Turn with me back to Luke 11. Luke chapter 11, verse one says,
and it came to pass that as he was
praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples
said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray. Teach us to pray. Can you imagine listening to
him pray? And when he was finished, one
of them Sometimes there's a moment of silence after someone prays.
One of them finally spoke up and said, Lord, teach us to pray. My hope is that by the end of
this message, we'll have a greater understanding of how important
it is to pray, to truly pray from our heart to our God. Verse one says, it came to pass
that as he was praying, our Lord constantly prayed. He constantly
prayed all through the gospels. It says he prayed. Just look
back at Luke nine, verse 18. Luke 9 verse 18, and it came
to pass as he was alone praying, constantly praying. Look over
at Luke chapter 3. I love this. Every time I try
to remember any time someone expresses a desire to confess
the Lord in baptism, I try to show them this verse right here.
This is just so precious. Luke 3, 21, it says, Now when
all the people were baptized, it came to pass that Jesus also
being baptized and praying, while John the Baptist was lowering
him down into that water, he was crying out to the Father,
calling unto the Father, praying. And it says the heaven was open.
Our Lord constantly prayed. That ought to prove to us the
importance of praying to our God. Our Lord Jesus Christ was
constantly in communion, constantly in prayer to the Father. Back
in our text in Luke 11, verse one says, it came to pass that as he was
praying in a certain place, when he ceased, One of his disciples
said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught
his disciples. And he said unto them, when you
pray, say, our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy
name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be
done, as in heaven, so in earth. give us day by day our daily
bread, and forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone
that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil. Verse five says, and he said
unto them, this is still our Lord answering them in teaching
them how to pray. He is still speaking. Verse five
says, 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. I say unto you, though he will
not rise and give him because he is his friend, yet because
of his importunity, he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.
And I say unto you, ask, and it shall be given you. Seek,
and you shall find. Knock, and it shall be opened
unto you. for everyone that asketh receiveth,
and he that seeketh findeth, and to him that knocketh it shall
be opened. Our Lord said, The man would
not get out of bed and help his friend just because he was his
friend. They were friends. And the man
said, would you loan me three loaves of bread? And the guy
said, no, he wouldn't get out of bed just because he was his
friend. But the Lord said, the man got out of bed and helped
his friend because of his friend's importunity. What that means
is his friend wouldn't go away. He just wouldn't go away. He
knocked and knocked and kept on knocking. And he said, that's how we need
to pray to our heavenly father. He did not say everyone that
has asked. And has sought. And has not,
he said, everyone that asketh. and seeketh and knocketh, knocks
and knocks and keeps on knocking. Our Lord gave another parable
just like this in Luke 18. Turn with me over to Luke 18. Luke 18 verse 1, and he spake
a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray
and not to faint, saying, there was in a city a judge which feared
not God, neither regarded man. And there was a widow in that
city. And she came unto him saying, avenge me of mine adversary.
And he would not for a while. But afterward he said within
himself, though I fear not God nor regard man, yet because this
widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming
she weary me. And the Lord said, hear what
the unjust judge saith, and shall not God avenge his own elect,
which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with
them? Verse 8, he said he will. He
will. This is our Lord teaching us
something right here. The heading at the top of my
page for Luke 18 says the importunate widow. The judge would not avenge
her at first, but she wouldn't go away. She wouldn't go away. The Lord asked his disciples
one time, will you go away? And they said, to whom shall
we go? Nobody else to go to. You have the words of life. Our
Lord said, though, right here, this is why she got what she
came for. She did not faint in her asking. She did not stop
crying out. Verse one right here says, Our
Lord spake this parable to this end. For this purpose to state
this point. That men are always to pray. 1 Thessalonians 5, 17 says, pray
without ceasing. Lord, teach us, teach us. James 4, verse 2 says, you have
not because you ask not. Lord, teach us. Now, for our comfort and our
reassurance, let me say that it is not our prayer that saves
us. Our prayer is not the beginning
of our salvation. We don't pray to God so that
we can be saved. We pray to God because we have
been saved. Christ is the beginning, He is
the middle, and He is the ending work of our salvation. It was Christ's prayer that saved
us. Turn with me over to John 17. John 17, our Lord here is praying
to His Father, and He said in verse 9, John 17, verse 9, I
pray for them. I pray not for the world, but
for them which Thou hast given Me, for they are Thine. I'm praying for my people, my
elect people. Verse 11, He said, I'm praying
that they might be kept. He said, and now I'm no more
in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee.
Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast
given me. I'm praying that they might be
kept. Verse 17, he said, I'm praying that they might be sanctified,
made holy, made pure. Sanctify them through thy truth.
Thy word is truth. Verse 21, he said, I'm praying
that they might be one in us. that they all might be one as
thou, Father, are in me and I in thee, that they also may be one
in us. Verse 22, he said, I'm praying
that they might be glorified with us. Verse 24, he said, Father, I'm
praying that they might be with me where I am. Verse 26, he said, Father, I'm
praying that as you have loved me, you will love them. That same love will be in them. That's the prayer that saved
the souls of God's elect. That's the prayer that was ordained
from the beginning. and was purposed and foreordained
for Christ to come and pray for His people that the Father might
hear His intercessory prayer and answer that prayer. Christ
prayed that prayer and the Father did answer that prayer. How do we know that? Turn to
Luke 22. Luke 22, verse 39. And he came out and went as he
was known to the Mount of Olives, also known as Gethsemane. And
his disciples also followed him. And when he was at the place,
he said unto them, pray that you enter not into temptation.
And he was withdrawn from them about a stone's cast and kneeled
down and prayed, saying, father, if thou be willing, remove this
cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but
thine be done. And there appeared an angel unto
him from heaven, strengthening him, and being in an agony, he
prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was as it were great drops
of blood falling down to the ground." That was the indescribable
agony of our sin being pressed into him in that moment. That was Him being pierced with
the feeling of our infirmities, the guilt and the shame and the
pain and the horror. He bore it all. He bore every
bit of that. That's why from the cross, just
before He died, paying the penalty to redeem us, He prayed this
prayer. That's why He prayed this prayer.
Look at Luke 23, verse 34. Luke 23, verse 34, then said
Jesus, Father, forgive them. Condemn me and forgive them. That was the effectual fervent
prayer of the righteous man that availed much. That's the prayer
that saved our souls. In His death, that prayer is
finished, and our prayer now is only the result of that prayer. We pray to our God only because
Christ has saved us and redeemed us, and the Spirit of Christ
has made us alive and given us the ability to cry out to Him
in prayer. And if God has given us that
ability to communicate with him and to inquire of him and to
make our partitions known to him, then we should do it at
all times for all things. He said, if you want to have,
ask me. Ask and you'll receive. Ask and
don't stop asking. Pray without ceasing. Now, what should we pray for?
This is why we pray. This is what we're commanded
to do. Pray, pray. What should we pray for? Well,
Romans 8 tells us, and you can turn if you want to, I'll read
it to you, or you can turn over to Romans 8. It tells us in Romans
8, verse 26, likewise, the spirit also helpeth
our infirmities, for we know not what we should pray for as
we ought. But the Spirit itself maketh
intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered, And
he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the
Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the
will of God. We do not naturally know what
we should pray for as we ought. But God's Spirit in us, and Galatians
4 says that it is the Spirit of Christ Himself in us. He causes
us to pray for the things that we should and we desperately
need to pray for. And I pray that our Lord will
let us take this to heart. I really do. I pray that Christ
in us will cause us to take this to heart. And from our hearts,
we will sincerely pray for some things that he's told us to pray
for, that we need to pray for here in his word. All right,
go with me back to Luke 11. Verse 1, and it came to pass
that as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of
his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John
also taught his disciples. And he said unto them, when you
pray, say, our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Our God is holy. Our Lord said we need to acknowledge
him as that. We need to acknowledge him as
that. We are very serious. We're not flipping about these
things because our God is holy. Our God is just. Our God is sovereign. He is high and lofty and our
Lord said when you pray to the father. Address him in that way. Address him humbly. address him
reverently, holy and reverent is his name. And he said, address
him in that way. Verse two, he said unto them,
when you pray, say our father, which art in heaven, hallowed
be thy name, thy kingdom come. We pray not only for the return
of the Lord, The end of this book says, come quickly, right? He's commanding us to pray for
the return of our Lord. Thy kingdom come. But that also
means, Lord, save your people. Save your people. Call your sheep
out. Lord, do it today. Have mercy
today. Open blind eyes today. Let today
be the day of salvation. Thy kingdom come today. Lord, I pray your kingdom will
come today. Is God going to sovereignly save
his people? You can answer that in your heart.
Yes or no. Is God going to sovereignly save his people? Here's the answer.
Absolutely he will. But what he's saying right here
is. Don't take this lazy, wrong approach. of saying, well, you
know, God is sovereign. It doesn't matter what I do.
I'm just not even going to worry about it. That's what a lot of people do.
That's wrong. That is not his means. If you
are burdened over somebody, if you know somebody who is not
saved, if you know someone who does not yet know the Lord, pray
for them. Pray for them. Pray to God for
them. Pray for that soul. You say,
well, what if they're not one of God's elect? Then they're
not going to be saved. But according to God's word,
if they are one of God's elect, then he is going to use the means
of you being burdened for them. And praying for them. and compelling
them to come hear the gospel and a preacher preaching the
gospel to them and the Spirit of God opening their eyes and
ears and hearts and causing them to believe and causing them to
cast their all on Christ. That's the means that God has
chosen to use. Our prayer is not the cause of
anyone's salvation. but it may just be a component
of God's means. If you're burdened for somebody,
pray for them and keep on praying for them. Keep on praying for
them. Children, spouse, parents, friend,
keep on praying for them. Verse two, he said unto them,
when you pray, say, our father which art in heaven hallowed
be thy name, thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, as in heaven,
so in earth. Let me ask you this question.
Is God's will going to be done? Yes. I mean, no matter what,
the answer is yes. Then why pray that? Why pray
that? Number one, it's because our
God told us to. That's the first reason. If prayer
was not important, our Lord would not have prayed and he would
not have told us to pray. He would not have told us to
pray these things, but he told us to pray, thy will be done. Thy will be done. So we do. Number
one, it's because he told us to, but number two, it's because
this is an open confession of the fact that that is the desire
that he has put in our hearts. We want His will to be done in
all things. That's our desire. Verse 3, He
said, give us day by day our daily bread. Physically and spiritually,
He said, ask for it. We usually don't have any trouble
remembering to ask Him for physical needs. We usually don't have
much trouble at all remembering to ask him for physical needs.
But I'm ashamed of how many times I come into this place of worship
without asking him to feed me spiritually. I hope that registers with us. I'm just being honest, I don't
think we do it too much. I don't think I do it that much.
That's shameful. May the Lord teach us to not
come to his table of worship without asking him to feed us. We have not because we ask not. I love you all so much. I love
you so much. Every time I stand up here, it's
my desire for your souls to be fed. But I cannot feed you. I think I have an okay personality,
but that's not good enough. I try to study as hard as I can,
but that's not good enough. I can't feed myself. I can dig
in these things and research these things and study. I cannot
feed myself. Only God can truly feed us by
His Word. I dig as I do this and I go back
over these notes and go back over these notes and I dig and
I search for illustrations and stories. And the reason is because
that's what gets all of our attention. And I love telling illustrations
and stories and you love hearing illustrations and stories. It
creates an emotional response in us. That's what our flesh
naturally connects with. And it's like, oh, OK, now he's
saying something. And it creates this emotional
response, and sometimes we have some really good stories and
we get overcome and we tear up and we think, oh, the Lord really
blessed us. Not necessarily. I'm not trying
to be silly, I'm trying to be honest. We can get that same
response from a Hallmark movie. We really can. In false religion,
that's the goal of the message, an emotional response. You know, I think about it. We
have these stories, okay? Go to the movies, whatever. Watch
the underdog on the sports team score a touchdown and the crowd
goes wild. I'm probably going to tear up.
Probably going to create an emotional response. Feeling fed is not
necessarily being fed. There are people all over this
world who feel saved, who are not saved. And there are people
who don't feel saved, who are saved. But Martin Luther said, feelings
come, feelings go, feelings are deceiving. My warrant is the
Word of God. Nothing else is worth believing.
I have a folder of illustrations. Every time somebody says something,
if it's good, I write it down and stick it in the folder. If
I listen to a message on sermon audio and I hear a good illustration,
I write it down and stick it in the folder. I've been doing
this for a long time now. But that folder is not what will
feed the sheep. It's this. It's this. God has not promised to truly
feed our souls through illustrations. He's promised to feed our souls
through His Word. And I know, and let me just say
this, I know that without an illustration, our Lord did not
preach to the people. He preached in parables, and
without a parable, He didn't preach to the people. I know
that illustrations help us to enter into the word that we preach. We give an illustration, it's
like, man, that made that come alive. Don't worry, I'm not against
illustrations. Had I been able to find one in
that folder today, I would give it to you right now. I'm at a
little bit of a loss for illustrations. If you find one, send it my way. But this is what I'm saying.
Let's not look to or rely on illustrations or particular preachers
or personalities or any of those things for the feeding of our
souls. Let's pray to God. We have not because we ask not. Let's pray to God, asking him
if he would feed us through his word, through his word. In the
study a moment ago, we read Luke 23, those two on the road to
Emmaus. Did not our heart burn within
us? All the Lord was doing was preaching the word. Lord, feed us through your word.
I really sincerely encourage all of us to pray that. Pray
that ask the Lord for that. And then if we enjoy an illustration,
that's just icing on the cake. Verse four says. And forgive
us our sins, only those who have had their sins forgiven will
truly cry, Lord, forgive us of our sins. Only those who have
had their sins forgiven will truly cry, Lord, forgive us for
our sins. Somebody says, well, hadn't Christ
already forgiven the sins of his elect people? Yes, he has. Lord, please let me be one of
them. Please, even me, even me, let thy blessing fall on me. And may God let us take this
really to heart. Look at this with me. Verse four,
forgive us our sins for we also forgive everyone that is indebted
to us. What that means is Lord teach
us, cause us, help us to forgive each other as you have forgiven
us. The natural tendency of our sinful
flesh is to not forgive each other and hold on to a grudge
as long as we can. Thank God Christ was not sinful
flesh. And he forgave us our sins and
iniquities, he remembered no more. Let's pray to the Lord
for that same ability. Let's pray to the Lord for the
same ability. Lord, would you give me the heart
of Christ, the mind of Christ, the desire of Christ? Sincere forgiveness. Verse 4
says, and lead us not into temptation. Our Lord said, pray this, pray
this. We would be so wise to pray this,
lead us not into temptation. Lord, we're so prone to fall
into trouble and trials and temptations. Please help us. Lead us not into
temptation, but deliver us from evil. Deliver us from evil. In
all three messages last Sunday, the funeral of our brother D
was mentioned, and I'm going to mention it one more time.
In our Lord calling him home, we just sang that song nearer
my God to thee. I was thinking about him the
whole time. And the Lord calling him home, he has been delivered
from all of the temptations and evil of this world. All of it. A true deliverance is coming. And our Lord said, pray for it. Lord, deliver us, include us,
lead us not into temptation, deliver us with all of your people. And I'm going to close the message
by quoting three scriptures to you. Okay. I knew that I had
a long message. I knew these were a lot of notes
and I knew that I wouldn't get to turn to these, but this is
what made me want to be here. So I'm just going to quote these
three to you and I'll be done. In first Samuel 12, Samuel said,
God forbid that I should sin against the Lord in ceasing to
pray for you. I pray for you. A lot of times I'll get the church
directory out. Because I can't remember everybody. And I go through you and your
children and I pray for you and I need to pray for you. But I pray that God will lay
it on my heart to pray for you more. I ought to pray for you
more. The Apostle Paul said in a few
different places, he said, brethren, pray for us. Those that have been called to
preach the gospel, this what we're doing is so important,
it's so important. We come in here on a Wednesday
night thinking, well, you know, let's go grab a service and then.
We'll go on about our way and. The closer we get to the end,
the more this is going to mean to us. Our brother D, those last
few weeks and days, all he wanted to do was listen to messages,
have scripture read. If you knew it could be tomorrow,
I'm telling you, you would lay hold of this. I would lay hold
of this as though my life depended on it. And what we're doing here is
so critical. It's just so, so critical and
so important. I am sincerely asking you to
pray for me. I believe that you do. But if you are anything like
me. It's not as often as I need for it to be. The last scripture I'll quote
is Psalm 122, verse 6. It says, pray for the peace of
Jerusalem, spiritual Jerusalem, God's people, us. Pray for peace
with us, peace with God, peace with each other. Let's not just
assume on it. Let's ask for it. Let's ask for
it. Let's never stop asking for that
until the day God calls us home and delivers us to perfect peace
himself. perfect peace and rest himself,
Christ Jesus the Lord. I will pray for you by God's
grace that he will keep you fervent in these things and not let you
go and not let you veer away and not let you wander off. I
will pray for you if you will pray for me. that the Lord will
keep me, keep me fervent in these things and not let me go and
not let me wander off. We could be here for a while
naming men who started out preaching the truth and then they left
it and they veered off on something else and everybody thought, wow,
he was so solid at one time. Not anymore. Pray for me and I'll pray for
you. And may the Lord teach us to
pray. May the Lord teach us to do it, teach us how to do it
honestly. May he cause us to be praying
people for Christ's sake. All right.