And it's official, you know, prayer doesn't work. They've done a study and scientifically proved that in hospitals, people who are prayed for do worse than those who are not prayed for. So it's official prayer doesn't work. How many believe that? Nobody's going to say amen to that one. You know, it's interesting about statistics. You see, in 1987, there was a study done that showed that those who are prayed for in hospitals did better than those who are not prayed for. So the other side said, hey, that was not a scientific experiment. You didn't have a control group. There's no way to prove that it was right. So we're going to do it again. So they did again a few years ago. They did it their way, scientifically, rationally, did a prayer study with a control group, and it was proven, according to them, prayer does not work. Those who were prayed for in hospitals did worse than those who were not prayed for. And so we're stuck with two studies, one says it does, one says it doesn't. So which works and which does not? You know, when you study prayer, you study a topic that there's all kinds of attitudes about. There are many who are cynical about it, many who are trying to show you that prayer doesn't work. I've had doctors look me in the eye and say, just get out of here. You can't do anything for this patient, I am able to help them. I remember when that young lady, that doctor, looked me in the eye and told me that I didn't know what to do except walk out and pray in the hall. Mark Twain said prayers like the weather. Everybody talks about it, but nobody does anything about it, you know. At least he had some humor in his sarcasm against the church and against prayer and against what we do in prayer. Have you noticed people have different attitudes towards prayer? The little boy was once asked by his Sunday school teacher. So do you pray before you eat? He said, I don't have to. My mom's a good cook and some of us don't have to pray. I mean, why pray? Give us this day our daily bread when I can just walk over to the refrigerator and open it and eat. I don't have to pray. And on one side, we have all of these sarcasms and cynicisms about prayer and people telling us it doesn't work and scientifically it's proven it doesn't work and sarcastically proven it doesn't work, etc. On the other side, we have all these quotes from other people. May I read some of those? Martin Luther. So anything that is to be done well ought to occupy the whole of man, all of his faculties, all of his members. As the saying goes, he who thinks of many things, thinks of nothing. And he accomplishes no good. How much more must prayer so possess the heart exclusively and completely that without it doing that. It is of no good in your life. In other words, his whole point was, if you don't pray always for all things, what good is that? John Stott said this prayer is not a convenient device for imposing our will on God or for bending his will to ours. But it's the prescribed way of subordinating our will to his. It is by prayer that we seek God's will, embrace it, align ourselves with it. Every true prayer starts like this. Your will be done. Owen Carr said a day without prayer is a boast of arrogance against God. Have you ever had a day when you boasted in arrogance against God because you did not prayer? Augustine said this when faith fails, prayer dies in order to pray. We must have faith and that our faith will not fail. We must always pray. Someone else wrote this prayer is not a substitute for working, thinking, watching, suffering or giving. Prayer is a support of everything that we do. We have heard many of the poems such as this one. I woke up early this morning and rushed right into my day. I had so much to accomplish. I didn't have time to pray. Troubles just came about me and heavier came each task. I wondered why God didn't help me. He said, my son, you didn't ask. You understand that so often we have looked at prayers as something that's an addition to my life. Maybe this poem is one that you have memorized, I met God in the morning. when my day was at its best, and his presence came like sunshine, like glory on my breast. All day long his presence lingered, all day long he walked with me, and we sailed with perfect calmness o'er a very troubled sea. Other ships were torn and battered, other ships were sore distressed, but the winds that seemed to drive them brought to me both peace and rest." And the poem would go on. Oh, the times I've wasted doing because I took no time to pray, always busy, always pursuing, just doing all the day. Had I been on tent on being and on praying, come what may, I had now been fully seen. God was truly guiding all the way. Thus, by prayer, his power conserving, making him my rock and stay all my doing, all my serving would not have been thrown away. You spend all your day doing. Sometimes we do, don't we? And we don't spend our time praying. So this morning, as we think of prayer, we come to it with hearts that are sometimes troubled, sometimes divided. Is Mark Twain right? Is this scientific study right? Is Martin Luther right? John Stott right? Where do I come down with prayer? But probably if I were to think about prayer today in your life and mine, the one thing that I suspect would be true. Is that most of you would think. That you could improve your prayer life. I think most of you, when we talk about prayer, if you're like me, you kind of like I just soon slide under the pew, let's go to some topic that's not so personal. I'd like to not think about the many days I woke up and I rushed right into my day, I had so much to accomplish, I didn't have time to pray. How many times I was doing and not praying, how many times I was wrapped up in life and living and I didn't have time for prayer. In fact, I'd ask you this as I ask myself, how's your prayer life? How's it going? Maybe you could measure it by how many things you prayed for this week. How many minutes you prayed, maybe you could measure it by how many people you thought of and immediately went to prayer. Perhaps you and I have to think about that. And today, as we think about it, there's one verse of scripture that perhaps more than any other verse is the verse that needs to come to our minds, because the Apostle Paul in Ephesians chapter six wants us to catch it and get it and know it. You understand that in Acts chapter 19, he'd gone to Ephesus. He had started the church and what an uproar there had been. In fact, he was put on that little prison there on top of that mountain overlooking the city of Ephesus. And finally, he was released and sent out of there. They hated Paul, they hated the gospel, they hated the message. The whole city was led in uproar against him, but the gospel kept going forward. In Acts chapter 20, he comes back there and he's able to meet all the elders. And you read about that in Acts. What a terrific ministry they had in Ephesus. But he understands as he writes to them in a book of Ephesians, the book we call the book of Ephesians. He wants them to know their wealth, their work, their warfare. He wants them to understand that they're in a battle that's intense. And so when he gets to Ephesians, chapter six and verse 18, he reads or he tells them this thing, these words, praying always with all prayer and supplication in the spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints. In fact, it's going to be on the slides here. And let's all say this together. Can you say it with me? Praying at all times with all prayer and supplication in the spirit. Watching to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the Saints. The next slide will tell you what he said just before this, because praying and watching our participants, they follow what really has been done before. Let's just put up all of those things. You understand that he had just told us to put on the whole armor of God, the belt of truth. The shoes of the gospel, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. And you would think that that if you had all of those on, you are ready for battle. I'm ready for it, take it on, let's go for it, let's do it. But the truth is, every good soldier knows when he's all prepared for battle, he's done everything he can to go into battle. He is still scared. He still knows there's a potential that he's not going to survive this particular battle. He knows that there's something that could go wrong. And therefore, in one sense, we have to prepare as if everything depends upon us. Each piece of the armor has to be put on. But as the songwriter said it so well, each piece has to be put on with prayer. Today, we're going to do that other side. You must prepare. To meet the enemy. As if everything depends upon you, you better have all of these pieces on. We've studied that. But today we're going to chapter six and verse 18. We not only prepare as if everything depends upon us, we need to pray. Like everything depends upon God, because we are in a battle. Did you see the statistics? They were in a newspaper last Sunday. Do you see them? In America, 90 some percent of the people want to be spiritual, but only 15 percent want to be religious. You know what that really means. If you read in Christianity today, the latest articles, we want to be spiritual, we all want to be spiritual, we just don't want to be religious, we don't know on any standards, we don't want any absolutes, we don't want any book that tells us how we're supposed to live or any God who tells us how we're supposed to live. We want to make up our own rules, live our own way and then to be spiritual, because religion to them Is that there is a God who gives us a revelation that tells us how to live our life and how to live it correctly. We don't want that. We want to be spiritual, religious. We are in a battle, my friends. You cannot read the newspaper or any of the magazines without coming to that conclusion. So how do we do it? We prepare like everything depends on us. But now we pray. Like everything depends upon God. So how is your prayer life, how could you improve your prayer life? That was the question I was thinking about when I was reading that passage, you read the words, so how can I? How can I improve my prayer life? Maybe today, as we just read these prepositional phrases, there are six of them that all follow two participles, praying and watching. You pray and you watch. And then there are prepositional phrases. Maybe something will strike your mind today that could help you to improve. your prayer life. Let's read them. Ephesians, chapter six, praying. That's the first part of it, we got to be praying, but here's how we do it. Maybe, maybe this could be the one thing that could improve your prayer life. Praying. Always literally, when you read that, you might translate it at all times in the sense of. Continuously, always. But as you read this passage, you understand he's not talking about chronology. There's two words for time, as you know, in the Greek. One is chronos, chronology, which has to do with chronology. And us people who are in Europe, United States, us Western thinkers, we think everything in chronology. The service starts at nine o'clock. It gets done at ten something. We always have a time we start, a time we end. It's all about chronology, a section of time. The rest of the world and historically, those who have written and wrote the Bible were not thinking about chronology. They use the other word. They deal with events. They deal with situations, and so right now it is not nine o'clock till 1015 that we have a morning worship service to them. It's a morning worship service. We start when we're here and we end when we're done. It's an event that's important. You understand that word is used in Acts chapter one, those words are used times and seasons, the chronologies and the kairoses of of life. And in this particular case, you've got to catch this. He's not talking about chronology. How many minutes did you pray? This week, how much time did you pray? He's not talking about that. He's talking about how many situations did you bring to God in prayer? How many occasions, how many events, how many situations And so many says praying always he really is saying this pray in every situation. So let's say you're walking through life this week and you're happy. Can you pray in that situation? Absolutely. You can give thanks. You can praise God. You could be thankful to God. How about if you're walking through life this week and you sin? Can you pray in that situation? Absolutely. You run to the Lord and you know what you do? You confess. How about it this week? You're walking through life and you see somebody who's extremely needy and you don't have the ability personally to help them. Can you pray? Can you bring that to God? Absolutely. We call that intercession. How about if you're walking through life this week and somehow you just come to the end of your rope? Can you bring that to God? Absolutely. We call that intrigue. And the list goes on. My prayer life would improve. If I could pray in every situation when I'm happy, when I'm sad, when things are going well, when things are going bad, when I look at somebody who I can't help, when I look at somebody I can help. I was at the gas station the other day, just Saturday, yesterday. There's a lady trying to put air in her tires. I watched her about three minutes. I thought, you know, somebody ought to go help her. But I didn't. But somebody else did. But I could have brought it to the Lord, I could have gone and helped, you know, we can always pray in every every situation, how that would change my life. Notice the next phrase, however, because it's not just that I can pray in every situation in verse 18, it says praying always or in every situation with all prayer and supplication. Did you ever stack up all the words that we use in English to describe prayer? Confession, desire, bending the knee, knocking, asking, seeking, praying, beseeching. I mean, how many words can you come up with intercession, giving thanks, praise on and on the list would go. Well, the same thing could be done in the Greek language, but there are two words that tend to be most used and they are used here. They're also used in the Philippians, chapter four, verse six and seven. They were used in First Timothy, two verse one, chapter two, verse one. And they seem to be the two words most precious in regards to prayer that we can ask and seek and knock and bend the knee and we can do all those other things, give thanks. All those are words related to prayer, but these two are specific about prayer. The first one is prayer. I'll never forget the day I finally figured out what that word meant, because somebody helped me to see that. I was about 45 years old when that happened, I'd never understood prayer until I was 45, I never knew what that word meant. You understand it's made up of two words, the first word is desire. And on the front of that word. It's towards it's a preposition on the front of that, you know, what prayer is. Taking my desires and turning them towards. Someone. And obviously, prayer is turning my desire towards God. It has everything to do with desire. It has everything to do with the general concept that in my life, there's a lot of things that go on and they turn to desires in my life. And what do I do with my desires? And prayer is when I just take my desires and I turn them towards God. You know, the Lord Jesus Christ did that in the Garden of Gethsemane. And then at the end of it, he said, nevertheless, not my will, I'm just going to leave him with you. I'm going to leave him with you, God. You can handle it any way you want. When you sin, you turn your desire for righteousness towards God and say, please forgive me. When you see needs in the lives of people, you turn your desires towards God and say, you know, there's this person who's really, really sick and in pain and I can't do a thing about it. Would you take care of them for me? And the list goes on and on. And so the first word is with all prayer, every desire of my life is turned towards God. In supplication, that's the other word that's most used in regards to the concept of prayer, and it's a concept that has to do with specifics, where the first one is general, the second one is specific. The first one has to do with desire. This word has to do with dependence. I have a lot of desires and I turn them towards God and I have a lot of dependence. I recognize that I'm needy, I recognize I can't do this, I recognize I depend upon somebody greater than me by the name of God. And prayer has everything to do with dependence as well as desire. And when you put those together, you understand what he is saying here in verse 18 is praying at all times in every situation. There's not a situation of life you shouldn't be praying about bringing to God and with all prayer and supplication of the word with probably is a little misleading. I wish they translated a different way because the word almost everywhere else is translated through. By grace, through faith that you're saved right through is a concept. Here's some water over here, some water here. How do I get it from here to here? I put a hose between them. It goes through the hose. It's the means by which I get the water from here to there through faith that I'm saved. It's the means by which I lay hold of the salvation. And it's through. It's through expressing my desires to God, it's through expressing my dependence to God. That's what prayer is all about, and really what he is saying is this, there's not a situation in life you can't bring to God or you shouldn't bring to God, and there's not a way or a method or a form of expression that you can't use as you bring them to God. Think of all the ways that you can approach God in prayer and supplication, all the variety. You can be happy. You can be sad. You can give thanks. You can cry out. You know, some of sometimes he said to God, God, would you please kill that guy? Remember those? He was really upset with his enemies. And you know what he did? He wanted that guy dead. And so he said, God, I'm going to bring my desire to you and leave it with you. And he did. Every variety, every form of expression that I can think of is a legitimate way. And my prayer life would would improve if I prayed in every situation and through every prayer and supplication, every expression of desire and every expression of dependence. Now, the next one, if the first one has to do with when and the second one has to do with with where the next one has to do with, well, how in the world can I do that? And the little phrase that you see here in verse 18 is this in the spirit. This is perhaps the most difficult for you and I to understand. So how do I pray in the spirit? Boy, I wish I had a nickel for everything was written about that, don't you? The whole section of Christianity in our world today will say, well, that means you pray in tongues. If you pray in the spirit, you're not praying in in logical, audible oral speech in a public setting. You're speaking in tongues, you're that's what it means to pray in the spirit. But if you think about it, I don't think that's what really it's all about. In means in, and that's all in means, right? It's a location. If I said pray in your closet, you would know where to pray, right? It's in your closet. If I said pray in public, you would know where to pray. It's in public. If I said pray in exuberance. You would understand what that meant, right? If I said pray in reverence. You would understand what that meant. So in doesn't mean just like a room, which room do I pray in? But in the realm of reverence or exuberance or joy or sorrow, or I could say a lot of things about praying in. But what he's trying to get us to see is that we can pray in. The spirit. in the realm of the spirit. What's he talking about there? Well, you understand, just before they said the sword of the spirit is the word of God. The spirit is the one who is using the word of God in the lives of people, including our own. Earlier in chapter five, be not drunk, but be filled with the spirit of controlled by the spirit. Christ had said in John chapter sixteen, the spirit Convicts of sin and righteousness and judgment. I mean, you could go through the scriptures, you could pick up all the things that the spirit does. Romans chapter eight, the spirit makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And on and on the list goes, if you put all those together, you would seem like when he says in the spirit, he's saying in harmony. With what the spirit is doing. In accord with what the spirit desires, independence, upon the spirit. As Paul said in Romans, we don't even know how to pray as we are, therefore, the spirit has to make intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. It has everything to do with this, it seems to me, I can pray alone by myself. And it's my words. Or I can pray in communion with an eternal God whose spirit lives within me, who guides me with his word, convicts the hearts of people, accomplishes great words and ultimately works and can ultimately control my heart and my life. And I think what he is saying is you could really improve your prayer life, you pray in the spirit, praying communion with God, independence upon God and reverence for God in harmony with God, whose spirit lives within you. You never have to pray alone. You never have to pray just what you think the spirit of God could be the realm in which you pray. It would transform my life if I pray in communion with God and in harmony with him and independence upon him. Well, we've got to move on, it's praying in all in every situation. through all prayer and supplication in the spirit. And then in my Texas is being watchful to this end. Literally, that's a participle watching. Remember how many times in scripture it's watch and pray, watch and pray, watch and pray. Those two words always seem to go together. You got to watch and pray. Now, you talked about singing where you told everybody to close their eyes and then sing, open my eyes, Lord. OK. Have you ever tried to pray with your eyes open? That's what he's telling you to do. Pray with your eyes open. What does that mean? Watching literally means watching. That's pretty tough, right? That has everything to do with being alert and awake and aware. Aware of what's going on in the world around you, aware of what's happening in the world around you. Watch and pray. Do you wake up? Are you alert? Are you aware of what's going on in the world around you? Or are you oblivious to reality? You have no clue what's going on in your own life. Personally, you have no clue what's going on in regards to your own children or your wife. You have no clue what's going on in regards to the city in which you live or the state in which you live or the country in which you live. You just you don't even know how to pray because you're not watching. That might be one of the greatest things that you and I could do that would help us to pray better, to improve our prayer. We wake up. We're alert. We're aware of what's going on in the world around us and in our own hearts and lives. You know what would happen? I think if we were really aware of what's going on in the world around us in our hearts and lives, I think we'd be praying more, don't you? I think it'd be a key to my life and living. But most of us, if we're not careful, we become indifferent, calloused. We just live in our own little world and I don't even know there's a problem. I don't see a problem, do you? Not at all. And when I start to watch, I know they pray, I watch. Here's what he says, and he adds a couple of prepositional phrases here, watching to this end with all perseverance and supplication. Again, the word with should be in. But either way, you translate is this. He picks up two words, one supplication, his word used before means dependence. Concept of dependence. Supplication means I I know I can't do it myself, so I got to I got to pray. I got to turn to somebody. I got to supplicate. I got to ask somebody to help me out because I can't do it myself. But here he uses the word perseverance. And once again, you could you could either use the concept of persevering, like I just keep doing it, just keep doing continuing prayer, continuing prayer, just keep doing it, just keep doing it, just keep doing it. It's a chronology kind of thing. Or it could be this perseverance is most used in the scriptures and in the Greek language to describe the reality that it's tough. It's difficult. It's hard. It's wearing me out. I want to quit. Anybody here like to run? I know I don't. You know why? I just quit. I just don't want to keep going. It's tough. You've got to keep going. So much of life is like that. And when you think of, if you're watching the world around you, you know what happens? Eventually you just want to quit. I just quit. What good is it for me to pray, what is it good, good, is it for me to work? I mean, seems like all the statistics are going the wrong direction and. I just quit. I don't want to witness anymore, do you? It's tough. People don't listen. I just want to quit. So I think what he's really talking about here is not duration so much as the difficulty. In all perseverance, in spite of any difficulties that come in your life, you just keep coming back, you keep coming back, you keep coming back, you keep coming back. In fact, I think when you think of the parables of the importune woman and so in the gospel of Luke, she just kept coming back, just kept coming back, just kept and she wouldn't quit in spite of the difficulties, in spite of all the hindrances in her life. She wouldn't say no for an answer. And so it has a concept of duration, but it primarily has a concept of it is difficult. One of the problems with prayer is that I don't seem to see the answers. Do you? Do you pray for your nation? Do you pray for the unsaved? Do you have a list of names on my prayer list? I got people I've been praying for so long. God save them. It's like I just quit. There's a lot of work, a lot of hours I put in praying for those people, a lot of time put in for that nation, for that governor, for that whatever. I just quit. Do you. Says, no, in spite of the difficulty in every difficulty, in every situation of dependence, we just keep coming back, we just keep coming back, we just keep coming back. And therefore, it's in all perseverance and supplication or dependence. The great example of that was a little old lady in my little church in Rochester, New York. Her name was Anna. And when you sit with Anna and she told you her story. She had everything bad happened to her that could happen. From being in a concentration camp during World War Two, where she was supposed to be killed. To. Well, I just won't even begin to list all the things that was a good part of her life. And one day we were with her and we talked about her husband. She said, well, he beat me. He did everything to her that you can imagine for years and years and years and years and years and years. And I said, I just give up. She said, because I prayed for him every day. I prayed for him every day that God would change him. And two weeks before he died, God did. See, I I'm prone to quit. I just walk away. And Paul says to us, why don't you pray in in all perseverance, just just keep going. No matter what the difficulty, how impossible it seems to you and all dependents. Finally, one last one in verse 18, for all the saints. This would truly transform your prayer life in mind, wouldn't it? What's your prayer list look like? God help me, me, me, me, me, me, me. I don't know. Maybe it is. There's a lot of things you got to pray about yourself. Trust me. The praying for all the saints. Turning my focus on others. And not just some of the others, when you look at your list, who is it? You know, it's really easy to pray for my kids, but it's harder to pray for your kids. It's easy to pray for my grandkids, it's harder to pray for your grandkids. Partially, that's OK, because I know my kids better and I know my grandkids better than you do. So I should be doing that. I understand that. But praying for all the saints. For all of God's people. Not thinking about myself. But my prayer life would be transformed if it wasn't so worried about who I am and what I'm doing and and all that kind of stuff, and I worried about people. In fact, when you read this, he jumps right away in verse eight, nineteen to these words, and for me, when you pray for people, for all the saints and for Paul, that's the apostles, is that utterance may be given to me that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel for which I am an ambassador and change that in it I may speak boldly as I ought to speak. When I pray and I look out instead of look in how it would transform my prayer life, I just. Pray for people. Got a lot of people on your list. Hopefully you do. Just got people with needs, all the saints and and for those who are presenting the gospel, as Paul was concerned about his own life, it wasn't just that he was saying, now you ought to just pray for me, but pray for those who are presenting the gospel, which should be yourself, by the way. And here's what he prayed or asked them to pray that utterance may be given to me. I've had the right words. I would know what to say. I was with somebody last night. They probably remember it. And they said, You know, I'm with somebody and the opportunity came and I just didn't even think about it and the opportunity went and I missed it. Have you been there? I've been there. You walk away and say, why didn't I say something? The door was wide open. I didn't even think about it, didn't cross my mind. Paul says, oh, that God would give to us utterance, the right words to say. And that I may open my mouth full, because sometimes I know I got the right door of opportunity and I know what should be said here. And then, you know what I do? I wimp out. And the early church wimped out, that's why they kept praying that God would give them boldness. Oh, God, open my mouth with boldness. Paul understood that was his great problem. So many opportunities come, you know, it's the doors, the doors open, you know, the opportunities there, you know what you need to say. And then somehow. You wimp out. And so he says, not only that utterance may be given to me, but that I may open my mouth boldly to make known the mystery of the gospel. For which I am an ambassador and change that in it I may speak boldly as I ought to speak. How it transformed my life, if my focus was not so much on me. And my focus was on others. The Saints. And for those who need the gospel of Jesus Christ. How my prayer time would be changed. Maybe even as a church, when you think about it, how much is our prayers just for ourselves? That's OK. We need to pray for ourselves. We need to pray for one another. Do we reach out and pray for for those who need the gospel? Well, we could go on, but you understand that as he just wants to talk to you and to me, it's a very, very simple message on how you could improve your prayer life. You can pray in every situation, no matter what happens to you. Take it, God. Thank him. Ask him not seek whatever it is. You can pray through every prayer and supplicate. It doesn't matter how you come. If you want to confess sin, go do it. If you want to give thanks, go do it. If you want to supplicate, go do it. If you want to intercede, go do it. He likes it all. There's not a certain way you have to come, you can come through any means available. Use every means available, do it in the spirit and communion and harmony with the eternal God while you're watching in all perseverance. Independence, just keep doing it, keep going, no matter how difficult, no matter how long and for every saint and finally for me, as Paul said, and I trust that as we think about that, maybe something has triggered in your mind and how you could improve your prayer life. But maybe Mark Twain was right. When he said. Prayer is like the weather. Everybody talks about it. But not too many people do anything about it. Or William Hendrickson said it so well in his commentary, says, you know, prayer in time of catastrophe has always been in vogue. Whenever you're in a desperate situation, that's an easy time to pray. You went on to say that most people have only one day of Thanksgiving a year. Praying in every situation. That would be unique. And I don't know how it impacts your life, I know how it impacted my life, and I trust that as we think of this, we understand. We prepare as if everything depends on us, we put on the whole armor of God. We want to be ready for it. But then we have to pray, knowing that everything depends on God. Everything depends on God. And as we move out into our world, we have a great burden for them. So we ask God to give us a great boldness to them. Let's pray. Father, thank you for your ability to help us. We must confess how often you have done that. There are times and Daniel experienced it when we brought things to you and nothing happened. And it seemed like you had a deaf ear, seemed like you didn't care. Father, we're glad that in that account, at least you helped us to see that you are always caring and answering just Daniel didn't see it. I pray, Father, that you would help us to be a people who do pray for my own prayer life for everyone here. That be a improvement in it. And change us as a people, for we prayed in Jesus name, amen.