The Midnight Bread

Hey everyone, this is Josh from Encounter Church

Henley, and thanks so much for tuning into our

podcast. Our prayer is that through this podcast,

you can have an encounter with Jesus that'll

change your life. And now get ready for an inspiring

message from our preaching team. Thank you, Clay.

Thank you, Church. Good to be here with you on

a Sunday. I'm just going to do the thing that

I always do, which is get myself a little bit

set up here. For those of you who don't know

me or maybe only know me a little bit or have

just kind of seen me around, my name is Tex.

I am one of the pastors here at Encounter Henley.

Now, when I started thinking about this story,

I'll need you to just kind of bear with me for

a sec. I promise we will get there. When I started

thinking about this, it really made me think

about us as a family and some of my fondest memories

of us as a family. And one of those is when Cadence

was quite young, three, maybe four years old,

when we did like a family visit to the show,

to the Royal Adelaide Show. And it's one of those

awesome memories that I will kind of never forget.

But if you know anything about the show, if you've

been to the show, especially if you've taken

a family to the show, if you're a kid that's

ever been taken to the show by your family, please

feel free to send them a text after this message

to say thank you. Because if I can tell you one

thing about taking a family to the show, it is

that it... is expensive. It is going to cost

you a few bucks. So you get there and you pay

for your entry. If you're smart, you go to Foodland

beforehand and save your, I don't know, $3 .20

for a family ticket or whatever it is. And you

get there and then what happens immediately is

that your kids want to do some stuff immediately.

So you get there and Cadence sees the really

big slippery dip and she's like, can I please

go down the really big slippery dip? And of course

I go, of course you can. of course we're going

down the really big slippery dip I'm afraid of

the big slippery dip but she's not so we're going

down the big slippery dip and she loved it and

she gets down the bottom and she thinks she looks

at me and she goes dad can I go on the carousel

Of course you can go on the carousel. That's

a bit more dad speed. So yeah, of course you

can go on the carousel. And we go on the carousel

and it's so cute. A little kid on a carousel,

genuinely nothing better in the world. And we

get off the bottom of, you know, the carousel

and we go on for a bit of a walk around and immediately

she sees the flashing 1D thing that definitely

has a cost of about 93 cents but... They're definitely

charging you $25 and absolutely will not make

the entirety of the car ride home. And she says,

Dad, can I have the $25 flashy wandy thing? And

I go, oh honey, of course you can have the flashy

wandy thing. It's only $25 after all. And look,

if you go to the show and don't have a Dagwood

dog, have you actually been to the show? The

answer is no. In case you're wondering, you must

have a Dagwood Dog at the show. It is the rules.

Those also not cheap. And then she says, Dad,

can I please have a Wiggle Showbag? And I'm like,

of course. What kind of man would I be to deny

my daughter a Wiggle Showbag? And then this one

might have been a bit more Kara, and it's definitely

a little bit cadence. Well, Dad, can we please

get some hot donuts? I believe you can't go to

the show and not have a Dagwood Dog. Kara believes

you cannot go to the show and not have hot cinnamon

donuts. Jazz. We were talking about this earlier.

I'm like, Jazz, you have no idea how prophetic

you are being right now during team prayer as

we talk about this. So, at this point, we've

been at the show for about six hours and we have

spent approximately six, seven, we've been asked

for about six or seven hundred things. We have

spent approximately nine million dollars. It's

about 6 p .m. She's only a toddler at this stage,

don't forget. So we are now headed back to the

car and we're walking and Kara's got one of her

hands and one of her arms. She's in the middle

and we're holding a hand each and it's that real

cute hallmark moment. And she stops and she looks

at me and she says, Dada? And I go, oh. And if

you've seen photos of like toddler cadence, just

like a massive, she's all curls and lips, right?

And she looks at me and she's like, Dada? And

I go, yeah, honey, and I think this is it. I'm

about to get one of those Hallmark movie moments

Where it's just like oh, I love you, and this

was the best day ever and she looks and she goes

data Can I get a happy meal for dinner And I'll

be honest My first thought was you have absolutely

got to be kidding me the shameless audacity on

this kid. We have been at the show. I have, there's

effectively a second mortgage happening right

now and now you want a happy meal. You've had

so much stuff already. You have asked for so

much. You have received so much and you are now

asking for more stuff. You want something more.

And for a moment I was absolutely gobsmacked.

If I'm being honest, for a moment I was a little

bit mad. And then do you know what we did? You

want to take a guess? We got happy meals for

dinner and it was great and that and Maybe I'm

a sucker Don't Maybe I'm a sucker, but maybe

Just maybe I wanted her to have it Maybe Her

asking for more wasn't born out of selfishness

or it wasn't born out of a lack of appreciation

Most of you in this room have met Kate and she

is a very appreciative kid. She's a wonderful

kid But maybe her asking for more was not born

out of that, but that boldness, that persistence,

that desire to ask for more was actually a direct

response to what she'd already received. She

had asked for plenty that day, sure. But she'd

also received most of what she asked for. Not

everything, by the way. A few dad points in there,

right? Like, not everything that she asked for,

but most of it. And as a result... Maybe this

place of question, this place of asking for more,

was really just born out of the fact that I'd

actually given her no good reason not to ask

for more. And as a result, why shouldn't she

ask for more? And that audacity, that boldness,

that persistence, that kind of more, more, more,

asking for more, that persistence of a toddler

at the show is actually exactly that kind of

shamelessness that Jesus is asking of you and

me with the parable of the Midnight Bread. As

Tim spoke about last week, and Ash the week before,

but Tim made it really, really clear that it's

important to remember that Jesus, when he's talking

in the parables, he's not using these as like

good life examples. He's not using them as a

way to just be like, here's a bit of life advice.

The parables are designed explicitly to reveal

things to us about Jesus himself. And we joke

sometimes about how Jesus teaches in like riddles.

He's like begging us to follow him down the rabbit

hole as he winks at us a few times and goes,

ah, you'll work it out or you won't and maybe

I'll explain it, maybe I won't. If he explained

all of it, we're kind of, you know, I don't know

what I'm doing here on a Sunday most weeks, right?

So, but directly before the telling of this parable,

Jesus actually gives one of the most direct and

one of the most straightforward answers that

he ever gives when asked a direct question in

the Bible. Directly before this, in Luke 11 .1,

Jesus is praying when one of the disciples approaches

him and says, Lord, teach us how to pray. And

Jesus responds as clear as you like. When you

pray, say, Father, hallowed be your name, your

kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread

Forgive us our sins for we also forgive everyone

who sins against us and leads us not into temptation

With the translation I was reading and going

through that's it. That's the whole prayer No

rabbit hole Pretty simple. It's pretty direct

Now this prayer when you kind of dig into it

now for those playing at home is the Lord's Prayer,

right? You've seen a thousand different versions

of it over the years I really quite like this

one. Now this translation, it does two things.

The first is that at the very beginning of this

prayer, which is how Jesus is teaching us how

to pray, it establishes God as holy, thus establishing

the dynamic and the hierarchy with which we're

approaching the rest of this prayer. Hallowed

be your name sets God apart. Hallowed be your

name. Holy be your name. Sets God above all of

us. He is the ruler of all creation. So what

we're saying when we establish that at the beginning

is God, I am praying to you because you are holy.

I am praying to you because I want your kingdom

come here on earth as it is in heaven. Now the

second thing that the Lord's Prayer does when

presented in this way is it establishes a pattern

in which the expectation is that we are to ask

for bold and shameless requests. Three things

in this prayer, give me daily bread, forgive

my sins, lead me not into temptation. We're effectively

recognizing God as holy and as a result we are

saying, Lord I ask you to sustain me, forgive

me and protect me. Like a child at the show,

this prayer establishes ask, ask, ask. Bold,

audacious, persistent. And the Bible is clear,

by the way, that we are to pray continuously.

Continually, pray consistently. Again, depends

on your translation. This isn't pray once. This

isn't pray this prayer once. Jesus is clear.

This is the pattern for when you pray, not if

you pray. And then it begs the question a little

bit. Why does Jesus go straight from teaching

us how to pray? Again, super clear, super clean.

This is how you will pray. directly into this

parable. Again, sometimes when we're talking

and we're doing these, we're doing a teaching

and we're talking through a text, we're like,

and then he goes to this, to this, and we kind

of skip a few verses in the middle just to kind

of help prove a point. Genuinely in this, this

is how you pray into the parable. And in this

parable, we find a man who has traveling friends

that have rocked up on his doorstep. in the middle

of the night and they are tired and they are

hungry and we are in a place, in a culture where

hospitality is kind of king, right? If your friends

rock up at your place in the middle of the night,

tired and hungry, you give them something to

eat and then you give them somewhere to rest.

Now he has a place for them to rest, so like

tick, wonderful. What he does not have is anything

for them to eat, not a lot of refrigeration.

So what does he do? He runs to his friend's house,

And again, I want you to think of this, Sarah

actually beautifully talking about, and again,

thank you Sarah for talking to us about compassion

before, but Sarah beautifully explained kind

of what the villages and the housing situation

look like in Indonesia. In a way, you can kind

of use that as your picture for the situation

that we're talking about here. Houses in this

time were not like, they're not a four bed two

bath, you know? Like this is, you've more than

likely got one really big room. Which is kind

of splintered two sections one side for sleeping

quarters one side for meal preparation Genuinely,

you might have like a cow or a goat or something

like in the property as well for safekeeping

like it's a bit of a mess It's not once you're

kind of said when he says like, oh the house

is all locked up for the night He's not saying

I've got these like 15 deadlocks and I've got

one of those little slidey things But what he

means is yo my guy I have finally got everything

in here. The chaos is like settled. And if you

knock on my door and keep on knocking you are

not just disturbing me, the odds are you are

disturbing the entire ecosystem of this house.

But the friend rocks, rolls up and he knocks

on the door and he's like, hey my man, three

loaves of bread please. Again, I'm going to use

that word again, the audacity of this man. This

is absolutely shameless behaviour. There is no

other word for it. Now, just to be clear, I love

you guys. I love this church and I love all of

you individually. But if you come to my house

in the middle of the night and knock on my door

and wake my wife and kids up and I rush to the

door in my PJs and I get there and you're like,

hey, Tex, per chance. Any tip top floating around.

I will be stunned. I will be absolutely stunned.

Please don't do this. But I tell you what, I'm

also, I'm gonna give you that bread. If you rock

up in my house and wake me up in the middle of

the night and what your request is is a bit of

bread, I'm probably gonna give you the bread.

Why? Maybe because I'm tired. The truth is because

you've asked me for it. you've rolled up we're

already here right we're already here i might

as well give it to you and not just because we're

friends although trust me that will help but

because of the sheer audacity of the request

itself which is again exactly what happens in

this pro in this parable. I imagine that the

possessor of the bread, by the way, is like,

he just kind of slips the door open. Eventually,

right, this guy keeps on knocking, like, I need

the bread, I need the bread, three loaves of

bread. I imagine the maid eventually is just

like door open, shoves the bread out the door,

here's your bread, see you, bye. And like locking

up the house and beginning the process of getting

everything back and settled again. But again,

don't miss the fact that he gives him the bread.

The shamelessness and boldness of the request

is enough to make it a request worthy of fulfillment.

Because it's only in the shameless asking of

the bread giver that his friend and neighbor

could even know it was a gap that needed filling

and one that he could actually fulfill. You can

only respond to shameless requests when they're

made because an equally shameless offer of generosity

can kind of sound insane. Again, think about

this. Rocking up at my place in the middle of

the night asking for bread. Shameless, bold,

persistent. Me rocking up at your house knocking

on the door to offer three loaves of bread. Weird,

unhinged, a little creepy if I'm being honest.

These two guys were mates. There's no way that

their friendship doesn't play a part in the fulfillment

of the request. And if you think back again to

Cadence at the show, her requests weren't to

a stranger, but her requests were to a father

that she knows loves her. So why should she have

any fear in the world about making one more bold

request? And if we remember that the parables

are actually about Jesus, not you and me, not

the dynamics of a friendship that we may have,

What exactly is it that Jesus is trying to tell

us about Him here? What makes Him different to

our neighbors and friends? What makes Jesus'

response so different to the way you or I may

choose to respond? And again, I can't emphasize

enough. Most importantly, Jesus wants us to know

that it is the shamelessness of the request itself

that leads to the fulfillment. Jesus is not a

reluctant friend, annoyed at our request. Jesus

is a loving Father who wants us to have good

things. Whether that be for the first time or

for the 5 ,000th time, that is a word that was

harder to say than I wanted it to be. Whether

it be for the first time or the 600th time, that

flowed much nicer. Whether you're a new believer,

whether you're a seasoned prayer warrior. This

parable we have this pattern where we hear about

how to pray and then we hear this parable itself

and then in Luke 11 10 it literally tells us

for everyone who asks receive the one who seeks

finds and To the one who knocks the door will

be opened Everyone who asks no other caveats.

So that means you too Now it's our desire to

bring everything to Jesus regardless of circumstance.

It's in that in that it becomes of an an affirmation

of us recognizing him as being sovereign. With

the belief that not only can he fulfill our needs

but he's actually the only one capable of fulfilling

our needs and a recognition that not only is

he capable but he wants to. So if Jesus is telling

us what we can expect of him, I suppose it's

not unreasonable to kind of ask, well, like,

what is Jesus asking of us in response to that

truth? And the first is that he wants us to pray

with shamelessness. There is no such thing as

a bad time with Jesus. There is no midnight knock

on the door that He won't answer. There's no

pushback on the other side. There's no, my man,

you have to understand it's been a long day and

it's not a good time. It doesn't exist. So we

need to pray with that kind of shamelessness.

We're to pray with persistence. Like a kid at

the show, he wants us to ask and ask and ask.

Prayer itself and what we pray for again is not

a one -time thing. And I'll leave you in a little

secret. Persistent prayer isn't about changing

Jesus, it's about changing us. It's about changing

how we relate to Him. And as William McGill says,

the value of persistent prayer is not that God

will hear us, but that we will finally hear God.

Persistent prayer is about us seeking to unite

our will with God's and being willing to return

to Him over and over again in that pursuit with

the expectation that He will respond. And the

third thing we're asked to do in this is to pray

with bold audacity. Because the problem is too

often when we don't bring things to Jesus it's

because we either think it is too small or unfortunately

it's far too often because we think it's too

big. And when we're doing that we are placing

limitations on a God that has none. He wants

to be with us as we prepare for our maths test

in the same way that he wants to be with us as

we await a medical diagnosis or in the same way

he wants to sit with us as we face the results

of one. Ian Bowne sums it up beautifully. Our

praying however needs to be pressed and pursued

with an energy that never tires, a persistency

which will not be denied and a courage which

never fails. Ours is a God who does not tire,

will not be denied and does not fail and our

prayer life needs to treat him as such. So why

don't we pray like that? Why don't we do it?

I'll throw up some examples that I have heard

directly from people and have probably said at

some point in my life. So like, I'm with you,

okay? First is, we don't know how. I don't know

how to pray like that. I don't know how to pray.

I don't know what I'm supposed to say. I don't

know what I'm supposed to do. No judgment. Absolutely

no judgment here. But again, like seven minutes

ago, Jesus, I read out how Jesus has literally

said, here's how you should pray. And I've heard

people say, I don't like praying out loud because

I'm worried about like, I don't sound as good

as some people say, like Charlie's got all this

like great theology and stuff, and like Tim says,

it's like, guys, start, if you are not sure where

to pray, start with the Lord's Prayer. Every

time. And if that's all you pray, that's enough.

Second reason we don't pray like that, we don't

pray with boldness. bold audacity is feelings

of inadequacy or annoyance. We too often think

that our prayers are too small for Jesus to care

about, or too big for him to actually be able

to alter. Which leads to timidity. And timidity

becomes our greatest barrier. Terminity forms

in us a dangerous ideology that tends to take

us down the path of self -reliance. If we are

too afraid to ask God about it, or for it, or

to be involved with this in it, then we immediately

take up the mantle assuming that we are responsible

for it instead. And as a result, followers of

Jesus too often become selective with our submission.

And prayer is the ultimate. act of submission.

God in heaven, hallow be your name. That means

everything else flows from that truth. Everything.

We need to be bold like a child with a father

who has proven time and time again that he loves

them, that he wants good things for them, and

that he wants to be the one that provides those

good things. Banji, you can come back up. That'd

be wonderful. This parable And the way that Jesus

tell it, the journey that Jesus takes us on through

Luke means that this parable is a green light.

For our prayer lives to be big, to be bold, to

ask for more and more and more and more, and

when we think we have exhausted ourselves, or

we think we have exhausted what it is that we

can ask of Jesus, then we should pray more and

ask for more again. And as I was thinking about

this, as I was thinking like about those reasons,

I won't even say we, I don't pray like that all

the time. It really led me to think of something.

Have you ever prayed for something, like really

desperately? I'm talking like when you, have

you really prayed for it? I'm talking on your

knees, weeping, pouring your heart out. The I

don't care who sees me, this right now is between

me and the Lord type of prayer. Have you ever

had that kind of prayer? If you haven't, that's

okay. This parable, this teaching, today's message

is an invitation into that kind of prayer, is

an invitation into that kind of space. But if

you have, and I have by the way, I made a...

probably life very uncomfortable for a few people

at XTOL a few years ago, right? As I had one

of those moments quite, you know, just literally

sitting in a row of chairs like this. And I'll

be honest, as I was preaching this message and

getting ready to bring this message to you guys

this week, I had to ask myself, and I'll be honest,

I had to feel a little bit of shame around the

sense of, yeah, when was the next time that I

prayed like that? I prayed in that moment for

something that I desperately wanted, that doctors

here on earth were telling me or telling us and

our group of friends it was nigh on impossible.

I felt so clearly that I'd heard from God in

that time. And I'll be honest, I don't remember

the next time I prayed like that. It might have

been weeks, it might have been months, it might

have been years. Praying shamelessly, praying

with boldness is one thing, but doing it over

and over and over again, asking Jesus to intercede

on your behalf, on the behalf of others, over

and over and over again, that is where your heart

begins to transform. Because it's in that kind

of prayer that we start to get a sense of what

this parable is actually talking about. Again,

Jesus is capable of more than we can possibly

imagine and his expectation is that we treat

him as such. He knows we have an eternal hunger

and an unquenching thirst that only he can fulfill.

And it's actually no, there's absolutely no way

it's an accident that this parable is about somebody

asking for bread. In John 6 35 Jesus says, I

am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me shall

not hunger and whoever believes in me shall never

thirst. So Jesus uses parable talking about coming

and shamelessly and repeatedly knocking on a

door and saying, I need bread. And this is a

parable that is about Jesus Him revealing Himself

to us and saying, Hey, you can come to me the

bread of life time and time and time again and

I will sustain you. The best part, we know this

for those in the room who are followers of Jesus,

we know this. And if you are not currently a

follower of Jesus, I need you to hear this. is

that in order to receive that bread, in order

to receive that sustenance, we literally, all

He wants us to do is to ask. He wants us to come

to Him and He wants us to ask. That's it. That's

where it all starts. Jesus is offering us the

most unbelievable gift, an eternal gift, one

that you would think would require or should

require something great of us in return. But

no, in order to receive it all we have to do

is come, ask and believe. I'm not going to be

honest, I don't think Jesus came to sacrifice

Himself on the cross in the boldest act imaginable,

to atone for our sins, for us to respond by being

too timid to ask Him for anything more. He's

already given us grace, love and forgiveness

beyond our wildest imagination. What makes you

think He's going to stop listening now? What

makes you think He's going to stop offering to

do more now? This love, this grace, this forgiveness,

we need to be shameless in coming to Him and

asking for it time and time and time and time

again. Whether the knock on that door is for

the first time or for the thousandth time, whether

it's 3 a .m. or during business hours, because

that's exactly what He wants us to do, that's

exactly what He's asking us to do. So as we come

to a close today and as we come back into a time

of worship, what do you need to ask Jesus for?

What have you stopped praying for? What have

you knocked for once or twice? Maybe you have

knocked a thousand times and it feels a little

bit exhausting at this point. My challenge is

what have you got to lose by praying again? What

have you got to lose by asking one more time?

So as we come into this time, I'd ask you to

stand as we join and worship if you're able.

Take some time to pray. What is that one prayer?

What is that one thing? And I want you to pray

that prayer, not just today, not just during

worship, not just because you're here on a Sunday.

I want you to take that prayer home with you,

and I want you to pray it every single day. Just,

you know what? Do it for a week. Take it home

and pray it every single day. Pray the Lord's

Prayer. You could even use the little cut down

one that I gave you today. And then pray that,

and then pray for that one prayer. And you say,

Jesus this is where I need you today. Jesus I

know I've asked before, but I'm asking again.

Because you are sovereign over all. Because I

am your child. Because I am... your child and

you are my father and I know that you want to

give me good things and I believe that you are

capable of doing it. Jesus is desperate to hear

your prayers no matter the time, no matter the

circumstance, no matter the frequency. Thanks

so much for tuning into this week's message.

If you felt challenged or need prayer, we'd love

to hear from you on Instagram at encounterhenley.

Or if you're interested in how you can support

this ministry, please go to our website encounteradelaide

.com .au. Thanks again for listening. God bless

you.