out on it. It was old and cracked so I had to get that off there and take off the clutch under the engine to get it out around there. Then go track down the new belt and wrestle it back on there, deal with pulley tensioners, things like that. So I finally did get the yard mowed last night, and that was about all I could do. So a little bit tired this morning, but here we are. And is there anything that we need to pray about this morning? I know Pastor's not feeling well, having a little bit of a stomach issue. And we just need to remember those who can't be with us as well. those elderly people who have a hard time getting out, or those just recovering from surgery. Linda, especially. Yeah, it's a praise for her. Three stints, and it was very successful. OK. Three stints and successful. We like to hear the successful part. So we'll pray that she recovers. And then we'll pray for Jeff Rod's mother, who's Oh, she did. Oh, well, we'll pray for the Rod family and the Lord's working in their lives to comfort them and help them make arrangements. Is there anything else this morning you know of that we need to lift up in prayer? Okay, well let's go ahead and pray this morning then. Heavenly Father, I thank you so much for your kindness to us and your goodness. Even when we walk through deep valleys sometimes, you are right there with us, helping us and watching over us. And we pray especially for the Rod family this morning. We pray you would comfort them and help them. Help Jeff to be able to make arrangements and coordinate everything that he needs to do. and help them to just mourn properly and remember the good memories. And we also pray that you would help Pastor with his stomach issue this morning, help him to feel better and recover from that. And also I pray for Adele that you will help him to preach well this morning with clarity of thought and just work with your spirit in his message this morning. And we also pray for those who are not feeling very well this morning that you would help them and comfort them and just lift them up to be with us once again. And we praise you for the success of Linda's surgery. We thank you that you guided the hands of the surgeons and that she is recovering. We pray that you make full recovery. We also pray for those who are not able to gather with us any longer. that you would bless them and help them as they worship you in their homes this morning, and that you would just keep them day by day and give them the strength that they so much need to just do the everyday, ordinary things. I pray that you would bless this lesson this morning, that your name would be exalted and lifted up, and that we would learn what it is you want us to know. It's in Jesus' name I pray, amen. So I will start out as I have by reading from the Valley of Vision once again. This one is called A Christian's Prayer. Blessed God, 10,000 snares are mine without and within. Defend thou me when sloth and indolence seize me. Give me views of heaven. When sinners entice me, give me disrelish of their ways. When sensual pleasures tempt me, purify and refine me. When I desire worldly possessions, help me to be rich toward thee. When the vanities of the world ensnare me, let me not plunge into new guilt and ruin. May I remember the dignity of my spiritual release. Never be too busy to attend to my soul. Never be so engrossed with time that I neglect the things of eternity. Thus may I not only live, but grow towards thee. From my mind to right notions of religion, for my mind, to right notions of religion, that I may not judge of grace by wrong conceptions, nor measure my spiritual advances by the efforts of my natural being. May I seek after an increase of divine love to thee, after unreserved resignation to thy will, after extensive benevolence to my fellow creatures, after patience and fortitude of soul, After a heavenly disposition, after a concern that I may please thee in public and private, draw on my soul the liniments of Christ in every trace and feature of which thou wilt take delight. For I am thy workmanship created in Christ Jesus, thy letter written with the Holy Spirit's pen, thy tilled soil ready for the sowing, then harvest. Beautiful prayers in this little booklet. And we'll be talking this morning about prayer. The lesson is about the Lord's Prayer. So open your Bibles, if you will, to Matthew chapter six, and that's where we'll be taking stock of what's written there. And the model prayer, a prayer that's familiar, I would say, to many of you. You may have even had parents or grandparents who might have prayed this prayer every evening before they went to bed or something like that. And we'll talk about all of that and whether or not that that is appropriate for Christians to do or should be done. And what does the meaning of this prayer entail? What can we learn from it? And how should we pray? I really think that as Christians, we've been given so many riches of grace. We've been given so many treasures in the Word, and so many privileges. What are some of the names that we're called in Scripture, that Christians are called? We're called the chosen people. We're called a people who are zealous of good works. We're called the children of God. We're called kings. We're called saints. So many different titles given to the Christian, but it all relates back to God. So we want to be like God in those things. We want to know what he's given us. We want to take stock of all that he's privileged us to know. and use our resources. It's easy for us to imagine this. If someone deposits a huge check in your bank account, how many would object to that? I don't think anyone would object to that. If someone deposits a huge check in your bank account, you would know probably exactly what you'd do with that. But we've been given riches and treasures, especially the privilege of prayer. That is a privilege far beyond anything else we've been given in terms of not surpassing our salvation, but in terms of the privileges we have before God. To come before His throne and to love Him, well, He gives us examples of prayer, and Let's review, let's start out in this chapter six, and look at verse six. This is part of the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus talks about prayer. And we could actually back up, let's back up all the way to the first verse of the chapter. Take heed that you do not do your charitable deeds before men to be seen by them. Otherwise you have no reward from your Father in heaven. Therefore when you do a charitable deed, Do not sound a trumpet before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory from men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. But when you do a charitable deed, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, that your charitable deed may be done in secret. And your father who sees in secret will himself reward you openly." And then he moves to talking specifically about prayer. And when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your father, who is in the secret place. And your father, who sees in secret, will reward you openly. And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore do not be like them, for your father knows the things you have need of before you ask him. In this manner, therefore, pray. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. For if you forgive men their trespasses, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. So that concludes the section on prayer and a little bit of the context there. And after that, from verse 16 downwards a little bit to verse 18, Jesus talks about fasting as well. And that's a theme that reoccurs over and over, where you see prayer connected with fasting. So link them together in your minds, just as the scripture tries to link them together here. Link prayer and fasting, but that's not our topic this morning. We'll focus on prayer, and more specifically, this Lord's Prayer. But from the context, we do need to draw several important lessons. First off, our prayers should be, at least some of the time, I would say most of the time in secret. They should be in secret to ourselves. We should have a place where we can go. It doesn't matter if it's a prayer closet or not. You've seen maybe a movie, a popular movie, I think it was called War Room, where a lady goes into her prayer closet. And perhaps several Christians have that same experience. But you can pray in a secluded area. It's best to get away from distractions when you pray. Because that will allow you to focus on God and focus on what He wants you to be thinking about at that time. And have you ever noticed when you sit down and you try to pray, if there's anything that you've forgotten about, you instantly remember it? You'll remember if you misplace something. Oh yeah, I left that across here. I need to go run this errand. So having a time of prayer, really, we should try to focus ourselves and get in the proper mindset before we begin to pray. Otherwise, we will let those distractions and temptations lead us into doing other things. And then what happens? Well, before we know it, the time that we have to pray is gone, and we have to get on with those other things that are necessary for us to do. We have to go take care of things and cook meals and do all those humanly things that we do that can distract us if we let them. But if we put them in their proper place and we put prayer in its proper place, then we can have some real spiritual benefit. The next thing, if you look at verse seven, and when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. I think that this is pretty plain, and on its face you can understand the meaning of this. It's not as if the more that you pray, if you pray and you say a million words, you do not have more of a chance of God doing exactly what you want, as if you just said, more so than if you just said a one-word prayer. Sometimes all we have time for, all we think to do in some situations is to just pray one word, and sometimes that word is help. Or two words, help me. Or four words, help me please now. There are some situations, emergencies that come up, And we should pray as much as we can in those emergencies, but we may only have the ability to just pray. Or maybe we're so distraught by what's happening to us or happening to someone else that all we can think about is just praying one word, help. But don't pray repeating the same thing over and over and over. just to try to gain favor with God, it won't work. Let your prayers be sincere. When's the last time that you considered that, if your prayers were sincere or if they were just kind of going through habits that you formed over time? Are they personal? What do I mean by that? I mean, do you view God as someone who knows the most, the innermost depths of your heart? Or is he more of kind of like a corporate entity to you? You're not praying to this giant corporation. You're not sending a business letter to God. You pray, open your heart up to him. He knows the innermost depths of it, but come to him and treat him like a father. I use kind of the old King James word, entreat him. Plead to him like you would plea, and many of you know what I'm talking about in this. Like a child goes up to their parent, whether it's a little boy or a little girl coming up to their mother or coming up to their father or both of them, saying, I really need this, can I have this? or whatever it is. It's not just a request for some object. Sometimes it's, I'm scared, I need help. I don't know what to do in this situation. Well, when we compare ourselves to the infinite magnificence and wisdom of God, we can come before him like a child. We can say, I don't know what to do. Even grown men can do that. You know, it's not to be shunned because you think it might be a little humiliating. Come before Him with humbleness. You're not so grown up that you've ceased to need the help of God. You've never got to that point in your spiritual life where you don't need to pray. So how should we pray? What should we pray for? So we're told, do not be like the heathen. Of course, we've got many examples in the Bible of the heathen. We've got many examples in life of the heathen praying. And often it's just in the time when they feel they're near death. If the only time you pray, let me give this warning, if the only time you pray has been a time when you felt that you would almost certainly die, then consider whether or not you are a Christian. Because a Christian wants to go before God and pray to him and be fed by the word to have things to pray about. They want to do that day by day. It may not be perfectly. I don't know what each of your prayer life looks like. If it's anything like mine, then we've got a lot to work on. We really do. We need to be dependent on God in prayer. But we shouldn't be like the heathen. We shouldn't be like those who would even go as far as to go up to an altar and make gross sacrifices on the altar. And like the prophets of Baal, no relation, cutting themselves to try and wake up their sleeping God, supposedly. No. We can never do that to God. He will listen to us if our hearts are right. If our hearts are right, he will listen. So how do we pray then? Well, we pray also in verse eight, knowing that God knows exactly what we need. Remind yourself of the faithfulness of God. Don't think of God as cold and uncaring. Even if you have not been loving God like you should, Don't think of him like he is subject to human passions and whims like we are. Yes, Christ was tempted in all points like we are. but he never sinned, not in thought, not in word, not in deed, not in any emotion that he ever had did he ever sin. And God does not have passions that change from one day to another. He knows what we have need of, and he loves us enough to provide us with exactly what we need, when, exactly when we need it. So we can trust him. Trust God when you pray. And also pray. Pray after, use the patterns of scripture. But don't pray them as if they will gain you favor with God just by praying. These aren't magic words. Now the Word of God does have power, and that's why I read the Word of God, whether I'm teaching or preaching. I want the Word to work in your lives, work in your hearts, and I believe just hearing the Word without any explanation, if you have the Holy Spirit, dwelling within you, the Holy Spirit will illuminate those words. He will help you to understand. But hopefully, some of my teaching, my explanation can be a blessing to you as well. We find over 15 times that Jesus himself is recorded as praying. but we know that's not all of the prayers of Jesus. But those 15 prayers, those 15 times that he prays, those are important. Pay attention when Jesus prays in Scripture. What's the reason he's praying? I think it'd be interesting to do a study of all the prayers of Jesus in the Scripture, when they happened, what were the specific circumstances, why did he pray those things? But the Bible is not a book of formulas. All right? This is not our science textbook that we open up and we do a little chemistry experiment and figure out, well, I didn't quite say this word with the right tone, so I need to adjust this next time. It's not science. It's faith. And we need to have faith that God will hear us as long as we are dedicated to holiness, As long as we want to be close to God and draw near to Him, He'll draw near to us, and He'll draw near to the ones who will humble themselves. So the first part of this prayer, starting in verse nine, look there, if you will. In this manner, therefore pray. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. The name of God. What is God's name? Well, we're given several names that God calls himself in scripture, that in and of itself is another study that you could do. And I think there's a few systematic theology textbooks that would go over the names of God, and maybe some other books have been written on that. But the names of God, why does God have different names in Scripture? Why does He call Himself that or instruct others to call Himself that? The one that comes to my mind, besides our Father in Heaven, is I Am. God calls Himself I Am. He is. He always was. He always will be. It's a picture of His eternality, His unchanging nature. and his faithfulness. God is. There's never a time when he will be overthrown from his throne in heaven. He will always reign, and he will always love his children, by the way. And we are to approach him as our heavenly father. Come before him as a child. I know I've already said that, but it's worth emphasizing. Come before God as a little child. Is his name reverenced by you? Is his name hallowed as the prayer says? Do we come before God flippantly? Do you come before God without clearing your mind of distractions, without purposing to focus on him? I really do think it'd be best if we came to God in prayer with an attitude and a mindset of just focusing wholly on Him. And praying even, if you have trouble focusing in prayer, pray that you will focus in prayer. And God will delight to answer those prayers to help you to do right, to help you to grow in your love for Him. Verse number 10, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. I don't know if it was Martin Lloyd-Jones or some other writer that I read, but how is God's will done in heaven? Think about that for a moment. How is God's will done in heaven? It's done instantly. It's done without any disobedience, without any sin. None of that is involved. God's will is done. So in one sense, We should be praying for God's will to be done, for our lives to be conformed to God's will so that we are obeying God as if we were standing before Him in heaven. Now, I know we've got the flesh that remains with us and that sin that comes up over and over again that we have to fight against. We're in a war. We're in a battle with that sin. And prayer is one of the mightiest weapons of that battle, that war. So I admonish you all, make use of it. Please, make use of prayer. I admonish myself, make use of prayer. Because without prayer, we are not gonna get very far. We're not going to have stability in our Christian life. We'll be tossed around like we're on a boat that's on a wavy ocean, a wavy sea. But we should pray that God's will will be done. We should pray God's will will be done in our lives. We should pray that God's will will be done in the lives of those closest to us. Our families, if you're married, your spouse, pray that God's will is done in their life and that you'll both grow closer and more conformed to the will of God. And I heard an old professor at Bob Jones one time say, he didn't want there to be a big gap between how he acts here on earth and how he will act and live in heaven. we should try to narrow that gap. We're never gonna get there to where the gap is gone. But narrow the gap between how you live now and how you will stand before God in heaven. You won't sin. That'll be done away with. So take encouragement. God has given us help, given us this encouragement, given us this love. And what else has he given us? We'll look at verse 11. Give us this day our daily bread. He knows that we need such a basic and simple thing as bread. Each one of us. That just means our food, our sustenance. Whatever actually sustains our physical bodies that we need. It doesn't have to be just a loaf of bread. You may need all sorts of things to sustain your body, but God cares even about that. This should be a rebuke to the modern Gnostics of our day. Why would Jesus instruct his disciples and instruct Christians to pray in this way for our daily bread, for the meeting of temporal needs, if it really was all about the spiritual, if the physical didn't matter? The fact is, God created you as both spiritual and a physical body. And he will care for both the spiritual part of you, your soul, and the physical part of you. Now, of course, the body is cursed by sin. But even with the curse of sin, isn't it amazing how God works in our lives, how He heals people who we pray for, and how He works out His will oftentimes in healing that physical body and showing love to us and tenderness and care. But He provides us our daily bread. And we need something from Him also that we should be generous with ourselves. Forgiveness. We can connect verse 12 with verse 14. So in verse 12 it says, and forgive our debts as we forgive our debtors. Verse 14, for if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. So where this could apply to financial things in some situations, I think it applies to those who have done us wrong. Those who we see have a debt to do right towards us, but we need to be forgiven. We need to be a forgiving people as Christians. But at the same time, just because you forgive someone doesn't mean they've automatically earned all of your trust back again. Deal with them wisely. The Bible is full of admonishments to be wise but gentle, to be honest and loving. We have to be those people who will do right But that doesn't mean, just like I have preached on before the subject of meekness. Meekness does not mean that you are manipulated by everyone who comes along to try and con you. That's not meekness. Jesus was not manipulated. He would not be manipulated by the Pharisees. So we should not be manipulated by those who seek to do evil. but we should be forgiving, willing to forgive, quick to forgive. Do a spiritual checkup in your life. Think about recent times when you have been challenged on this. How quick were you to forgive someone of what they've done against you? Now, have they come to you? Have they sought forgiveness? Can you really forgive them if they haven't sought forgiveness from you? You can not be bitter about it, you can not hold a grudge and obsess about it, but if someone comes to you for forgiveness, you've got an obligation, forgive them. So that you yourself will not stand before God one day and find out you've not been forgiven and pardoned of your own sins. Of course, just forgiving someone doesn't save you. Let me be clear about that. Let there be no misunderstanding. And right next to that verse, right below it, and I do believe every verse in Scripture is placed in its order for the reasons of God that He wants us to understand. right underneath verse 12 is, and do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. I think that we can be led into temptation really easily by not forgiving people who ask for our forgiveness, or by simply holding grudges, simply walking around with a bad attitude and a poor spirit that doesn't want to love people, but it wants to crush people down instead. but we need to walk, to walk so that we are not led into temptation. We need to pray to God to guide us away from temptation, and he makes a way to get out of temptation. If there were no way to get out of temptation, then how could God be just in telling us to not sin? There was no escape from temptation, but there is. Find that escape, look for the escape from temptation. How should you do that? Well, we circle back to prayer. When you're praying for God's will to be done, when you're thankful and you're praying humbly for even your basic daily provisions, and you're willing to love and forgive others, then you're gonna have a lot of power and you're gonna have a lot of understanding to be able to be led away from temptation. But if we're not doing these things, then the temptations will be strong upon us. They'll be weighty burdens, and it'll be so much easier to give in to that temptation and find ourselves not doing the will of God, but actually sinning. but we should pray to be delivered from those temptations. We should pray to escape temptations. Maybe you're not tempted now, but you know you will be. It won't be long before, it may not even be the end of this service, and you'll be tempted in some way, in some area. And each one of us, I do believe, has particular temptations that we're more susceptible to than any other individual. We should pray especially in those areas. Be proactive. Target those things ahead of time. How does someone plan to battle? How does someone go to war? Here's another suggestion for Bible study. I've got lots of them. Study out warfare in the Bible, both spiritual and actual warfare, because some of those strategies can carry over. Study out that. How are we to fight against the temptations that we receive? How did Jesus fight against temptations when he was in the wilderness, when he was so hungry from fasting for so long, and the devil himself came to Christ and tempted him? Jesus withstood temptation by the power of the Word. So make use of the power of the Word in your prayers. And that's what really helps me to pray. If I get up and I'm groggy in the morning, or if I just can't focus for whatever reason, read the verses of scripture, read the promises of God, and you will start thinking about the promises of God. You'll start thinking about his provision for other people. And then you can pray better, knowing what he has already done for so many other generations of Christians and the prophets and all of those who've gone before us in the faith. From age to age, God is the same, and God will help us. Why? Look at the last part of verse 13. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. And this is true. God's kingdom will stand forever. It can never be overthrown. God's power will stand forever. He will never be overthrown from his place of power. No power, everything that is created was created by God. So what is created that can overthrow its creator? It cannot be done. And the glory of God's plan and purpose stands forever. So let's put this into practice as we close and pray that God will help us to understand and use this powerful weapon and this wonderful blessing of prayer he's given us. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, I thank you. You have not left us here to fend for ourselves, but we know that we can come before your throne and have the blessing of communion with you and help from you in your place of power. I thank you that you have power over all of our lives. Power to give us help when we need it. Power to encourage us. Power to lift up our countenance and help us to worship you faithfully as we ought to. So help us to humbly come before you and remember this week to pray to you and to seek to do your will and all of these things that we've covered. In Jesus' name I pray, amen.