It's a good hymn. It's scriptural. I've shown you before that the
chorus is taken from Genesis 32. But Albert Wright wrote this,
Teach me to pray, Lord, teach me to pray. Thou art my pattern,
day unto day. When the disciples saw the Lord
praying in Luke 11, they heard Him praying, and He was a pattern. of prayer. He prayed often and
they heard him and they asked him to teach them to pray. They said John taught his disciples
to teach us. And then this line, grant me
power with men and power with thee. Sounds like some kind of
modern line, but it's not. It's Genesis 32, 28 where Jacob The Lord wrestled with Jacob,
and Jacob was wrestling back. And the Lord said, as a prince,
as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and has prevailed. So that's where that comes from.
Meaning? Influence. Don't you wish that
you were so urgent in prayer that it would influence someone? And Jacob said to the Lord, I'm
not going to let you go till you bless me. Now that's prayer
isn't it? Okay, Matthew 6, Matthew chapter
6. Prayer, this subject, is nothing
more important. Nothing more important. Hearing
God's Word preached and reading God's Word and worshiping together
is as important, but nothing more important. Nothing more
vital. The word vital has to do with
life. It's your life. It's proof of
life. Prayer. Nothing more vital to
our spiritual and temporal life. the life we live in this world.
Prayer is a vital part of that, and I'm going to give you some
reasons in a moment. It's a sign of life. One of the old writers
said, you know, someone who doesn't call on God doesn't know God.
Someone who doesn't talk to God doesn't know God. You don't talk
to somebody you don't know, do you? If you know and love someone,
you talk to them and commune with them. That's what prayer
is, communion with God. Communing. Communicating. Communion with God. Calling on
God. Whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be
saved. And that doesn't just mean one time for your sins,
but it means every day, all day, from everything you need saving
from. Yourself. Prayer is communion with God,
calling on God, crying unto God like a baby. Like a child to
the father, like a spouse to her husband in need, and a servant
to the master. Who was it that said that? We
all, our eyes look unto thee as a maid to her mistress. Yep. Prayer is communion. It's the truest revealer of a
relationship with God. It really is. If you know God,
you know Christ, you need Him, you need Christ, you will call
on Him. You will. You will talk to Him.
You will commune with Him. It's calling. It's crying. If
you're poor and needy, if you're really needy, He'll ask for you. You'll ask, you'll be calling.
That's why the Lord rebuked the church that led to see us so
strongly. He said, you have need of nothing. You're rich and increased
with goods and have need of nothing. Apparently they weren't calling,
they weren't crying. They were just lukewarm. And so, you know, if you're poor
and needy, you'll be always crying and calling. If you're sinful,
if you're ignorant, if you're foolish, you'll always be calling. If sin serves anything, it serves
that purpose, to make us poor and needy and realize how much
we need His mercy and grace. Prayer is worship, praise, thanksgiving. That's what it is. Our Lord Jesus
Christ, as a man, prayed. And that still astounds me when
I think about it. He knew everything. Though He
was in a human body, Perfect communion with the Heavenly Father
at all times. He knew that. He knew God was
with him. The Spirit of God was with him and with God. And this is a mystery. He actually
got alone and prayed all the time. One time he prayed all
night long. What did he pray about? Everything. That's what he tells us. He had
the weight of the world on his shoulder. God's law to fulfill,
every jot and tittle, all of his people. If you have a lot
of friends and loved ones, you'd pray all night. If you call all
their names. He has our names. Was he calling
our names then? Written on the palms of his hands.
Prayed all night long. So he urges us to pray. If he
prayed, how much more should we? How much more do we need
to pray? And we looked at Luke 18 where
he gave the story of the importunate widow for this reason, that men
ought always to pray and not to faint. And the apostles learned
that and they said it in all of their epistles, didn't they?
Pray without ceasing. How many times did Paul say that?
Pray without ceasing. James, you have not because you
have not. And he teaches us to pray here, and I believe it's
the same prayer that in Luke 11, but it was at a different
time. So, he taught other disciples the
same prayer, he said. That wasn't a portion of the
Sermon on the Mount in Luke 11. Alright, just a couple of things
before we look at it. The necessity of prayer. Bunyan said this, he who does
not call on God does not know God, and he who does not call
on God in the morning will scarcely find Him the rest of the day. And you know that's true by experience,
don't you? Painful experience. Luther said
prayer is the sweat of the soul. And how our Lord prayed in the
garden, He sweat blood. He was that urgent about it.
In other words, it's something you have to do. William Gurnall said, prayer
is the breath of faith. It's the breath of life. As someone
who's alive unto God, you breathe, don't you? Prayer is the breath
of faith. Isaac Watts said, if you abandon
prayer, your life will decay in every area. It will decay. And we all know that by painful
experience. So the necessity of it, the benefit of it, prayer. We're laying hold on God. James
said, draw nigh unto God, and He'll draw nigh unto you. How?
Prayer. Where He is, what we're doing
right now. God, the Lord has promised to be here, so we come. But prayer is preparation for
drawing nigh unto God. Did you ask before you came here?
The Lord to bless you. Prayer is laying hold on God.
Prayer is drawing nigh unto God, who is peace. God is peace. God is joy. God is wisdom. God
is righteousness. If we want all those things,
we have to be near Him, don't we? Otherwise, we don't have
that. We don't have peace. We don't have joy. We don't have
any wisdom. We lack the food. Scripture talks
about His presence being health. The health of thy countenance.
The health of thy presence. We're laying hold on God. We're
drawing nigh unto God who is peace and joy and wisdom. You
can't be too proud when you're near to God. You know that? It's a restraint to sin. In the presence of God, you can't
be self-righteous. You will be humble in the presence of your Lord.
Prayer is to humble us. Prayer is to cheer us. Does it
not do you good to call on your Father and He answers you through
the Word or some way? Prayer is laying hold of the
promises. Someone said, when you pray, just repeat back to the Lord
what He's promised you. Lord, you said. That's what Jacob
said. Lord, you said you'd never leave
me. You'd bring me back here if you
do. You're my God. That's for sure. Prayer is laying
hold of the promises. Prayer is unburdening, you said.
They say confession is good for the soul only if it's to God,
not people. Honestly. It's casting all your care on
Him. Casting all your care on Him.
Remember, it says He cares for you. Cast all your care. It's
leaving all of your wants and needs. Yes, wants. He knows. Tell Him anyway. We're not informing
Him, but we're communing with Him. Don't hold back. Casting
all your doubts, all your fears, all your worries, all your troubles,
all your sins, all of you and everything about you and everyone
you care about, cast them all on Him. Unburdening yourself.
Lord, I can't take this. Help me. That's what He tells
the student. You'll feel better. It's not
a thing, prayer is not a thing that you do, it's someone we're
calling on. That's the difference. There's
no magic in prayer itself, but there's power in the one we're
calling on. Okay. So, let's look at it now. Beginning with verse 1, he tells
us about the secret alms. Take heed that you do not your
alms before men to be seen of them. That's any religious activity
or works, I mean any service toward others, toward the church,
giving and whatever. He said don't do it to be, take
heed. And beware that you're not doing
it for others to see. And I know you people have known
some of you a long time, and you're not guilty of that. But
we need reminding that, no. He says, when you do your own,
verse 2, do not sound a trumpet before thee as the hypocrites
do in the synagogues and the streets. He names these, you
know, hypocrites. That's the word, the word is
actor. So they play a part. Someone who's trying to act a
part. And actors always play a part
in front of people. for their accolades, for their
praise. They want to be seen and praised
for how they're acting. And they're just playing a part.
Okay? It's not real. And the Lord sees
through it. So, God's people, although we
do things hypocritically sometimes, we act like hypocrites sometimes,
God's people are not hypocrites. They're honest and true. But
he's reminding us, isn't he? Don't be like the hypocrite.
Although we act hypocritically, God's people are not hypocrites. So he says, they sound the trumpet. The Pharisees would make a great
procession when they'd come in and give and do all this and
all that. You see it everywhere. In the newspaper, people giving
to charities. A big organization giving $138.43. Ten of them holding up a check. These philanthropists and all
these billionaires, you know, telling you what they gave. About
ten professional athletes could end hunger in the United States.
You know? And they wouldn't miss a dime.
Hypocrites. Ah, boy. They have their reward.
That's what they're after. When you do your own, when he
says, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, meaning,
Do things anonymously, you know, you're members of one body. Okay? We're all members, one of another.
Be careful, he's continuing this thought, but be careful that
you don't, not doing something that you want other people to
find out about it. You understand? We all do. Like I told you about blowing the
leaves the other day. We all do, don't we? Hope somebody
finds out, finds out. Come on, admit it. Don't do that,
he said. Don't do that. However, you know,
and I've received gifts anonymously, and I've often thought, I wish
I knew who that was, so I could thank them. You can do that. You can, you know, if you give
something to somebody, and you love them, you want them to know
that you love them. And you're giving it, don't you?
We don't give anonymous gifts at Christmas time. I want my granddaughters to know,
Papa gave you that. Not so they thank me, but because
I love them. So, you know, and often, every
now and then, I'll ask the treasurer, please tell me who gave that.
But there's nothing wrong with that. It's not given to be seen. It's given because you want them
to know you love them. I'm doing this. I want you to
have me because I want you to know I love you. There's nothing
wrong with it. But for the most part, you see,
be careful that you're not doing things to be seen. All right?
When thou prayest, verse 5, here's secret prayer. When thou prayest,
don't be as the hypocrites are. They love to pray standing in
a synagogue in a corner of the streets that they may be seeing
a man. That's their reward. When thou prayest, enter into
thy closet. Literally. Literally. Secret prayer. Don't do it. You
know, there really is no such thing as public prayer. You won't find it in Scripture.
The people of Israel pray together. They didn't pray with the Egyptians.
They can't. They have different gods. You
won't find any mass meeting of everybody of all, you know, getting
together and praying. God's people pray together. We can't. We pray to different
gods. We can't pray. We're not going to, you know,
Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, Adonai, Azariah, and Mashiach. They wouldn't join in with that
countrywide prayer meeting they were having. They would not join
in. But they didn't quit praying. Daniel, they told him to quit
praying. He said, I can't. But he didn't
pray to be heard. He was just in his room, wasn't
he? And they were spying on him.
They knew he prayed all the time. You can't pray with people that
don't know your God. It's never with the Egyptians,
the children of Israel. They pray. And prayer in the
church, when somebody leads in prayer and we all pray together,
this is private prayer. This is our closet. Yes, it is. This is the church's closet.
The world's not watching us. And we're not doing it for them
to watch us here, but we're together for God to hear us. So, and privately
now, individually, he's telling each of us, literally, find a
place, alone and quiet, without the distraction. Nothing will bother you, no one
will distract you, no one will hear you. And a regular place
is a good thing to do. The Lord resorted to the Garden
often, the Garden of Gethsemane. They knew where to find Him.
Judas knew right where to find Him. He loved to resort there. And it can be anywhere. But the
Lord literally meant that. You know that? He meant that.
Enter into your closet. Do it in secret. Because you're
praying to be heard by one person. Our Heavenly Father. Now, he
doesn't tell us the posture of prayer, does he? He doesn't tell
us to get on our knees, though. He did. He did. He even fell
on his face. But that's in private. I told
you about a meeting I went with these fellas who were foreign
preachers, and this fella, every time before he preached he'd
get down on his knees on the pulpit. It was just such a show. It just made me sick. He was
doing it to show how pious he was. Our Lord said, don't do
that, didn't he? Now he himself told his disciples,
watch here while I go and pray. And he privately went to his
father and fell on his face. Daniel fell on his face. Now,
well, but he doesn't tell us we have to get on our knees.
He doesn't. Although, in private it might be a good thing. Now
here's what he tells us. Here's how he tells us. To pray
and not to pray, verse 6 and 7, look at when you pray, verse
7, don't use vain repetitions as the heathen do. You know,
the Hindus and the Muslims have their mantras that they keep
repeating over and over again. You keep repeating it, repeating
it, the gods will finally hear you. Elijah made fun of the first
Kings 18, didn't he? He made fun of those false prophets. God said, cry louder, he's asleep. Our God doesn't sleep, does he? Well, the Catholics do their
rosaries and their Hail Marys. Have you ever seen that on Catholic
TV? We used to have one of those
Catholic channels, EWTN or something. And I just turned it on one day,
and they literally say that Hail Mary a thousand times. That's all they do. That's all
they do. Hail Mary, Mother of God, pray
for us poor sinners. Hail Mary, Mother of God, pray
for us poor sinners. It's on and on and on and on
again. How ignorant can you be? And God doesn't hear one of those
Hail Marys. Besides, there's one mediator
between God and men. God doesn't hear the Muslims.
He doesn't hear the Hindus. He doesn't hear the Jews in their
prayer book. The Jews use a prayer book. He doesn't use that. He
doesn't hear the Rosaries and Hail Mary. He doesn't hear any
of that. As John Bunyan has said, better
to have hearts without words than words without heart. We're
not heard for our much speaking. We're not heard for our repetition
or by rote, which means mechanically repeating something from memory
without any thought to the meaning. No sir. That woman caught in
the act of adultery, they brought her in and cast her at the Lord's
feet. And everybody there was talking. Everybody there was
talking. Weren't they? And he stooped
down where she was. He stooped down and started writing.
And they said, don't you hear us? Remember that? They kept
hollering at him. And he made as though he heard
them not. He heard every word, but he's
not paying any attention. Now that's a wonderful illustration.
But there's someone there who wasn't saying a word. There was
one guilty sinner there that wasn't uttering a word, but her
heart was breaking. Her heart was crying out. You
know what she was crying. Have mercy. Do you think she
had an elephant prayer going through her head? One thing.
God, have mercy. Have mercy. Have mercy. At the public and in the temple,
seven words. True prayer, seven words. God be merciful to me, the sinner. And our Lord said he went down
to his house just to pray. That's about, I've been honest
with you before, and I'm honest with you all the time. But I
mean, about all I can seem to pray in private is God be merciful
to me, the sinner. I pray for you, but for myself,
Lord, please have mercy on me. He said he'll hear it. Yes, he
will. All right. Now here's the matter
of it, and we've been through this many times, but it's still
wonderful, isn't it? And perhaps we should look at
it once a month, if not more. After this matter, verse 9, after
this matter, therefore pray ye, our Father which art in heaven, You know who He's talking to,
don't you? He's talking to His disciples. He kept telling them
over and over, chapter 5, verse 46, that you may be children
of your Father. And He said, if your Father,
which is in heaven, will give you good things. He kept calling
them, saying that God was their Father. And you know in John
8, where He said to those fellows that said, God is our Father. They say, if God were your Father,
you'd love me. God is not your Father. He said, you're of your
father's level. But he's talking to God's people here. And those
who know Him and love Him and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and come to Him, come to God through Christ. Our Father which
art in Heaven, though God will hallowed be thy name, it
says. Our God is high, holy, and we always approach him with
reverence and respect, though he's our father. My earthly father,
I had such respect for him. I did not approach him disrespectfully. Even when I was a rebel, I knew
better than that. And, Stephen, I respected him
too much. I really did. Even when I was,
you know, a rebel, I still... He's just not my buddy. That's
my father. He deserves my respect. Oh, how
men disrespect God. And you can tell it by the way
they talk about Him. Our Father which art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name. Holy, holy, holy Lord God of
hosts. And though He's holy and high
and holy, it says He dwells among those that are poor and of a
broken heart. And tremble at these words. Thy
kingdom come. Before we ask anything. Before
bread. He says, Thy kingdom come. What's
that? That's the gospel. Kingdom. Thy kingdom. We should have such
a desire for the gospel of the kingdom to come not only in our
hearts, but in the hearts of our children and our spouses
and everyone else that we know and love. That should be our
greatest concern. And Lord, send the gospel of
Your kingdom into our hearts. Like Sunday, come and reign over
us, Spirit of holiness. On us, descend. Send the Gospel. Our children need the time of
shore. Please, Lord, set up reign and rule in their hearts. That should be our greatest concern,
isn't it? Not just bread. Remember, they
came to the Lord and told Him to eat, and He said, I am. I
haven't meat to eat that you know not of. He said, man doesn't
live by bread alone. So he says, first thing, ask
for God's kingdom and thy will be done. Oh Lord, have your will. Do your will in earth as it is
in heaven. He is. He is. But we're to pray to that end,
aren't we? Prayer, here's the thing about prayer. Our God reigns
and rules. He does all things according
to His will and purpose and covenant that's ordered in all things
and sure that was predestined. Everything was predestined before
the world began. It's already been written. Nothing's
going to change that. We're not changing God. Nothing
God has promised or purposed is going to change. He's going
to do what He's going to do. That's why I pray. Well, number one
is to acknowledge God in all things. The world, God feeds
the world, God clothes them, God protects, God is tender mercies
over all His work, every human being, okay? And most people
don't call on God. But He keeps giving, don't they?
And then these things come. They get bread. They might get
a healing or whatever, you know, a paycheck, a new house, something,
whatever. And they don't acknowledge God
at all. What do they say? I sure am lucky. Our Mother Earth, Mother Nature
has finally been kind to us today. That's blasphemy. God's going
to do what He's purposed to do, but we call on Him to acknowledge
Him in all things. He's going to give us bread.
The righteous will never be forsaken or begging bread. Ever. We're
never going to miss a meal. But when we call on Him, see,
we're acknowledging Him in everything. The smallest things. Everything. Thy will be done on earth. Give
us this day our daily bread. Now you know He's talking more
about God's Word it is anything. As said, aren't you ashamed of your prayers
at the table? You're hungry? You want to get
it over with? Anybody? One of the old writers said,
don't pray so long that everybody's hoping you'll say amen. Don't
do that. But come on. Aren't you ashamed
of yourself while you pray at the table? But He tells us to pray. Give
us bread. Our Lord gave thanks. He broke
the bread. And we should too. Acknowledge
Him in everything. Because that bread, our cupboards
that are full, our two or three refrigerators and freezers that
are full of all that, That's not our industry or our works
or our savings. It's God. He gave it all to us. Easily take it all back. Acknowledge
Him in everything, the smallest thing. But give us, Lord, our
daily manna from heaven. We need Thy Word more than anything
else. Forgive us. Give us and forgive
us. We're poor and needy, and the
thing we need the most is forgiveness of sin. Forgive us our debts. Over in, I was reading, if you
want to read a good prayer, you've read it, but 1 Kings 8, Solomon's
prayer at the dedication of the temple. Just read that today. And he said, When thy people
Israel are smitten down before the enemy because they have sinned,
Here in heaven, forgive their sins. When heaven shut up, no
rain, because they have sinned. And they pray, confess your name.
Then hear and forgive. If there's a famine, pestilence,
a plague in the land, because they have sinned. On and on he
goes. There's a plague, he said, whoever
knows a plague of his own heart. And spreads forth his hands toward
Christ, here in heaven, and forgive. And that goes on and on and on. Hear and forgive. Hear and forgive.
Hear and forgive. Our greatest need, forgive us.
Our debts, oh what a debt we owe to our God. We'll never pay.
Christ paid it all. And as we forgive our debtors,
and he is telling us to pray for one another, us, us, us,
us. As we forgive our debtors, because
our Lord said, look at verse 14, 15. If you forgive men their
trespasses, your heavenly Father will forgive you. If you forgive
not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your
trespasses. Is that what he said? Did he mean that? You know, I
got an anonymous letter from somebody one time that wrote
an article on that, and he said, you're preaching works. I couldn't believe it. That's what the Lord said. One time he said, you won't be
forgiven. Isn't that what he said? You won't be forgiven if
you don't forgive. Is that what he meant? That's
exactly what he meant. And one time he said, if your
brother has ought against you, you better go to him. Don't come
in here and pretend to worship. You better go and settle this
thing. Or rather, you're not going to
worship God. That's what he said, didn't he? So he says, forgive us our debts
as we forgive our debtors. And the best way for us to be
forgiving is to realize how much we've been forgiven. We will be forgiving if we realize
how much we've been forgiven, won't we? When we forget what
we've been forgiven, we'll quit forgiving. It's true. If we feel, less than the least,
not worthy to be called a son. That's why Paul was so loving
and caring about his Jewish brethren who wanted him dead. They beat
him to a pulp and he still called them brother. Why? Because that
was him. He never forgot where he came
from, what he was, when the Lord saved him. So, he says, forgive
us our debts as we forgive our debtors and lead us not into
temptation. Meaning, deliver us. Let us not go. Lead us in paths
of righteousness for thy name's sake. Let not my feet stray. Prone to wander, Lord, I feel
it. Prone to leave a God I love. Oh, here's my heart taken, see. Lord, I'll be tempted, but let
me not enter into it. Deliver us from evil. And he's
talking about the evil one, the principality of powers. We're not wrestling with flesh
and blood. The evil one. He's the only one that can, isn't
he? The only one that can. Stronger than he. We're no match.
But he says, he tells us, reminds us, it's his kingdom. God is
the kingdom. Thine is the power. I have no
power. We have no power but Him. And when we're weak, He's strong.
And the glory. We need to pray for His glory,
don't we? Father, glorify Thy name. Our Lord couldn't stay
silent. God couldn't stay silent when
our Lord said that. Father, glorify Thy name. A thunderbolt. I have both glorified and glorified
again. John, you reckon the Lord would answer that every time
we came in here? Lord, glorify Thy Name. Boom! Might thunder forth from the
pulpit. We might go out of here greatly blessed. And the last
word is Amen. Don't you love Amen? I love to
hear it. I love to say it. Don't you?
I love when a fellow's preaching and it just blesses me. I just
love to say it. He loves to hear it. It means
that's the way it is. It means so be it. It means that's
the way I like it. Amen. All right, stand with me.