We looked last week at Luke chapter
18, the Lord teaching us a prayer. I want to look at this passage
this evening. Chapter 6 of Ephesians verse
18. The Apostle had just finished
speaking of the armor that we were to put on. having our lawns
girded about with truth, breastplate of righteousness, and so on.
And then he sums it up here with verse 18. Praying always with
all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watch and learn
to with all perseverance and supplication for all saints. One of the reasons I like expository
preaching, though I'm not doing much of it lately. We've gone
through the Genesis, of course, but one of the reasons I like
to take a book, Brother Marius did it for us, and Brother Glenn's
gone through John, is because you deal with everything. You
deal with what we call sometimes the doctrinal aspect of the epistles
or book, and the practical aspect. You that have studied this epistle
realize that in the first chapter the apostle was speaking of God's
electing grace and His calling us and sealing us with the Holy
Spirit. And in the second chapter he
deals with what we were by nature and how God loved us when we
were there, dead in sins, and quickened us with Christ. And
the ages to come, he said, and the ages to come, He begins in
chapter 1 with ages past, where God chose His people, put their
names down in the Lamb's book of life. Chapter 2, He goes to
the ages to come. He'll show us the exceeding riches
of His grace and His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.
And you can read that aspect of the epistle. But then he comes
here to this last chapter in verse 18 and he speaks of prayer. That we should pray always with
all prayer and supplication. And I know many have problems.
And I think they have problems because they won't read their
Bibles. They try to reason things out in a logical manner. If God has purposed everything,
and God's sovereign rules over everything, and God does all
things after the counsel of His own will, why should we pray?
Why should we pray? Why even talk about praying?
If God knows what we need before we pray, why ask Him? We have
all of that, don't we? If we listen to man's carnal
reasoning, you and I would be so confused and discouraged we'd
probably never pray at all. Why do we pray? Why do we pray? Well, the Lord Jesus tells us
to pray, doesn't He? The Holy Spirit told us to pray.
And here we have in this passage assurance, as we do all the Scriptures
to pray. Why should we pray? I've got
a few points this evening, and I won't keep you too long, hopefully.
The first point this evening, the Scriptures teach us to pray. The Scriptures teaches us to
pray. Why should we pray, Brother Glenn? The Scriptures teaches
us to pray. Pray always, our text says. You know a lot of the Psalms.
We love the Psalms so well. You know what most of the Psalms
are made up of? Prayer. They're made up of the
prayers of David, the prayers of the saints, even the prayers
of the Lord Jesus Christ. You and I find in the Psalms.
David said, At evening, at morning, and at noon will I pray and cry
aloud unto the Lord, and he shall hear my prayer. He also said,
O thou that hearest prayer. Unto thee shall all flesh come. The Lord will regard the cry
of the destitute. He will not despise their prayer."
The scriptures encourage us to pray. Seek ye the Lord while
he may be found. Call ye upon him while he is
nigh. Call unto me, and I will answer
thee, and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest
not. I shall yet for this be sought
of by the house of Israel to do these things for thee." The
scriptures all through the Old Testament. I looked up prayer
one time, and if I'm not mistaken, I can't remember exactly, but
it seemed like the word itself in the Old Testament alone was
written somewhere between four and five hundred times, the word
prayer. Just prayer. The Scriptures teach
us to pray. And of course, when we come to
the New Testament, and our Lord Jesus stands there on the mountain
and begins to preach, what does He teach us to do? Pray to thy
Father with seeth and seeth. Pray to your enemy. Pray for
your enemies. Pray for those who despitefully
use you. Pray. Pray. And then we come
to the epistles, and that's the theme of all the epistles. I
would that men pray everywhere. Let the afflicted pray. Pray
for me. Pray for me, the apostles. So
why do we pray? Well, first of all, the scriptures,
every word, teaches you and I to pray. And secondly, and just
as importantly, the scripture teaches us, by example, to pray. Not only we're told to pray,
but when we go to the scriptures, we find men everywhere. Six thousand
years, men have been praying. When Cain had slew Abel, and
the Lord turned him out, and our mother and father had another
child by the name of Seth, and he had a son by the name of Enos,
the scripture says, men begin to call upon the name of the
Lord. My, how long will that be? That's
been almost 6,000 years ago. Between 5 and 6,000 years ago,
men have been calling on the Lord. That's a long time. Pray,
pray. We're taught in the scriptures,
by example, to pray. You'll find Daniel praying three
times a day. Abraham building his altars and
calling on the name of the Lord. And those 120 turnts in the upper
room? We studied about that the other day then. That was when
the church first met. And what was she doing? Continuing
instantly in prayer and supplication. Those apostles said, you'll have
to look out for some other men to wait on tables. We're going
to give ourselves to prayer. We're going to pray continually
and search the scriptures. And what do we have in the Lord
Jesus Christ? We have the best example of prayer
done. He was a praying man. I think
if there's anything that we needed to prove the manhood of the Lord
Jesus Christ, it would be this. He was a praying man. How he
prayed. We often read or sometimes read
that he got up a great while before day and he went out to
pray. We sometimes read that he prayed
all night. When he had a decision to make,
when he chose his twelve apostles, he went out and prayed all night
long. He continued in prayer. He was
a praying man. We often read in the scriptures
about his prayer. I thank Thee, Father, Lord of
heaven and earth, that You hid these things from the wise and
prudent and revealed them unto babes. You know who said that?
The Lord Jesus. And you know who He said it to?
His Father in heaven. He prayed. And you know sometimes
He prayed and prayer was so natural to Him. One time He was talking
to some people and He went right into prayer. He was talking to
him about the corn seed falling into the ground and dying. And
he said, it has to do that. You can't have a stalk of corn
with that ear on it full of grains if that corn is not falling into
the ground and dying. He said, that's the way I have
to be. Before I can bring fruit, I must fall into the ground and
die, and then I'll bring fruit." And you know what he did then?
He went right from talking to them, got to talking to his Father.
What shall I say? He said, Father, save me from
this hour. No. Father, glorify thy name. Prayer was so natural to the
Lord Jesus. He was a man who lived by faith.
He was a man who had a real soul. Glenn, as you so aptly taught
us this morning. who was burdened, who was sometimes
grieved, sometimes full of sorrow, and he depended upon God, and
he poured out his soul unto his Father. Father, he often prayed,
that high priestly prayer, a whole chapter were written, the Lord
Jesus prayed. And then in Gethsemane, remember
that night? That cold night in Gethsemane,
he prayed, and being in an agony, he prayed more earnestly, until
his sweat became as great drops of blood, pouring out his soul
in prayer to his Father in Heaven. The Lord Jesus was a praying
man. And one day he was praying, and
I'd have loved to hear him pray, wouldn't you? It must impress
his disciples, because one day he was praying, and they must
have felt something when he was praying. Because the scripture
says in Luke 11 verse 1, when he had finished his prayer, the
disciples said, Lord, teach us to pray. And I wonder if they
weren't saying, Lord, teach us to pray like that. I've never
prayed like that. And out of that request, we have
what some call the Lord's Prayer. Our Father which art in heaven.
It is not the Lord's prayer at all. It's the prayer of the Lord.
Give us to pray. But he was a praying man. The
Lord Jesus Christ was. So we're taught in scriptures
to pray. We have an example from all these prophets and these
other men who pray in the scriptures. And thirdly, prayer. Pray it. Pray it. You don't have
to read along until you see the value that these old men and
the Scriptures put upon prayer. You wouldn't think a man like
the Apostle Paul would need to pray, would you? He was so wise. Men spoke more languages than
anybody. The most learned man, I imagine,
in all of the New Testament. But you know what he said? Oh,
pray for me. Pray for me. Strive in your prayers
to God for me. Pray that God would give me utterance
to speak. Pray for me. This man was called
up to the third heaven. He saw things and heard things
that would have been impossible for him to tell us. But he felt
the need for prayer to the Lord. He prayed. Elijah on Mount Carmel. Got down on his face and prayed
that it would rain. He'd prayed a few months before
that that it wouldn't rain. Three years and a half, prayed
again that it rained. He saw the value of prayer, didn't
he? That's why James said, the effectual, firm prayer of a righteous
man, it availeth much. Pray, pray. Anna, bless her heart,
she was an old widow, stayed there in the temple, and the
scripture says she served the Lord night and day with prayers
and fasting. Night and day. And Paul said
here in our text, In verse 18, not only praying, praying, we're
taught to pray everywhere. But he said, praying always. Praying always. Well, I tell
you, some of us begin to pray. I began to pray. Well, I don't
know when I began to pray. Looking back on it now, I prayed
when I was a teenager. So often I prayed, Lord, don't
kill me tonight. Let me live another day. Oh,
have mercy upon me. But you know, I guess I really
began to pray probably 33 or 34 years ago. Some of you have
been praying a long time, haven't you? For years. And by God's
grace, you're not going to quit. You're just going to keep on
praying. You're going to continue in prayer. But true believers,
we don't always have time to be reading. We can't sit at a
desk and read all the time. We can't be listening to sermons
all the time. But you know, we can pray all
the time. We can have a heart prayer all the time. We can pray. Pray in all ways with all prayer
and supplication. I talked to you last weekend
in that parable the Lord Jesus said men should always pray and
never turn cowards, never go weary, never cease to pray. Pray
all day. Pray the rest of your life learns.
I never will forget, me and little Bevan was somewhere, my little
grandson, we were eating. And I don't know if he was just
especially hungry that day, or if the food was good that he
was putting it away. And he put a bunch of it away.
And I said, Buddy, are you hungry? You're eating a lot. And he said,
Papi, I like food so well, I'm going to eat the rest of my life.
And that's what we said by prayer. We're going to pray the rest
of our life. Praying always, about everything. About everything. I had a friend of mine, one time,
and I'll never forget him telling me this, when his kids were very
small. Bob Byers. He said, well, we got to go to
prayer. We're going to prayer. We're going home to pray. Me
and the kids. He said, well, they want to get a dog. Want
to get a dog? Yeah, we're going to pray about
getting a dog, he said. That's all right, ain't it? Pray always. Pray about everything. If we
prayed about everything, we'd probably avoid a lot of trouble
in the little things that turned out to be big things after a
while. Pray always and pray about everything. And here, fifthly,
we come to this word, pray it always with all prayer and supplication
in the Spirit. Now, what does that mean, all
prayer? Pray it always with all prayer. Well, I think it simply means
all kinds of prayer. All aspects of prayer. You know
what our trouble is sometimes. I don't want to embarrass you.
I don't want to cast a snare on you about your prayer, but
we're all guilty of it. We're all guilty of it. We've
made our prayer too much about us. And that's alright. There's a certain aspect about
prayer. Our needs. Our needs. We got
needs and we're told to make our requests known to the Lord.
But don't we sometimes, we just have these two points about prayer.
We begin with our need. Oh Lord, help us. Oh Lord, we
have this need. And then we close in Christ's
name. And we got two points basically. And it's all about us, isn't
it? And it's so selfish sometimes. If you had a friend, and every
time that friend saw you, and you went up to them, you started
pouring your heart out, what you needed. After a while, they
started avoiding you, wouldn't they? There's different aspects
to prayer. And you and I need all these
aspects in our prayer. If it's a scriptural prayer.
Let me give you an example of what I'm saying. How do we begin our prayer? We
have a good example in the scriptures of how to begin our prayer. The
Lord teaches us to pray. You start your prayer like this,
Our Father which art in heaven. What does that mean? That means
He's high. That means He's over us. That
means the first thing we do, we realize who's present we're
coming into. He's the Father in heaven. We're
so lowly, we're down here on this little terrestrial ball,
but our Father is high above us and over us. Our Father who
art in heaven, hallowed, holy, reverend, high and exalted be
thy name. See how we begin our prayer?
With adoration. With adoration. And I love that
prayer in Acts chapter 4. We studied that before. The awful
trouble that had come upon the early church. The persecution
that they were facing at this time. And when they came to pray,
they distilled their sounds. They didn't rush into His presence
and start saying, Oh God, look what an awful shape we're in.
You've got to help us or we're going to be stomped out. They're
going to kill us. Oh help us. They didn't do that
at all, did they? They steeled themselves and they
went right into the presence of God. And you remember how
they started their prayer? Oh Lord, Thou art God. which made the heavens and the
earth and the sea and all that in it is. That's a good way to
begin our prayer. With adoration. Adoring Him who
is in heaven over all. God bless for Him. And then,
what do we say? Well, the Lord Jesus said, then
make your request. Make your request. Father, forgive
us our sins. We are dependent upon you to
forgive us of our sins. We ask you to, we confess it.
For Christ's sake, forgive us of our sins. Give us our daily
bread. There is a time to make our needs
known to the Lord. Thine is the kingdom, the power
and the glory. What is that? That's praise ain't
it? That's praise. Recognition that His is the glory. Look over here with me in Daniel.
Somebody, maybe it was Larry, read this a while back to us.
Look in Daniel chapter 9, Holy Ephesians. And look over here
in Daniel. This is probably one of the best
prayers that I've ever read in the scriptures. At least for
me right now probably is. Maybe later on my opinion of
it will change and I'll like the other one better. But what
Daniel does here in his prayer He integrates all of these things
together. Adoration, confession, thanksgiving,
request. And look at this prayer. This
is a good prayer to our prayer. In chapter 9 of Daniel, and look
in verse 4. And I prayed unto the Lord, my
God, and made my confession, and I said, and look how he starts.
Oh Lord, the great and awesome God. Dreadful God. Sovereign God. Almighty God. Keeping the covenant and mercy
to them that love Him, to them that keep His commandments. We
have sinned. We've committed iniquity. We've
done wickedly and have rebelled. Even by departing from Thy precepts
and from Thy commandments. He can only confess His sin.
He confessed particular sins, didn't He? You know, one of our
problems sometimes, we talk about we've sinned, but we never confess
any particular sin. What have you done? What have
you done? Well, I've sinned. What have
you done? Don't just go to the Lord and say, Lord, I've sinned.
What have you done? Tell Him what you've done. Anybody can
say, Lord, I've sinned. Pharaoh said that, didn't he?
Wicked Saul said that. But tell Him what you've done. Neither have we hearkened unto
thy servants the prophets which spake in thy name, to our kings,
to our princes, and to our fathers, to all the people of the land. And to all the people of the
land, O Lord, righteousness belongeth unto thee, but unto us confusion
of faith, as it is to stand. To the men of Judah, and to the
inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, that are near,
and that are for all, through all the countries, whether thou
hast driven them because of their trespass, that they have trespassed
against thee. O Lord, to us belongs confusion
of faith, to us belongs shame, to our kings, to our princes,
to our fathers, because we have sinned against thee. To the Lord
our God belongs mercies and forgivenesses, though we have rebelled against
him. Neither have we obeyed the voice of the Lord our God to
walk in his laws, which he hath set before us by his servants
the prophets. Yea, all Israel have transgressed
thy law, even by departing, that they may not obey thy voice.
Therefore the curse is poured upon us, and the oath which is
written in the law of Moses the servant of God, because we have
sinned against him. And he hath confirmed his word
which he spake against us and against our judges that judged
us by bringing upon us great evil. For unto the whole heaven
hath not been done, as hath been done upon Jerusalem. As it is
written in the law of Moses, All this evil is come upon us.
Yet made we not our prayer before the Lord our God, that we might
turn from our iniquities and understand thy truth. Therefore
hath the Lord watched over the evil, and brought it upon us.
For the Lord our God is righteous in all his works which he hath
done. for we obeyed not his voice. And now, O Lord our God, thou
hast brought thy people forth out of the land of Egypt with
a mighty hand, and hast gotten thee renowned, as at this day
we have sinned, we have done wickedly. O Lord, according to
all thy righteousness I beseech thee, let thy anger and thy fury
be turned away from thy city Jerusalem and thy holy mountain.
Because for our sins and for the iniquities of our fathers,
Jerusalem and thy people are become a reproach to all that
are about us. Now therefore, O our God, hear
the prayer of thy servant. hear his supplications and cause
thy face to shine upon thy sanctuary that is desolate. Do it, he said,
for thy sake, for the Lord's sake. O my God, incline thine
ear and hear. Open thy eyes and behold our
desolation and the cities which are called by thy name. For we
do not present our supplications before thee for our righteousnesses,
but for thy great mercies. O Lord, hear! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, hearken and do! Delay
not, for Thine own sake, O my God, for Thy cities and for Thy
people are called by Thy name." Ain't that amazing prayer? Sometime
I suggest to you, you just go through that and you look at
that prayer and you'll find out what the Apostle meant when he
said, praying with all prayer, adoration, supplication, Making
requests, confession, praising, all of these are there in that
prayer. And you and I need a pattern don't we? We need a pattern to
go by. The Lord told us about that verse
over in Philippians chapter 4 verse 6 and 7. Be careful for nothing
but in everything by prayer, See that prayer, supplication,
will thanksgiving, let your request be made known to God? There's
all prayer. Supplications, thanksgiving,
request, other place you find confession, all prayer, with
all prayer. By Him, therefore, let us offer
the sacrifice of praise to God continually. That is the fruit
of our lives, giving thanks unto his name. So that's what he means
by all prayers. We have all these aspects in
our prayers, brothers and sisters. Back over in our text, pray it
always with all prayer and supplications in the Spirit. And here's our
sixth thing about this, in the Spirit. praying in the Spirit. And you know, I doubt seriously
if there's any true prayer unless it's prayed in the Spirit. We
often say that the salvation of the Lord is of a triune God. And the work of the Holy Spirit
in our hearts, brothers and sisters, is just as essential as the work
of the Father and the work of the Son. How essential is it
for us to have the Spirit of Christ? Without the Spirit of
Christ, we're not healed. That's how essential it is. How
do we pray? In the Spirit. With the Spirit,
the Apostle Paul said in another place. The first point on this
is praying with the Spirit and with the understanding. How do
we pray with the Spirit or in the Spirit? We pray with the
understanding. We don't pray ignorantly, do
we? Paul said pray with the Spirit and pray with the understanding.
What do we mean when we say we pray with the understanding?
We have this heart realization, this heart knowledge that God
is our Father. And boy, that's something when
you pray in the Spirit, with the understanding, with the knowledge,
the heart realization that we're praying to our Father. That's
wonderful, ain't it? That's wonderful. There's this
holy, there's this intimate relationship between us and God. It's the relationship of the
Father, with his son. He goes to the father not just
to make requests, though that's part of it. But he goes to the
father to maintain this contact. To maintain this communion with
him and his father. And he loves this communion so
well. He loves the smile of the father
so much. He prefers it above everything
else. Now ain't that what your heart
says? I tell you, you prefer God's presence, you prefer the
knowledge, the understanding that He's your Father above everything
else. God has sent forth the Spirit
of His Son into your hearts. Why did He do that? Because you're
sons. You're His sons. And you have
the Spirit of His Son. And you cry, Father. I told you
just the other night that I have found more comfort in that one
word, uttering that one word, my father, than I have in reading
all the books that I've got on my shelf. And I've got quite
a few, haven't I? I've got quite a few books. But I've found more
comfort in going to my father and addressing him as my father,
my father. Heart comfort, soul comfort,
spiritual comfort. His spirit bears witness to our
spirit that He's our Father. And oh, when you know that, when
you know that, oh, that's joy unspeakable and full of glory.
It's not just a word. It's the utterance of the heart,
the spirit. And you know something? The Father
in heaven would never have this communion broken. It's not His
will that it's ever broken. Paul said, you've not received
the spirit of bondage again to fear. And you'll never receive
the spirit of bondage again to fear. If I had one verse of scripture
that taught me that a true child of God would never be lost again,
this would be the one I'd go to. You have never, you will
never receive the spirit of bondage again to fear. Once the spirit
has come into your heart and crying, Father, Father, He'll
never leave you. And it's not in the Father's
will that that communion will ever be broken. Not even during
the time of His severe chastisement. Sometime when He hides His face,
what do we call Him then? Our Father. Our Father. And it's never His will that
that relationship be broken. And that's what the Spirit teaches
us. That's what He shows us. He opens our understanding to
know when we're praying to our Father, He's truly our Father. We know that. We know that. That's
what it means to pray in the Spirit. Secondly, to pray in
the Spirit means this. Not only we understand and have
a heart realization that God is our Father, but we have this
heart realization of how to approach unto our Father in prayer. We
know how to approach unto Him. The Spirit often reminds us of
this. When the Comforter is come, He
said, what will He do? It's expedient for me, He said,
but I go to the cross. If I don't go to the cross and
go back to heaven and pray my Father, the Spirit will come.
But I'll pray the Father and He'll send you another Conqueror.
And what's He going to do when He comes to your heart? He's
going to glorify me. He's going to take the things
that belong to me and He's going to show them to you. What's one
of the things that belong to the Lord Jesus Christ? Well,
one of the things, He's got this unique office. He has a unique
office. And there's only one of Him.
And He occupies that office. And you know what it is? It's
the office of the mediator. He sits between us and the Father
to make intercessions for us. He's now in the heaven. Not the
place made with hands, but in that holy place. There to appear
in the presence of God for us. for us. And when the Spirit lets
us know that, that we have access through Him, through His intercessions
to the Father in Heaven, oh, I tell you what, you talk about
encouragement to pray. I have had this verse of scripture
on my heart for years now, probably the last 3 or 4 years. That is
in Romans 5, Romans chapter 5 verse 1. Being justified by faith,
we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. And listen
to what he said. By whom we have access. By whom we have access. Ain't it wonderful that God knows,
God knows us. And God desires our communion.
He desires to hear our prayer. But to be able to receive us,
He not only had to provide a clothing for our shame, blood to wash
us away, but He had to set somebody between us and Him. that we could
go to and go through, that the Father may accept our prayer.
And who did He send for us? The Lord Jesus Christ. He ever
lives to make intercession for us, and we always have access
unto God's presence by Him. Okay, for access is by Him. How
free is it? How free is it? If it has anything to do with
me, the strength of my faith, If you don't have strong faith,
don't even go to prayer. Well, ain't no sense in me going
there. Because I got a level. And that's all I'll ever have.
Just enough to get by. If you don't have a real enlightened
understanding, if you don't understand and comprehend all these things,
no sense you going in prayer. Well, I don't have much sense,
do you? And if a man thinks he knows anything, he knows nothing.
He has New York to know. But you know what our access
is. It's through Jesus Christ. Therefore, it's freeing Him.
It's a complete access if it's through Him. You can go to Him
anytime. You can go to the Father anytime.
24-7. Is that what they say now? 24-7. Because you've got access. Because your access is through
the Lord Jesus Christ. Here we are upon this earth,
brothers and sisters, and what are we? We're poor sinners, aren't
we? That's all we ever hope to be in this world. Poor sinners.
But we have an advocate when we sin between us and the Father.
We have a mediator. We have a faithful and merciful
high priest over the house of God. And we can go to God anytime
and be fully and perfectly accepted of Him. Our prayer. Our prayer. Now ain't that encouraging to
pray? And the Spirit lets us know that. When you sin, sometimes
you say, I'm going to wait till I get better. I feel better.
I'm too guilty now. I feel like a dog. I can't go
now. Why can't you go? Why can't you go? You've got
free access. And the Spirit lets us know that. And I think sometimes
He humbles us, letting us see our unworthiness. To then let
us know your access is not because of your worthiness. You have
access to a perfect one, a righteous one, the just one, who has bore
that misery and that wretched unworthiness. And thirdly, praying
in the Spirit. Praying in the Spirit. What does that mean to pray in
the Spirit? Well, it means when we pray, one of the aspects of
prayer is saying, Father, thy will be done. Knowing the Lord's will and seeking
His will has something to do with prayer, because you see
too many people seeking the Lord's will in prayer. The Lord Jesus,
Father, not my will, but Yours be done. Father, if You be willing,
let this cup pass from me. How often have you and I been
so confused, and we didn't know which way to turn, what to do,
and we went to the Lord, and we said, Lord, I need to know
Your will. It ain't about me. It ain't about
what I want. It ain't about what I need. It's
about your will. Lord, just teach me your will.
And you know where he's going to show you his will? From this
book. This book? I ain't wanting to find out the
will of God apart from this book, are you? I don't want to know
anything apart from this book. It'd scare me to death if the
Lord told me something. And it was outside of this book.
So that's the only way I know the Lord's speaking. He's speaking
according to His Word. If they speak not according to
His Word, I don't care if it's an angel from heaven. You better
beware of it. Here's William. And lastly, and
lastly, is this. What does it mean to pray in
the Spirit? Well, it means we pray in truth. Boy, that's something, ain't
it? Not only sincere, not only being honest, but in truth. Well,
you can tell a lot about a man when he prays. Old Spurgeon,
we'll forget one time he was talking about some of the Methodists
of his day. Of course, the Methodists of
his day was not like the Methodists of our day. But he had a little
controversy with them. And he had gone to preach to
them. They were just amenin' him. They got so happy they were
amenin' him. Yes, brother, preach it, brother,
preach it. And one of his points was election. And he said, a
hush came over that congregation when I started preaching on that. And he said, I'd like to go to
the prayer room with some of you, dear brother, and see how
you pray. He said, because you probably
argue one thing out here, but you go in the prayer room and
you pray altogether something different. And he said, if you
want to know where a man's honest or not, where he's truthful or
not, where he knows the truth or not, listen to him pray. And Spurgeon said, I'd like to
hear some of you old Methodists pray. He said, what would you
pray? Oh God, I know that you're able to save my son. Wait a minute,
he said. That sounds a lot like sovereignty
to me. I didn't know you believed that. You've been arguing against
it. And now you're praying, oh God, I know you're able? What
if your son's not willing to be saved? Is God still able to
make him willing? And on and on he went. But what
his point was this, when we go to prayer, if we're really honest,
if we pray in the Spirit, we're not only sincere, but we're honest
and true. The Spirit of Truth. And I said
that was the last one, but this one also. What does it mean to
pray in the Spirit? Well, it means the Holy Spirit
holds us up in prayer. That is, He gives us grace to
pray. He gives us strength to pray.
Prayer is a difficult work. That's why you and I don't do
as much of it. That's why most people never do any of it. It's
difficult work to labor and pray, striving and pray. And I tell
you, if a man don't pray in the Spirit, he won't hold out long.
He'll give up. He'll quit. The Holy Spirit helpeth
our infirmities. We have many infirmities. One
is our weakness. We just don't have the strength
to continue. But you see men like Moses wrestling with the
Lord in prayer. Wrestling with the Lord in prayer.
You see men like Hannah. Look at Hannah in 1st chapter
of 2nd. She wrestled with the Lord in prayer, didn't she? Look
at Jacob. You want to talk about real wrestling.
He got ahold of the Lord and went and let him go, whipped
him. He whipped the Lord. The Lord
said, let me go. I ain't letting you go until
you bless me. I've got to get out of here. It's coming daylight.
I ain't turning you loose and you can't get loose until you
bless me. And he whipped him, didn't he?
He whipped him. That's what John Bunyan said.
He whipped the Lord. And he said the way he whipped the Lord was,
the Lord was wrestling against Jacob with his left hand and
wrestling in Jacob with his right hand. And he said, you know the
Lord is stronger with his right hand than his left hand. So he
whipped his saints, using Jacob to do it. That's how we wrestle
with the Lord, ain't it? Oh, let the Holy Spirit come
to a man and get in us, in our hearts. And you say, I can't
pray but a couple of minutes. But oh, when he starts giving
you strength. Begin to pray. He just keeps
giving you strength. And you get hold of the Lord,
and you start pleading with Him, and you start blessing Him, adoring
Him, and you just go on, and you go on, and you go on. And
you did start your prayer that way, but oh, He comes and He
holds you up, and He helps your infirmities. Watch Him. Watch Him for what? Watch Him for the Spirit's prompting
us to pray. Notice this about yourself, if
you haven't already. Isn't there sometimes when almost
suddenly, this burden comes upon your heart? You feel this need
to pray, almost overwhelming. Sometimes it's about some particular
thing. Sometimes you just feel this
need and burden and concern to pray. I need to pray. I want
to pray. I'm burdened to pray. You know
what you should do at that time? Find a place to pray. If you
can't find a place, pour your heart out to the Lord, or find
a place to get along with Him. I have noticed this about myself,
especially of the night. The Lord does a lot of night
work. Paul and Silas prayed at night. Hannah prayed unto the
Lord at night. Jacob wrestled at night. The
Lord does a lot of night work. Sometimes when you and I are
alone, or we're laying there upon our beds, our hearts become
burdened to pray. Get up. You may be sleeping. You may have to work the next
day. Get up. And go in there by yourself somewhere
and begin to pour your heart out in prayer. When the Spirit
prompts you to do it. When He puts it upon your heart
to do it. David said, when the Lord said to my heart, seek ye
my faith. Do you mean the Lord says that
to hearts? Well, sometimes He does. And
that's when He's willing to hear. He puts it upon your heart. I could tell you something about
that, but you'd think I was bragging, so I won't. But I tell you, when
the Lord puts that upon your heart, He's ready to hear. He's
ready to hear. Watch for the prompting of the
Holy Spirit. Watch against the suggestions
of the devil and flesh and this world tempting you not to pray. Don't even begin to pray. And
when you begin, cut it off. You prayed long enough, watch
against that. Watch against that. Sometimes
if we pray with all prayer, you can't pray with all prayer two
minutes sometimes. You begin with adoration and
confession and praise and request and confession, and after a while
you've gone on longer than two minutes. Don't be so quick to
quit because the devil says you ought to. Then watch for answers
to prayer. Watch for answers to prayer. If you call me and say, Bruce,
would you come and visit me? And then you left before I got
there? How do you think I'd feel? Watch for answers to prayer.
If it's serious enough to pray about, then watch for an answer.
If you've asked the Lord for something, watch for an answer
to it. Pray with all prayer and supplications
in the Spirit, and watch in clarity with all perseverance. Just don't give in. And supplications
for all saints. Pray for me. Pray for Clarence.
Clarence has got all kinds of needs, hasn't he, Clarence? Clarence
has got all kinds of needs. Glenda. Oh, Jean. Cindy. All of us have got all kinds
of needs. Ashley's got all kinds of needs. Pray. Pray. Always, for all saints, pray. Oh, Father in Heaven, gracious
and wise and holy and tender Father, Oh, again we remind them
of the access that we have, that you've given us. Unworthy as
we are, we have a full and free access through the Lord Jesus
Christ, in whose name we pray. Oh, Father, thank you for encouraging
us to pray. Thank you for encouraging us
that you're a God who hears and answers prayer. And oh, that
you're able to shape this earth and answer to prayer, that immortals
are immortal here when prayer is answered. Thank you for this,
dear people. We pray you'll keep us this coming
week, be gracious to each of us, encourage your people, save
the lost for your glory. In Christ's name we ask. Amen.