Join us now for the chapel hour coming to you from the campus of Bob Jones University. Our speaker is Dr. Greg Mazak, chairman of the Division of Psychology at BJU. The title of his message is What Are We Praying For? The text is from Matthew, chapter six, verses nine through 13. Good morning. Now, we're facing a little bit of a challenge today because I know it's early. And a lot of you are used to waking up during your first hour of class and not used to being awake this early in the morning. I know in addition to that, from all the coughing, we're reminded of all the colds that people are struggling with. I know in my classes we've been down as far as attendance because of the illnesses that are going around. My voice is a little bit weak even this morning. And I know, I've recently been told that some of you have maybe a little bit of a hard time understanding me anyway. And I never realized that. I guess it was brought to my attention recently. We had a guest preacher here, Pastor Tim Potter from Mentor, Ohio. And as he was finished preaching that day in chapel, I was very surprised to have repeatedly people come up to me and say, Greg, I don't know if you know this, but he talks just like you. And I looked for him after chapel. And I caught up with him. And before I could say anything to him, he said, you know, I had a number of guys, Greg, come up to me and say that you talk just like me. And I even had someone say, how can two people talk so similarly? And I never really thought about it, but we're both from Cleveland. And if you study the progression of the English language, you'll find that millions of years ago, English started in Cleveland, Ohio. And as evolution took place, it went into different places and was corrupted. And some of you aren't used to hearing properly spoken English. And I realize that could be a challenge for you. You can read about that in the library. I looked that up under fiction. And I'm just teasing, obviously. But I do hope that you'll be able, by God's grace, to pay attention that we'll be blessed this morning. Because I'd like to begin with the question. It's the title of the message. What are we praying for? What are we praying for? You say, what do you mean, what are we praying for? Do you mean what's the purpose or motivation? Well, no, that's not how I'm defining that question. When I ask the question, what are we praying for? I want to focus on the requests that we make. If I could sit in the back of your local church on Wednesday night, as an objective observer and take notes and simply record every prayer request that was made. If you could sit in the back of my local church on Wednesday night, and you would simply make a list and record every request that was made, what kind of conclusions would you come to? If we would take the Internet email list that many churches send out with prayer requests, and there's nothing wrong with that, and make a list of every request that was made, what would you expect to find is the number one most requested prayer request? What is the primary thing that Christians seem to be praying for? Think about it. What would you say? I've thought about this a lot. And it seems to me in my limited sphere, in my little slice of life, I am hearing people pray over and over and over again for physical health, that our physical lives in this world would be prolonged. And in fact, if a person were not a Christian, I think he would sit in the back of your church and my church and come to the conclusion that whatever is true of Christians, one thing is definite, they are all afraid to die. Wherever Christians go after they die must be a terrible place. Whoever Christians meet after they die must be a horrible person. The Christians' true home is no doubt right here in this world. And the number one goal of Christianity is to simply stay out of heaven as long as you can. If I were to simply to listen to the request at your church, if you would listen to the request of my church and you were to come to some conclusions, I think that would be the conclusion you'd come to. And then if I were to ask you for the second most popular prayer request, again, I may be wrong. But I would guess it's some type of physical intervention, something tied to money, something tied to help me find a job, help me sell a house, help me get a car, etc., etc., etc. You say, is that a problem? That's the question I'm asking. Guys, what are we praying for? You say, what do you mean? One day Jesus was praying and one of His disciples came up to Him and said, Lord, teach us to pray, just as John also taught his disciples. And Jesus said, OK, you want to know how to pray? I'll show you. Open your Bibles, please, to Matthew 6. In Matthew 6, we ask the question, what are we praying for? In Matthew 6, I direct your attention to verse 9. We'll be looking at verses 9 through 13. In Matthew 6, verse 9, Jesus says, After this manner, therefore, pray ye. You know, even that's interesting. The disciples didn't say, Jesus, tell us specifically what to pray. They said, How do we pray? Jesus didn't say, Pray this prayer. He said, After this manner, pray. Jesus wasn't telling them to recite this prayer, even though there's nothing wrong with that. I do think it's interesting. You don't find this prayer recited anywhere in Scripture. Jesus was teaching them how to pray. And it begins with our Father which art in heaven. Certainly, prayer begins with the reverent worship of a person, our Heavenly Father. And as important as that is, I'd like to move beyond that. And I'd like to look at the six requests that are in this prayer. And then come to some practical applications for our day of prayer. What's the first request you see in this prayer? Actually, the first one is the most difficult, because sometimes we don't even catch it. We don't even see that it's a request. It's in verse nine. Request number one, hallowed be thy name. Request number two, verse ten, thy kingdom come. Request number three, thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. Number 4, verse 11, give us this day our daily bread. 5, verse 12, forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And 6, some would divide this into two and others would keep it as one. I'm dealing with it as one. Number 6, verse 13, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Six requests. And if you notice those first three in verse 9 and verse 10, You'll notice that there's a word that comes up frequently. It's thy. Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done. And it's only once we get to the second three that we start reading these pronouns us and our, if you will. You say, what does this teach us? It teaches us how to pray. And we have two simple points this morning. The first point is simply this. We must pray for the glory of God. Jesus gives us six requests. Number one, number two, and number three really are not about us. They're all about Him. Look with me please. Request number one. Hallowed be thy name. You say, what does name refer to? It refers to a person. The psalmist says those who know your name will put their trust in you. What's the psalmist saying? Lord, we know You. We trust You. When we sing, blessed be the name of the Lord, what are we saying? We're not saying, God, You have a really neat name. What a neat name. Jehovah. We love the way it sounds. No. When we sing, blessed be the name of the Lord, it's just a poetic way of saying, Lord, You're blessed. When we praise the name of God, we're worshiping God. That's what it means. Hallowed be Thy name. You say, what about the word hallowed? It means to be set apart. It means to be revered, to treat as holy. God's not saying, pray that I'll increase in my holiness. He's already completely holy. That's impossible. I think what we're hearing here, what Jesus is teaching us, is maybe similar to when the psalmist said, oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt His name together. I put it simply this way. You know what the first request is all about? That God's character would be magnified. That's the first request. Hallowed be thy name. Lord, would your character be magnified at Bob Jones University today? Number one request. Lord, would we treat you as holy? And would your fame be spread throughout the student body of Bob Jones University and surrounding areas? Greenville County, South Carolina, United States International, etc. We should be praying, number one, that God's character would be magnified. Number two, we should be praying that God's reign would be amplified. Notice what Jesus says next. The second request, in verse 10, thy kingdom come. You say, is this referring to a future millennial kingdom? Certainly it would include that. But no doubt it also would refer to the return of the Lord Jesus Christ, right? Paul prayed Maranatha, our Lord come, back in 1 Corinthians 16. John is revelation with even so come Lord Jesus revelation 2220. Certainly, we're talking about a literal kingdom. Certainly, we're talking about the return of Christ, but it's more than that. Because Christ today rules in the hearts of His people. And as we submit to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, that is the rule of Jesus Christ. And thus Jesus said in Luke 17, 21, the kingdom of God is in your midst. And again in Matthew 12, 28, the Kingdom of God has come upon you. Jesus Himself, when preaching, the time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is at hand. Repent and believe the Gospel. So even when we're praying for people to come to know Christ, and many of you will be praying for unsaved loved ones today, we should be praying that God's reign would be amplified. Number one, that God's character would be magnified. Number two, that God's reign would be amplified. And let's look at the third request in this first half. Number three, that God's desire would be realized. Because that third request is what? Verse 10, Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. We know that Jesus came to do the Father's will. Hebrews 10, I've come to do Thy will, O God. We know that Jesus delighted to do His Father's will. It's recorded in John 4. Jesus said, My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to accomplish His work. Food is something we enjoy, something we delight in. Jesus delighted to do the Father's will. Three requests. Half of the total prayer time. And how much of it's about Me? None. And how much of it's about you in a sense? None. 50% of the requests were all for God's glory. Now, you can accuse me of being overly literal this morning, but I'm taking Christ's words literally. If I could take a look at every blackboard or whiteboard here in the university, in the rooms where we pray, and look at all of the prayer requests that are written down, could I say, yep, half of them are for the glory of God. Lord, would your character be magnified? Would your reign be amplified? Would your desire be realized? And even if it were true, and we all know it's not, but even if it were true that half of our requests were for God's glory, that's not good enough, guys. The first half needs to be for God's glory. Which means if I'm going to pray for ten minutes, I ought to spend five minutes just praying for God's glory. Before I get to anything else, I ought to spend the first half of my prayer time praying for nothing but God's glory. If we're really going to pray the way Jesus taught His disciples to pray. Those are the first three requests. That's the first half. We must pray for the glory of God. Secondly, We must pray for the needs of God's people. Now, you might be sitting here and thinking, hey, this is good because that's what I have. I have great needs. Of course you do. We all have great needs. Are we allowed to pray for our needs? Yes, absolutely. But first we pray for God's glory. And then we pray for our needs. You say, so it's OK to pray for a new boyfriend, right? For a nice car, for good grades. For my mom's health, for my dad's job, is that OK? Let's look and see what Jesus says. It's OK to pray for our needs. And we'll see three specific requests that address our needs. Verse 11, give us this day our daily bread. That's request number four. Yes, we are to pray for our present physical needs. Bread refers to that which sustains life. And so I think we could include here water, daily health, shelter, employment, the things that we need. Yes, it's okay to do that, but notice the word daily. One day at a time. We should be praying for our daily, but not our daily wants, but our daily needs. As one author has put it, we should be praying each day for our daily needs, not our daily greeds. We should be praying for the things that we need to sustain life. Give us this day our daily bread. How many of us pray for daily needs? How many of us pray this morning for the strength to get out of bed? Lord, would you please, by your grace, give me the strength to get out of this bed, to get down from this bunk? You see, I don't have to pray. For sure you do. If God would not bless you with the strength, you wouldn't have the ability to get out of bed. How many of us pray for water to shower with, or maybe even more basic, to drink? electricity to plug your razor in, or your curling iron, or your waffle crimping iron, or whatever. Okay? I know about those things. How many of us prayed for a cup of coffee or a glass of juice for your vehicle to start? Guys, we should be praying for these basic things. That's daily bread. It's okay to pray for our present physical needs, but look at the next request, number 5, verse 12. and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. We not only should be number four, praying for our present physical needs, but five, we should pray for forgiveness from past sins. The word debt refers to an obligation. It's something you owe. It's translated with the word sin in the parallel in Luke 11. We have sinned against God. And what do we pray for? We pray for forgiveness. Because if you have a debt, you have two choices, right? Either it's forgiven or you pay it. There's no way we can pay the price of our sin. And so we plead for forgiveness. And we pray, Lord, forgive us our sins as we have forgiven others. So number five, we pray for forgiveness from past sins. And number six, the last one, we're to pray for deliverance from future temptation. The Bible says in verse 13, lead us not into temptation. The word can be translated trial. Some translations do it that way. I think it's better translated temptation, because we're not supposed to pray that we don't fall into trials. In fact, James says we should rejoice when we fall into trials. But it's certainly biblical to pray, Lord, don't lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Some would suggest even the evil one. Those are the six things we should be praying for. We should be spending 50% of our prayer requests on God's glory. That means if your mom or dad is struggling with a life-dominating illness, maybe those of us that are older, we have a child that's leading just a horrible life, A situation maybe that's personal, related to your job, that's burdensome to you. All of those are fine to pray about, guys. But before we get to any of those, we ought to spend half of our time praying for God's glory. You say, OK. And then we can get to my request. Yeah. But can I point something out? Out of the three requests that we pray for ourselves for God's people. How many of them have to do with present, temporal, physical needs? Go ahead and look. We have three requests. Verse 11, give us this day our daily bread. That's a physical, temporal need. Verse 12, forgive us our debts. That's spiritual. Lead us not into temptation. That's spiritual. Hey, do the math. 50% of our prayer requests should be for present needs. Two-thirds of the 50% should be for present spiritual needs. One-third of 50% should be for present physical, temporal needs. You say, what is that? One-sixth. You can check me out on your calculator. I believe that's 17%. You want to know how many of our prayer requests should be for loved ones that have cancer? 17%. For a new job, 17%. For help with finances and grades, 17%. If I take this literally. Now some of you may be thinking, and it's a proper thought, well, Brother Greg, couldn't I be praying for God's glory even in issues related to physical health? Yes, but I don't hear people praying that way. Because if I heard people praying that way, you know what they'd be praying? They'd be saying, Lord, my mom's dying. My dad's dying. Would you please be glorified by life or death? And if you would choose to take his life, let him die as a Christian and bring you glory. If you would choose to heal him, let him be healed and bring you glory. And Lord, it's all about your glory and that's all I'm praying for. So Lord, would you please be glorified? And let's be frank, that sounds odd. You know why? Because people don't pray that way. But Jesus did. This is what Jesus said when His disciples said, Lord, would You teach us to pray? Even as John taught his disciples. He said, ok, I'll teach you how to pray. I'm not giving you words to recite, even though there's nothing wrong with that, but I'm teaching you how to pray. I want you to pray 50% of the time that God would be glorified and 50% of the time that God's people would have their needs met. Primarily, the needs that matter most. Spiritual needs. Oh, and oh yeah, Physical need's okay too. Yeah, 17%. That's fine. You got it. That's okay. 17%. But you wanted to know how to pray. And this is what Jesus said. Now I teach this in a class, and I'll be very frank with you. My students openly object to this. They find this troubling. And when I teach this in a class, I will have hands across the classroom and almost every question, and they're good questions, begins with, but Dr. Mazak, but Dr... This morning, I have not given you how I think we should pray. All I have done is taken a look at what Jesus said. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for being a wonderful God. And we come into Your presence in the name of Jesus Christ, thankful that You have been compassionate and kind and merciful to Your people. And Father, we pray that this day on this campus that You would be glorified. that Your character would be magnified, that Your reign would be amplified, that Your desire would be realized. Lord, by Your grace, we pray for Your glory. And Father, we also pray that by Your grace, You would meet the needs of Your people. Lord, the needs that matter most, that You would forgive us and that you would deliver us from temptation, and that you also would be pleased to meet our temporal, physical, daily needs. You've been listening to The Chapel Hour, coming to you from the campus of Bob Jones University. Our speaker was Dr. Greg Mazak, Chairman of the Division of Psychology at BJU. For a cassette or compact disc copy of today's message, send a check for $6 to Campus Store, Bob Jones University, Greenville, South Carolina 29614. Be sure to mention the name of the speaker and today's date. The Chapel Hour has been sponsored by Bob Jones University.