Amen, and I want to thank you Josh and the team for leading us, and I hope that that song will be ringing out in your head as we make our way through this passage, because we need to come to this text with humility. We need to come to every text with humility, but particularly here as Jesus is walking us through the Sermon on the Mount, and turn in your Bibles to Matthew chapter six. As he makes his way through the Sermon on the Mount, he's calling us to a life that we really are incapable of living in our own strength. And so I want to make sure we all hear that from the outset, that you know that from the outset. We cannot do this in our own strength. We need Jesus to bring this about in us. We need him to, by his spirit, to change us from the inside out, from one degree of glory to the next. And if we begin to think that we can do this in our own strength, then that fosters pride, it fosters the kind of attitude that Jesus is warning against in our passage this morning. Because once we've got the pride, once we think that we've done this, then suddenly we want everybody to see what we've done. It's kind of like, look at this amazing life that I'm living. Look how awesome I am. Are you noticing? I hope you're noticing how great I am. And Jesus says, man, that's going to be a real temptation for all of you, not just the Pharisees, but for me, for each of you in this room, that's going to be a real temptation for us as we grow. If we begin to think, man, I did this, then we're gonna want everybody to be looking and seeing, and we need to just remember today in humility that all these good things that are growing in us, they're coming from the Lord, right? They are all a gift, they are all a grace. And so today we look in Matthew chapter six, and as I began last Sunday, or explained last Sunday, this section that we're looking at in the Sermon on the Mount is a section where Jesus is warning us against the danger of hypocrisy. And that word hypocrite, it comes from, originally comes from the theater, the dramatic world, and it expressed the person who wears a mask. And so Jesus takes that kind of theatrical language, and he says, in your religious life, you're gonna be tempted to be like that guy from the theater, wearing a mask, putting on a performance for the people around you. You're all gonna feel that temptation. Maybe you're here this morning, and in fact, in a room this size, I would say there certainly are some people in the morning, here this morning, who are wearing a mask, even right now, trying to put forward a show that makes people think that this is all, we've got it all together, and in reality, you don't have it together at all. We all feel that temptation, and if you're familiar with your Bible, you know why we all feel that temptation. If you remember back in the very beginning, in Genesis chapter three, the first time when Adam and Eve sinned, do you remember what they did after they sinned? They hid, that's right, they hid. There's something about sin that transforms people like us into people who hide. We want to hide from God, we want to hide from each other, And so, what we do, Adam and Eve, they hid behind a bush, but we hide behind all sorts of things, right? We hide behind maybe our perfect Sunday morning attendance, or a really snazzy outfit, or really long, ornate prayers, or whatever it is that I need to do to make the rest of you think that I've actually got it all together, when in reality, I know that I don't. There are things in my life that are not the way that I know they should be. There are areas of my life that are currently in disorder, and I wish that they weren't, but I don't want any of you to know that. I don't want God to know that. And so I'm going to put on this mask, and I'm gonna perform for everyone. And Jesus is warning us in this passage that that approach to life is gonna leave you empty. It's gonna leave you empty, and ultimately, it's gonna rob you of your reward. See, the scary thing is that that performance works. And again, you probably know that. We're really good at putting on a mask. We're really good at hiding. And so you can convince all the people around you that you have it together. And in fact, you can perform in such a way that not only do they think that you have it together, but they start patting you on the back, they start telling you the kind of things you wanna hear, they puff up your pride. It feels really good in the moment. But Jesus warns us, remember back in verse one, he undergirds this whole section with this warning. He says, beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them. For then you will have no reward from your Father who's in heaven." That road, even though it works in the moment, it gives you a little temporary shot to your ego and your pride, ultimately it's going to leave you empty. So here he's warning us not to trade our treasure in heaven, as I said last week, not to trade our treasure in heaven for a pat on the back in the foyer. not to trade this eternal glory that he offers to us for a temporary boost to our pride. That's a fool's trade, and that's the warning in this section. He applies it to three areas of our lives. He applies it to our giving, which we looked at last week, to our prayer, and to our fasting. And so today we're looking at this warning applied to our prayer life, and we see that in Matthew chapter six. We're gonna read verses five to eight today, so look there with me. And here now God's holy, inspired, inerrant, living, active word to us today. And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly I say to you, they've received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room, shut the door, pray to your father who's in secret, and your father who sees in secret will reward you. And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your father knows what you need before you ask him. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Now here in verses five to eight, Jesus very clearly spells out how not to pray. And if you've got your Bible in front of you, your eyes are gonna notice that immediately following this, he comes into what we refer to as the Lord's Prayer, where he teaches us how we ought to pray. The Lord's Prayer, there's so much there to unpack that I decided we're gonna deal with that in a whole sermon unto itself. And so today, we're gonna focus in on the warning that we find in verses five to eight. And what we learn here is Jesus gives us two examples of what prayer is not. Two examples. First, Jesus reminds us here that prayer is not a performance. So look again at verse five. When you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners. Why? That they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they've received their reward. Now, if you were with us last Sunday, then something that you learned last Sunday is gonna help you to picture this a little more clearly. Remember, we talked about the trumpets, and people would give with the trumpets, and the trumpets were part of the public fasting in Jerusalem, and so there were times when they would have a public fast, and they would signal this with the trumpet blast, and then people would come out of their homes, into the streets, they'd make their offerings, they'd go to the temple, and there were some people who used that opportunity They'd store up all of their generous giving and they would do their giving when they hear the trumpet and they know everyone's in the street. When they know they've got an audience, then they bring forward their gift so everyone can see. That was the warning last week. Well, Jesus here, he's using the same language. He says, and in the same way, some people use that trumpet blast, that time when the whole community's in the streets. They use that as an opportunity to pray on the street corner. Again, because they know that the whole community's out, people are gonna see them praying, people are gonna hear them praying, and that's ultimately what they're after in their heart. Whether it's in the synagogue or on the street corner, what Jesus is warning about here is the hypocrites need for an audience. The hypocrite needs an audience to perform for. Now, I want to fence this warning before we go any further. It's important that we don't misapply what Jesus is saying here. I mean, we had people praying from this stage this morning, so is Jesus saying that we should never pray before others? Well, no, because the Apostle Paul teaches us how to pray in our gatherings. In 1 Corinthians 11, for example, and chapter 14, he gives us instructions on what our corporate public prayer should look like. So Jesus isn't telling us not to do that. And neither is Jesus telling us that we should never pray with other groups of people because in the book of Acts, we find lots of examples of church prayer meetings. Acts chapter 12 describes a prayer meeting where they gathered together and prayed. So that's not what he's warning against. He's not saying never pray in public, never pray together, only pray in your closet by yourself. What then is he warning against? Well, he's warning against the motivation that drives our prayers. So for example, he's warning against the person who only prays in public, and only prays when there's an audience to see him or her praying. D.A. Carson says, the person who prays more in public than in private reveals that he is less interested in God's approval than in human praise. See, Jesus here, he's targeting our hearts. He's targeting our motivation when we come to him in prayer. What is it that drives that desire to pray? Is it a desire to have the audience of our Heavenly Father? Or is it a desire to have the audience of this group of people who are gonna hear me pray and they're gonna think I'm amazing and I can't wait to pray in front of all of you. And sometimes that creeps into our hearts. Now let me take this opportunity to repeat a warning that I shared last Sunday. I think it's an important warning as we talk about hypocrisy in this section of the sermon. You might just feel a temptation today to think to yourself, I am so glad that she's gonna hear this sermon. She prays so much, you can tell she's trying to impress, or he, he needs to hear this sermon. What a hypocrite. If any of that is happening in your heart, I need you to recognize that that's actually the heart of the Pharisee. That that thing inside of you that says, oh, I don't need this, but they do, that is the pride that Jesus is rebuking here in this passage. Listen, he's aiming at the heart. Do you have the ability to see people's hearts? No? No, exactly. You can't see the hearts of the people around you. You don't know their motivations. You can see your heart, though, can't you? You can see your motivations. So you apply this today, not to the people around you, in front of you, behind you. Apply this to yourself, which, again, was the thing that the Pharisees never wanted to do. I'm gonna provide a few diagnostic questions this morning, just for you to apply this to your own life as I apply this to my life. I mean, this morning we've prayed a number of times in our gathering. we've all bowed our head and we've prayed. Here's a question for you. Have you prayed more in this gathering today than you did all week long? Because that might be indicative of a problem in your life. Or moms and dads, I wonder, you know, if we pray with our kids at the dinner table, here's a question. When you pray at the dinner table with your kids, is that the only time of the day that you're come in and pray into your Heavenly Father, the one time of day when your children have a chance to see Mommy and Daddy praying, and that might be indicative of a problem. Or when you're in prayer groups and you're praying with other Christians, do you find yourself thinking about, what can I say that would impress them? Or do you find when other people are praying that you're not even listening, you're just thinking about what you're gonna say and you're thinking how you can incorporate some scripture and how you can make this impressive prayer? Do you find that happening in your heart? Does your public prayer life paint a false picture of your private prayer life? If it's true of you, Christian, if you're seeing, if some of those diagnostic questions are hitting the mark, then I would tell you it's a symptom of a deeper problem. And the problem is this, you're actually, you've lost sight of the beauty of prayer. You've lost sight of the gift of prayer. By misusing prayer in this way, by using it as a tool to try and impress people like us, you are robbing yourself of the gift that you've been given, that you get to talk to your heavenly father. You get to come before the maker of heaven and earth and bring your burdens and your cares and concerns and your praise. You have an audience with him and you are trading that audience with him for an audience with us? That's a terrible trade, it's a fool's trade. And as Jesus said, if you make that trade, if in that moment you're like, I'm gonna give my time and attention to trying to impress these people, it just might work. And we just might find ourselves thinking, man, what a prayer warrior. That guy can pray. That girl, she is a model to be followed. You just might get that temporary reward, but as Jesus said, that's where the reward ends. You're trading your treasures in heaven for the pat on the back. Don't fall into the trap. Don't make that trade. Guard your heart, Christian. Prayer's not a performance. That's the first example. Now the second example Jesus uses, he explains to us that prayer is not a magic formula. I couldn't find exactly the right word for this, but bear with me. Prayer is not a magic formula. Look at verse seven. When you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. So again, let's just put up a little fence here and ask, what is Jesus actually warning against and what is he not warning against? One thing we can say for certain is that he's not warning against bringing something to God a number of times. Let's say you're praying for your lost, your son, who's far from the Lord. Jesus isn't saying here, you know, you can only pray for him once, but after that, you know, you're praying like a pagan. No, because later he's gonna tell us the parable of the persistent widow who comes again and again and again and gains an audience with the judge. And he tells us that that's the model we should follow. So bring your request to God again and again and again. He's also not warning against long prayers. And sometimes we can misapply that. We think, oh, anybody who prays for more than five minutes, they're praying like the pagan in Matthew 6. But that can't be the case because, again, we find prayer meetings in the book of Acts that go all through the night. Okay, so there's nothing wrong with a long prayer in theory. He's not warning against that. Well, then what is he warning against? He's warning against this pagan approach to prayer. This idea that we can somehow obligate or manipulate God into giving us what we want. If we just repeat the words enough, if we just do the right stuff, then God will answer us, and that's the secret to prayer. He's warning us against that way of thinking. And perhaps as an illustration, I'll just draw from a biblical story, we find it back in 1 Kings 18, it's the story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal. If you've never heard this story, it's a great story. So Elijah, he wants to show, he wants to demonstrate that Baal, who's being worshipped across the land, is no God at all. And so he does a very bold thing. He calls together all the prophets of Baal, and a great audience to watch, and he tells the prophets of Baal, he says, tell you what, we're gonna set up two offerings here, and then we're gonna ask our God to rain fire from heaven on the offering. So I'll let you guys go first, and then I'll go. And so the prophets of Baal, they set up their offering, and we read, they took the bowl that was given them, and they prepared it, And they called upon the name of Baal from morning until noon, saying, O Baal, answer us. And so you can imagine them repeating this for hours. O Baal, answer us. But there's no voice. No one answered. And so they limped around the altar that they had made. So now they're walking in this circle around the altar. Oh, Baal, answer us, but it's not working. And so the text goes on to say, and they cried aloud. Start raising our voices, adding more of our passion. Maybe that's the problem, not enough passion in my prayer life. So they add some passion and then it says they cut themselves after their custom with swords and lances until the blood gushed out upon them. If you're picturing the scene, it's becoming quite grotesque, right? As they circle this altar and they cry out and they're bleeding and they're trying to do anything to try and get the attention of their God. And as midday passed, they raved on until the time of the offering of the oblation. There was no voice. No one answered. No one paid attention. Now this is an extreme example, but it draws attention to the approach to prayer that Jesus is calling us away from. And if we're honest, Sometimes this approach to prayer can creep into our own hearts and minds. Man, if I was just more passionate, God would hear me. Maybe I need to raise my voice. How am I gonna get his attention? How am I gonna obligate him to answer this prayer? Listen, he's not a genie. Prayer is not the way that you rub the lamp exactly the right way and then out he pops for your wishes. Prayer is not a vending machine. It's not as if each prayer is like a quarter, and if you put in enough of these quarters, then eventually out will pop the blessing. If you're thinking that way, that's a pagan approach to prayer. Looking back at the story of Elijah, after this big display with the prophets of Baal, We find Elijah, and he takes this offering, and again, a bold prophet, he soaks this offering with water. He just completely drenches it. He's got trenches around the thing, and they're full of water. And then, what does he do? He prays a very simple prayer. He just prays a simple prayer to God in heaven. And the text reads, oh, I flipped two pages. What does the text say? Then the fire of the Lord fell. and consumed the burnt offering, and the wood, and the stones, and the dust, and licked up the water that was in the trench. Here's the point. God is not more inclined to hear your prayer if that prayer lasts 15 minutes rather than five. He isn't. He's not more inclined to answer your prayer if you use some big four-syllable words. Some big theological words that you didn't know 20 years ago, but you know them now. It doesn't work like that. Prayer is not a way that we obligate him to answer us. And passion, I think that really creeps into our hearts. Sometimes we feel like, man, I'm so dry. Of course God's not answering my prayers. Look at me, I'm just like emotionally depleted, I'm so dry. Your passion does not obligate God to answer your prayers. It's, you're coming with the wrong approach. Christians, you know why your prayers are heard? Your prayers are heard because Jesus has opened the door for you to come to your heavenly Father. That's why your prayers are heard. Not because of your language, not because of your posture, not because of how amazing you are, not because you had a good week or a bad week, not because today you're feeling really passionate, you got the right music on in the background, your heart feels stirred. He hears your prayers because of what Jesus has accomplished on your behalf. He's opened the door. Which means, maybe you've been a Christian for a week, and you hear all this talk about prayer warriors, and you see this example of prayer warriors. You know what you need to be a prayer warrior? Faith of a mustard seed. Jesus said that. He said, For truly I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, move from here to there, and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you. Prayer is a door that is opened into the very throne room of heaven. Just think about that. When we come to Him in prayer, we are coming into the We're all in the room of heaven, we're coming before our holy, majestic, awesome God, and we get to bring him these burdens that we've been carrying. And now if you're in Christ, which means that you've confessed your sin, and you've placed your trust in Jesus, you've put your trust in the fact that he died for my sin, he has made a way for me to be righteous before God. If you are in Christ, then that door is wide open for you all the time. You can always come before your heavenly father. So don't stand outside the door trying to impress us. And don't stand outside the door trying to learn enough of the fancy words so that you can finally make your way in. Prayer's not a performance. Prayer is not a magic formula. Jesus has already opened the door for you, so come in. Come in. Which leads us into this last section of the sermon. How then should we pray? Now, as I said, Jesus is gonna go on to give us this beautiful teaching on prayer that we know as the Lord's Prayer, and we're gonna look at that in its entirety. But he teaches us some valuable lessons here in this warning, and I wanna draw your attention to those, and particularly, I wanna speak to those in the room who are maybe new Christians, young Christians, or maybe you've been a Christian for a long time, but you've always felt like, man, prayers are so hard for me, I can't figure this out. I wanna encourage you today, as you listen to what Jesus teaches us about prayer, I want you to see how beautifully simple it is. It's so wonderfully simple. And I wanna say that sometimes, unknowingly, unwittingly, we've maybe taught you the opposite You know, maybe you've sat in on a prayer meeting with me or with someone and you've come away thinking, okay, well maybe in five years I'll be able to pray to God. You know, because sometimes we even say things like, you know, prayer meetings are the place where you learn to pray. But if you then go to a prayer meeting and everybody prays for 20 minutes with really big, long, ornate words, you might leave that prayer meeting thinking, Prayer is something that maybe someday I'll graduate into, but I can't do it now. I just want to say that's just not the truth. Now God hears long prayers, but he hears short, childlike prayers too. And actually when Jesus teaches us how to pray, he invites us into a simple, childlike faith. You can do this. And my prayer and my hope as I was writing this sermon is that every Christian in this room would leave today knowing that you can talk to God. You can go to a prayer meeting. So somebody put in a survey, and I really appreciate that they put this in. They wrote a suggestion that, you know, what if we had a prayer meeting for new believers? And I love the heart behind that question, because the heart is that new people come and maybe they're intimidated by our groups, but what if we made a group just for the new folks? And my response and pushback would be, and here's what we could strive for, church, what if every prayer meeting was a prayer meeting for new believers? What if when we see, and maybe you have an opportunity to pray with a new Christian, What if we recognize in that moment that I have an opportunity to model for them what prayer is? And if our whole group, if we all model that prayer needs to be long and theologically dense, if we all set that example, then they're gonna walk away thinking that they can't pray at all, and they're not gonna be back next week. So what if we just strove to model that? Because again, nothing wrong with a long prayer, but what if when we see the new believer sitting next to us at the prayer meeting, we say, you know what? When it's my time to pray, I wanna just pray a simple faith-filled prayer that doesn't leave them feeling like they've gotta stay on the outside. We could shoot for that. So I want you to see this beautiful simplicity. New believer and old believer, let's see this today. First and very simply, remember who you are praying to. When you pray, remember who you are praying to. We see this in verse six. It says, but when you pray, go into your room, shut the door, and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you. Remember the first half of this warning, he was warning against those who were using prayer as a performance. So this is his corrective. It's like, you know, you're using prayer to perform for other people, but you need to remember that prayer is actually for your Father. And sometimes it's lost on us how radical this teaching is. Maybe if you've grown up in the church, you just assume that the people of God always addressed God as Father, that that was always the way that they approached Him. And in the Old Testament, we do see some references to God as Father, but they're rare. That's not the primary theme. In fact, one commentator notes, the fatherhood of God is not a central theme in the Old Testament. So when Jesus comes and he teaches us to pray, and he takes this kind of rare theme of God as Father, and he makes it the primary theme, that's a really big deal. This is a huge deal, and seeing this is going to change the way you pray. Jesus says, here's the secret to prayer. When you come in prayer, pray to your Father who's in heaven. This is like a whole new language that he's bringing his people into. Yes, he is holy, majestic, awesome, sovereign. And in the Lord's Prayer, he's gonna teach us, our Father, who art in heaven. Meaning, don't lose the fact that he is holy and awesome and wonderful, but he's putting this on the front burner. He is your Father. He is your Father. And Jesus is giving this new language because Jesus is ushering in a new relationship. He's, that's what he's done in the new covenant. Jesus is coming and he's transforming us into the children of God. And because we are the children of God, we need to learn to address him as our father. Now, maybe you're here today and you're not a Christian. I want to say something that's hard for you to hear, but important for you to hear. Do you know, apart from Jesus, we have no business addressing God as our father. We can't address him as our father apart from Jesus. Now, if I'm not a Christian, then I'm certainly, I'm a creature made by God. The Bible says I'm made in his image. So there's like dignity and worth. But I'm not a child of God. I'm not yet a child of God. The Bible says I'm dead in my sin. The Bible says I'm actually a rebel because of my sin and my rejection of God. I'm separated from him. He is holy and perfect and I can't even come into his presence because this rebellion in me, it's like he would consume me with his glory and holiness if I came close to him. So I'm separated from him. There's a big problem if I'm not a Christian, but of course God so loved the world. He sent his only son that whoever believes in him would not perish, but have everlasting life. And so as I see that distance, and maybe you're here today and you're seeing that distance, I need you to see that God has made a way for us to draw near. He sent his son to do for you what you couldn't do for yourself. So you can't clean yourself up enough to come before a holy God. You just can't. You could spend a whole lifetime trying, but you can't. Because it doesn't get to the root of the problem, which is a heart that is rebellious against God. So God sent His Son to die for our sin on that cross, and when we put our trust in Him, when we lay down our sin and say, okay, I need that, I need Jesus, God takes all of our sin and He puts it there, and He takes the righteousness of Jesus and He puts it on us. And in Romans 8 we learn, For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons. That's what you receive when you put your trust in Christ. You receive the spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry, Abba, Father. The spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God. So we receive adoption, which means that before we receive that gift, we are not the children of God. We can't come to him as our father. Because of our sin, the door to the throne room of God that we talked about Jesus opening, it's closed for us until we are in Christ. That's when it swings open. And if you're here today and that door is closed and you sense that, I need you to know that you can surrender your life to Jesus today. You don't need to go home and make a plan about how you're gonna earn this. If you repent of your sin and you say, God, I thank you for sending Jesus, I trust in him, that door swings wide open and you could have that today. But seeing that, seeing that the door is open is the secret to prayer. If you're in Christ, you can come to your Father in heaven, and He loves you. He loves you. Wrapping your heart around that reality is the secret to prayer. So Martin Lloyd-Jones writes, I suggest that if you can say from your heart, whatever your condition, my Father, in a sense your prayer is already answered. Meaning, what more do we need? When we can wrap our heart around that reality, that the God of the universe loves us and calls us his children, that he has a fatherly affection and concern for us. I mean, the things of earth grow strangely dim in the light of his glory and grace. I hope you can see that today. So when you find yourself unwilling to go to prayer groups because you're just too ashamed and you don't know the words and what are people gonna judge you, or when you find yourself at home and you know that you should pray but you feel like God probably doesn't wanna hear from you because you've had a bad week or your life's not the way it should be, when you find yourself feeling like I can't come before him, what you need to see first and foremost above all things is that he is your Father in heaven, he wants to hear from you. He wants to hear from you and you don't need to earn your audience with him. Jesus earned the audience. Jesus opened the door. So come, come. Remember who you're praying to. Shake off all the bad habits. Now some of us maybe today, that needs to be our takeaway. We need to shake off some of these bad habits we've cultivated after a lifetime of living in the church. Maybe we've just cultivated the habit of trying to impress people. And every time we do pray out loud, there's a part of us that's just trying to make everyone think, wow, what a great prayer warrior I am. Some of us need to go into the closet, take a little break from the prayer group for a week or two, and shake all that off. And remember, what is this really about? It's about coming before him. Remember who you're praying to. And then finally, when you pray, remember that He knows what you need before you even ask. That's straight out of verses seven to eight. It says, when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him. Now if we could just wrap our hearts around that truth, it would take off so much pressure from our prayer life. This might seem like a, maybe you hear this and you're thinking, well then why do we even pray? If that's your instinct, I'd say you're missing the point. If you're hearing this the way you should, then it should just be like taking off all kinds of pressure. I'd argue in two ways. First of all, it takes off this pressure to, you know, this thing we feel to try and twist God's arm to get him to do the things that we need. You know, as if like God doesn't want to meet our needs and so we gotta find some way to, again, put the coins in the machine, find some way to make him do the things we need. That's not how it works. Remember, he's just correcting the pagan approach that thinks that we just need to multiply our words enough times until he hears us. He's not like that. The Gentiles thought it was like, you know, almost like a magic key. And if you get the right key, then you twist it and then voila, it opens up all the blessings and it pours out. But of course, if you adopt that thinking to prayer, then it implies that if you use the wrong key, or if you don't heap up enough phrases, or you don't use the right words, that you're gonna miss out on the blessing, that God's not gonna give you what you need. But that's not it at all. Remember, he knows what you need before you ask. Maybe one example, I feel like I'm rambling a bit. zoom in. I saw this in my own life. I remember when I first started preaching, I found this to be the most horrifying thing. It's still scary, but now I think it's more just a fear of God and less of a fear of man. But at the start, it was a fear of everything, including my shadow. It was just horrified at the prospect of preaching. And on Sunday mornings before I would preach, I remember I would be in my office, I'd go through the sermon, and then I'd get on my knees and I would just pray and plead with God, help me to get through this, help me not to be a fool, help me not to say the wrong things, help me not to faint. And he always helped. He always gave me everything I needed. But I remember vividly there was one Sunday where I went through my routine and I prepped my sermon, and I sat at my desk and I prayed, and I came down for the service, and then I realized, I didn't kneel today. I mean, I prayed the same prayer, but I was sitting at my desk. I didn't get down on my knees, and I felt this real trauma, like, now this service is going to be a disaster. Because, I mean, there's something good about kneeling. It expresses our need, our humility. But I thought, I didn't do that, and so now God's not going to bless me, and now the whole thing's going to fall apart. And do you see what happened in my heart? I had slipped into this way of thinking, this approach that thinks that I have to, God hears me because of my physical posture. We all face this temptation, and this stuff is gonna creep in. And again, maybe you think, like, oh, God hears me because I had a great week, or God hears me because my attitude was in the right place. We can't take that in. He knows what we need. Before we even ask, He knows what we need. He's our Father, He loves us, He wants to give us what we need, He knows what we need. So that takes the pressure off in our prayer life of feeling like we have to, again, twist His arm to get the blessing. But also, the second way it takes the pressure off is that it frees us from the fear that we might not ask for the right thing. And maybe this is just me, because I do overthink sometimes, but have you ever found yourself praying for something and you just have no idea what to even ask for? Like maybe you're just, you're walking through a really broken situation with your friends, and you're not sure even what is right, and you find yourself thinking, like, I know what I want, I know what I think I need, but do I wanna, what if I ask for this, and God swings open this door, but in reality I was supposed to go through that door, and I ruined my whole life. Maybe this is just me. You are dismissed. No. It's not just me, because one commentator at least struggles with this. He says this, he says, I will be frank to confess, if I really thought that I could change the mind of God by praying, I would abstain. Because I would have to say, how can I presume with the limitations of my own mind, the corruptions of my own heart, how can I presume to interfere in the counsels of the Almighty? Meaning, if that's what prayer was, if prayer obligated God to do exactly what I asked him to do, Why would I ever pray? I mean, I just think back, think back in your own life. I think back to 20-year-old version of Levi. What did he know? Like, what would he have asked for for my life? He would have swung doors open that would have led me into ruin. And if that was true of 20-year-old Levi, I'm certain it's true of 35-year-old Levi, too. Right? It's just, that's not how it works. That, you know, whatever I ask God to do, he's going to do exactly that. You know, for better or worse, we're going to follow that road to the end. No, he knows what you need. He knows what you need before you ask. And in fact, when you're asking these requests, he's perfecting your requests. Romans 8 teaches us that. Wrap your head around this. Paul reminds us, likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness, for we do not know what to pray for as we ought, even when we think we do. But the Spirit himself intercedes for us, with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the spirit. Because the spirit intercedes for the saints, listen, according to the will of God. So even though you're not sure exactly what's right and you come with this bumbling prayer, the spirit knows exactly what the will of God is for your life. And he takes that prayer and he perfects it. Picture this scene, this is like putting together what the Bible teaches us about prayer. When you pray, you bring this request to God, you say, God, I need X, I'm struggling with Y, would you do this? You pray, and then what happens? The Holy Spirit then takes that prayer, and he perfects it, takes off all the stuff that you shouldn't have asked for, takes off all the mess, all the muck. maybe even some of the sinful motives we bring with us. In fact, sometimes it's the big, ornate multiplication of words, that's the first thing he chops off. All that pride and mess, he's like, okay, let's get rid of all that. That was for the people in the room, not for God. And then he brings this prayer, and he aligns it with the will of God, and he brings it to Jesus, who's seated at the right hand of the Father, who's our mediator. And then Jesus, perfect Son of God, brings this request to the presence of our Heavenly Father, and He asks for it in His authority. By the way, when we pray in Jesus' name. That's what we're alluding to. When we pray in Jesus' name, what we're saying is, I'm asking for this not on the basis of how great I am, not on the basis of what I deserve and my merit for the life I've lived. I'm asking this in confidence because of who Jesus is and what Jesus has accomplished. I'm asking this in the name of Jesus' perfect righteousness. So Jesus brings this request to the Father, this perfect request, he presents it. And that's what's happening in prayer. Now, if you backtrack that all the way to the beginning and you consider what we add to that equation, it's an embarrassingly small contribution. We just come and say, help, with more or less words. Like, God, help. And so why do we spend so much time stressing about like, oh, I hope I got the words right, or I hope I had the right bodily posture, or I hope I had enough passion. God doesn't hear our prayers because of any of that stuff that we spend so much time stressing about. And how tragic it is when those little things actually keep us from beginning this process. You know, I started with the question, why do we even pray then? If he knows what we need before we even ask, and he's our father and he wants to bless us, why do we pray? I think the act of prayer itself is transformative for us. that the faith that we express when we come to our Father, believing that He actually can answer, wants to answer, the faith that we express, it just glorifies Him when His children come. I prayed with a younger believer this week, and I asked him if I could share this, and he said I could. I was so refreshed. Sometimes we just make this so complicated and it's meant to be so beautiful and simple. I prayed with this young man and he just said, good morning God. And jumped in and there was something just beautiful about it. There was something, he captured the simplicity. He got it. He knew what we were doing in that moment. We get to talk to God. And so I'm gonna talk to him. And I just, I came away from that, if I'm honest, a little bit chastened, a little bit challenged. and very much encouraged. Now, having, I've pointed at certain things, I wanna be clear, there's nothing wrong with long, eloquent prayers. I love that we can pray. We bring ourselves to God, and sometimes that's gonna bubble up in long, eloquent prayers, but we need to know as a church, so hear this, that in the same way that God hears long, eloquent prayers, he also hears simple prayers with childlike faith. He hears those too. And so we want to model that for one another and encourage each other in this. You don't need to train for prayer, brothers and sisters. You were made for prayer. Hear that. Prayer's not a performance. I don't need to impress you when I pray, and you don't need to impress me, and we shouldn't be thinking about that at all. Prayer's not a magic formula. You don't need to study for five years to learn the fancy words so that God will finally hear you. That's not how it works. When you pray, remember who you're praying to. You're not praying to us. You're praying to your Heavenly Father. He loves you. He wants to hear from you. Maybe some of you just need to hear that today. He loves you and He wants to hear from you. And remember that He knows what you need before you even ask. You don't need to try and twist His arm enough so that you can get the blessing that you need. You don't need to make sure that you've got it all figured out before you come to Him again. He's gonna sort that out. He's gonna perfect that in the process. You don't need to get it all just right. You simply need to come to him with the faith of a mustard seed and ask. To that end, let's pray together. Spend a moment and invite God to apply this truth to our hearts, and then I'll pray for us. Heavenly Father, I want to pray today, particularly for those who feel that they can't come to you. Lord, for those who feel perhaps that they're not educated enough. They don't know the right words to bring before such an amazing God, and you are amazing, and you deserve our very best. But Lord, I pray that they would feel a great freedom to come to you now. And Lord, I pray for those who feel that they can't come to you because they just see what a mess they've made of their lives, and they see all the things that aren't the way they should be, and they wonder how a holy God could ever want to hear from them. I pray right now, Father, that you would reach to them in compassion and mercy and love. and you would show them that the door is open, that Jesus died for all of that sin, that the price has been paid, and that nothing would please you more than to hear from your children. God, help us to come to you in faith today. I pray that today would be a day of awakening. for the prayer lives of every man and woman, boy and girl in this church who has surrendered their life to you. And Lord, I pray that today would be a day of salvation for those who have not surrendered their lives to you. I pray that you would open their eyes, and it's a miracle every time. God, we ask for a miracle, that you would open their eyes to see that they can't do this in their own strength, and they don't have to. I pray that you would bring about real faith in Jesus, real trust in the work that he's accomplished on our behalf. Lord, so press that gospel truth deep into our hearts. For those who've never heard it, Lord, let it come to life. And for those who have heard it, Lord, I pray that you would remind us again today of the rock on which we stand. So God, we come. I pray today that you would compel us to come, Lord, not as an obligation, but as a tremendous privilege and joy. I cannot believe that I get to talk to you right now, that you hear me. that you hear my brothers and sisters in this room, none of us have it all together, or none of us in our own right deserves your audience, but all of us in Christ, we've been invited and been called sons and daughters. Thank you, God, thank you. Good morning, God, we love you, and it is just our honor to walk with you and to live for you. Even as we stumble along, would you just grow us and transform us, I pray. And now, Lord, as we sing this song and we respond to you, I pray that you would help us to see that in the arms of our dear Savior, there are 10,000 charms, which means there are 10,000 delights. As we come to you, we will never fall short of finding wonders and joys and glories. You are everything we need. And so we seek first your kingdom, your righteousness, and trust that all these other things will fall into place. And we pray this in Jesus' name. And everyone said, amen. Worship team, would you lead us?