So we're going to continue in our study of this book of Matthew. And while previously we have studied the whole of chapter five, we looked at a few things on murder, adultery, on retaliation, how a Christian is supposed to deal or interact with other people, Christians, non-Christians alike. And now Christ is going to come and talk about this very important topic that a lot of us know about. It is a topic of prayer. A lot of us know about it, but it is something a lot of us do not do. But before we get there, and that starts in verse 5, we have like a prelude to that, and that's in verses 1 to 4. And that's about almsgiving. And Christ is basically going to use this small portion to lead on into prayer. So I'll just very quickly go through verses 1 to 4 and what it is all saying. So in verse one, Christ says, you know, take heed that you do not your alms before men. And the first thing I want you to realise is this, that he assumes that a Christian will do alms. Now what is alms? The word alms there is an old English word that means pity, mercy. It is also translated as charitable deeds, good deeds, good acts that you do to other people. So he assumes that a Christian would perform or do alms to other people. And he assumes that, but now he's going to say something. He says, do not your alms before men, to be seen of them, otherwise you have no reward of your father, which is in heaven. You know, it is necessary for a Christian to do alms. It is necessary for us to dispense grace and mercy because we ought to be as our Father. Our Father is perfect in heaven and therefore we ought to be as He is, perfect, or at least striving to be perfect, regardless of who you're interacting with, be it the Christians or non-Christians, people in your workplace, your work colleagues whom you may not like very much, who may honestly not have a very moral character, And these other people that God says, you know, you must do alms to them. In fact, I just came back actually from UK yesterday. I have not slept through the night. Not because I didn't want to, I couldn't sleep through the night. Like, it's supposed to be 1am now, so I'm supposed to be sleeping now. But there were a lot of people on the streets. And I believe you see this as well in the Philippines. A lot of people on the streets begging just for one pence, begging just for a cent, begging just for some food. And you know, James tells us that, you know, as a Christian, if you go up to him and say, bless you, God bless you, but you walk away without doing anything, and he says, your faith is in vain. Whatever you say is not going to mean anything to the person who is destitute. And Christ, of course, here assumes that a Christian is someone who dispenses grace and mercy, even as God the Father does. But unfortunately, of course, there are people who do it for the wrong motives. There are people who do it to be seen of other people, and that's in verse 2. It says, again, he assumes it. He does not say if you do it, he says when you do it, do not sound a trumpet before thee. What has happened here is, that many times as the hypocrites went about in the streets. Now there are two understandings of what it means to sound a trumpet in those days. The first one is this, that as they went in the street, they would literally sound a trumpet to tell the people that I'm distributing arms, I'm distributing money. And they would gather the people to collect these alms. So that was one way Christ was referring to as sounding the trumpet. But there was another way of sounding the trumpet, and that is when people put money in the offering box. And in the Jewish temple, there will always be the offering box at the door of the temple. And people would put money in. And oh, you know, the more money you put, the more the noise. the metal box is going to ring, it's going to clang. And those clanging of the coins in the metal box, it was like street music to those who only desired the praise of man. And Christ warns here, you know, when you do your alms, make sure you don't do it for other people. Why? Because in verse one, back in verse one, it says, otherwise you have no reward of your father which is in heaven. What he's really saying here is this. And this is a principle we all understand. If you work for five hours, you get paid the wages of five hours. If you work for 10 hours, you get paid a fair wage of 10 hours. And that's how it's supposed to be. And Christ is saying here that these people, they do their arms for the purpose of getting the praise of man. And he does not deny that they'll get the praise of man. Look in the verse carefully. All he says is that you will not get the reward of the Father. So yes, you'll get the praise of man, but you'll not get the praise of God. And he's basically saying this, you know, in verse one it says that you have no reward of your Father which is in heaven. The real meaning behind this verse is like this. If you desire the praise of man and you go out to seek it, Yes, you will get it. You will get the praise of man. But be warned that this praise of man is only going to last you a few days, a few weeks, a few years maybe. But if you get a praise of man, you can't expect a double portion of your wages. If you work for five hours, you can't expect to get paid for 10 hours. And if you get a praise of man, if you seek the praise of man, don't expect your father to bless you. Don't expect a reward in heaven. In fact, the old English is more expressive. It says that they have to the full and so exhaust the blessings of the father. They exhaust it completely. I mean, can you imagine this? That you have been doing alms all your life and when you reach heaven, you suddenly realize that there's no reward for you? because all you have desired for was the praise of men and you received it to the full? And you exhausted your father's rewards in heaven? I mean, that's a tragedy. That is a tragedy all of us ought to be careful of. And he warns us, of course, make sure your left hand does not know what your right hand does. It does not mean literally, of course. It just means don't publish it around. Keep it to a secret. You don't have to ask how much people give. You don't have to go around boasting how much you give. Give out of a wailing heart. Give out of a heart of thanksgiving to what God has provided for you. And so with this principle, he's going to come now onto verses five and eight, five to eight. And he's going to really teach his disciples here how to pray. You know, verses nine to to 13 is what we commonly know as the Lord's Prayer. And I'll deal with that next week. And that teaches us what we are supposed to pray for. But before Christ comes to the topic of what we are supposed to pray for, He's going to deal with something first. He's going to deal with how we are to pray. How a Christian should pray. And I just want you to pause here for a moment and think of this. that Christ said, my house shall be a house of prayer. And that is the extent by which he emphasizes the importance of prayer. Now, he could have said, my house is a house of sermons, my house is a house of almsgiving, my house is a house of discipleship making. He could have said all those things. but he instead chose that my house shall be the house of prayer. And that is funny because you know why? Because as we read through the Bible, a lot is recorded of great and powerful sermons. I mean, you would recall that Christ gave a long sermon on the mount, and that is recorded in such detail for us to study, and praise God for that. The Bible records how Peter preached on the day of Pentecost and 3,000 souls were saved. And it records every single line that he says. It records how Stephen used 40, 50 verses to preach from the Old Testament to the New Testament before his death in Acts chapter 7. So a lot is recorded of how people, men, preached. A lot is recorded of what people preached. But you realize one thing, very few, or rather, less is recorded about what is prayed. Yes, you have, just think of this. of all the sermons that Jesus Christ had. How many prayers do we recall being recorded in the Bible from the mouth of our Lord? Yes, we have the Lord's Prayer. We have one or two lines in the Garden of Gethsemane, not my will but thine be done. We have a few lines recorded of Him on the cross. He commanded his spirit into his father's hands. And we have some of those. And we have, of course, in John 17, which is one of his longer prayers. It is often called the High Priestly Prayer. But besides those, you would very rarely find that the Bible records what Jesus Christ prayed. Instead, it records a lot more about his attitude towards prayer. And I want you to mark the distinction. It records not what he prayed, but how he prayed. And I think that's important because a lot of us know what to pray for. A lot of us have burdens that we know we should pray for. And so the problem really with us is not that we don't know what to pray, but rather how to pray, if we even get to prayer. And that is what Christ is going to deal with here in verses five to eight. He's going to teach his disciples how they're supposed to pray. What is the attitude they're supposed to pray? And it's recorded in Luke chapter 11, you don't have to turn there, that the disciples asked, how do we pray? Lord, teach us to pray. And I have no doubt in that line, in that statement that the disciples made, they were not only asking Christ what to pray, but how to pray. In fact, it says in Luke 11, teach us to pray as John taught his disciples how to pray. They saw fervour, they saw vigour, they saw opportunity in how Christ prayed. And they wanted that. They wanted the power of prayer that Christ had. And so that is why they asked the Lord how to pray. Again, they did not ask how to preach a sermon. They did not ask how to go about making disciples. And really, I want you to consider this today, that prayer is something that all of us in this room, myself included, that we so severely lack. And it is often not because we don't know what to pray for, but there are a few reasons as to why we don't pray enough. Now before we get there, I'll just cover a few verses. It says in verse 5 that when you pray, Don't pray as the hypocrites do. They love to pray standing. So you're told, number one, to pray in secret. Now, what does this mean? Does it mean we're not supposed to pray in a service? Does it mean that we're not supposed to have corporate prayer? No, it just means, again, like in almsgiving, don't pray for show. If you pray for show, and others praise you for your good oratorical skills, and they praise you for your long, flowery prayers, Again, you have the praise of man. Don't expect the praise of God. And there are a few questions I just want to just quickly throw out to you, which is this. How do we know whether we are praying for the praise of man or praying to God? Here are a few questions you can ask yourselves. Number one, do you find yourselves praying in front of others more than in secret? We come to the prayer meeting, everyone looks so pious. And then we start to think, or even, oh, I'm going to take this prayer item, what should I say? How should I phrase my sentences? And you know, your mind gets disengaged from what other people are praying. That is when you know you're praying for the praise of men. When you pray to be heard of other people, Do you pray more in secret than you do in public? You know, the real you is the secret you. Leonard Ravenhill once said that a man's life is marked by how much he prays. A man's life is marked by how much he prays. And of course, if you're expecting to only pray during the prayer meeting, then you know your life It's just a show of other people that you are attending the services. You are coming to prayer meeting just because it is on the bulletin. Oh, but my friends, ask yourselves this. Do you pray in secret? Do you, as it were in verse six, close the doors and close the closet? You know, look in verse six. It says, enter into thy closet and shut the door. Shut the door so that no other man knows that you are praying. And the flesh, of course, would tempt you to boast even. Perhaps you have been praying in secret, but your flesh would want to come out and boast that, oh, I've prayed for hours. You know, I face this myself, and that is why I can say all this, because we all face it. We all know that the flesh desires and craves for our own glory. We often talk, of course, about abiding in Christ, how to abide in Christ. Let me read one verse to you. It says in Psalm 91, it says, He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. You know what? You want to abide under the shadow of the Almighty? You've got to dwell in the secret place. You've got to stay there. To dwell in the secret place is not to go there for like five minutes, 10 minutes. It's to dwell there, it's to stay there permanently. That is how we are to abide in Christ, to dwell in the secret place of the Most High. But here's another problem that we all have. Verse seven, it says, but when ye pray again, it assumes that a Christian would pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do. Now he's going to say one thing, and this is it. The heathen know how to almost, as it were, chant a prayer. And you see that people of other religions, they often go about chanting. The Buddhists have their scriptural chants. You see the Jews, even at the Wailing Wall, they'll be chanting the Torah. The Muslims would chant from the Quran. And ask yourselves this, are you a Christian like them who chants from the Bible? Are you praying or are you chanting? And I admit so many a times, you know, I have this prayer list and it's almost like when you go into prayer, it's just autopilot. You go there and you almost know what to pray next. Not because you're thinking, but because you have been saying the same thing over and over and over and over again for the past one or two years. And then it becomes a chant. You're no longer speaking, you're no longer praying. So he says, don't use vain repetitions. For they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. They think that the more they say, the more God is going to hear them. He says, no, that's not how it works. In fact, he promises us a great promise in verse eight, that your father knows what need you have of before you ask of him. So it is not your asking that informs God what your need is. What is prayer then? What is prayer? Again, I've said a lot of us know a lot about it, but we find it so hard to do. Let me give you, this is just how I would like to define prayer. It's by no means right or wrong in any sense of being the perfect definition. But this is what I think prayer is all about. Prayer is a conscious conversation with God, where we take His words, blend them up, and offer them up as praise and supplication to Him. Let me say that again. Prayer is a conscious conversation with God, where we take His words, blend them up, and offer them up as praise and supplication to Him. Now I want you to pause here for a moment, because let's just consider one thing. Prayer as a conversation with God. I mean, just stop and ponder on that for a moment. That us, frail as dust, made from the dust of the earth, can have a conversation with God. That should blow your mind. You know, one more thing that blows my mind is this, that in all of Matthew 6, Christ refers to God as the Father, Abba, Father. Now, all of you have fathers. And just think of this, how many times have we approached God as some impersonal being far out in heaven, that we cannot approach. It says that we are His children. He is our Father. And He is God. Yes, He dwells in inapproachable light. But so is He, the same God that is our Father, who knows of our needs before we ask of them. And you know, we are given immediate access as the children of God to the Father. Now it does, you know, if you were to go up one day to your president and ask, you know, can I have an appointment with you? I want to chat with you. I have a list of things I need to seek your help. Do you think your president is going to entertain you? Well, of course not. But here we have a great high priest who is way more powerful He is the omnipotent God that we have immediate access to. He is the King of Kings and Lord of Lords and we have access to Him anytime. So just think of this for a moment, that yes, He is God, but besides the fact that He is God, He is also our Father that we can approach. We don't have to buy a ticket to look for Him. He is there anytime, anywhere, as long as we call upon Him. No, the problem, of course, is not with God. The problem, of course, is with us. And if I were to give you an illustration, it's almost as if, you know, if you have a door here, and you knock at the door, and you expect an answer from the door, but before that answer comes, you run away. I mean, that's a prank, like a prank call, right? Or you call someone up, and before that person answers you, you put down your phone. That's a prank call. And even as humans, how offended we would be if someone prank calls us. But just think of this, isn't this what we often do with God? We knock at the door, but before he answers it, we run away. Oh, he's not working to our timetable, therefore he doesn't care. He's not answering my prayers, therefore he does not hear. My friends, the problem is really with us. He says, knock. Oh, but knock and don't run away. Knock and stay there and keep knocking until the door is opened unto you. Prayer as a conversation with God. Yes, you have to seek Him, you have to knock the door. But what is prayer? What is the essence of prayer? It is where we take His words. And this is so important because it is only God's word that is eternal, that we have with us in physical form. God's eternal word, we take them and we blend them up. Now I'm going to give you an illustration from the Old Testament, and this is what prayer is like. So if you turn to me in Exodus chapter 30, unto verse 34 to 38, it says that, and the Lord said unto Moses, God is going to explain to Moses what the altar of incense in the tabernacle, or the temple, was to be like. And God told Moses, take unto thee sweet spices. And he lists a few of them, he lists four of them, and it says, and thou shalt make it a perfume. Sorry, in verse 34, at the last portion, it says, of each shall there be light weight. In other words, verse 34, of each shall there be light weight. In other words, each of these ingredients that you have here, it shall be of the same proportion. Now, going to verse 35, and thou shalt make it a perfume, a confection after the art of the apothecary, tempered together pure and holy. And thou shalt beat some of it very small, and put of it before the testimony in the tabernacle of the congregation, where I will meet with thee. It shall be unto you most holy. Next verse. And as for the perfume which thou shalt make, ye shall not make to yourselves according to the composition thereof. It shall be unto thee holy for the Lord. So in other words, he says, this specific recipe that I'm going to give you, you shall not make it for your own use. It's holy for the Lord. Last verse 38. Whomsoever shall make like unto that, to smell thereto, even to smell it, shall even be cut off from his people. And you're perhaps asking, you know, why am I picking out this verse in Exodus chapter 30? Why am I picking out the altar of incense in the tabernacle? What relevance does it have with us? And the simple answer is this, that incense is often used as a picture of prayer. Go with me in two other verses. It says in Psalm 141 verse 2, it says, So, the Psalmist here uses the Old Testament imagery of the altar of incense to depict prayer. He says, my prayer is like incense. and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice. In Revelation chapter 8 verse 3 to 4, it says, And unto another angel came and stood at the altar, having a golden censer, and there was given unto him much incense, and that he should offer it up with the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne. Next verse, And the smoke of the incense, Again, speaking of prayer, which came with the prayers of the saints, ascended up before God out of the angels' hands. So again, we have another picture of how incense, the smoke of the incense, was a picture of prayer. If you go back with me to verse 3, it says that the prayers of all the saints, my friend, As long as you're in Christ, you're a saint. And as long as you're a saint, you are caught in this verse, verse three. It says the prayer of all the saints shall rise up to God, shall ascend to God like the incense. And this incense was like a perfume. And I was really meditating on this and thinking, how is the incense made? How is the incense made? A modern example, of course, would be how perfume is made. That is what it would be like. Now, first of all, to make a perfume or to make the incense, you need a specific recipe, and that is what God gives in Exodus 30, verse 34. And then he says, you have to have each of them in light weight, in equal proportions. We'll study each one of these in a bit more detail afterwards. And it says, you know, you shall beat some of it very small. In other words, you need to blend them up. You need to extract the essence out of it. And then God promises that you put it before the testimony, which is where the word of God was held, before the testimony, and there I will meet with thee. You know, God promises to meet with us where our prayers are made. He promises to meet with us where our prayers are made. And of course, unto verse 37 and 38, we are told that, as I've mentioned, you shall not make unto thee a similar incense. And that is teaching, of course, of the holiness of prayer. How holiness is a sacred activity that we all ought to partake in. So now let us just consider very quickly how the incentives made. So first of all, if I were to use the analogy of making a perfume, first of all, you will need to prepare the environment. You need to prepare the environment. You know, you can't make perfume in any room that you just want. You got to clean up the room. You got to make sure the room is of a certain temperature, humidity, maybe even lighting conditions. And that is why some perfumes are kept in dark bottles. So you need a specific environment to make the perfume. And that is precisely how prayer is like. Before you come to pray, now take note of this. This is even before you pray. Before you come to pray, you need to prepare yourself. You need to prepare the environment. You need to approach the mercy seat with clean hands and pure heart. Because God says he will not regard those who regard iniquity in his heart. He will not heal those who regard iniquity in his heart. So you've got to prepare the environment. I'm just going to list out a few things which is what I took from a book on the locks and keys of prayer. Now prayer, a lot of us think like it's some magical formula. No, God has given us in his word certain locks, things that hinder prayer. He has also given us keys to prayer. In other words, things that help us to pray. So what are the locks of prayer? Pray from an unrepentant heart. Praying for show, as we have mentioned earlier. Praying with repetitive, empty words that you're not considering. Or perhaps you pray with lustful heart. It says in James, that you ask and you receive not, because you ask amiss, that you may consume it upon your lust. Peter gives us a warning in his epistle, he says, that husbands dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honour unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and it says at the end of the verse, you can take that down if you want, it's 1 Peter 3, verse 7, that your prayers be not hindered. So another lock of prayer, and not just for the husbands, for the wives as well. Mistreating your spouse, that is another hindrance to prayer. Those who ignore the needy, those who do not do alms, says in Proverbs 21, verse 13, So if you stop your ears to the poor, don't expect God to hear your prayers. That is another lock of the prayer. What are some others? Praying with a bitter heart. Praying when you don't obey the revealed will of God. I mean, you know, this is something that a lot of us again fall to. When God reveals something to us, and we don't obey it, prayer will do nothing. I mean, those of you with children, just imagine this. You tell your children to clean up their messy room, And one hour later, you go into the room, and you see it's all still messy, but now your kids are gathered in a circle. They're having a special Thursday evening prayer meeting. They're asking, you know, when should we start cleaning our room? How should we start cleaning our room? You would treat that as willful disobedience. But that is how God sees us, when we willfully disobey what he has chosen to reveal in his word. You see, my friends, rebellion cloaked in prayer is dangerous. Rebellion cloaked in prayer is dangerous. And you know, many things Paul says in his epistle to the Ephesians, put off the old man. You know, he does not say pray to put off the old man. He just says put off the old man. There's some things that God has commanded us to do, and there's no need to pray about it. I mean, should you pray about whether you should put away adultery or sin? Paul just commands them, you know, deal with it, put away the old man, put off the old man. These are things that God has chosen to reveal to us and we often Find ways to cloak it, to hide it in prayer. You say, I'm praying for God to grant me the strength to put it away. No, Paul just says, put it away. You have the Holy Spirit in you, put it away. That is enough. One last lock of prayer is praying with a faithless heart. Praying without faith. Now, these are all hindrances to prayer. But there are, of course, also keys to prayer. How to unlock the power of prayer. And I'll just run through them very quickly. Number one is praying persistently. Again, you don't knock and run away. You've got to knock and keep knocking until the answer is given. In passing, let me just say this. Sometimes we often think that when we pray, God answers us, and sometimes he says yes, sometimes he says no. You know, it says in Hebrews 11, verse 6, I can't recall that, Hebrews 11, verse 6, that says God is a rewarder of those who seek Him. Now just think of this, let me give you an illustration of this. Paul prayed for the thorn in his flesh to be removed and he said he prayed twice. He prayed thrice for God to remove the thorn in his flesh. Did God remove it? No. But what did God answer him with? He said, my grace is sufficient for thee. In other words, what he's telling Paul is this, that yes, in your temporal circumstance that you are living in, it may seem that I've not answered prayer, but what I've given you is instead far greater than an answer you have asked for. And that is, I've leveraged grace upon you. You know, when God says no, it's often because He wants something far greater than what we've asked for. And in fact, if you think of it, that is a better yes than we can ever ask for. Because we, with our limited minds, will never know the perfect will of God. And God simply says, trust me. Trust me to answer you in my own time. And I will reward you. I will reward those who diligently seek me. So praying persistently, praying with faith, praying in secret, praying according to God's will, praying in unity with other believers, praying with an obedient life, praying while abiding in Christ and delighting in the Lord. All of this are the keys of prayer. So that is first, preparing the environment. Now you see how important it is that before we come to pray, the environment must be properly prepared. Because anytime you have a lock, in prayer. Don't expect God to hear you. Because God is true to his word and if he says I will not hear you because you regard iniquity in your heart, don't expect God or don't pray for God to remove that. He's not going to turn away from his word. He's expecting you to put away iniquity in your heart before you come to pray. And that is what we have to do. So the second thing is this. How do you make a perfume? The second thing is you need a recipe. And I'm not going to give you an exhaustive list because of time, but some of the recipes of prayer. And we're going to look at this in more detail next week in the Lord's Prayer. Thanksgiving, forgiveness, intercession for other people, praise and adoration, utter dependence on the Lord, seeking wisdom. petitions and supplications, seeking peace and the salvation of souls. These are the recipe of prayer. So first of all you prepare the environment and then you need the recipe. You need the ingredients. As you would in a perfume, you know some of these ingredients are so rare and you have to search for them high and wide. And so it is, my friends, in prayer. That you know, it is said of George Muller, that he prayed through the Bible. He took every single verse there was in the Bible, and he prayed according to it, starting in Genesis chapter one to Revelation. He started off, in the beginning, God created. And then he started praying. God created the orphanage. God created my family. God created all of these things. And he started praying verse by verse through the Bible. You know, George Muller, it's amazing. He said, in this unbelieving generation, I am going to prove to them that God still answers prayer, even the prayer of one man. And George Muller proved that. Not in anything because of George Muller, but because of the great God that George Muller was praying to. One man changing a nation. Now, that is the power of prayer. You know, some of us, we are all given different gifts. Not many are called to be apostles. Not many are called to be teachers. Not many are called to be preachers. Not many are called to be Sunday school teachers, PA, crew, ushers. You all have your own gifts, but everyone is given the gift of prayer. And let me say this, that yes, you can move a great crowd with a sermon, But you can only move a great God through prayer. And choose for yourself which you would rather have. I told myself, I would rather be a man of prayer than be known for preaching. I would rather be a man of prayer than be known for preaching. So yes, you need the ingredients for prayer. You have to know the Word of God. But the next thing you do is after preparing the environment, after getting the recipe and the ingredients, now you have to extract it. Extract the raw ingredients, as it were. And how do you do that? Perhaps you boil them, you press them, you dissolve them. Whatever means it is, you've got to squeeze every drop out of the Word of God. That is where the power of prayer lies in. You take the Word of God and you extract every ounce of it. It is a gold mine for the believer. It is a gold mine that will never exhaust itself. But after extracting it, and that is where I believe a lot of us stop there. We perhaps, we prepare the environment. We come before God with clean hands and pure heart. We know the verses, and we extract them. But here's something that we all lack, blending it, blending it. And that is why I say that prayer is a conversation with God, where we take his words and blend them up. and offer them up as praise and supplication to him. You know, my friends, what is blending it? It says in Exodus that you need a specific quantity, each of them in equal parts. Now what does that mean? It means you don't... Have your prayer lopsided on the salvation of souls and forgetting your supplications? Neither do you forget about other things that are needful. You need a balance. That is what Exodus is teaching us. When you make your incense, you can't have too much of the frankincense and leave out other ingredients. You need a fine balance in the exact recipe that God has given. You see, a lot of us, when we come to pray, It is almost as if we take verses and we just take verses and then shoot them up to God. Or we don't blend them. We need to blend them, as it were. Make them come together in one harmonious prayer. So many times our prayers are disjointed. They're all like bits and pieces. It's like I want A and I want B and I want C and I want D. Oh, we only ask for things. But how many times do we take to give thanks to God? You see, a perfect prayer would need the perfect blending. And the perfect blending would need the perfect recipe. And all of these are linked. And I think, of course, I'm using myself as an example. We often have a lot of things. It's like our prayers and supplications are always the longest list. And our Thanksgiving, if any, it's probably thank God for the day, and then we move on to our supplications. Next week, what I really want to consider is this. The Lord's Prayer, the perfect model for prayer. Why? Because it focuses our eyes on the great God. And when you put your eyes on God, your prayers would come naturally. That is the Lord's Prayer. Now, so you have to blend it. And then the fifth step to making a perfume is to age it. You know, like when you make wine, you have to age the wine. And what is aging? Aging is when you take the prayers and you let it age on its own, in the sense of knocking persistently. You know, we are told at Henna, pray year by year. Now just think of this, year by year. You know, if God were to describe us by our prayer lives, would it be day by day? Would it be week by week? Oh, for Hannah, it was year by year. She prayed year by year. And for many years, of course, it seemed that God did not hear her. God did not answer her. But we know the end of the story, that God heard her and answered her prayers. So if you want a good prayer, a mature prayer, it's going to take a good blending and years of bended knees for the blended recipe to fully blend properly. You can't expect God, or rather you can't expect a prayer to mature in a day. and everything is going to work according to your timetable. It's going to take years, year by year. And finally, the last point on making a prayer, or as it were, a perfume. And this is, of course, in many ways, obvious to us. The last step is to use it, to use it. Imagine buying a bottle of perfume and putting it at home, not using it. As I started out and I said, a lot of us, it is not that we don't know how, what to pray, but rather we don't pray even. So we have the knowledge on how to pray and what to pray, but we don't use it. And let me just say this, and I shall close shortly, that repeating words in vain is not prayer. Keeping your mind on God is not prayer. You know, in fact, even if you were to get on your knees and you have your head bowed, your eyes closed, your fists clenched, and you speak words that are reflected in the Bible, it may not even be prayer if the words are not directed to God. So the last step is that when you have made a perfume of prayer, a sweet incense of prayer, you've got to use it. You've got to use it as God instructs us to. Because to burn it, as the altar of incense was, day and night, morning and evening, day by day, for every year, continually, that is what prayer is all about. It is a conscious conversation with God, where we take His words and we extract it, and we blend it up, and we offer them up as praise and supplication to Him. The final point I have to make here is this. It is a prayer made to God. Never forget the audience of your prayer. You pray for man, you get the praise of man, you get no reward of God. You pray to God, you don't get the praise of man, you get the reward of God. That's what God promises us here. It is a great promise. Now, in closing, let me just close with one last verse. It says, call unto me and I will answer thee. and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not." There are many things we don't know how God will answer, but God promises that they will be great and mighty. I spoke a bit of George Muller just now. I'll close off with a little story from him. You know Spurgeon, all of you know Spurgeon. And Spurgeon was praying for, he had his own orphanage, and he needed a sum of 300 pounds, which in those days was a huge amount of money. So the fund was raised, and he went to Bristol to collect the 300 pounds. And at the end of the week, that money was raised, and Spurgeon took the money. And as he went to bed, as he prayed about how to use the money, It just impressed upon his heart, God impressed upon his heart, to give the money to George Muller. Now, he was struggling in his heart, and he said, you know, I can't do that. I need it for my own orphans. I have my own orphanage to run. But God, sorry, Spurgeon couldn't shake off that conviction. And the next morning, with his heart full of peace, he went to look for George Muller. in Bristol. He took a train there, gave him the 300 pounds. You know what's the amazing thing? He went there, he found George Miller on his knees, knocked at the door. George Miller opened the door and George Miller said, Spurgeon, I never expected God would use you as a steward. I know the exact amount you have brought. 300 pounds. And Spurgeon knew This was the will of God. He gave Muller the money. And they both rejoiced. The story often ends there, but as he took a train back, back to London, where his church was, on his desk was an envelope that was not opened. And in the envelope was 300 pounds and 300 shillings. You know, God is going to give you more if you give it out to other people. God answered the prayer of Muller, and God answered the prayer of Spurgeon, because they were willing to submit themselves to the will of God. And Paul tells us that God, he spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all. How shall he not with him also freely give us all things? What a great promise that is. great promise, that yes, you may ask for certain things, but never forget this one thing, that the greatest gift you will ever receive has already been given to you, the gift of salvation in our Lord Jesus Christ. So we have the tools for prayer. The question is not whether we have them, but whether we are using the tools for prayer that God has given us in his word. And again, I say this, that yes, you can move great crowds through a sermon. You can do great things that move many people, but you can only move a great God through prayer. And my prayer, of course, is for yourself and myself that we'll be men and women of prayer. Let us pray.