"A House of Prayer for All Nations" - Pastor Greg Addison - Jan. 14, 2024

Ministering to the heart of Western Arkansas's River Valley for over 165 years, welcome to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.

You'll find sermons and teachings from Pastor Greg, our ministry staff, and guest speakers.

Thank you for listening.

Thank you again, choir team and orchestra and all of our tech folks and everything for leading us in worship today.

Now, I don't normally take my phone out when I'm preaching, right?

Y'all got that.

But here's what we're gonna do.

Randy is watching the weather, and he's gonna text me.

So I'm not playing video games or anything like that if I look at my phone.

So that way we can all relax and we can and we can uh handle it.

I've done these weather things before in my first pastorate in the city of Perigul, which is one of the cities, a little like ours, who's in a uh tornado run.

One Sunday night, we're in the middle of service.

We had a youth team that was returning from a mission trip in New York City, and uh and they flashed up on those screens right there, uh category four tornado five miles away.

And I'm thinking, if that's a joke, that is not funny.

But it turns out it was legitimate and it hit uh the town adjacent, one of the towns adjacent to uh Paragul, Marmaduke, and so we stopped church and we kind of dealt with everything and took care of it.

So we got this.

Good?

Everybody good?

You relax now?

All right, turn with me in your Bibles in Mark chapter 11.

Mark 11 · chapter mention

And today we're gonna continue our study on the house of prayer.

And today we're actually going to look at that scripture verse when Jesus uh quotes the Old Testament and he actually says, My house should be called a house of prayer.

Now, this is also a fascinating story because this is a dramatic moment, and if you've been in church any amount of time, you have uh heard this story.

This is the story where Jesus comes into the courtyard outside of the temple and overthrows the tables where they're doing money changers and all that kind of stuff, and he throws them all out and calls them thieves and all that kind of a deal.

And we all kind of get that part of the story because that's kind of exciting, right?

Like, I can't wait to get to heaven and talk to Jesus about that.

Like, tell me about that.

Like, that's kind of awesome.

And we sort of love that picture of Jesus, right?

He's defending the house of God and he's throwing out all these people.

I mean, he just I just love that picture.

I mean, that's one of my pictures of Jesus that I really like.

But there's so much more involved in that than just the dishonesty of how they were doing that.

In fact, it really isn't even about that nearly as much as it is about God's vision for his people being a people of prayer.

So read with me in Mark chapter 11.

Mark 11 · chapter mention

Now, what's already happened at this point is we have had Jesus come into Jerusalem in the moment that we refer to as Palm Sunday.

If you've been in church around, you heard that.

And so this week begins to unfold as Jesus is heading towards the cross.

And so we see in multiple times in these events just how much the cross and the work of the gospel is looming on the heart and the mind of Jesus.

It is consuming him that this is why he is come, and he is about to go, and he's going to do the eternal work of dying on the cross for our sins, being raised again.

He tells his disciples that.

They don't grasp that this is about Jesus coming to be the Lamb of God to take away the sins of the world.

In fact, as Jesus is coming on that road, and I've actually been on that road and walked that road in the journey that Jesus took when he's riding on that donkey.

And you can picture what happens here.

It's actually on a hill.

And so Jerusalem is a little bit like northwest Arkansas.

There's really not anywhere that you can stand that your feet are on the same level.

It's pretty much like this, all up and down.

And so on that road, you cross this hill and you begin down this road that goes into the valley that comes back up into Jerusalem.

And as you crest this hill, right now you see this mosque, but it's gleaming gold on its dome and all that.

But it's easy to picture what the temple must have looked like on that spot.

And you cross over and you Jesus sees the temple.

He understands what he's going to do, he understands how the temple is the picture of God amongst his people and bringing the gospel.

Jesus knows he's going to do that.

He sees all these people who've misunderstood what's happening.

And the Bible says that Jesus breaks down emotionally and begins to weep and says, You do not understand why I've come.

And so you can just see on the heart and mind of Jesus how this event of salvation that is about to take place, and people don't understand it, and they've lost the understanding of it.

The Jewish religion and how it is operating has become a legalistic methodological thing, and they've missed the whole point of the promise of the coming of the Messiah.

They've lost an understanding that the sacrifices are to teach us that there is no payment for sin outside the shedding of blood.

And that God had promised to send the Messiah to be the one to shed his blood and die in our place, so that his death could be a substitute death for us and pay the price for our sins.

The prediction of the resurrection and the joy of what that means, of being born again and of eternal life, and they've missed all of that.

And so now you have this moment where Jesus comes to the temple, and what he sees laid out in front of him, he is in one of the large courtyards, and it's the courtyard, it's the only courtyard on the temple grounds that Gentiles could even enter into.

They're not in the temple, but they're in the courtyard outside of that.

Now, this is Passover time, and so what would happen is people would come from everywhere on Passover.

And the way they had established the function of the temple at that time, there was a temple tax to come there and worship.

There were fees that you had to pay, there are sacrifices, animals that you had to sacrifice, and there are standards for those animals that they have to be pure and without blemish and all of this.

So you got all this happening.

People are coming from everywhere.

You have all kinds of currency.

Of course, Rome is ruling the world at that point.

You have Roman money, you still have things from Jewish culture and currency from that.

You have all this stuff, people coming from all over the world, all of these different things.

And as they would come to the temple, what would happen is they began to set up this system where out in this courtyard, you could come and instead of having to drag your animals to the sacrifice, you could buy them there.

You see, Buckey's is not a new idea.

You could come and if you're going to pay your temple tax, you had to pay it in the right currency, and they would exchange your currency for you for a fee.

And they estimate that if you bought your sacrifice animals, like your turtle doves to do and to present or whatever, that you would spend five to ten times as much in this courtyard as you would out somewhere else.

The fees on the currency exchange were exorbitant at best.

And then the high priest and his cadre of priest leaders were operating the booths, or they were receiving rental fees for booths, and they were making all kinds of personal money on top of what was happening to fund the temple and all of that.

You have this whole process that illustrates that people had lost an understanding of what the temple is and what it means and the promise of God to bring the Messiah to take away our sin.

Jesus, who has entered the city to be that Messiah and has been confronted everywhere he turns with people who've misunderstood what the point is and what they're doing, he walks into this moment and he sees all these people being bilked.

All these people who've come to worship and who've come to pay their sacrifices to the Lord, and they are getting used and abused by the very process of worship in that place.

And you against that backdrop, now you have this story where the Bible says in verse 15, they came to Jerusalem and he went into the temple complex, and this is what he sees.

And he began to throw out those buying and selling in the temple.

He overturned the money changers' tables and the chairs of those selling doves, and would not permit anyone to carry goods through the temple complex.

Now, you can imagine what's happening in the havoc this begins to wreak.

And it is an incredible thing.

You have the priests who are hacked off because Jesus is a messing up their deal.

And since this is Passover, this is the best retail time of the year.

This is like Jesus walking into Walmart on a Black Friday and closing everything down.

I mean, this is like you got to get this picture is happening here.

These people don't know what's happening.

There's all this craziness.

The disciples are probably going, yeah, I don't really know that guy over there.

I mean, there's just all this stuff going on.

And then Jesus began to teach them, the Bible says, My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.

Is it not written, my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations?

He is quoting Isaiah from Isaiah chapter 56.

Isaiah 56 · chapter mention

We'll talk about that in a minute.

But this is what Jesus says: Is it not written in God's word that my house should be called a house of prayer for all nations?

But you have made it a den of thieves.

Then the chief priests and scribes heard it and started looking for a way to destroy him.

But they were afraid of him because the whole crowd was astonished by his teaching.

And so what you get in this moment is Jesus begins to grab a hold of all of this process and focus everything on salvation.

And here's what he knows.

I'm coming in here to the temple to tell people about God's salvation, and the church has missed all of it.

And Jesus' first thought is the thing that should be happening more than anything else amongst God's people and God's house is people seeking the Lord through prayer.

That's his response.

And so for us as the church, I think it's really important for us to understand why this is happening and what Jesus is saying in the midst of this.

I mean, his whole point is look, everything we do should be God's people coming to him to be in his presence and pray and plead for others to be able to come into his presence through the gospel.

That's who God's house and people should be.

And that's what disturbs Jesus so much.

Yes, he calls them thieves and robbers, but they are that not because they're making money on some of that.

They are that because they are stealing the very message of the house of God.

They are literally blocking people from access to the Lord when God's house is supposed to be the place where we come to have access to the Lord.

And he chooses this statement from Isaiah to say, listen, this should be a house of prayer for all nations.

And it's an incredible, incredible picture here.

Hopefully, as you were reading this past week in your daily journals, as you read through time after time after time where God's people were praying and they were coming to prayer, they were praying over the preaching, they were praying every time there was a problem, they were praying for each other, they were constantly in prayer.

The theme for us, we ought to understand that everything we do is about having access to the personal, uh, to the person of God and pleading for God through the gospel to bring other people into his presence.

He is not just quoting from the Old Testament, but he is actually describing the people of God and who we are to be moving forward.

Now, as we're studying this, uh, this study and prayer this month, um, we are doing two things.

You are reading your prayer journals daily, right?

Right?

That was good.

Y'all did that.

If you are, if you're not, it's not too late to get started.

And so we are studying together doing that, but we are also re-establishing or reinvigorating our prayer ministry as a church.

Because if Jesus said, My house shall be called a house of prayer, and the point of the temple or the church or the people of God or however you describe that is being in God's presence and opening the doors through the gospel for other people to come into his presence, then this picture right here is vital for us.

And so we must be a house of prayer.

And so, as a part of that, one of the ways we're illustrating or teaching our prayer ministry that we want to invite you to be a part of.

We're trying to walk through you how to get involved.

We use this idea of the prayer force.

Not just because we're in a military town and even an Air Force town, but really because of the picture that this brings to us of being on mission.

On mission.

That God uses military illustrations all throughout the New Testament.

He tells us military battles and stories of battle and how he steps into battles in the Old Testament.

It's all throughout.

And so it's a very strong illustration used throughout Scripture.

And one of the reasons is because it's universal.

People in every epoch of time and every culture know what an army is, they know what a soldier is.

But also it's universal because you understand mission.

You understand mission.

I've heard people say a long time the the purpose of the military is to kill people, take over land, and break things.

That's what they're supposed to do.

They're on mission, right?

And so that's what we're doing, on mission.

So here's what we want to do.

When you have this picture of this bomber on mission, it is my, our mission is to be in the presence of God and to plead for the souls of men and boys and women, uh, men and women, boys and girls to come into the presence of God through the gospel.

And so here's the central truth of our mission.

The central truth of what Jesus is trying to teach in this moment.

God's purpose, the whole reason Jesus came, the whole reason that he wrote scripture to us so we would understand why Jesus came.

God's purpose is to bring people to himself in relationship through the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We are saved through the gospel.

It removes the barrier of sin between us and him, and it allows us to be in relationship with him, and the way we exercise that relationship with him is in prayer.

The way we see God move is through prayer.

The way we define ourselves as the people of God, it's being in prayer and how we love each other.

Those are the things that are unique to who we are.

And Jesus grabs that moment, and the thing that breaks his heart is that the religious leaders and the church and the process had missed the point of relationship with God, to bring people in relationship to him.

I just know that it frosted Jesus for people to be confronted with all of these barriers and struggles when they are trying to come to the Lord and to seek his forgiveness and worship him.

And so, if we're going to be a people of God, then this is a house of prayer, and prayer is an integral part of what we're doing.

Now, let me just illustrate this passage of scripture very quickly.

Here's what Jesus says.

In Isaiah chapter 56, he uses this, he's quoting from Isaiah.

Isaiah 56 · chapter mention

Now, just to unpack it very quickly, Isaiah 55 is a chapter written to explain that the Messiah would come and that the gospel was to see people saved.

Isaiah 56 talks about the power of the gospel and how God forgives and saves through that, and people come to him, and then he says, My house shall be called a house of prayer.

Then it also says, for all nations, and that's important for us because we understand that the gospel is for everyone.

In the Great Commission in Matthew chapter 28, Jesus said, Go into all the world.

Matthew 28 · chapter mention

In Acts chapter 8, verse 1, when he gives another version of our commission, he says, You wait here until the Holy Spirit gives you power, and then you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost part of the world.

Acts 8:1

A few weeks ago, when we were talking about Zachariah and Elizabeth and Simeon and all those different people in the Christmas story, Simeon was the man, if you'll remember, who blessed Jesus when they brought him to the temple as a baby to purify him.

And Simeon, as he pronounced that blessing over Jesus, he used this phrase: this is the Messiah who is the light to the Gentiles.

And so Israel and the Messiah was referred to as the light to the Gentiles.

The gospel is for all people, and God has intended it for all people.

And so in this picture, Jesus is saying, all of these people are coming, and I'm dying for the world, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son, and the magnitude of the spread of the gospel is on Jesus' heart.

And people being separated or prevented from coming, it just breaks the heart of our Savior because he came to see them saved.

And so not only does he say a house of prayer, it's not just for the church people to come and spend time, but it is the lighthouse of the gospel that brings people into the presence of God.

And so Isaiah, through the prompting of the Holy Spirit, adds this house of prayer shall be a house of prayer for all nations.

And when Jesus quotes that scripture, he chooses that scripture on purpose.

Because yes, it is a house of prayer and people coming into the presence of God, but it is also for God so loved the world that he gave his son, and it is a house of prayer for all nations.

And on his mind and heart is his journey to the cross and the accomplishment of the gospel, and that the house of God is to be here for the gospel to bring all people to him.

And so our prayers have got to be structured, not just in praising the Lord, we get to be in God's presence, but Lord, we are here for all nations to come to know Jesus.

We are here for people who are not in the presence of God to have a process of coming into the presence of God.

And so when he picks this picture of the people of God, he picks it specifically, and it is a broad, full picture of the gospel itself.

Then we talked about what's happening in there and how that's a barrier.

And then he uses this phrase, but you have turned it into a den of thieves.

He is now quoting from Jeremiah chapter 7.

Jeremiah 7 · chapter mention

And in that passage of Scripture, he actually Uses a much more nefarious description of theft and and and criminals and all that.

He uses the term robber.

And when you get in the New Testament, there's actually a difference in the original language between the word thief and the word robber.

If you want to think about the word thief, you can think about like Matthew the tax collector, like he's just cheating people.

You think about, you know, someone who is pilfering or someone who is shoplifting.

Then there's another word, robber, and this is a criminal.

This is the guy we're scared of.

This is the one your mama warns you about.

This is why, and my mom and dad would say in Memphis, they'd say, son, you can't go there in that part of the city, because there are robbers there.

In fact, when they offered the choice just a few days later of Jesus or Barabbas, who was being put to death, Barabbas was a robber.

This is the worst form of that crime.

And Jesus says, you guys in this deal, and the actual language is the word robbers.

And he says, You high priests and you people who are cheating people and stopping people from being in the presence of God, you are like robbers.

Robbers like Barabbas, who was put to death, or was scheduled to be put to death until they chose him instead of Jesus.

And you see this picture here.

It's an incredibly powerful message.

And so it's important to understand that Jesus is not throwing them out because they are cheating people.

He is throwing them out because they are blocking them from coming to the Lord.

And they are damaging and covering up the picture of what the house of God should be.

Now, in order for us to understand that mission and to have that mission, mission requires everyone to be on task.

Everyone to be on task.

If we're going to be a house of prayer as the way Jesus has called us to be a house of prayer, if we're going to be a house of prayer on mission of bringing people in the presence of God and pleading for the advance of the gospel to bring more people into the house of God, if we're going to be an example to the river valley of what it looks like to be in the presence of God and draw people to want to be in the presence of God, then we've got to be on mission.

Can't just be playing at it.

It's got to be serious.

We've got to be on mission, and that requires everyone to be on task.

And so that's why we've asked in the journal and us do this together, and every day we're praying together.

It's because we all need to be everyone.

Without you, we're not everyone.

And so everyone's got to be on task.

Everyone's got to be involved.

I want to encourage you as you study your thing during the week, talk to a friend, text somebody, have coffee with somebody, encourage them.

Let's hold each other accountable.

Share what you're hearing from the Lord.

Share what you're learning from those scriptures.

Let's really be together, everyone, in this process.

And then on task, what a prayer ministry should do in a church is be the mechanism that keeps us on task.

And that's how we've designed the roles to function.

That this is that backbone in the church that keeps everyone on mission with this being a house of prayer for all the nations.

Let me real quickly just walk through those roles again because we're inviting you to come and learn about how to get involved and sign up on January the 28th, that Sunday night.

Sign ups are still out there even today.

And so here's what our roles are.

We divided it into three tasks, and these are the positions on a B-17 bomber.

We've used that as our illustration to teach.

The pilots are the group that are directing us.

They've got the wheel and they're keeping the plane on the straight and narrow, and they are walking us through that.

He was the commander on the bomber.

He was responsible for training and all of that.

And so we will have a group of pilots that will function as a task force that will help us as we recruit people, be on task, praying together, and all of that.

And it's important, it is so important that this not be a pastor staff thing.

We cannot be a house of prayer for all nations without everyone.

And so we are building this so this is a congregational structured deal.

This is all of us together.

And then the second role, and these folks are key, the navigator on the bomber was really, in a lot of ways, the most important person.

Because you are on a mission, you were given an assignment to accomplish.

You were going to go bomb that city and you're going to return.

And the only way to do that is if the navigator knew how to get there, how to keep them on track to get there, and then knew how to get them home.

They knew a lot of the other positions on the bomber because they could go and help fill in spots, but they were the ones that made sure that we stayed on mission and accomplished what we were required to do.

And so we are using that term navigator to describe people who will sign up Monday through Saturday from 8 in the morning to 10 at night.

We want to have a constant stream of prayer calling out to the Lord.

And so you can sign up for a half an hour, an hour slot.

Our prayer room is set up during the business hours.

If you want to come in and pray here, and I pray that we have people throughout the week who are here praying.

But you don't have to be in the prayer room to pray in your committed spot.

And so we will have a virtual way that you can get the prayer requests and be trained and do your spot where you are.

Like if you're 9 o'clock home at night and you're going to pick up 9 to 10 and pray before you go to bed, fantastic.

You can do that right there in your prayer closet or your study or your bedroom or wherever it is that you meet with the Lord.

And then on Sunday mornings, we want to have the prayer room with several people who begin praying when the service starts and they pray all the way through the end, and we are covering every worship service and all aspects of it in prayer every Sunday.

And we've called those the navigators because it's those people who are praying constantly that create that structure that keep us on mission to be a house of prayer for all nations.

They'll have two lists of prayer requests every single time they pray without fail.

And the first one is this the first one is that a list that they are praying every single time they meet, every one of them.

And so they're going to be praying for revival and spiritual awakening in the River Valley.

They're going to be praying that we see more people saved.

We have people who are listening to the gospel.

We have people who are in conversations with Sunday school teachers and staff people and doors that God has opened, and they're in the process of asking questions, and we're walking them through that journey.

We have people that hear us preach on television and all of that.

And so we are praying that God is using all of that gospel to draw people to Himself.

House of Prayer for All Nations.

And as we are constantly praying for people to be saved and praying for revival and spiritual awakening, it keeps us on task as a church.

It keeps us on mission to know that we are always being guided by praying for people to be saved.

And then they will have another list that are things that might be happening in the church and all of that.

And then the third list are the gunners.

And those are the folks that man the machine guns.

And so when the bomber gets in on the battlefield and it's in that place where he's going to be attacked and has to defend itself, there are 10 men on that bomber, and anywhere between six and eight could at any one time be on a machine gun.

It's why they name that plane, that airframe, a flying fortress.

Because it was built to withstand all kinds of damage and it was built to defend itself.

And it is a formidable machine when you have all of the gunners in place firing away, defending the mission.

And so that's who our gunners are.

So you may have never been involved in a prayer ministry before.

This may be new for you, and we wanted to have a way that you could get involved and help you grow in that process.

But we also know that there are times, man, we are in the middle of it.

Defrosta weekend this weekend, which our students had a great weekend.

And we had people who were praying and they were sending out prayer requests all through that thing.

In fact, I sent Jake a text the other day and said, Hey, I have manned a machine gun and I'm a gunner all weekend.

So I've been a gunner all weekend.

There are times like that, mission trips, vacation Bible school, different times in the church where we need to become a flying fortress as the church.

We need to become that formidable force because we are loaded up and ready to go to battle.

And so all three of those roles, and what will happen in that gunner role is we'll send you emails in times when you're called to prayer with instructions, what the prayer requests are, pray during this period of time, and we'll load up and everybody be ready to go.

It's a simple way to understand it, but we want to make it understandable and clear so everyone can be involved, so that we can meet Jesus, picture, description, command, and heart to be a house of prayer for all nations.

We'll have that organizational meeting on the 28th.

You don't have to be there to sign up, but we'd love to galvanize everybody together and get them together.

If you have questions between now and then, please call.

Please ask one of us and let us help you.

Last week's triangle podcast, as we got moving again, I've walked through all these positions again, and so we're trying to do everything we can do to get this information to help everybody understand how we're going, how we're going to do this.

Why do we do this?

Because we want people to be saved.

And when God's people pray and we're faithful to share the gospel, Jesus saves.

And you may have never trusted Christ as your Savior.

This may be new to you.

And we want you to know these prayers are for you, and we are praying for you to be saved.

That's why when we describe this moment where Jesus cleans out this part of the temple, it was important for us to let you know and help you understand that Jesus was headed to the cross on purpose to pay the price for your sins.

He rose again, conquering death and sin, to offer you forgiveness.

And if you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, we're going to invite you to do that.

There's no ice yet.

There's plenty of time for you to be saved.

So if you're at home watching or you're here in the room, listen, we want to invite you to give your life to Jesus Christ, to trust him as the Lord and Savior of your life.

How do I do that, Pastor?

It's very simple.

Scripture tells us what to do.

If you will believe and understand that this is actual history, that Jesus literally, actually stepped out of heaven, became a man, lived a sinless life, and went and died for you on the cross and rose again.

The Bible says in the book of Romans, if you will believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, if you will take as true what Jesus did for you, and then in your life understand and trust spiritually that the effect of his death for you was to allow you to trust him to take your sins, pay the price for them, and then him, he gives you his righteousness when you trust him as your Savior, the one who died and rose again for you.

But the Bible also says this that decision of faith to trust in him is not just believing that God raised him from the dead, but he says if you will confess that Jesus is Lord, Jesus gave everything and all of who he was to become sin and die for us to accomplish salvation.

And so if Jesus gave his life for us, then Jesus requires that we give our life to him.

That's what it means to confess that he is Lord.

You take everything that you've been, you are, and you ever will be, and you give it all to Jesus.

But he will save you and do more with your life than you could ever imagine if you'll give your life to him.

I'm gonna pray, and then we're gonna stand, and God's people are gonna sing.

And if you need to be saved, I'll invite you to be saved.

Every head bowed, every eye closed, as I move into this time of prayer.

If you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, you can literally see from this passage of Scripture that Jesus went on purpose to the cross, but he also commanded this church, his people, to be praying for you to be saved.

So right now we're praying.

Whether you're at home watching online, watching by television, or whether you're here in the room, we are going to pray as a house of prayer for you to meet Jesus.

Lord, that is our prayer, and we pray that folks will be saved.

We know that you loved us so much you stepped out of heaven to die for us.

You became sin for us.

You took God's full wrath and punishment for that sin, and then you rose again to offer new life and eternal life and forgiveness and joy of walking with you.

And so, Jesus, we pray this morning that this picture from Scripture of what it meant to you to go to the cross will speak to hearts of people either here or as they're watching.

And those who need to know you as that Savior, we pray that you will reveal yourself to their hearts.

Let the living, powerful word of God stir them and call them to you and give them a faith of the truth and the reality of who you are and salvation in your name.

And we pray that people will be saved.

Lord, I pray for us as a church.

I know we have so many people who are prayer warriors and a heart of prayer.

We have a heritage as a church of prayer ministries and calling out for people to be saved.

And Lord, I pray that right now, in this time, in this month, you'll help us as this generation to be faithful and project that prayer passion into the next generation.

That you'll help us to be faithful, to be the house of prayer for all nations that you've called us to be.

Lord, give us the freedom now to respond to you.

In Jesus' name we pray, and all God's people said.

We pray this message has been a blessing to you and helped to strengthen your walk with Jesus.

Please know we want to minister to you and pray for you.

Send an email to contact us at fsfbc.org and let us pray for you and help you in any way we can.

Thank you for listening to chapter and first, the Bible teaching ministry of Fort Smith First Baptist Church.