I've entitled this sermon, what can we learn from the Lord's Prayer? Or what can we learn about prayer from the Lord's Prayer? But we're not going to be actually going through the whole prayer. This is actually kind of a part one. I'll be starting with verse one of Matthew chapter six. Take heed that ye do not your alms before men to be seen of them, otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. Therefore, when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward. But when thou doest alms, let not thy right hand, thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, that thine alms may be in secret, and thy father, which seeth in secret himself, shall reward thee openly. And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be like the hypocrites are, be as the hypocrites are, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into the closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, Pray to thy father, which is in secret, and thy father, which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly. But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do, for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. Be not ye therefore like unto them, for your father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask him. After this manner, therefore, pray ye, our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever, amen. For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. And may God bless the reading of his holy and inspired word. Further on in this chapter, Jesus goes on to talk about fasting. And then as we look at the context of chapter six, we see in verse one the idea of giving in a godly manner as opposed to a showy manner, showing off for other people. Then we have verse five, praying in a ostentatious manner instead of praying in the way that God would have us to pray. And then the chapter goes on to talk about fasting and fasting to show off as opposed to fasting for the glory of God. And then we get down to the well-known verse in verse 33, but seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow, for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. So don't be showing off for others, do what you do for God. And as we can see in those last two verses that I just read, we are supposed to be living for the kingdom of God, not the kingdom of ourselves. Do not show off for others, do what you do for God. This is a God first chapter. It can be argued that all chapters of the Bible are God-first. This is an obvious God-first chapter. And this could remind us or should remind us of the Ten Commandments, where in the first two commands we get the idea that God is speaking to us and saying, I am God, you are not. And so often we need to be reminded of that. Like fasting and giving in this chapter, Jesus' emphasis here is on the personal and not the corporate. So on the personal and not the corporate. Personal fasting, personal giving, personal prayer. How should these be done on a personal level? What should our attitude be? Whose kingdom are you seeking? And whom are you seeking primarily to glorify? Yourself or God? In chapter six, verse one of the book of Matthew, we read in verses one and two, take heed that ye do not your alms before men to be seen of them. Otherwise you have no reward of your father, which is in heaven. Therefore, when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward. If you choose to seek to glorify yourself, then we see your reward, nothing. you have all the rewards you're going to get. If you try to impress people, and you impress people, that's your reward. That's it. Nothing more. Nothing more to be received from God. Some years ago, I say some years ago, as I get older, I realized that people may say something like, well, that's a really old antique. That was made in the 60s. I say, well, that's not old. No, that's not old. So this was actually more like about 30, 35 years ago. My pastor and I went to hear a very well-known preacher. He stood up in front of us and he basically said, do you see this ring that I have? It wasn't a wedding ring. It was another type of ring, but he had this ring on. And what he went on pretty much to say was, would you like to have one of these rings? And if you donate $500 to my ministry, I think it was $500. If you donate $500 to the ministry, you can have one of these rings. Well, I don't think based on what I see in scripture that we are supposed to be giving, I put this in quotes, strategically, giving so to show off. And I'm not accusing that pastor of showing off, but at the same time, I do admit that that did not impress me a whole lot. Don't be praying, don't be doing acts of kindness, don't be doing anything that you do for the sake of other people so that they will be impressed by you. Jesus mentions the hypocrites. By the way, when he talks about hypocrites, the word hypocrite is not necessarily in the Greek an insulting word. For that matter, there's not necessarily anything wrong with being a hypocrite. That sounds kind of strange coming from a pastor. What I mean by that was that the hypocrites, that was a certain job. It was a position. Now, what they may have done in that job or that position may have been bad, may have been good. I don't know. Might depend on the situation. But the Greek there, The Greek for what we call today, actors. It's not necessarily a sin to put on a play in which you have actors. And then, at that time, they were known often for putting on a face. I guess that's where you might get the idea of the not-so-nice thing when somebody might say to you, you're two-faced. You don't take that as a compliment. You have a face, and then you've got this other face, and you're pretending to be something that you are not. You are two-faced. These were actors. That was their job. That's what they did. They were hypocrites. Now, as time went on, that word has obviously taken on another meaning, and what Jesus is basically doing is calling religious leaders of his day Actors. Now you might say to yourself, well, you know, they deserve that, they richly deserve that, but think about this, in some ways that these people that Jesus is calling hypocrites were considered to be, by many, to be the best and the brightest that were there in Israel. He is calling them actors, they are pretending. It'd be kind of like if I went to Synod and I was supposed to preach at Synod and I just called everybody that was sitting in front of me a bunch of play actors, a bunch of fakes, a bunch of frauds. I don't think I'm going to be invited back. What Jesus is doing is doing something that's very powerful in his speech. Verses three and four we read, but when thou doest alms, Let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth, that thine alms may be seen, may be, excuse me, in secret, and thy father, which seeth in secret himself, shall reward thee openly. In these particular verses, we see that you don't let your left hand know what your right hand does. Anybody here, I'm not asking for hands, but is anybody here that's able to do that? When you do something with your right hand, your left hand doesn't know what it's doing. You do something with your left hand, your right hand doesn't know what it's doing. Well, this is somewhat of an exaggeration or a figure of speech here that we're looking at here. If your left hand, think about this, if your left hand doesn't know what your right hand's doing, no one else is going to know either. you're going to give as if you've basically forgotten as soon as you've done it. And so you're not going to be parading and telling other people what you've done because you've forgotten what you've done. You don't really care what you've done. It's over. It's done with. You did it for the glory of God. It's over. Forget the good that you have done and no one will know. Your reward should come from God rewarding you, not by other people rewarding you by being impressed because of how wonderful you are. And this brings us then to prayer, verse 5. And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are. For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, they have their reward. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to the Father which is in secret, and thy Father which is in secret, which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. Don't be like these religious leaders, many of whom are hypocrites, fakes, pretenders. Don't be like these strategic givers, Don't pray strategically. Don't stand in the temple at just the right place where everybody can see you. Don't stand in the streets just so everybody can be impressed by you. This kind of prayer leads to its own kind of reward. If people happen to be impressed by your prayer and it makes you feel good, that's all the reward you're going to get. In other words, for all practical purposes, that's it. God is not impressed by hypocritical prayer. He's not impressed by a me first prayer. He's not impressed by ostentatious prayer. Verse six. But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy father which is in secret, and thy father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. Jesus is not condemning public prayer here, but Jesus is talking about our attitude when we pray. Also, Jesus is not telling us to have a separate room to pray. You may even hear somebody sometimes say, you should have a prayer closet, or you must have a separate room in which to pray. Well, that'd be kind of, That really wouldn't fit the context of the type of people that Jesus is talking to, because many of the houses in that day only had one room. So it'd be difficult to have a separate room when you only had one room to actually live in. It's a word picture that Jesus is giving that emphasizes the attitude of the person, not the geographical location of the person. It emphasizes the godliness and the humility of the person praying. who is not praying so that others will be impressed. The person praying has an audience, and that audience is God. Tied up within this word picture that Jesus is giving us is the idea of shutting the door, which figuratively speaking makes the secret prayer to God even more secret. And by the way, if you do have a prayer room or a prayer closet, that is not a bad thing. If that helps you, that's good. It can help you for privacy. If it can help you because it helps you so that you don't feel like you're showing off when you pray, that's fine. But remember, don't advertise it to others in order to show off. This would defeat the purpose of having a prayer room or a prayer closet. Unlike the reward that the person who prays to show off gets, which is nothing, becomes of their own, what they get is their own showy display and how whether people are impressed or not, the godly person that we see here who prays secretly, again, will be rewarded openly by God. Verse 7. But when you pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do, for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. Jesus describes pretentious long prayers elsewhere in the gospel. I don't know if any of you have seen the comic strip, Peanuts. I mean, a lot of people have. And I think it's sometimes when the teacher is talking or the adults are talking, and you don't really see what the adults are saying. I think it's kind of like a blah, blah, blah, blah, blah type of thing that's in the comic strip. Well, Jesus is telling us not to blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, like the pagans. Remember Elijah and the prophets of Baal? Unlike Elijah, who prays simply and straight to God with confidence, these prophets of Baal are making a tremendous amount of noise and are obviously sounding very desperate after a while. I think they even got in the place where they're actually cutting themselves. Well, this is the type of thing that Jesus is comparing Ostentatious sinful prayer too. Long prayers are in and of themselves not wrong. A big key to prayer here is not the what, but the why. It's not the length, but the motive. Why are you praying what you are praying? God knows the heart, God knows everything. God knows everything unlike the pagan gods who might need to be screamed and yelled at a lot in order to get their attention. And so that they can be filled in on all the matters that they might be ignorant about. And of course they're quite ignorant because they don't even exist. Verse eight, be not ye therefore like unto them for your father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask him. Unlike the pagans, what the pagans did, where they imagined their gods to be and who they were, they made these in their own image. And like all of us, they don't know everything. But unlike these pagan gods, God knows everything. Now, as we know, of course, these pagan gods didn't exist, but in the imagination of the pagans, I don't know of any of their gods where they said they knew everything. Don't approach God as if he needs to be informed about anything. Giving details in prayer may be all fine and good, But always remember, as you are giving the details of what's going on in your life, always remember that God already knows everything you're going to tell him. Now, this doesn't mean that it's bad to pour out your heart to God and let him know what's going on in your life, but always remember that God already knows your situation. Verse nine. After this manner, therefore, pray ye, our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Now while this prayer may be recited in our prayers to God, within the context that Jesus is speaking, this prayer is a model prayer, primarily, for our everyday lives. Question 187 of the larger catechism, how is the Lord's Prayer to be used? The Lord's Prayer, answer, the Lord's Prayer is not only for direction as a pattern according to which we are to make our other prayers, but may also be used as a prayer so that it be done with understanding, faith, Reverence and other graces necessary to the right performance of the duty of prayer. Notice, it again says, but may also be used as a prayer so that it be done with understanding, faith, reverence, and other graces necessary to the right performance of the duty of prayer. The main reason that Jesus is giving his people this prayer is to give us a pattern for our prayers. But if we are going to pray this prayer word for word, we need to be careful on how we do that. I see that based on what we see in scripture and what we see in the context here. And then secondarily, what we see in the larger catechism, that this is something that would potentially take a lot of time to go through, as opposed to just something that you would just go through very quickly. What are some things that we can learn about prayer from this model prayer that Jesus has given us? Well, number one, Let's see, I think we'll get out of here about two o'clock, because I've got a 20-point sermon here. Not really, I want to eat too. One, it is a model prayer. It's not given to us primarily as a prayer to be repeated over and over again. Again, I say it's not primarily given as a prayer to be repeated over and over again. This does not mean that it cannot be prayed word for word, but it must be prayed in a proper manner. I would think that, based on what Jesus is saying, that if it is prayed word for word, that it would take some time, as I mentioned, to meditate on the words individually. Secondly, this prayer, is a prayer for the covenant people of God and the covenant people of God alone. This is not a prayer for everyone. And we must not, as the church, advertise this as a prayer for everyone. This is not a prayer for our public schools. This is not a football team, before the game starts, prayer. That is, unless everybody on that football team happens to be a member of the covenant. Or everybody in that school happens to be. This is not a community prayer. The person who is not part of God's covenant may not truly say two key words in the prayer. Our Father. And it is our responsibility as Christians to not encourage people to lie. Again, why do I say that this prayer is for God's covenant people and God's covenant people alone? Two words, our Father. Jesus is using covenantal language for God's covenant people. And God's covenant people alone can say, our father. Number three, God comes first in this prayer that Jesus has given us. Now this does not mean that it would necessarily be an ungodly act to cry out help in emergency. Recently, we've been in two car accidents in the last year. One in which a truck swerved over into the lane that we were in, and we ended up in a ditch. Not a whole lot of time to pray in that particular case. On the way home the last time we were here, a deer hit us. That's the proper way to say that, I understand. A deer, and it did, definitely hit us. We've got proof that it hit us. Even less time. to pray. But the general rule for prayer should be God comes first. And even in a quick prayer like that, we argued God comes first because who are you praying to? It's an attitude as well as an action. Our attitudes so often come out in our prayers. Everything in life revolves around God, not ourselves. God should take first place in our prayers. Our father. Number four, God is not our buddy or our pal. God is God. Notice these words, our father. Is my little pal on my shoulder? No, it's our father who art in heaven. God is all around us, but God is also, don't forget, in heaven. Remember, we are not. So again, this should remind us of the first two commandments, that the triune God is not like the rest of us. God is someone to be feared as well as loved. God is all powerful. no other gods before him, no other gods in his sight, no other gods that we are showing any respect for whatsoever. No images, our father who art in heaven. Number five, our desire should be that God's name be recognized as holy and exalted as such. The first petition of the Lord's Prayer is not a I want, it's not a I need, it is after our Father which art in heaven, first petition, hallowed be thy name. May your name be hallowed, may it be holy. We pray this for Christians, we pray this for the world as a whole. We pray that for ourselves, we pray that others would become more and more like Jesus. We pray for our fellow Christians. We pray for our family members who are Christians. But we also pray this for the unregenerate as well, that the Holy Spirit would change those people so that they would be looked at as being holy in the sight of God. So God's holiness points to the gospel. God's holiness points to the bad news and the good news. In Adam and in your own sin, you're headed for hell. But the good news is repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And for those who or died for, there's not one person that is going to be spending an eternity in hell because the Holy Spirit will change each and every one of those members of the elect. Number six, the prayer is a reminder that we as God's people must be holy. There are two ways in which a person must be holy. One falls under the category of imputation. That's what we see when we're regenerated and justified by God. And we're looked at as being holy because of Jesus and his holiness. So that's imputation. That's like going to the bank, as I've described multiple times. It's like going to the bank and finding out that your account has a million dollars in it. And not only that, it's not a mistake. It's all yours. And you didn't put it in there. When God looks at you, if you are a Christian, God sees Jesus. God sees His Son. He sees the holiness of His Son. He knows the work that he did on the cross for you. But then there's also impartation in which we look at in the subject of sanctification. Sanctification is a 100% work of God in which he enables his people to become more and more like his son. So it's not just a let go and let God type of thing. Notice I said it's a 100% work of God in which he enables his people to become more and more like Jesus. So that's hard work. Imputation and impartation. Prayer is a reminder that we as God's people must be holy. Number seven. This prayer reminds us of the necessity for evangelism. If we are praying that God's name is going to be holy, anything that we pray for in this prayer, we should be working toward. So if we are praying that more and more people would be holy in the sight of God, we'd better be working toward that and not just praying about it. Number eight, the prayer reminds us that the Ten Commandments are for today. There are some churches where there are Ten Commandments, there's some that are nine, there's some that are eight, there's some that are none. Some say that actually the Ten Commandments are not binding today in some way, they aren't binding, but today we have the law of love. But if you ever notice some of those churches that have done away with the Ten Commandments and gone with the law of love, that they end up with 15 commandments or 18 commandments or 22 commandments. They end up doing what the Pharisees did in a sense. They take away and they add, and by the time it's all done, it looks biblical in a sense, but it looks cockeyed because it is. The Ten Commandments are for today, they are a measuring stick. If we are going to become more and more like Jesus and we are going to become more and more what God expects, it helps to have a measuring stick to measure our lives against. And that is one of the things that the Ten Commandments is there for. It's not only to point unregenerate people Christ because they realize, hey, I can't do this on my own, obviously. The Holy Spirit works through that, letting that person recognize that they cannot keep the Ten Commandments. At the same time, it's also there for us as Christians. Notice that the first three portions of the Ten Commandments should remind us of the first three commandments. Our Father, the first commandment, who art in heaven, the second commandment, hallowed be thy name, the third commandment. So the prayer reminds us that the Ten Commandments are for today. Number nine, the prayer is a reminder that we must not be hypocrites. I mentioned about what the hypocrites what a hypocrite meant and how the word ended up changing through the years, but also it helps to be reminded of who these Pharisees were. Now, the Pharisees weren't the only hypocrites, and I'm not saying every Pharisee necessarily was a hypocrite when it was all said and done, but Who were these Pharisees? Well, you go back a few hundred years, and these Pharisees, these people were people who had tried to separate themselves from ungodly Hellenistic Greek culture. And they saw what was going on in Israel, and they hated it, and they despised it, and wanted to stand up for the truth of scripture. But it was, I guess, kind of like the Presbyterian Church in the United States as a whole. The ones who used to really stand up for truth, what's happened through the years? Well, what's happened through the years is the mainline Presbyterian Church has a tendency to stand for the opposite of what they used to stand for. And they're still perhaps standing up there using some of the same words, but we know that their definitions of biblical words are different than what our words are. This is apparently what happened with the Pharisees. Started off with some really good motives, but then as time went on, they ended up instead of standing for what scripture said, actually taking a little away, adding a little, and coming up with something that was incorrect, that was unbiblical, that was sinful. So it's a reminder to us that we could become that, or that in some ways, we might even be that, and we need to repent ourselves. We may say, well, you know, I'm not for homosexual marriage. I'm not for some of these things the mainline church is for. But sin is a very, very sneaky thing. We need to be careful that we are not being pharisaical in areas of our life. Number 10, this prayer is a reminder that we must watch what we say and how we say it when we talk about others. Holy living. We, as Protestants, don't believe in having to go to a priest and confess our sins to others. But we as Protestants have been guilty of confessing other people's sins to others. And what do we call that? We often call that gossip. We can do it in many ways, and we may think that we're doing the right thing, but so many times we need to actually be going to that person about it instead of telling everybody but that person. One of the scary things about gossip, which I often call mouth murder, is that when you do murder somebody with your mouth and then you find out, notice what happens when people gossip and then they find out they're wrong and say, oh boy, I was wrong. And then they go on with their lives. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Now you get to try to clean up the mess. Now you get to go to that person and ask them for forgiveness. Now you get to go to everybody Can you imagine how difficult that is? You told one person, they told three or four people, they told five people, and you get to try to clean up the mess you made. Notice in scripture that when you ask somebody for forgiveness, it's not just asking for forgiveness, but it's trying to make things right. If I steal $100 from you, and three years later I come to you and ask you forgiveness, and you say, I forgive you, good, I get to keep the $100. No! No, I have the responsibility to make things right. It's one of the problems with gossip. When you say something, you better make sure that you should be saying it, and then beyond that, it better be true. Notice what conservative Christians, us, have a tendency to do when it comes to politicians we don't like. I noticed that one of the things that happens is that conservative Christians get an email and it says, Hillary Clinton did this. Email this to all of your friends. And they email this to their friends without even checking to see whether it's true or not. And then afterwards, I guess what happens is when we find out that Hillary didn't do that, say, oh well, she's a creep anyway. I'm sure she did worse things than that. We do not have the right to live ungodly lives for the sake of trying to win a political election or because we don't like somebody. Number 11, the prayer is a reminder that we must use the name of God in a godly manner, as I believe I mentioned here recently. And I will, again, mention, as I've mentioned from various pulpits, the name of a very popular website among Reformed Christians. Reformed Christians love this website. It's abominable, it is beyond belief what they end up doing, but Christians don't seem to mind It's basically a so-called Christian satire website, and it's called the Babylon Bee. And it time after time after time takes the name of God, takes the name of either Father, Son, Holy Spirit, or God as far as the Trinity is concerned, and drags it through the mud by using that name in a humorous manner. When are you able to use God's name in a holy and respectful and fearful manner when you're making a joke, when you're making fun of other people? I'm not saying this is the only one, but I do notice that Reform people like this, and it's a shame. It's also a shame that Christians, time and time again, on Facebook, When I get excited about something, OMG. Put it in initials all you want, it's still oh my God. And again, the Minstoth idea is what's called Minstoth. Don't think that you're not taking the name of God in vain because you did what the Pharisees do. You may add a little to that name, you subtract a little, and it's okay to say G's or whatever the case is, gosh, because you've chopped a little, added a little, whatever you've done to it, now I can say it because that's what Christians do. And when you're telling jokes, please keep God's name out of it. Don't just say, well, you know, that comedian, he's a good comedian, he keeps it clean. Well, he might not be telling dirty jokes, but if he's telling jokes with the name of God, Father, Son, or Holy Spirit, there's no business doing that. He is taking God's name in vain. Now, you might say, well, that person may be able to do that in a respectful and fearful manner, but, you know, one of the things, as I mentioned about humor, what is one of the things about humor, it's the unexpected. And all of a sudden you find yourself laughing and then you realize, whoa, wait a second, I shouldn't be laughing about this. Number 12, the prayer is a reminder that we have a responsibility to be honest in our dealings. I've had a life and health insurance license for well over 20 years now, so I have I know what it's like to be a Christian salesperson, and I know what it's like to have your hands tied behind your back to a certain extent, because you're up against the competition, is able to do things that you know that you cannot do, that you may not do. But on the other hand, if somebody says, well, so-and-so, they're a Christian, they're a salesman, that doesn't necessarily impress me at all, because of some of my dealings, or some of my... when I've watched so-called Christian salesmen. I'm not saying they're not Christians, but just think, if you are in sales of any kind, that you have the responsibility to do everything honestly and with integrity, never making a sale so that you can make a sale stretching the truth a little bit here or stretching the truth a little bit there. But it's not just in sales, any of our dealings. It can be in our purchasing. It can be the way in which, you know, it's actually possible to rip off a salesman. But stealing is stealing. Lying is lying. So, that means that if you're filling out a life, if you're getting life insurance, and you know that you had a visit to the doctor within the last five years, but, eh, I'll just stretch a little bit and say I haven't. Remember that the decision on that life insurance policy has to do with you telling the truth. And how embarrassing would it be for, if you were to pass away and your, let's say your widow or your children end up not getting that money, and why? Because you had lied to the salesman. Number 13, again, holiness here reminds us that we need to watch our minds. Coveting, wishing we could have things so much different than what we do right now. Or lusting, a subject that we don't like to mention from the pulpit, but it's one of the biggest problems in our churches today. We have, especially men on the internet, surfing the net, seeing things that they don't have to pay for. Like in the old days, you had to go to a store or had to go someplace and potentially be embarrassed. Now in the privacy of your own home, you can watch things that you weren't able to see before in the way that you're able to see it now. It's one of the huge problems among young men and men as a whole in our churches. Not much use hiding it. It's huge. But that also ties into how we dress. We have a responsibility to dress in a godly way, male or female, so that members of the opposite sex are not tempted by what they see. We have a reminder not just to watch our minds, but to be protective over the minds of others as well. Number 14, it's a reminder that we must watch out for others, and I just stated that one. But, not just in how I mentioned it, but how we talk, mentioned how we dress, and how we act. So that when somebody thinks of the name Christian, they may think, an unregenerate person may think certain words like idiot, loser, repulsive, But they don't think words like dishonest, creepy, as in simply creepy. They're not thinking pervert. They see what you are. They don't like what they see. But what they don't like goes against their sin nature. It doesn't team up with their sin nature. Fifteen. How we worship, it reminds us how we worship is important. Again, holiness. Outwardly and inwardly, how we worship. Some people might say, well, it doesn't matter whether we sing hymns or psalms, it's our heart. Well, our heart is important, but so is doing things the way that God has called on us to do. Both are important. I understand there are one or more examples of pastors in the RPCNA being criticized by one or more of their church members for not singing hymns in a community setting. It's funny for one or more of those pastors to be criticized for that. when years ago, if a pastor in the RPCNA, it's true in the Associate Reform Presbyterian Church, I can think of one specific example, but if an RPCNA pastor years ago would go into, let's say, a Baptist church and sing hymns, they would potentially be defrocked. They would potentially lose their ordination. Now we're potentially criticizing RPCNA pastors because they are not friendly enough, or an RPCNA pastor for not being friendly enough and what, embarrassing us in front of the community? By the way, if you happen to know this happening here or anywhere near here, I'm not talking about that. So I'm talking about something else. But what I'm getting at is that it is important how we worship And we need to be really careful that we don't criticize somebody for doing the right thing. Always remember, on the other hand, we may do our worship exactly the way that God has called us to, but if we're just going through the motions, we can see in the Old Testament that God can actually hate our worship. So it's both heart and head. It's both doing it the right way and doing it with a loving Christian heart. Number 16, looking at holiness. Holiness reminds us that none of us measure up. We can look down on other people, but we always remember when you're tempted to look down on other people and looking at yourself as being superior. On Judgment Day, if you don't have Jesus, you're going to hell too. In and of yourself, you deserve hell. You can say, and this brings me up to my 17th point, and that is, Adam messed things up for us, and he did. Remember, my son was only a few years old, and he got in trouble with his mother about something. And he tearfully said, why did Adam have to sin? Well, Adam did mess things up for us. But that's tied in with point 18. We also mess things up for us. Now, if you can tell from what I have already said, as far as my view of psalm singing, it's the only thing you should sing in worship, of corporate worship of God. However, I will mention a hymn. If you want to close yours, sorry, but I consider a lot of hymns to be good. What I call shower songs. It's great to sing, you know, on your own sometimes, as long as they're biblical, not for corporate worship, but top lady who wrote rock of ages mentions in rock of ages, be of sin, the double cure. See, when Jesus died for his people, he died both for what Adam did and any of your sins as well. See, we're coming to the world, and as we live, we're doubly cursed. So you may hear an evangelical person say, well, nobody ever went to hell for what Adam did. Well, for one thing, You go to hell for what you do, but also, yes, we are guilty. Even if we theoretically didn't sin at all, we're still guilty in Adam. But of course, because of what Adam did, we will sin. Adam messed things up, we messed things up. That reminds us of where we stand, but also it also reminds us of where we'd be without Jesus. brings us to the 19th point. The only hope for the Christian is the righteousness of Jesus. That's it. That's the only thing you got. Nothing you can add to that. And the 20th should go without saying, but it's tempting. Do not brag about your holiness. When I was in my first church, We had a godly elder who said something that you'd have to know him. It's just what came out of his mouth. It sounded funny. He said, I'm more humble than what I used to be. Actually, that should be true. It's just that when we say it of ourselves, it doesn't come off sound. It's kind of sounds funny. Don't brag about how godly you are. Don't trumpet how godly you are. Remember why you are more godly today than what you used to be. 20 points and I've only made it through the first petition. There's so much more. This prayer is a wonderful model prayer that serves as an example for our prayer lives. And may God enable his people May God enable you, if you are a Christian, more and more to pray and live in this manner. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your Son, Jesus, and we thank you for your Holy Spirit, and we thank you for you. We thank you that you enable your people to become more and more like your Son, We thank you for watching over us, for leading us, giving us always good direction. And we pray for the courage to recognize that your commands are always good for us. In the name of your son, Jesus, amen.