Devoted to Prayer.

[0:00] Luke chapter 11 and verses 1 to 13. It's entitled in the NIV, Jesus' Teaching on Prayer.

[0:13] One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples.

[0:24] He said to them, When you pray, say, Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread.

[0:36] Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us, and lead us not into temptation. Then he said to them, Suppose one of you has a friend, and he goes to him at midnight and says, Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have nothing to set before him.

[0:58] Then the one inside answers, Don't bother me, the door is already locked, and my children are with me in bed. I can't get up and give you anything. I tell you, though, he will not get up and give him the bread because he is a friend, yet because of the man's persistence, he will get up and give him as much as he needs.

[1:18] So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, he who seeks finds.

[1:31] And to him who knocks, the door will be opened. Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or he asks him for an egg, will give him a scorpion?

[1:43] If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?

[1:55] Amen. And the Lord will bless to us the reading of his word. I was looking for water. It's okay. No, it's all right. It's fine. I'll be fine. Thank you.

[2:07] So we're looking at the life of Jesus, and in particular, the third year of our purpose statement is that we seek to be with Jesus our first year, become like Jesus our second year, and do what Jesus did.

[2:24] That is the third year focus. And one of the things that Jesus modeled for us, perhaps more than any other thing, was his life of prayer. He taught us an awful lot, but then prayer is really the application of his teaching.

[2:41] And prayer is something he wants us to learn and learn from him. And so it's interesting that Luke chapter 11 begins in this way.

[2:52] Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples. There was something about his prayer life that attracted them, that made them want to do the same.

[3:05] And if you've ever been around in your life, in your journey, in the Christian faith, if you've ever been around people who we might call prayer warriors, people of prayer, you kind of envy what they've got and think, I wish I had their faith, their trust, their discipline, their practice, whatever you might think.

[3:24] But there's something attractive about a praying man or a praying woman. And we're going to look at the life of Jesus in respect to how he prayed because obviously the subject of prayer is a huge subject.

[3:39] You can't possibly cover that. In one sermon, you can't really cover what I've got here in one sermon, but I'll do my best. We're thinking about the life of Jesus. He was devoted to prayer and so should we be.

[3:51] So next couple of slides, please. Just to emphasize this from the scriptures. This is from Luke chapter 5 and verse 16. Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.

[4:06] Now again, in the Greek language, the tense here suggests that this was his regular habit and that's indicated by the use of the word often. This was his common practice to withdraw to lonely places and to pray.

[4:23] He didn't make a show of prayer. He didn't kind of stand on the street corners like the Pharisees. He wasn't noted for his fine words, although some of his prayers are full of beautiful language.

[4:35] But this was his custom and it's an obvious application for us. Is it our custom to begin each day with prayer, to seek times alone with God in prayer?

[4:48] That was the practice of Jesus and if we're going to do what Jesus did, then we're going to want to do the same. Next text, please. He's got a number of scriptures today. About eight days after Jesus said this, he took Peter, John, and James with him and went up onto a mountain to pray.

[5:08] That's in Luke chapter 9. This again was Jesus' common practice, to go into really solitary places. A mountain would be quite attractive.

[5:19] If I get a day off, I go to Maybeck and I get to the hermitage and I sit on top of the hermitage because there's a little stone seat. I sit on top of the hermitage.

[5:31] Probably people wonder what I'm doing. I have my backpack, my water, my Bible in my backpack, a book that I take and I sit there and you just can't help but pray. It's beautiful.

[5:42] There's something about being out in creation that encourages the spirit within us to pray like Jesus did. And of course, to go up to a mountain essentially is to provide, to find a place where you're undistracted, where you're alone, where you're not likely to be stumbled upon.

[6:03] And we ought to remember that too. The hardest thing about modern life is to get solitary places, to get enough time to pray without the phone pinging off and telling you that another message has come through from Whitby Christian Fellowship.

[6:19] If you're on our WhatsApp group, that never stops. We have so many requests for prayer that we kind of, you know, sometimes we forget to pray. We read it. It's like news. But we just need to stop, don't we?

[6:30] And sometimes to get away from all of that to a solitary place is a really good practice, one that Jesus followed. Now I want you to think for a moment about why do we pray?

[6:42] It's an interesting idea. Why do we pray? And I want to show you another scripture from Genesis chapter 4. In Genesis chapter 4, we're told about, in chapter 4, the murder of Abel by his brother Cain.

[6:59] When Cain murdered his brother Abel, and then he was confronted by God and he confessed his crime, after all that ends, the Lord comes and grants to Eve's line, another child.

[7:18] And we read, Seth also had a son. Seth was the son of Adam and Eve. Seth also had a son and he named him Enosh. Now, Enosh in Hebrew means man, but it emphasizes the frailty of man.

[7:33] Seth had also a son and he named him Enosh. At the time, men began to call upon the name of the Lord. This is the first recorded passage in scripture that tells us that people began to pray.

[7:46] Now, isn't it interesting that they began to pray when something terrible had happened? Next slide, please. So, Cain and Abel, murder, frailty, and the beginning of prayer.

[8:05] The Lord granted to Seth a child and that teaches them dependency, that their fellow men could take life so easily and without warning, they could spill blood.

[8:28] Suddenly, they realized their lives were vulnerable. God could give a replacement child. They realized that they were dependent upon God's grace.

[8:41] And the child was named Enosh because men are frail and vulnerable, so they call out to God in prayer. Prayer is always an expression of our need.

[8:53] We can't help praying even atheists admit to pray when they're in trouble. Isn't that kind of interesting? It's very easy to be an atheist when everything's going well for you.

[9:04] But when you're ill, when you're in trouble, when you're in danger, when you're aware of your fragility, then perhaps your confidence that there is no God gives way and you cry out to God.

[9:18] There were no atheists, they used to say, in foxholes in the first world war. When we are in need, when we are aware of our vulnerability, we pray. But it's interesting too that what happened at this time was that Satan was involved.

[9:36] Satan had heard in Genesis 3 about God's intention to redeem humanity that had fallen in the garden when the seed of the woman would crush the serpent's head.

[9:51] the seed of the woman was the seed that led to the birth of Christ. And Christ was born, Christ came into the world, because the line of Abel was preserved.

[10:10] Satan's intention was to wipe out that line, so Abel was murdered. God replaced him with Seth and with Enosh, and when you read in Luke's Gospel, the genealogy of our Lord Jesus, we're told that Jesus was the son of Seth, the son of Adam.

[10:33] So this complex war zone, spiritual war zone that has taken place in the earth at that time, is the context in which prayer is born.

[10:47] we pray not only because we're vulnerable, we pray that because we are in very real danger from the assaults of the evil one. Which is why when Jesus taught his disciples to pray, he said, I want you to pray, deliver us from evil.

[11:06] Literally, actually, I want you to pray, deliver us from the evil one. you see, the problem is we know our vulnerability to the things of the flesh. We kind of know that we get older, that we get sick, that we might die, we understand that, but we don't appreciate that our greatest danger is a spiritual danger, that we wrestle against, not against flesh and blood, Paul says, but principalities and powers of evil in the heavenly realms.

[11:37] We are born into a spiritual battle zone where we are constantly threatened by demonic forces.

[11:49] And this is, again, what we're seeing in the context of Genesis 3 and 4. The devil has his agenda. The whole world lies under the sway of the evil one, says the apostle John at the end of his first epistle.

[12:06] We need to appreciate, we need to pray because we are constantly under spiritual attack. And if we do not pray, then we fall victim to the schemes of the devil.

[12:20] Next slide, please. There's a wonderful book called Praying Like Monks, Living Like Fools by Tyler Statton. I do recommend it if you've not read it. Everybody prays, he says, everybody always has.

[12:33] Prayer seems to be instinctive, a part of human nature. In the words of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Herschel, prayer is our humble answer to the inconceivable purpose of living.

[12:46] We pray, we can't help it. Jesus commends prayer to us because it's vital for our physical and spiritual well-being.

[13:01] And if we neglect prayer, we are in tremendous difficulty. And so the Apostle Paul, we've already reminded you of this, but next slide, please.

[13:13] He encourages us to pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests, and with this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints.

[13:25] Prayer, he says, should occupy your waking moments. It should be part of your everyday practice. Because you are in this spiritual war zone, prayer is vital for your spiritual health.

[13:42] Happily, next slide, Jesus taught us to pray. His disciples said, Lord, teach us to pray. And so he did. Very inconveniently, he didn't give them the Anglican version of the Lord's Prayer.

[13:55] Did you notice that? But he did give us an accurate one, which the Anglicans added a little to, quite healthfully, but not in Scripture. Now, notice this prayer, Father, hallowed be your name.

[14:11] Think, for example, of how our Lord Jesus constantly in his prayer emphasized that relational aspect of praying, Father, Abba.

[14:22] He wants us to understand that when we're praying, we don't need to be afraid. We don't need to think, oh, God in heaven, that's scary. The one who watches everything I do and takes note of all of my sins and stands there with a big whip ready to beat me.

[14:36] No, no, he's not like that. He is your Father in heaven. And he wants you to know that you can ask anything you like of your Father in heaven. You need daily bread?

[14:47] Ask him for daily bread. You need the forgiveness of sins? Ask him for the forgiveness of sins. God. But he wants you also to think about how you want to honor your Father in heaven.

[15:00] You want his name to be hallowed. You want his kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven. You want him to help you. You think of his power, his power to keep you, to protect you, so that you can resist temptation and you can stand up under testing.

[15:17] This is the teaching of our Lord's prayer. And it's very simple. It isn't difficult to understand. Jesus says this is how you should pray.

[15:31] Now you can of course pray this prayer literally every day if you like. And there's no harm in that. It's a good thing to do. But it's more about the content of the praying.

[15:45] If you like the headlines of the praying. So when you read something like, forgive us our sins, it's good to be specific about them. What are your sins?

[15:58] Why are you struggling with them? Are you being honest with your Father in Heaven about them? Or are you just kind of, oh forgive me my sins, but you don't really care? You don't want to name them, you don't want to change from them, you're just kind of going through the motions.

[16:12] That's possible. But if you're struggling with particular sins, tell God about it, tell your father about it. You say, well, I'd be embarrassed. Well, he's not embarrassed.

[16:25] And you don't have to tell any human, but you can tell him. Satan will seek to tell you that you can never overcome those sins, that they're too deep and too loved by your heart, that you don't really mean it anyway when you confess them, and you will never have the power to overcome them because you failed so many times before.

[16:49] Whereas Jesus will say, confess them and trust me and you will overcome. It's all about who we believe. It's all back to that same temptation, did God really say?

[17:03] To which the answer is, yes, he did. I can do everything through him who gives me strength, says the scripture. No matter what Satan might whisper in your ear about your incapacity.

[17:19] So when Jesus prays and when he teaches us to pray, he wants us to be specific about it. What are the things that concern us? What are our daily needs? Okay, what comes under the orbit of your daily bread?

[17:33] Well, I've got this bill to pay, Lord, or I've got this need I have, I've got to have a job, or I've got to have provisions for my family, or I've got this coming up and I don't know how I'm going to meet this demand.

[17:46] Tell God about it. Be specific. He is your Father in heaven and he loves to give notice, good gifts to his children. If you ask for bread, he said he's not going to give you a stone.

[18:00] If you ask for fish, he's not going to give you a scorpion. You know, if you try to swallow stones or you play with snakes or you try to handle scorpions, they're going to harm you. That's the point. He doesn't give you things that harm you.

[18:12] He gives good gifts to his children. So learn to trust him, Jesus says. Trust him for it. It's important that you should. By praying in this way, Jesus is revealing to us a God who cares for us, a God who loves us, a God who loves to hear from us, a God who has our best interests heart.

[18:37] He is your father. Don't let the devil persuade you that in any way he's unkind or can't be trusted. He can be trusted. He is your father.

[18:49] So what can we learn from the life of Jesus by way of application to our lives? First of all, next slide, please. We need to learn from the what of Jesus' praying.

[19:01] By the what, I mean the content of his praying and there's so much we can think about here, but next slide. To emphasize that idea of his fatherly care, Tyler Stanton says, Jesus hasn't revealed a God we can perfectly understand, but he has revealed a God we can perfectly trust.

[19:26] Trust is the certainty that the listening God hears and cares. I'll make the register that in your head. You will never understand all of God.

[19:39] So he will continually surprise you with the way he does things, and he will mystify you when he doesn't answer some of your prayers, but does answer others.

[19:50] Yeah? We can never understand why God does those kinds of things. He is not subject to our will. Thy will be done. And his will is mysterious.

[20:02] But ever and always we need to understand that we can trust him, that he cares. And for this you just have to think of Gethsemane, Jesus going to pray, praying with real focus and real earnestness, with a depth of desire for God's will that is unbelievable, praying that God would take this test from him.

[20:33] But then he said, nevertheless, not what I will, but what you will. He received God's no, and he had to go to the cross. But even when he received God's no, he never distrusted his father, because he knew that God knows best.

[20:52] And the things that for us often seem to be disastrous, or harmful, or hurtful, in the end proved by the mysterious grace and providence of God to be the best thing possible for us and for the world.

[21:10] Sometimes God says no, but it doesn't mean he doesn't care any more than when you say no to your children, it doesn't mean you don't love them. You want what's best for them, and sometimes what's best for them is to say no.

[21:29] So we learn from Jesus' prayer in terms of content, just headlines because that's all we've got time for, the first one, next slide, that God is our Father. We've already said this, God is our Father, but just to remind you of this scripture from Matthew 7, next slide, ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be opened to you, for everyone who asks receives, he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks the door will be opened.

[21:58] Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone, or if he asks for fish, will give him a snake? If you then know you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him?

[22:14] He is your Father, you can trust him, he will give you what you need. And so we pray to him constantly, Father, I have this need, I have that need, and he meets that need.

[22:28] Next slide, please. Just to emphasize, God knows our needs. Thirdly, God wants to forgive you and wants to forgive others.

[22:41] So when you pray, forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us, we are saying what God wants us to learn, that we cannot hold grudges in our heart or despise others in our heart or try to justify it in any way.

[22:57] If we seek forgiveness from God, then we remember to forgive others. And we do that actually for our good. Because if we do not forgive others, then we create a bitterness and a resentment in our hearts that will fester and damage us and damage those around us.

[23:17] We must not live with unforgiveness. The fourth thing, God does powerful things through prayer. Again, just headlines here. But he says, remember when he was asked by the father, could the father do anything for his son who was demon possessed and was in danger of destroying himself?

[23:39] He says, if you can do anything, Jesus said, if all things are possible for the one who has faith. Just think of what is possible through prayer.

[23:53] Just think of how many situations have been changed through prayer. How many diseases healed? How many lives transformed? How many nations transformed by prayer?

[24:05] Everything is possible for the one who has faith. So you must not despair, you must never give up, you're praying to your heavenly father. And he says, keep praying, all things are possible.

[24:15] He is able to do immeasurably more than anything we ask or imagine. And prayer is vital for fighting and resisting temptation. At one point when the disciples were praying that the demon might be cast out, he said, this kind can only come out through prayer and fasting.

[24:37] You have to pray in order to fight and to do conflict, spiritual warfare with evil.

[24:49] When he was in Gethsemane, he took his disciples with them, they fell asleep, remember, and he woke them up, he kept waking them up. Can you not wait with me one hour, he said? The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.

[25:02] You've got to resist sometimes your fleshly desires and instincts not to persevere in prayer. You need to wait with me, Jesus says.

[25:14] He will not always answer our prayers immediately. That would be too easy, wouldn't it? And actually when you think about it, if he did that, you would not learn fear.

[25:25] You would stop trusting because it becomes automatic. Well, I prayed, there's an answer. I prayed, there's an answer. I prayed, there's an answer. I prayed, there's an answer. Oh, this is easy, this prayer stuff. But no, no, God is wise.

[25:39] He understands that sometimes we must wait and sometimes we must trust him in the darkness. Sometimes we must believe that he will take care of us and will not disappoint us, though he makes us wait in prayer.

[25:54] And so at the end of that passage we read in Luke chapter 11, you know that case of the friend at midnight, knocking, oh, friends come, I've got no bread, what am I going to do? Go round to the neighbours, keep knocking at the door, and eventually the neighbour will get up.

[26:08] The neighbour has no obligation to the person who's going to be socially embarrassed, but wants to give to the neighbour because they are sick of being disturbed. an interesting picture.

[26:21] I don't believe that we are to learn from that, that God just gets a bit fed up with us because he's sick of us, you know, knocking at his door. Jesus is teaching us the importance of perseverance, persistence in prayer.

[26:37] And what does persistence teach us? What does it tell God? God, it tells us, it tells God rather, that we really want what we're asking for.

[26:49] Sometimes we ask for things carelessly, we ask for things because we think they'll be good for us. But if we persevere with prayer, then we are showing God just how desperately we are seeking the thing that we're asking for.

[27:07] And then Jesus tells us to exercise faith in prayer. He says to us, don't doubt, but believe. You need to remember that he is able.

[27:23] You also need to remember that he is willing. And therefore, if by praying you are made to wait, that doesn't mean necessarily that he's saying no. He's testing how much we are trusting him.

[27:37] He's testing how much we are believing him, how much we feel that he can do for us in our time of need. And prayer always is to be offered in Jesus' name.

[27:50] Next slide, please. We always offer prayer in Jesus' name. Why? Because name is an expression of character in the Bible. Remember back to Exodus when Moses asked, if I go back to Egypt and they say to me, what is his name, then what will I say?

[28:11] And God says, tell them I am who I am, which if we had time is worth exploring. The idea is God is saying to you, God is saying to Moses, look, my name represents and reveals my character.

[28:26] I am the eternal self-existent God. I have life in myself. That is who I am. my name is who I am. You shall call his name Jesus.

[28:38] Why? He will save his people from their sins. His name is who he is, the Savior. When we pray in Jesus' name, everything that is true about Jesus is available to us in prayer.

[28:53] That's why he says, all authority in heaven on earth is given to me, therefore go and make disciples. when you pray in Jesus' name, you're praying believing that everything he did, everything he said, everything he promises is available to us and we just have to ask.

[29:13] He is available to us. I am with you always, even to the ends of the earth. And if we really believe that, it's not just a magic formula, I pray in Jesus' name.

[29:24] If we really believe that all of the promises, all of the power Jesus is available to us when we pray, it will transform our praying. It will make us realize that in the act of praying, we are not alone.

[29:41] For where two or three are gathered in my name, what does he say? I am there, in the midst of them. Lord, I am with you always, even to the end of the world.

[29:54] You say, I'm on my own in my prayer room. Sometimes it's hard. You're not on your own. Jesus is with you. And maybe that will just help you just to remember that, that wherever you are, however solitary the place, however difficult the circumstances, Jesus is right there with you in that moment.

[30:15] And he's there not only to comfort and to reassure you, but to say, everything you need is in my name. Everything I have promised to you, everything that I am for you is available to you right here and right now.

[30:32] That's learning the content of Jesus' praying. Secondly, learning from the why of Jesus' praying, the why of Jesus' praying. Why did Jesus pray? It's kind of an unusual thing for him to do.

[30:44] He didn't need to do it, did he? He has all power and all authority at his disposal. By the Holy Spirit, he could perform any miracle he wished.

[30:56] He hardly needed reassurance of the presence of God. He knew him intimately. And when he prayed, mysteriously as well, remember at the tomb of Lazarus when he prayed, before he raised Lazarus from the dead, he said, Father, I thank you that you hear me.

[31:14] I know that you always hear me. Okay, why bother then? And yet he prayed. And not just to give us an example to follow.

[31:28] Let's think of some reasons why he prayed. Next slide. Jesus prayed because he delighted to communicate with his loving Heavenly Father. He just loved to be in the place of prayer.

[31:39] Who doesn't like spending time with their dad, Eve? Who doesn't like it? She's rolling her eyes. We like to spend time with our Father.

[31:53] He did. When you read the high priestly prayer in John 17, and it's so deep and so intimate in so many ways, he keeps repeating the phrase, Abba.

[32:06] Daddy, I just love being with you. He talks about the joy that I had with you before the world began. And he says, I want my disciples to know that joy.

[32:20] I want them to experience and feel that same level of intimacy and comfort that comes from praying. Prayer should be the best thing of the day.

[32:34] Time to be alone with Jesus, time to be in the presence of the Father, and praying through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, the triune God being available to us in our closets, in our solitary places, as we walk through the woods wherever we may be.

[32:54] A chance to spend time with our Father. Jesus did that. That was one reason why he prayed. Next slide, please. Jesus prayed to be empowered by the Holy Spirit.

[33:07] There were times when he was about to do some miraculous work where he prayed. He was effectively opening himself up to the power of the Holy Spirit operating within him.

[33:20] Now, we don't have time for this, but when Jesus came to earth, he voluntarily suspended his divine attributes and he became as dependent upon the Holy Spirit in his ministry as you and I are dependent upon the Holy Spirit in ours.

[33:36] He prayed because he needed the infilling of the Holy Spirit to do miraculous works, to resist evil, etc. He prayed for help and courage to face the cross.

[33:49] Father, if it is possible, take this come from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will. It's hard to think of Jesus being afraid, isn't it? It's even harder to think of him sweating blood because his body is in such shock and under such extreme pressure that he's thinking, I don't want to go this way.

[34:18] I need the courage and help of the Holy Spirit. Nothing wrong with that. When you are afraid, when you are in panic mode, as it were, to pray for the help and the power of the Holy Spirit at such times.

[34:33] Jesus prayed for the forgiveness of those who crucified him. Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing. And Jesus prayed for his church, for all believers.

[34:45] believers. He prayed for us. He even prayed for you. In John 17, I pray for all those who will believe in me, who will follow later.

[34:59] That's you. Isn't that amazing? Jesus looked down in the annals of time and history, and he saw you, and he prayed for you. And you know what?

[35:10] He continues to pray for you now. Next slide, please. In heaven, he prays. Sorry, just missed that one. Next one. Next one.

[35:22] That's John 17, but we don't have time. Jesus in heaven ever lives to make intercession for us. He sits at the right hand of God, ever living to make intercession for us.

[35:37] I don't know how that works out in practice, but it's just nice to know. I used to know a man called Mr. Patterson, I called him, and he used to say to me whenever he got in touch, I pray for you every day.

[35:50] And because he was such a man of prayer, I knew that was true, and it was deeply comforting. He didn't tell me what he prayed for. But I'm sure the fact that he prayed for me every day did me an awful lot more good than I can even begin to say.

[36:07] And yet Jesus prays for me every day. Remember when he said to Peter, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail.

[36:21] Have you ever wondered how you ever managed to get through certain times? How you managed to believe against awful circumstances? I have prayed for you, Jesus said, that your faith may not fail.

[36:36] Thank God God is able to keep us from falling and to present us before his Father with exceeding great joy. We are what we are by the grace of God.

[36:48] We are what we are because Jesus prays for us. He keeps us. Praise his name. So lastly, we learn from the how of Jesus praying.

[36:58] The what, the why, and now the how. How does Jesus pray? Next slide. Well, he began the day in prayer, and so should we.

[37:11] Great while before dawn, Mark says, he got up and went to a lonely place to pray. I'm not suggesting you should get up a great while before dawn, unless you're so disposed, or you just want to, at such an age in your life, where you do anyway.

[37:26] But to begin the day with prayer is important. It sets the mood or tone of the day. It tells the day who you're trusting in for the rest of the day.

[37:38] It tells God who you're trusting in. It tells your soul who you're trusting in. It's anticipating the challenge. It's anticipating the warfare. It's anticipating the difficulties that life throws up.

[37:52] It's commending them to God. Dallas Willard used to say, I give the day to God, and then I don't need to worry about it. It's a good way to go on.

[38:05] I give the day to God, and I don't need to worry about it. And therefore, if anything comes up in the day, you just remind your soul, I give this to God. I don't need to worry about it.

[38:16] Secondly, he sought out quiet, lonely places for prayer, so as to be undisturbed, and so should we. Quiet, lonely places where the phone goes away, the computer is off, the telephone is switched off if it can be, and you just get that time.

[38:37] Be realistic about what you can do. Martin Luther used to say that I'm so busy today that I have to spend three hours in prayer. Well, some of us don't have three hours. We might only have three minutes.

[38:48] Well, that's a start. Ten minutes, it's a start. Fifteen minutes, it's a start. But again, make sure it's an undistracted start, if it can be.

[39:00] Thirdly, he prayed at different points of his day when he needed God's power and help, and so should we. Praying always with all kinds of prayer, Paul said, and you think, how is that possible?

[39:11] Well, just watch how Jesus did it. When people confronted him, when they made requests, etc., he stopped, he looked up to heaven, and he prayed. A very quick prayer, almost you might call an arrow prayer.

[39:24] Just quickly off to the Father, help me in this situation. And it can happen to us, can't it? We're confronted with a need, whatever it might be, just in your heart say, Father, how shall I respond?

[39:38] Just get into the habit of turning your thoughts to God, whenever a need or a situation presents itself that you think is going to be difficult. Fourthly, he prayed when he wanted to bless people with God's gracious presence.

[39:53] The last thing he did as he ascended into heaven was, Luke said, he raised up his hands and he blessed them. I like to try and get into the habit of saying, God bless you.

[40:05] Because when you say, God bless somebody, you're kind of saying, God give his best for you. It's not much in terms of the number of words, but what a gift you've given to a person if you've asked God to bless them.

[40:22] And then he prayed when he wanted, oh, I've done that, next slide please. Oh, okay, got to the end. No, missed that one, I've done that one already.

[40:36] Learning from Jesus, the what, the why, the how of praying. Karl Barth, famous Swiss theologian, to be a Christian and to pray are one and the same thing.

[40:48] It is a need, a kind of breathing necessary to life. I love that. It is a need, a kind of breathing necessary to life.

[41:04] Now, deep breathing is a health trend. You might have heard of it, Wim Hof. You heard of Wim Hof? So nice deep breathing, kind of keep your lungs going really well, get your heart rate down, kind of bring oxygen all around your body, reduce your stress levels, it's a big, big trendy thing, yeah?

[41:25] Deep breathing is good for your health. Deep praying is really good for you. Deep praying is better for you than anything else because we live in a cosmic war zone where the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour and we resist him by prayer.

[41:55] We live in a world where we're frail, where Enosh, where men at best, we cannot stave off all the things that this world will assault us with.

[42:06] We can't inevitably delay the onset of old age and dying, but deep praying will make sure that we're ready for it when it comes.

[42:19] let us learn to do what Jesus did to pray all this, all kinds of prayer, trusting that God our Father will give us what we need.

[42:31] Amen.