How To Pray

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0:00Good morning again. My name is Joel and I'm happy to be serving Christ and serving you all as pastor here at New Creation. And we are in a sermon series on the book of Luke. So you can, if you want to go ahead and start flipping there, if you have a Bible or an app or something, we're in Luke 11 today. As you're turning, I want you to think about, think about a time in your life when you needed help but you didn't ask for help. You knew that you needed it but you didn't ask. What was it that held you back? For me sometimes it's just plain old stubbornness. I got this is what I tell myself or somebody who walks up and says, hey do you need a hand? I got this, I got this. And as the realization sinks in that no, I don't got this. Now I've got a choice to make. Do I keep struggling by myself or do I swallow my pride and go back to the person and say, actually I do need help.

1:05Sometimes it's not stubbornness, I'm just afraid to be a bother to somebody else. I think, well everybody else is busy too. How could I possibly impose on them? I don't want to impose. Most people, it's true, but I think really, I really do think most people want to help other people. But a lot of times we just don't ask for the help. We don't give people the opportunity and I don't give them the opportunity. I would rather be polite than be needy. I'd rather be seen as respectful to other people's space than I would like to be seen as needy. Can you relate to me on that? So if you can relate to me, then this is a good passage for us to dive into today and to see what Jesus says. Because this tendency to be reluctant to ask for help, it impacts our spiritual life. Because it's not that we are reluctant to ask for help for everyone else but God. It's all the same pattern of living. If we're reluctant to ask people for help, we're going to be reluctant to ask God for help. We're going to be consistent about that. I've yet to meet somebody who doesn't ask for help from other people but is very good about asking God for help. Right? So this impacts particularly our prayer life. And today's passage is about prayer. We're in a stretch of a very practical set of instructions and teachings that are in the book of Luke. Very practical. And today's about prayer. So Jesus wants to help us pray so that we can be more alive spiritually. So that we can experience more of his presence in our life. More of his help in our life. And he knows the struggles

2:51that we have. He knows the struggles that we have and that you have. So let's turn to Luke 11 and see what Jesus says to us here. Luke 11 starting in verse 1. This is the word of the Lord for us today. Let's pay attention to it. As God himself speaking to us, the God that is reliable, truthful, does not lie. He speaks clearly and he speaks truthfully in his word. So Luke 11 starting in verse 1. This is the word of the Lord. 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.

3:37And he said to them, when you pray, say, Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread and forgive us our sins as for we forgive, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation. And he said to them, 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.

4:16And he will answer from within, do not bother me. The door is now shut and 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 is his friend. Yet because of his impudence will he 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 opened to you. For everyone who asks receives and the one who seeks finds. And to the one who knocks, it will be opened. 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? Pray with me. God, we know that your word is living and active because you told us that it is. And make it so today. Cut through the nonsense that we try to believe about you and about prayer, about how and when we can come to you. Cut through that, Lord, and show us the free access we have in Christ to come before you, the gracious and good father. Lord, increase our dependence on you and help that to come out in how we pray and how we live. Bear fruit in us, Lord, for your glory.

6:08And we pray this in your name. Amen. How to pray? Ask boldly because you are needy and God is good. The people that follow Jesus noticed that he prayed a lot. He depended on it. He needed it. It's a little surprising if you think about it. He has this unbroken, clear fellowship with the father and yet he retreats oftentimes, goes by himself to pray. The disciples notice his practices and one of them finally plucks up the courage and says, you know what? I want to be like that.

6:49Right? Will you please teach us, Jesus, how to pray? Show us how to live like that. If you feel like you don't know how to pray, take comfort. The people that follow Jesus didn't feel like they knew how to pray either. Okay? So let's start there. You're in good company. If you feel like you don't know how to pray or you struggle with prayer, you don't do it very well, you don't understand it very much. You're in good company. At its most basic prayer is spending time with God and talking to him. But spending time alone with God is unnatural. Okay? You don't come by it naturally.

7:34Remember, when Adam and Eve sinned, when sin entered the world and entered them, they hid from the presence of God. God came walking in the garden and they ran away. It is the natural tendency for sinful people like you and me is to go away from the presence of God. Now through Jesus, he welcomes us into the presence of God again. Right? He welcomes us in through faith into the presence of God. But that doesn't mean that just because he welcomes us in, we automatically know what to do when we're there. Right? If a person who was a paralytic received a miraculous, amazing breakthrough surgery to reconnect nerves from legs to brain, he's still going to need physical therapy, right? To learn how to walk again. So that's what this passage is. It's prayer therapy, spiritual therapy for us. Jesus brings us in to the presence of God and now he's teaching us, this is how you pray. This is how you approach God. So if you feel like you are weak in prayer, like we all do, if we're being honest, take comfort and just pay attention to what Jesus says.

8:49Listen to him. Because he wants to teach you. He gives a very thorough lesson on prayer. I don't, this is, should not be the only sermon you ever hear on prayer. This, don't just read one book on prayer, read several because we need a lot of help. But Jesus is pretty thorough here. And he starts with this, he says, ask for spiritual treasure. When you hear the Lord's prayer, you might think about it being prayed in unison together with other people. But Jesus is doing more than just giving us a script here. He's, he's trying to tell us themes, themes that we can pray about. It's more than a script because we see in other passages, Jesus wants us to pray in other ways too. So this prayer that he gives us, don't treat it as only a rote thing that you pray. It's good to pray it that way. And we're going to do that later. Some of the verbs here are plural. Give us each day, our daily bread, forgive us.

9:51So you can tell that Jesus meant people to say this together. But it nevertheless instructs us for our private prayer life. And the theme that I'm calling us to here is that Jesus says, ask for spiritual treasure. That's what encompasses everything in this prayer. So let's look at the spiritual treasure we're supposed to ask for. The first thing is this, ask for his glory. Ask for his glory. The first thing that he says is, hallowed be your name. To hallow something means to revere it, to count it significant and as weighty. We don't use the word hallow very often, at least I don't never heard anyone use it.

10:32But we, nevertheless, we still do it all the time. When you are a fan of a musician or a comedian or a book or a movie or a restaurant, you want other people to know about it. You tell other people about it. You believe that this thing that you love deserves more recognition, that more people should know about it, that more people should be enjoying it. So you tell people about it. I went just last night, no, two nights ago, to a concert of one of my new favorite bands. I'm not going to get into that right now because that'll distract us from this text, but I've told a lot of people about this band, right? I wanted to make, I wanted to help make the name great because I think it's enjoyable, right? That's how we should feel about the name of God. That's how we, more than anything else, that's how we should feel about God. We should say, you know what? He is so great. He is so great and greatly to be praised. We should look around and we should say, you know what? There should be more recognition of God's glory on the earth. Not less, more. There should be more people enjoying him the way that I enjoy him and experience fellowship in the name of Jesus with him. Experience fulfillment and peace. More people should be experiencing this. Let me tell you about the name of God. Make it great. The whole world should be ringing with the praise of God. That's why we read that psalm earlier. The whole world. He deserves it that much, amen? He deserves it and it's good for us.

12:18We want people to experience good things and so, Father, Father, hallowed be your name because that's going to turn right around to bless people. When the name of the Lord is hallowed and it's glorified, people experience goodness in their life and so we ask him to do it. Father, I agree that your name alone should be great and so make it so. Make it so, God. The second thing is this, his will. The second spiritual treasure we're supposed to ask for is his will. Your kingdom come. If you've ever looked at the news and you have felt a longing inside of you for the eradication of injustice, for the end of war and bloodshed, if you've wanted peace and wholeness in the world, then pay attention to this phrase in the prayer. Pay attention to it because these good desires are ultimately met only through the coming of God's kingdom. That's the only way that those good things that you want are going to be realized in the world. Your kingdom come. It turns out that government is the solution to man's problems, but not man's government, God's government. Your kingdom come. Humans are sinful.

13:45Whatever institution or solution we try to bring to the table, it's not going to ultimately solve the problem. It takes God and his kingdom coming. This is asking for God's rule, for God to have control, for his will to be done, but of course it means not just out there, but in here, in my life. Your kingdom come in my life. Our hearts are like Burger King. We tell ourselves, have it your way. Have it your way, Joel. And we like to hear that message. Yes, I like that. I will have it my way.

14:27Thank you. Jesus wants us to say, God, have your way. Have your way on the earth and have your way in my life. Have it your way. Now these first two asks are a really important way to begin the prayer. They're almost like calibration. They're recalibrating, realigning our hearts, our perspective, our minds, so that now we can start talking about the requests we have for ourselves. It reorients us. It directs us towards him to get us back in alignment. If you get a new set of tires on your car, you should probably get the car realigned, right? You need the steering wheel to be nice and straight so those tires work properly. That's what these two prayers, the two things that you start with this prayer are asking to reorient me, God, to your way and your glory. So the next thing that comes that we ask for is our dependence on God. Give us each day our daily bread. God's people in the Old Testament, in a certain period of time, they had a direct experience of this, an actual lived experience of this. When they left Egypt, before they came into the promised land, God provided them manna to eat. This might be familiar to you. God provided them manna. They went out each morning to collect it, but they could only collect the amount that they needed for that day. If they tried to hoard it, stockpile it, if they liked the flavor that was out that day and they wanted to keep it, I like to think that there were different flavors on different days. I don't know. Maybe not. If they collected more than they could eat that one day,

16:12they would wake up the next morning and it would be full of maggots. It'd be rotten. God says, I told you, collect only what you need for that day. The only exception was the day before the Sabbath. On that day and that day alone, they could go out and collect enough for two days. And lo and behold, they would wake up the morning of the Sabbath and it would not be rotten. They could eat it, so they didn't have to work on the Sabbath. They depended on God every day. Every day. Can you imagine that? You wake up and you're like, boy, I hope there's manna on the ground because I got nothing, nothing in the pantry, nothing to eat. God literally has to provide for me every day.

16:54In order for me to eat today, he's got to provide it today. Jesus wants that kind of posture in our life, the kind of daily posture of, Lord, I'm dependent on you. Please provide for me, for my needs. No matter how much or how little is in your savings account or is in your pantry, God is calling you to this kind of posture. I'm depending on you every day, every day for what I need. It's a good place to be. It's a good place to be to be leaning on the Lord every single day and not ever being drawn off and say, you know what, I'm fine for a week or two. I'm fine for a month or two. Next thing we ask for is our restoration. Jesus says to ask, forgive us our sins. You've probably seen that bumper sticker. Actually, I haven't seen it in a little while. Maybe it's kind of fallen out of fashion. But the bumper sticker that says, Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven. Anybody seen that?

18:05Yeah? So I'll just say, that's true, but it's a little misleading because it makes it seem like forgiveness is a once and done thing for our lives. But Jesus has prayed this over and over, forgive us our sins. That's not how Jesus sees the Christian life. He knows that we still struggle with sin and when we sin. When we sin, it saps our spiritual vitality. It confuses us. It draws us away from him. Right? We don't see things as clearly as we used to and we feel like there's something between us and God. We need all of that to be remedied and Jesus here gives us that remedy and that is repent. Repent. Forgive us our sins.

18:57This brings us out of hiding and back into his light. We're refreshed and we're restored. This is the practice of the Christian life. So I think a better bumper sticker would say, Christians aren't perfect, just repentant. Now what kind of message would that convey? It's a little bit of a humbler bumper sticker, don't you think? Christians aren't perfect, just repentant. That's how we're meant to live. Forgive us our sins. That's what he's calling for here. But there's a little extra phrase here.

19:32Did you notice that? Jesus adds on something. For we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us. True repentance leads to mercy. One way that you can know if God's grace is operating in your life and if you are living in God's grace is to ask yourself, when's the last time I've shown mercy to someone? Him. Practicing mercy is part of our restoration. That's how we know it's taking root in our lives. A forgiven person is a forgiving person. Now the last thing is this, we're supposed to ask for our protection. Lead us not into temptation. One way Satan tempts us is by telling us that sin's no big deal. It's not that big a deal, he whispers in our ears. Church, that is a lie.

20:31It's a lie. It's a lie from the pit of hell. Listen, Jesus did not die to improve lives, right? He died to save lives. He didn't die to make them a little better. He died to create new life because there was death there. If you believe that, then you believe that sin leads to death, which is exactly what the Bible teaches. It is not to be trifled with, ever. It is not something to be toyed with. But we're all tempted, and so this prayer is saying, God, I really do want to walk in newness of life.

21:16I really do. But I need your help. I want to honor you with holiness and with obedience. But I need your help. Please keep me away from temptation. Strengthen me to resist. I've been there, God, and I don't want to go back. I don't ever want to go back. So we need to pray this, and God will help us. Now, that's what to pray for. But now, now Jesus talks about how you should ask for it. The how is just as important. Look at this. He says to ask with boldness. He gives an illustration. I'm going to sum it up this way. Suppose you had an out-of-town friend show up unannounced in the middle of the night, and you had nothing to serve them. Now, prepared food is in short supply in this day and age. There's no grocery stores for the people that Jesus is talking to. They wouldn't have a lot of prepared food. So if somebody shows up in the middle of the night needing a place to stay, which would be pretty common. People traveled at night to avoid the hot sun. They would roll up into town to be the middle of the night. They would find someone that they know or someone that a friend of theirs knows or someone and knock on the door. So it would happen pretty often that someone would come, and if you get caught and you have nothing to serve, well, there's only one solution going to a neighbor and knocking on the door, asking for help. Now, how do you feel when you get woken up in the middle of the night? Anybody here happy about being woken up in the middle? I mean, it doesn't matter what the reason is. I remember Cadence and Bree being really little, and if they woke up

23:04in the middle of the night with coughing or throwing up or, you know, something like that, like, it, you kind of feel a sense of shame because the first instinct you have is, what is going on? Oh, my kid's sick. Okay, okay. They need help. Calm down. But that first instinct is like, I am, what? I'm supposed to be asleep. So this person in this hypothetical story is caught. I really, really want to serve something to these out-of-town guests, but I don't want to wake up my neighbor.

23:37I know they're going to be mad. Do I impose on the neighbor to meet the need, or do I leave the need unmet to avoid imposing? Well, listen, the way that Jesus phrases the question shows you what's going on for the people that are listening. Jesus knows that everyone listening to him, maybe not us, but everyone listening to him would answer in the exact same way. All of them to a person would say, well, of course we would wake up the neighbor. Of course we would do that. Why? Because to them, the need is so urgent. Hospitality was a paramount virtue, paramount practice for those people at that time. People depended on hospitality so that they could live. There weren't hotels everywhere.

24:28There weren't grocery stores everywhere. People traveled in hot, exhausting conditions. If you came into town, you needed someone to let you in and not just let you sleep, but feed you from the hot day of travel that you had, to feed your whole family. People needed hospitality. It was so important. That's how society worked. And so the need is so urgent because the traveler must be fed. So everyone's like, you know what? I know what I would do. I would knock on the door. I know the person will be mad at me, but I would get my bread and I would go back to them in the morning and I had to apologize and all would be cleared up. In the light of day, you know, the annoyed neighbor is like, okay, I get it.

25:13Someone came to your door. You had to do it. I understand. It's water under the bridge. No problem. I would have done the same if it would have been me. Everyone knows that's what it would have happened. And so the need is so urgent. And here's what Jesus is saying, okay? He's saying, look, you all know that being hospitable would compel you to ask for help. If you think that need is great, what do you think about your spiritual needs? He's kind of hooked his audience.

25:44Do you see that? He's hooked his audience because he knows how everyone would respond. Of course, Jesus, we would do that. And now he says, okay, if you believe that about being hospitable, how do you feel about your spiritual needs? And now they're like, oh, I hadn't thought about that. And Jesus is saying, look, if that urgent need would lead you to go boldly to your neighbor and knock on the door, go to God in that same way. Because your need is urgent. I remember when I was a kid, I probably was about, I want to say like seven or eight. And I was asleep and then I woke up and it was pretty late.

26:32It probably was, it was 11, 12, something like that. And I had this spiritual question on my mind. I really, really wanted to know the answer to this question. And I could hear that my dad was downstairs watching TV. I knew I shouldn't be out of bed, but I had this question. I was like, I just, I've got to know the answer to this question. Dad's up, he knows. And I, I sat at the edge of my bed and I was like, do I go ask him? No, I won't. And I kind of laid back down. And then I got up again.

27:07I was like, no, I've got to. And I, I remember walking halfway down the stairs. It's so vivid in my mind, sitting on the stairs halfway down, just around the corner from where he was sitting. And I was sitting there like, I've got to have, I got to know the answer to this question. But I, what is he going to think when I'm out of bed so late? Eventually I was like, okay, here goes. And I walked around the rest of the steps and I walked around the corner and I asked him, church, how do you approach God in prayer? How big do you think your needs are? God thinks that your needs are great.

27:56Do you think that your needs are great? How boldly do you go to God in prayer? How urgently, no matter what's going on, how urgently do you go, God, I've got to talk to you. I've got to talk to you about this. Forgive me. Glorify your name. Your will be done. Your kingdom come. Keep me from temptation. Friends, go urgently. This is more important than a, than a piece of bread for a visitor. Go urgently to God. Go boldly. But listen, you might think that this parable, this little story that Jesus tells means that God is that cranky neighbor. Don't believe that, okay? The lesson is for you to be like the person who needs the bread. The lesson is not that God is the annoyed neighbor.

28:51And here's how we know this because of the other things that Jesus says in this passage. Oh, I forgot to mention this. Could you go back? Is it possible to go back? Previous slide? No, no. No. The one that, the one that has impudence on there. So, okay. I just wanted to point this out. The NIV translates impudence as shameless audacity. I think that's really helpful. So last thing I'll say about point, my second point, have shameless audacity the way that you pray, okay? That's what we're called to. Be shamelessly audacious with the way that you go to God in prayer. Okay. Moving on.

29:38So, Jesus begins and ends this teaching with the fatherhood of God. So we're going to talk about how you should ask your good and your generous father in prayer. That's who you're asking in prayer. You're not asking a cranky neighbor. You're asking your good and generous father. To start the prayer, Jesus says that the very first word is say, father. Now, this probably doesn't blow your minds, but it should. It probably blew the minds of the people that Jesus was talking to.

30:13This would be unheard of to be told, talk to, say father when you talk to God. Unheard of. The prophet Isaiah, my search of the Old Testament, the prophet Isaiah is the only person who twice in his prophecies talking to God said, God, you are our father. Nobody else referred to God as father. David didn't. Moses didn't. Noah didn't. Even Adam didn't. According to the records we have, called God father. The disciples knew that Jesus called God father. They knew that that was getting him in trouble. In fact, that's one of the charges laid before Jesus is he's making God out to be his father. But now Jesus says, go on, it's okay. You call God father. I'm telling you, it's okay.

31:08Call him father. And when we relate to him as father, it comes with promises. And that's what comes at the ends of the passage. Because our God is a good father. He's not an angry father. He's a good father. As a general rule, parents will do anything for their kids. Parents, am I right? You'll walk into traffic for your kids. Some of you might have. Few things make people more immediately defensive and hostile than the accusation that they are not a good parent.

31:46Why? Because taking care of your own children is a universally acknowledged virtue. Everyone from any culture acknowledges that it's a virtue and it's a responsibility to take care of your own kids. That's what Jesus is pointing out in verses 11 and 12. When a child has a need, no reasonable parent will give them something harmful. If a kid asks for a fish to eat, you're not going to give him a serpent. If a kid asks for an egg, you're not going to give him a scorpion. Jesus knows that they're not going to do this. And he says, look, if you act this way, even though you're evil, did you notice that? Even though you're evil? Ouch. Jesus, really? You don't want to couch it a little bit? Nope. Even though you're evil, you treat your kids this way. How much more? With a holy, righteous, completely good father, listen to your requests and give you what you need. How much more? How much more?

32:51That's why we should go to him boldly with our needs, our raw neediness, because he is not stingy. He's not standing there with his arms folded. What do you need now? No, friends. He's there with his arms wide open saying, yes, come ask me. Tell me what you need. Tell me what's on your heart and on your mind. He's good. Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and it will be open to you. So ask and seek and knock. These are all ways to go to God boldly, anytime. And Jesus says the Father is going to give you a very specific and special gift, and that's the Holy Spirit. We're going to close with this. This might surprise you. You might feel like the kid at Christmas who asked for one thing and got something different. But trust me, you want this gift. You need this gift.

33:56Don't be disappointed. The Holy Spirit is the greatest possible gift. Now, I'm going to put up, actually Avery's going to put up some scripture up here on the screen. Don't look it up right now. Once this video is up on YouTube, go and watch it and pause it right here and look up these scriptures and read them. But for now, I just want you to listen to me, okay? All of the spiritual treasure that we ask for comes to us through the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit reveals Christ to us. It helps us see Christ. He opens our eyes to show us who Jesus is. The Spirit helps us to pray, even pleading for us when words fail us. He makes us understand God's Word, which contains God's will and God's promises to us, the things that He will do for us. The Holy Spirit gives us wisdom so that our minds and our hearts can begin to wrap around the promises of God, the things of God. The Holy Spirit is the seal of our present salvation, and it's the promise of our future redemption. The Holy Spirit tells us with certainty every day if we're listening to Him, you are God's adopted child through faith.

35:21He helps us call out to God, Abba Father. The very way that Jesus tells us to address God, the Spirit helps us to do it. Reminds us that we belong to Him. And the Spirit is the guarantee of our future inheritance, where we will be with God and with the redeemed people of God forever. We have that guarantee now in the form of the Spirit in us. What a good gift. What a good gift from a good and generous Father. It comes to everyone who repents and puts their faith in Jesus, receives that gift. And it is a perpetual gift because the Spirit continues God's work in us, forming and shaping us like soft clay into the vessel that's going to bring Him glory and be used in His kingdom. He's putting His fingerprints on us through the Holy Spirit. He supplies us daily, He assures us of forgiveness, and He protects us from evil. So church, ask.

36:40Ask for spiritual treasure every day, boldly, because you are so needy and because God is good. And He loves you. And He is generous for you every day. And we're going to close in prayer. And I want us to end by praying this prayer. Now, I know you're all more familiar with the one that's in Matthew, the longer version of the Lord's Prayer in Matthew, but let's pray this one since we just studied this today. So this will come at the end of the prayer. So pray with me, and then I'll prompt you for us to pray together. Lord Jesus, we are grateful that somebody asked to be taught how to pray and that you stopped and you taught that.

37:24Everything that you taught here, Lord, we need. We need to not just understand in our heads, but know deeply in our hearts how needy we are, what to ask for, and how boldly we should come to you because of who you are. Lord, refresh us with your grace, with your promises. Jesus, remind us that we belong to you. Holy Spirit, continue the work of redemption that has been begun in us. Thank you, God, for giving us the Holy Spirit so that we can walk in newness of life, so that we have a living way into the throne room of God. And it's as simple as prayer.

38:07So Lord Jesus, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, hear us now as we pray together. Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us, and lead us not into temptation. Let the church say, Amen.