The Village Church
Our Attitude Towards Prayer - Audio
I think it's fall '08, you know, we had, you know, Bible study, and then we eventually started having evening services, and I said that it's going to take more than just our resources, our plans, our gifts, to make this local church what Jesus wants it to be. It has to take more than just those things. It has to be more than just those things. Do you remember what I said? Those of you who were with us back then? What did I say? Yes. Prayer. Simple, but not always easy. You see I don't want to be a church that just prays occasionally. I want us to be a church. I want us to be a praying church, a praying church. We pray intentionally. We make prayer a priority. You see it has to be written into the DNA of who we are as a village church, who we are as believers. And the only way that's going to happen that I have to be a praying pastor, I have to be a praying believer, and you have to be praying believers as well. If we're not that way in our lives, we're not going to be that way as a church either. Praying without ceasing, praying through the peaks and valleys of life. That's what I'm talking about. One pastor says life is war. Life is war. And until you realize that, you never pray like you should, you never pray as you want. Are you a praying believer? How do you be prayer? What's your view of prayer? Is it a cash cow that allows you to milk God for all material blessings, physical blessings? Is it your plan B for life when your plan A fails, then I pray? Or is prayer just an inconvenience for your life? I'm just too busy, Alex. I work for the hours a week, got kids at home, I just don't have time to pray. Where are you? You're in the right place this morning. In Matthew 6, Jesus shows us the attitude we need to have towards prayer. How we should approach it. What should be our mindset? Because if we don't pray, if we don't pray, are we not going to be the church? I believe God wants us to be. This ministry, those of you who are familiar with this ministry, it would be not this if people never pray, if they never bow the knee and crowd out the God. I can't do it, Father. Will you release in people to help? That's the prayer of a broken man. That's the prayer of a humble person crying out to Jesus constantly. If you have your Bibles, open them to Matthew 6. Beginning with verse 5. This is Jesus speaking. He says, "When you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room, shut the door, pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will reward you. And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as a Gentiles do. For they think they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them. For your Father knows what you need, even before you ask. Let us pray. Father God, I pray that as I always pray, Lord, that you will be glorified in not me. I'm just a man. All of us are just people. And so I pray that Christ will continue to increase. Christ will be glorified in the spirit of brain glory to your name. I'm just a messenger. That's all. An under shepherd, to these shepherds. And so I pray spirit that you will bring all of our hearts to Christ, all of our lives to Christ. Not to me, not to anyone else. I'm a beggar, just like everyone else. I need a savior, just like everybody else. So show us Jesus. Show us our need for Jesus. In Christ in my prayer. Amen. The first thing that, you know, when I was stood in this passage, you know, the first thing that came to my mind when Jesus was talking here is that when you pray, your prayers have to be directed to something, brightly directed to something. Now I like the hypocrites. And what is a hypocrite in this passage? What is it? It's an individual, a person, who does all the right things for all the wrong reasons. That's what Jesus is talking about here in this passage. Don't be like the hypocrites who stand and pray in the synagogues. Why? So they can be seen by others. Their motives, intentions are all wrong. And they're blind by it. They can't even see it. And prayer is a good thing. We got to pray as believers. But do we do it for the wrong reasons? Do we do it for the false motives? Do we do it for self-seeking purposes? Or we like those hypocrites who love to stand and pray in the synagogues, in the street corners, so they can be seen by others. Jesus is talking about Pharisees here. If you're familiar with the Pharisees, they were spiritual. Man, they did all the right things. They knew theology. They did all the religious works. And most of the time they did it for self-glory to promote themselves. It's like us. It's like you saying, "I'm going to give out turkeys for Thanksgiving. I'm going to call the newspaper and the TV station too so they can watch me hand out the turkeys." Good thing, but you're doing it for self-promotion. You're doing it for your own glory. A good thing for the wrong reason. Now praying in public, there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with playing in public. There's nothing wrong with praying in the congregation or prayer. But it's always about the attitude of my heart. Where is my heart? Where are my motives? What's my motivation? Where is it? The hypocrite is motivated by pride. And this person desires to be above others, to be seen and glorified by others. They're using prayer as a tool of self-promotion and self-glory. And they love man's praise. That's the reward. And what did Jesus say? If you're a reward in life, if you're a reward for being in ministry, is to receive praises for men, you have received a reward in full. If you're a reasonable man, part of this church. And so all the Christians are going to see, think of them. They're really loving Jesus. Don't fire for Jesus. If that's your motivation, you have received a reward in full. Man's praise. That's what you want. And sometimes you get it. You see, a hypocrite, this type of prayer, is wrongly directed. It's directed at me. My goodness, my righteousness. Look at me, God. Look how much I love you. Look at how righteous I am. I pray three times a day. I even fast. I'm a good Christian. What about you? Where are you? There's a verse from my old hymn that says, "Oh, what peace we often forfeit. Oh, what needless pain we bear. All because we don't carry everything to God in prayer. And when we do, we carry it in prayer for all the wrong reasons. Where are you?" James says, "You ask and you do not receive because you've asked wrongly to spend it on your own passions." You see, prayer, we cannot just use prayer as a tool to get everything I want. Bless me here, God, so I can just get more stuff, bigger stuff. God is not our ATM. He's not our cash cow. Praying for more creature comforts and ease. Only, only praying with things. You get in the jam. When I'm in the jam, then I call God. God, I'm in the jam. Can you get me out? Should we pray for blessings? Yes, we should pray that God will bless us. But prayer is not just that. It is not just that. You know, in Luke 18, 9 through 14, we have another example of prayer. Jesus tells a simple story to illustrate a spiritual lesson. He tells a story about two men. Two men went up to the temple to pray. One a Pharisee, one a tax collector. The Pharisee, he stood by himself over here, praying to God. Know what he said to God? "God, I thank you that I'm not like other men, robbers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give ties of all that I have." What kind of prayer is that? Is that you? And then you have the tax collector who stands far off. He wouldn't even look up to heaven. But he beat his chest and he said, "God, have mercy upon me, a sinner." What did Jesus say? "The tax collector went home justified." He says, "Whoever exalts himself will be humbled. But the one who humbles himself will be exalted." That's true. If you exalced yourself before God, you will be humbled. I've told a lot of you the story what happened to me when I was in college. When I became a Christian, I started doing all things I needed to do. I read my Bible. I remember I said my passages a week, one for every day, had them all in my little box. I shared my faith every day. I even led Bible studies. I had my own D group. I was in a Bible study. I did all those things. I was a new believer. I was on fire for Jesus. But you know my motivation for doing those things? It wasn't so people could see how good God was. It was so people could see how good Alex was. Alex is knocking it out for Jesus. He's on fire for Jesus. He went a whole year without missing a quiet time. Oh my goodness. He's super spiritual. You know what happened to me? I burned out. I burned out. I hate rock bottom. And I went into depression. I didn't think I was a believer anymore because I couldn't no longer keep up. I no longer want to do those good things anymore. He who exalts himself will be humble. God humbled me and it wasn't pretty but it was good. He will humble you. Do you see the difference between those two prayers? Now I know when you talk about motives and one question comes to mind. Can we ever have 100% per motives in anything? That's always the question. Can I have primitives in anything? Because I said probably not. But the issue is all you're aware when you don't. That's the issue. Do you know when you have imprimitives or you're blind? The Pharisees were blind to it. They couldn't see it. They couldn't even see that what they were doing was wrong. Why? Because self-righteousness blinds you from your sin and self-righteousness water down your prayers. Get watered down your prayer life if yourself righteous because you don't ever pray out of need. I pray for so-and-so you know that family needs prayer so I'm going to commit the prayer for them. They need prayer. So-and-so needs to be here this morning because they don't pray like they should. No you need prayer. Your family needs prayer but are you blind to it? You see the motive and attitude that we need to have in prayer is not perfection. It's humility. And you don't have to be perfect to be humble. You don't have to be perfect to be humble. And when I first started with working with Mark and Thor and everybody one of the things that that I really loved about the team was that I sense the spirit of humility from everybody. No one was there for self-glory. No one was there to promote their own agenda. Everyone was humbled before each other and I like that. I've been around people who are motivated by other reasons and it destroys a ministry. It destroys a church. And so I love to see leaders that are humble who know where that source of strength comes from. Humility is just thinking about yourself less and when you pray that's what you're showing. I'm thinking that's about myself. The tax collector said God be merciful to me or center. You see it's this internal attitude of humility that Jesus talks about in the next verse. No one he says go into your room and shut the door and pray to your father in secret. He's talking about being humble. Humble of heart. The father who sees in secret will reward you. Prayer that is rightly directed is directed to God in the attitude of humility. Coming to God out of need. Not out of arrogance. Coming to God in weakness. Not thinking on the man that God is looking to have me on his team. I know my stuff. I want the seminary. I got my education. God knows he needs me. No he doesn't. Remember he spoke to a donkey. So he doesn't need you. Doesn't need me. He chooses to use us. Prayer is not a display of glory, self-glory, but it should display your humility. You see it's not it's not a campaign sign you know using prayers a campaign sign for self-promotion. No you know what prayer is for me. It's me waving at the white flag of surrender before God. Thank God. I surrender. I surrender my being to you. I surrender my life to you. I surrender the welfare of my kids to you. I surrender the welfare of my family to you. I surrender the welfare of everything I have to you Lord. When you bend your knee that should be you. Surrendering the control of your life to God. Your marriage. Your kids. Your money. Whatever it is. Humility before God is what he wants. And one one theologian says prayer is communion with God. Do you feel that when you pray? Are you communion with God? Are you fellaschipping with the father when you pray? Is that is your prayer? I look that way. I don't fellowship a man. If I'm driving I'm going for a walk. If I'm taking a shower wherever when I pray I'm talking to my daddy. Do you have to pray that way? We should. And you can do that in private. You can do that in public. Because it's always about the solitude of heart. David says in Psalm 51 the sacrifices of God are broken spirit. A broken and contrite heart. That's what God likes. And prayer that that is rightly directed is directed to where God and humble hearts. And when God sees you praying that way he will reward you. And when you pray you are saying Jesus apart from you I can do nothing. I need you to survive. That's what he's talking about. Humility. Second thing we see is that prayer is intentionally confidence. What do you mean by that Alex? Verse seven and eight. He says when you pray do not heap up empty phrases as a Gentiles do for they think they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them for your father knows what you need even before you ask. We're not to heap up empty phrases. What does that mean? You see Gentiles here is referring to those who worship false gods. Pagging gods. And so when they pray they have to offer up all these different words. They got to pretty much plead with the God to answer. Since let's babble. They're not intentional. They're pretty much trying to micromanage the God to make him come help me. That's what false gods do. You have to force their hand but they're not really real. And so you got to pretty much beg them to do stuff. And in the pagan he's bewildered when he prayed because he doesn't even know if he has to write God he's bewildered. He's anxious because he doesn't even know if the God's going to answer. And he's devious. Why? Because he got to swear to God down. How long will it take me to wear this guy down before he answers my prayer. You see those who worship false guys cannot be intentionally confident when they pray. Because they're uncertain that the guy is going to come. They're not dependable. So a lot of us we don't have little idols in the house but we do have things other things that we worship. Other things that we place our security in. Stuff, money, whatever. What's your source of dependency? It's the question. You see faith and prayer is dependent upon the source. And this is what I mean by that. The source of your faith makes all the difference and who you pray to makes all the difference. If my faith is in this. I'm trusting this for my salvation. This is going to get me to heaven. This little table here. Is that a good source? Is this really going to save me from my sins? No. It's not. So whatever faith I have in this thing is useless. It's worthless. Because it can't save me. It didn't die for me. If I'm praying to this to save me, my prayers are not heard. It's worthless. And so for us as Christians we got to realize that the source that we pray to is God. The source of our faith, Jesus. And because of that it makes all the difference for us. We can be intentionally confident when we pray. Because of the source that we pray to. It doesn't matter what you're going through. What you're dealing with. You can be confident that your prayers are heard. That are not falling on dead eaters. You see, if you read I'm 1 Kings 18. I love this because you have the prophet Elijah going against the Prophet's abel. It could be a movie almost. And I want to read this and listen carefully to what God does here. The God who is real. Then the God who is not real. Ahab sent all the people of Israel and gathered the prophets together at Mount Karma. And Elijah came there to all the people and said, "How long will you go live between two different opinions? How long? If the Lord is God, follow him. But if Bill is God, then follow Bill. And if people didn't answer him, a word, then Elijah said to the people, "I, even not only the only prophet left. But Bill prophets were 450 men. Let two bulls be given to us. Let them choose one bull for themselves. Cut into pieces and lay it on the wood and put it on the fire. And I will prepare another bull and lay it on the wood as well. You can call upon the name of your God. And I'll call upon the name of my God. And the God who answers by fire is the true God. All the people answer. It is well. Let's do it." I'm paraphrasing there. "Then Elijah said to the problems of Bill, 'Choose for yourselves one bull, prepare it.' So they did." They called him the answer about five. And they took the bull that was given in preparedity. They called him in LaBelle. They called him morning under noon. Old Bel Amstrus. They were cold. They lived around the altar there at night. At noon Elijah marked him, said, "Crowd is louder!" "Where is he the number one count?" "Is he the leading group cell?" "Is he on a journey?" "Your God?" "Perhaps he was free." "He was breaking up." "He didn't cook." "He didn't cook." "And then they passed." "They waved him to the time of the altar. That was over." "No one cared." "No one cared." Elijah said to all the people. "Come there to me." "All of you came there to me." He prepared to also the Lord come down. Elijah said, "12 strong, important to members of the prophecy." To whom the word of the Lord came staying Israel to be your name? With these stones he took an altar in the water. He made a tree that's about the altar. At praise? We took out the water. We got out of the water. We put water on the water. He took the bluest pieces and laid out the wood. All of these draw up the water. Pour it all over the ground. Pour it all over the place. Pour the water everywhere. Now only that pour water only the second time. He poured everything down. Then he said, "We're the third time." Put more water. Then he did. We walked all around the altar. When the time started by pain, Elijah's the prophet came here and said, "Oh God!" "Oh Lord!" "God, I didn't even have to apologize for the intro. Let it be known this day that you are the God of the intro. That I am your servant. And I have done all these things in your words. Every certain meaning, oh Lord, that these people may know. Oh Lord, you are not. You are the second part of that. The fire is over. They soon live right off the wood and tell them that. It lives up all of water and nutrients. And all of the people saw it and they fell to that faith and said, "The Lord, He is God. The Lord, He is God. The Lord, He is God." That God from Mount Hormel is your God. Your God. Who answered prayer in Old Testament, answered prayer in New Testament, and he still answered prayer in 2010 for his people. That God is your father. He is here no prayer when you come. He has prayers always behind the couple of years. Not how do you belong. Not how confident you belong. We always do. Always do. Always do. Always do. Always do. Always do. He says the first eight. And I realize that if my father knows where he is. So maybe you don't have to have mechanical prayers. You don't have to be transient when you pray. You don't have to write your prayers out. You don't have to be mechanical about your prayer. You see, can I go over again? What do you have? The Lord, He is God, the Lord, He is God. All I know will be for you. And you can be intentionally confident in your prayer life, but below your father's hands is created. And you can, as you know, as I all of you are great. As you change my prayer life, like you come and come, you never should. You only answered your note. You just left. You don't need to be used to what you need. I'll hear it any more. My definition of prayer is that it's supposed to be before God and it's supposed to be before God. One of my professors said that prayer is in the flesh of God. It changes lives. It builds up churches. It brings revival to community, and even nation people. They grow prayer in the flesh, and they know how to learn, and how to do prayer. If we want one to release more blessing in this community, then we got to be a praying church. Not just talking about it, but just praying more in the service. One by God. So, the last prayer is in the past. So, it's directed towards, directed towards God. It's essential and it's natural. The only day that's going to sleep is the spirit helps us know. But we do not know what to pray. We don't know how to pray at all. But the spirit can still be in the flesh. There are moments too big for us. Do you understand those words there? I've heard it all right. God is still working through his spirit. His spirit is praying for me. Wow. People don't know what to say. Your spirit can still be more beautiful. Do you understand how powerful it is? What it should do to you prayer like? So, if you're on it in faith, I'm going to feel like praying if it isn't. I'm going to feel like praying to have the spirit. You can pray. Yes. God is good. And if we were born in church, God has great things for us. You know what to mean to us? We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We don't make it a prayer, it ain't going to happen. We don't be intentional about it, it ain't going to happen. It's easy to still raise money when you think it's done. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. We need to make prayer for ourselves. [BLANK_AUDIO]