Now I just want to give you a little appetizer that doesn't directly bear on what I'm going to be focusing on today but is an encouragement I trust to you as a church in terms of some of your corporate prayer meetings and maybe it will even be an encouragement to you on occasions to call for a special prayer meeting for a special cause. This was given to me by one of the brethren in our church who was a church historian and a man who has a vast amount of knowledge, particularly in the area of Baptist history and English Baptist during the 16 and 1700s. There was an elder in the church by the name of Edward Terrell. His pastor's name was Thomas Hardcastle. Some of you may have heard of him. He's a most interesting man to learn about. He pastored the Broadmead Baptist Church in Bristol, England. And he asked his fellow elder, Edward Terrell, to keep the records of the church and to keep some archives. And this one I'm about to read for you was written in the 1670s. And it's about a peculiar trial that came to that church. And again, my hope is that as you listen to this, you say, that's good. That's good they did that. Man, maybe someday God will call us to do that. That's how we're responding to it in Owensboro. Upon the 23rd day of this second month in 1673, a sad providence fell out to this congregation, which was this. Our brother John Fry, a bachelor, fell distracted. First, it came upon him in a way of despairing. that he was lost and damned. Then he broke out in bad language to all the brethren that came near him, calling them very bad names and immodest expressions to some women, raving and striking them that came near to hold him. And when they were forced to bind him on a bed, he would spit at some and use such vile and grievous words. It was consternation of spirit to all who knew him, it being so directly opposite and contrary to the whole frame of his former way and temper, and being thus sorely assaulted and pressed by the devil. He did also break forth into such dreadful and horrible expressions against the holy deity, at some times with such blasphemous words that it made the hearts of all who heard it to ache and the hair of their heads as it were to stand on end. and their spirits to be so pressed thereby, hardly able to contain it, to be in the room near him, being so astonished that the Lord had suffered to befall this brother, that the testimony of all, good and bad, that he had a very lovely, humble conversation or behavior of life, and judged that he walked close with God. A member of another congregation in the city, a doctor, said that he lived several years with him, and basically said that he witnessed such apparent godliness. His distraction broke in upon him on the fourth day of the week called Wednesday and grew higher and higher into great raging. Physical means were used, but all in vain. Most persuaded he should be carried into the country for help, but some of the brethren desired the church to seek the Lord by fasting and prayer to the Lord to heal and deliver him. Whereupon, the second day following being the 28th day of the month, the congregation kept a day of prayer in our brother Fry's home and in the room where he was in the bed bound. But his raging was so great in the beginning of the day that we thought we should not have been able to have continued in the room. Yet, notwithstanding, a brother began the work of the day by him. The day was, by the Lord's assistance, carried on And a gracious answer of prayer was given by the Lord, as we did seem to apprehend, insomuch that the spirit of rage left him in a great measure, that it ceased the evening of that day before we parted from him. Praise only be to the Lord. And then it goes on to tell how, though he was recovered from that particular kind of despairing, a spirit of fear came over him several days later. And the church got together again and prayed. They said, we're going to pray for him that he'll be delivered from this. And he was wonderfully delivered from that. And then finally, one more thing happened to him. He began to reflect back on how horribly he had behaved and how he had blasphemed God and how he had doubted God's goodness. He was overcome with a spirit of shame. And the congregation said, let's get together and pray again. The congregation fasted and they prayed and the Lord wonderfully delivered him from the spirit of shame. And his life was radically changed for the rest of his life and he was able to go back into his work and his business and serve the Lord and carry out a beautiful testimony. Now that happened in a church in Bristol, England in the 1670s later one of the pastors of that church became a signer of the 1689 Confession of Faith. But I only read it because it's beautiful to see how a church can rally to the needs of the body and trust God to do the extraordinary, trust Him to do things that they cannot do. And they fasted and they prayed and the Lord met their needs. And I would hope that your church and our church in Owensboro and the church in Louisville and the church in Hartsville will be more and more responsive to peculiar needs that arise and that many people will quickly say, maybe even before the pastors say it, could we just meet and pray about that? Could we declare a day of fasting and seek the Lord for his special help? If you suggest that to your pastors, they're not going to be like, well, who do you think you are suggesting to us? They're going to say, good idea, brother. Good idea, sister. Thank you for being burdened about that. They will be encouraged. Now, I'm going to ask you in this last session to please turn in your Bibles to Genesis chapter 32. And we will be looking this morning, I guess it's It's afternoon. We are going to be looking at just two more examples of prayer. And we will be focusing especially upon our need to persevere in prayer. The definition of prayer that I submitted to you on Friday and reiterated yesterday is simply this. Prayer is coming by faith into the presence of God in the name of Jesus and by the help of the Holy Spirit to humbly confess our sins joyfully adore his majesty, sincerely express our thankfulness, and fervently petition his grace. For those things we believe are in accord with his revealed will, and if granted, would bring him glory. We've been thinking in each of these sessions about the fourth dimension of prayer, and that is fervently petitioning his grace. More particularly, we've been thinking about the elements, the essential ingredients of petitioning prayer when we are asking for something extraordinary, when we know that we need supernatural help, an intervention from God that would virtually have to be called miraculous. That's the very focus interest of each of the messages that I have brought. And I have said that we must have faith, a growing, strong faith. We must be fervent in our prayers. We ought to utilize holy arguments when we come to God. But here's what I want to say now. We must not give up quickly. We must not become weary in well-doing. We must persevere. We must hold on. We must not let go of our grip of God's throne until we have obtained the blessing or until in some inconceivable way He makes it clear that we should not continue to pray. So we must persevere. Are you a man or woman whose prayer life is characterized by faith, fervency, holy argument, and perseverance? I want to encourage us in this hour to persevere in praying for those things that we really believe are according to the revealed will of God, or at least not contrary to the reveal of God, and we really believe that if you would answer this, it would be something that would redound to His glory, because it's good. I want to encourage you to not let down and to not give up. I want to be able to talk to Pastor Ben or Pastor Steve in years to come and say, how is that situation that you've been praying about? And they say, you know, the Lord has not yet answered, but we're not giving up. We're still praying as a church. In fact, we're more intense now than we've ever been. That's what I would hope to hear and I hope you would hear similar things from us. Now there are two examples that I want us to see this afternoon about perseverance. The first example comes from the Old Testament and the second comes from the New Testament. In Genesis chapter 32, we have a beautiful example of persevering prayer from the life of Jacob. grandson of Abraham, son of Isaac. Now, you remember a little bit about what Jacob's life was like. And you remember that he stole the blessing from his brother. And his brother was extremely angry with him for that. I won't have you turn here, but I'm going to tell you what his brother said after he realized that Jacob had stolen the blessing. It says, now Esau hated Jacob because the blessing with which his father had blessed him. And Esau said to himself, the days of mourning for my father are approaching. His dad is going to die relatively soon. Then I will kill my brother Jacob. He was very, very, very angry and bitter. And Jacob had every reason to believe that someday his brother would attempt to kill him. And yet Jacob knew that God had promised that he would raise up a seed for him. But nevertheless, he was fearful. And in chapter 32, Jacob had heard that his brother Esau was coming to meet him. You will see that in verse 6, the messengers told him that Esau is coming to meet you and there are 400 men with him. And then no wonder we read in verse 7, then Jacob was greatly afraid and distressed. He had reason to be greatly afraid and distressed, at least from a human perspective. That night, he had some serious dealings with God. And he was like we are. We get really serious about prayer when we're really in trouble. When there's something very fearful approaching. And yet God is so gracious. God meets us and blesses us and helps us even in those times. And we read about the prayer meeting that Jacob had with God, if you will. And we find it in verses 22 and following. So may I just read that now. The same night he arose and took his two wives and his two female servants and his eleven children and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. He took them and sent them across the stream and everything else that he had. And Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day. When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he touched his hip socket, and Jacob's hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. Now, as we read that, just imagine that it's the first time you've ever read it. If you're really thinking, you could say, wait a minute. He couldn't prevail. but he could touch his hip and cause his socket to go out of joint? This is not an ordinary man. If he could do that, surely he could prevail. So at least we're struck with that if we read it. Then when you come to verse 28, it says, then he said, now this is the man who touched his hip socket. He said, this is not Jacob. This is the man. Let me go. For the day has broken. But Jacob said, I will not let you go unless you bless me. Then we hear ding, ding, ding, ding, ding again. And Jacob is realizing that this is not merely a man. He knows it because he's been touched. He probably knew it in some other way, perhaps subjectively. He's so persuaded that it is more than an ordinary mere man that he says, no, I need a blessing and I'm not going to let you go unless you bless me. And the man says to him, what is your name? And he said, Jacob. And then he said, your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel. For, here's why you're going to have a new name, for you have striven with God and with men and have prevailed. Wait a minute. You have striven with God and prevailed? You and God having a wrestling match? And you prevailed over God? I would never say that. that God says it in His Word. That's what God's Word says. Then Jacob asked him, Please tell me your name. But he said, Why? Why is it that you ask my name? And there he blessed him. So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, saying, For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been delivered. The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip. Therefore, to this day, the people of Israel do not eat the sinew of the thigh that is on the hip socket because he touched the socket of Jacob's hip on the sinew of the thigh. So it became a custom in Israel not to eat that part of the hip of an animal because it was their way of always remembering what happened to their forefather, Jacob. Now, if we could have interviewed Jacob real quickly that morning, just before he got about his business the rest of the day, and says, now who do you think you were really wrestling with? He would say, I already told you. God. He wasn't wrong. God, as our catechisms teach us, has not a body like men. God is a spirit and has not a body like men. But God sometimes took on a body like men. Jesus did that. I mean, the Son of God did that. And he became incarnate. But there were times in the Old Testament that God made appearances. We call them theophanies. And the second person of the Trinity made appearances. We call those Christophanies. In this particular case, God took the form of a man. In a sense, incarnated himself. But it was really God that Jacob was wrestling with. And at some point during that wrestling match, Jacob became aware of the fact that he was dealing with God. And he knew he needed a blessing. And he was determined to get that blessing. He had faith that he could get that blessing because he believed that God could give him that blessing. And that God would give him that blessing. And he was fervent in asking for that blessing. And actually, in an earlier prayer, he used holy argument in obtaining that blessing, but it was more of a normal prayer in the very same chapter. If you notice in verse 10, Jacob is praying to God and he says, I'm not worthy of the least of all the deeds of steadfast love and all the faithfulness that you have shown to your servant for With only my staff I crossed this Jordan. Now I've become two camps. Notice the prayer request. Please deliver me from the hand of my brother, from the hand of Esau, for I fear him. It's okay to pray to God to be rescued from peculiar situations, even if it's your fault that you got into it. You know, Jacob, how do you dare to ask God for help? It's your fault that your brother hates you, isn't it? You were stupid. People hate you because you're stupid. It's your fault. You're going to go to God? You're going to ask God to help you for a problem that you brought on yourself? Yes, because first, I need Him, and secondly, because God is so gracious. He's so gracious. And then notice, after he says, deliver me from the hand of my brother, For I fear him, that he may come and attack me, the mothers with the children." Notice his argument. But you said, who's you? God. You said, you will surely do you good. I will surely do you good and make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered for multitude. God, if my brother kills me, your promise won't come true. A convenient argument for a man whose life is in jeopardy, but still a true argument, a legitimate argument. So, we're seeing all the ingredients of prayer in this man. Faith, fervency, holy argument, and what we're really looking at now in the wrestling match, which was in a sense a prayer, well, it became a prayer, is perseverance. Perseverance in prayer is us saying to God, God, we're not going to quit praying about this. We're seeking to lay hold of you, and we believe we have hold of you by faith, but we're not going to let you go unless you bless us. How long are you going to hold on to me? God may say. Until you bless us. You mean you're going to hold on to me tomorrow, too? Yep. Next week? Yep. Next year? Yep. We're going to hold on to you, God, until it's hopeless, until there's no longer any reason to hold on to you. We will not let you go until you bless us. And I want to say again, maybe for the last time, that I think as Reformed people, we have a tendency to let go too soon because of our high view of the absolute sovereignty of God, and we default to the sovereignty of God instead of persevering. Should we relinquish our views of the absolute sovereignty? Of course not. But neither should we quit praying so quickly. And one more time I want to tell you that the reason Paul quit praying after only three times was because God told him to quit praying. And when God tells you to quit praying after three times, and I don't expect He's going to tell you the same way He told Saul, but if He tells you to quit praying and you are absolutely sure He's told you to quit praying, I don't know how He's going to tell you that, then you quit. But we don't quickly default to that because, well, that's what Paul did. He just prayed three times, and I think that really shows how quickly he submitted to the sovereignty of God. No, that's not what it shows. It just shows that he obeyed God when God said, there's no need for you to pray about this because I've got a better plan. So we need to persevere in our praying. That's the point, and that's what I want you to appreciate. Now, I want you to see how faith helped. Jacob to keep praying. When this person that he, I think, came to realize was God, because it was after he touched his hip, the man said, God really said, let me go. Now, Jacob, by faith, realizes that this person is, I don't know how to put this, is in a sense submitting to what he's doing. It is this person saying, you are presently prevailing over me. And Jacob took hope from the very request to let me go, that he didn't have to let him go, that he could continue to hang on. And so by faith he says, no, I'm not going to let you go. He took encouragement from the request to let me go. And it doesn't make sense because, I mean, in one sense it doesn't make sense because it's God talking. God saying to a man, let me go? Yes. But it's really God encouraging him not to let him go. Because he's presenting it in a way as if he needed permission. God doesn't really need permission, but he's encouraging Jacob with the power that he presently was exercising. And we need to see that in the challenges that we have. I don't know if that made sense to you or not, but I want to read to you another quote from a Puritan. that is pretty astounding and shocking to hear. It's the kind of thing that you just don't feel like it's right, again, for a person to pray. And this is Thomas Brooks. And I think I made a mistake the other night in attributing that great treatise, The Privy Key to Heaven, and I think I said that it was Richard Sibbes. It wasn't Richard Sibbes, it was Thomas Brooks. And this is what Brooks says, he says, in this conflict, you have not one man wrestling with another man, nor do you have one man wrestling with a created angel. But what you have is a poor, weak, mortal man wrestling with an immortal God. I mean, we're all there so far that this was God. Jacob said it was God. He knew it was God. The Bible says it was God. Brooks is saying, think about it. One man, a mortal man, wrestling with an immortal God. Weakness wrestling with strength. A finite being with an infinite being. Though Jacob had no second, that is, no person to come along. It's like tag team wrestling, and now he reaches and touches his friend who's going to take over. He had no second, though he was all alone, though he was wonderfully overmatched. Of course he was overmatched. It was God. Yet, he wrestles and keeps his hold, and all in the strength of Him he wrestles with. Did you hear that? The ability to persevere in prayer with God is an ability that God Himself gives. He's wrestling with a man who says, let me go. And the reason why he has the power to say, no, I'm not going to let you go, is because the person with whom he's wrestling is God, who's giving him the strength, the faith to say, no, I'm not going to let you go. I don't know if that makes any sense to you. It's a mystery. But when we wrestle with God perseveringly and find the ability to sincerely say, No God, we can't let you go. No God, you cannot let my friend die, Luther says. When we have the strength to say that, and we believe we have biblical grounds because it's not contrary to the revealed will of God and we really think there are good reasons to keep pressing on, that strength that we have is actually coming from God and we should be encouraged to continue to pray that way because in a sense it's God who's enabling us to pray that way. So take encouragement in persevering grace. From your viewpoint, say, I've got to keep persevering. But as you persevere, recognize that God is helping you to persevere. And then Brooks goes on to say this. Now, if you can accept this at face value, wow. When I first read it, I just said, Mr. Brooks, we're going to have to talk about that when I get to heaven. Because I don't think you should have put it like that. But now I wouldn't say that. But just listen to this. This doesn't sound right. Brooks says, Oh, the power of prayer. It has a kind of omnipotency. Prayer has a kind of omnipotency? Yes, because prayer lays hold of an omnipotent God. It takes God captive. It holds Him as a prisoner. It binds the hands of the Almighty. Yea, yes, it will ring a mercy, a blessing out of the hand of heaven itself. Oh, the power of prayer that makes a man victorious over the greatest, the highest power. And you see why when you first read that, that just doesn't ring right. Part of the reason is because most all of us came out of Arminianism And, you know, we had this wrong view of God, and this wrong view of how powerful man is, and God wonderfully delivered us from all of that. We came to see that man is nothing and is impotent, and God is everything, and He's omnipotent, and God is sovereign, and no man's will is stronger than the will of God. We embraced all that, and we love it, and we'd die for that. And we love that so much that when somebody comes along and says to us that prayer has a kind of omnipotency in it, and that it takes God captive, and it holds Him prisoner, and it binds the hands of the Almighty. We're prone to say, I don't think you should say that. But you have to understand, Brooks believed every bit as much as we believed in the absolute sovereignty of God and the impotency of man. He's talking about a kind of prevalence. Now, if you struggle with what Brooks said, then I submit that you also are going to have to struggle with what God said. Because go back to your text and notice that it says in verse 28, And this is God speaking. You have striven or struggled or wrestled with God and with men and have prevailed. God was willing for us to view this wrestling match as one that the man won and God lost. That's what God says. So if you get a problem with Brooks, You've got a bigger problem with God because what Brooks is saying is really just opening up the power that prayer can have when God himself is blessing it with God. No wonder Octavius Woodenslow said, I don't understand this stuff. I just submit my reason to my faith and love it. And love the truth. I just love the truth. There's one more thing I want to read to you about Jacob. And this I have put in my Bible, because I love this statement. He says, So when Jacob was with God alone, ah, how earnest and fervent he was in his rustlings with God. He rustles and weeps and weeps and rustles. He tugs hard with God. He holds his hold and he will not let God go till as a prince he had prevailed with him. Fervent prayer And this is what I really love. Fervent prayer is the soul's contention. The soul struggling with God. It is a sweating work. It is the sweat and blood of the soul. It is a laying out to the uttermost all the strength and powers of the soul. He that would gain victory over God in private prayer... Is that legitimate language? Yes. You have striven with God and prevailed. He that would gain victory over God in private prayer must strain every string of his heart. He must, in beseeching God, besiege him and so get the better of him. He must, like an unfortunate beggar, be like unfortunate beggars that will not be put off with frowns or silence or sad answers. Those that would be masters of their requests must, like the unfortunate widow, press God so far as to put Him to a holy blush. As I may say with reverence, they must with a holy impudence make God ashamed to look them in the face if He should deny the importunity of their souls. I was thinking that was Spurgeon who said that it was Brooks. Now maybe you're not ready to receive that kind of description of the power of prayer. But I think we should be. He that would gain victory over God in private prayer must strain every string of his heart. He must, in beseeching God, besiege him, and so get the better of him. He must be like importunate beggars that will not be put off with frowns or silence or sad answers. Those that would be masters of their requests must, like the importunate widow, press God so far as to put him to a holy blush. as I may say with reverence, they must with a holy impudence make God ashamed to look them in the face if He should deny the importunity of their souls." That's a pretty astounding statement. And I want to ask you, as I ask my own conscience this morning, is that the way you pray? Have you ever prayed like that? If you pray like that, then you will be Like Fester, Stephen prayed last night, you won't be falling asleep in the prayer, you'll be exhausted after the prayer. And, you know, one of the ladies was saying to me last night, she said, isn't it sad that sometimes we can't even remember after we prayed what we prayed for? And while she was saying that, I was thinking, if you had a child that had a terrible accident, and they were in the hospital, in the ER, and they're just working furiously with the child, and the doctor says, we're going into surgery, but I'm going to have to tell you right now, The chances are far greater that your daughter will not make it. It's extremely risky. There's an outside possibility. And I'm going into surgery now. You're going to go to the chapel, if they have one in that hospital, and you're probably going to lay flat on the floor. You don't care who's in there. You're going to cry. You're going to plead with God. You're going to beg Him. You're going to give Him every reason you can think of. You're going to be fervent. You're going to be earnest. And when you come out of that chapel just weary and tired and your eyes red and your face swollen, if someone comes to you and said, what did you pray when you were in there? Would you say, you know, I can't really remember. I just don't remember. I know it was some pretty good stuff, but I don't know. You're going to say, I asked God to save her life. I asked God to help the surgeon. I ask God to give me my daughter. I ask God to forgive me for living in such a way that I don't deserve to be asking Him for such a blessing. You're not going to have any trouble knowing what you prayed. Now, I know we can't pray that way all the time. And I know that a crisis brings out that type of thing. But I would submit to you, we have a lot of crises if we just open our eyes and look. And it's like my fellow pastor said, if your children Living under the wrath of God is not a crisis. I don't know what is. We've got plenty to pray about and to be important about. Okay, I'm not going to take nearly as much time to look at the second illustration. Very quickly, New Testament, one in the New Testament. I'm going to try to take half as much time, just quickly to see this woman, Matthew chapter 15. She was a Gentile. She was A Canaanite woman. Matthew 15. The story is in verse 21 and following. We're told Jesus went away from there and withdrew to the district of Tyre and Sidon. Verse 22. And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying, Have mercy upon me, O Lord, Son of David. My daughter is severely oppressed by a demon." But he did not answer her a word. And his disciples came and begged him, saying, Send her away, for she is crying out after us. And he answered to his disciples, in her hearing, I'm sure, I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. But she came and knelt before him, saying, Lord, help me! Then he answered, It is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. She said, Yes, Lord. Yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table. Then Jesus answered, O woman, great is your faith. Remember I said Friday night there are degrees of faith? There are degrees of faith. He says to his disciples, because of the littleness of your faith, he says to the woman, great is your faith. Be it done for you as you desire. Now, very quickly, I want you to see something beautiful in Mark's account of this, in Mark chapter 7, because we have a composite picture here, and we learn from this story that her daughter was home, on a bed. But there's something beautiful that I want you to see, and I guess I'll just jump in with verse Mark 7.26, Now the woman was a Gentile, sire of Phoenician by birth, and she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. The other night we saw a man, a father, who had a demon possessed son. Now we have a mother who has a demon possessed daughter. And he said to her, Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children's bread and to throw it to the dogs." But she answered him, Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs. And he said to her, For this statement you may go your way. You see, because this statement revealed faith, For this statement, you may go your way. The demon has left your daughter. It's already gone. And she went home and found the child lying in bed. And the demon gone. Now, there's just two things I want you to see about the case of the Canaanite woman. One is the fact that she did persevere. You see that especially in Matthew. Because you see, in Matthew's account, we find, back to chapter 15, She was crying, have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David. And what did Jesus do? Nothing. Then apparently what she does is she says, OK, I'm going to have to try something else. I'm going to plead with the disciples. And she apparently keeps pleading with them because the way they put it to Jesus is that she just keeps doing this. Jesus, will you please deal with her? Will you do something for her? Will you send her away or help her? Because she's basically driving us crazy. Persevering. And she comes to Jesus again and this time she bows down. She says, maybe I haven't approached Him well. Maybe I haven't been humble enough. Maybe my request isn't as it ought to be. And she begs Him. That's from verse 25. Lord, help me! And He pours a big bucket of ice water on her. He says, it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. And she still holds on to her grip. This is her way of saying, Lord, I'm not going to let You go unless You bless me. Yes, Lord. Yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table. Then Jesus does what he planned to do all along. He planned to do this all along. He was drawing out her faith. He was drawing out her earnestness. And in a sense, he was demonstrating to you folks and to me that we shouldn't quit too soon. We need to keep praying. There's a whole parable about that in Luke 18. And he told them this parable so that men would continue to pray and not lose heart. Remember the widow who just kept, kept, kept, kept coming to the unjust judge? And then Jesus makes an argument. If that's what a sinful judge will do for someone who continues to pray, what do you think God will do? And this woman is doing this. She's like, Jacob, I'm not going to let you go until you bless me. I'm persevering in prayer. This is a good cause. This is a good thing. So that's the first thing I want you to see. Humanly speaking, had she quit after she first went to Jesus, humanly speaking, I mean, that's the only way you can think about it, she wouldn't have obtained the blessing. But she just keeps pressing. Keeps pressing. And the second thing I want you to see is the holy argument back in Mark chapter 7. She latched on to a word. And I think faith is what helped her see the word. It was in Jesus. It came out of Jesus' mouth in Mark chapter 7. Sometimes it's hard to figure out. Is this faith? Is this fervency? Is this holy argument? Or is this perseverance? And the answer is yes. It's faith. It's fervency. It's holy argument. It's perseverance. In one sense, she's the best example of all four things I've been trying to preach on, though we kind of saw it with Elijah on Mount Carmel. It's all here. And Jesus says to her in Mark 7, verse 27, Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. And the second she hears the word First, she takes hope. And she says, then maybe there's a second. Maybe there's a second place. Okay, that's good enough for me. If there's a first, hopefully there's a second. Go ahead and give the bread to the children first. May I be second? You're right, Jesus, I'm not one of the children, I'm a Gentile. And she goes on even further, because he goes on further, he doesn't just say, let the children be fed first. He continues to speak, and he says, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs. And it's as if she says, but also, in addition to recognizing that I'm not one of the children, I agree with that, and I agree with you that I'm a dog. Okay, I'm a dog. I'm a dog. It's fine. But Jesus, don't some crumbs normally fall on the floor after the bread is given to the children? And isn't it rather ordinary for a house dog to be able to pick up the crumbs and eat the crumbs? I'll take the crumbs. I'm glad to say I'm a dog. Just a crumb, God and Jesus, if you just give me a crumb of grace, my daughter will be delivered from the demon. So, you see why I'm saying, I don't know if this is, I think this is all, I think it's faith and fervency and holy argument, perseverance, it's all wrapped up in there. And Jesus says to her, you may, for this statement, you may go your way. But what I love is what he also said. He didn't say two different things. He said all of these things. He also said to her, because of your faith, oh woman, great is your faith, be it done for you as you desire. One of the old writers said that because faith most glorifies Christ, Christ of all the graces, faith does most glorify Christ. Because faith most glorifies Christ. Christ most glorifies faith. Oh, woman. He could have complimented her fervency. He could have complimented her ability to be quick-witted and utilize holy argument. He could have complimented her perseverance. that he complimented instead that grace which produces fervency and holy argument and perseverance. Faith. Faith is the fundamental, foundational grace. And so he says, O woman, great is your faith. So there is such a thing as great faith. Some people say, never speak of a man as being a great man of faith or a woman as a great woman of faith. That draws attention to man. Well, you're holier than Jesus. Jesus said, oh woman, great is your faith. You have a large measure of faith. And she wasn't going to take any pride in that because faith is looking outside of yourself to someone else. And we know that faith is a gift. So, there we have two beautiful pictures of perseverance. And I summarize it all now and leave you with this challenge. When we pray, Often it includes the confession of our sins and the adoring of God's majesty and giving thanks for all His goodness and His kindness. But sometimes it also includes petitioning. And sometimes when we are petitioning God, we are asking Him to do the impossible. The things that are impossible with men are possible with God. And I've come this week to challenge you with what I have challenged our congregation with, and that is that as a church and as individuals who make up the church, we need to learn how to prevail with God in seeking that which is seemingly impossible. In seeking that which, if He grants us, we would have to say, that was supernatural. That was a divine intervention. What will it take for us to petition God that way? Faith, fervency, holy argument, and perseverance. And we need help. And if we can pray more and more like that, God will get more and more glory. And we will have astounding answers to prayer. I hope, I told you a while ago what I hope to hear someday from Pastor Ben, Pastor Steven, that you're persevering. May I add one more thing? I hope that someday when I'm talking to either of your pastors or any of you, say, how are things going in Nashville? You say to me, some amazing things happening. I say, what do you mean? We have had some answers to prayer that are extraordinary. Tell me about it. How did that happen? And you will say, God gave us grace to pray to him in a way that we didn't used to be able to pray. With more faith, and more fervency, and more holy argument, and more perseverance than we've ever known before. And he blessed that means, and has done marvelous things in our midst. That's what I hope to hear, and that's what I hope you get to hear from us. because we have a great God. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, one more time we need to say to you that we don't pray the way we should pray. Our prayers are a poor reflection upon you if the world is watching us. We know that you are worthy of prayers that should be filled with so much more faith so much more fervency, so much more holy argument perseverance. And so Lord, we pray with the disciples of old, perhaps in a little different meaning, teach us to pray. Teach us to pray like that. Lord, isn't it a fact that a greater faith in our hearts and in our prayers would bring you a greater glory? And God, that you might be more glorified by our prayers. Help us to pray as we are. Bless this church. We thank you for the Reformed Baptist Church of Nashville and for its pastors and its people. May this church continue to be a great lighthouse in this community. May people talk in this community about the God of the Reformed Baptist Church of Nashville. And may great things be done here and happen here. And may the word spread and may people come to hear the gospel about this great God. So help us, Lord, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.