TEACH US TO PRAY

LUKE 11:1-13

Ps. 65:2 [GNB]. because you answer prayers. People everywhere will come to you.

      Adrian Rogers said, “‘There is nothing that lies beyond the reach of prayer, except that which lies outside the will of God.’ Prayer can do anything that God can do, and God can do anything!”

  I. Place of prayer (11:1)

      Jesus prayed in a certain place (1 Kg. 8:29; Is. 56:7; Dan. 6:10; Mt. 6:6; Mk. 1:35; Lk. 22:40).

Mk. 1:35. And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, He went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.

      A. Model (Lk. 3:21, 5:16, 6:12, 9:18-28, 22:40)

      Warren Wiersbe wrote, “If Jesus Christ. . . had to pray, how much more do you and I need to pray!”

      B. Method (seasons of prayer and unceasing prayer– Lk. 18:1; Rom. 12:12; Eph. 6:18; Col. 4:2; 1 Th. 5:17)

      C. Mentor (Rom. 8:26; Jas. 1:5)

      Alexander Maclaren said, “Christ’s praying fired the disciples with desire to pray like Him. There must have been something of absorption and blessedness in His communion with the Father which struck them with awe and longing, and which they would fain repeat. Do our prayers move any to taste the devotion and joy which breathe through them?”

      D. L. Moody wrote, “It is not recorded that He taught them how to preach. I have often said that I would rather know how to pray like Daniel than to preach like Gabriel.”

      J. H. Jowett said, “I’d rather teach one man to pray than ten men to preach.”

 II. Pattern of prayer (11:2-4)

      The Lord’s Prayer contains six petitions which are expressed as six imperative verbs.

      John R. Rice wrote, “Real prayer is asking for something.”

      E. Stanley Jones said, “Some things God will not give until we want them enough to ask.”

      Andrew Murray said, “Let your prayer be so definite that you can say as you leave the prayer closet, ‘I know what I have asked from the Father, and I expect an answer.’”

      A. Father (Rom. 8:15; Gal. 4:6)

      All who come to God through Christ can call on God as Father.

      A Roman emperor entered Rome in triumph after a victorious battle. As the magnificent procession moved down the street, a small child suddenly darted through through the fence of soldiers lining the street, and headed for the carriage that bore the emperor. One of the soldiers grabbed the child and said, “That is the emperor!” The child broke loose, raced for the carriage, and cried back, “Your emperor, My father!”

          1. Sanctity (Ex. 34:5; Prov. 18:10)

      R. A. Torrey wrote, “The true purpose in prayer is that God may be glorified in the answer.”

      John Wesley said, “In praying that God, or His name, may be hallowed or glorified, we pray that He may be known.”

      Lloyd-Jones wrote, “Our Lord is here teaching us to pray that the whole world may come to know God in this way, that the whole world may come to honor God like that.”

          2. Sovereignty (Dan. 2:44; Rev. 11:15)

      Lloyd-Jones stated, “We should have a great longing and desire that the kingdom of God and of Christ may come in the hearts of men.”

      Ron Dunn said, “Prayer is not a means of getting man’s will done in heaven; it is the means of getting God’s will done on earth.”

      B. Faith

          1. Morning (Mt. 6:33-34)

          2. Manna (Ex. 16:4)

      A. B. Simpson noted, “If God just gave us all His glorious gifts of grace in one lump sum, we would be in danger of enjoying the gift and forgetting all about God.” Lloyd Jones wrote, “That is how God deals with us. He does not give it to us all at once. He gives it to us in installments.”

      C. Forgiveness (family prayer–Dan. 9:5)

          1. Repentance (1 Jn. 1:9)

      John Bunyan said, “Prayer will make a man cease from sin, as sin will entice a man to cease from prayer.”

Ps. 66:18 [ESV]. If I had cherished iniquity in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.

      Charles Spurgeon said, “A prayer without penitence is a prayer without acceptance. If no tear has fallen upon it, it is withered. There must be confession of sin before God, or our prayer is faulty.”

          2. Reconciliation (Mt. 6:14-15, 18:21)

      Calvin said, “Wherefore, we are not to ask the forgiveness of our sins from God, unless we forgive the offenses of all who are or have been injurious to us.”

Mk. 11:25 [ESV]. And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.

      William Barclay wrote, “When Robert Louis Stevenson lived in the South Sea Islands he used always to conduct family worship in the mornings for his household. It always concluded with the Lord’s Prayer. One morning in the middle of the Lord’s Prayer he rose from his knees and left the room. His health was always precarious, and his wife followed him thinking that he was ill. ‘Is there anything wrong?’ she said. ‘Only this,’ said Stevenson. ‘I am not fit to pray the Lord’s Prayer today.’ No one is fit to pray the Lord’s Prayer so long as the unforgiving spirit holds sway within his heart.”

I heard a knock I know, I said,

“Lord Jesus, do come in. Come in.”

He said, “The door is locked.”

It was. . . I turned the key.

I heard Him touch the handle.

And a crack of light appeared.

“Come in, Lord Jesus. Please come in.”

“Something is against the door.” He said,

“It will not move!”

I looked. I saw a dark, crude bundle

I had not known was there–an ugly bundle,

Hateful to the touch.

I glanced inside and saw the rancid unforgiveness of a wrong.

I pushed it back, flung wide the door and light poured in as

Jesus stepped inside my house and greeted me. (Jane Emerson)

      D. Fight

          1. Test (Jas. 1:13)

      Vincent explained, “Suffer us not to be drawn away by our own lusts: keep us out of the power of our own evil hearts.”

          2. Tempter (1 Cor. 10:13)

      D. L. Moody said, “If you are under the power of evil, and you want to get under the power of God, cry to Him to bring you over to His service; cry to Him to take you into His army.”

      Martin Luther said, “If I fail to spend two hours in prayer each morning, the devil gets the victory through the day. “

      Jerry Vines said, “Too many times what we want to do is to pray and ask God to clean up the messes we have already made. There was a teenage boy and his car ran off the highway. It ran up against the post and tore up the front of the car. He put his head over one the steering wheel and said, ‘Oh dear Lord, may this accident not have happened.’ Prayer is not just a defensive weapon. Prayer is an offensive weapon.”

III. Parable of prayer (11:5-10)

      J. Oswald Sanders said, “If an ungenerous neighbor can in the end be coerced by his friend’s shameless persistence. . . into granting his request, how much more will their heavenly Father give them what they need?”

      R. C. Trench wrote, “Prayer is not overcoming God’s reluctance, it is laying hold of God’s willingness.”

      A. Ask (request; Mt. 21:22; Jn. 14:13-14, 15:7; Eph. 3:20; Jas. 1:5, 4:2; 1 Jn. 5:14)

      B. Seek (reason; Prov. 8:17; Jer. 29:13)

Dt. 4:29 [ESV]. But from there you will seek the LORD your God and you will find him, if you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul.

      C. Knock (Acts 12:16; Col. 4:3; Rev. 3:20; repetition; shameless persistence– Gen. 32:26; Rom. 15:30; Col. 4:12)

      Persistence means to pray boldly in the will of God until an answer comes from God. The first level of prayer is desire (ask), the second level of prayer is determination (seek), and the third level of prayer is desperation (knock).

      A. W. Pink wrote, “Such intensity and perseverance are pleasing unto the Lord. . . .”

      R. A. Torrey explained, “Those who have gotten beyond praying twice for the same thing have gotten beyond their Master (Mt. 26:44).

      D. L. Moody said, “The only way to trouble God is not to come at all. He encourages us to come to Him repeatedly, and press our claims.”

      George Mueller spoke of persistent prayer when he said, “The great point is never to give up until the answer comes. I have been praying for 63 years and 8 months for one man’s conversion. He is not saved yet, but he will be. How can it be otherwise? I am praying.” The friend did not receive Christ until Mueller’s casket was lowered into the ground. Near an open grave, this friend gave his heart to God.

 IV. Privilege of prayer (11:11-13)

      A. W. Pink said, “It is our privilege to spread before Him our smallest needs.”

Phil. 4:6 [CEV]. Don't worry about anything, but pray about everything. With thankful hearts offer up your prayers and requests to God.

      A. Goodness

Ps. 84:11. For the LORD God [is] a sun and shield: the LORD will give grace and glory: no good [thing] will he withhold from them that walk uprightly.

Rom. 8:28 [ESV]. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.

      B. Gifts

      If flawed parents demonstrate love by giving beyond basic needs, then imagine how the heavenly Father will pour out spiritual blessings that His children really need.

Rom. 5:5 [GNB]. This hope does not disappoint us, for God has poured out his love into our hearts by means of the Holy Spirit, who is God's gift to us.

Jas. 1:17. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.

      Man may give temporal gifts, but God gives spiritual gifts. God will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him.

Acts 4:31 [ESV]. And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.

      John R. Rice confessed, “My greatest sin, and yours, is prayerlessness. My failures are all prayer failures. The lack of souls saved in my ministry is primarily because of lack of prayer, not because of lack of preaching.”

      Early African converts to Christianity were earnest and regular in private devotions. Each one reportedly had a separate spot in the thicket where he would pour out his heart to God. Over time the paths to these places became well worn. As a result, if one of these believers began to neglect prayer, it was soon apparent to the others. They would kindly remind the negligent one, “Brother, the grass grows on your path.”

Teach me to pray Lord, Teach me to pray;

This is my heart cry day unto day.

I long to know Thy will and Thy way;

Teach me to pray Lord, teach me to pray.

      The first prayer God promises to hear is the prayer of a sinner for salvation (Rom. 10:13).