How To Pray

It is good to be back in the house. I was actually not here last week. And I don't say that for any other reason than to honor our pastors, my leaders, Pastor Josh and Katie and Nicole. They came to me and they said, hey, you should take a week off.

And I was like, nah, I'm busy. And they were like, no, we actually care about you. And we care about your family. And we'd like you to take the week off.

And so I was given the week off. And so I just say that because I want you guys to just have a peek behind the curtain. When we say that as a house we prioritize healthy hearts and healthy homes, and it's not just about doing stuff for God's butt, your leadership is actually living that out in the midst of a lot of work that needs to be done. They gave me the week off because they love me.

And I hope that builds trust for you guys in who's leading this thing. Because they actually do care about people. So that's why I share that. But tonight is going to be fun.

I mean that. We love following the Lord. We love letting him lead. And there's times where he leads us as a house.

And it gets emotional. And it touches on things deep in our hearts. And there's times where he leads us. And it gets kind of intense.

And it's like, wow, I'm feeling something. There's times where it's intellectually stimulating. And there's times where I just go, man, that's a fun night. I'm leaving with a smile.

Like I felt connected to people. Like I learned something. And I feel the fancy word in scripture for that is edified. I feel built up.

And so my hope is that tonight is like a fun edifying night for us. Yeah? It's always tough to say that because then people are like, was it? But figure that out there for instead of our bar high.

And then we'll reach it. OK. You guys probably heard us talking about this. But a few weeks ago, we hosted our Everyday Heroes Kids Camp.

So that's something that we do. Hey, this is something that we do every year. One of our favorite times of the year, we get to have this past couple weeks. It was 150 elementary-aged kids that we got to invest in.

And this year specifically, our kids pastors, Abby and Danny Christian, they had this idea. And they said, let's for our older students. So that's 4 through 6 graders, 9, 10, 11 year olds. They're ready to be pushed a little bit and be challenged.

And they don't really want to sit and do a craft necessarily. They don't want to go in the backyard and get their wiggles out, like little ones. Let's take some ground here. Let's actually take some steps.

And so they said, what do we want our students to grow in? As those that take discipleship of the next generation seriously, they were like, what do we want our students to grow in? And so they did this thing called tracks, where students were able to pick their focus or topic. And the 4 through 6 graders had 30 to 40 minutes a day in that track where they got to learn and grow and practice.

And things like worship or prayer or messenger track, where it's like, here's how you share the gospel. Like, things that were like, hey, I actually care about you knowing this stuff. I don't want to assume that you know this. And so let's actually boil it down and teach 9, 10, and 11 year olds about this.

And we had a blast. And I say, we, because I was asked to leave the prayer track. So I had 30, 9, 10, 11 year olds that we were in the back hallway here. And we said, man, the high school we had for this week is that our students would be able to know what prayer is and know how to pray.

That was our goal. And it was amazing what the Lord did. But my job here, my role is I'm the director of adult ministries. So my job is normally with adults.

And when I was asked to share tonight, it was I was like, what? I mean, it was kind of just open-handed, like what do you pray and see what the Lord would want to say? And then you can take the word. And I was like, man, I feel like without any judgment on anyone, I feel like we need the exact same teaching.

I feel like we actually need to know what prayer is and how to pray. We think we know. And that's part of the problem. Because a lot of us, not all of us, but a lot of us were raised in the church.

And so we've been around prayer. And so we can see prayer when it's happening. We know that's not prayer. And that is, and we feel like we know could bring the context of prayer.

But don't raise your hand. But if I were to say who could come up and in five to 10 seconds give a concise and theologically accurate definition of what prayer is. Some of us are just like, no way. And some of us would be 45, 50 seconds in.

They'd be like, wow, I guess I'm kind of just rambling. I don't know fully. Some of you may know. But could we give a five to 10 second concise, theologically accurate definition of what prayer is?

For most of us, probably not. And in this house, we actually really value prayer. We teach our prayer. We care about prayer.

Do we have a working definition that we all know? And then I was like, do we know how to pray? And based off of your different backgrounds and your different experiences and faith traditions and all that, you might pray very, very differently. And they go, no, this is the right way.

And it's like, well, but it's that broad enough definition. And so my goal for tonight is that we would learn to define prayer and then be able to explain how to pray. And my goal is that every one of us, once a night's over, would be able to lead 10 people in a half hour prayer meeting. Because it's really, really simple, actually.

But we just need the tools. Somebody just needs to tell us how to do it. And I've sat with adults. And we start talking about prayer.

That was someone that I was talking with. And they were like, I just like to be honest, I've been saved my whole life. I'm embarrassed to say this. But when it comes to praying out loud or a group prayer, I had no idea what to do.

It kind of locked up. And that can feel embarrassing when we name it until we take comfort in the story in Matthew 6, where Jesus is talking about prayer. And Jesus is often very broad. He was frustrating people all the time with his kind of answers that were like this.

And they're like trying to nail him down on things. And we'll hear a story about this. And they're like, just tell me what to do. With prayer, he's actually, he starts giving his disciples a ton of specifics.

I'm like, hey, you've seen people in the streets praying like this and this and this. Don't do that. He'll do it this way. And he starts giving specifics.

And it suddenly awakens his disciples heart, who have been with him for a long time, who know him well. He's their rabbi. He's their teacher. They're with him constantly.

And they have the humility to say, Rabbi, could you teach us how to pray? They just realized that they didn't know. And from the outside that might have been humbling, that might have been like, well, surely they know. They're with them all the time.

But they just, they got close enough to realize, oh, I actually, I need to be taught how to pray. These are Jewish men who were raised in like a prayer culture that we know nothing about America. But like you were taught the morning prayers and night prayers. And I have this prayer all the time.

And I have the humility to come to Jesus and say, listen, you can teach us how to pray. Guys, this is not the main point of my message. But I'm going to be teaching tonight, the same content, the same kind of like the lecture sizes and things that we did with the fourth or sixth graders. And I can feel humbling.

I can feel like, oh, this is beneath me or whatever. And I just want to name the difference between something being childish and childlike. They're not the same thing. Being childlike is a value where Jesus says, you have to become like one of these.

You want to enter into the kingdom. We see this value of childlikeness that Jesus puts out to his church. But then we see some people that take that way too far. And then they're reckless and they're foolish.

And they don't think things through. And then someone calls them. And they go, well, it was called to be childlike. So that's not being childlike.

It's being childish. That's being immature and foolish. That's being short-sighted. Being childlike is coming with humility and teachability and wonder, teach me.

And so I would love us as we go into the content for tonight. We learn definitions and things like that. Don't be above it. And don't call it childish.

Actually, there's an invitation to be childlike and to receive. So we have these tools that can actually go with us out of here so that we know how to pray. We don't want prayers. Can we do that?

Incredible. All right. Do you guys know what mnemonic devices are? Some of you, they're learning tools.

They're memory tools that we have that we learn these little tricks and rhymes or things that help us remember things. Very often, this is like elementary school. But we're going back to the days of Italian dunkers tonight. We are going to go back and learn some things that are going to help us to memorize things.

Because these are actually super important. It's not just like a fun exercise for kids. It's how we learn. For example, right now, if I were to ask you what comes first in the alphabet, K or L, how many of you just went, baby, CDE, FGA, K, L?

K, L? Because you learned something about it. You learned something that was like, oh, that's how I know. I know the 50 states in alphabetical order.

Hello, Bama. Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas. Because there was a little song that I learned in fifth grade, a Mrs. Verstegans class that I've never been able to forget.

Because there's this little thing. OK, how about this one? It doesn't always have to be sung. On a map.

OK, so here's the problem. There's a lot. Never eat soggy wheat, soggy waffles, soggy worms I just heard. I mean, some of those are worse than others.

I'll just say that. But yeah, we learned never eat. I was a soggy wheat man myself. Never eat soggy wheat.

Because we learned these mnemonic devices. And so we're just going to lean into that to help us remember definitions tonight. OK? There's going to be little goofy actions and things.

You're not above it. Because like I said, most of us, we wouldn't be able to do this otherwise. And so we're going to learn how to do this together. OK, fantastic, fantastic.

So our goal for tonight is the same goal that we have for Prayer Track, which is we want everyone to know what prayer is and know how to pray. So we start by talking about what prayer is. My son Josiah was, he's nine. And he was in the Prayer Track, which was hilarious.

They have him in there with me. But I asked him this week. I was like, OK, I'm going to be teaching the adults the same thing I taught in Prayer Track. His response for some reason was, just.

He was pumped about it. He was so excited. You guys were going to be learning the same thing. So I said, OK, buddy, what should the adults know about prayer?

First thing he said, he said, prayer's not about us. Prayer's about God. I could actually cry with a pride in my heart. I'm like, yes, you little stud muffin?

Prayer's not about us. Prayer's about God. I really kind of hammered this with the kiddos. Because I was like, guys, when you see prayer on TV, when you're observing, you're just learning by observation.

Adults sometimes treat God like Santa Claus. And it's like, here's what I want. And to justify why you should give me what I want, I made the nice list. Because I did all this good stuff.

And so I feel OK coming to you with my list of things that I want, because I did the good stuff. So I deserve something. That's unfortunately a very, very common picture. It sounds strange to name it like that.

But the reality is, for most people, when you think prayer, it's like the list of what I want. Let's let my nine-year-old disciple us. Prayer is not about us. Prayer's about God.

And so we're going to learn what that means. And that's going to be our framework of how we do this. OK? You ready for your little rhyme-y mnemonic device?

OK. Everybody say, who do see agree? Do you want actions? OK.

We'll say, who do, like we're running? See, agree. Do, see, agree. This is our definition of what prayer is.

Prayer is agreeing with God about who he is, what he wants to do, and how he sees. God, who are you? What do you want to do? How do you see?

I agree. Who do see agree? Who do see agree? So I'm just going to break that down for us.

So there's a reason why who is first. Because again, prayer is primarily focused on God. And the goal of prayer is the knowledge of God. Prayer is about God.

There's, like I said, I wasn't planning on tying the same. But like Westminster Catechism, the chief aim of mankind is to glorify God and enjoy him forever. It's not about you. It's about God.

And so prayer falls right in line with that. It's about who God is. There's this, there's a Scottish author back in the day named George McDonald's. Does anyone know George McDonald's?

Yeah. He's known as like the father of fancy novels. So like CS Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, they point back to George McDonald.

Like he's who inspired me with his creativity. And like he'd write these stories about little fairies. Way before that was like a thing. He just had his imagination.

He was also a faithful believer in a theologian in his own right. And he'd write about his times with the Lord and the kind of that poetic language and that fancy language that he was accustomed to. And I found this quote by George McDonald. And it was so good.

I wanted to read it. He says, he's telling the story of this moment in prayer. Oh God, I said. And that was all.

For what are the prayers of the whole universe but expansions of that one cry? Oh God. It's not what God can give us but God that we want. It's not what God can give us.

It's God that we want. And if your only prayer was the name of Jesus, you just say Jesus. You're doing it. You're meditating on who he is.

So it, there's so much to say on this. And there's so much to that I want to cover. We're trying to keep it elementary school. But God is the focus of our prayer.

There's some of these Psalms that we read about. And we'll read the Psalms. And the reason why they've stood the test of time is because even when David's talking about himself, it's anchored in who God is. More discipleship for my nine-year-old.

So as we're talking, I was like, OK, so prayer's about God. Who does God love? He said us. Great.

So it does come full circle. So I don't want us to get trapped in a thing that says, like I never talk about me during prayer. It's like, no, there's room for that. But the goal and the focus is knowing who he is.

Everything else about who he is is going to inform what he does and how he sees it. It's the anchor point. But it's not a waste of time. It's not an invalid prayer.

It's the only thing that you ever did, who's just say, God, you're good. Thank you, God, that you're holy. Which means that you're just different than anything that I've ever seen. You're just completely set apart.

God, I love the way that you are. Those are good prayers. And that qualifies as prayer, who he is. We're going to move quick.

Now we're going to do. Who do? God, what do you want to do? This is fascinating to me.

I'm a thinker and a tinkerer. And I just had a conversation this past week with a buddy of mine who doesn't follow Jesus. He's in the camp of like, there's a central, higher force of love that's kind of at the center of all of this. But he just can't name it God.

So he's not following Jesus. But he believes that there's this sort of force out there, the universe, whatever you want to call it. And I was talking with him. And I was like, so does that force have any desires?

He was like, what do you mean? I said, like, does it want something? And he was like, he was kind of stumped. And he just had the humility to be like, why are you asking that?

And I said, because I think one of the things that is different about the God that I worship is that he's a person, which means that he has things that he wants. That changes everything when we realize there's things that God wants. He's not an abstract thought or idea or concept. He has a personality.

He has desires. He has things that he wants. And so there's this place of humility that then is almost mandated when you go, he's God, which means all of that. But meditating on who he is, they go, oh, and he wants something.

That makes me lean in a little bit. Because if I'm worshiping him as the one who's higher than anything and you're wholly and you're different, and then he wants something, now I'm leaning in. What do you want to do? That actually is an incredibly simple, good question for us to ask God all the time.

What do you want to do? Because he's moving, and he's active, and he's alive, and he has thoughts and emotions and desires. And so prayer can be agreeing with God about what he wants to do. There's action, right?

We start with who he is. Because we don't want to get stuck in the machine of doing and performing. We start by glorifying God and enjoying him forever. Then we go, what do you want to do?

Which is then informed by how he sees. It's our third one. Who do see that one? God's perspective is so different than yours are, than yours or mine.

God sees the under the surface motivations behind things. I was thinking today about this moment, because I don't know if you know that an event can happen, and your perspective can be completely different than someone else. Someone says it's good, you say it's bad, right? It's like you don't know.

I was thinking about when I was in college. It was election night, presidential election night. And here in America, a lot of people have all of their hopes and dreams and aspirations and goals tied up and who gets elected. It's like a really emotionally high night.

And I'm in college, and I found myself in a room of people on election night who were hoping for a different candidate to win than I was. And it was late enough in the night that it's like, OK, we know. And I found myself in that room, and it's like somber. And everyone's trying to rationalize how this could have happened because they were so sure their candidate was going to win, and there was this and this.

And there's all this different stuff. And I just thought it was so interesting, because they were, when I walked in, they just assumed that I thought they did. And so they said something dramatic like, we're not going to make it. Or something like that.

It was like, we? I'm on this side. But our perspectives are so different. God supersedes our human perspective.

I'm not saying I was right. I'm not saying they were right. We don't know. But God sees differently.

And we have access to him through this gift of prayer. And so we can go, God, how do you see this? There's a family member of yours that's really struggling. And you're moved with compassion.

You want to go towards. And those are all good things. And you pray and you say, Lord, how do you see this? And he might say, I got her.

Don't be anxious. Don't worry. I got her. And that completely changes the way that you pray.

It completely changes the way that you act, because his perspective is higher than yours. And he's informing you. So you'll notice that in all of this, we're not saying, well, Lord, here's my list of good ideas. Here's the thing I'd like you to rubber stamp.

I made a proposal. If you could just sign here, we can actually my plan. It's all who are you? What do you want to do?

How do you see? And our role, our joy, our privilege is agreeing. The word amen means let it be. For me personally, I never say let it be, because I'm not in 1800s England.

And so if you've prayed for me in a group, you might hear me muttering under my breath, rather than amen. I go, I want that too. I want that too. That's how I agree in prayer.

When I'm praying and I say, Lord, open my eyes to see what you're like. And suddenly I start meditating on the beauty of God. I say, I agree. You're beautiful.

Because Holy Spirit's the one that's showing me that. So I'm just agreeing. I agree. God, what do you want to do?

He's saying, I want to reveal my beauty to the world. She's like, oh, I want that too. I want you to do that too. Why?

Because the way that I see it, the world has a beauty deficit. She's just looking around trying to find something good, and beautiful. I've got the answers. Oh, I want that too.

I want her to see. Prayer suddenly becomes interactive. It becomes fun. It becomes something that's life-giving, because there's nothing anxiety of me saying it right, doing it right, or having the condition that if I don't get my prayer answered, then I did something wrong, or I'm not OK.

It's all about God. So prayer is about God. If you want to define prayer, who do see and agree? Who is God?

Who are you? What do you want to do? How do you see? Our job is to say, I agree.

Amen. I want that too. OK. So if we can define prayer that way, then we want to say, OK, something like, how do we do that?

Like, what's a tool? And let me just say, there are so many ways that we could pray. So many ways. So this is not us saying, here's how you do it.

This is the right way to pray. People get in a lot of trouble when they start defining the right way to pray all the time. We're not going to fall into that trap. We're just going to say, hey, here's a way that we could do this.

Before we get into the nuts and bolts, I asked Josiah, my son, what should people know about how to pray? And he giggled, and he said, don't be fancy. This is something that Pastor Josh says all the time. He says, stop praying good prayers.

What he means isn't stop praying theologically accurate prayers. What he's not saying is stop praying prayers that are authentic. What he's saying is, stop praying so that you sound good. And stop praying in a way that feels like you're impressive.

Prayer's not about you. And it's not about the person next to you. Prayer's about God. So again, we were hammering this in the prayer track.

We're not going to pray fancy prayers. I asked everyone. I said, OK, hypothetical scenario. Say that you have a friend named Charlie.

Charlie has a bunch of sour patch kids. You don't have any. And Charlie goes, hey, do you want some of my sour patch kids? And he gives you sour patch kids.

What do you say to Charlie? And they're all kind of laughing. They're like, thanks, Charlie. You're the best.

You're really generous. I was like, phenomenal. You know what you would never, ever, ever do? Dearest Charles, I come to the end thanks for the benevolence of that gift.

The sour patch kids that you bestowed upon me were truly excellent in every way. And I can't thank you enough for the benevolence immersive that you show. You'd never do that. But here we are in our prayer times, saying words that we don't know what they mean, trying to sound like someone else that we heard pray because that sounded good.

And I want to pray good. Let's just be over that. There's another pastor, Josh, stop it. Do you do that a lot?

Stop it. Stop doing that. We're not going to pray fancy prayers. Because it's the goal of prayer is that we're speaking to God.

And so I just have a personal rule that if I don't say something if I'm talking to my wife and my kids, I'm going to try and avoid that word if I can't even pray her. Because I want it to mean something that I actually mean. So a long time ago, I stopped praying for a hedge of protection around someone. I'm like, if that's authentic to you, please keep going.

But for me, I heard my mom pray a thousand times. I just assumed that's how you prayed for someone who needed protection. Every time someone's on the road, it's like traveling mercy. So I'm like, I don't say that.

I don't say that. God, watch over them while they're driving. Keep them away and keep them safe. Keep them on the road.

Help the car work, amen. It's like, I just learned how to pray in a way that felt like, oh, this is how I would say it. So when we're talking about how to pray, a little ground rule, talk like normal. That's a really good ground rule.

It'll keep us safe. And yes, you can pray scripture. And if you're like, hey, I have a way that I pray in a rhythm, it's like, I'm not going to say not to. You just don't do it so that you feel impressive or so you're trying to impress someone else.

Way too often in prayer meetings, especially public prayer meetings. We'll be at prayer room. And I'll see someone who I'm like, I know that you have something. You've been so, I'm kind of observing this prayer time is really impacting you.

They would do an open-like thing. And they don't come up to pray. Maybe it's because they're just having a time for the Lord and that's awesome. Man, I don't have traffic about praying good.

Or like, what if it sounds stupid when I pray? It's like, you're talking to God. Prayer's about God. OK, we derailed there, but that's important for some of us to hear.

OK, Josiah said, don't pray, fancy prayers. The question of how do we pray then? This is the question that the disciples asked to Matthew 6. This is them going to Jesus and saying, Lord, teach us how to pray.

He's just been going through the list of what not to do. He's saying, OK, here's the Pharisees. Don't do that. Don't do that.

Don't do that. Instead, do this and this and this. They say, just give us the basics. And in the mercy and kindness of God, Jesus invites them into his prayer closet.

And this thing that we now call the Lord's prayer. He says, when you pray, pray like this. Our Father, who is in heaven, have a beer name, or holy name. Your kingdom come.

Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day, our daily bread, and forgiveness, our sins, we forgive those who've sinned against us. Don't lead us into temptation that delivers our evil. Your is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

Amen. God the Son was asked how to pray, and that was his answer. I take that super seriously. God the Son, God in the flesh.

He's probably been waiting for a couple thousand years for people to ask him, how do I pray? And that's what he gave him. So we take that really seriously around here. What we don't think is that the specific phonetical structure is the perfect prayer.

What we do think is that he's giving us a window into the value system that undergirds prayer. And so can we throw up the slide? Oh, it was really last minute. Did we get it?

The up up. You guys are incredible. Amazing. So we've got this model that we use that helps us learn how to pray.

That follows that same structure. We call it up, out, in. Up, out, in. Ready for your little actions?

It's all in a row. Just go up, out, in. Yeah? All row.

Up, out, in. Who do you see a degree? Up, out, in. There we go.

We got it. This is taking the principles that we see in the Lord's Prayer and saying, let's flesh that out of the day. Let's believe that that model is a perfect model, because God is untold so. And let's just try it this way.

And so again, I'm not saying this is the only way you can pray. Very helpful model though. Up, our Father, who is in heaven, holy is your name. We're just looking up at him.

This is not a time where we ask him for anything. It's not a time where we tell him what we want. We're going to start our prayers and Jesus started his prayers by looking up, by going to God. Out, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

What are you doing up there? Oh, you're ruling and reigning in perfect glory. Would you do that here too? That'd be awesome.

God, what are you doing up there? Oh, people that are up in heaven. I don't know what the theology of heaven. Don't get on me about this.

But heaven seems to be completely pain free. Could you do that here too? God, wherever you are, people seem to have perfect peace. Would you do that here too?

We're looking out at the world and we're saying, I want what you want. What are you doing? And I want to partner with it. And then give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our sins.

That's looking in. It's so OK. Like I said earlier, it will pre-cursus. It's so OK to pray for yourself.

I was raised in a faith tradition that was pretty good at making a big deal of God and pretty lousy about bringing us into the picture at all. And so I had to deal with a whole bunch of like, God doesn't care about me because he's so holy. And I'm down here. But man, I'll throw out the Psalms and even the Lord's Prayer.

There's a lot of language about God acknowledging that in our weakness, we have a lot going on. And he wants to be a part of it. God loves us. And so it's OK to say, in, going, what's going on?

What am I dealing with? Yes, you're perfectly holy and perfectly beautiful. And the reality of my life is that I feel like I'm in a cesspool of all of the stuff that's going on. I feel gross.

I feel like I can't get out of this. It's the worst. And then we invite God using the Houdusi degree in our own life. So we go up, out, in.

OK? So this is a model. This is something that when we say, we want to learn how to pray. This is what we do here and every day.

We just started doing this. I don't know when it started maybe nine months ago. A year ago, something like that. But on our Wednesday night, prayer room sets.

And on Monday morning, men's prayer time. And on Tuesday morning, corporate prayer time. We use this model. Up, out, in.

We start by looking up. And the way that we do this, you can all see on my little slide here. We select a lens or an attribute of God. Because God is massive.

And there are so many different ways you could view God. It could make your brain explode. Good news. We're going to have all of eternity to get fascinated by God.

It's going to be incredible. We're just going to pick one lens. And so hypothetically, say that we're going to be using God our shield. It's true about God.

We know that God is a shield. And so we're going to say, OK, for the whole time, whether it's 30 minutes, whether it's an hour, or whatever, we're just going to poke. That lens, God our shield. And that's going to inform all of our prayers.

So for yourself, you can do this. If you're leading 10 people, again, my goal is that everyone of you can lead a prayer meeting 10 people for 30 minutes using this model. Because this is the way we can learn how to pray. So you pick a lens.

You come to the group and you're like, all right, the lens is God our shield. Everyone goes, all right. And you say, we're going to take some time. We're just going to look up Bible verses.

We can anchor on that. Tell us that this is true about God. What does the words say? Because guess what?

God loves the Bible. He will use the Bible. Does the Holy Spirit move in speaking ways that aren't direct scripture? Absolutely will God ever contradict scripture?

Absolutely not. So we have the Bible as an anchor. And to kickstart our meditation on God our shield, we'll say, let's find verses. Some of us might know, oh, yeah, well, salt blah blah blah.

It says, God my shield is like, awesome, good for you. I go to Google and I say, God our shield verse. And then Bible.com or the God answers thing is like versus on God's shield. I'm like, you listen.

We're going to start there and we're going to go, right? But I just find some verses. And so your little prayer group just takes some time and starts to thank God for being a shield. First to honor God.

We're not asking for a thing. We're not saying, God, you be my shield. Hold on. We'll get to that.

He cares about you. Now we're just looking at God. What does it mean that you're a shield? Holy Spirit, bring revelation to my heart.

What you meant when you revealed to David and all these other people that God was a shield around that. And so we take time just personally. Again, we're not just jumping straight into here's how this is going to sound cool of a prayer. I'm just taking my passage.

And so I prepared. So I have a verse for this one. Psalm 28, seven. The Lord is my strength and my shield in him, my heart trusts.

And I'm helped. So I might take that. And I might just be, if you've been around to me and go to the pacer, just helps me focus. So I'm going to be pacing.

I'll be like, the Lord is my strength and my shield. I'm in him and my heart trusts. And I'm helped. God, I thank you that you're my strength and my shield.

And you, my heart trusts. And I'm helped. God, when I need help, you're there. When I feel weak, you're there.

You're a shield around me. Shields are the same. It's meant to keep out all the junk that comes out and all the dangerous stuff. God, I thank you that you're a shield around me.

And I start just using my own words, but based off of scripture. And I'm honoring God as a shield. I'm saying, you, this is what's true about you. Yeah?

So in these prayer meetings that we'll have, we sometimes take the first half of it. Because we're going, this is the whole point of us praying. Is connecting with God about who he is. And so we're going, I just want to grow the knowledge of God.

And this is one little angle I'm going to explore God. Shield. So the whole time we're just looking up. This is who you are.

This is what you're like. I love you. Thank you so much. Then we go out.

And we look out. So a lot of times what we'll do for this is we'll pick a specific topic. Because how many of you know God are shield? It's like, that's true about God.

So he's a shield for Chris. And he's a shield for me. And he's a shield for Uzbekistan. He's a shield for the government.

And he's a shield for everything. He's a shield. It's just a two-ease. And so we focus that just because it helps us focus.

We go, let's have one topic. And so maybe we're going to say a shield over our pastors. Because you know, by the way, I should play for my pastors. It's incredible.

I want to do that. God, I thank you. That you're a shield for my pastors. And then we go back to that exact same verse.

And now we take what we've seen and we apply it going out. God, I thank you that you're their strength and their shield. I thank you that when they trust in you, their heart is helped. God, I thank you that you have protection for my pastors.

I thank you that you can cover my pastors. I thank you that there's a shield of faith. Oh, there's another verse. I thank you that you're covering over them.

You're their strength and their shield. I'm still in the word. I'm still on shield. But I'm looking out fabulous time to say, God, you're a shield.

What do you want to do? God says, I want to cover them. Say, I want that too. I want you to cover them, God.

How do you see them? I see them as being weak and in need of covering. You go, wow, God, you see differently than I do. Because I just think that they're rock stars all the time.

And they're the spiritual pillars that this thing's built on. But oh, you actually see them as needing covering? That's incredible. Thank you for the empathy in my heart.

So I don't put them in a different plane field. Now I'm being changed. See that? We're going, God, thank you for your covering over them.

I thank you that when they're weak, you're strong. And there's different scriptures coming in. But I'm just in this kind of melting pot of taking God as shield and applying it externally to the topic that we've got. Make sense?

OK? So we do that for a while. And God loves you and adores you. He's not just there so that you can work for him.

He actually loves administering to you. That's the last part of Lord's Prayer. It's OK for you to look and say, where do I need you to be a shield? Where are there parts of my mind that are unrenewed where I feel totally alone and uncovered?

But what parts of my emotions need to be reminded that you're God my shield? And we look internally. And we go, how am I doing? God, let this revelation, this revelation is just this word that's outside knowledge that I was suddenly presented with.

Well, I've spent, for our men's spare time, we might spend a half hour on the just meditating of who God is. I've got a half hour's worth of meditation on God my shield. And then I go, oh, and yet in my own life, when I look at how I parent, I feel totally alone. I feel like I'm just getting abused by these little people.

And I'm doing my best, and I feel like I'm doing a terrible job at it. And I feel totally unprotected, and I feel wounded and shot at, and I'm in need. I say, God, would you be my shield? I thank you that who you are.

You're my strength and my shield. And when I trust in you, then I'm helped. And I use that same verse. But I'm going, this is what's true about you.

And I apply that to my own heart. And in the group setting, we can turn to one another. And we can say, hey, would you pray God my shield over me? And guess what?