Let's go to the next verse 5 to verse 8 in this chapter together this evening.
So Matthew 6 at verse 5.
Do you struggle to pray or do you find it easy to pray?
Maybe we go through both the experiences.
Sometimes we find it easier to pray.
And at other times, sometimes we find it a real struggle to pray.
But would you ever go to someone and ask them,
will you help me in my prayer life?
Would you help me to pray?
Or would you be too embarrassed and thinking,
well, everybody should know how to pray.
Well, listen to what it says in Luke chapter 11, verse 1 to 2.
Now Jesus was praying in a certain place.
And when he finished, one of his disciples said to him,
Lord, teach us to pray as John taught his disciples.
And he said to them, when you pray, say,
Father, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come.
And so it goes on as Jesus there teaches the Lord's Prayer.
And it's what we see here in Matthew chapter 6 as well.
But it's just how the disciples come to Jesus there we want to think of.
Teach us to pray as John taught his disciples to pray.
So there was a culture there of learning how to pray.
And Jesus taught them how to pray.
And that's what we see in this chapter as well with the Lord's Prayer.
We are always learning in the faith.
And prayer is just part of that life of faith.
And we learn how to pray as we're going on.
We don't have the same prayer as when we were a child,
where we maybe repeated the same prayer every evening.
We should come to the Lord with our prayer that's based on the Lord's Prayer.
But we can pray in a different way every time we come.
And before we just come into this section on the Lord's Prayer,
we want to see the setting of where Jesus is here with his people.
This is the section in Matthew's Gospel known as the Sermon on the Mount.
And when you go back to chapter 5, verse 1, it says there,
Seeing the crowds, he went up on the mountain.
And when he sat down, his disciples came to him.
And he opened his mouth and taught them, saying.
And that's the beginning of this Sermon on the Mount.
He taught them, saying.
So there's a lot of teaching going on in this section.
And it was really a teaching on what it meant to be a disciple, a follower of Jesus.
And it covers so many aspects of our Christian life.
And part of that is our prayer life, where he teaches to pray.
And prayer is not something we're not familiar with.
It's not a shock to us that there's a challenge for us here to pray.
But the question behind it is, do we pray?
Do we pray as we should?
And what can we learn from this section on the Lord's Prayer?
And hopefully, over a period of time going forward, we'll look at the Lord's Prayer just bit by bit.
But we want to look this evening at the start of this section, an introduction to prayer,
where Jesus is saying this is how not to pray.
So he begins by saying this is how not to pray,
before he then goes on to say this then is how you are to pray.
Because we are dependent on prayer.
We need prayer.
We need prayer individually, collectively, and for all things going on around us.
So do we pray as we should?
Charles Spurgeon has a book entitled Only a Prayer Meeting.
And in it he makes two remarks in the first chapter that are a challenge to us when it comes to prayer.
He says, first, how could we expect a blessing if we are too idle to ask for it?
So are we asking God for blessing?
The second thing he says, how could we look for a Pentecost if we never met,
with one accord and one place to wait upon the Lord?
In other words, are we gathered together for prayer as well?
It's that our desire to be gathered together as they were on Pentecost when God poured out his Spirit.
They were gathered together in one accord, in one place, waiting upon the Lord.
So it's good for us to pray individually,
and it's good for us to come together and pray collectively as well.
But it can be one of the things that we can struggle with and maybe are most anxious about,
especially when it comes to being called upon to pray in public.
It's something that maybe leaves us afraid.
But this passage just helps us to see how we are to pray,
who we are praying to and who we are not praying to as well.
And these verses, verse 5 to verse 8, begins by saying,
when you pray, and three times it uses that phrase, when you pray.
That's the first thing we want to note about this.
It says, when you pray.
First glance, these words might not seem to be important.
But as Jesus is teaching them here,
He's teaching them, you are to pray, when you pray.
He's not saying to them, when others pray,
or when some of you pray.
It's a collective teaching.
He's saying to them all, when you pray.
And so there's a challenge there for them from the start.
The disciples, the Christians,
is to make sure that they are a prayerful people,
that they recognize that there is a dependence on God as we come in prayer,
and that we are to come in faith,
and that we are to come knowing who God is.
So there's this behind it, when you pray.
If you go to Psalm 5, it's a Psalm of David,
and David there is talking about prayer,
and he's talking in it about his morning time of prayer.
He commits his day to God in prayer,
but he uses the phrase, and then he's waiting expectantly.
And so it's not just that he prays,
but he's waiting on the Lord,
and waiting with expectation
that the Lord will answer prayer,
that the Lord will show him an answer to his prayer.
And so when we think, are we praying as we ought,
it's not just, are we coming and making that point of prayer,
but how are we coming in prayer?
Are we coming with a sense of faith,
and a sense of expectation,
and excitement of what God can do for us?
We learn that from David in many of his prayers in the Psalms,
that he has a sense of that joy coming into the presence of God,
that delight in worshipping as he comes in prayer,
and bringing his requests to him in prayer.
So when he prays,
he is teaching us how to pray as well,
to come with that sense of expectation.
And when we think of hear as well,
when you pray,
it also challenges to ask,
what's our motive in praying?
And it's interesting how in each of these three sections that we've read,
we've got three aspects of the Christian life,
not just prayer,
but in the first part,
verse 1 to 4,
you've got giving to the needy,
and then in verse 16 to 18,
you've got fasting.
And as you read through them,
you see there's a lot of commonality in them,
there's a lot of things that are repeated in them.
How you are to fast,
how you are to give,
how you are to pray,
there's common factors in them.
There's the same words used about doing it in secret,
not being like the hypocrites.
It's a repeated theme in each of these three.
And so you also see that each of it ends,
that when you do it in secret,
your father who is seasoned secret will reward you.
So it's true for each of them,
giving,
prayer,
and fasting.
And so tonight isn't about saying,
put your hands up if you're giving,
put your hands up if you're praying,
and put your hands up if you're fasting.
It's not that kind of who's doing it,
but we're learning here how we are doing it.
And we are doing all of these three things.
We should be doing them in secret.
Part of it should be in secret,
knowing that your father sees you in secret,
and will reward you.
So it's a sense of our own personal prayer life as well.
And what motivates us in prayer?
What motivates us in giving?
What motivates us in fasting?
If we do fast,
all of these things,
what is our motivation?
What kind of attitude are we coming with?
Are we coming so that we might just satisfy our own conscience?
Are we offering up a prayer just to make us feel better?
Well,
I've done that.
Are we praying because it's ticking the box for that day?
I've prayed to God.
Are we praying because maybe it makes us feel better?
A sense of relief that we've got our prayer time in.
Or are we recognizing the motivation in prayer
is when you pray,
you see who you are coming to.
We see that as you go into the Lord's prayer.
When he says in verse 9,
pray then like this,
our father in heaven.
This is where we are coming.
It's not a tick box exercise.
It's not just to appease our conscience.
It's recognizing that we are coming to commune with the living God.
That we are approaching God through his son,
Jesus Christ.
That that is how we are to come.
Prayer is first and foremost a recognition
of a dependence on God.
Acknowledging that he is able to do what we cannot do.
So do we get the point of prayer?
Do we recognize who it is that we are coming to?
A minister told about a time when he was reading a Bible story to his young daughter.
And it was from one of these picture story Bibles.
And the story is about King Nebuchadnezzar.
So there was a picture of what they thought King Nebuchadnezzar looked like.
And the story behind him.
And as the father was reading the story to his daughter,
and he thought she was listening attentively,
and then he started discussing it with her after.
And she said, well,
the king was a very mean man.
So she was getting the gist of it.
But then she said,
but he had nice shoes.
Because she'd looked at the picture,
and she'd seen the shoes that he was wearing in the picture.
And that's what caught her attention.
And the innocence of a child can be the way we come to God in prayer.
We recognize the majesty of God in some ways.
And yet we maybe start to think about our own conscience.
Well, I'm glad I prayed.
Or just not what's important.
Because we miss out on who God is.
And so when he's saying here three times he repeats,
when you pray,
it's important for us to realize it's something we are to do.
Not just of habit.
Not just for our conscience.
But to recognize who it is that we are praying to.
And so that's how he begins.
When you pray.
But then in these next verses,
he goes into how we are not to pray.
So it's quite interesting.
He starts not just,
this is how you are to pray,
but this is how not to pray.
Because remember what it said in the Gospel of Luke.
Teach us to pray.
Just as John taught his disciples to pray.
And so there was a lot of different people praying.
And they were praying in different ways.
And what Jesus says first is,
well, this is how you are not to pray.
And he's challenging where motives were wrong.
And the first is that you are not to be like the hypocrites.
It says there in the middle of verse 5.
For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues
and at the street corners,
that they may be seen by others.
So he's saying this is how not to pray.
Have you ever felt like a hypocrite?
I'm sure as we approach this theme of prayer,
I can stand here and say,
well, I'm a bit of a hypocrite myself.
I'm here telling you how to pray.
I have to ask, how do I pray?
And you can feel a hypocrite.
And there's many different ways we can feel a hypocrite.
It's saying one thing,
but meaning or doing something very different.
And how easy it is for that to creep into a life of prayer.
Do not be like the hypocrite, Jesus says here.
What were they like?
Why mention them in each of the sections
when it comes to giving and fasting and praying?
Don't be like the hypocrites.
Well, he's saying this is how important your Christian life is,
that people are watching.
But what the difference was with hypocrites,
they were doing it to be seen.
Those who were praying in Jesus' day
should have been approaching God,
recognizing it was to God they were in coming.
But instead, they're on the street corners,
they're in the synagogues,
that they may be seen by others.
And these were very public places.
The street corners and the synagogues,
these were where people gathered.
And so the hypocrites would be there,
but they're there to get praise from man.
But look at what Jesus says to them,
that they may be seen by others.
Truly I say to you,
they have received their reward.
There's no answer to their prayer.
But they have received their reward
just by if they get praise from those who are around them.
And so they received the reward,
that was their praise from man.
There's no answer from God.
And so, how do we approach God in prayer?
Well, as Jesus goes on to say,
he says,
when you pray,
in verse 6,
go into your room and shut the door
and pray to your Father who is in secret.
So we are to make sure that
wherever we are coming,
our focus is that we are praying to the Father.
Now does this just mean
that we go into a quiet place?
Well, yes,
there is that sense of taking time away.
But even if we are called to pray in public,
it's a reminder to us
that we are coming into our own room
where we are asked to pray.
We are not standing wherever we are asked to pray
to be praying to those around us.
To be trying to impress the people sitting beside us
or in our hearing,
that's not what it is about.
We are approaching our Father
who is in heaven.
Somebody once put it like this,
it's not wrong to be seen praying,
but it is wrong to be praying to be seen.
And that's the difference.
It's not wrong to be seen praying
because we have to ask people
to publicly pray,
but it's wrong to be praying to be seen.
Because if we're praying to be seen,
we are not praying as we should to God.
And so as his disciples,
as his followers,
we are to pray,
and we are to pray in secret
in that sense of it being between us and God.
And one of the fears of public praying is,
what will others think?
And maybe that's what puts people off coming
to a prayer meeting.
I'm afraid I'll be asked to pray.
But it's not to see it as about
impressing others around us,
but to see that you are leading
in that prayer for all around you
and that all around you
shouldn't be listening,
what's he saying,
or how did he say it,
or did he say that right or wrong,
but praying with you.
That we are praying together.
Because our prayer is offered up to God
as we meet together.
Like the book of the day of Pentecost,
they were in one accord.
There was a unity.
There was a togetherness.
There was a oneness in that.
They were praying to God together.
So we come to meet God.
We meet him collectively together,
remembering we are praying to him.
And we come to God in our own time as well.
It's not about being seen by others.
It's not about going through that process
just to get it done,
but to recognize we are not to be hypocrites,
but that we are to approach God
who hears and will reward in secret.
So don't be like the hypocrites.
Then you also have in verse 7,
And when you pray again,
Do not heap up empty phrases
as the Gentiles do,
for they think that they will be heard
for their many words.
Do not be like them,
for your Father knows what you need
before you ask.
So there's great comfort in these words,
isn't there,
when you think of what it says,
your Father knows what you need
before you ask.
He just wants you to come.
So our prayers are not focused
on how long they are.
He calls them here,
Do not heap up empty phrases
like the Gentiles do.
Another word that's used for them here
is the babblers do.
They're just babbling away to God.
Just trying to fill in the time
with the length of their prayers
and the words that they are offering up.
And so in Jesus' day,
this was another problem.
Not just that people were praying
to be seen,
but that people were praying
just to go on and on and on.
Thinking the greater the length
their prayers were,
the more likely God is to answer.
And I guess we have that thought
as well at times,
that we feel we have to keep on
going on and on and on in prayer.
It's not the sense of the length of prayer.
When it says elsewhere,
you know,
we are always to pray
and not to give up.
It's not just to be
keeping on praying
and praying and praying,
but just to keep coming back to God,
to keep coming back day by day,
time by time,
recognizing we are just
to keep coming to God
and he hears
and is able to answer.
So it's not about,
well, I must pray for 20 minutes.
I must pray for half an hour.
Otherwise,
it's not going to be good enough.
That's not what it's saying.
That's not how we are
to approach God at all.
Martin Luther put it like this.
He said,
the fewer the words,
the better the prayer.
To have prayed well
is to have studied well.
And so what he was saying there
is to make sure
that as we come to prayer,
it's based on God's word.
We can pray,
and that's,
you know,
when we say the Lord's Prayer,
we can often repeat it now
because we hear it so often.
But even the Lord's Prayer itself,
if you pray that prayer
and just think about it
as you're going through it,
how many words
are in the Lord's Prayer?
There's not that many.
And yet this is the answer
to Jesus
when he gets,
Jesus gives
when he asks the question,
teach us to pray.
So it's not a long prayer.
But as we see,
as we go through it,
it's going to say so much to us
about how he taught to pray.
So it's not the length.
It's not the kind of words
that we use.
But that we just come
and see that he knows our needs
even before we ask.
And it's not a great encouragement
to us in our prayers.
That our prayers,
they don't have to be
eloquently structured.
They don't have to have
a particular set
of words used.
But that we just approach him
with the words
that he puts in our hearts.
Knowing that even before
we speak them,
they are known
unto him.
And so it's not about
comparing ourselves
to how others pray.
It's not about
looking at how long
they prayed.
But just coming
with that genuineness.
That dependence
upon him.
But it's not to say
that we shouldn't learn
to pray
as we're going on.
And when we look
at the Lord's Prayer itself,
you see that it does
have order to it.
It does have
structure to it.
And so as we're praying
and as we're learning
as we go on,
we realize that prayer
is something that we are
working on
all the time.
So it's not about
empty phrases
or being babblers,
but just about
coming
to him.
And so that's how we are
to approach him.
Expectantly.
With a prayer
of faith.
Many people
would say
in various
church circles
nowadays
that God
doesn't hear our prayers
because our faith
isn't what it should be.
But is it really
based on
how our faith
feels
to ourselves?
It's not.
It's about
who our faith
is in.
And our faith
is in
the Lord
Jesus Christ.
Christ.
And we come
through him
to God.
And he is the one
who is able to help us
in our prayers.
That even if all we have
to pray
is the Lord's prayer,
it's the way
we have been taught.
And even just to use
that as our prayer
is enough.
Because that's how
he taught us
to pray.
But the more you
pray it,
the more you realize
you can add on to it.
The more you realize
that it teaches us
again and again
how to pray
more and more.
But it's about
having confidence.
Confidence in God
as we come
to him.
We are to come
to him
with confidence.
That's what Hebrews
4 verse 16
says for us.
So that as we are
learning to pray,
one of the things
we are to have
is that confidence
to draw near
to the throne of grace.
That we may receive
mercy and find
grace to help
in time of need.
And look at what
it says here,
your father knows
what you need
before you ask.
So it's about having
that confidence
to draw near
the throne of grace.
To recognize
we're not going to be
like the hypocrites.
We're not doing it
to be seen.
We're not doing it
like the babblers
who are going to come
with many words.
But that we are
just to come
with a dependence
on him.
Jesus isn't condemning
public prayer here.
He's not condemning
long prayers here.
What he's doing
is saying
it's what the motivation
is behind it.
So when you pray,
don't be like the hypocrites.
When you pray,
don't be like the Gentiles
who use empty phrases
or being heard
by many words.
But when you pray,
come seeing
it is to our Father
who art in heaven.
And don't give up
in praying.
For we depend
upon it
for all things.
And that's what we'll see
as we go on into
the Lord's prayer
itself
and go through
the different sections
of it.
And we learn
where he says
pray then
like this.
Prayer is a great
privilege.
And what a delight
it is to have
that throne
of grace
to go to.
And so then
let us have confidence
to draw near
to that throne
of grace
that we might find
grace and mercy
to help
in time
of need.
Well let us come
to God
in prayer.
Let us pray.
Lord our gracious
God,
we do thank you
that you
have your people
in the scriptures
who ask the very
question
that we so often
have ourselves.
Teach us to pray.
And we thank you
that you answered it
in such
a beautiful
and such
a simple way.
And yet
with a depth
to it
that we can
hardly recognize.
even we think
of the words
our Father
who art in heaven.
Even to appreciate
who it is
that we come to.
What you are
to your people.
What you give
to us
on a daily basis.
And so Lord
we pray
that through
the teaching
around the Lord's
pray
that you would
indeed teach us
to pray.
Not to be like
the hypocrites
who do it
to be seen
or the Gentiles
who do it
with empty
phrases
or many words
that they would
feel that they
would be heard
in that way.
But that we
would recognize
that you already
know every need
that we have
before we ask.
Help us Lord
that we would
then have that
confidence
to draw near
to the throne
of grace.
That place
where prayer
is made.
Where it's
offered up to you
in and through
the name of your
Son
the Lord Jesus
Christ.
And so Lord
hear our prayers.
Unite us
in prayer.
May we have
that one accord
that it speaks
of in the book
of Acts.
And that unity
and that purpose
in prayer.
That together
we would offer
up our prayers
in the quietness
of our hearts.
And saying
Amen Lord
your will
be done.
So continue
with us Lord
bless us
go before us.
We ask all
in Jesus
precious name.
Amen.
Thank you.