Man, Jay was trying to wake some people up this morning with those drums, wasn't he? That's right. Appreciate you, bro. Oh, man, today is a great day.
I hope y'all are excited. I'm excited. I'll let her work on this for a second. So the one fest was great, y'all.
Man, it was so good. Like real good. Who all came out for it? Okay, great.
Good, good, good. I just want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart to everyone that came and served was there in that hot day all day long, along with everybody else. But it was really hot, y'all. We had a janky mistant.
We set it up last minute. It worked a little bit, but it was a very hot day. But everyone came out and served and just really appreciative of everyone that gave their time to ultimately love on the community. That's what it was all about.
So it was a great outcome. And we just had a lot of fun doing it like we do. To all the winners, congratulations. Yeah, right?
It's cool to be able to give people things, isn't it? So first thing I want to address, is this caught me way off guard? I was back there praying, you know, I'm trying to think about this morning. But my wife stands up here and she says about the kids going back to school and all this, all this stuff, which I found like suspect.
I don't know. She's a school teacher, y'all. She's going back with them. Like, it's not like she left one thing to get like, oh, they're out of the house.
She went to 15 more of them. Like, I mean, whatever, I guess your own kids are different. So I'm going to do a part two. Thank you, Bernie.
Last week, not the week before that, I went into different attitude, different outcomes. How many know that that's true? Very true, right? So this week, I'm going to go into a part two of it, but I'm going to talk a little different because there's a certain attitude that I believe we lack for multiple reasons that I'm hoping to help us out with that today, which is an attitude of prayer.
And I'm going to get into that in a minute. But listen, y'all, when I say has God ever answered a prayer for y'all? Like really answered a prayer for y'all, right? Clap.
Yeah, that's good. Have you ever gotten a picture of it? You ever got like a photo of it? Y'all, listen, I've been praying for this to happen for a long time.
Bernie, show him that photo that I captured of answered prayer. Look at that, y'all. That is my wife right here. Oh, man.
A picture says a thousand words. We were practicing, I was Jesus in a play, we were practicing. So I got an opportunity to walk up and I was like, you know, I better take a picture of this moment because I can use this for multiple things, right? Oh, man.
I always like to start off with a laugh. That's all right. I've got the picture forever now. Right?
All right, so let's go to the second slide here. I'm sorry. Bernie's trying to leave it up there. It might even just freeze right there the rest of the day.
Y'all are going to have to focus in. No, so what I really want to talk about today is prayer. So just so you guys know, at the one fest we had a little prayer tent and healings took place, salvations took place, like so many things took place over there and I just thought it was so cool. I'm just like, man, like people came, they got healed, they got saved, they got delivered.
Like, things were really happening y' y'all in downtown Cumberland, right? I know I'm going to clap my hand for that because that's great. And it was just late on my heart that, you know, prayer is the one thing that we really have that is super powerful. I'm not going to go off on a long rabbit trail in this because I want to get to the teaching, but it's one thing that I believe as a lot of believers we struggle with, right?
We all like to say that we pray, we're praying for you, we like to give those quick little shot outs like, oh yeah, I'm praying for you. I'm doing that, you know, and then just it's almost like a quick and easy like remove yourself from the situation, keep it moving. Y'all don't have to agree with me. I know what happens.
I do it, we all do it, we've all done it. But as I got thinking more about prayer, it was just real heavy on my heart. And I wanted to start laying out the foundation of the next couple of teachings that I feel like God's really trying to show me to help us as a church to begin to pray, but pray together and then ultimately what it's going to do for not only ourselves, but as a group and a church and a body moving in one direction. But what stuck out to me is in Luke, when I was reading in Luke, this is Luke 11, verse 1, this is the amplified version, it says, it happened that while Jesus was praying in a certain place, after he finished one of his disciples said to him, Lord, everybody say, teach us to pray.
Just as John also taught his disciples. So what was super interesting to me about this though, first was, all right, let me go check out what John taught his disciples when prayer. Good luck, y'all. I cannot find a single thing.
There was nothing that I could find about John teaching his disciples in prayer. If you find it, Phil's looking for it right now, I know he is. If he finds it, help me out. But what I also realized, for me personally, that this was the first time as well, that the disciples actually asked of him to teach them something.
I want you to think about that. So I want you to think about a lot of the stuff that they were doing. So they're casting out demons, they're doing all types of stuff. But this is really the first time that they look and they say, teach us to.
I mean, that hit me sideways because I'm like, wow, out of everything that I'm just thinking of myself, like teach me to walk on water, right? Teach me all these crazy things before I get to prayer. I want some cool stuff, like give me the cool stuff, right? That's what I want.
But then the more I thought about it is when you look at Jesus's life and the things that he did and he example, what I really believe in this is what happened was that they've watched the patterns and consistency of Jesus. That when he was doing things, what was he going and doing? He was going and praying. They found him doing things.
They found him places praying. And then after that, they see like the miracles happen and all this. So they're putting all this together. Like, what is he doing?
That, you know, that I'm not doing or it must be this consistency of prayer. That really means something. That if he's doing that and these things are happening, then I want to know more about this. So don't teach me that.
Teach us to pray. And that just took me down this rabbit hole, I guess, if you want to say, of my prayer life and what I believe a lot of us struggle with. And the next slide, he goes into, it's Luke 11, 2 through 4, Amplify Versa. And he goes in to tell them how to pray.
You know, the Lord's Prayer, popular prayer, we've all probably heard it. If you haven't, you can go read it. It's a great prayer. But I don't want to spend a whole lot of time there, just like the extra song through my wife off it, through me off.
So I got to speed up and everyone's already thinking about lunch. So I got to keep it moving. I'm going to pray for your hunger to go away and stay with me for a few minutes. But following immediately after that, after the question was asked, he goes into three parables to teach them prayer.
And I find them super interesting. There's something in common with all of them. But again, this is following the question and teach us to pray. Okay?
So the first parable I want to start with is the friend at midnight. Everybody's got that friend at midnight. That's bugging knocking on your door. I'm just kidding.
But we're going to go and read this. Guys, it's going to be a lot of reading. So I hope you brought your Bibles, you brought your Bibles, your phone doesn't count. As I'm looking off my computer.
I'm just like, I got my Bible too. No, but we got it up here for you. So we're going to start with this parable, Luke 11, 5 through 7, and Amplify. It says, then he said to them, suppose one of you has a friend and goes to him at midnight and says, friend, lend me three loaves of bread.
For a friend of mine who is on a journey has just come to visit me and I have nothing to serve him. And from inside he answered, do not bother me. The door has already been shut and my children and I are in bed. I cannot get up and give you anything.
I felt like I was super polite. I can imagine if you knock on my door at midnight, what was coming to the door? Four foot nothing. But a whole lot of like little chihuahua.
Barking, she's going to be at you. If you came at our door at midnight, right? It says, for a friend of mine who is on a journey has just come to visit me and I have nothing to serve him. What a first one you guys understand is that in this time, like hospitality was everything.
Like it really meant something. You wanted to serve your guests. You wanted to be prepared. Like hospitality was a real thing then.
So the urgency is there. That's why he's not going to the door at midnight. It says, I cannot get up and give you anything. Next slide.
It says, I tell you, even though he will not get up and give him anything just because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence and boldness, he will get up and give him whatever he needs. I need you all to say that with me. Because of his and boldness, he will get up and give him whatever he needs. So I say to you, ask and keep on asking and it will be given to you.
Say ask and keep on asking. Ask and keep on asking. So I say to you, ask and keep on asking and it will be given to you. Seek and keep on seeking.
Say seek and keep on seeking. And you will what? Knock and keep on what? And the door will be open to you.
for everyone who keeps on asking persistently, say persistently, receives, and he who keeps on seeking, come on y'all wake up with me, who keeps on seeking, there we go, finds, and to him who keeps on knocking, the door will be, so what are y'all seeing that? Oh, come on, now we're leaving with something today, right? Give yourself a hand. So persistently, in doing something, something happens.
So let's go to the next line and finish this out, this first variable. What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead of a fish? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then be an evil, that is simple by nature.
Know how to give good gifts to your children. How much more will your heavenly father give the holy spirit to those who ask and continue to ask him? So there's a confidence in God's ability. Are you guys seeing it?
Like are you guys seeing what's happening here in this first parable of what he is shared here in using his example? But there's a need that needs met, right? As we're going to find out in all of these parables that is used here in this teaching, there's a need. There's a real need.
And I know you guys are sitting there like, well, of course, in most parilers there's a need, right? Yeah, but there's a need in all three of these. So the problem with this first one, next slide, the hindrance, we doubt that God is truly concerned about us. And I know this is going to be challenging for us to look at, but I believe if we really start to take a real look at this and realize that why we lack in prayer, and I don't know about so many of it, even get to the point where you're like, I'm not even going to deal with it.
Like I'll pray when I can, I'll pray for my food, right? I'll pray before I go to bed, I'll pray in the morning, I'll pray for these things. But the reality of it is, is a lot of us in circumstances, and when things happen, there's a hindrance in the prayer that he's speaking of here that basically we're dallying that God is really concerned about us. And then that leads us to pray or not pray in faith, not pray at all or not pray in faith.
Stick with me, y'all, the second parable, the persistent widow, Luke 18, and this is the message translation, I love the message translation, it might seem a little wild to y'all, but stay with me. Jesus told them a story showing that it was necessary, everybody say this, necessary for them to pray, consistently and never quit, say that, that's good. He said, there once, there once was a judge in some city who never gave God a thought and cared nothing for people, a widow in that city kept after him. My rights are being violated, protect me.
Next slide, four through five. He never gave her the time of day, but after this went on and on, he said to himself, I cared nothing what God thinks, even less what people think, but because this widow won't quit badgering me, I'd better do something and see that she gets justice. Otherwise, I'm going to end up beating black and blue by her pounding. Next slide.
Then the master said, do you hear what that judge, corrupt as he is, is saying? So what makes you think God won't step in and work, justice for his chosen people, who continue to cry out for help? Won't he stick up for them? I assure you he will.
He will not drag his feet, but how much of that kind of persistent faith will the son of man find on the earth when he returns? So hindrance, feeling our prayers haven't been answered. You ever feel like your prayers aren't being answered? You all ain't being honest this morning.
Do y'all ever feel like you're like, man, I'm praying God, I'm praying, I'm praying, why is it this being answered? What is it? Not giving it your all. How many of us know that it's our own delays and doubts that keep us?
It's not his. We always get worried with time, and it's in God's timing, it's in God's plan, it's in all these things. But the reality of it is, it's really our own delays. And here's what I believe why, is because a hindrance happens when we're feeling that our prayers haven't been answered.
It attaches it to the very first one, if you will, that we just talked about the last hindrance. And it's a continuous thing that keeps putting us in a place that we feel like we can't go to God, or God's not answering us, so there must be something wrong with us or what we're doing. Amen? So let's go to the last parable.
The parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector. So this is in Luke 18, starting not through 17, this is the message translation. He told his next story to some who were complacently pleased with themselves over their moral performance and look down their nose at the common people. Just look down to our text and keep reading.
I know people, I know I've done this, everyone's done this. Two men went up to the temple to pray. One, a Pharisee, the other a tax man. The Pharisee posed and prayed like this, oh God, I thank you that I am not like other people, robbers, crooks, adulterers, or heaven forbid, like this tax man, I fast twice a week and I tied on all my income.
Yeah, where you at? Where's all my tithers at? On all your income and you're fast and daily, right? This is funny, this is tough.
I know this is gonna be challenging. 13, meanwhile, the tax man slummed in the shadows his face in his hands, not drained to look up said, God, give mercy, forgive me, a sinner. Jesus commented, this tax man, not the other, went home, made right with God. If you walk around with your nose in the air, you're going to end up flat on your face.
But if you are content to be simply yourself, you will become more than yourself. 15 through 17, people brought babies to Jesus, hoping that they might touch them. When the disciples saw it, they should them off. Jesus called them back, let these children alone.
Don't get between them and me. These children are the kingdom pride and joy. Mark this, unless you accept God's kingdom, in the simplicity of a child, you'll never get in. So these three, now we're gonna talk about these three parables here.
So we got the three parables that we just read, which run back through again, the friend at midnight, the persistent Willow, or Willow, my dog's name's Willow. He's a piece, he's haunting me here. I wish she would go back to school. Is there a dog school I can send her?
The parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector. So the three parables on prayer teach us, the first one, next slide, next slide, next one. Here we go, to what? Everyone say pray boldly.
Think about this, y'all for a second. Yeah, there your john is just boldly. Having the audacity of expecting this friend to wake up his entire household to give him bread. Like think about that, y'all.
And then here's what I put underneath it. If you can ask your friends things of this nature, and they will respond, how much more? Everyone say how much more? Can we expect from our God?
And guys listen, I know this is probably, you may not have heard this a thousand times, it seems like this, but here's what I want to really start to sink in. Like think, I know that people in here, including myself, I've asked some crazy things of my close friend, right? I mean, crazy, I wouldn't even tell y'all if you're all crazy, because it just is not appropriate some things that I ask. But the reality of this is, is why do we instantly, this is a real quick question, why do we instantly feel comfortable most times to go to a friend, or go to someone we're close with, and be so open with them about our situations, our problems, whatever the case is, and we will tell them everything, right?
But we struggle to take that immediately in prayer, to honestly, listen, the only one that can do something about it. The only one that's gonna give some sort of sound guidance or wisdom into the situation, to help then make it better. A lot of times we go to someone who cosines for us, allows our feelings to be, you know, and again, I'm not saying in any situation, but I really want you guys to think about this, we will be so quick to go to somebody else for something, then we will to the one who we're supposed to be in continuous, prayer with, continuous prayer. Not just every so often, I'm learning in my life to be in constant prayer at all times, around my life.
Just, my wife said, I see church violence today, anybody else relate with that. But for real, to pray boldly, this is something guys that we need to learn, and I know the prayer is difficult, this was gonna be challenging for me, it's a little out of, it's funny, I text prayer, I was like, yeah, he's like, you're all good to go, I was like, oh yeah, I think so. He was like, wait, you know, what's the message, I was like, prayer, I'm just struggling a little bit with it. And it was real funny, because I was like, I believe it and all, I just don't normally teach on it, like it's not something I normally teach on.
And he started laughing, he's like, well, I hope you believe on it. It was funny, but here's the reality, it's a touchy subject. The people that are close to me that I'm chatting with throughout the week, they're like, you just gotta really watch, because you might say something that offends somebody, you might, some people, it's just, it's touchy, but I accepted the challenge, because what I believe is that we're lacking in areas of things that we're claiming we know, the thing that we have, which is full access to our father, and that if we would just ask the simple question, like these disciples who were with him, watched him do everything, followed him, all this, and the one thing they asked, I said, teach me how to pray. Guys, I don't think we should overlook this, because this is one of the most important things in our Christian walk and lives, that we have direct access to, that we don't tap into.
We allow our flesh go for a minute, and then after we calm down, then we go to prayer, then the situation fakes, and we're like, oh my God, yeah, next time, I'm gonna go to pray for it, but we never do, and there's simple steps that lead us to how to do these things. Simple steps. So the first one is, we need to learn how to pray boldly. If we can ask crazy things from others, like our father wants us to ask him all of those things.
Yeah, next slide buddy. It's my little helper up there. You ask and you get next slide. So pray persistently.
Everyone say that. So as I put up here, if you guys can see, so this was neat as I was told in my studies. So sometimes, at Jewish disputes, they had to go further than the elders. You know, they had to bring in the judges, from Herod to Rome, they had to, they had to get involved sometimes.
How many of you know that things have to be taken up higher sometimes? You gotta be dealt with in different ways. So if you were poor, when this happened, there was pretty much zero chance that you were gonna get your way. So remind me who we're talking about here.
We're talking to the widow who had a problem, right? With the judge, she felt like it wasn't fair. It was being unjust. So she kept asking, she kept asking, she kept asking, she kept asking, and the judge in this time, who wouldn't, this normally wouldn't happen.
He eventually just got to the point, he was so annoyed, he was like, God, just give her what she wants, right? I can relate, y'all. I'm not gonna keep talking about my wife up here, I'm already in trouble, but I can relate. Man, y'all are 12 crowd this morning.
Nobody. But she keeps asking and asking and asking, and then finally he's just like, all right. So why does Jesus use the widow? Yeah, because she's persistent, but because she had no influence, and remind you guys, he's teaching the disciples.
These are the examples he's using to teach his disciples. So he uses her because she has no influence to fight on her own behalf. Like, I don't know if that's saying since you guys, but there's no influence for her to fight on her own behalf. The only way she was going to win is by annoying, it's by being so persistent and annoying that judge that she was gonna get what she wanted to get.
I wish I had just one person in here that was willing to just, I'm gonna keep asking, no matter what, I don't care what happens, I'm gonna keep asking, I'm gonna keep asking, I'm gonna keep asking, I don't care if you tell me if I pray to Father knows everything, that I don't have to continue to pray, but I'm gonna continue to pray and pray and pray and pray and pray until I get, what is mine? It's tough, y'all, it's tough because, you know what, it's loudly why it's so tough? Because I think we tell ourselves we are, but we're not really willing to do what we're called to do, which is continually pressing. And guys, this is pray, you know what prayer is?
So my prayer life looks wild, and I thought for a while, I'm like, man, mine's gotta be all whacked out. Because I'm just different, y'all, I'm not big on, I'm like telling myself here. I believe in prayer 1000%. But I got this week started looking into a bunch of things.
I'm like, where in the world did we just start closing our eyes and power? I got my down this wild rabbit trail of wonder and where we adopted these practices of prayer, right? Because when I'm looking and reading in the Bible, Jesus is when he's doing things, he's looking up to the heavens, he's praying, you know what I mean? Like, there's so many things, and I'm like, where did we adopt these things?
Like, where did I start just closing? And I know people are like, it's a respecting, and you've always done it, and all this stuff. I understand all that, but it did make me really start to think how much we box prayer in, and we limit it to a building. We limit it, actually, you know what's funny is that it says, and one of the teachings that, what he pretty much is saying is that, listen, if you can't keep yourself from wanting to be seen and pray or do it in secret, you guys didn't hear me, he's telling them that if you can't, for whatever reason it is, for you to find that connection with God in public, around people, if you can't do that on your own without wanting to be seen, or without any other reason besides connecting with God, do it in secret, you don't have to believe me, this is out of the Bible, this is what he's telling them, this is what the hypocrites do, this is what the Pharisees do, the Pharisees go and they pray standing to be seen in the synagogues, amen, are we reading the same Bible?
He's saying that this is what they do, and yeah, there's times in secret, and then I get through this other times where they felt, it says he fell in his face, I hit my knees and I bow my head to the Lord, and then I realize in some of these things that's form of worship that is talking about, so there's just a lot of things that I was looking at today, or in this past week, that was really having me looking at like, prayer, and where our hearts are really postured at when it comes to prayer, then I don't have to come to a prayer night to pray, listen, that's great, I want you to come, it blows my mind even more that five people come to a prayer night. I'm trying to figure all this out guys, but the reality of it is that I have full access and conversation with the Father whenever I want it, whenever I want it, why do we struggle to connect that after the fact of whatever the case is and the situation is that we're going through, why isn't it an after fact, why isn't it a before thing, why isn't it a constant thing like it calls us to do? And I believe, listen, if you're one of them and you wake up at five o'clock in the morning, four o'clock in the morning and you go pray, I love you to death, but God is not calling me out of bed that early, I'm so sorry. My wife gets up and like, she's got up at four o'clock, she would be, I worked out, prayed, made dinner, and it's not even breakfast time yet, pack all the kids lunch, fed the dogs, let the dogs out, all this stuff, and I'm just scratching my eyes like, oh, I'm so excited getting up, and my duty is to make the coffee, I'm the best coffee maker on this side of the Mississippi, y'all, I'm telling you, but she would get mad and I was like, hey, no one asks you to get up at four o'clock in the morning, then I have some friends who are like, Lord, I'm gonna be up in the middle of the night, I'm like, yes, they're like, what, I'm like, I'm dying and wake me up, I'd be mad at 12 o'clock at night, someone wake me up, but guys, I'm being funny, but I'm being for real that, I understand there's different types of prayer, there's God that lays things on your heart, there's all these different types of prayer, but we're boxing it in, we're not following the simple directions, the simplicity of the directions that is given to us when he's teaching his disciples to pray, we're not taking them with us, we're not practicing them, putting them in play, so therefore we're struggling, and I believe we're falling into these, we'll call them a thousand different things, we're spiritually drained, we're all these other things, and I believe the sole reason is because we don't understand that prayer is the one thing that we have that's gonna help us get through any and every situation, any and every situation, so that was, all right, let's go to the third point, everybody said, pray with humility, this is a big one, y'all, this is a really big one, so Jesus responds to the humble approach of the tax collector, not the Pharisee, you know what's even crazier?
So for us having the Bible and how we read it, the Pharisees to us are like a villain, right? But in this time, Pharisees were like, they're like the real deal, like they're like the superheroes of this time, the tax collectors are the bad guys, they're the bad dudes, right? They're the one that's taking the money, they're lying in their pockets, they're doing crazy stuff with them, like nobody likes the tax collectors, so it's neat here that he uses this tax collector who uses a self-reflection because when we realize in here in the tax collector, when we realize the things that are being said and how he approaches the situation, it's completely different than the Pharisee, it's not looking down, it's looking itself. One of the biggest struggles we have is people today.
We are quick to look at anything and everybody else and point the finger before we look at ourselves. The self-reflect to realize that it's something of me, not everybody else, and that's the comfortable thing to do, it's easy to look at you and point and see what you're not doing or look at your prayer life or look at how you're doing things, what you're not doing, you're in here lifting your hands and you're out there, you know, don't whatever you do out there, but the reality of it is is when we stop comparing ourselves to others and we start comparing ourselves to God, things change, guys, things change in a drastic way. It's no more that I'm looking at everybody else, it's that I'm looking at me. So all three of these examples, there's what, there's a me, right?
Unbelief is a big part of some of these examples, and I'm gonna say that. I'm gonna say it again, unbelief is a big part of some of these examples, and you would ask why, because here's what I've learned, nobody likes to be challenged in the area of saying, well, why don't you do something? I don't know about y'all, but when I look at my life and I can be honest with myself, the reason that I'll entertain certain things I don't do is because I don't believe in it. It's as simple as that.
I don't know, I wish one person would get honest with me is that the reason that I don't do something, because I don't fully trust or believe in it, that's all there is to it. And I know that for a long time, even in my Christian walk, I didn't fully engulf myself or believe that prayer was the thing, that I needed, I knew the relationship with Christ was the most important thing, but you know what he struck me with today? You know what the very first things that I did, and everybody else sitting in here that's accepted, Christ did, you said a prayer with faith. Something happened, I don't know where you were at, I was in Fort Aspre, West Virginia, how he loves us was playing, I was getting all hot and sweaty and getting that feeling when your music is playing and all this stuff and something happened, and then it hit me and I started sweating and I started profusely weeping and crying and don't know, but something happened inside of me and I took faith and led me into a prayer that changed my life, that changed my life.
So faith activated and I prayed with faith and it changed my life. And this is one thing that I know. And I think it's super cool because when we start challenging the areas of our life where we have a lack of trust or unbelief to realize is that one of the reasons we don't pray, it comes down to being a hindrance of a lot of things we just talked about. We don't really believe we deserve it, right?
Oh God's not answering my prayer, God's not this. I mean we can go back to a lot of things, we can go back to Paul had an unanswered prayer, God, we moved this storm three times, he asked him, I guess you could sum up that Jesus said, let this come pass from me. There's unanswered prayers in the Bible from significant people that still continue to follow and guess what? Here's another cool thing that was pointed to me as I was reading and studying.
So I'm sure Paul, on the Damascus road where he was blinded that I'm sure before all then, I'm sure he said prayers, right? We've all said prayers, we've all reached out in times of need before relationship with Christ or during our relationship with Christ, whatever it may be. We've all said the basic prayers, if you will. But what's neat is when he was blinded and then he gives an anise to dreams, tells him go to straight straight, there's gonna be a guy there and he's gonna be praying.
Once Paul had to encounter with Jesus, his posture of praying changed. Because today I wanna help encourage you that at some point we have to start getting serious about prayer, our posture has to start changing. Our hearts posture has to start changing to realize this is the thing that we have access to. This is one of the greatest things.
Here's the other thing I looked at. How many times, y'all ever said this, there's power in prayer. I might get in trouble for this, but forgive me, I'll ask for forgiveness. Is there, how much power is in prayer?
As much as you put into it, or you don't have nothing. I don't have nothing. The power is not in the prayer itself. The power is from the one that grants it.
The power's from the creator. The power's not in the prayer, guess what a prayer is? A prayer is an expression of faith. Come on, follow me.
A prayer is an expression of faith, right? The reason I pray is because I believe. The reason that I have faith and I pray is because I believe. So when we start getting down to this guys, in the example that there, and all of these, there's all needs to be met.
And there's one thing that we can do, and he's telling them and teaching them this, and showing examples like this to realize that in all these needs that there's prayer, and there's a heavenly Father that has the answers and wants to answer. I mean, right? If I get one hallelujah, I'm good with it. Because this is, I was so nervous today, oh, I'm not gonna lie.
I told my wife I was leaving the house, I'm like, I'm so nervous today, I'm normally nervous. I sweat a lot, but I'm like, I'm nervous, because I don't want people to not hear my heart today. My heart's not to tell you you're not believing, you're not knowing something you should be doing. My heart's to saying is that if the disciples said and did all these things and still asked, teach us to pray, that there's a need for us to continuously want to learn how to pray, how to press in, how to access the things that he has for us, to walk in the promises, to do all these things, that I have to want to look to him every single day and be able to pray in the middle of whatever the case is.
So next slide is prayer is an expression of faith. When we choose to pray, we are putting complete trust in God. I know guys that God has done enough in everybody's lives sitting here, I'll get to that in a second, that if we will just continue to trust him, I believe things are gonna continue to happen in our lives and we're gonna get further, we're gonna further trust him and be able to be in prayer at all times. And like I was saying earlier is, you're gonna be able to be in your job.
Listen, it's okay to have to reach out and send one, send a text message like I'm struggling, I wanna strangle my code work or whatever, I don't know how you are at work or what you're saying, but I'm saying you're gonna be able to control that because you're gonna realize that that's okay, to need to do that and you need help. But at the same time, you're gonna know that you can sit there and you can pray and you can ask and you will receive, and listen, you might need to keep on praying and keep on praying and keep on praying and keep on praying. And that's okay. But you have been giving something with access to the one that created you, that loves you, that sent a son to die for you.
You can access that wherever you may be and it will change the situation. So if my attitude switches to instead of after the fact, I'm gonna pray in the middle of the situation or I'm gonna pray right now, then my outcome is gonna be different. And guess what, it might even be that, I don't know what happens. It might be that they, I'm not losing their job, but they change departments.
I don't know, you don't have to deal with them anymore. I don't know what the situation is, I'm just saying. We have to really start asking and taking part in the things that's been given to us and also what Jesus has taught us. He example of these things.
They have to be important. So the last slide I have here is first, Thessalonians. I'll go back, first, Thessalonians 5, 16 through 19 and this is the message translation. It reads, rejoice always, everybody say always.
And delight in your, so we're rejoicing always and we're delighting in our what? Be unceasing, unceasing, unceasing. And what's that word? Man, I feel like we heard that a lot today, right?
Persistent in prayer, in every situation, no matter what the circumstances, be thankful and continually give thanks to God. For this is the will of God for you and Christ Jesus. Do not quench, subdue or be unresponsive, excuse me, through the working and guidance of the Holy Spirit. Which guys, the Holy Spirit is on a whole nother level.
Guide, teacher talks about it. Listen, if you don't know what the pray, it'll teach you what the pray. We have to start getting in tune with the things that we have and the advice that's been given to us that we rejoice and delight in our faith. Unceasing, that means to never stop.
Now, don't listen, I don't want to have any messages. It's like, hey, I got fired, I won't stop praying. And don't put that on me. What I'm saying though is how do we do that?
That's a question, right? It's a valid question, like how do we continuously pray? Because that's the thing, have you guys noticed that too? They'll continue, we gotta renew our minds and say what?
Is that a one time thing? It's an everyday thing, right? It's continuously. So pray or continuously.
Could you look at your life and say, hey, I haven't continuously been doing this? Or if I have, I haven't persistently been doing this. Could you be honest with yourself and say that? And listen, I'm not asking you to tell me, I'm asking you to ask yourself to say, what have I committed to and that I'm not doing?
Because this takes discipline. That's another word that is the tough one to talk about, discipline is tough. I don't know if you've ever tried to be disciplined. My wife is terrible when it comes to like little Debbie cakes.
Zero discipline. I mean, Oreos will smack a whole sleeve. It's not one or two, it's gone. I'm telling everything right now.
I will learn discipline one day up here. Listen, Oreos, don't bring a snack there. It's an all out brawl. There is no discipline.
But look, our face is red. I've never seen your face red. But guys, listen, when we delight in our faith, and we are persistent in prayer, continuously asking, continuously in everything that we do every single day, I promise the outcomes of our life is going to be so different. And I don't know what you're not doing.
I don't. Only you do. Only you know if you're taking prayer seriously. Only you know if you're taking the time to give to him, to conversate with him.
Guys, if prayer is a conversation with our father, we can do that on the fly, right? We can do it wherever. There's nothing. And this is where I feel like some people are like, ah, it's just weird.
I can't pray there. Right? You are. And a lot of people will admit that.
A lot of people will. But that raises the question, then why do we struggle to pray? And listen, God's checking my heart this week, guys. This is more for me than it is probably for any of y'all, of learning to pray more.
Trust more. Not just, again, wake up and say, my prayer for the day, I check off my morning prayer. Now I'm good to go. Because as soon as I leave the house, something else happens.
And then I have to be inconsistent. I have to be inconsistent, continual prayer, and be persistent. Because I was reading that, well, we don't. I struggled for a while to pray in front of people.
Because there are some people that would pray. I'm like, holy cow. Heaven just arrived. Like right here, right now.
I ain't about to say nothing. I'm going to scare it away, right? But I used to struggle. I was like, I'm not going to say anything.
My words are not that important. I don't know what to pray. Guys, listen, the hindrance was really on my life a prayer. I'm praying, I'm praying he's not answering.
I don't know what to do. I must be doing something wrong. It must be how I'm praying. Well, then I read in the Bible that I pray and fast me.
Am I not going to need to fast with this? I don't know, guys, listen, I believe in prayer, I believe in fasting, I believe in all this stuff. But what I'm getting at is we need to be able to just, in faith, lift our prayers to God. We need to stop worrying so much about what it looks like, how it looks like, how we sound and having the proper words.
There's two things that he really talks about is that we need to stop stressing and worrying about what it looks like when we pray. The words that we speak, that doesn't matter. It matters that your heart is postured in the right way towards him and you're just speaking and asking and having a conversation with him. That's prayer, y'all.
I don't know if someone's told you that that's not prayer. But when you have faith and trust in something and you ask it of him, and I don't care how it sounds, I don't know what y'all sound like, but you don't have to worry about that. Because it says he hears our cries and he will answer. So I just want to ask today, that I know we have a lot of situations in our life, I know we have a lot of struggles, we have ups and downs, we don't want to be seen in front of people admitting that we're struggling in an area, right?
That's the cool thing about the tax collector. He's like, listen, I need a self reflect right now, I need to get right, I need to admit my wrongs are where I'm at. Because today don't leave here and just stay where you're at. You're not doing yourself any good.
Don't sit here knowing that you've lacked, because everyone has to some extent be like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know I black a little bit here. Don't leave here without saying, today I want to make a change in that. And listen, I believe it's as simple as you and your heart, the same faith that you have to say, I believe in you and who you are. That like we sung that song, there's no one beside him, he's the God Almighty, he's all those things.
If that's the God you know you're praying to, what do you hold him back from him? Don't wait for you to have this perfect planned out speech, to let him know, to make it sound right, for him to think that's when he's gonna work in it. He's already working, he's already working on your behalf. He just wants your honest heart, lifting it up to saying, God come, I need you, I need you today, I need you in this situation.