Well, let's turn together back
to the book of Luke. Chapter 11. Verse 5. Remember verses 1 through 4,
we spoke on what most people call the Lord's Prayer, which
we know is not the Lord's Prayer, because the Lord could never
pray, forgive me my sins. He doesn't have any sins. But
it's the disciples' prayer. It's the prayer the Lord said,
pray like this. Not pray this. He condemns vain
repetition of things. That doesn't come from the heart.
But he said, pray this way. And he taught them to pray. But
he's still teaching them to pray in verse 5. Listen to this. And
he said unto them, which of you shall have a friend and shall
go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me
three loaves, for a friend of mine in his journey is come to
me, and I have nothing to set before him. And he from within
shall answer and say, Trouble me not, the door is now shut,
and my children are with me in bed. I cannot rise and give thee,
Think about what he said. He gives reasons and then he
says, I can't. But what he's really saying is
I won't. Clearly he can. If those are the reasons, those
can be overcome, I would imagine. He said, I can't rise and give
thee. I say unto you, this is the Lord speaking again now,
I say unto you, though he will not rise and give him because
he is his friend. If it was just a question of
the friendship, he would have said, come back
another time, just serve what you got, it'll be fine. Yet because of his importunity,
the reason this man is gonna receive the three loaves is because
he's not going away until he does. the importunity. Because of his importunity, he
will rise and give him as many as he needs. Now with this passage,
I think it's important. I think a lot of times this is
a good way to start, but this particularly, I think it's important
to understand what our Lord is not saying. All scripture has
to be understood in the context of all scripture. And when we
think of it that way, we know that our Lord is not saying that
he only blesses those people who are insistent and who repeatedly
ask over and over again and will not give up. It's not saying
he only blesses people like that. This word importunity means that. It means persistence. God does
not only bless people who are persistent. The man at the pool
of Bethesda never even asked the Lord for anything. He never
sought the Lord whatsoever. The Lord just walked up to him
and asked him, will you be made whole? And he still didn't say
yes. He made excuses why he couldn't be made whole. The Lord made
him whole anyway. We know that. And so we know
the Lord's not saying the only way you're going to get anything
from me is by being persistent about it. That's not what he's
saying. The woman at the well, the Lord said unto her, if you
knew the gift of God and who it is that speaks with you, you
would ask of me. And I'd give you something to
drink the water of life In John 9 it says in John 9 1
as Jesus passed by He saw a man Which was blind From his birth
that man didn't see him. He was blind. That's us by nature. We don't see the Lord We don't
seek him first The Lord saw a man that couldn't see him and he
went to him and he spit on the ground and made clay and put
it on his eyes. Told him to go wash and he came
seeing. And we know the Lord is not teaching
also that even when he doesn't want to help you, if you inconvenience
him enough, he will. He's not saying that. Does that
sound like your Lord? It may be an inconvenience, you
know, to me to bless you, but if you bug me enough about it,
I will. We know the Lord's not saying that. It's never an inconvenience
to our Heavenly Father to give us anything, you reckon? He's
not teaching that. The last part of our text will
show that. This is a human example, and
he's saying this in the same spirit In which he says what
he does in verse 13 look at verse 13 in the book of Luke Verse chapter 14 13 I'm sorry did I say 14 I mean 11 Luke 11 And verse 13, this is the same
spirit he's saying this. He said there, if you then being
evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much
more shall your heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to them
that ask him? This is something that happens
in the scripture a lot. It's called the principle of
arguing from the lesser to the greater. In other words, Even
if this wretched man who's not really a very good friend, he's
not even a good friend. He said, go away. I'm asleep. My kids and I are
in bed already. We go to bed early around here.
I can't do it. But even though he's not a very
good friend, even you being evil, But because of his persistence,
he'll go ahead and give it to him much more than your heavenly
father who is never inconvenienced by anything. You're not ever
going to be a bother to him. You see how he's presenting this
story. He's not saying, well, it may
not be convenient for me, but if you bug me enough, I'll go
ahead and reluctantly. God never reluctantly blesses
anybody. He never reluctantly does anything.
So you've got to understand what the story is teaching and what
it ain't teaching. This is a contrast to our Heavenly
Father. Just like He said, even though
you're evil, you're going to do certain things, much less
me. I'm not evil. I'm not a bad friend. I'm not
inconvenienced. I don't sleep. I'm the friend that sticketh
closer than a brother. I'm the friend that gave myself for
your soul, for your sins. How am I gonna not get up and
give you some bread? It's a contrast, not an example.
I wanna be very clear. Verse nine of our text, Luke
11, nine. I say unto you, ask. Now this
is right after our text. He said, just because of his
importunity now, he'll give up. And notice the contrast though.
I say unto you, a friend that's not much of a friend, he might
be reluctant, but even he will give you if you just gotta have
it. You're just not going away until
you get it. But here's what I say unto you, just ask. Ask. and it'll be given. He's not
going to give you any grief about it. If any man have a need, if he
lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who upbraideth not. In other words,
he's not going to chide you or say, what are you doing? He upbraideth
not. He gives liberally to those that
ask. Just ask. That's what he says. Now in the story we have this
man saying what he said, but it is teaching something now.
The word importunity is there to teach us something. I believe
that's the key word in the text. We also have examples in the
scriptures now of sinners begging the Lord Jesus Christ for mercy.
Begging him for mercy. And doing so insistently. Refusing
to go away the disciples at times would say go away you're bothering
us and they would just come the more earnestly And cry even louder And he gives us those examples
to show us that once he does come first to us Once he does
bless us first There will be an urgency in our seeking of
Him. There will be an urgency. And
His blessing is given freely, but it's asked for desperately. A blessing that only He can give.
God must come to us first before we will ever come to him. In Romans 10 20 the Apostle Paul
quotes Isaiah 65 1 where the Lord says, I was found of them
that sought me not. I was made manifest unto them
that ask not after me. That's what happens first. We love him. Why? Because he
first loved us. We seek Him because He first
sought us. I was made manifest unto them
that ask not after me. And that's true of every sinner
whom the Lord saves. He doesn't just, He doesn't go
around looking for people that are begging Him and save them.
No, nobody's seeking God by nature. Nobody. God looked down from
heaven upon the children of men to see if there were any that
did understand and that did seek God. Is there anybody that's
importunate that is insisting on blessing from God? I need
you, God. I've come to seek your face.
I must have your blessing. I must have forgiveness. There wasn't anybody doing that.
There were not any that did understand. Every one of them has gone back.
They are all together become filthy. There is none that doeth
good. No, not one. God sought for a seeker and didn't
find one. If any sinner is ever going to
find God, then God is going to have to be found of them that
sought him not. Because there isn't anybody by
nature seeking after God. He must find you first, and I
say find in parenthesis. It's not that he don't know where
you are, but he very beautifully illustrates his saving of us
by finding that one sheep that went astray. He must come to you first. He
must do something for you first. No man can come unto me except
the Father which hath sent me. Draw him, and I'll raise him
up at the last day. God does something for you if
he comes to you and Reveals his son in you then you're coming
to Christ and Christ said I'll raise you up at the last day
You're gonna be with me forever in verse 65 of John 6. He said
therefore I said unto you that no man can come unto me Except
it were given unto him Of my father so you don't have to come
to you first. We know that and Salvation is
by grace through faith and even that's not of yourselves, but
in the experience of salvation. Once God does come to you and
show you your need of him and reveal to you that Christ is
your only hope, faith is the gift of God, not of works lest
any man should boast, but that faith that he gives is tenacious. It is faith that will not let
go. It is faith that is importunate. It is faith that will never give
up. Paul said, I press toward the
mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ. I run
after him just as fast as I can and nothing's going to stop me.
That's the kind of faith he gives. Once God does come to you, shows
you your need, reveals that Christ is your hope of salvation. He
is salvation. His name is Jehovah is salvation. That's what Jesus means. Jehovah
is salvation. Christ is Jehovah who is salvation. He's our righteousness. We desperately
need right. Blessed are they that hunger
and thirst after righteousness. What would you do to get some
bread and water if not just some guest was over and you wanted
to impress them and have something for them to eat? What if you
starve them to death? How long would you knock on the
door then? Blessed are they that hunger
and thirst after righteousness. They'll be filled. When you need
Christ that bad, that you're gonna die without him, die forever
without him. He said, you'll have me. You'll
have me. We need forgiveness of sin. God
be merciful to me, the sinner. One thing is needful and that's
Christ. And when you need something,
or in this case somebody, You're going to be persistent. I got to have him. You'll be
like blind Bartimaeus. Mark 10. I guess we better turn
over there. Mark 10. Verse 46. If you want to know
what it means, what this word means. Importunate Look at Mark 10 46 They came
to Jericho and as he went out of Jericho with his disciples
and a great number of people Blind Bartimaeus the son of Timaeus
Sat by the highway side begging And when he heard that it was
Jesus of Nazareth he began to cry out Oh my, now, he was begging
before that. He was asking people, you know,
like they do, can you spare a dollar? Can you spare any loose change?
Have you got a little something, you know, for me to eat? But
when he heard that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by, you see, everybody
else was able to relieve the symptom, give him a little money. The reason he needed money is
he's blind. He couldn't do anything. He couldn't
work. Little money will help on it.
But here comes somebody that can solve my problem Not just
give me a hand a leg up. He can solve my problem He can
make my blindness go away Then he begins to cry He began to cry out verse 47
and say Jesus thou son of David have mercy on me And many charged
him that he should hold his peace, but he cried the more a great
deal. That's the definition of what our text is teaching. He
cried the more a great deal. That's how you get what you need.
Look, the Lord knew what you needed before you ever cried.
He came to you because he knew what you needed. He walked by
He passed right by Blind Bartimaeus because he knew what he needed
and he wanted to give it to him. And Blind Bartimaeus needed it
bad enough that he wasn't about to shut up. Everybody, it says
everybody, many charged him. Think about that, there's a multitude
with him it said and many, everybody said shut up, shut your mouth
you old blind idiot. You old beggar, you worthless
scum of the earth. Shut up! We don't want to hear
your nonsense. It didn't shut him up, did it?
Why? Because of the truth of our text. There are though, and he's teaching
us still how to pray, isn't he? Prayer is not just saying your
prayers. Prayer is, I need God And I need only what He can give. I've got to have Him. I've got
to have Him. He cried the more a great deal,
Thou Son of David, have mercy on me. You can't shut up somebody. That's
what we're saying. People say, well, we need to
put prayer back in the school. Let me tell you something. If
you need God and you just happen to be at school, nobody's going to stop you from
praying. And Jesus stood still and commanded
him to be called. And they called the blind man,
saying unto him, Be of good comfort. Arise, he calleth thee. And he,
casting away his garments, rose and came to Jesus. And Jesus
answered and said unto him, What wilt thou that I should do unto
thee? And the blind man said unto him, Lord, that I might
receive my sight. What a picture this is. Who was
he? Blind Bartimaeus. That's who
he was. So what does he need? Oh Lord,
I want to see. Who are we? The sinner. What do you need then? Righteousness. I need forgiveness. Forgiveness
of my sin. Righteousness in which I can
stand before God Almighty. That's the opportunity. Cried
the more a great deal. What does this have to do with
prayer? Absolutely everything. Prayer begins at salvation. Prayer
begins at salvation. Your very first prayer really
is, Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me. Why do I say that? God, be merciful
to me, the sinner. That's your first prayer, isn't
it? Why do I say that? Well, it's
just simple. If you haven't cried to the Lord
for mercy, then you've never really prayed. You just haven't. You may have said your prayers, but sinners that know they're
sinners are mercy beggars. If you haven't cried for mercy,
you haven't prayed. And if you have cried to God
for mercy, then He's given it to you. He's given it to you. And you're not ever going to
stop crying. You're not ever, ever, ever going to stop. They can make it illegal to pray
in school. And you know what I'm going to
do? I'm going to pray in school. Because I got to have him. I got to have
it. They can make it illegal to pray
in a church. You know what we're going to do? We're going to get
together somewhere and we're going to beg God to have mercy
on us. All of your prayers should be
like that first one. That's what our Lord is teaching
us. We should always pray with a
sense of urgency and a sense of the truth that what God only
can give, I've got to have. The way to pray to God is with
urgent need. Jacob prayed importunately at
Pineal. In Genesis chapter 32, he laid
hold of the Lord Jesus Christ like his life depended on it.
Do you know why? Because his life depended on
it. Is that how you lay hold of him? If not, you ain't laid hold of
him yet. He laid hold of the Lord Jesus
Christ and the Lord said, let me go for the day breaketh. And
Jacob said, I will not. Let thee go, except thou bless
me. Oh, you talk about importunity. That's the word. That's the definition of it.
This is what he's teaching us. Let's lay hold of him in prayer
and not let go. Not let go. We must have his blessing. You're either blessed or not.
You remember when we learned that not long ago, I heard it from
another preacher, and then I preached it to you. It may have been somebody
here, you may have heard it, and then I wasn't able to act
like I came up with it because you heard it from somebody else.
But we ain't none of us come up with nothing but what God
gave us, did we? But blessings are not things,
are they? People are blessed. And if you're
blessed, Even the bad stuff is a blessing. Well, I hope I never forget that.
We got to have his blessing. And once we do, everything's
a blessing. Somebody said, I ain't never got no bad news since I
got the good news. It's all good now. Got to have his favor. We must
have acceptance with God. It's not about us accepting Him.
We need for Him to accept us, and we'll cry for it. His mercy,
His provision every day. He tells us, give us this day,
Lord, our daily bread. His peace. If we had any idea
how badly we needed Him every moment, then like Jacob, we would not
let go. And the Lord is teaching us that
even we, even we ungrateful, selfish,
fair-weather friends will give in in the face of importunity.
When confronted with the urgency of a matter, we'll give in, even
though we're fair-weather friends. You know, if you'd have come
an hour ago, I'd have gladly given, but I'm trying to go to
sleep here. I got to work in the morning. And I say I'm grateful because
if we were truly grateful, I've got three loaves and my friend
doesn't have any. I may have ten. He's asking for three. What a blessing it is to be able
to provide that. God had to give me something
before I'm able to give him something. And if I'm not willing to give
it, what is that but ingratitude? for the gift we received. But even we, when confronted
with the urgency of it, would give in. But oh, in contrast
to that, He's teaching us that our great Heavenly Father, He
delights to show mercy. He delights to give what's needed. He's not like us. And we come urgently we need
him continually and we need him desperately and he is He delight
I just I'll just stick with the way the scripture says it he
delights To give He's teaching us here how to
pray he's teaching us who we're praying to in verse 13 remember
he said your heavenly father your heavenly father If you then, being evil, know
how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall
your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them
that ask Him? He knows what you need before
you ask. He says that in the text too. We read a text that
told us that in connection with this. He said, don't pray like
the heathen do. using vain repetitions they think
they'll be heard for their much speaking but your heavenly father
knoweth what you have need of before you ask he's the one that brings us to
ask and he does so he brings us to
himself to ask because he wants us to have what we need Ezekiel 36 37 listen to this
text Thus saith the Lord God I Will yet for this be inquired
of by the house of Israel They haven't inquired. They haven't
asked me yet. They haven't prayed to me yet, but they're going
to I will yet be inquired of For this some specific thing
by my people My people are gonna ask me Now, let me start over
I will yet for this be inquired of by the house of Israel To
do it for them That's why they're gonna ask
me Because I'm gonna do it for them He doesn't do it because we ask We ask because he's going to
do that. Oh, if we could ever learn that. If you want to see what importunity
looks like, you could come over sometime and watch Our Dog Clark. I'll call him
Our Dog. when I'm eating. I sit down with a plate of food
and he is right there every time. You can count on it. Now if you come over to eat at
our house, we'll have to put him in his crate because I've
spoiled him. I admit it, I readily confess it, I've spoiled him.
And he thinks just everybody's going to give him food off their
plate. So we'll have to, we'll put him up because we don't want
him bothering you. He'll be a nuisance to you now,
but he's not a nuisance to me. It doesn't bother me a bit. I
love to give him, Vicki brings me breakfast every morning. I love to give him a little piece
of bacon. I eat most of it myself, you
know. He is just a dog. But boy, that doesn't bother
me a bit. It makes him so happy. Oh, it's the picture of happiness
when he gets a piece of bacon off of my plate. And you know
something that makes me happy too? It doesn't bother me because
I love that dog way too much. I confess that too, I love him
too much. But there's a reason that I use
a dog as an example because it's in the Word of God. The word
importunity contains the word import. You will be importunate regarding
that which is important to you. And in Matthew chapter 15 we
have a picture of that And we've seen this story so many times. It's Matthew 15, 21 through 28
if you want to look at it later and look into it. But this is
a picture of how sinners are saved. This woman came begging
because her daughter was grievously vexed with the devil. Can you
imagine that? Can you imagine your own daughter being actually possessed by a
devil in so much that it's destructive to her and horrible to watch. You can't stand it to see her
suffer because of it. And so you come to the Lord Jesus
Christ and again the disciples said, make her go away. And she
kept on coming, she kept on begging and the Lord answered her not
a word. He didn't give her any reason
outwardly to continue to ask. But she kept on asking, Jesus,
thou son of David, have mercy on me. My daughter is the one
with the problem, but I need the mercy. That's love right
there. And only those who have the grace
of Christ in their heart can love like that really. But he answered her not a word
and she kept on begging and finally he said it would not be right
for me to take the children's bread and give it to a dog. And
what he simply meant by that is he said I've come not but
to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Scripture says he
came unto his own and his own received him not. That's the
Israelite, the Jews, his people in an earthly sense. They're
a picture of his elect. But he said, it wouldn't be right
for me to take the children's bread and give it to a dog. And she said, truth Lord, but
even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's
table. And he said to her, oh woman, great is thy faith. The faith that he gives, he gives
it freely. He gives it without you seeking
it, without you wanting it, without you asking for it. He gives it.
But when he gives it, that faith will never go away until it has
Christ. To whom shall we go, Lord? You. To whom shall we go? Thou. Because He is who He is, I cannot
go. I cannot leave. I cannot quit.
I cannot give up. Not if I have the faith that
He gave me. And of course, every sinner is
saved that way. We cry unto the Lord importunately
because it's an urgent, important, vital need. We need forgiveness
of sin. We need righteousness in order
to stand before God. We don't have any of our own. And let me ask you a question
now. You cried unto Him at one time if you know Him. But do
you need Him any less this very morning than you did the first
day you met Him? We still cry to Him the same
exact way. May it be so. He's teaching us
to pray that way. Pray like that when you pray. Pray like Your life depended
on it Because he is life and he's the
giver of life That woman was like a dog who
was told to go away This is human food you don't deserve any of
it. This is the children's bread that The master of the house, he works
hard to provide something to eat for his children. That's
not for the dogs, that's for the children. Can a dog even
appreciate good food? Does a dog know the difference
between a ribeye and a round steak or something, the worst
cut of meat you can... Do they know the difference?
Can they even appreciate good food? A dog doesn't deserve anything. Let's just get some old Roy or
something. The worst thing you can give him. You know, give
him that. No. I can't do that. And that's mostly
what he eats. Not old Roy. But something a
little bit better than that. But I can't just give him. I'm
sitting there eating bacon and eggs. And he doesn't just get crumbs
that fall from the table. He gets food right off my plate.
And let me tell you something. That woman was willing to have
a crumb. Oh Lord, the dogs eat the crumbs that fall. Just let
me eat from your table. I'll just eat what falls on the
floor. Is that what our Lord gives us? You remember Mephibosheth? Second Samuel 9.6, now when Mephibosheth,
the son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, was coming to David,
he fell on his face and did reverence. And David said, Mephibosheth,
and he answered, behold, thy servant. And David said unto
him, fear not, for I will surely show thee kindness for Jonathan's
sake, and will restore thee all the land of Saul thy father.
And thou shalt eat bread at my table continually, And he bowed
himself. Listen to this now. David just
said, you're going to eat with me. You're going to eat at my
table. You're going to eat what I eat. You're going to eat royal
food. You're going to eat the best
there is. And listen to what Mephibosheth
said. He bowed himself and said, what is thy servant that thou
shouldest look upon such a dead dog as I am? Then the king called to Ziba,
Saul's servant, and said unto him, I have given unto thy master's
son, Mephibosheth, all that pertain to Saul, and all his house. Thou, therefore, and thy sons
and thy servants shall till the land for him. He was lame on
both of his feet. He couldn't till anything. You're
going to do it for him. And thou shalt bring in the fruits
that thy master's son may have food to eat. Everything that
you after you've tilled and weeded and planted and worked And you
bring in the harvest you're doing it for him You're doing it so
that he will have something to eat But Mephibosheth thy master's
son shall eat bread all way at my table Now Ziba had 15 sons
and 20 servants. Then said Ziba unto the king,
according to all that my lord the king hath commanded his servant,
so shall thy servant do. As for Mephibosheth, said the
king, he shall eat at my table as one of the king's sons. He
said it three times in that text, didn't he? He's gonna eat at
my table. He said it to Mephibosheth, he
said it to Ziba, and he said it again at the end. He's gonna
eat at the king's table Just like one of my sons. And what
a beautiful arrangement this is. We come with urgency. We come to our Lord Jesus Christ
with urgent need. We come incessantly. We're not
ever gonna stop. We're gonna keep coming back.
There's a lot of reasons why we keep coming back. We ain't
got, we got to, don't we? Gotta have him. but also because
he's been so gracious to us before. We know that he will be again.
We come persistently and we come to him who came to us first. He came to us first because he
delights to give us everything we need. Mephibosheth didn't
come to the king's palace and say, can I get something to eat?
David said, go and fetch him. They said, he lives out in Lodabar
out there. Go fetch him. I'm going to show
mercy on him for Jonathan's sake. And in our next lesson or two
or more, We're going to see more and more just how blessed we
are to be able to come to Him for all of our needs. You and I now, Lord, children
of the King, we Mephibosheths, worthless, lame, can't do anything
for ourselves. We are sitting pretty, my friends.
We're sitting pretty. He says to His children, just
ask. This will be our lesson next
week, Lord will just ask and I'll give it to you. Seek and you'll find. Knock. And I'm not going to say
it's too late. I've gone to bed. I'll open the
door. May God give us grace to knock.
With urgency. to knock as though our lives
depended on it, because they do. Do we just sing that song,
I Need Thee Every Hour, because it has a pretty tune? Or do we sing it because we need
Him every hour? May the Lord bless His word to
our hearts.