open your Bible to the book of Luke chapter 11. We were in Luke chapter 10 this morning and I was scared to death that Brother Tozer was going to say Luke chapter 11 when he had you open your Bible. Then when I told him after the service that I was going to be in Luke chapter 11, he said, that's where I was last night at Emmanuel Baptist Church. So as comfortable as I was when he said Luke chapter 10, I'm not comfortable anymore, but we're going to be in Luke chapter 11 anyway. As you get to your place in the Word of God, let me just remind you, and I realize that many of you are pastoral majors, and so there are three things that when you're pastoring a church, that your church ought to have in every single service. As a matter of fact, if any one of these three things is missing from a church service, you ought to feel like you haven't been to church. It's just that simple, and before I say another word, I realize I am in North Carolina. I realize where I am when I say this, but understand there are three things that we expect when we come into the house of God for a church service. Number one, we expect, not in any particular order, number one, we expect singing. Do you realize that corporate singing is something that is almost uniquely associated with a church service? You don't corporate sing anyplace else. You might be at a restaurant, and somebody comes up and starts singing Happy Birthday as all the waitstaff gathers. Or you might be at a baseball game, and in the seventh inning stretch, they might sing Take Me Out to the Ballgame. But for the most part, corporate singing is reserved for church services. You go to work one day and you go in there on a Monday morning and the boss says, even though your shift starts at 8 o'clock, you have to be there at 745 and you have a staff meeting and he goes over, there's too much overtime, no more time and a half, no more double time. We've got to cut, tighten our belts and here are the new rules from OSHA for what kind of steel-toed boots you have to have on. before you work at the assembly line, and they go through all of that stuff, but your boss never ends that meeting by saying, now let's sing a couple choruses before we go start the day. Corporate singing is something that is uniquely associated with the church service. We're supposed to be teaching and admonishing one another in songs and hymns and spiritual songs. It is something that's prescribed to us in the book of Hebrews chapter two, when it tells us that it is our savior himself standing in the midst of the congregation singing praise unto the Lord. It is certainly something we ought to expect in every church service that we come to. And I love being an ambassador where you open up a hymnal and you sing songs with such rich doctrine. So many churches across our country, it's the same five songs in the church service. It has been years since I've been in a church service and needed a hymnal. The truth of the matter is though, music is associated with our church services. And if you walked out of a church service, or if you're as a pastor and you've ended your church service, and you walk out to get in your car and your wife looks at you and says, honey, that was a good church service, but we didn't sing a single song. We didn't have a choir special, didn't have a quartet, didn't have an instrumental, didn't have a soloist. We didn't sing one single congregational song. You would have every right to feel cheated by that church service. There's a second thing we expect when we come to church. We expect preaching. Now, I know again where I am. I've been in lots of churches over the years and I've heard preachers and I've heard deacons and Sunday school teachers say this, well, Brother Harper, you should have been here about three weeks ago. We were having a church service and Miss Cindy stood up and started testifying and then Brother Bill stood up and started testifying And then Grandpa Jones started testifying, and before it was over with, we'd had an hour and a half worth of testimonies and didn't have any time for preaching. Listen, I'm of the school of thought that says this. If you went to a church service and you didn't have time for preaching, then you didn't go to a church service. It's just that simple. It pleased the Lord by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. Listen carefully. If you want to have a church service and have an hour and a half worth of testimonies, that is a wonderful thing as long as someone's going to open up the Word of God and say, thus saith the Lord before you go home that day. We expect preaching when we come to church. We expect singing when we come to church. There's a third thing. If you get to your car at the end of a church service and you say, boy, that was a good service. Boy, we had a lot of singing and a lot of testimonies, but we didn't have any preaching. You would have every right to feel cheated by that church service. But there's a third thing we expect when we come to church. It's already happened a couple times tonight. It'll happen a few more times before we go home. We expect praying when we come to church. We expect someone's going to open the service in prayer. We expect someone's going to pray before the offering. Someone's going to pray before the message actually starts. There's going to be a prayer at the beginning of the invitation. There's going to be a prayer of benediction before we leave. We expect praying when we come to church. If you came to a church service, and you sat there, and you listened to the preaching, and you listened to the singing, and when you got finished, you walked to your car, and you got ready to leave, and you said, boy, the music was good, and the preaching was good, but do you know we didn't pray one single time in that entire service? you would have every right to feel cheated by that church service. We expect preaching, we expect singing, and we expect praying when we come to church. Now, here's some things, some of this you know, some of this might be news to you, I don't know, but we expect when those singers get up to sing that they practice. Do you know when Brother Josiah got up to sing tonight, that is not the first time that he sang that song. It's probably not the 50th time that he sang that song. He's probably practiced that song over and over and over. He said, Brother Harper, why would he practice that much on that song when he knows it so well? Oh, it's not because he wants you to sit there and go, wow, he is the greatest singer that ever lived. Not because he wants you to rejoice and glorify how great he is. He does it because he realizes he's preaching the solo before the message and he wants to prepare your heart for the preaching of the word of God. The instrumentalists, they weren't just winging it. Those old days, and I've been around long enough that I've seen it happen a few times, when someone walks up and hands a hymnal to the piano player who hasn't seen the song yet and says, y'all pray for me. I haven't practiced much. Those days are pretty much over in Bible-believing churches, or at least most of them. You know, the choir gets up and they have choir practice. I remember Brother Ream changing my life just a few months ago. He doesn't even realize it. He actually said, I was here for Camp Barnabas, and he mentioned something about choir practice, and he said, actually, technically, it should be called choir rehearsal. So I have tried to change that to choir rehearsal, but you're not gonna change 50 years of choir practice by calling it choir rehearsal. So I've almost given up. You know those choirs, they don't rehearse and they don't practice so that you'll be impressed with the complexity of the music that they do or the range of their vocal abilities. They do it so that they can sing for the honor and glory of God and sing praise to Him and help prepare your heart for the preaching. We expect music when we come to church, and we expect the musicians to do their best when they come to church. We expect them to strive to do better every time they sing. We expect, as I said, preaching. Do you know there are hundreds of books out there on homiletics? You've probably looked at a few of them if you're a junior and a senior in this college. You've read a few of those as you went through homiletics and expository preaching and evangelistic preaching. You've read books on homiletics, but there are hundreds of books out there on homiletics. Did you realize that those books on homiletics are not written so that the average lay person will do a better job in his Sunday school class? They're written so that preachers will do a better job preaching the Word of God. There are books on how to study for a message, how to organize a message, how to prepare a message, how to deliver a message, how to pray about a message. There are book upon book upon book upon book describing for a preacher how to do a better job preaching. Because here's the truth of it. And no matter how long you're in the ministry, and when you stop striving to do a better job preaching the Word of God, you might as well hang it up and take another job somewhere because you're finished in the ministry. Our goal ought to be to preach the best message we've ever preached every time we get into the pulpit. It ought to be not to be robotic and not to be mechanical. It's to realize that for those 45 minutes or so that we stand in the pulpit and open up the Word of God and say, thus saith the Lord, We are literally borrowing the authority of Almighty God to preach to His people. And if you ever get complacent with that preacher, then you might as well just go ahead and quit then. The truth is, a preacher worth his salt always wants to preach better than he's ever preached before. Not for accolades, not for compliments, not for anything like that. Just because we realize the responsibility of preaching the Word of God. We expect singing when we come to church. We expect the singers to do their best. We expect preaching when we come to church. We expect our preacher to do his best. And if you're a preacher, you ought to expect to do your best every time you can. And we expect praying when we come to church. Here's the problem with praying. Most of us are comfortable with where we are. Oh, we want to do better singing. We want to do better preaching. But when it comes to praying, we're pretty much happy with where we are. I'm not saying we're satisfied. I'm saying we're pretty much happy with where we are. Now, I personally believe this. And having been in Bible college, I think I can say this with some authority. I believe we started right down here and went all the way back and snaked our way all the way back to the front and came across the platform and asked every person in this auditorium to stand up and vocalize one specific answer to prayer you've seen in your prayer life. I believe that there's not a single person in this room that would be unable to stand up and testify of a specific answer to prayer that you've seen. However, if I were to start here at the platform and work our way back and all the way back up and I ask this question, how many in the auditorium are completely satisfied with your prayer life? I don't think there's a single person that would say, yes, Brother Harper, my prayer life is about as close to perfect as it can possibly be. The problem is not that we are unwilling to admit that we have shortcomings in our prayer life. The problem is that we're too proud to ask for help. In this passage of scripture, one disciple, just one disciple, there are 12 of them there, but one disciple whose name we do not know is going to approach our master with a simple request. He's going to come to him and say, Lord, Teach us to pray, even as John also taught his disciple. And I do want you to notice as we read our text here in just a moment, that the instant that he asked that question, Jesus does not say, go get some books and read some pointers and then maybe I'll teach you how to pray. He doesn't say, I want you to go downtown and listen to some publicans pray, and listen to some Pharisees pray, and get some pointers from them. He does not say, why don't you ask the other disciples that John taught how to pray what you're supposed to do. I want you to notice that the instant, the very moment that that disciple said, Lord, teach us to pray, Jesus immediately begins to teach to pray. Our problem is not that we're unwilling to admit we have shortcomings in our prayer life. Our problem is we're too proud to ask. Let's read our text this evening, please. And I want you to notice as it begins with the setting that's going on here. And it came to pass that as he was praying in a certain place. When he ceased, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. And he said unto them, When you pray, say, Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. Give us day by day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins. For also forgive everyone that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves? For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him. And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not. The door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed. I cannot rise and give thee. I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth. And they say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you. Seek, and ye shall find. Knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For everyone that asketh receiveth, he that seeketh findeth, him that knocketh, it shall be opened. If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? If he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, Know how to give good gifts unto your children. How much more shall your Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him? Jesus is going to teach us some things about prayer. It is not an all-exhaustive lesson on prayer. It's just an introduction. It's a rudimentary lesson on prayer, if you will, to give us some foundation. And then after that, He's going to give us a couple of illustrations. These are not parables, they're illustrations, and they're such simple illustrations that everybody can recognize them and identify with them. But I want to ask you the question tonight. Are you willing to ask for help? Are you willing to ask Him to teach you to pray? Or are you saying to your Savior, no, no, I got this. That's the difference in this passage description. Let me point this out. This whole story is here because one disciple didn't care what anybody else did. He didn't care that there were 10 other disciples that were sold out. Of course, I'm leaving Judas out. There were 10 other disciples who wanted to walk with the Lord, wanted to learn what the Lord had to teach them, wanted to serve the Lord, but none of them stepped forward. One stepped forward in a crowd full of people who were supposed to be sold out to God and asked that simple request, teach us to pray. Let's have a word of prayer before we begin. Dear Lord and Heavenly Father, thank you for this evening. Thank you for our time together in your house. We'll be asked that you bless the message tonight. We ask that you help us as we look at the power and the potential and the privilege of prayer. We ask father that you help us as we look at our own prayer lives, examine our own lives and help us father to bury our pride. May your word find fertile soil in the hearts of your people tonight. Father, we pray that you'll bless this message, bless it to the hearts of the hearers, in Jesus' name, Amen. I want you to notice the passage starts with an exhibition of prayer. Jesus is praying. Jesus did not pray like you and I pray. As a matter of fact, I heard one preacher say, and I'm sure every preacher's heard this somewhere along the line, I don't remember, I don't know who originated it, but he said this, some of the biggest liars in a church service are people holding hymnals in their hands. We'll sing, I surrender all, when we haven't surrendered all. But we'll stand up and sing, sweet hour of prayer, sweet hour of prayer, when most Christians, honestly, don't know what an hour of prayer is. If we sang sweet 15 minutes of prayer, some of us would be okay. If we sang sweet 3 minutes of prayer, I think all of us would be fine on that one. But Jesus didn't pray like you and I pray. Remember the night before He called His disciples? He prayed all night long. After He'd fed those 5,000 with 5 loaves and 2 fishes, He sent the disciples across the Sea of Galilee, and He went up into a high mountain apart to pray. And then it says this, And when the evening was come, He was there alone. When the Lord prayed, He prayed a long time. Remember in the garden, when He said to His disciples, you couldn't pray with me for one whole hour. When Jesus prayed, when the Son of God talked to His heavenly Father, to His Father, He prayed a long time. And you can almost picture the disciples standing there. There they are, the 12 of them, as Jesus is praying. They've long since finished praying, and now they're looking at their watches and checking the time on their phones. Listen. I know they didn't have watches or phones, that's just part of the message, alright? And they're over there looking at their watches and looking at their phones, and they're tapping their feet, and they're getting a little bit antsy, and they're saying, doesn't he know we have to get to Samaria before the end of the day? Doesn't he know that people are waiting for us in Bethany? Doesn't he know that we've got places to go and people to see? And there he is praying. And they're probably just a little bit impatient. They're probably just a little bit antsy as Jesus continues to pray. But then one disciple, and I don't know which one it was, and I would love to find out. I don't know which one it was, as instead of standing there worrying about where they have to be and what they have to be doing and who they have to meet, he starts listening. He's listening to the second person of the Trinity talk to the first person of the Trinity. We marvel, do we not, about Jesus standing there at the Mount of Transfiguration talking to Moses and Elijah. Wouldn't you love to be a fly on the wall listening to that conversation? But this conversation leaves that one in the dust, does it not? The Son of God! is talking to His Father, and you have a front row seat, and you're listening to what He's saying, and this disciple starts to listen, and this disciple starts to be moved just a little bit. Wouldn't you be? He was moved more than the others. He was moved enough to ask. He's not saying, Lord, can you please give me an academic lesson on prayer, because I'd like to pray better and influence people and impress people with my prayer life. He is not saying, Lord, I really need you to know, I really need you to tell me the principles that John taught his disciples. Listen, if he wanted to know those, he could have asked some of the other disciples. I don't believe for a second that he's just asking for an education, for an introduction to prayer 101. I believe he's really asking this, Lord, teach us to pray like that. Because if what you're doing, Lord, is praying, then what I'm doing is nothing like what you're doing. I don't want to pray the way I've been praying. I'm so moved by this that I don't care if Peter rolls his eyes, if Andrew makes some kind of sarcastic comment. Lord, I want you to teach me to pray like that. I'm tired of the way I pray. I'm tired of not getting my results. I'm tired of not getting answers. I want to talk to God like you talk to God. That's what he's asking here. You ever prayed with someone that when they prayed, it seems like they reached up into the heavens and grabbed the horns of the altar and seemed to have more power in their prayer life than you ever had? It happens every now and then. Now, please understand when I tell you what I'm going to tell you. I don't believe in hero worship at all. But years ago in 1981, I packed up as a 17 year old, 128 pound freckled face boy from the wrong side of the tracks up a holler in West Virginia. And I headed off to a place called Tennessee Temple University. Some of you have heard older people like me talk about that over the years. It does not exist anymore. There was Highland Park Baptist Church. Let me just describe for you, just for the sake of the description of it, if you will, the size and the scope of that ministry at that time. Highland Park Baptist Church in 1981 was the largest church by membership of any independent Baptist church in America. There were 46,000 people on the membership rolls of Highland Park Baptist Church. The church averaged between 8,000 and 10,000 people every single Sunday morning. The auditorium that had just been finished actually seated 8,000 people. It was so big. Let me describe it to you for just a moment. From that corner to this corner in the fan-shaped auditorium was 360 feet from corner to corner. Do you know what else is 360 feet? A football field. That's how big this auditorium was. The church had 8,000 to 10,000 people every service. That doesn't count the 72 chapels. These were 72 independent, fundamental, Bible-even Baptist churches that were pastored by Tennessee Temple students at the time because the churches couldn't get pastors and so they got to train by pastoring while they were going to school. The Bible College at the time had 4,000 students in the Bible College. That did not include the seminary or what they called the Bible School. It also did not include the well over 1,000 that were in the Tennessee Temple High School, Junior High, and Elementary School. On any given day, Sunday through Sunday, any given day, you had anywhere from six to 11,000 people walking the streets of Highland Park Baptist Church that were in one way or another involved in the ministry of Highland Park Baptist Church. All this headed up by one man. The pastor was also the president, the chancellor of the school named Lee Roberson. And Dr. Roberson was a wonderful individual, a very unique individual for those of you that ever met him or heard him. I went there in 1981. And after my first year, 81-82, I went to basic training in AIT in Fort Sill, Oklahoma, and I missed that next year. When I came back from basic training there in Sissonville, West Virginia, I began to date my pastor's daughter. Now it was okay for me to date my pastor's daughter, my pastor's wife, my girlfriend's mom was okay, because I was in fact called to be a preacher. And in Sissonville, West Virginia, where at that time there were no stoplights, there was a Geno's Pizza, there was a Big Star grocery store, and a Rite Aid pharmacy. That's all that was in Sissonville, West Virginia. And it was okay for me to date the pastor's daughter, because I was called to be a preacher boy. Even though I was 128 pounds, freckled face, and from the wrong side of the tracks, the actual pool of preacher boys in Sissonville, West Virginia was pretty shallow, if you understand what I'm saying. When we went off, she went to Tennessee Temple for my second year. When I went back for my second year, she was there for her first year in 1983. After we got there, immediately, her mother began to impress upon her that although in Sissonville, West Virginia, the 128 pound, Freckled-faced boy from the wrong side of the tracks was the only preacher boy. Certainly, at Tennessee Temple University, there were a whole lot more preacher boys that she could choose from. Certainly, there were some that didn't have freckles, that weren't 128 pounds. And certainly, you could find one that wasn't from Sissonville, West Virginia. And so, every time she would talk to her mother, her mother would try to talk her into breaking up with me. Eventually, it worked. She broke up with me. I believe it was on a Friday night. I was miserable all weekend long. So Monday, I did the only thing I could think of. I needed to talk to someone. I needed some kind of counsel. And it was obvious I couldn't call my home church pastor. So Monday morning, I went to the administration building at Highland Park Baptist Church. I walked into the offices there and I walked up to Dorothy, who was Dr. Roberson's secretary. And I said, Ms. Dorothy, I would like to speak to Dr. Roberson. And she said, why? And here I am, I'm 18 years old at the time, and I said, my girlfriend broke up with me. Now, to her everlasting credit, she didn't laugh. She didn't roll her eyes, she didn't make a sarcastic comment, but this will give you an idea of the era that it was. She got up from her desk, she walked over, knocked on Dr. Robertson's door, opened it up, and then in just five minutes time, I was walking into his office. Now let me take just a moment and go on a rabbit trail. How many of you preacher boys know what a rabbit trail is when I say that? Raise your hand. Thank you. A rabbit trail is when you go off of your topic to say something that isn't part of the actual message, but you want to say it anyway. Say, Brother Harper, why are you going on a rabbit trail? Because it's my rabbit and it's my gun and I'll hunt it if I want to. How about that? I have heard of preachers, well-known preachers, preachers that have even garnered some respect and some fame in our own circles, that if you go to them with a broken heart, a lost loved one, a dead child, something like that, or you get a cancer diagnosis, and you go in to visit your pastor and get some counsel from him, you're going to be told that he can't see you for one to three months. Listen, if you're a pastor and you're not watching for their souls as one that must give an account, if you're not taking heed to the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, if you don't have time to love on hurting people in your church, get a job selling used cars and stop tainting the ministry and just admit that you're not a pastor in the first place. Now we're done with the rabbit trail. Five minutes, I'm in Dr. Robertson's office. I sat down, he said, tell me what happened. I told him that my girlfriend had broken up with me. Now, here I am, this guy is this monolithic character in fundamentalism at the time. I fully expect the president of this Bible college to open up his Bible to a verse in Haggai or something like that and read to me a verse that says, and when my girlfriend breaketh up with thee, thou shalt therefore verily do step one, step two, and step three. That's what I'm expecting. You've been to Bible college for a little while. You know that verse isn't in there. It wasn't. He talked to me for a couple of minutes and then he said this. And if you ever heard him, he said it just like this. He said, let's pray just like that. And he did his hands like that. And we got down on our knees and we're praying together about my problem. And I just knelt there and listened. I don't want to put a man on any kind of pedestal, but he didn't talk to the Lord the way I talked to the Lord. I was supposed to be praying beside of him, but I was so convicted just listening to him pray. I just sat there and listened. And if I was that way listening to a sinful man praying to God, what do you think it did to this disciple listening to the perfect sinless son of God talk to his father? By the way, I know somebody's gonna want the rest of the story, so let me give it to you. After a couple of weeks, my girlfriend decided that we were meant to be together, that I was God's will for her life. She said we were getting back together. As soon as she did, I took her up on a place called Lookout Mountain. I opened up a little velvet box with a ring in it that I had purchased from Roan Regency Jewelers in downtown Chattanooga. I already had the ring when she broke up with me. Now you know why I was so sad. She agreed to marry me. That was on Saturday night. On Sunday night, we walked up on the platform of Highland Park Baptist Church. All that's up there now is Dr. Robertson and his co-pastor, Dr. Faulkner. The choir's already gone. It's just those two men up there. My wife does not want to come up the steps. She does not want to go up on the platform. I'm so ignorant that I didn't realize that you probably weren't supposed to go up on the platform, but I'm going anyway. And so I'm pulling her up the steps. It's like boating a marlin. All right, I'm pulling her up the steps. I finally get her to the top of the steps. I walk up to Dr. Robertson, and I said, Dr. Robertson, you remember praying with me about my girlfriend making up with me? He said, yes, I remember very well, I remember very well. Just like that. I said, let me show you something. I reached out and I grabbed her left hand and I held it up like this. And he did this, and I promise you I'm not exaggerating at all. He said, Oma. He said, I didn't know my prayers worked that well. And in case somebody is going to ask me this question, of course, I'm talking about my wife of 38 years. All right. I've heard people say, were you engaged twice? No, no. That's the same wife. She was sitting in the auditorium as she is tonight. But the truth is, if it could convict me so much listening to Dr. Robertson pray, what do you think it would do if you could hear the son of God pray? He doesn't say, Lord, please give me some interesting points about prayer. He says, Lord, teach me to pray like that. You know, Christian, your prayer life will change forever when you finally decide that it needs to change forever. Notice, number one, there's the exhibition of prayer. Number two, then there's the example of prayer. Now, this is not a prayer to be memorized and repeated. We don't do that as independent Baptists, or at least we say we don't do that as independent Baptists. We actually have our memorized prayers, don't we? We have our meal prayer. Lord, heavenly Father, we thank you for this food. We pray the blessing of the nourishment of our bodies. Bless the hands that prepared it. In Jesus' name, amen. How many times you heard that exact prayer? How about this one, our offering prayer? Lord, heavenly Father, we pray for this offering and pray that you'll bless the gift of the giver. May the offering be used for the furtherment of your gospel around the world. In Jesus' name, amen. I'll never forget. I follow all pastored in West Virginia. And we had one really good piano player in our church. Now, sometimes when I come here, I'm always amazed at how many piano players there are. A great piano player plays, and another great piano player plays, and another great piano player plays. Listen, gentlemen, when you go out and pastor your church, you're not going to have 25 pianists in your church. We have one really good piano player, and you notice this when you look around here, Brother Ream, that there's really, really the bestest, bestest piano. And I know bestest isn't a word, I'm exaggerating. The best pianist in the entire college. And then there's a second one, and a third one, and a fourth one. You put them on a graph, they're just going down like this, right? Well, in our home church, we had one really good pianist. Her name is Debbie Cook, alright? And our second string pianist was a lady by the name of Mary Pala. So, if Debbie Cook is about this good as a pianist, Mary Pala is... about this good. All right. Now here's the thing about Mary Pala. If she's watching tonight if she were sitting right here I would say that just exactly like that. But it wouldn't bother her at all because she knows she's not that good a pianist. But I'll tell you something. She's willing to be used every single time she's asked. Our first string pianist was gone. She was out. It was the Sunday before Christmas. Mary Pala was playing the piano. She is our second string pianist. Our first string song leader was my brother-in-law at the time and he had broken his ankle and was not able to lead the congregational song leading. So we had our second string congregational song leader. Our choir director was also my brother-in-law, and they had our third string choir director, because the second string choir director was also the second string congregational song leader, and they didn't want him to do both. And it's one of those services where everything is going wrong. My brother-in-law also helped with the PA, to stop every time there's squeeches and there's squeals and all that kind of stuff, and nobody could figure anything out on the PA. The PA, the devil got in that thing, and it was terrible. It's one of those services where so many bad things happen. Like we stood up to sing number 67. What a day that will be. And as everybody stood up and started singing the first lines, we all realized that the piano was playing number 68. The choir was finally singing. It was getting a little bit more normal. And everybody's listening to the choir. And all of a sudden the choir stops and the piano stops. And everybody in the auditorium turns sideways and looks at the piano. And we watched in horror as Mary Pala did this. and turned the page in her music before we played and we went on. One of those services. And gentlemen, if you're in the ministry for any length of time, you're going to have a service where everything goes wrong. My father-in-law, an experienced man in the ministry, finally had gotten control of the service, and he finally called the men up for the offering. I won't mention the man's name, but he called Brother So-and-so who's standing over here, would you please pray for the offering. And there in that service, Brother Lucan, when everything was going so wrong, I'll never forget as we all bowed our head and closed our eyes what this man said as he asked the Lord to bless the offering. He said this, he said, Dear Lord and Heavenly Father, we thank you for this food. We pray that you'll bless it to the nourish for our bodies. Bless the hands that prepared it in Jesus name. Amen. Yes, he prayed the meal prayer instead of the offering prayer. By the way, let me point this out. If he had remembered to pray the offering prayer instead of the meal prayer, it still wouldn't have done any good. Because if you want your prayer life to be effectual, then you've got to do it as the Bible tells us in Jeremiah 29, 13. You shall seek me and you shall find me when you search for me with all your heart. We don't have our memorized prayers, at least we're not supposed to. But Jesus is going to teach us an outline of prayer. It is not all that we're supposed to pray for. The Bible gives us multiple things that we're supposed to pray for. But in this passage, he's going to give us a nice outline for a prayer, an example of prayer. Notice what he says. He starts with, Our Father which art in heaven. We saw the exhibition of prayer. Now the example of prayer. Notice the example of prayer starts with praise. Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. He starts by praising the Lord. You realize that prayer, we have been so tuned or so trained to believe that the only way you can praise is with melody or harmony or instrumentality. We forget that there are lots of ways to praise. And certainly prayer is an avenue of praise. Hallowed be thy name. His name was already holy when Jesus said that. His will was already going to be done, and his kingdom was already going to come. Whether you and I ever say, Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, his name is still going to be holy, his kingdom still going to come, and his will is still going to be done. And yet, our Savior tells us to start by telling him how holy he is, and how mighty he is, and how powerful he is. I said, Brother Harper, why? Because God deserves it. It's that simple. Let me tell you something that will help you, right? Once in a while, once a year, once a month or once a week, when you go to your prayer closet, take your prayer list and leave it outside. Walk inside. Nothing wrong with having a prayer list. We should all have a prayer list. But walk inside, close the door and say, Lord, I didn't come to ask you to bless my finances. I didn't come to ask you to guide my future. I didn't come to ask you to bless my family. Lord, I just came in here to spend a little time on my knees telling you how holy you are. and how mighty you are, and how loving you are, and how gracious you are, and how merciful you are, and how forgiving you are. Lord, I just came in here for a little while to thank you for being you, for being the God that saved my soul, that gave your son to die for me. Lord, I just came in here for a little while to say, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, and thy will be done. You'll never pray the same way again once you've done that a couple of times. Number one, he starts with praise. Number two, he goes to provision. Give us, on the first day of the month, all the bread that we're going to need for the rest of the month. That is, of course, what it says, isn't it? You know what you and I have decided, and it's all over Bible-believing churches, we've decided this basic philosophy, well, I'll take care of the little things, and I'll only pray about the big things. Problem with that is twofold. Number one, it's not what we're told to do. We're told to be careful for nothing, but in everything, with prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your request be made known unto God. We're told to pray about everything. Secondly, to believe that or to practice that is for you and I to assume that we've ever had a big prayer request. You've never had a big prayer request. When you get down on your knees and you say, Lord, I need five thousand dollars or I can't take my finals. Do you think that for a moment, almighty God, biggest prayer request you've ever had in your life, that almighty God sitting on his throne in heaven said. Who? Five thousand dollars. Where am I going to come up with five thousand dollars? What a big prayer request that is. I wonder what I. Oh, that's right. That's gold. You've never had a prayer request that Almighty God could not answer with the snap of His fingers. You've never taxed His ability, His power, or His resources. So if you're waiting to have such a big prayer request that Almighty God says, WAH! You're never going to pray about a single thing. The truth is we're supposed to pray about everything. Whether you think it's big or you think it's small, you're supposed to pray about everything. And by the way, if you say, Lord, give me today my daily bread, do you know what you have to do the first thing in the morning tomorrow? You have to say, Lord, give me today my daily bread again, don't you? But do you know what else you get to do? You get to say, Lord, by the way, thank you for yesterday's bread. I really needed that, Lord. Thank you for answering my prayer. Listen carefully, Christian. The first example of prayer is for praise. The second one is provision. Notice number three, though. Notice what he says. And forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone that is indebted to us. The third thing is purity. Purity needs to be a part of our prayer life, does it not? Psalm 66 in verse 18, if I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me. Isaiah 59 in verse 2, but your iniquities have hid his face from you that he will not hear. The Bible tells us our sins have separated between you and your God. Isaiah 64 in verse 7, now has hid thy face from us and has consumed us because of our iniquities. John chapter 9 in verse 31, now we know that the Lord heareth not sinners. The simple truth of the matter is, Christian, if we're going to pray, we need to make sure We've taken time to confess because if we confess He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. The example of prayer is praise. It is purity. It is provision. It's also protection. Notice what he says. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. I believe those are two different things. First, he's saying, lead us not into temptation. Please understand, as long as we follow the Lord, he's going to lead us on the path of righteousness, surrounded by green pastures and still waters. He's going to lead us away from temptation, but You and I don't always follow Him like we're supposed to, do we? And what happens if we're following Him and He's not leading us into temptation, but we decide to go off in this direction over here? You know where we find ourselves? We find ourselves in evil, don't we? What an amazing, gracious, merciful God, that number one, He won't lead us into temptation, and number two, when we get away from Him and stop following Him and find ourselves in evil, He's still willing to deliver us. What an example of prayer. Oh, Brother Harper, I already pray about these four things. That's wonderful. Keep doing it. But the truth is, most of us, we pray these four things when we really need something. We get our prayer. We try to get our prayer life right as we get closer to finals or we get closer to having our bill to be paid. But how many of you started the semester praying right? Notice number one, there's the exhibition of prayer. Number two, there's the example of prayer. Number three, then we find the expectancy of prayer. These three, I'm sorry, these four different illustrations, if you will. And as you look at these four different illustrations, we're going to see that answers are available, and number two, that answers aren't enough. Notice what he says. Now, he's told them how to pray, and then he says this. He said to them, You shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves. For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him. Brother Tozer was talking about this a little bit this morning. The second worst kind of company is unannounced company. When you get unannounced company, that's always a bad thing. The only thing that I can imagine that would be worse than unannounced company is unannounced company at midnight. All of a sudden there's a knock on the door and this family opens the door and here is the unannounced company. And this poor man has to go from door to door. He can't go to Walmart or convenience store. There's no bread to set in front of his company that's shown up. And I imagine in this particular situation, this man didn't mind leaving the house. He didn't mind going from door to door, waking people up at midnight. You say, Brother Harper, why? Can you imagine if you're married in this auditorium, you'll know what I'm talking about, whether, and if you're a man, don't say amen, all right? Just be quiet for a couple minutes. Let me get myself in trouble, not you. Can you imagine what's going on in that house? As this wife realizes there's no food to set in front of the company that showed up unannounced at midnight, can you imagine what she's saying? You know, if you had gone to the store today when I told you to go to the store, instead of sitting there and watching that football game all afternoon in your pajamas, we would have bread to sit in front of my company. And now I've got company, and they're going to tell all my friends that I'm a bad hostess. And this man finally said, look, I'll go find you some bread. I'll do whatever it takes. And she says, but it's midnight. He said, I don't care. Just let me go. It's more peaceful out there knocking on strangers' doors than it is right here in the house right now. This man goes and knocks on the door. Friend, lend me three loaves. I got company that showed up unannounced at midnight. And the friend inside says, no. I'm in bed. It's midnight. The door's locked. The kids are in bed. I'm not giving you any bread. And Jesus said what he will not rise and give because he's a friend, yet because of his importunity. You know what importunity is? Let me illustrate it from this passage. Hey friend, I need three loaves. It's midnight. Yeah, I know. I got to watch. Appreciate that. I still need three loaves. But the door's locked. Pretty sure you have a key. I kind of expected it to be locked, seeing how, you know, of course, the aforementioned midnight. But can you please come and give me three loaves? The fact that it's midnight, the fact that the door is locked, doesn't change the fact that I need three loaves. But I'm in bed once again. I understand that it's midnight and that the door is locked and that you're in bed. I get that. I do have a watch. It doesn't change the fact that I need three loaves. But my kids are asleep, not for long. That's what importunity is. You just ask, and ask, and ask, and ask, and ask. How many times have we left answered prayers off without receiving them because we decided to stop praying before the Lord answered? As I understand it from my Bible, and maybe you can give me an example from someplace else, I see two times when we're supposed to stop asking. One is when the Lord says yes. We're usually pretty good about that, although that might not be the right answer. We'll get there in a minute. Number two is when the Lord says no. Please understand, the Lord does, in fact, say no. The Apostle Paul, you ever noticed that he besought the Lord thrice, that he might remove from him his thorn in the flesh, and the Lord said, no, my grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Did you ever notice that Paul never asked a fourth time? When God said no, Paul stopped praying. God doesn't say no because he's a bully up in heaven. God says no because he loves us and he knows what's best for us. And if you look back through your Christian life, I imagine it's the same as my Christian life. Some of the greatest blessings I've ever gotten in my entire life were when God said no. By the way, not always is a no a no. You say, Brother Harper, what do you mean by that? Well, the Bible tells us, one of the most famous verses in the Word of God on prayer is so often mispreached and misunderstood when Jeremiah 33 says, call unto me and I will answer thee. And it says this, and show thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not. Doesn't it seem logical to us that if God does something great and mighty, we would be able to know it. We'd be able to tell it. See, the great and mighty things which thou knowest not, it's not talking about the answer there. It's talking about the asking there. I'm going to show the great and mighty things which thou knowest not to ask for is what it's saying. That you didn't even think to ask for is what I'm going to show you. Several years ago, I was at a church, First Calvary Baptist Church in Hampton, Virginia. Actually, my little brother, Phillip, now pastors that very same church, but this is about 15 years ago. And as I was shaking hands on a Monday night, saying goodbye to everybody in our revival there, this man walked up to me. He was 82 years of age, a retired brigadier general in the United States Army. That's a one-star general for those of you who don't know what a brigadier general is. And he said to me, Brother Harper, do you have a minute to pray with me? I said, certainly. I said, would you mind? If you're in a hurry, we'll go right now. But if you're not in a hurry, I'd like to say goodbye to a few more people and let them leave. They're all standing in line. And then we'll go and pray. He said, I'm not in any hurry at all. I finished shaking hands. I went and found him in the vestibule. We walked through the vestibule and up the set of steps to the fellowship hall, then through the fellowship hall to a little room there that was called the church library. We walked in the church library and I said, brother, what are we praying about tonight? He said, well, tomorrow I'm going to the doctor. He said, they're going to do a test on my kidneys. He said, five years ago, they found cancer in my right kidney and they removed it. And now they found tumors in my left kidney. And tomorrow, they're going to put dye in my veins and see how bad the cancer is and if there's anything that they can do. He said, here's my prayer request. The last time I went through this, I had no problems with the dye that they put in my veins. But now it makes me very sick. I think they've changed the dye. By the way, for those of you with a medical background, it's probably not that they've changed the dye. It's probably that with one kidney, his body can't filter it like two kidneys could. Whether that's the case or not, I'm not sure. He said, Can you pray with me that they'll use the old dye tomorrow morning for my test? Because I'm afraid if they don't, I'll be too sick to come to church tomorrow night. This is an 82 year old man with tumors in his one existing kidney that was worried he'd be too sick to come to church on a Tuesday night. I don't know that there's ever been one single revival in my entire ministry where I haven't had people that missed the Tuesday night service with a lot less of an excuse than that man would have had. We prayed. I remember what I said, Brother Tozer. I said, Lord, we know the heart of the king is in your hand. If it be your will, the pharmacy can run out of the new dye and they have to use the new old dye tomorrow. Lord, if it be your will, the technician will write the prescription for the old dye, not the new dye. But Lord, if they have to use the new dye, I pray that you'll protect my brother so he still feels good enough to come to church tomorrow night. We finished praying, we hugged each other's neck, and we walked out the door. The next night I walked in about 6.15. I came in from my trailer, I parked out on the side here, and as I walked in, the two walls here are cinder block walls as you come in. The first door to the left is the men's restroom, the first door to the right is the church nursery. As I walked in at 6.15, he was walking out of the men's restroom, and without being graphic, he was walking out of the men's restroom after being sick again. He'd been sick all day. He'd been sick ever since he left the hospital that morning. I looked him in the eye and I saw his face. It was almost ashen, very little color in his face at all. He did have blue around his lips, which concerned me. And as soon as I looked at him, I'll be honest with you, I got upset with the Lord. I said, I don't understand, Lord. All he wanted to do was feel like coming to church. All he asked you to do Didn't ask for a miracle, just asked that he'd feel like coming to church tonight, and here he stands, and he's still faithful, even though you didn't answer his prayer. Be as honest as I can. As soon as I said that, I was convicted by it. Who do I think I am to question Almighty God? I asked the Lord to forgive me, but I still am face to face with this man. I tried to put the best smile I could on it. with my voice. I said, brother, didn't they use the right dye? And he looked at me and he said, no. And then he lifted up his eyes and looked me eye to eye and he said these exact words right here. He said, they didn't find any cancer either. Listen, we didn't even pray about that. That was a great and mighty thing that we didn't even know to ask for. See, when God does something great and mighty, you can't give the credit to a preacher. You can't give the credit to a doctor. You can't give the credit to a lawyer. You can't give the credit to anybody because only God gets the credit for great and mighty things. So what I'm saying is, Christian, every now and then when God says no, you might want to get a bucket out because there might be something great and mighty that you didn't think to ask for coming your way. Notice the expectancy of the prayers. We expect answers. What does the Lord then say as he continues to talk about importunity? Remember Luke 18 and verse 1, the Lord spake a parable unto them to this end, that men are always to pray and not to feign. Or 1 Chronicles 16 and verse 11, seek the Lord in his strength. Seek his face continually. Or 1 Thessalonians chapter 5 tells us to pray without ceasing. The fact is we just pray and pray and pray and pray. But what if I've been praying for something for 10 years? You realize God doesn't have a watch. If a thousand years is as a day and a day is as a thousand years, it's not ten years to Him. You just keep on praying till God says yes or God says no. He then expounds on that a little bit more. Ask, and you know this already, it's a perfect tense verb, I believe. Ask and keep on asking is what it's saying. And asking, I'm sorry, it goes on to say, I say unto you, we're down to verse 10, verse 9. And I say unto you, ask and it shall be given you. And it's actually ask and keep on asking and it shall be given you. And seek and keep on seeking and ye shall find. Knock and keep on knocking. and it shall be open unto you for everyone that asks, and keep on asking, receiving that when it seeks and keeps on seeking, findeth him that knocketh and keeps on knocking, it shall be open unto him. The simple truth is you just keep on praying. Now, Jesus is going to give us three more quick illustrations and we're done. Three more illustrations that, to be honest with you, for years I misread as I read this passage of Scripture. It's not saying what I always thought it says. It's saying something different. Notice what he says. Which of you is a father? Your son comes up to you. Notice how he exactly words it here. If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, we give him a stone. Now, this is not saying that your son comes up to you and asks for the most expensive bread in the bakery and you say, son, I can't afford the most expensive bread in the bakery. So here's some money to buy some less expensive bread. That's not what it's saying. It's not saying, dad, I'd like some bread. Well, son, I can't give you any bread at all right now. You're going to have to do without bread. That's not what it's saying either. The fact is, as parents, for those of us that are, what we do when our children ask us for something that we might not be able to afford at that time, we work hard, we save, we do without so that we can provide everything that we possibly can for our children, don't we? This is not a dad that's unable to give his son the expensive bread. It's not even a dad that can't afford any bread at all and has to say no to his son's request. No, no, this is a dad that says, son, I know you'd like to have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, but I don't have any bread right now, so here, have a rock. They're filled with fiber. You understand, if a child eats a sandwich made out of a rock, it's not going to be the best thing for their dental capabilities, if you understand what I'm saying. Simple truth is, this is a dad that instead of giving his son what he asked for, gave him something that would hurt him. Or your son says, hey, I'd like to have a fish. And if we live for a fish, give him a serpent. No, son, I know you like some tilapia or some flounder or whatever the case may be. This is not the case where a son's asking for lobster and crab legs and all you can give him is a filet of fish sandwich at McDonald's. That's not what it's saying. It's not saying my son would like to have a filet-o-fish sandwich at McDonald's and I can't even afford that, so he's gonna have to do without fish. It's not what it's saying. Which of you, your son asks for a fish, you're gonna say, well, son, you don't have any fish right now, but I got this copperhead. Go play with this for a little while. No dad would do that. The dads that are listening to this are saying, well, of course, if my son asks for bread, I'm gonna give him bread. If he asks for fish, I'm gonna give him a fish. How about if he asks for an egg? Give him a scorpion? You know, son, I can't give you an egg right now, but I have these two scorpions. And seriously, if you move them around just right, it's kind of like Legos. You can play with these and have a good time in the black. That's not what it's saying. It's not some poor dad that can't afford the extravagant desires of his son. It's not some poor dad that can't even afford the basic desires of his son. This is a dad that's going to give his son, instead of something that would help him, he's going to give him something that will hurt him. Instead of answering the request for bread and for fish and for an egg, he's going to give him a stone and a serpent and a scorpion. Every dad listening to this is going, Of course not. I wouldn't give my son a rock if he asked for bread. I wouldn't give him a serpent if he asked for a fish. I wouldn't give him a scorpion if he asked for an egg. We as dads, we like to give our children what they ask. We have one daughter. Her name is Charity. She graduated from here three years ago. And I remember it was in November of 2001. My daughter had just turned four. She had gotten a catalog. It really wasn't a catalog. It was an advertisement in the mail from a doll company. Now, I realize the average age of the people in the auditorium. So let me take a moment and explain. Mail was something made out of paper. It came to a box at the end of your road. Yes, you had to walk out of your house, walk all the way down to the end of your driveway and get these pieces of paper. It didn't have emojis on it, didn't have any memes with it. It didn't have an E in front of it. It was just mail. My four-year-old daughter got a piece of mail addressed to her. I have no idea to this day how they got her name. There it said, Charity Harper, and it was 3 Maranatha Acres, Charleston, West Virginia, 25312. And I handed it to her, and she was so excited. It was from a famous doll company. Now, the doll company was different than it is today, but it was a famous doll company. Every night, as I would walk into my office, I had to walk past her room. She'd be sitting at her little desk with a pen in her hand, circling things in that advertisement. Every night, she slept with it under her pillow. It was dog-eared and wrinkled and all those things. By the time I saw this catalog, every single thing on every single page was circled at least once, and some of them were circled multiple times. Finally, the first weekend, the first week of November, she walked into my office. As an evangelist, I don't have an office in a local church. I've always had a room in our house that is designated as my office. She walked into my office. She walked behind my desk. She stood there beside of me and then reached over on my desk and moved all my stuff to the side. She then, with her little four-year-old hands, laid her little ad on my desk right in front of me. And then, I'll never forget it, she smoothed it out so that I could see it. She then climbed in my lap, put her arm around me, and said, Daddy, I think I would like to have this doll right here for Christmas. I looked at the doll. Now, I'm a father that has a daughter. I know dolls. Or I knew dolls. She's married now. I don't know a thing about dolls now. But I knew dolls back then. I knew how much the cheap dolls at Kmart and Walmart were. And I knew how much the expensive dolls were. I expected, since they'd gone through all the trouble of printing this whole catalog and mailing it to her, that it was going to be a little bit more expensive than the more expensive dolls. And so I began, like I was on a scavenger hunt, searching this page, trying to find the price of this doll. And it was so well hidden. When I finally found it, I saw all these numbers beside of it. I thought that they were using dollar symbols in their stock numbers. There were that many numbers beside this doll. It was far more than the most expensive doll I'd ever seen. And my initial response to my precious daughter was, no. I am not going to buy you a doll that costs that much money for Christmas. As a matter of fact, I'm going to get on the phone and I'm going to call your grandparents and I'm going to tell them not to buy you a doll that costs that much money for Christmas. I was going to have to use the phone on my desk or the phone in the kitchen because I grew up in an era where phones were on the wall and TVs were not. Okay, you understand that? She put her arm around me. She kissed me goodnight. She told me she loved me. She slid down off of my lap. She reached over on my desk and she picked up her little catalog like so and folded it like like this. And she began to walk out of my office. She got to the door of my office. I promise I'm not exaggerating. And she stopped and she looked at me and she went. And she walked out. Now, as she was walking out, I grabbed the mouse there on my desktop computer. I logged on to the website and I ordered the doll. There was no question where this story was going. When the doll came in, I wrapped it. Now, I am not a good rapper. Not musically. and not when it comes to wrapping presents. Maybe some of you in this room will agree with me. My personal conviction is that if every single square inch of that present isn't covered with Scotch tape, that it is gonna involuntarily open up the day before Christmas without anybody touching it. So I tape and I tape and I tape. Every January, I get a personal thank you note from the president of the Scotch tape company thanking me for wrapping three presents every year. That's what I do. I put it under the tree, I hid it in the back with a fake name on it. Christmas morning came, we're in the floor, presents are everywhere, boxes are everywhere, bows are everywhere. I'm sure I got a wallet, because the height of irony is our children buy us wallets for Christmas. I don't know what else I got that year for Christmas, but Charity's opened all of her presents, and I said, Charity, by the way, that last present under the tree, that's to you from Daddy. She crawled under. She began to open it. It took a long time. That's a lot of tape. She finally got it open, and there was that doll's face looking back at her. She dropped it on the floor. She ran across the living room floor. She jumped in my lap. She wrapped her skinny, little, bony, four-year-old arms around my neck, and she squeezed as hard as she could. And she said, thank you, Daddy. Merry Christmas. I love you. You know what? I don't remember what I got that year for Christmas. But I'll never forget the hug. Why? She asked for bread. I got her bread. She asked for an egg. Got her an egg. She asked for fish. I got her fish. Let me point something out and we're done. That makes us feel like something wonderful. When God answers our prayer, you ask the Lord for $4,000 for your school bill and God provides $4,000. How many times have you heard illustrations just like that over the years? A missionary says, well, we needed $9,000, $9,714 to go to the mission field. And I went to the mailbox and there was a check there for $9,714. And we praise the Lord and we say, that's wonderful. Do you realize that's not what Jesus is teaching here? He says this, you know that if your son asks for bread, you give him bread. If he asks for fish, you give him fish. He asks for an egg, you give him an egg. If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children. If you as an evil father can answer your child's prayer and give them exactly what they want, how much more Shall your heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? In other words, Christian, I hate to pour cold water on hundreds of years of good preaching. But when did it become okay just to be satisfied with an answer to prayer when there are great and mighty things that we should be experiencing? When did it become okay for me to ask the Lord for bread, and He gives me bread, and He asks me for fish, and He gives me fish, and He asks for an egg, and He gives me an egg? It's okay, it's wonderful to be thankful for that, but understand this, how much more is there that we're not getting? We've become trained to expect answers when we should be trained to expect exceedingly, abundantly above. All that you ask or think. Any evil dad can give good gifts. Only God can give how much more. Here's the problem, Christian. Not that one single one of us would walk out of this auditorium and say, I've got to get to my dorm room and sit down and start writing my book on the successful prayer life. We would all admit we have shortcomings. Here's the question. How many are going to be the one disciple that leaves maybe Peter and Andrew and James and John behind? The one that steps out and says, I'm tired of the way I pray. I want to pray like he prays. This whole story takes place because one disciple wasn't satisfied with his prayer life and wasn't afraid to ask. Because as soon as he asked, Jesus taught.