Thank you, amen, good. Good song, I praise the Lord for that. All right, let's get right into the message for tonight. Thank you, Mindy, I always enjoy hearing you sing. What a blessing that song is, and thank God he continues to pick us up. Well, this morning we talked just briefly about this message, and I introduced the thought that there's some things that just need to stay together always, amen? And we mentioned the peanut butter and jelly, they go together, right? And I think I mentioned apple and pie, they go together. Somebody say amen right there. It is Thanksgiving coming up soon, and Christmas soon, My dad reminded me of the digging specialty sandwich that nobody likes. My wife learned to make it through the years. Mom, who came up with that? You or mom? It's a unique sandwich. Of course, I heard today that someone in this church likes to eat bones. I won't name any names. If you don't make it obvious Evan, no one will know it's you. But anyway, just kidding. We have a sandwich in our family that's kind of odd. It's bread with some mayonnaise and then you just get cheese, like Colby cheddar cheese, and then green olives. Put it all over with a bit of pepper and that's your sandwich. It is delicious, man. I mean, it's delicious, right, dad? Dad, it's delicious, right? I think only me, my dad, and brother Nick like it, but it's a Digging Men specialty. But there's some things that just go together. Turkey and stuffing, we mentioned. I said this morning, Randy and Janelle go together. All right, right. Steak and potatoes. Amen. All right. Christmas and tree or Christmas and present. I mean, we just go on and on, right? And you'll see it in this passage here that two men who are complete opposites. Definitely opposites Peter and John are opposite of each other, but when they came together they served a purpose That was just amazing God used those two men who were completely different personality to just do great work Both of them would write part of the Bible both of them would make a difference in people's lives and real quickly I want to I want to I want us to look at prayer and praise in a little different light tonight. I think sometimes the devil has Separated the two more than they should be separated. I really believe prayer and praise need to come together more and I think sometimes we as Christians will maybe put more of a priority on prayer and we pray and pray and pray and when it gets answered, we go ahead and move on to the next big prayer without spending some time praising. I mean, when God answers a specific prayer and God does something miraculous, we want to specifically praise for it. I mean, if you're gonna pray specifically, then maybe we should praise specifically. Brother Jake just mentioned our youth conference in January, and I'm excited about that. January 21st on that Saturday. And the man that's coming, the preacher that's coming, you all will absolutely love. Teenagers, help me now. Dean Miller is one of probably the best preachers in America right now. You will absolutely love him. He's become a dear friend of mine. And so we're praying for right now that from January 19th to January 24th for 50 degree weather, no snow, right? You never know what Missouri's weather is going to be like, so pray for that right now. Because he's not just going to be here on Saturday, he's preaching all day Sunday for us too, and you will love having him here in this church. So tonight I wanna encourage us as Christians to remember that prayer and praise do go together. Now watch this, number one statement, I'm gonna give you three quick statements and then we're gonna practice what we preach tonight. Number one, prayer usually precedes praise. Prayer usually precedes praise. Now, we can just praise God for things he's done for us, but sometimes, we know what we're talking about, when you specifically pray about something, and then God answers it, that means the prayer came before, now it's our duty and our opportunity to praise. If you notice, the first few verses are about a man who is lame at the gate, and he asks for something, he doesn't even realize he's gonna get something much better than what he asked for. For years, somebody or several somebodies have brought this man, laid him at the gate of the temple, and boy, that was nice that people would just bring him there. The Bible says he was lame from his mother's womb, and they would bring him to the gate, and he would just lay there all day and ask for an alms. Always. At least this guy has an excuse. A lot of people that stand and ask for alms nowadays are able to stand there just fine. even smoke a cigarette and text on their cell phones. That's a whole other message there. But this man is lame. He can't get up and walk. And Peter and John tell this man, we don't have what you're expecting, what you're used to. But instead, in the name of Jesus Christ, they grab hands, right hands, the Bible says, and he stands up And this man, I want you to think about what happened to you. This is not just some fictitious Disney story. This is something that really happened. A man who has never experienced walking. And we take it for granted. I'm looking at a building full of people who walked in here tonight. Some maybe limped in, but we still walked in here. Somebody say amen. And we walked in. This man had never experienced walking. As soon as he stands up for the first time, the Bible says he immediately leaps. He wanted to test those ankles right away. And then he runs into the temple skipping and I mean literally the Bible says leap. I believe he's almost like skipping, just jumping up and down and praising God. Why? Because his prayer was preceding this opportunity and when God gave him something exceeding abundantly above, we just talked about an iron man, amen man? Above what he asked, he couldn't help but praise God. Now specifically this last week God did something that only God could do. My favorite thing he did last week was he gave freedom life again. He gave liberty life again. He gave Israel a friend again. And he also made the media go into hiding, praise God. The liberal lying, liberal lying, let me make it clear again, lying media has been hushed up for a while. It'll be just for a while, but they are confused, astounded, hushed up by the American people. And we prayed, and prayed, and prayed, and prayed, and prayed. Now it's time to praise, and praise, and praise, and praise. Why? Because this prayer, specific prayer, preceded this specific praise. And it's our duty to praise. And this man does a great job of standing up and testifying. Now notice this. This man does not necessarily give the testimony. Just his activities and his actions showed the crowd of people something was different. And those people immediately came to Peter and John and wanted an explanation. And Peter and John immediately said, hey, by the way, the Jesus you guys crucified, he did this, not me. because prayer precedes praise usually. Number two, I love this one. Prayer produces praise. I was thinking about this the other day as I was praying, asking God to help our churches to praise God more, because I don't think we praise him enough. That's my opinion. Maybe you disagree, but I think we should praise God more than we do. I think I should praise God more than I do. And I try to be a, people call me the praise preacher. A lot of people call me that, but I'm not sad. I wanna praise God more than I do. I think he's worthy of praise. But here's why I think we've lost our praise. Because prayer produces more praise, and if we're not praying enough, then why should we praise enough? Now look at Acts chapter three, verse five. And he gave heathen to them, expecting to receive something of them. May I say to you, I prayed specifically this past week, like many of you did. Our family prayed numerous times, specifically for things, and God gave us more, I think, than most of us expected. And not just on the national level, but statewide. You understand that the state of Missouri made a huge statement to the country. The state of Missouri went stronger conservative than even the state of Texas did. When you read the stats, Missouri ranks up now in the top five or six states in America. It's considered the most conservative states in America. That's your home state. That's where we live right now. My daughters and my kids jumped up and said, wow, daddy, we're so proud of the state I was born in. It was a joke in our family because every state we were all born in was going conservative except for one state. I was born in Florida. My dad was born in Florida. It went the right way. Utah, brother Nick went the right way. Ashley was born in Kansas, went the right way. Texas went the right way. You go down the list. Ohio, the last state was my wife's state, Pennsylvania. And we all know what happened. They had to wait till the last minute. And they finally went the right way. And we were all thrilled at that. And because we specifically prayed, it automatically produced a praise. And may I encourage you as a church to specifically pray and put God on the spot. Challenge God. Expect God to do something. And then when God answers that prayer, then it immediately produces praise. I think churches have failed to brag on answered prayers to God enough, and that's why we don't have the praise. You see this new crowd of Christians that are moving, they are trying to manufacture a praise that is not really from the proper offspring of prayer. And they try to manufacture that praise so much that they use music as a motivator for praise. Don't misunderstand me, there's nothing wrong with using music as a motivator for praise, but if that is your sole reason for praise, you're missing the boat. Because true praise comes from, and I can prove it to you scripturally from Genesis to Revelation, true praise comes from acknowledging God's activities. And when God acts on something, it immediately makes the Christian say, wow, God, praise your name for what you did. Music maybe helps us to praise him for who he is. but more what he does is a result of prayer. And when we as Christians pray and God answers that prayer, it immediately produces praise. So number one, prayer usually precedes praise. Number two, prayer produces praise. Number three, I like this one. Prayer promotes praise. You see, when you pray, it makes you want to praise and then go right back to praying again. You see, you just cannot have a peanut butter jelly sandwich if you're out of peanut butter. You can't have a peanut butter jelly sandwich if you're out of jelly. Somebody say amen right there. And the problem with many Christians is if we're not praying, we don't have praise. If we're not praising, we don't feel motivated to prayer. It's a beautiful cycle that goes back and forth and God allows us to witness answered prayer and then we praise him like he deserves it because he is worthy and in the midst of that prayer and then praise we see the promotion of praise because prayers keep getting answered, praise then gets promoted. When I mean promoted, I don't mean like promoted like a job. I mean it gets more advertising. It gets more attention. It gets more people to get engaged in this. And that's what this verse is all about. And this context, you see, as soon as this man is healed in verse number eight, he leaping up stood and walked and entered with him into the temple, walking and leaping and praising God. And all the people saw him. Him walking and praising God. When the people saw this man and knew this was the man that was laying at the gate and this is the man that was always begging of our arms. This is the man we've seen for so many years. This man is standing but walking. I demand an explanation and guess what? They got it. They got an explanation. You see, Christians can make a difference in our families, in our neighborhoods, in our workplaces by being people of prayer Watch this, I'm gonna add something. More so being people of answered prayer. When our prayers are specifically answered, and our prayers are specifically praised for, automatically people start knowing who to go to when they have prayer requests. Also when people know who they can contact, who they'll go to, who they'll text, who they'll call, who they'll lean on when they have a need. May I say something? We live in a country of many, many needy people. Americans are unneeded people today. And they don't understand what they really need. They think it's finances. They think it's a better job, a better promotion. But really what America needs is Jesus Christ. These people that are protesting and angry and frustrated and destroying good business owners, places of business, and acting out in wrath and anger, these people need Jesus desperately. This generation of young people that are so confused because they've been given trophies for everything, Because they've never been said, no, you're wrong. They've never had any discipline or character instilled in them. So when they don't get their way, all they know to do is get angry and lose control. No discipline. These people need Jesus. And it's time for the Christian to arise. But before we start to reach the people on the streets of America, we've got to have a beautiful cycle in our life where we pray and praise, and prayer precedes praise, and prayer produces praise, and prayer then promotes praise. That's what God intended for. If you study the Old Testament, I'm just about through, stay with me now. When you study the Old Testament, you'll see oftentimes that when the children of Israel went to war, there was a time of prayer, then they won the battle, and there was a time of praise. And it became a beautiful, contagious thing within the nation of Israel. When bad kings took over and started to abandon the principles of God and the Old Testament laws, then they left those prayers lost their praise and their relationship with God got very weak. There was a huge volume between Israel and God. Then a right king would come back. What would he do? He'd bring back the law. He'd bring back the word of God. He'd then start praying again. They would emphasize the religious leaders and the priest of their day. And then they would pray. And then when they saw victories, they would praise. And then people started to get excited again. And it becomes a beautiful, contagious cycle. Look, church, I hope you get the best Black Friday deals of our lifetime this year. But please don't forget what Thanksgiving is all about. It's not about prepping for Black Friday. It's still a day where we as Christians can set aside and say, Dear God, you've been so good to us. Thank you for being a good God to us. After you've thanked them and filled your belly, then go Black Friday shopping all you want. Amen. But before that, don't forget what Thanksgiving really means. God is so good. My heart is so proud My mind is so unfocused I see the things you do through me As great things I have done But now you gently break me Lovingly you take me and hold me as my father and mold me as my maker. I ask you how many times will you pick me up when I keep on letting you down? And each time I will fall short of your glory, how far will forgiveness abound? And you answer, my child, I love you. And as long as you're seeking my face, you'll walk in the power of my daily sufficient grace. At times I may feel weak and feel a bit discouraged, knowing that someone somewhere could do a better job. For who am I to serve you? I know I don't deserve you. And that's the part that burns in my heart and keeps me hanging on. I ask you how many times will you pick me up when I keep on letting you down? And each time I will fall short of your glory, how far will forgiveness abound? And you answer, my child, I love you. And as long as you're seeking my face, you'll walk in the power of my daily sufficient grace. You are so patient with me, Lord. As I walk with you, I'm learning what your love really means. The price that I could never pay was paid at Calvary. So instead of trying to repay you, I'm learning to simply obey you. By giving up my life to you For all that you've given to me I ask you how many times will you pick me up When I keep on letting you down And each time I will fall short of your glory How far will forgiveness abound? And you answer, my child, I love you And as long as you're seeking my face You'll walk in the power of my daily sufficient grace. Amen.