The 21st Century Disciple: "When You Pray"...

[0:00] if you've been around the block for a while as a Christian you've been praying or if maybe you're new to the Christian faith new to following Jesus maybe you're just learning how to pray whether you've been praying for a while and you're a Jedi Knight of praying or you are just getting started and you feel like you're kind of waddling into prayer Jesus speaks to us and he teaches us how to pray we started a couple weeks ago a series we're calling the 21st century disciple a 21st century disciple is someone who is seeking to intentionally live out every area of their life for Jesus today a couple weeks ago we started the series by listening to those two words of Jesus follow me those two words change everything everything for those who hear those words who receive them by faith and turn from living for ourselves into living for Jesus last week we talked about the importance of the Bible in the life of a Christian following Jesus and this morning we're going to turn to one particular area in which becoming a follower of Jesus makes a pronounced difference your prayer life this morning we're going to see Jesus teaching us what to pray how to pray and why to pray someone's defined prayer as simply talking with God and generally speaking that's true what is that all that it is let's look at Luke chapter 11 1 through 13 if you would turn there now and let's hear God's word these are Jesus words instructing us how to pray now Jesus was praying in a certain place and when he finished one of his disciples said to him

[2:10] Lord teach us to pray as John taught his disciples and Jesus said to his disciples when you pray say Father hallowed be your name your kingdom come give us each day our daily bread and forgive us our sins for we are ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us and lead us not into temptation and Jesus said to his disciples which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him friend lend me three loaves for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey and I have nothing to set before him and he will answer from within do not bother me the door is now shut and my my children are with me in bed I cannot get up and give you anything I tell you though he will not get up and give him anything because he's his friend yet because of his impudence he will rise and give him whatever he needs and I tell you ask and it will be given to you seek and you will find knock and it will be open to you for everyone who asks receives and the one who seeks finds and to the one who knocks it will be open what father among you if his son asks for a fish will instead of a fish give him a serpent or if he asks for an egg will give him a scorpion if you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children how much more will the heavenly father give the holy spirit to those who ask him prayer is more than just speaking with god prayer is calling on the living god to do things that only he can do here in luke jesus teaches us his modern day disciples how to pray and what jesus shows us is that prayer is essentially a means by which we live for god's glory and so this morning here's what i want to help you to see pray big pray bold pray believing jesus is going to help you see to pray big pray bold and when you pray you pray believing that your father in heaven is a how much more father so let's turn to this idea of praying big it's the lord's prayer now jesus taught this material in a variety of different contexts and so it looks like he used the same material but taught the same stuff in matthew 6 which is a different context than here in luke chapter 11 but they're very similar and look where jesus starts in this call to pray big and when you pray say father father this would have been revolutionary when jesus disciples would hear jesus pray and pray to his father they would have never heard anybody praying like that before up until this point when israeli would call on god as father it would be like the king of all father over the nation but what jesus is doing here is he's personally calling god his father it would have been new it's a term of tender affection and authority and what jesus is calling us to do is that we call on our god as father and it's worth noting that the one who's calling us to pray to god as our father he shed his blood so that we can be welcomed into the family of god and with confidence call on god as our father

[6:11] so when you see that word father brother and sister in christ that's a blood right you have the blood of jesus accomplished that for us the only reason why we can call on god as our father is because jesus shed his blood for that we can enter into god's presence and pray to him as father because of jesus so we see this address jesus begins this teaching for his disciples on prayer with this address call your god father note this look at verse 2 he begins this teaching on prayer with father and then look down at verse 13 he ends this teaching on prayer with father he couches the teaching on prayer with this theological category of the fatherhood of god when we pray we pray to our father and then he says hallowed be your name there's there's five petitions in this lord's prayer we've seen the address first petition hallowed be your name when you pray you pray father hallowed be your name we don't use that word hallowed that much that's not something we typically use in everyday language and so what does it mean well it means to to set apart to distinguish it carries the sense of reverent knowledge so when we are to pray hallowed be your name what we're being told to pray is oh father would you in our life in our church set your name apart as holy to be worshipped when Jesus says hallowed be your name that name carries a lot of freight in psalm 20 verse 7 we read some trust in chariots and some in horses but we trust in the name of the lord our god when the bible uses that that word name like that it's talking about the very character of god so name and character god's character are virtually synonymous so when Jesus says hallowed be your name he's saying pray that god's character would be reverenced by all very interesting where he teaches us to start our prayers

[8:56] Jesus calls us to begin praying to our father whose reputation is to go out among the nations calls us to pray big prayers god exalting prayers it doesn't end there your kingdom come in matthew 6 when we read about the lord's prayer there he expands on this your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven so when Jesus commands us to petition the father your kingdom come he's urging us to pray that god's revealed will will be obeyed by his children on earth your kingdom come your will be done on earth it's like Jesus is praying telling us to pray oh when you pray to your father and you pray that you hallow his name and you pray his kingdom come pray that god's people would live in the good of his revealed will that they would obey him the coming kingdom is the saving reign of god and when jesus came the first time he inaugurated that kingdom people are being saved around all the world right now but then he's going to come back a second time and he's going to culminate the kingdom it's going to be full and beautiful and perfect and so we live in between the comings the appearings and so our call and what we're to pray is that god's kingdom will be established and advanced now through his word your kingdom come these first two petitions are god exalting petitions now if you were to measure your current prayer life and what you typically pray and measure it up against what jesus is calling you to pray how are you faring so far where do you begin your prayers jesus continues he moves from god exalting prayers to god dependent prayers give us each day our daily bread this is the third petition we're to ask our father for our daily needs that the little phrase daily bread is representative of food we all need food but it's even bigger than that any daily need that you have go to your father and ask him for it here's what this means your father in heaven wants you to come to him daily for your daily needs he's not distant he's not far away he's near he's present he wants to help you today do you remember how long israel was in the wilderness wandering there for a long time and god made this amazing provision for them on a daily basis it was called manna it literally means what is that god provided manna israel came out like what is that literally that's what manna means what is that every day what is that is there every day do you know how long for 40 years day after day what is that there manna god

[12:56] has already established a precedent of daily taking care of his people we can go for him to him for our daily needs whether that's food shelter clothing or some kind of spiritual nourishment and strength you go to your father daily he's in it day in day out with us he's not standing aloof far away he's in it with us so we ask him for our daily needs and then we're going to ask him petition him to forgive us our sins the fourth petition when was the last time you confessed sin to your god jesus is teaching us here that confession of sin forgive us our sins it's a normal infrequent part of a disciple's life prayer life just to help you understand theologically when a sinner puts their faith in jesus for the first time at that moment that sinner is declared a saint in god's eyes the spirit of god indwells them immediately and they are declared righteous in god's sight they're justified they're forgiven of all their sin they've got the promise of eternal life they've been adopted into god's family sin but what you're going to need to understand is when someone becomes a christian their sinful nature is not completely eradicated and so what happens is you have saints who are indwelt by god's spirit and justified who continue to sin which means they will need to regularly confess their sin to the one they've sinned against the one they've sinned against is no other than their god their father so first john 1 9 says if we confess our sins he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness and so when god by his spirit makes you aware of some area of sin in your life it is good and right for you to go to your father and say forgive me of my sin you acknowledge it and then you ask him to forgive you for it well that might sound a little weird because

[15:20] I just said that once a sinner's justified they're completely forgiven of all their sin why would they need to confess their sins and ask god forgiveness if they've already been forgiven well it kind of happens like this let's say one of my kids sins against me though that would never happen I'm not going to immediately disown these children I love them even when they sin against me I'm committed to them and I will always be committed to them but the reality is when they sin against me things are now kind of weird between us there is something now in the way of our normal fellowship there's an elephant in the room one of my children comes up to me and says dad I am so sorry for what I said will you forgive me man they're already forgiven I get to say of course of course now let's experience the goodness that

[16:23] God intends for us child of God you are forgiven of your father but you still sin against him go to him and confess that and experience the mercy and forgiveness afresh you've got nothing to fear Jesus is here teaching us to pray our prayers to pray ask him to forgive us our sins regularly because we sin regularly and then he says for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us that's just a way of saying hey you want to know how you're truly forgiven when you forgive others when they sin against you that's when you know you're truly forgiven by God we ask for our sins to be forgiven and we forgive others when they ask the last petition is lead us not into temptation Jesus is teaching us to depend on God in a certain way here having just confessed sin he's saying now ask your God not to lead you into sin to deliver you from evil as Matthew 6 says someone who's intentionally living for

[17:32] Jesus is constantly asking his or her father to keep him or her from sinning oh God deliver me deliver me today help me to see the temptation when it comes so that in the moment I can trust you lead me not into temptation and what's implied here is that our father is a holy father and we are to be holy as he is holy do you know the reason I don't want to sin I don't want to sin because it grieves my holy father and so we're asking him on a regular basis oh God lead me not in temptation let's get really specific when we go in without sleep we tend to get kind of cranky don't we and if we're going without sleep we'll be uniquely tempted to impatience with the people closest to us so one of the things that you can do when you've had a sleepless night without getting in the details of why you're having a sleepless night but one of the things that you you would do well to do is call upon your father oh father I'm going to be uniquely tempted today to be to be crotchety and impatient because I'm loose I've lacked sleep

[18:52] God would you deliver me from the temptation to be selfish and hurtful five petitions and you can group these five petitions into two groups you have the first group the hallow would be your name your kingdom come God exalting group and then you have the latter three the provide for my daily needs the forgive us our sins the lead us not into temptation the God dependent petitions and so whether you're God exalting in your prayers or God dependent in your prayers it's all God glorifying prayers it's all praying that in which you've been completely reoriented from being self absorbed to being now God centered when you follow Jesus it changes everything even the way you pray you pray big

[19:56] God centered God exalting God dependent prayers now let's talk about praying bold where praying big is the content of our prayers it's all God centered praying bold is how we pray and for that Jesus gives us a parable in verses five and seven Jesus puts us right into a situation verse five it's midnight and you go to one of your friends and ask him to lend you three loaves verse six tells us why the reason why you're asking your friend for three loaves is that another one of your friends has arrived late and has been on this kind of gotten to your place unexpectedly after a long journey and you have nothing to give him that's the problem so you're going to your friend's house ask for help and you knock on his door and from within verse seven you hear your friend say don't bother me the door is now shut and my children are with me in my bed you got to remember back in the first century Palestine there wasn't a 24 hour festival or gas station down the street and people would live in a one bedroom home and they would share a bed together if you are a parent with little dudes someone comes knocking on your door at midnight you freak out you're like do you not know we've got kids and it's taking them 30 minutes each to put them to bed what are you crazy so here's this really interesting parable about this guy who has a friend come and he goes to another friend and is kind of knocking on the door looking for bread and in verse 8 we get the point of the parable it's cued up with those words

[21:50] I tell you Jesus I tell you though he will not get up and give him anything because he's his friend yet because of his impudence he will rise and give him whatever he needs in other words Jesus is saying hey you can you can just show up and you can play the friend card and your friend who's as snug as a bug in a you can play your friend card all night he's not coming out for that but you know what he's going to come out for when you keep on talking to him hey hey I need some bread when are you going to get up I'm still here I need bread that will get your friend up here's how this shakes out in our house this is what's called impudence not impudence impudence if you're reading out of the NIV it's translated boldness what impudence is this shameless boldness that is persistent here's how it shows up in our family it's not unusual that we have lines form around bathrooms you start hearing it this way how long you're going to be the one outside the bathroom the one inside

[23:13] I don't know the one outside the bathroom brings it up a notch can you just tell me how long you're going to be the one inside the bathroom a little bit the one outside the bathroom starts would you come come on already I gotta use the bathroom I'm not gonna stop knocking until you get out that's impudence shameless bold persistence you're gonna keep pressing until you get what you want Jesus is teaching on prayer and he shares this parable about shamelessly bold persistence in asking for something and then in verses 9 and 10 he brings it home to his disciples he applies it to them and I tell you disciples ask and it will be given to you there's some impudence seek and you will find impudence knock and it will be opened to you verse 10 for everyone who asks receives and the one who seeks finds and to the one who knocks it will be opened and so

[24:34] Jesus has just made the point of the parable and now in verses 9 and 10 he's applying this parable to his disciples in order to pray ask seek and knock keep on asking keep on seeking keep on knocking until you receive what you're seeking be insistent and in verse 10 there's this little tweak for everyone who asks receives and the one who seeks finds and the one who knocks it will be opened the tweak is that it's emphasizing the promise of it if you keep on boldly persisting and seeking you're going to find if you boldly persist in asking you'll receive if you boldly persist in knocking the doors are going to be opened up for you keep on keeping on it's going to happen and one might start thinking well it's going to happen because

[25:38] I'm being so persistent but Jesus is about to really flip this it's not about your persistence it's about the one you're asking kind of begs the question okay what what's the basis of this promise if I'm going to be persistent on what basis will God answer my asking and my seeking and my knocking how do I know that God's going to respond to big and bold prayers ongoing knocking well that leads us to verses 11 and 13 we're to pray big and we're to pray bold impudently but we're to pray believing the why of our bold big prayers Jesus comes full circle remember in verse 2 father hallowed be your name and now in verses 11 through 13 he comes back to this father theme and he's going to make a case that the reason why we pray big and we pray bold is because we have a father unlike any other father and he makes his point with a comparison and he starts it in verses 11 and 12 just imagine if he asked you this moms and dads what father or mother among you if his son asks for a fish will instead of a fish give him a poisonous serpent or if he asks for an egg will give him a deadly scorpion

[27:36] Jesus is brilliant what he's playing on is every parent's commitment instinctual commitment to do good to their children saying what father among you if your son asks for fish will give him instead of a fish a serpent and the answer is none of us would Jesus knows that he's setting up a comparison it's verse 13 that he makes the comparison he starts if you then if you then who wouldn't give a scorpion for an egg to your child if you then who are evil sinful you're the one that's asking God to forgive you for your sins on a regular basis if you who are evil give good gifts to your children how much more will your heavenly father give the holy spirit to his children who ask for it the comparison is a comparison that's called and how much more comparison it moves from lesser to greater in this case it's moving from the lesser evil parents who know how to give good gifts to the kids to the greater a heavenly father who gives the holy spirit to his kids let's camp out on the how much more how much more how much more how much more think in terms of purity of character we are sinners and in our parenting we still get good gifts to our kids even though we're evil how much more does a perfectly holy

[29:42] God give good gifts to his children how much more in terms of character how much more in terms of authority we are on earth with limited authority with limited responsibility God is in heaven our heavenly father and he has authority over all things how much more authority how much more power we are limited finite we need sleep and we get cranky when we don't but our heavenly father he is of unlimited power he is from everlasting to everlasting infinite he does not sleep nor he slumbers Psalm 121 and he never gets cranky at least not over sleep how much more power how much more wise when we give good gifts to our kids we we we do the best we can right as any parent in the room after giving your kids something like six months later you're like

[30:48] I'm not sure if I should have done that we lack wisdom when God gives a gift it's given by the wisest of all fathers it's the best he never regrets it how much more willing sometimes when I'm giving something to my kids or they ask me for something I am sinfully kind of reluctant how much more willing is our father who is always eager and poised to answer the prayers of his children how much more resourced we can give our children food we can give our children toys we can give our children clothing and vacations and bikes and even an education but how much more our father is resourced our father gives the holy spirit our father who is god gives god to his children think about it this way my kids spent some time with my dad my mom these are years ago and my parents brought them to fun way roller rink in batavia illinois and they got an arcade and my dad brought my kids in and my kids used to their father was figuring yeah

[32:33] I'm gonna have to make five bucks stretch a long way in that arcade and so when they asked their grandpa how much they can spend my father their grandpa said I'm loaded you know what that meant unlimited I'm resourced God we give gifts to our kids and we're limited in our resources God gives the Holy Spirit to his kids and it is an unlimited resource why is Jesus making this comparison why is Jesus making this comparison between evil parents who give good gifts and our heavenly father who gives the Holy Spirit why is he making the comparison he is compelling us to pray to our father think about who your father is

[33:40] Jesus is what Jesus is doing how wonderful and trustworthy he is we can be confident that our God will give us what we ask for lead us to what we seek and open doors we knock on because he is a good how good so good that he gave his only begotten son for you how much more along with him also will he not give you everything Romans 8 32 if he was willing to give his son for you he'll give you everything else you need for life and godliness he will give you his Holy Spirit again and again and again this is the basis for our big bold prayers we've got a big bountiful father he's going to pour out his

[34:41] Holy Spirit on us again and again if we only just ask for it so let's go back to the praying big so if we go to our father do you know why we pray father Romans 8 because the Holy Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God that's why we pray father that's a ministry of the Holy Spirit father hallowed be your name and when we ask God to make known his name in our lives and through our lives in this city in this world when we pray that God responds by pouring out the Holy Spirit on us to do things that only he can do who makes God known the Holy Spirit spotlights God when we go to God and we ask oh father let your kingdom come bring about the obedience to your will on earth that is in heaven do you know who does that the

[35:46] Holy Spirit brings about the inclination in his children's heart to obey his will to give you strength to follow him when we start asking our father to provide our daily needs do you know why we're asking him to pray for our daily needs the spirit in us our father to meet our needs when we ask God to forgive us our sins it's his spirit ministering to us that reminds us oh that's been forgiven oh that's been forgiven that's been forgiven too on the head of Jesus that is done it's finished there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus bear that on your mind when we ask that God would not lead us into temptation did you know that it is a ministry of the Holy Spirit to lead a Christian into greater godliness Romans chapter 8 Galatians chapter 5 walk by the spirit and do not gratify the desires of the flesh when we pray these things and we ask

[36:55] God God answers and he pours out his Holy Spirit to empower his children to live a life for the glory of his name and notice verse 13 it's to those who ask him it's to those who ask we've got to be asking we pray big and we pray bold and we pray believing that our heavenly father is eager to pour out his spirit on us for the glory of his name and he's made it all possible through Jesus let's wrap this thing up pray big pray God centered God exalting God dependent prayers start it this afternoon you might need to at one point say

[37:57] God forgive me for my little self absorbed peewee prayers and would you change me in the very orientation of my heart to pray for your glory pray bold be persistent is there something now you are praying for join us we're praying that God will provide more parking for this church do you know why because we want a parking lot we want God's name hallowed and in order for that to happen people need to get here and if people are going to come in here they need to park so join us in praying for parking for the hallowing of God's name and pray believing full confidence in your heavenly father who not only has given us his son but gives the holy spirit in fullness and in freshness over and over and over again if you're going to intentionally live for

[39:04] Jesus if you're going to be a 21st century disciple you learn to pray big you learn to pray bold and you learn to pray believing in your how much more father let's turn to him now father we come to you as your sons and daughters privileged to come into your presence through the blood of Jesus and we ask father that you would pour out your spirit upon us your people for the hallowing of your name for the coming of your kingdom for the meeting of our daily needs for the forgiving of our sins and for the leading us not into temptation Lord we're going to keep you asking you this we know you're not a guy locked in his house not wanting to hear us you are our father eager to hear eager to answer would you stir your children to pray bigger to pray bolder and to pray with greater faith it's in your name we pray

[40:18] Jesus Amen Amen