The Heart of Good Works Pt 2

And if you would, read verse 7 with me. Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion. When the Lord restores his captive people, Jacob will rejoice. Israel will be glad. And Lord, we do thank you that you are our refuge and that salvation truly has come out of Israel. Because you came to save us. And so, Lord, I thank you that we have our hope in you.

And so, Lord, as we get ready to spend time in your word this morning, I just ask that you would minister as you see fit to each of our hearts. Father, as always, I just pray that your word would go out with power, that you would overflow me with your gift of teaching, to be able to communicate your word in a clear way, and that you would bless all of us as your people with the gift of hearing. Lord, that we would hear the conviction that is necessary. Lord, the correction that is necessary and the comfort that is necessary in each of our hearts.

Lord, work. In the power of your Holy Spirit, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. You may be seated. And if you would open up in your Bibles to the book of Matthew, chapter 6.

Matthew, chapter 6. Last week, we opened up a new section of the Sermon on the Mount. And the section that we opened up in the Sermon on the Mount had to do with the heart of good works. Matter of fact, we called it the heart of good works. And so, the first section that we talked about was, first of all, he gave the overarching principle or warning. He said,

Beware of practicing your good deeds before men to be seen by them. We said, you can't help the fact that when you do good works, which is what we should be doing as kingdom citizens, that people are going to see the things that you do. But when people see the things that you do, who are they glorifying? Are they glorifying you? Or are they glorifying your Father who is in heaven?

Jesus, if you will, expounds upon that principle that he gave us earlier when he told us that we are the light of the world. Let your light so shine before men that they see your good works and they glorify your Father who is in heaven. He says, If you do your good works to be seen by men, you have no reward from your Father in heaven. All you get is the praise of men which has no eternal and lasting value.

And, of course, the first thing he told us about was giving. We said there were three things that we were going to talk about. Giving, prayer, and fasting. And, of course, the one we covered last week was giving. He said, Don't make a public spectacle of your giving like the hypocrites do. Instead, Your giving should first of all be in private. And then we also discussed the fact that giving should be second nature to us.

So much so that we could give without our left hand knowing what our right hand is doing. And so that's what we addressed last week. And so today, as we move on, we look at the last two aspects of good works, and that is prayer and fasting. And so we pick up in verse 5, and this is what it says. When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand.

And pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly, I say to you, they have their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door, and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. And when you're praying, don't use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do.

For they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. So do not be like them. For your Father knows what you need before you ask Him. Pray then in this way. Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

Do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For yours is the kingdom and the power, the glory forever. Amen. So Jesus once again begins to deal with this next issue of prayer. And as He deals with this next issue of prayer, in the same way He did giving, He starts off by telling us what not to do. He says, when you pray, don't be like the hypocrites.

Well, of course, as we move into a section on prayer, I think it's important for us to identify a little bit what prayer is. Not an overly deep theological statement I'm going to make, but prayer is simply our communication with God. I say that because I think we as human beings can make prayer. It's very much harder than it needs to be. Sometimes I think we can overcomplicate it and over-spiritualize it.

And that's exactly what was taking place with the Pharisees at this point in time. Which is why Jesus had to tell them, when you pray, don't be like the hypocrites. Because those that were hypocrites had overcomplicated prayer. They had made it something that it was never intended to be. It's simply intended to be our communication with God. As a matter of fact, I would say it's one of the most vital aspects of our walk with Jesus Christ.

As vital. As my communication with my wife is. You know as well as I do that any relationship, the lifeblood of it, is the ability to communicate with someone. And so if you're in a relationship with someone and you never talk to them, one would have to question, are you in a relationship with that person? It's kind of like when you're in junior high and you finally find a girlfriend, if you're a guy, or a boyfriend, if you're a girl.

You finally find that someone and you're like, we're dating. And you go, but you guys never talk to each other. And you're like, that's right, because we're dating. And there's no relationship there. So prayer is very vital. It's very vital in our walk with Jesus Christ, because without it there's actually no true relationship that takes place. And may I also say, as I mentioned Wednesday night, I think one of the greatest ways to know just how dependent we are upon the Lord

is very much measured by how much time we spend in prayer. And maybe not even how much time we spend in prayer, but how often we are willing to take our needs to God in prayer. And so it's very vital to our lives, but there's a wrong way that it can be done. And the wrong way that it's to be done is like the hypocrites. Notice what he says. Be like them, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men.

Now in the time when Jesus was roaming the earth amongst all of the Jewish people, there were several times a day that Jewish men were required to pray. Two of them were required by law. And of course they then added some other prayer times. The two required by law were to be done no later than nine o'clock in the morning and no earlier than nine o'clock at night.

And so those were the times when they had to pray. And so. So when they were out on the street corner or when they were out amongst the world and it got close to nine o'clock in the morning, they would say, it's time to pray. And if you knew what you were doing well enough, you could position yourself in the right place within a town square where everybody could hear you pray.

And if you're a really boisterous person, you wouldn't even really have to position yourself that well. You just decide I'll be really loud and pray as loud as I possibly can so that all the people around me look and say, isn't he a great man of prayer? Look how devoted he is. And so this was what they were doing. This is what made them hypocrites is that it wasn't necessarily in their hearts to pray.

It was that they wanted everybody to take note of the fact that they prayed. They wanted everyone to realize how spiritual they were. He says, that's not how you need to be because that's called praying to be seen by men. Now. Let's point out, first of all, what this is not. This is not a prohibition against publicization. As a matter of fact, there are three times today when you can have the option to pray in public right here at Calvary Chapel.

Two of them take place before the service. One took place at 8 o'clock. The next one will take place at 10 o'clock. And then we've got an opportunity tonight at 6 o'clock for there to be public prayer that takes place. I thought Warren Wiersbe put it best when he said this. It's not a prohibition against public prayer. But if your private life isn't marked by prayer,

then it's hypocritical to make your public life marked by prayer. I thought that was a pretty interesting statement. If you're not willing to pray in private, then why are you going to go and pray in public? Well, one could only guess that it's because you want to be seen by men as someone who's a little bit more spiritual than you are. Now, for us in our culture, we don't have those particular times of day when you're supposed to pray.

We don't have those, this is morning prayer time, this is evening prayer time, and these are the rote prayers I'm supposed to say throughout the day. But we can have the tendency to do a couple of things. First of all, we can have a tendency to make sure people know just how much we pray. And we make sure that they have the understanding, I pray a lot for people.

There's nothing wrong with asking somebody if they need prayer or even praying for them. But we want to be careful in the way that we do so that we're not drawing attention to ourselves. The second thing I think that we can do is when praying in public, we can become those flowery King Jamesian sort of prayers, right? We can be the ones who have the absolute most eloquent, we can be the ones who have the absolute most eloquent, we can be the ones who have the absolute most eloquent speech in the entire place.

Now listen, if that's who you are by nature, be who you are. But we can all tell the difference between those who talk like that all the time and those who only speak like that during prayer. I was in a prayer meeting one time with a rather Pentecostal pastor who I appreciate, I love him a great deal, but it was fascinating to me to be in a prayer meeting with this guy because in general, this particular individual was very soft-spoken, very gentle sort of an individual. But when prayer time started, he put on what I called his prayer voice.

And his prayer voice sounded like this. His prayer voice sounded nothing like his regular voice. He went from speaking kind of like this to be like, And I was like, did he just use vibrato in the midst of his prayer? What are we doing here? Now listen, I'm not trying to criticize that particular individual, but I am starting to say, at what point in time are you trying to put on a show?

And at what point in time are you really communicating with God? And so these are the things that I think we can tend to do when we get into prayer meetings where public prayer is taking place, and they're all to be seen by men. Again, only God knows the heart, and only God can judge whether or not that's what's taking place. But I think each of us deep down in our hearts knows that there are points in time where we pray so that other people can hear.

There's one other way I think that we can do this, and pastors I think are the most guilty of this, is we can like to make statements to people while we pray. Have you ever done that? You ever had a friend that is about to make a really bad decision, and so you're like, well, can I pray for you? And in the midst of you, you're like, well, can I pray for you?

And in the midst of you, you're like, well, can I pray for you? And if you're praying for them, you list all of the potential downfalls of the decision that they're about to make. Lord, I pray that you would just help them to understand that moving there is the worst idea I've ever heard of in my entire life. Lord, I pray that you would help them to understand that that's the worst idea of a job I've ever heard of, and probably the worst idea you've ever heard of in a job.

And we can do that. For pastors, we like to reiterate our points while we pray, right? And sometimes it's because I genuinely want God to minister those points to your heart, but sometimes it's because genuinely I think, maybe they didn't get it the first time, so I'll say it in prayer the second time. I admit, I'm guilty of it. And sometimes that's what we can do.

And every now and then I sit back after I'm done, and I'm like, that was to be seen by men, not so that God would be glorified. I wasn't really talking to God. I was talking to them. And God convicts my heart about it. He says, don't be that way. When you pray, don't be like the hypocrites. Don't be like the actors who pray on the street corner simply to be seen by men.

And, of course, he gives us the result of what happens. He says, truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. You see, when we pray with the flowery speech, I guarantee what's going to happen is somebody's going to come up to you afterwards, and they're going to say, I just love the way you pray. And you kind of go, thanks. And you just received your reward.

When you're the person who makes sure everybody knows how much you pray, they say, you're such a great prayer warrior. And you say, thanks. And you've received. And you've received your reward. He says, truly they have received their reward in full. But notice what he says what we are to do. He says, but when you pray, he says to do a few things. Number one, go into your inner room.

Number two, close your door. And number three, pray to your Father who is in secret. Now, everything about that indicates one main point to us about what the bulk of our prayer life should be like. That the bulk of our prayer life should be, in private, in secret, where only the Father can hear. Because if that's what my main prayer life is like, then when I do pray for somebody in public,

that's what my heart is focused on. Now listen, just because somebody comes up and tells you you're a wonderful prayer warrior, doesn't mean that's the reputation you were seeking. Sometimes that's just a wonderful benefit of the fact that you also have a private prayer life that's really good, that overflows into your public prayer life. But he says, there should be a private aspect to your prayer life as well.

There should be that secret aspect to your prayer life. He says, go into your inner room. That word, inner room, is kind of interesting because it's a Greek word that would indicate a storehouse where the treasure, or a room where the storehouse of treasures are stored. Isn't that a beautiful picture? David Guzik, in his commentary, makes the point that there are unknown treasures that we receive

when we have a place in private where we seek the Lord in prayer. And I do think there are, there are things about a private, personal, deep prayer life that I don't know that we've plumbed the depths of just yet. I don't know that anyone has plumbed the depths of just yet, maybe except for the fact that Jesus knew the depth of it. I think that there's an aspect of that that we don't fully understand.

As a matter of fact, when I was in Bible college, I remember a guy coming and speaking and him saying, the world has yet to see the effect of a man whose heart is fully depleted. He's dedicated to the Lord in prayer. And I thought, what an interesting thought. What a crazy thing to think about with all of the great men that have walked this earth, and to think that we maybe have not fully yet seen what could happen if someone's heart was fully dedicated in a prayer life.

He says, go into your inner room, close the door, and pray to your Father in secret. Do you know, I think that can even happen when you're praying with somebody in public, because all of a sudden you're not concerned about what anybody is saying. You're not concerned about what anybody else is going to hear. You're not concerned about what anybody else is going to say.

The only one you're concerned about talking to is the Lord. I was telling a group of kids this the other day. I said, you know why most of you won't pray in public right now? Why most of you? Because I have a time of prayer at the beginning of every class, and there's always two kids that pray. They're usually the seniors, and they're always the ones that pray every year.

It's a different set of seniors, but there's usually two of them. I said, you know why most of the rest of you don't want to pray? I said, because you're scared of what somebody's going to say. You're scared you're going to say something stupid, right? And you know what they all say? Because that's how we all feel. Matter of fact, I think one of the greatest concerns we face

when we begin our walk with Jesus Christ and begin our prayer life is, I'm going to say something stupid. You know what? God doesn't care. God doesn't care if you say something stupid. One of the things I appreciate more than anything is listening to a brand new believer pray because they haven't learned Christianese yet. They haven't learned the right words to say yet.

They just say what they're really thinking. They just say what's really on their heart. And sometimes words that maybe aren't overly appropriate come out of their mouth and they're like, sorry God, I probably shouldn't say that. But that's just kind of how I feel. And I'm just like, that's the most refreshing thing I ever hear when they haven't learned the language yet.

And they're just struggling through because all they know is that God saved them and they want to communicate with God. And they're not praying for everyone to hear. They're praying, if you will, in their own heart in an inner room with the door closed. Where only their Father, their Father can hear them because they know that's who they want to communicate with.

And notice what it says. Jesus says, when you do that, your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. Your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. How will He reward you? Well, of course He rewards us through answered prayers. And of course, we all know that there's three answers to every prayer, right? One of three answers to every prayer.

There is no such thing as an unanswered prayer. I do hope we all realize that. God either says yes, no, or wait. And so there's a country song, most of which I don't like, but this one particularly I don't like, that says God's greatest gift is unanswered prayers. I understand the premise behind the song, but what I wish He'd said is God's greatest gift is when He says no.

Because that's what that is. When you don't get what you've been praying for, it's because God said no. That's a bad idea. That's not going to be good for you. And you're like, but God, why? Man, there was something I was praying about 12 years ago, and God said no. And at the time I was like, Lord, why? My current situation seems way worse than that situation.

That situation seems amazing. And now I look at the situation that I was really, really praying that God would put me into, and I see the danger that that would have been. And I'm like, dear Jesus, thank you. Thank you for saying that. You're saying no. So how does God reward us? First of all, He rewards us by answering our prayers. Second of all, do you know God oftentimes rewards us

with great peace? Because sometimes when we go to God in prayer seeking Him, the greatest need in our life is the peace of knowing that God is in control, and He's going to take care of those things. God oftentimes rewards us with great joy because there's just simply joy in communicating with our Father. God rewards us with great love. Because our love for Him has grown,

and we understand more deeply His love for us. Yeah. When you make that hidden storehouse of treasure, the place where you pray before your Father, He rewards you in ways that you're not even aware of yet. But He goes on from there to address another concern that can sometimes come up in prayer.

He says in verse 7, And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition, as the Gentiles do. For they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. He says don't use meaningless repetition. Perhaps some of your translations may say vain repetition. Perhaps some of your translations, I think, say empty speech. The idea is that when you go to your Father,

don't try just repeating the same thing over and over again. Now again, let's say, first of all, what He does not mean. What He does not mean is that you should only pray about something once and then never bring it up again. As a matter of fact, Jesus is going to tell a parable later in the book of Matthew about being persistent in our prayers. I believe that we are to be persistent in our prayers,

and we should pray until God gives us an answer and releases us from that request. Because when God lays a burden on your heart, you are to pray until He releases you from that burden. If there's a loved one that's sick and you need to pray for them, pray for them until, God releases you from the burden. How does God release you? God either heals them by healing them on topside of planet Earth,

or God heals them by taking them home. That's how you know you're released. Sometimes you're praying for a new opportunity in your life, some door that you want to walk through, and you pray until God releases you by either opening the door or closing the door. But you pray until God releases you from that prayer burden. And so He's not saying you can't pray,

pray about the same thing multiple times. No, what He's talking about is when our prayers become meaningless. What does He mean by our prayers becoming meaningless? Well, sometimes our prayers are meaningless because we're just plain too wordy. You know, some of us are just really wordy human beings. Most people think I'm a really wordy human being because I stand up here and can talk for 45 minutes to an hour

without any other people joining in on the conversation. But really, in real life, I'm not an overly wordy human being. I actually am incredibly content to sit and say absolutely nothing. And sometimes I feel bad when I pray because I'm like, well, that didn't take very long. That was like five minutes. I probably should be praying for longer than that. And God's kind of like, why?

Did you get to the point? I'm like, well, yeah. He said, perfect. You see, sometimes I think we feel like we've got to introduce everything that we say in this super eloquent way, the same way that we can oftentimes be to be seen by men in that really wordy, over-eloquent sort of way. And sometimes I think it just becomes meaningless. And God's like, get to the point.

That can be meaningless speech. Another way, I think, is that when we begin to speak words with no heart. Let me give you an example. I'll give you an example from my daughters. My daughters, I love them dearly and they love to pray, but they get a little nervous in prayer, especially when it's kind of late in the evening and it's really been way past dinner time.

They revert to their old school prayer from when they were about three years old. Dear Father, thank you for this day. Help our food to be good. In Jesus' name, amen. I've never known how to feel about the help our food to be good because I cook a lot. And so I don't know if that's like a Lord Jesus, protect us from whatever dad has done to the food at this point in time.

Lord Jesus, mom made us eat something healthy this time, like protect us from the green peppers in there. I don't know what that means, but that's what they say. And so sometimes we can, though maybe not in those words, we can become a little meaningless in the things that we say. When we begin to pray, sometimes we can slip into what I will call autopilot in your prayers.

You know what I'm talking about, where as you begin to pray, pretty soon you've been praying for five or 10 minutes and you realize, I haven't even thought about what I've said. I literally have just been jabbering because I'm supposed to be praying right now and so that's what I'm doing. And so I think sometimes when he says, beware, and when you pray, do not use meaningless repetition, he's talking about that slipping into autopilot that is so easy for us to do where we repeat the same prayers over and over again. It's interesting to me that there are books of prayer.

Now, I'm not gonna criticize anybody that uses a book of prayer. I am saying you need to beware of using a book of prayer because those can become vain repetition. Those can become meaningless repetition because while God wants the words that you pray, what he really wants is words from your heart. And sometimes when we read those same prayers over and over again, you have to begin to question, are those really coming from your heart?

Is that really what's going on on the inside of you? One of my favorite authors is A.W. Tozer. And A.W. Tozer, at the beginning of a lot of the chapters of his books, writes out this amazing prayer. And it is just, it's cool to see what he wrote because he's really good with the words, right? And so you read it and you're like, oh, well, when I was in college and shortly thereafter,

I would just start praying some of those prayers. And I just remember thinking, but maybe that's not what I'm supposed to do. Maybe I'm not supposed to pray his words. Maybe I'm supposed to pray my words. Maybe I'm supposed to pray what's really on my heart. And so we have to be careful about this vain repetition, this meaningless words of just saying things

over and over again. But the third thing I think that he can be talking about here when he says vain repetition, like the Gentiles do, or perhaps some of your translations say, like the heathen do, is actually some pagan. practices that were beginning at that point in time that took a hold on the church in the third century and have once again began to come up within the church in about the past 15 to 20 years. And it's called contemplative prayer.

There's an entire movement within the church that really started in the early 2000s and what's referred to as the emergent church. The emergent church began to get away from the inerrancy of God's word and the true work of the Holy Spirit. And they began to pursue God's word. They began to pursue God in new ways because they got bored with the word. They got bored with what God had to say.

And so they began to pursue other ways of seeking God. And so they decided, let's go back to the early church. So they went back to the third century. The third century when monks began to go live in monasteries and do weird things. A time when the church began to be infected with some of the Eastern mysticism of the world. And they began to think, you know, meditation is really good.

God says, to meditate, well, in the East, they meditate by achieving the silence. So let's combine God's word with the Eastern idea of meditation. And you can achieve the silence by repeating biblical words over and over again. And then once you've achieved the silence, you can really communicate God without the use of your mind, only your spirit. Sounds great in theory,

except it's completely opposed to what God's word has to say. Because I would say that if you're repeating a word over and over and over and over and over again, one would maybe call that meaningless repetition. And so it was a thing that began to be big in the early 2000s. I think it's still big amongst some of the church authors in the world today. But I think maybe that's kind of

what God's talking about here too. When Jesus says, don't use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do. Because God wants not only our hearts to be involved, but he does want our minds to be involved. And we do have to understand there's points in time where we don't know how to pray. And so when we don't know how to pray, what does the word tell us that we do?

It says that the spirit intercedes for us with groanings that can't be uttered. You see the groanings that can't be uttered, I believe in one aspect are actually just going.

And Jesus is like, this is what he meant. And I really think that that's kind of what goes on there. Sometimes maybe you've been there where whatever you're going through in life is more than you can handle. Or whatever somebody else is going through in life is more than you know how to pray for. And all you know how to do is just kind of groan in your spirit.

The Holy Spirit interprets that for us and says this is what they meant. The other aspect of it I think is that the Holy Spirit comes in and allows us that gift of a prayer language to be able to pray to God in the way that he wants us to pray. That he sees fit. The Holy Spirit interprets for us. He says don't use meaningless repetition like the Gentiles do

because they think they're going to be heard for all of their many words. Notice what it says in verse 8. Don't be like them for your father knows what you need before you ask him. Now that's kind of an interesting thought, is it not? He says your father knows what you need before you even ask him. And so usually the first question that comes up when people read that verse is

so why do I need to pray? Why do I need to pray? If God already knows what I need before I ask him, why do I need to pray? Because God has chosen that the way that he works his will out in our lives oftentimes is as we seek him. Because God's greatest desire for us is to be completely and fully dependent upon him. What's the greatest way that I can be completely and fully dependent upon him?

Well the same way that my daughters show me that they are still completely and fully dependent upon me. And that's that when they need something they come to me and they say Daddy, can you fill in blank here and I still realize they're fully dependent upon me to do those things. They're still completely dependent on me for the things that they need in their lives. In the same way God desires, he could do anything he wanted for us anytime he wanted to without us ever having to say a word to him.

And yet he chooses to do that. He chooses to wait until we pursue him in prayer to do some of those things. Because I think he longs to know that we are dependent upon him. And so that deals with that question. The second question is so if that's not the case then what does he mean? I believe what he means here is you don't need to be concerned with using the right words.

Remember what we said earlier why do sometimes we struggle in prayer because we don't know what to pray for or we don't know how to pray we're like what if I don't use the right words well just use whatever words you've got because God already knows what you need what he's really concerned about is you coming to him to be dependent is you seeking him in that humble dependent sort of way so don't get too worked up about whether or not you're going to say it the right way well if I don't ask God correctly then he'll probably give me the wrong thing he'll probably do it the wrong way no, he knows what you need he's just waiting for you to seek him don't get too worked up about using all the right words but the second aspect of it is

you don't have to force God into doing anything for you you don't have to force him by using the right kind of language he already knows what you need he's just waiting for you to ask so Jesus then begins to give us what's referred to as the model prayer or the Lord's prayer I actually think, I agree with Chuck it should actually be called the disciples prayer because this is how he taught his disciples how to pray as a matter of fact there's going to be another place we get to in the gospels where his disciples look at him and they say will you teach us to pray kind of like John did with his disciples and he teaches them this same thing we're given the indication that he teaches with this model more than one time

this is the model he used to teach them now we have to understand something we don't now need to go and recite the Lord's prayer over and over again as if this is the only way to pray by saying the Lord's prayer that would actually violate the very thing he just said two verses before that would become for us meaningless repetition now what he does in this is he gives us principles for how to pray so let's read over it and I'll give you what I've identified as the six principles for prayer that he gives to us out of this he says in verse 9 pray then in this way our Father who is in heaven hallowed be your name your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts

as we also forgive our debtors and do not lead us into temptation but deliver us from evil for yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever amen so six principles for prayer number one acknowledge who God is notice what he says in verse 9 he refers to who God is he says our Father who is in heaven our Father who is in heaven you see part of acknowledging who God is in our lives is having that distinct understanding that he is our heavenly Father you see that presents for us a very different relationship with God does it not he's not just the creator of the heavens and the earth although we'll get there in just a minute he's not just the creator of the heavens and the earth he's also your loving heavenly Father that means that

my relationship with him is not that of master and servant although often times I take on that form my relationship with him is actually child and Father and in the same way that my girls very boldly come to me and say Daddy that's exactly what's referred to in the book of Romans when Paul tells us that the Spirit within us cries out Abba Father that's what the word Abba in that verse means it literally means Daddy now I knew folks in Bible college that that's how they would pray that always weirded me out just a little bit to go in prayer and say Daddy that just I don't like saying that word in that form but some would I know guys that would say Hey Dad I still like to say Father because I'm old school that way but in my mind

it still creates the same image and that's that he's not a scary entity that I should be nervous to bring my request to he's simply my Father that I can come to with anything I always tell people there's one there's two people in the world that I have never have a problem with them interrupting me while I'm studying and their names are Violet and Nora because they can come to me anytime that they want to and so he says our Father who is in heaven but notice the second thing he says in this identification of acknowledging who he is as the Father hallowed be your name because we also have that distinct understanding that he is the almighty creator of the heavens and the earth it not only maintains the respect necessary but it reminds us

that there is nothing too hard for him and I think one of the best things that we can do as we come to God and acknowledge that not only is he my Father but he is also the all-knowing all-powerful eternal omnipresent God and there is nothing that's too hard for him number two is a heart surrender to his will a heart surrender to his will notice what it says in verse 10 he says your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven one of the keys to prayer is that we are fully surrendered to what God wants that means when I come to him and I make requests I have the distinct understanding that in making that request I'm also surrendered to his will now there is an entire movement out there that says we should not

worry about being surrendered to God's will when you want something it's a desire God's put in your heart and you should name that desire you should claim that desire and God has to give you that desire it's called the name and enclaimment movement and it's still very much alive and there are still very very many preachers out there who are doing this sort of preaching they're telling you if you want that house you should claim that house because God will give you that house you can actually have your best life now and that movement is wrong and it's opposed to what Jesus tells us right here because our goal in prayer is not for God to do my will it's that God would do his will and prayer lines up my heart with the will of God if you don't believe me

I want you to think about how Jesus prayed in the garden right before he was crucified he said Father if there is any way for this cup to pass from me now if he was listening to the preachers today that are writing a lot of books Jesus should have named it and claimed it Father there is another way therefore I will not go to this cross and I'm claiming that in my name right now and he would have never had to go to the cross and we would have all missed out on salvation but how does Jesus finish it up he says nevertheless not my will but your will be done you see there's an aspect in our hearts where we are surrendered to the will of God in the way that we pray and what I desire is this but I know that what he may desire is this and I need to line up

my heart with his will therefore I come to him in a fully surrendered way and say Lord not my will but your will be done number three after we acknowledge who he is and after our heart has been surrendered to his will there's also the aspect of making requests for physical needs he says give us this day our daily bread friends there's nothing wrong with asking that God would take care of our physical needs God cares about our physical needs there's nothing overly spiritual about not being willing to pray for the things that you need to pray for for the things that you need to pray for for the things that you need to pray for for the things that you need to pray for need in life but I do want to point out how Jesus prays he says give us this day

our daily bread so it's the it's the seeking of the true needs that we have in our life and may I say in the world we're living in right now we do struggle to identify the difference between want and need but I do think that we should pray for those physical needs and quite frankly if you're praying for those physical wants if your heart is being lined up with God's will and you're being surrendered to God's will well then praying for those physical wants will make you go but Lord that's just a want not a need so you do you do what you will with that I remember when I first graduated Bible college and I did not have a vehicle and I started dreaming about the vehicle that I wanted and I had to buy a truck and so I started praying Lord be your will

there's a brand new F-150 that I'd really like to have and I started praying Lord may it be your will and I started dreaming about how it could be God's will and then God was like no and then I got a 1990 F-150 that I lovingly named Norm because he kind of acted like Norm every time I started he'd be like alright let's go and I was like oh that was God's will my will was a brand new truck God's will was Norm and that's what we do so we pray for those physical needs that we have in our lives the next one number four is the confession of sin now I think this is one of the more important aspects of what we do in our prayer life is confessing our sins notice what he says forgive us our debts why do we need to confess sin in our prayer life

because we're told in scripture that his arm is not short that he cannot save his ear is not deaf that he cannot hear no then what's separating me from God your sin is separating you from God that's the problem that I have in my walk that's the problem that I have in my prayer life that's why my prayer time is sometimes not what it should be is because I don't spend enough of it saying Lord this is what I need to do this is where I went wrong this week this is where I went wrong today this is where I went wrong 45 seconds ago because as I confess those things to the Lord all of that stuff gets cleared up and now all of a sudden I've got that direct pathway to where my communication is not hindered by my guilt my fellowship is not hindered by my sin

I have free and clear access to the Father he says forgive us our debts and I believe that confession should be a big portion of our prayer life as a matter of fact we'll get to the spiritual needs in just a second but I think sometimes as you're starting off in prayer and being surrendered to God's will one of the greatest things to praise the Lord reveal the sin that's in my heart because there can sometimes be things in there that we haven't even noticed there can sometimes be things in there that we haven't even thought about and God begins to gently point those things out and we say oh Lord please forgive me please forgive me so there's that aspect of confessing sins and then there's that aspect the number five principle that he gives to us

is kind of an interesting one that most of us don't think about in our prayer life and that's the forgiving of others because notice what he says verse 12 forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors I think that in our time of prayer as God is searching our hearts and as our heart is being tuned in to the Holy Spirit and we are being surrendered to God God begins to reveal areas where we have been holding grudges against people where we've been holding things against people and we need to forgive those people in our heart and then if something needs to take place outwardly we take place we do that outwardly but often times it's just something that's in me that I need to deal with it's an issue in my own heart that I need to deal with

and so we've got to forgive others and so as God reveals those little faces that pop up in your mind oh Lord you're right I got mad at them because I don't even know why I got mad at them but Lord I forgive them I know what they did was wrong but Lord I forgive them and so please forgive me for what I held against them and so there's this aspect of forgiveness and forgiving of others and we'll talk about why that's important in just a minute and then the last one number six is the requesting making requests for spiritual needs requests for spiritual needs and notice what he says in verse 13 do not lead us into temptation but deliver us from the evil one so as we pray that God protects us spiritually cares for us spiritually we make those requests

for spiritual needs now listen these six principles don't have to be don't necessarily have to take place in this order I just think that these are six principles for prayer we should always make sure we take time in our prayer time to acknowledge who God is we should take time in our prayer time to surrender ourselves to his will whether it actually be verbally or just the attitude of our heart we should make sure that we take time to make requests for our spiritual needs our physical needs to confess our sins to God and to make sure that we've extended forgiveness in our hearts to those that are around us now as he closes up he tells us with a little addendum in verses 14 and 15 why forgiveness is so important notice what it says in verse 14

for if you forgive others for their transgressions your heavenly father will also forgive you but if you do not forgive others then your father will not forgive your transgressions you ever want to use your black highlighter on something in the Bible because you're like I don't like those verses right I want to highlight those and something I could never see them again because those are hard verses matter of fact I've struggled with these verses for a lot of years and I actually think this particular time that I've studied the Lord allowed me to see exactly what he intended here because we need to understand that what God is speaking what Jesus is speaking of here is not judicial forgiveness it's parental forgiveness now I hadn't thought about

the difference between those two things until a couple of years ago and I was like I don't know I don't know I don't know the commentary that I read kind of opened up my mind to think about this your salvation is secure in Christ and there's nothing you can do to earn it I don't believe there's anything you can do to unearn it I don't think there's anything you can do to lose it so what does he mean when he's speaking here well if he's not speaking of judicial forgiveness which is you being justified before God salvation what is he speaking of here he's speaking of the type of forgiveness that allows open fellowship with God in other words what he says is if you forgive others then your fellowship with God is maintained you can continue to have

that open fellowship with God because what violates our fellowship with God is sin it's not that we don't we aren't saved it's that our relationship isn't very good we can't actually have open communication between me and the Lord my relationship is somehow severed between me and God when I'm unwilling to forgive somebody else but when I am willing to forgive them then God opens that fellowship back up to me because forgiveness is so vitally important in our lives why is forgiveness so vitally important in our lives because I've never deserved it myself and yet Jesus extends it open handedly and so for me to take what God has extended with an open hand to me and then close my hands and my heart to somebody else it's hard to do that it's hard to say

what could be more egregious than that in God's eyes it's hard to say what could violate my fellowship with a forgiving God more than that and so he says if you don't forgive the sins of others your father will not forgive your transgressions in other words your relationship with God will never be right it's one of those heavy verses is it not one of those heart-searching verses where we sit back and go okay Lord my relationship with you is really important so you're going to have to reveal where I'm wrong so that I can be made right so he deals with this aspect of prayer now we'll close up with the very last thing that he talks about in this aspect of doing good and it's in verse 16 and it has to do with fasting he says whenever you fast

do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do for they neglect their appearance so that they don't that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting truly I say to you they have their reward in full but you when you fast anoint your head and wash your face so that your fasting will not be noticed by men but by your father who is in secret and when your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you now I think my biggest problem with this next set of verses is he doesn't say if you fast he says when you fast because you know what I'm not good at I'm not good at fasting that's why my face never looks not plump it's because I'm not good at fasting matter of fact for me personally and this is the excuse that I've used

it's a terrible excuse but it's the only one that I've got the only excuse I've got is that when I wrestled we had to go without eating a lot and I've got PTSD from it that's no good reason but it's the only excuse I can ever come up with because the moment I tell myself okay I'm going to fast today I don't usually eat a lot in the morning but by 830 in the morning I'm like I'm going to die right because that's how I feel when I'm fasting it's like the idea that comes across so anyway that's my biggest problem with these three verses but let's explain what he's talking about here what is fasting well fasting according to definition is the denial of the physical for a specific time and purpose I will deny myself particularly of food but some sort

of a physical desire for a specific time and for a specific purpose now according to the old passage there was only one day where they were supposed to fast and that was at least required by law and that was the day of atonement the day of atonement one of the feasts that we'll talk about soon in the book of Leviticus the day of atonement was a day of fasting because they were supposed to mourn over their sin over the past year before God atoned for their sin for the past year however throughout the old testament you see examples of people fasting for example Hezekiah called for a fast when the armies of Assyria were coming against them and they knew they were going to be defeated Hezekiah tore his clothes and proclaimed a day of fasting and prayer

in order for to seek God for what he wanted to do that God would move on their behalf you also see other instances of individuals that fasted Moses fasted for 40 days when he was up on the mountain twice different instances throughout the old testament so what is fasting for us in the new testament well fasting for us in the new testament is good for several things it's good for learning some self control in our lives fasting can be good for us when we take time to seek God and set aside all of the physical things setting aside meals for a time in order to seek God fasting can be good for discerning God's will it can be good when we need to take a time of repentance in our lives and sometimes fasting is good simply to reset our focus

denial of the physical so that we can reset our focus back on the spiritual but much like the other things we've talked about the Pharisees had taken this and they turned it into a work that it was never intended to be the Pharisees at this point in time would fast once a week and according to what Jesus tells us here when they would fast once a week they made sure the whole world knew about it so it says whenever you fast don't put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do for they neglect their appearance so that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting truly I say to you they have the reward in full now as somebody who not for spiritual reasons but for making weight reasons has gone without eating quite a few times may I say one day of it

doesn't change your appearance you don't all of a sudden look much more peaked that day or much more pale that day or much more disheveled that day and so what the Pharisees were doing at this point in time is they sort of neglected themselves because they wanted the whole world to know today's my day of fasting so that I can seek God know what he wants for my life I can tell look at his face you can tell he hasn't eaten all day I mean he's just he's a mess he's a mess for Jesus he's a mess for the Lord right he says don't be that way and part of it is because God doesn't want our works to be done to be seen by men he says truly I say to you they have the reward in full they've not sought God's will they've not received discernment

self-control is not something that they're learning and their hearts are not being reset and they're focused on the things of God instead of the things of man their hearts are simply being focused on themselves and so notice what he says but you when you fast anoint your head and wash your face so that your fasting will not be noticed by men but by your father who is in secret and your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you he says instead what you should do first of all is take care of your appearance make sure that you do the rest of your daily routine as you would normally do the one change you've made is that you're seeking God in a deeper sort of way make sure that the whole world has no idea what you're doing

so that what is being done is being done in secret before your father so that your father who sees in secret will reward you openly because fasting does have a good effect on our lives if we do it in the right way and so as he has addressed these three things the aspect of giving the aspect of praying and the aspect of fasting of course the greatest issue that he's dealt with is that of not being hypocrites that of not being those who are simply seeking to be seen by men and my prayer is that as we have studied this that the Lord has done his work in our hearts to begin to reveal to us those areas of our lives where sometimes we can be those hypocrites praise God that he is good enough to show us where we have gone wrong so that he can also show us

how we can be made right amen let's all stand as the worship team gets ready to come up and share one last song with us I'll just remind you that we're coming into a time of year where the world is going to be forced to focus on Jesus going to be forced to focus on the Lord first of all in this time of Thanksgiving that even though everybody wants to pretend it's not happening that we've gone straight to Christmas first of all through this time of Thanksgiving but then also as we move into this holiday season I think we're living in a time where we could really stand to hear people talk a lot about Jesus in this time Father we come before you and just thank you Lord for the time that we've had in your word this morning Lord thank you

for how good you are to us and Lord I just lift up each of our hearts Lord if there is hypocrisy in us Lord if there is the desire to be seen by men in us the desire to do our good works to receive attention that you would do your work of conviction in our hearts and Lord that we would give in such a way that you would be glorified that we would pray so that only you would hear that we would pray and that we would fast so that our hearts can truly be set on you and Lord we just thank you and praise you for who you are in Jesus name Amen Be blessed

I'll fly away I die hallelujah by and by I'll fly away when the shadows of this life have grown I'll fly away I'll fly away like a bird from prison bars I'll fly away I'll fly away oh glory I'll fly away when I die hallelujah by and by I'll fly away just a few more weary days and then I'll fly away to a land where joy shall never end I'll fly away I'll fly away oh glory I'll fly away in the morning when I die hallelujah by and by I'll fly away oh glory when I die hallelujah by and by I'll fly away hallelujah by and by I'll fly away Amen You guys have a wonderful day God bless you