[MUSIC PLAYING] Spirit Hacks. Tips and tools for mastering
your spiritual life. Acts, Chapter 2 and Chapter 4,
get a marker ready for that. Martin Luther said, "To be
a Christian without prayer is more possible--" excuse me-- "To be a Christian
without prayer is no more possible than to
be alive without breathing." Hudson Taylor, a great
missionary to China, said, "It is
possible to move men through God by prayer alone." EM Bounds, who wrote so
many great books on prayer, said, "God shapes
the world by prayer. The more praying
there is in the world, the better the world
will be, the mightier the forces against evil." And finally, Billy Graham
said, "To get nations back on their feet, we must first
get down on our knees." When I hear sayings like
this, I resonate with them, I agree with them,
I say amen to them, but I got to be honest
with you, they don't always make me feel great. They often make me feel guilty. And I've discovered that
when you mentioned prayer, there are people
when they hear, we're going to talk about prayer,
they have one of two reactions. I'm speaking here generally now. One reaction is boredom. The other reaction-- anxiety. Guilt. Let me explain. You say, hey, we're going
to talk about prayer. They go, oh man, that's
such a boring topic. And that's because
probably they have heard-- I bet we have all heard--
people pray in monotone voices, droning on and on and mentioning
everything and everyone, and you're hearing-- they're
going, put an amen on it and stop. I get it. They're not praying
to us, they're praying to God, that's
their prerogative. But if you're a part of a
prayer meeting like that, you have felt that
or thought that. The other feeling many get
when it comes to prayer, probably most often, is anxiety. Guilt. Oh man, I'm
so bad at praying. I don't do it good enough. I don't pray long enough. And so they get frustrated. Well I want you to know, you're
not alone if you feel that. You need to know that some
of the greatest prayer warriors in history felt
exactly the same way. Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Great German pastor. God used him, he was
executed in World War II. Admitted that his prayer
experience was something he was ashamed of. Well that doesn't
make me feel great, it makes me feel really guilty. Because he had a pretty
awesome prayer life. Martin Luther, founder of the
Reformation whom I just quoted, anguished in prayer
sometimes three hours a day. I don't do that. Three hours a day. And he walked away
feeling unsatisfied. And I've discovered that many
people who labor in prayer walk away from
their labors feeling disappointed and frustrated. And so I wonder-- maybe we've done that, not God. Maybe, just maybe
prayer was meant to be a joyous, life-giving,
delightful experience. Maybe we've turned it
into-- we've forced it into a hard, painful,
guilt-giving experience and exercise that no
one can attain to. Maybe not God, maybe
we've done that. In fact, maybe prayer
was meant by God to do the exact opposite. Not to produce
guilt, but to relieve guilt. Not to rob us of peace,
but to leave us in peace. Not to elevate anxiety,
but to alleviate anxiety. Perhaps, could it
be that prayer was supposed to be a key to joy? I believe that. I believe that. I don't believe you should walk
away from your prayer going, wasn't good enough,
wasn't long enough. I think it was meant to
alleviate anxiety and produce peace. How do I know that? Because Paul writes in
Philippians, Chapter 4-- don't turn to it, I'm
going to read it to you, and I'm going to read it to
you in the New Living Bible-- I want you to let
it just soak in. He said this-- "Don't worry about anything,
but pray about everything. Tell God what you need and
thank Him for what He has done. If you do this, you will
experience God's peace, which is far more wonderful than
the human mind can understand. His peace will guard
your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus." That's what prayer
was meant to do. It was meant to up the game of
peace and joy in your heart. Now if you know anything
about prayer in the Bible, you understand that the
Bible mentions prayer a lot. If you were to
count up the times that pray or prayer or
praying are mentioned you would come up with
about 370 different times. So it's all over-- smattered throughout
the scripture. But what is New
Testament prayer? What are the
qualities of prayer? What makes it work? What makes prayer effective? To answer that, I want you to
look at Acts, Chapter 2 with me and Acts, Chapter
4-- we're going to actually look at a
few different verses in the Book of Acts. Don't worry, we won't
go bonkers on it, we'll just look at a few. But what I want to do is move
from general to specific. I want to give you first
a description of prayer in the early church, then
a depiction of prayer. So we're going to look at
principal and then example. In Acts, Chapter 2, we're
going to notice the prayer life of the early church generally. In Acts Chapter
4, we're actually going to eavesdrop
on a prayer meeting that they have in the fourth
chapter of the Book of Acts. Let's begin generally. Let's look at a description
of prayer generally. Acts, Chapter 2, Verse 42. A verse we looked at
half of last week. "And they continued steadfastly
in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking
of bread, and in prayers." Now that verse is a list. It's a list of priorities that
the early Christian believers maintained,
steadfastly observed-- these things were
important to them, and the activity of
prayer is on that list. So generally speaking, here's
what I want you to see. They prayed regularly. Not sporadically, not when the
bottom fell out of their lives, not when 9/11 happened
or a stock market crash, they prayed on every occasion,
they prayed regularly. In Acts, Chapter 1-- just turn back one page-- Acts, Chapter 1,
Verse 14, they're gathering in the upper room. It says, "These all
continued with one accord in prayer and supplication--"
that's just intense prayer-- "with the women and Mary,
the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers." Go down to Verse 24,
they want to replace Judas Iscariot, who's committed
suicide, with another apostle. Verse 24. "And they prayed and
said, 'You, O Lord, who know the hearts of all
men, show which of these two You have chosen." So you've got a picture
about 120 of them gathered together in an
upper room in Jerusalem. This is the church. 120 of them. They're in a room. Jesus is no longer
with them, He's gone, He's ascended into Heaven. But they have no
manual on how to start a church, no social media-- they have nothing. No charter, no agenda. They're looking at each
other going, now what? And the now what is, let's pray. They did it regularly. They would gather together
and regularly pray. Now this reminds
me, interestingly, of the way we
started as a church. We met in an apartment complex. It grew to about 100 or so. There wasn't much
room, and so people were saying, well now what? They came with now what? And I said, I don't know,
I've never done this before. I don't know what to do next,
but I'll tell you what-- we're meeting on
a Thursday night right now, let's meet again on
Monday nights, whoever's free, and we're going to
have a prayer meeting and basically we're going
to say, now what, God? What do we do now? What's the next step? That's how we started-- Bible study and a prayer meeting
asking God, now what do we do? RA Torrey said, "Pray for great
things, expect great things, work for great things,
but above all, pray." And the early church
did exactly that. They prayed regularly. They prayed in Acts 1, they
prayed in Acts, Chapter 2 on the Day of Pentecost,
they prayed in Acts, Chapter 4 when there's persecution. Go over to Acts, Chapter 6-- I won't keep doing this, I'll
just give you that idea-- Acts, Chapter 6, Verse
4, there's a conflict, there's a kind of an
issue with priorities. Acts, Chapter 6, Verse
4, the apostles say, "But we apostles will
give ourselves continually to prayer and to the
ministry of the word." So it was something
they regularly did. You all know, perhaps, what
it says in 1 Thessalonians. It says, pray without what? Pray without ceasing. Have you ever read that and
said, how can I do that? How do you pray without
seizing I mean you walk around all day mumbling. I'm praying--
[MUMBLING] hey Skip! [MUMBLING] don't talk
to me, I'm praying-- [MUMBLING] I can't stop. That I have to pray
without ceasing. Well that's stupid,
you can't do that. You've got to sleep. You're not going to pray
while you're sleeping. You have to eat
food, you can't-- [MUMBLING] that'd be gross. You have to talk to other people
to maintain relationships, you have to work. So what does it mean
pray without ceasing? Well it's talking
about something that is constantly recurring,
not constantly occurring. You do it regularly, you
pray on every occasion. Jesus said, don't
pray like the heathen who think that they will be
heard by their many words. So the idea of praying
without ceasing is to make prayer a
regular part of daily life. And the early church did that. They made prayer a regular
part of daily life. They prayed in the beginning,
they prayed on Pentecost, they prayed on persecution, they
prayed when there was a crisis, they just kept doing
that regularly. A second thing to note generally
about their prayer experiences is that not only did
they pray regularly, they prayed customarily. What do I mean by that? Well, go back to our
anchor verse, to Verse 42. And if your version
is like mine, it says they continued steadfast
in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the
breaking of bread, and what? In prayers. The Greek language has an
article before prayers. It's "and the prayers." The prayers. [SPEAKING GREEK]-- the prayers. What does that mean? It refers to a known
practice manner of praying. The prayers-- they were Jews. They grew up with certain
prayers for certain times during the day. In fact, look at
Chapter 3, Verse 1 where it says, "Now Peter and
John went up together to the temple at the hour
of prayer--" the ninth hour, that's 3:00 o'clock
in the afternoon. What this tells me is
they kept observing what observant Jews did in Jerusalem,
and that is going to the temple to pray at 9:00 in the
morning, at 12:00 noon, and at 3:00 o'clock
in the afternoon, the time for the
evening sacrifice. Of course, they had been with
Jesus three-and-a-half years. They knew that you don't
have to pray in a temple, you can pray anywhere--
shores of Galilee, walking down the road, while
you get your donkey serviced or whatever-- you can pray 24/7. Doesn't matter where you pray. But they're in
Jerusalem and they also understood traditionally, this
is something we acknowledge, that when we're together,
we go to the temple and we pray during these times. And they did not see a
conflict with that kind of traditional outlook along
with just praying anywhere. It's funny. If you go to Jerusalem
today, tour guides love to do this when they take
you to the city of Jerusalem. They'll encourage tourists to
go down to the Western Wall, the enclosure remains
of the temple, and they'll say, pray here. Because though you can pray
anywhere in the world and God will hear you, here
it's a local call. They kind of pride
themselves on-- this is the city that God decided to
put His presence and name in. Here it's a local call. So they went to the temple
to make a local call. To keep the hour of prayer. Now this was their custom. Paul, the apostle, would
travel all over the world, and where did he first go
visit when he went to any town? A synagogue. In fact, it says an Acts
17, "As was his custom, Paul went into the synagogue." Why the synagogue? That's where Jews
gathered to pray. That's where they gathered
to hear the scriptures. He made it a custom. So they took prayers they
learned as kids, infused them with new meaning,
or you might say they saw the old prayers
through new eyes. They prayed regularly. They prayed the
prayers customarily. A third generality I
want you to notice, they prayed instinctively. Hey, you know what
their first reaction was when something happened? When a problem happened? When an issue happened? When somebody told
them news that was a little bit disturbing? You know their
first reaction was? Let's pray. Let's pray about it. Go over to Acts, Chapter
12 for just a moment. Persecution is on the
rise in Acts, Chapter 12. Peter is arrested, put in jail. Acts, Chapter 12, Verse 5. "Peter was therefore
kept in prison--" watch this-- "but
constant prayer was offered to God for
him by the church." Notice their reaction. Their instinctive reaction
when there was an issue-- Peter's put in jail,
what did they do? They don't picket. They're not picketing
out there, let him go! Let him go! They're not writing letters-- let's have a letter writing
campaign to get Caesar and-- they don't do that. They don't file a lawsuit. First thing they do is the
most powerful thing to do, and that's talk to God about it. Pray about it. It's the first thing
we should try-- why has it become the
last thing we do try? Why has prayer
become this-- there's nothing left to do but pray! Really? That's what you've
turned it into? A last resort? Like as if to say, well I'm
going to work really hard, but if that doesn't work, I
guess you got to trust God. Hello! Corrie ten Boom
asked this question-- is prayer your steering
wheel or your spare tire? For the early church it
was the steering wheel. They prayed regularly,
customarily, instinctively. That's a general description. Now turn over with me
to Acts, Chapter 4. Let's get a little more detail. Let's get a depiction,
an example of it. Let's eavesdrop on
a prayer meeting. Acts, Chapter 4, they
have been arrested, they have been let
go, but they have been threatened
by the hierarchy-- the government of Jerusalem--
don't preach the gospel anymore in this town, that
was the mandate. So Acts, Chapter 4, Verse 23. "And being let go, they
went to their own companions and reported all that
the chief priests and the elders had said to them. So when they heard that,
they raised their voice to God with one
accord and said--" now we're hearing their prayer-- "Lord, You are God who made
Heaven and Earth, the sea, and all that is in them; who
by the mouth of Your servant David had said, why did the
nations rage and the people plot vain things? The kings of the earth
took their stand, and the rulers were gathered
together against the Lord and against His Christ--"
they're quoting Psalm 2. "For truly, against
Your holy servant Jesus whom You anointed, both
Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and
the people of Israel were gathered together
to do whatever Your hand and Your purpose
determined before to be done. Now, Lord, look on their threats
and grant to Your servants that with all boldness, they may
speak Your word by stretching out Your hand to heal. That signs and wonders may
be done through the name of Your holy servant Jesus. And when they had
prayed, the place where they were assembled
together was shaken. And they were all filled
with the Holy Spirit and they spoke the word
of God with boldness." That's their prayer. What are we to
notice specifically about their prayer? Well first of all,
it was honest. It was honest. It was a heartfelt,
authentic, candid expression. There was nothing
pretentious about it. They're dealing with
a real life issue. What's the real life issue? They're threatened. They have been arrested. They have been mandated
not to do certain things that they know the
Lord wants them to do. And so they pray. They're honest. Somebody once said,
"there will always be prayer in public schools as
long as there are final exams to take." You can have a law all
you want against praying in public school, but when that
student sits in that chair, he's going to probably-- or
she-- get very honest with God if they have any
kind of faith at all. One of the striking features
about the Book of Psalms is the honesty in praying. The Book of Psalms,
one Psalm will say, "I drench my bed in tears." I'm crying so much, I'm
just making the pillow wet. Another person says,
God, You've forsaken me. Where are You? Another prayer, David
prays for his enemies and he prays this-- get this. "O Lord, break their
teeth in their mouths." Now that's an honest prayer. I remember when
I first described that, I go, wow,
I gotta underline that, that's in the Bible? That's cool. I want to pray to that, baby. Not that God will answer
it, but it's there. And why do those
in the scripture feel that they can pray
so honestly with God? Because they know
something about God. They know that he
is unshockable. First of all, God isn't
impressed with your prayers. So why not be honest? God didn't go, wow, he prayed
that with a British accent. That's so eloquent-sounding, and
the vocabulary that she used? My, I admire that. Are you kidding? So be honest-- they were honest. A second thing to make note
of, it had perspective. This prayer had perspective. Look at Verse 24. Let's muse on that for a moment. "When they heard that,
they raised their voice to God with one accord
and they said--" now here's their prayer-- "Lord, You are God." Doesn't God already know that? "You're God." Really? Notice what else. "Who made Heaven, Earth, and the
sea and all that is in them." Does God not know
what He has done? No-- so why are
they praying this? Because it elevates
their perspective. They begin their
prayer recognizing who they're praying to,
that helps their faith. It gives them faith. It's for them, not for God. They're not informing God. By the way, the word
Lord that's used here is a very different word
than the typical word for Lord in the New Testament. A lot of you know the word for
Lord is the Greek word kurios. You've been around and
you know that term, you've heard that term. That's the typical
word for Lord. This is not that word. This is the word despota-- despot. If you look it up in the
dictionary, it means a tyrant. But that's what the
word has become. Originally the word
simply is a word that means absolute ruler
or dictator-- in this case, benevolent dictator. So they realized, I'm
not talking to Herod, I'm not talking to
Caesar, I'm talking to the one who has
higher authority than those numbskulls. I'm talking to the
autocrat of the universe-- the Lord. The Lord. It's easier to have faith
when you pray that way. Jeremiah prayed that way. He was confronted with a
very difficult situation. Jeremiah 32, Verse 17, he says,
"O Lord or O sovereign Lord, You have made the
Heavens and the Earth by Your great power
and outstretched arm, there's nothing
too hard for You." When people pray that way, it's
because they want a perspective adjustment. And it's just
healthy to realize, because we so often carry our
limitations over onto God, we have to realize God is big. Listen to some of our prayer. God, I'm so freaked out. It almost as if-- I don't know if you can handle
this one-- this is a big one. This is cancer. A cancer and a cold
are the same for God. Not for us, not for your
doctor, but for God, one is not harder
than the other. But we often carry our
limitations over onto God as if God is as weak
and limited as we feel. So it's helpful for me to
just get my perspective. Every now and then I just like
to realize that I am one-- only one-- of 7.7 billion
people on this dirt clod that we call
the Earth that is only 8,000 miles in diameter. And the nearest star, the
sun, 93 million miles away, is so big that if
it were hollow, you could stuff 1,200,000
earths inside of it. And that's just a little sliver
of the Milky Way galaxy-- 10,000 light years wide by
100,000 light years long, and that's only one of
billions of other galaxies, and the Bible says, God measures
it all by the span of his hand. That's a big dude. That's a big God. And when I pray this way-- Lord, You are God-- I know you know that,
but this is for me now. You made the Heaven, the Earth,
the Sea, and everything that is and it elevates my perspective. Look at Verse 25 just briefly. Verses 25 and 26. They're quoting, as
I mentioned, Psalm 2. Why quote scripture to God? Why quote scripture to God? Because Psalm 2 is a messianic
psalm, and in doing so, they're saying, You knew
about this-- in fact, You predicted this in advance
and now it's happening. It didn't take you off-guard. This is why knowing scripture
helps you in your prayers. You gain perspective when you
know the promises of the Bible. So here's the tip-- when you're in trouble and you
feel overwhelmed by a problem, let your trouble be overwhelmed
by an overwhelming God who is overwhelmingly powerful. How do you do that? Find a text of
scripture that describes God's power, God's glory,
God's majesty, God's control. Place that in front of you,
look at it, and now pray. Based on that, now pray. That's what they did. It was honest, it
had perspective. Another thing to
notice, it was balanced. This prayer was balanced. What I mean is, they
don't immediately jump into personal petition-- prayer requests. They begin with adoration. There are five verses of
things like, You're awesome, You made this, You made
that, You spoke this, You spoke that, Your holy
servant Jesus, Your plan, Your purpose. Then they don't even get to
the request till Verse 29. What does that mean? It means this is respectful. In coming to God,
this is respectful. It's an honoring way to pray. It's the way Jesus
taught us to pray. He didn't say, and when you
pray, say, give us this day our daily bread. He said, when you pray-- you know this-- say,
our Father in Heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come, Your
will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven. Now, give us this
day our daily bread. That's a balanced prayer--
keeps you from being lopsided. Sometimes we treat God like He's
an emergency room rather than a loving, Heavenly Father
who is to be adored and loved and praised. It was a balanced prayer. Something else--
it was specific. It was specific. One of the things you notice,
it's not vague at all. Look at Verse 29,
look how specific. Lord, now look on their threats
and grant to Your servants--" that's us-- "that was all boldness,
they may speak Your word." Why'd they pray that? Because their boldness
got them arrested. Now they're not feeling so bold. They've just been in jail
because they were so bold. Now they've been threatened
because of the boldness. They're feeling a little timid,
so they need some of that back. "Grant with all boldness
they may speak Your word by stretching out Your hand to
heal that signs and wonders may be done to the name of
Your holy servant Jesus." So a simple prayer, but
very, very specific. We need boldness because we're
not feeling it right now, and it'd be really cool
if you did some miracles to get people's attention. Very, very specific, right? It's not vague. They don't say, Lord,
you know every need, spoken and unspoken. What is that? I don't like people-- I'm praying for an
unspoken need-- speak it! Be very specific about it. Well, Lord, I'm just-- I have an unspoken
need, bless me. What if you walked into
a restaurant and say, I have a general food need. [LAUGHTER] Bless me. They look and go, what? It'd be very helpful you say,
I'd like number three, please, on the menu. Oh, you want bacon and eggs, OK. Not that God needs
the information again, but the more specific you
are, when it comes to pass, you can go, that's
exactly what I prayed for. I think the more
specific you are, the more specific the outcome. Again, you're not trying to
impress God with your words, it's God you're dealing with. You don't need to lavish-- There's this great
story about a Puritan who began his prayer by saying,
"oh sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient, great, holy,
majestic, mighty--" he just kept lathering
on these adjectives. There was a very simple
lady in the prayer meeting who said, look, just call
him Father and ask Him for something. Just be that direct,
be very specific. Finally, the last thing to
notice about this prayer, it had results. It works, right? Verse 31, "When they
had prayed, the place where they were assembled
together was shaken, and they were all filled
with the Holy Spirit and they spoke the
word of God with what?" Boldness. What did they just pray for? Boldness. What'd they get? Boldness. So God answered their honest,
balanced, specific prayer. First with a physical
manifestation. The place was shaking,
sort of as a sign-- I'm here with you. This is a sign of my
presence outwardly, like what happened to Pentecost. Second, a very
practical manifestation. They were filled with boldness. They're asking for,
fill us with what got us into trouble
in the first place-- boldness-- they got it back. Something I want to
draw your attention to. It might throw some of you. This is not a very long prayer. We're examining it and I
can make a sermon out of it, but the prayer
itself is very short. In fact, I timed it on my
iPhone, I put my timer on-- 49 seconds. Prayed out loud. Now maybe I rushed it. Let's say a minute. It took a minute to
pray this prayer, and this was an
effective prayer. But you know, sometimes you
don't have a whole lot of time. You know, Peter was walking on
the water filled with doubt. What happened? He started drowning. He prayed. You know what his prayer was? Three words. "Lord, save me!" That's it. He didn't have time to go, Lord,
omniscient, omnipotent, holy, [MUMBLING]-- he'd have been dead. [LAUGHTER] But he had time to
say, "Lord, save me!" And he was saved. It worked. It was answered. James in the New Testament
gives a classic teaching on prayer in James, Chapter 5. And he speaks about Elijah, the
prophet in the Old Testament. Sums it up by saying, "The
effective fervent prayer of a righteous
person avails much. The effective fervent
prayer of a righteous person avails much." Now he's referring to Elijah. But get this. If you go back and look
at the prayer of Elijah-- 1 Kings, Chapter 18, that's
the prayer he's referring to-- he's having a contest
between the God, the prophet Baal
aligned with God, and the false prophets of Baal. It says, "The false prophets
of Baal pray to their God--" listen-- "from
morning till noon." Let's just say it's a
three to four-hour prayer. It's a long prayer. You know what they
got out of it? Nothing. Zero. Nothing happened. Elijah steps up and prays. 63 words, that's it. Fire falls from Heaven and
consumes the sacrifice. They're praying four hours they
get nothing; he prays 63 words, he gets something; why? Well they prayed to whom? Nobody. It's like calling
somebody up and nobody is on the other line. You can talk, my day is
going fine, how's your day? You know, I'm wearing
this and that. Nobody's listening to you. You can be sincere talking
to nothing and no one. He is talking to the
only true living God, 63 words was enough to
bring fire down from Heaven. "The effective fervent prayer
of a righteous man avails much." I'm not trying to say you
should pray shorter prayers. I think you can work
your way up to having meaningful, long
conversations with God. But here's my point. The key is not in the
length of the prayer, the key is the one to
whom you are talking. That's the key. Max Lucado said, "Our
prayers may be awkward, our attempts may be feeble,
but since the power of prayer is in the one who hears it
and not the one who says it, our prayers do
make a difference." I hope that set
your heart at ease. So you don't walk away
going, I feel so bad. Why? Well I just prayed. Well shouldn't you feel good? No, I don't do it good enough. It's not long enough. My words aren't cool enough. Stop! It's not about you, it's
about the one who goes, talk to me, pray to me. So prayer is the
slender nerve that moves the muscles of omnipotence. God responds. And just quickly, you'll notice
in our little story in Acts 4, there is a connection
between assembled together and they prayed and power. They assembled,
they prayed, and it was a very powerful encounter. Great story about a
church in New York City. They got a brand
new organ-- pipe organs are quite expensive. New pipe organs rely
on electricity, not like the old ones. Well, they got this new
pipe organ in church, it was the first Sunday. The organist is sitting
at the keyboard, presses the first chord-- nothing. No sound. Dead silence. Because the power cord
was not plugged in. A deacon saw the problem
and texted the organist to say, as soon as the
invocation is over, I'll plug it in. But the text read
this-- after the prayer, the power will be on. After the prayer-- invocation--
the power will be on. Now you think about that
and you apply that to you. After the prayer,
the power will be on. I'm feeling kind of crummy
today, but after the prayer, the power will be on. Well I'm feeling
really overwhelmed. But after the prayer,
the power will be on. But people are treating me and
saying-- but after the prayer, the power will be on. So I'll sum it up in
a nutshell by saying, prayer voices our dependence
on God and God likes it. That's the Skip Heitzig
definition of prayer. It's not as good as Spurgeon
or Martin Luther, but God-- a prayer voices our dependence
on God and God likes it. That's prayer. God likes it. God likes his kids to be
dependent, just like a parent. When a child says,
Mommy, Daddy, you think a parent says, you're
two years old, get a life. Get a grip. Are you kidding? The parent loves a child
voicing dependence, so does your Heavenly Father. It voices your dependence
on God and God likes it. Quick tips, some hacks,
how to pray effectively. We'll put him up
here-- pray simply. Just be yourself. Be your best self,
but be yourself. This to use simple
words from your heart, pour it out-- like Spurgeon
said, I'll pour it out into the ears of God. Number two, read scripture. Read scripture. Scripture helps you
get your bearings, scripture reminds you
who you're talking to, it elevates your perspective. The more scripture you
know when you pray, the more effectively
and faith-filled will be your prayers. Third, keep a journal. Why? Because you can
write requests down, and when they're
answered, you can go, wow, I prayed about
that on that day. That'll help you in the future. I keep a journal-- I'm not great at it, I
don't do it regularly, I'm not like, Mr. Holy
always in my prayer journal, but I keep it and I'll pull
it out every now and then and I'll often write
prayers in it that are near and dear to my heart so
that, for this reason, when they're
answered, I can say, that's the day that
I prayed for that. Another tip-- pray in real time. Pray in real time. I get people all the time, hey,
Skip, would you pray for this? Would you pray for that? If I just say yes, you know
what's going to happen? I'm going to walk away and
forget I had the conversation. So I like to do this-- let's pray right
now, and I'll just pray right there on the spot. Pray in real time. When you leave the house,
men, in the morning and you kiss your
wife, pray for her. Right there. Pray for your wife. As you hug your kids
goodbye, pray for them. When you're at work, you
open the computer, pray for your day at work. As situations come up,
you want to regularly on an ongoing thing,
instinctively, that's praying without
ceasing on every occasion. Pray in real time. Another tip-- use a template. I guarantee you, almost
any New Testament epistle written by Paul,
there's a little section at the beginning of that
where he prays for the church, and he tells them what
he's praying for about. And I find that to be
very helpful in my prayer life-- it's a template. Also, let's talk about
the template, right? The Lord's Prayer. Jesus said to the
disciples, hey, when you pray, do it like this. And I found that
the Lord's Prayer is an excellent skeleton for
me to hang my own thoughts and expressions on. So I'll pray
something like this. Our father, You're not
just God, You're my father. I have a relationship
with You because of what Jesus did on the cross. I'm talking to the
one that I have a personal relationship
with-- my Father who loves me like a child. And you're my Father in Heaven. You're not on the Earth, you're
not limited by what I see, you have unlimited visibility. You're seeing all things
from a heavenly perspective. You're my Father in Heaven. And I want to hallow Your name,
I praise You, I glorify You-- I'll think of a few things
that come to my mind that I want to
praise the Lord for, and I'll use that as a way
to hang my own thoughts and expressions and
pray with that template. A couple others they didn't
even include in this, but I find it helps
when I pray aloud. I'm guessing you may have
the same problem I do. If I confine it to my
thinking in my mind, I get distracted in five
seconds by another thought. And I divert or I check
a text or-- it's just-- so if I'm talking out loud like
I would talk to you out loud, it helps me to stay on target. And often I will combine
my talking in prayer to my walking. I'll walk around
the neighborhood, if you're a neighbor
of mine, you're going, oh, I was wondering,
I thought you were kind of like losing it. Walking and talking to yourself. No, I'm talking
to God, but I find that when I walk
and I talk, it just helps me to use that
time, an ongoing time to do my business before God. I want to close with a story. It sort of wraps all this up. Howard Hendricks some
years ago told a story about a family in
Dallas, Texas that had fallen on very difficult times. Life was hard. They had four kids
in the family, and one night at family worship,
Timmy, the youngest boy, said, Daddy, do you
think Jesus would mind if I asked him for a shirt? That's how bad it was-- couldn't
afford a shirt for Timmy. Dad said, of course not. In fact, let's write it down
in our prayer request book. So he wrote down a shirt for
Timmy and he added size seven. That's specific, right? Shirt for Timmy, size seven. Every day he prayed
for the shirt. After weeks went by, one
Saturday morning, mom received a phone
call from a clothier in town, a Christian
businessman who said, I just finished
our July clearance, and knowing that
you have four boys, I thought you might be
able to use something. Could you use some boy's shirts? And she's on the phone, she's
smiling, she goes, what size? He says, size seven. She says, how many you got? He says, I've got 12. So that night, they got
together for family worship and Timmy says, don't forget
to pray for the shirt. And mom says, we don't
have to pray, sweetheart. How come? said Timmy. She said, the Lord has
answered your prayer. He said, he has? So she went and got one shirt-- one shirt and put it
down on the table. Timmy's eyes grew
big like saucers. And then she put 12 down,
just one on top of the other until she got to 12. Now, says Hendricks,
Timmy thinks God is going into
the shirt business. [LAUGHTER] But he concludes that
little story by saying, but there is a little kid
in Dallas, Texas named Timmy who believes that there
is a God in Heaven who is interested enough
provides boys with shirts. Very specific, faith-filled,
ongoing prayer, and it brought that
result. For some of you, the very first prayer
you should pray is not, Our Father who art in
Heaven, hallowed be Your name. It's not, Now I lay
me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. But Lord, forgive me of my sins. I believe in Jesus Christ. I want to enter into a
relationship with you by faith in Him. I turn from my sin
and I turn to you. That's the first
prayer that must be prayed to enter
into a relationship with the Father in Heaven. That's how He gets to be
your Father in Heaven. And then after the prayer,
the power will be on. Let's pray. Lord, I want to pause because
we're talking out into the air. We're not talking
to a human being. We're now addressing
the God of the universe. The one who was absolute
total control and power over everything and everyone. Moreover, He is our Father. He loves us like children who
depend on Him for everything. Thank you, Lord,
that we have a window to see how communication
with You should be done. Lord, You know the
needs of our heart, I pray we would be very
honoring in our requests. Very filled-- praise-filled. We'd be very
specific and balanced and all the things that
the early church had in their prayer to You. Lord, I pray that we'll walk
away from our encounters with You not filled with grief
or anxiety or guilt or remorse, but joy and peace, and feeling
like we've laid it before You-- we've poured it into Your ears. It's in Your hands, we
can walk away unburdened. Knowing that what happens now
is what You wanted to happen. Fill us with faith
by our perspective, realizing who we're talking to. And Lord, we long to see then
those results, the very things we prayed for. Lord, I pray for anyone
here who doesn't know You. That they would
just get to know You by an honest,
introductory prayer of asking Jesus Christ to
cleanse them of their own sin. You could do that right now
right where you're seated. You could say to Him-- and if
you don't know Him and you want to know Him, just
say this to Him-- Lord, here I am. I'm a sinner. I admit it, you know it. Forgive me. I give you my life. I believe Jesus died on a
cross, was raised from the dead, and is alive right now. I turn from my sin, I turn
to Jesus as my Savior. I want to follow Him as my Lord
and enjoy You as my Father. Cleanse me and now use me for
Your purpose in Jesus' name. Amen. We hope you enjoyed this message
from Skip Heitzig of Calvary Church. How will you put the truths
that you learned into action in your life? Let us know. Email us at
mystory@calvarynm.church. And just a reminder, you can
support this ministry with a financial gift at
calvarynm.church/give. Thank you for joining us for
this teaching from Calvary Church. [MUSIC PLAYING]
