures, these adopted, uh, uh,

forms that we can take on is, man,

they just give us a way to help focus things in.

They give us a way to channel these emotions that we feel all these times when

bowing our head and closing our eyes. Just doesn't feel like enough.

There are ways that we can express to God with our entire body, uh, in,

in what I believe are significant, authentic ways.

So this week in our 21 day prayer journey that we're going on together inside of

the Hope app, which that we have some information on how, uh,

you can access that and get into it, if you haven't joined in with us so far,

we're going in a week to hop in with us. But through this,

we actually want to, as a church, this is where we find the value in this,

right? I dunno if you remember last week, I said,

the value in this is not about us just coming together and talking about prayer.

It's actually in experiencing it. So this week, every single day,

we are going to practice a different posture of prayer together, not as like a,

Hey, this is gonna level you up in your Christianity, or this is gonna somehow,

uh, uh, blow the roof off of everything that you knew prayer to be. Listen,

maybe it will be that for you and maybe it won't.

But what we hope is that through practicing these things that,

and somehow it at least stirs up the affection inside of you to say, man,

I'm finding new ways to express my heart to God

And just maybe you've never tried before.

So here's a guided way to be able to go through that.

Some of the things that we're gonna be working through this week is the idea of

kneeling in prayer, which just give us this,

this stature of submission and reverence to God.

The idea of standing with our arms raised over our head.

We see this in scripture as a sign of steadfastness and perseverance,

laying prostrate before the Lord that is face down in complete surrender to

God's will. The same way that Jesus was in the garden of Gethsemane.

It's sitting the way that King David did before the Lord,

just allowing God to speak to us in a place of fellowship and meditation.

It's walking around your neighborhoods or around your schools or around your

cities interceding on the behalf of other people, saying, God,

I'm willing to get some skin in the game and actually take an action to walk

outside of the comfort of my own home,

towards the people that I believe you're calling me to pray for.

It's dancing the way that David danced in a way of celebration and praise

without limitations. And it's sitting in silence,

learning what does it mean for me to sit still and be quiet and turn everything

off and trust and know that God is sovereign?

All of these different things are just ways for us to help, uh,

learn what it looks like to use our whole body,

to focus in on God, because that's what these things are.

These prayer postures are tools to help us

focus on God. It's as simple as that.

If you're anything like me, when you try to pray, man, sometimes your brain,

it just goes all over the place. But it's,

it's just little things like we do in spaces like this where we'll say,

let's pray. And what do you do? I don't know if you think about this or not.

You take on a prayer posture. Typically,

you'll close your eyes and your bow your head. Why? Why?

Like genuine question. Do you ever think about why?

Or do you just do it because it's a reflex? No,

we close our eyes to keep us from getting distracted and we bow our heads out of

reverence and respect for the one that we're talking to. See,

we all have a prayer posture.

But what if we were intentional about taking what we do on the outside and just

letting that be an expression of our hearts, the posture of our heart,

which Jesus really cares about. Listen,

if if you feel like I'm laying in the plane a little quick here, uh,

I am because again, the goal of this is not just to talk about it,

but it's to practice it.

We closed out our time last week of singing a song together as an opportunity of

prayer, and we're gonna do something that's kind of similar to that.

But what I want us to do is, man,

I just want us to worship together in a way where we're just mindful

That we are authentically presenting ourselves to God. And so for you,

if that looks like sitting in your seat, stay in your seat.

If that looks like standing on your, uh, feet and raising your hands,

by all means do that.

If that feels like maybe you need to scoot over a little bit and find a space,

a space in the aisle,

and kneel down before God and just genuinely let him do some soul work,

if it means you just need to not sing, but just listen.

Or maybe it's vice versa,

you actually need to sing these things out even though you don't feel it,

to try to stir up something inside of you towards, uh,

your affections for your father than man. Do that.

Blessed.

But let's not just go through the motions.

Let's actually worship together and listen,

this has been factored in our time together.

You don't have to worry about your kids in kid city.

You don't have to worry about picking up people from middle school or anything

like that. This is a chance for you to just sit

in the midst of your busy week. We said, Hey, what if we just,

what if we gave everyone some time uninterrupted

to just authentically connect with the Father?

And then we'll have a moment of,

of prayer that we kind of guide here with one another. But for now,

let's pray.

Lord, um,

you know us better than we know ourselves.

You intricately made us and you gave us all of our quirks.

God, I think all of us have a part of our personalities of who we are,

that we just feel like we should, uh, hide away from other people.

Maybe we temper it when we leave the house or whatever, but God,

you know that that's there. And God, you want all of us.

So, Lord, whether that is a joy that we feel,

that we don't feel safe to express,

whether that is an anger or a hurt that we have with you,

that we don't know how to let out God or anywhere in between. Father,

we authentically present ourselves to you, to today,

God, as a church, collectively be honored in our worship.

Be honored in our praise. Be honored in our prayers.

Hear us, oh God,

not just for the words that come out of our mouth or the things that are

happening externally, God, but examine our hearts. And Lord,

we just pray that you would give us permission somehow to align the two,

help our bodies to be used, to bring you glory in every way.

Give us postures of prayer both physically and spiritually. Lord,

we honor you today. In your son's name we pray. Amen.

If you're watching with us online, thank you for sticking around. Uh,

I'm actually here with a couple of people, um, in our Raleigh campus right now.

They came to hang out with us through all the snow and all the bad weather

, but we're here, um,

doing the exact same thing.

We just wanna present ourselves to God authentically.

And so I just wanna lead all of us in this moment of doing it.

There's only a few of us here. Uh, so there's plenty of room to,

to get up and move around and spread out. If you're watching this at home,

maybe you're in your living room and maybe you and your family are watching this

together. Maybe you're by yourself, but I just wanna encourage you,

can we just practice, uh, uh, prayer together,

but in a way that is authentic and just uses all that we have. So,

so here's what I wanna invite all of us to do. I just want us to,

to get into this, this posture of getting on our knees.

And, um, once you're there, I just,

I just want you to think about the way that you're sitting for a minute.

Just close your eyes and ask yourself, man,

when was the last time I sat like this before my father?

And I want you to think about what this posture means.

It's a, a position of reverence.

It's a position of respect.

I think in certain aspects it's a position of begging.

But man, we don't beg as, uh, someone going to a tyrant.

We beg as people coming to a father who we know loves us and who we just want

to pour out his love on us and to lavish that love on us in new ways.

And so right now, I just want you to sit,

and I just want you to, to just talk to your father.

And we're gonna do this in a couple of different ways. The first is,

I just want you to spend some time in your own words, just saying, God,

thank you for loving me.

When Jesus talks about a, a good father, um,

he says that,

that God knows what you need in the same way that he provides for the sparrows

he provides for us. And so, I know a lot of us,

we have needs, we all have things in our life that, um, man, if

We just trust, we just need to trust God to supply those things. And so,

I just want you to take a minute

and just in this humble posture,

make your requests known to God.

Let your heavenly Father know what you need.

And then from the same posture of humility, I, i,

can we just ask God to use us

like how he sees fit. To say, I'm,

I'm willing to take my hand off the steering wheel. And God,

I just want to trust you, for you to,

to speak to me and tell me how you wanna lead me and how you want to guide me

and where you wanna send me. Lord,

it's from this posture of humble obedience that we say yes.

So Father, speak to us.

Lord, we love you.

Lord. We love you. Thank you for loving us.

God, thank you that you, uh, saw fit to save us.

Lord,

thank you that you draw us to yourself and that you allow us to just connect

with you. God, we're so humbled by that.

Lord, I pray for our church. Um,

I pray for everybody who's going on this journey with us together of just

connecting with you, God, that your spirit would just be, uh,

made real to all of us. That we would connect with you in new, in fresh ways,

that we would learn what it means to actually pour ourself to you.

Not pour out ourself to you authentically. God may be for the very first time.

And God,

I pray that it changes the trajectories of lives and in turn of families,

and in turn, our church, God,

and in turn our city and in turn our world, father

Lord, we love you. We ask you to use us as you see fit.

Guide us to the places where you want us to go.

Lord, we love you. We love you.

And just from this bent down place of abandoned God that we just say thank you,

we say thank you, thank you for Jesus, thank you for the cross.

In your son's mighty name we pray, amen.

And I just wanna encourage you, man,

just sit in this space for as long as you need to take that time.

Just sit before your father in humility because he loves you.

Guys, thank y'all so much for joining us this week. And, and I just pray that,

uh, man, that this week would be profound

and you just sitting before and connecting with your heavenly Father.