Chapter 11. It seems like it's been some
time since I brought a message to us about prayer. And I wanted to do that tonight.
We're going to read verses one through 13 of chapter 11. 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, 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. 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 has 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. If a son shall ask of any of
you that is a father, will he give him a stone? If he shall
ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him
a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he
for a fish give him a serpent? Or if he shall ask an egg, will
he offer him a scorpion? 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? I want you to notice that in
verse one, we are told two things. We're told, first of all, that
the Lord Jesus Christ prayed. And it came to pass that as he
was praying, We're told, first of all, that the Lord Jesus Christ
prayed. We know that he was here in this
world as a servant of the Lord. He is the God-man mediator between
God and man. And while he was here, he prayed. And this alone is an example
to all of us. If he felt the need, if he knew
the need to pray, how much more? Do you and I need to pray? Think
about that. The Lord Jesus Christ praying. If he needed to pray, how much
more do you and I need to pray? So that's the first thing we're
told in this verse is that our Lord prayed. He is an example
unto us in all things. And certainly he's an example
to us in this, in this matter of praying. The second thing
that we see in this first verse is that one of his disciples
asked him to teach them to pray. When he sees one of his disciples
said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray. Now we might be prone
to think that it is only a young, a new believer who needs to be
taught to pray. I remember asking men at various
times, new men, new believers, if it were all right if I called
upon them to pray. I think we have a tendency to
think that only young believers, only new believers might need
to be taught to pray. But I say unto us tonight, as
long as we are in this world, I don't care how long we've been
saved. I don't care how much we've grown
in the grace and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. We still
need to be taught to pray. We still may learn lessons that
will be for our good in this matter of praying. And then the
Lord, in verses two through four, gave unto his disciples what
we have come to call the model prayer, the model prayer. It's not the Lord's Prayer, although
it is oftentimes called the Lord's Prayer, but we know that there's
one petition in this prayer that he could not pray, forgive us
our debts. He had no debts, he had no sins,
but this is a model prayer. We can look at this prayer and
read this prayer It will help us to learn to pray, how we should
pray. Now, Bishop J.C. Routh gave three
divisions in this model prayer. The first division respects the
God we worship, verse two. 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. The first division respects the
God we worship, and we pray to him first of all concerning his
name. Of course, his name means himself,
his being. For whosoever shall call upon
the name of the Lord Jesus Christ shall be saved. We know that's
not just calling the name of Jesus, it's calling upon the
person and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Hallowed be thy
name. The first petition, or the first
division, rather, respects the God we worship. We come to him
as our father and we speak to him concerning his name. And secondly, we speak to him
concerning his kingdom, his kingdom, thy kingdom come. We know he
has a kingdom in this world. And we know also that if we,
in reality and truth, if we may call him, if we may address him
as our father, my father, which art in heaven, That means that
we have been born again, that we are in this kingdom. Thy kingdom
come. So we pray concerning his name. Hallowed be thy name. We pray
concerning the kingdom of God, which is the kingdom of God's
dear son. In Colossians, the apostle Paul
reminds us that we were born into the kingdom of darkness.
when we came into this world dead in trespasses and sins,
and God translated us. He moved us out of that kingdom.
Only God can do that. He moved us out of that kingdom
of darkness into the kingdom of His Son, the Son of His love,
it says there in Colossians chapter one. The Son of His love. That's
the new birth, isn't it? When a person is born of the
Spirit of God, and calls upon God when God gives life and with
that life there's repentance. Everyone who's born of the Spirit
of God is given repentance as well as faith. Those are both
gifts of God. The natural man cannot produce
repentance even though God commands all men everywhere to repent. The natural man cannot repent. Why? He, she loves darkness rather
than light. And faith is a gift, it's a gift. All men have a type of faith,
there's no question about that, a type of faith, but saving faith
is a gift of God. For by grace are you saved through
faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. Not of
works, lest any man should boast. And then we pray, not only concerning
His name, His kingdom, but His will. Thy will be done on earth,
even as it is done in heaven. How is His will done in heaven? Well, it's done immediately. It's done voluntarily, isn't
it? I mean, those in heaven, they
delight to do His will. And as soon as His will is expressed,
it's done. Here upon earth, men rebel at
the will of God. So we pray that will be done
on earth even as it is in heaven. And then the second division,
according to J.C. Rowe, respects our daily needs,
our daily wants. Verses three and part of verse
four. Give us day by day our daily bread, and forgive us our
sins, for we also forgive everyone that is indebted to us. There are two things that you
need every day. There are two things that I need.
There are two things that every child of God needs every day. We need our daily bread. Now that's not just speaking
about physical bread that we eat, though we need bread, we
need nourishment, we need water too, don't we? In fact, you can
live longer without bread than you can without water. No, give
us our daily bread, everything that we have need of today, whatever
it is, we look to Him to meet our needs. And then the second
thing that we need every day is forgiveness, forgiveness. We never live a day. I know sometimes
people think you're exaggerating, preacher, when you say we always
need forgiveness of sins. But I don't know about you, but
I never pray that I do not ask for forgiveness of sins. Do you?
You know, there are sins of ignorance. There are sins that we may be
guilty of we're not even aware of. If we confess our sins, the Apostle
John wrote, and we love this text, don't we? If we confess
our sins, he's writing to believers. One time a person told me, after
the Lord saved him, he said, I didn't think I'd ever have
any more sin. He said, I thought I was done
with that. But he soon found out that he wasn't. If we say
we have no sin, John said, We call God a liar, don't we? That's what He says there in
1 John chapter 1. But if we confess our sins, He is faithful and
just to forgive us our sins. He forgives our sins in a just
way, doesn't He? Just sweeping our sins under
the rug or something like that. No, He forgives our sins in a
just way. That is, Christ paid for our
sins. His justice is satisfied by the
sacrifice of our Savior. So every day, these two things
we have need of. We need our daily bread. We're
needy creatures. That's just true, isn't it? We're
needy creatures. All of us are. We need air. We need oxygen. We need water. Our needs are great. And we look to him to supply
those needs. And we thank him that he does
meet all our needs. But my God shall supply all your
needs according to His riches in glory. And then the third
division according to J.C. Rowling. I really like the way
he dealt with this. That's the reason I'm giving
it to all of us here tonight. The first division respects the
God we worship. The second division respects
our daily wants. The third division respects our
daily dangers. our daily dangers. Notice in
verse four, about halfway, and lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil. Two things we should be aware
of every day. We live in a world of temptation. We do. And we live in a world
where the evil one is active. That's what I think that may
mean. Deliver us from evil, from the evil one. Remember, Peter
tells us he goes about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Deliver us. Then our Lord gave this parable
in verses five through eight. 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 has 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. Notice these things in this parable. Our Lord says, we have a man
who is a friend, a friend, who ask help for a friend. Do you see that? Which of you
shall have a friend, he's your friend, and you go to your friend. We have a friend asking help
of a friend. Here's a man, he's a friend,
and he goes to his friend and he asks help. And then second,
we have a friend asking bread for one of his friends. I hope
that is very plain when you look at it. I hope I'm not making
it hard to understand and see. Here's a man, he's called a friend,
he goes to his friend, and he asks for his friend, another
man, his friend. And then third, we have a friend
asking bread for a friend at an inconvenient time. It's midnight. It's midnight. He's already in
bed. The door's locked. Children are
asleep. A friend's not going to starve
before sunrise in just six hours. He's not going to die of starvation
in this time. And at first, the man, he would
not get up. No, no. And that just shows us
our selfish nature, doesn't it? There's not any of us in this
building, probably, who would not have done the very same thing
in the same circumstance. Let him wait until sunrise. He'll
be okay. He'll be okay. But he did. At first he said
no, but then he did arise because of the man's importunity,
because he persevered knocking. He kept on knocking and asking.
Now think. Think of how this parable might
have been different. What if, if instead of a friend
asking for bread, it had been a father asking maybe his son
for bread for one of his grandchildren? It'd been different, wouldn't
it? Most likely the man would have got up. giving his father
the bread for his grandchildren. This is the point. Our praying,
when we pray to our father, which is in heaven, our praying is
altogether different from the circumstances in this parable. Altogether different from the
circumstances in this parable. First of all, We're not asking,
when we pray, we're not asking someone who is merely a friend.
We're asking our heavenly father. That's who we're praying to.
That's who we're asking. We're not asking someone who's
merely a friend. We are asking someone who has
already shown his great love and his great concern for us.
I believe that's Paul's reasoning in Romans, that text in Romans
chapter eight and verse 32, when he said, he that spared not his
own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not
with him freely give us all things? We're not asking a person to
help us who's merely our friend, we're asking our father, our
heavenly father, who's already given his son that we might be
his children, that we might be reconciled unto him. He's already
proven, he's already demonstrated beyond any doubt of his concern,
his love for us. Look down in verse 11. If a son
shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give
him a stone? You wouldn't do that, would you?
I know you wouldn't. I don't believe I would. I know
you wouldn't. If your son came to you and asked
for bread, you wouldn't give him a stalk. If he asked for fish or meat,
you wouldn't give him a plate covered with syrup. You wouldn't
do that. Or if he asked an egg, you wouldn't
give him a scorpion. And if you being evil, and we
are, we are. By nature, no one escapes a sinful
nature. We're born into this world. If
you then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children,
and you do, how much more? I like those verses that say
much more, don't you? Romans chapter five, much more,
much more. How much more shall your heavenly
Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? And the parallel
passage in Matthew is how much more shall your heavenly Father
give good things to them that ask him? So praying is altogether different
from this parable. We're not asking a friend, we're
asking our Heavenly Father. Our Heavenly Father who has already
demonstrated beyond any doubt His love and His concern for
us and giving His own Son that we might be reconciled unto Him.
Number two, we're not asking at an inconvenient time. Midnight
is an inconvenient time to go to somebody's house and ask them
to get out of bed and give you a loaf of bread. That's an inconvenient
time. But we're going to our Father
and there is no inconvenient time with Him. He never slumbers
nor sleeps. And He's never weary. Never. And the third thing, we're not
asking for something that is too small a matter for Him to
be concerned with. If it's something that matters
to you, if it's something that troubles you as one of his children,
you know that he may be touched with the feelings of your infirmities. We're to persevere in asking. That, of course, is the main
lesson from the parable. We are to persevere in asking. But we're also given these very
encouraging words. Ask. Notice that in verse 9 and
10. Ask. This is very encouraging,
isn't it? These are the words of our Savior.
Ask, and it shall be given you. Seek, and you shall find. Knock, and it shall be opened
unto you. For everyone that asketh, receive
it. And he that seeketh findeth,
and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened. I don't know
how we could hear any more encouraging words than those. Does this promise, or this promise
here in verse nine, ask and it shall be given you, seek and
you shall find, knock and it shall be opened unto you. Does
this promise of the Lord have any limitations? Yes, yes. I know there's at least three
limitations to that promise. Number one, God, and you see
this in the text there in verse 13, if you then being evil know
how to give good gifts unto your father. Unto your children, how
much more your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them
that ask him? God will only give us what is
good for us. He'll only give us what is good
for us. You would only give your children
what is good for them. How much more your Heavenly Father?
So yes, there is a limitation. We may ask for something, and
we may desire it with all our heart, but it might not be good
for us. There's a verse in Psalm 84,
verse 11, which says, for the Lord God is a sun and shield. The Lord will give grace and
glory. No good thing will he withhold from them that walk
uprightly. You know, the children of Israel,
They asked the Lord for a few things when they were in the
wilderness, and God gave them what they asked for. They asked
for flesh, and God filled the camp with those quails, and while
the meat was still in their mouths, God sent a plague among them.
They asked for a king later, remember? And God gave them a
king, but God sent them sorrow over that king. That's one limitation. God's only going to give us the
things we ask that are good for us. And that's what we want,
isn't it? We wouldn't want him to give
us something that we ask for that's not good for us. And number
two, if thou canst believe. If thou canst believe, all things
are possible to him that believe it. Ask in faith, nothing wavering,
for a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways, the Apostle
James says. And number three, and this is
so important, here's the limitation. God is not going to give you
anything that is not his will. First John, look over here in
First John, chapter five. I think this is something that
many so-called modern day Christians are ignorant of. They just believe
they've got a blanket promise to ask anything that they could
wish. And if they can get someone to
agree with them and pray the same prayer, they just feel like
they've obligated God. God now is obligated. to give me this. No, no, no. You've misunderstood the word
of God. He never promised you to give,
promised that he would give you something that's not according
to his will. Here in 1 John 5, verse 14, this
is a confidence, verse 14, this is a confidence that we have
in him that if we ask anything according to his will, He heareth
us. What if we ask for something
that is not according to his will? Well, it's very clear. He doesn't hear us. He doesn't
hear us. And we know, and if we know that
he hear us, that is when we ask according to his will, we know
that he hears us whatsoever we ask. We know that we have the
petitions that we desired of him. We know that. That's one
reason it's so important to study the word of God, isn't it? To
study the word of God that we may know his will. And when we
pray, we take his word to him and claim the promise. Lord,
this is what you said. It's what you said. Now do it. That's the way Jacob prayed.
Lord, you told me to come back. You told me to. And I want to close with this.
I believe we should read prayers that are recorded in the Word
of God to encourage our faith. I said one of the limitations
is according to our faith. But our faith, we know, we pray,
Lord, increase our faith. But reading various prayers recorded
in the Word of God helps us. encourages us in our, in our
faith. And I want you to look back with
me to Isaiah. I'll look at this prayer here
in Isaiah chapter 37 of the King. King Hezekiah. This is one of those times when
their back was against the wall, so to speak. an invading army. They had no power. Judah would
be overrun immediately. What does Hezekiah do? He went
to the Lord in prayer. Verse 15. Hezekiah prayed unto
the Lord, saying, O Lord of hosts, God of Israel, that dwellest
between the cherubims, thou art the God, thou art the God, even
thou alone. Of all the kingdoms of the earth,
thou hast made heaven and earth. Incline thine ear, O Lord, and
hear. Open thine eyes, O Lord, and
see. And hear all the words of Sennacherib,
which hath sent to reproach the living God. Of a truth, Lord,
the kings of Assyria have laid waste all the nations and their
countries, and have cast their gods into the fire. For they
were no gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone,
therefore they have destroyed them. Now therefore, O Lord our
God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth
may know that thou art the Lord, even thou only. Then look down
to verse 35, see how the Lord answered this prayer. He said,
for I will defend this city to save it for mine own sake and
for my servant David's sake. When we pray, we pray for Christ's
sake, don't we? We ask in his name. And God told
Hezekiah that he would do this, he would save that city for David's
sake. And for Christ's sake, he hears
and answers our prayers. And then in the last verse, verse
37, and so Sennacherib king of Assyria departed and went and
returned and dwelt at Nineveh. He heard a rumor, didn't he? There he was encamped outside
of Jerusalem, ready to overthrow them. And God sent a word to
him, causing him to go back home to Nineveh. And one of his sons
murdered Sennacherib. One of his sons killed his own
father. God has many ways to answer prayer,
doesn't he? He's not limited like we are. Oh, that we might pray more. Pray the scriptures. Paul said,
pray always. And remember that verse when
he said, brethren, pray for us. Pray for us. That is, pray for
the pastor, pray for missionaries. Think about Brother Heller over
there in New Guinea tonight. Pray for him, that the Lord will
give him good success and taking care of the work that must be
done while he's there. Let us sing and we'll be dismissed.