Message 5-09-08 Thoughts on Prayer

A message given to the youth on 5-9-08 - Done after Bob Aisawa’s Listening Prayer series

How many of you know my sister Lessa? Lessa was born with conditions known as Cerebral Palsy and Short Bowel Syndrome. In short, she was born with less developed brain function which affects movement, speech, and motor control and she was born with only half a set of intestines affecting her digestive system. She must be fed through a tube that goes directly into her stomach.

Now as a Christian what should we pray for? We know God can do miraculous healings. Why not ask god to completely heal her and grant her a normal life? Did you know that the doctor’s didn’t expect her to live beyond a year? And yet she did. That’s a miracle right there. Do you guys know how old she is? 17. She’s 17 years old.

Now my parents’ have been through a lot with Lessa. The hospital, she’s had seizures, the medical bills, an entire life change when Lessa was born. And they’ve prayed and prayed. But God hasn’t healed Lessa completely, she’s still in a wheel chair, can’t eat (although for some reason she really likes if feed her a little bit of steak soup and coke), she still can’t hold things properly, and she can’t really talk. But through that time of prayer, God did answer. And the answer I think that He gave my parents, Lessa, and my family was this: Trust. God said, Trust me, I know what I’m doing.

So obviously, we’ve been doing a lot of praying lately. And I for one have been blown away by what Bob has been doing. And so we wanted to further develop our understanding of prayer, so I thought we’d go right to the source of our teaching, Jesus. Look at your handout and focus on the bold text. The Lord’s prayer. In fact, I’m pretty sure a lot of you know it by heart. So let’s say all stand and say it together. And though I’m not Bob, I’m going to have Kathy come and lead us in the Lord’s Prayer. This is simoultaneously our prayer and scripture for tonight.

What I want to get at today is an understanding of the reasons for prayer, what we should pray for, and how we should pray. I think we all can admit that prayer often can become a burden, another thing to do, a chore. And I am guilty of that as well. But maybe together we can all get a fresh perspective on prayer. And after, I’ll give you some practical prayer things to try with what we learned from Bob with listening prayer – LORD’S PRAYER

Context – Ok, an important thing in understanding the Bible is to understand the context of what is being written. If you were here on Sunday, Brandon shared about 3 different parables and how in Jesus’ time it is the first parable that is the surprising one, whereas today, we would consider the 3rrd suprising. Another piece of context one must understand is what the text around a certain verse is saying.

So here we must look at the verses before and after the Lord’s Prayer. Read 5-8

Right before if you start with verses 5-8, Jesus first tells us how NOT to pray. Hypocrites and showy people pray standing in synagogues and on the streets to be seen by men. Pagans babble on hoping that they’ll hit the right words so that the god’s will respond. What is in common with these 2 is their lack of confidence in God. In the first one, Jesus is pointing mostly at the Pharisees, who were Jews that were very very pious, but tended to do it more for their own glory, rather than God’s. Therefore, when they prayed, they made a big show about it so everyone who walk past would know just how holy they were. Jesus says their reward, whihch would be people’s attention has already been achieved. Their heart was not with the prayer but with themselves. ACT OUT

In the second example, Jesus now turns to the pagans, or those who were not Jewish or practiced Judaism. He says that they babble on, hoping they’ll be heard by their many words. And honestly I think sometimes we all do that. We all kinda pray with a formula, hoping that ok, if I pray this, then God will hear. Oh and have to open it with a Dear God or Heavenly father or maybe he won’t know I’m addressing Him and not like Buddha or Tom Cruise. And I gotta make sure I close with “In Jesus Name”.. Oh and I gotta make sure I have my head down and eyes closed, but not so much that I fall asleep. But see, it really doesn’t matter about all those things. Prayer can be open and free. There’s nothing wrong with those things, but sometimes I think we worry about doing that, which can often place restrictions of our listening and our own honesty in prayer. The pagans would try to list out a bunch of names of their gods correctly and try to pronounce it right to try to get more favor. Like if they mispronounced the name, they wouldn’t get their wish. Now I just took a midterm and I know I didn’t study enough. I always pray before a test, but Often, if that happens, I pray something like “God, I know I didn’t study enough, but would you please give me a better grade?” I keep thinking that well, If I show a little humility and admit that yeah, I didn’t study hard enough, then God will maybe give me information that I forgot to study….

Jesus contrasts these, confidence in yourself and prayer for attention, with what a true follower’s prayer should look like. And its not necessarily a prayer with a formula, like the ACTS prayer (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication), though that’s not a bad thing, or the need to use scripture in prayer, but in my interpretation, a prayer is to show and develop trust in God. To show you this ultimate point, I think that the Lord’s prayer has for us, we must look at what other things are around it. There is a theme that seems to run through it – Trust in the LORD. The section right after the Lord’s Prayer is about fasting. The teaching gives similar instructions as the ones on prayer – fasting shouldn’t be obvious to men to gain credit with them, but rather done just for God. The next section is about material and earthly treasures. Here Jesus tells us not to trust in our stuff or wealth, but rather to serve and trust God. After that, from verses 25-34, it speaks about worry and concern about Eartlhy things. Again, the overall theme here is to seek God and to trust Him.

So all around the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus seems to be saying, “Trust God”. In all these things, prayer, fasting, money, clothes, food, we can trust God. We can. If you remember my last message (which was awhile ago, and most people forget 90% of any message by the next day anyways), I talked about obedience and that obedience isn’t just something you jump blindly into, but really, we have a God who we can trust and that our obedience will be for the good of His Kingdom. I used the illustration of Jesus at the Gethsemane and how He trusted God so much with His life, that He trusted God with His death. He trusted that God would vindicate Him in his going to the cross and indeed, God did by raising Him from the dead.

And if you get one thing from this message today, it is to trust God. Even if you don’t have a great prayer life or if you’re in constant communication with God, know that we have a God that you can trust.

Before getting into the Lord’s prayer text itself, yes, I’m going to delay it even further, I want to spend a few minutes in listening prayer. There are a lot of things that we might have trouble trusting God with. Jesus suggests things like food and clothes. Maybe we can’t seem to trust with our friends or family. Relationships. School. Our futures.

So for a few minutes, I want us to just sit and listen to God and ask Him what we might need to trust Him more in. Maybe you already know something that you need to trust Him with but are having trouble. During this time, listen for Him and ask a way for you to do that, but also be open to something else you haven’t thought of. Just do this individually right now, right where you are. I’ll open us up, but then just spend some time listening to God.

Ok, if you got something, write it down on your papers. If you didn’t get something, that’s ok, but keep listening to Him whenever you pray.

Now the Lord’s prayer is something most of us know. In fact a lot of churches actually have made a song out of it. Honestly, I’m not a huge fan of it as the last few lines seem to have way too many syllables for one line of song. And its sung in hymn fashion which I’m not particularly used to. Not that hymns are bad, but just not my taste. But the big problem I have with it and really any worship song for that matter is that once you know it really well and you sing it almost second nature, the meaning of the words can get lost. I mean, how many times are we really just sitting here blankly while the worship leader is singing their heart out to God. Ya know, like a song could be doing something really deep in our souls, and our mouths are moving and some sounds are coming out, but really, we’re thinking, “Man, I gotta pee.” Or “Hmmm… service is almost over, where should I go get lunch” or “Man, that girl a few rows ahead of me is hot!” or in my case if I’m sitting next to Kathy “Man, this girl sitting next to me is hot! I should like ask her out or something…”

And then we lose the entire meaning of the song. In Israelite times, these songs have meaning and indeed, ours do too. So I encourage you that in any worship set, really listen to the words and let it minister to you. Ask questions, reflect on them, what does a song tell you about God?

You know, as a more contemporary church, we like to be cool, and we’re very suspicious of any sort of liturgy, which is a sort of ordered church worship service. We rarely repeat prayers or hymns cause honestly, they seem a little… well… old or maybe even Catholic. Now regardless of what you believe about Catholics (and I’d be happy to discuss things with you later), I have to say that there is something beautiful about ordered worship. Saying it over and over creates familiarity and comfort. They became a set way of worshipping God. And not only that, everyone is doing it with you and hopefully that’ll create unity. And also, if you really grasp the meaning of the words, you’ll learn truths about God that will grow your faith. The Jr Highers know that I hate Christmas songs. They’re sappy and happy and mushy and I just get suspicious of that stuff. But I did learn something new about them. Christmas is the only time that people can get together, from almost any background, Christian, agnostic, even atheist or another religion, and sing these songs that almost everyone knows. And there is something kinda cool about that. It does sort of produce that sort of unity and harmony that Christmas is kinda sorta supposed to be about.

So, that all being said, its important that we garner some meaning from the Lord’s prayer. And part of the meaning is exactly what we just talked about. Community, doing things together. If you look at the Lord’s Prayer, there’s a community aspect. Our Father, Give Us our daily Bread, and forgive us of our debts. As Americans, we like to keep focused on our own walks as individuals. But Jews in Jesus’ time would not have done this. They saw themselves as part of a whole. A Group. A people of God. And that’s something we need to remember as well. We are the church, the body of Christ, all of us. As such, we should be praying, serving, and living our walks together.

Now when it comes to prayer, there are a lot of questions… 8 Do not be like them [the pagans] for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. This brings up a couple of questions in our minds. First, why bother to pray if God already knows what we need? Second, is it okay to even ask God for something? The answers are many. One, the one I’m focusing on, is that prayer will develop and reinforce our faith and trust in Him. Another, is that God invites us to participate. Just as we are called to participate in His kingdom with practices of justice, mercy, compassion, our prayer life is a chance to participate with God. This goes hand in hand with our trust in Him. If we trust in Him, we will be more apt to participate with Him. And when we participate with Him, it will grow our faith. Another idea is that prayer is not really for getting our requests met. God isn’t a genie or anything. His job isn’t to grant our wishes. Now I’m not saying that God never answers the things we pray for, because I’m sure each of us has tales that tell the opposite. But perhaps the purpose of prayer is not to simply ask God to change our situations, like “God, get me through this test” or “Can I win the lottery?” or “Can I please go out on a date before I graduate” kinda thing.

Perhaps prayer is more for changing our hearts. To align our will with God’s. If we are truly following Christ, our requests will be of God’s Will. When we listen to Him, as we grow and mature in our walks with Him, we will hopefully come to understand more and more of God’s character and what he wants for us. If we go back to the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asks God to change His situation. “Father if, possible, may this cup be taken from me.” Jesus specifically asks God to let him do something else. So obviously, we can present our requests to Him! And that’s awesome! We have a God that listens to our desires and needs. But! But… we must remember that He may not answer the way WE want Him to. He will answer, but it might not be what we expect or want. And that’s where the trust factor comes in. Jesus said, “But not as I will, but Your will be done”. In essence, He was saying, God get me outta here. I do not want to die. But, I trust you Father, because you have been and are forever faithful, that you want me to go to cross and lay my life down for the world. So not what I want, but Lord, what you want.” Jesus was fully human. And like anyone, he didn’t want to die, especially knowing the pain, suffering, and shame involved. But Jesus trusted with His life. And He let God change His will to His. But not as I will. But not what I, Brett, want, but what you, God want. During Your Prayer, open your heart and soften it so that He can mold it to what He wants. Can you trust Him enough to do that? Or instead, will we trust other things like our own abilities? Riches? Technology? Government?

Jesus soon after this text in Matthew 7 gives us one of the oddest teachings. Matthew 7.6 – Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet and then turn and tear you to pieces.

Now I looked at this passage for awhile and its just… well, weird. I wouldn’t want to give dogs and pigs my treasures, but I doubt that’s what Jesus was teaching about. So obviously this isn’t to be taken in its literal sense. So we’ll have to understand the context of when and where Jesus is teaching. The terms dogs and pigs was a common term that Jews might use for gentiles and pagans. You can see the imagery for uncleanliness, which to the Jews, the gentiles were, as they would be unable to go to the temple and worship God. Its important to know that unclean did not always stand for sinful, it often just meant that one could not enter the temple for worship. But that still doesn’t answer the question of giving pearls to gentiles.

Now, if you have your Bibles or the handout, you’ll see this text under the heading of do not judge others. And I looked at this text and wondered, What the heck does this have to do with judging others? It makes no sense in that context! Now its important to remember that most of these headings like Judging others or ask, seek, knock nor the chapter numbers and verse numbers are not actually in the original texts! When the gospel was written, there were no numbers or titles or anything. They’re put in by early church fathers and translators later to help us understand and manage the Bible more easily. So in this case, this verse just kinda dangles in this section like it doesn’t really belong. But what if perhaps it goes into the next section “ask, seek, knock”. This part starts off 7“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. So here, Jesus makes it clear that yes! God does say its cool to ask. In fact he tells us to! Now what might then the verse about pearls to pigs have to do with asking God? It goes back what we’re talking about: trust. Jesus is saying Don’t throw your trust, your allegiance, you hope to the Gentiles and Pagans. Rather, Ask God. Seek God, Knock at His door, and He will give you what you need. You see the Jews were often tempted to try to trust other Gods. Their country had a history of worshipping other gods in the hopes of getting good luck or finding what they needed. But it led to ruin. If you give them your pearls they may trample you under foot. And that’s what happened. The Jews eventually lost their country and were ruled over by the Babylonians, the Persians, and then the Romans. This was all because they did not trust God. This verse also seems to fit better here because it follows a similar literary structure as before. Jesus earlier says for example, “Don’t be like the pagans who pray with a lot of words, but rather pray like this…” and then he gives the Lord’s Prayer, which we will get to…. Here, Jesus says, “Don’t give your trust to the Pagans or things not of God, rather, ask God because He knows what you need.” See the Bible can be looked at in so many ways to figure out meaning. Its crazy!! So I think that the heading Ask, Seek, Knock should actually go above verse 6 instead of 7. Now, We today might put our trust in money, our things, people, but ultimately, they’ll let us down at some point. God however is faithful. We can trust God. We can. Jesus trusted God to the fullest and God through Him saved the world.

Kat’s story – Now This verse of ask seek and knock became one of Kathy’s theme verses. Before she came to Christ when she was starting to seek Him out, this verse played a big role in her life. Ask, Seek, Knock at the Door. And God answered,

I can’t hammer this point home enough. We can trust God. God is a faithful God.

Now we’ve concluded that God is ok when we ask things of him. But as we know He’s not a genie that will just grant our wishes. No, He is God, with infinite wisdom who will answer with what is best for us. After verse 8, it says, “ 9“Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!”

In Luke’s version of the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus gives the teaching to boldly and persistently ask God. Yes, we can ask. God encourages us to do so. And honestly, when God answers, His Will isn’t always so… tricky… I think a lot of times we think about God’s will, we think like Oh crap, if I make the wrong decision, it’ll lead me down this path, and this’ll happen to me, and then I’ll end up in a ditch somewhere, all because I chose wrong and it wasn’t part of God’s will. We agonize over figuring out what college to go to, whether to go here or there. Heck we might even start asking what’s God will on where I go to lunch or which side of the bed to get out of…

You see, God’s already given us a lot of His will. We know God’s character. He’s a God of love, compassion, justice, mercy, serving. He’s a God of righteousness, patience, hope, and trustworthiness. When we know this in our heart, that God is all these things, we already have a good idea about what God’s will is. And that is to grow these in us. So honestly, yeah, we’ll have some big decisions to make in life, but seek first to embody the things of God. Seek to have more of these qualities. Matthew 6 says Seek first the Kingdom of God. Story of “failure” – [wait on God = serve God. No failure in God if you serve Him. Human failure does not equal failure to God.]

Remember that prayer is to trust God and a chance for God to prompt us to participate. To possibly take part in the unfolding adventure that is God’s story as well as grow our hearts closer to His. So for example, if you ask Him say for a lot of money, perhaps He might speak to you and ask you to trust Him more. If you ask Him to help your friend out with a situation, He might prompt you to help your friend yourself and equip you to do so. When I started praying that God would work in the world for justice, He instead changed my heart and asked me what I could do in His name. We are the representatives of God, here to embody the same things He cares about. God does do miracles like healings, raising people from the dead, but He also works through people and I think we often forget that. So when you pray, ask God also how you can serve Him in your request. How can you best embody His character in your situation?

So keep these things in mind. 1) You can Trust God! 2) Prayer can grow your trust in Him. It is an act of participation in God’s story where your faith in Him can develop 3) Pray for things and ask, but also ask how you can show Godly qualities. God may change you for the better. Let me close with Lessa again.

A couple years ago, Lessa had to go to the hospital. One weekend, I stayed with Lessa in the hospital and watched her so my parents could go home and rest for awhile. While I was there, I looked over at Lessa who was working on some craft project and listening to music. She was smiling and laughing despite the fact that she had an couple IV lines, she didn’t get much sleep do to a crying baby next door, and she’d been there for already 2 weeks with maybe another couple to come. I, on the other hand, had been there only a few hours and I was getting antsy. I turned to Lessa and asked, Lessa, how can you be so happy? And I listed things from the entire ordeal. She smiled and gave me a look like “why do you need to ask that?” and she pointed to herself. “Yourself?” I asked, puzzled. She again pointed to herself and nodded. Then it clicked, “You’re happy because you’re alive? Because God has gotten you this far?” She laughed and nodded and went back to her work. There was a child like trust in her that I’d never seen before. She trusts God because it is God that has kept her alive for 17 years, a miracle by any means. God has used my parents’ trust in Him to be faithful and commited to Lessa, to give her care. In Jewish times and in many places today, like Japan, someone like Lessa would be kept in a room, locked away from public eye, a shameful mark for the family. But instead, Lessa is the symbol of our family, the crown jewel, the ultimate gift. So how could I pray for her? Yes, I’d love to see her walk and talk one day, but I could also pray that God could use me to take care of her, to have compassion on her. I could pray for my parents to continue to take good care of her. I could pray for the inspiration that she’s given me to overflow to others. Or that more people would seek to understand people like Lessa and learn to see them as people as well, to take up the cause of disabled people’s rights. And I could pray for Lessa’s continued trust in God and realize that if Lessa can trust with her life, then I can trust God as well.

Now what I want to do is do some listening prayer with you guys using the Lord’s Prayer

Keep in mind that the Lord’s Prayer is a community thing. Our Christian walk is not just alone, but includes other believers as well. As such, pray in terms of community as well as yourself.

Now we’re going to take the Lord’s prayer and use that as a prompt for Listening Prayer.

On your handout, there is the Lord’s prayer divided up into parts. What I want you to do is get into your prayer groups and each person take a section and repeat it a few times. Then I want you to simply listen with a question in mind which are on your handout as well. So for example

12Forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.

Pray for forgiveness of sins. Is there a sin in your life that you’re unaware of or have not confessed? Do you need to forgive others? Is there someone that you know needs to forgive someone else?