We find ourselves in 1 Timothy again, 1 Timothy chapter 2, the first 8 verses of that chapter. Remember that this is Paul's letter to his son in the faith. We saw that in chapter 1. It's an overview of church conduct, so it's older elder to younger elder, if you will. It's a pastoral epistle. That does not mean that it is only for elders in the church. There are applications to be made. Specifically, the necessity of prayer for all people, especially those people who are in authority. Because we who are called to the ordained office do not labor as cults of personality. As we've said before, these authorities and the opportunity to lead and to govern in Christ's church is based on His authority that He grants us for a season of time. We are not the end-all be-all of church government. And so we need others to pray for us, just as we pray for them. So I'm going to read our text today, 1 Timothy chapter 2, verses 1 through 8. I will read the whole chapter, but we are going to focus on verses 1 through 8. So, 1 Timothy chapter 2 is my reading. And remember that this is God's Holy Word. I exhort, therefore, that first of all supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men, for kings, and for all that are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. Whereunto I am ordained a preacher and an apostle. I speak the truth in Christ, and lie not, a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and verity. I will, therefore, that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting. In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety, not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array, but which becometh women professing godliness with good works. Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. Notwithstanding, she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity with holiness and sobriety. So we pray that the Lord would bless the reading and hearing of the Word. As we read the entire chapter, some people might be inclined to look forward a bit to next week's message, Lord willing, as it will be about issues that are controversial in society. Nonetheless, we preach the full counsel of God. We will address that, Lord willing, next Lord's Day afternoon. For now, we are going to consider the first eight verses, though. Paul is speaking of the prayer for all people. We're supposed to pray for our leaders as an act of obedience and godliness in our tribalized time. Many people would be inclined to say, well, I'll pray for the leaders that I agree with, but I'm not going to pray for those people with whom I disagree. Paul makes no distinction. Scripture does not make a distinction. We are called to pray for all who are in authority. Not just the ones we like, not the ones we don't, not the church ones, but not the civil ones. All in authority. Because it's an act of obedience and godliness as it applies to our relationship with the Lord. We're going to look at three things. We're going to look at the call to prayer, which is the first couple verses. Verses 1 and 2 is the call to prayer. Verses 3-6, this is where we're going to dive a little bit deeper into some things, theological. The Gospel for all, what does that mean? So we've got verses 1 and 2, the call to prayer. Verses 3-6, the Gospel for all. And then verses 7 and 8, the life of holiness. The life of holiness is the last two verses. So let's take a look at the first couple verses. Prayer is a universal duty, as Paul talks about it here. It's pretty clear what he's saying here. Verse 1, he says, I exhort, therefore, that first of all supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks be made for all men. Now, he's exhorting. That has in mind the idea of an urgent appeal. I'm not just suggesting it would be great if, hey, it would be really cool if you could do this. The exhortation is an earnest, serious-minded appeal with a sense of urgency. In our theological history, governing elders have at times not preached sermons, they've given exhortations. We call them something different because of the nature of the office, but it's been an exhortation. And that's an urgent appeal. Whatever the text might be, it has in mind a sense of urgency. Now we look at the framework in verse 1, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks. It's kind of a total spectrum, it's a bunch of different perspectives, different aspects of prayer. We're asking for something or we're interceding on someone else's behalf, we're giving thanks. We're submitting our wills to the Lord. Think of laws, commandments, and statutes. Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. It kind of sums up the total of something. That's what we have in mind here in a similar fashion. Different aspects of prayer. So it sums up all of it. So nothing is outside of the realm of Paul's discussion with Timothy. So there's an urgent appeal. to do all of the things in prayer, not just to submit our wills to the Lord, but to go on someone else's behalf, to ask for specific things, to give thanks for the things that have been provided, all of those things have the same sense of urgency. And so when we talk about praying without ceasing, we've got enough for which to pray. Sometimes we think, well, I don't even know what to pray about. Well, here's something right here we could pray for our leaders, for everyone that's in authority. It's not just elected officials. Covenant children, are you praying for your parents? They're in positions of authority. What does the text say? We're going to talk about it. For kings and all that are in authority. If you work, have you prayed for your boss, your supervisors? Not about them. Have you prayed for them? Sometimes that can be a painful question because the answer is no. Well, we're out of accord with scripture in this area. So we've got to see what Paul is actually telling us. Because it's a whole lot different to pray about somebody than it is to pray for someone. You have a completely different framework, a completely different posture towards that individual. And so Paul is saying to do all of these things with a sense of urgency for kings and for all that are in authority. And there's a reason for that. But the inclusion of rulers, to include them in the list, shows that God's people have to pray for some sort of peace in our government. If we're praying for chaos, or if we're abstaining because we don't like the person that's in charge, or the people, or the party, or whatever it is that's in charge, we are out of accord with God's word. We're called across the board, irrespective of whether the person's godly or not, to pray for our kings and rulers and all that are in authority. And there's a goal in mind with that. Not just the goal of taking them to the throne of grace in prayer, with the hope and the expectation that they will either be encouraged, or converted, or like we've said before, confused. No problem praying for a wicked person, that, Lord, if you're not going to convert them, please confuse them so they don't harm anybody. We talk about imprecatory prayers, and it's unseemly in our modern, evangelical, milquetoast, limp-wristed church these days to actually pray that God would destroy His enemies or confuse people. It's unseemly to weak, theologically driven people. But biblically speaking, it is a sound prayer to ask that the Lord would protect people from wicked rulers. Now, what we ought to also be doing is pray for their conversion. We don't just want the Lord to crush the wicked. Ultimately, we want them spared from damnation. Because again, these prayers should be saying more about us than they are about anything else. We're going to the Lord on behalf of someone. Yes, we can say that we want the wicked to be confused, but we don't want them sent to hell unless it's the Lord's will. But we submit our wills to His when we're asking Him to protect people and we're also asking to convert that wicked person. And there is a goal. The people, the rulers, that we're called to pray for, as well as everyone in authority, has in mind the goal of peace and godliness and honesty. A simple life, a simple godly life, that's all God's people should want. The ability to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. That should be the goal of our prayer life. as we pray for ourselves, as we pray for our family, as we pray for our church and our community, and then the society as a whole. The goal should be for the ability to be given to us to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. We understand that as we pray for these people, that civil authorities exist by God's decree. We saw that in Romans 13. And so, since we are praying for God's ordained people, it makes sense that we should go to Him to say, Lord, You ordained these people to be in charge. Please cause them to govern justly, so that God's people aren't hindered from living those peaceable, honest, godly lives. So God's people aren't hampered or hindered or harmed in any way. It's a godly thing to pray. Jeremiah 29.7, Jeremiah says, Now that's the thing that I think chafes a lot of people's pride. Because Jeremiah, God through Jeremiah, is telling his people to pray for the city that has enslaved them. To pray, that's literally what he says. Seek the peace of the city, whither I have caused you to be carried away captives, and pray unto the Lord for it. You say, why would God tell his people to pray for the people that are enslaving them? Why would he do that? I would never. Yeah, you wouldn't. And that's the point. Because we're not God. It chaps our hide, so to speak. It hits us where we're the most prideful. That idea of subservience or some sort of hierarchical structure. The idea that we could pray for somebody that's actively enslaving or harming us. Shouldn't be a problem for those of us with renewed minds. For Christians, we should understand. We've been set free from the slavery to sin, and we are now slaves to Christ. We're going to serve somewhere. The call to pray for the people that were enslaving us speaks more about where we are. It says more about the genuineness of our faith and the consistency. Now, it could be an immature faith. You could react viscerally opposed to that sort of thing, and many times we do. But when we stop and think about what it is that prayer is actually doing, we're going to the throne of grace on behalf of someone else. We're saying, you know what, Lord, I want these people killed. I want them humiliated. I want them run out of this culture. But not my will, Lord. Thine be done. Yes, it's possible from our perspective, the prayers of a righteous man availeth much. It could very well be that as we pray, the Lord turns the hearts of our captors, but more than anything else, our prayers in those circumstances submit our wills to His that much more. And then as we struggle with that, we go to Him for more grace in order to pray even more fervently. It's counterintuitive to the world, because the thing that the world values is vengeance, and wrath, power, and strength. And it's only demonstrated in things like this, where the concept that somebody could live under bondage, temporal earthly bondage, and actually pray for somebody that has some sort of structure over them, some sort of power over them, the concept is antithetical to worldliness. To the worldly, this doesn't... You are honor-bound because if the world's view is right, and all that there is in the physical world is all that there is, then you have to violently overthrow somebody that's taken you into captivity. But for the Christian, we understand that this world is not all there is. That our relationship with the Lord now prepares us for eternity, and we'll live forever with Him. And so the idea of living in difficult situations, but not actively and violently overthrowing it from an earthly standpoint, but rather dealing with things with the tools in the spiritual war we're fighting. Dealing with things that way doesn't make sense to the world. Because of course it doesn't. Because the world fights with physical tools, but ours is a spiritual battle. And the first battlefield is in our own minds. and our own pride, our own egos. Proverbs 21.1 says, The king's heart is in the hand of the Lord as the rivers of water. He turneth it withersoever he will. The Lord is in control of all of these people. So if we go to those people, we're not going high up enough in the chain of command. But if we go to the Lord, On behalf of and because of rulers and leaders and all that are in authority, we're going directly to the source of all the power. And saying, you know what, I'm not going to submit my... I mean, there is a sense in which we have to submit to the civil magistrate. Inasmuch as until they expect us to sin and command us to sin, then we obey God and not man. But we have to go to the only one that has any power and authority. You have to go to the Lord on behalf of these people. Not only to intercede when they're being wicked, but also to pray for their salvation and for their encouragement. To bear their burdens in that way spiritually. John Calvin in his commentary said, to pray for rulers is to pray for the preservation of the church and the common good. Because if we are praying for our leaders in authority, and the Lord blesses them, then it's a benefit to the church, it's a benefit to God's people, because it puts them in a position to live peaceable lives, peaceful lives. Matthew Henry said, prayers must be made for all in authority, that under them we may live quiet lives. The goal is not a famous, well-known life. The goal is to quietly live in obedience to the Lord. And the way we do that is by lifting up our leaders and our rulers. And as the Lord settles them and causes them to govern justly and wisely, then that brings peace into the land. Because blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord. So as we go to the Lord on behalf of our rulers, as individuals and as the body of Christ, The Lord hears those prayers. And He will either change the hearts of the leaders, or He will comfort them, or He will equip us with the ability to endure whatever needs to be endured. If we prayed more for our rulers than about our rulers, we would find ourselves in a much different place with relationship to God Himself. And likely a much different place with regards to our rulers as well. Our problem is many times we pray about folks rather than praying for folks. But ultimately, we're called to do all these things because of the call of the gospel, the universal call of the gospel. We're going to dive into this in a little more detail than maybe is expected. We're going to take a look at some texts. Let's look at verses 3-6. Paul writes that the idea of living a quiet, peaceful life in all godliness and honesty is a good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who will have all men to be saved and come unto the knowledge of the truth. There is one God and one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. So it's good and acceptable in the sight of God to live a quiet, peaceable life. Because God has a desire to save all men. We think about that language of all categories of people. We're tap dancing around the idea of limited atonement. We're going to talk a little bit more about that momentarily. Because He wants all men from all categories of people. to come unto the knowledge of the truth, because the knowledge of God's revealed truth is what leads to salvation. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. It is God's Word that opens the eyes of people's minds to not only their sin and their need for salvation, but the free gift of salvation that is offered in Jesus Christ. Now this verse is apropos, it's fitting that we talk about it today. For there is one God, this is verse 5, for there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. The Pope of Rome seems to be on his deathbed. The vicar, so-called, of Christ. The so-called substitute for Christ. The so-called head of the church. we hold the position that he, as our historic reformers understood him, is that antichrist. that son of perdition that's discussed in Scripture, who takes all three names of God for himself, who teaches that Mary is a co-mediatrix with Jesus. But Paul, in God's Word, says something completely different. Christ is the only mediator between God and man. Not the Pope. Not Mary. Not Joseph Smith. Not Charles Taze Russell. Not Ellen G. White. Nobody else. Not me, not any other elder, no one. One mediator that bridges the gap between a holy, perfect, sinless God and a wretched, vile, disgusting, rebellious sinner. And that is the God-man, Jesus Christ. That's what Paul is making clear. The exclusivity of Christ as the only mediator is the point of contention that separates Christianity from everything else. whether it's you follow these five pillars, whether it's you do these offerings, whether it's you knock on doors, whether it's you kill a chicken and beat it against a wall and think that you tricked God. Whatever apparatus or circumstance you use to try to bridge the gap for yourself, it all works. It's all do, do, do. Christianity is a done religion. Christ did it all. He is the one that bridges the gap that mediates between God and man, and that's what He's doing now! He's interceding for us. There's no one else there, seated at the right hand of God, but His Son. And Paul talks about in verse 6, that it was Christ's ransom, we've talked about that, to be testified in due time. Ransom. He paid that debt. He paid that price. Christ's atoning sacrifice. Sufficient for all, effective for the elect. Certainly sufficient for all. The God-man spilled his blood for humans to be saved. That's sufficient. There's nothing else we have to do. Book of Mormon teaches we're saved by grace after all we do, but we can never do all we can do, so we'll never be saved in Mormonism. But God sent Christ to pay the ransom fully. When He said, Tetelestai, on the cross, He said, it's finished, that's it. No bloodless re-sacrificing like the Mass. No do all you can and hope for the best. Like Islam or every other works-based religion, nothing. Christ did it all. It's certainly sufficient. The blood of the God-man poured out for many. But what does it mean? We talk about all. All men. Well, if all men means all, and every, how come not everybody's going to be saved? Because we just read in Luke 16, the rich man's in hell. Judas Iscariot was predestined to do what he did to Jesus. He's not saved. So what are we talking about here? We're talking about the doctrine of limited atonement. We're going to pay a little bit of attention to this. The sufficiency of Christ's death for all men. We think about Christ's death being sufficient to save all, infinitely sufficient at that. 1 John 2, verse 2. He's the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. The idea of the propitiation being a sacrifice that satisfies divine justice, divine wrath. It pays the penalty. The idea of the whole world in this context. It's not every individual without exception. It's universalism. We know people that have not repented. Anybody that's been in a room when someone has died and has not repented, you know they're not just saved. It's not how that works. It's all without distinction. Now that should sound familiar to us because there's neither slave nor free, Jew nor Greek, male nor female. We're all one in Christ Jesus. We come to God for salvation on an equal playing field. So the whole world, without distinction, Jews and Gentiles alike. John's use of the word world here refers to people from all nations, not every individual. I'm going to look at a couple things here that we need to see. The Gospel of John, chapter 12. I'm going to go to chapter 12, then I'm going to go to chapter 17. Chapter 12, verse 19, John writes, The Pharisees therefore said among themselves, Perceive ye how ye prevail nothing? Behold, the world is gone after him. The world hasn't gone after Christ. The idea of the world is not the entire world. Context matters for these words. We can't just rip something. It's one thing to say that we take the Bible literally. We take the Bible literally in its proper context. We understand that words have a semantic range and a context in which they operate. So the idea of day, for example. There's tons of different uses of the word day, but in Genesis, when there's a number in front of it, it always means a 24-hour day. Context matters. The other day doesn't necessarily mean yesterday. It could be back in the day. It took a day to get somewhere. It might not have taken the 24 hours, it could have taken the large sum of the day. And so we use it colloquially to mean like a large chunk of the day. Context, again, matters. John chapter 17, verse 9. I pray for them, Jesus said. This is the high priestly prayer. I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me, for they are thine. So not the entire world. We have to understand the proper context for these things. Because we don't want to be hyper-literal and pull something out and ascribe meaning to it that wasn't what the author intended. Westminster Larger, question 59, says, "...redemption is certainly applied and effectually communicated to all those for whom Christ hath purchased it." So certainly, the blood of the God-man is sufficient. It's enough to pay the penalty. But it's efficient, it's effective, for the people for whom Christ died only. Let's look at John chapter 10. Verse 11, and then I'm going to go to verse 14 and 15. We need to understand, because there are a lot of people that will extrapolate views that are inconsistent with scripture because they have a poor interpretation of particular verses. And we want to be careful as well. So John chapter 10, verse 11, John says, I'm the good shepherd. The good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. And then verses 14 and 15. I'm the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. Other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them also I must bring. And they shall hear my voice, and there shall be one fold and one shepherd. So we have the idea that a shepherd speaking to his own sheep, his own flock, the sheep will know that shepherd's voice and be called out of the flock, out of the existing pack of sheep. When a shepherd speaks and calls for the sheep that are a part of his flock, the sheep know that shepherd's voice. No matter whether they are of this flock or another, when he calls, the good shepherd's sheep know that voice. So he's called out of some larger flock, meaning the ones that weren't called out are still a part of that other. There's separation there. So effective for all, but only effective for the ones that know the shepherd's voice. Do you know the shepherd's voice? Because if you don't, Today is the day of salvation. Listen to what the shepherd is saying. He's calling now. It could be that yesterday's goat is today's sheep in the Lord's economy. The idea of the sheep, Christ's death, His work is specific for His sheep. Because if Christ didn't, if He died for everyone without exception, Why does He distinguish between His sheep and the sheep who aren't His? Think about John 10, verse 26, But ye believe not, because ye are not of my sheep, as I said unto you. He's talking to people that didn't hear His voice and respond to Him. But if Christ died for everyone, without exception, when Christ called, everyone would answer. So it can't be that. Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter 8, Section 5, says, "...the Lord Jesus, by His perfect obedience and sacrifice of Himself, hath fully satisfied the justice of His Father, and purchased not only reconciliation, but an everlasting inheritance in the Kingdom of Heaven for all those whom the Father hath given unto Him." Christ's atonement is particular, specific in its intent and its efficacy. Matthew 20.28 says, "...even as the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give His life as a ransom for many." Many speaks to a limited scope. Not for all. Many is a lot. Many could be a ton. Many could be millions. But there's trillions or more that have been born who've rejected Christ. He didn't die for them. We can talk about God's sovereign ordination of vessels for wrath and vessels for redemption. We can talk about that outside of this context. But the idea in this context of what Paul is saying When he uses, let's go back to 1 Timothy, when Paul uses the word all, he's talking about all of the elect, all kinds of people, rather than every individual without exception. We'll go back to chapter 2, verses 4-6. He says, "...who will have all men to be saved, and come unto the knowledge of the truth." And that's the section we're considering right now. The idea, the language, to analyze that language. The context of the passage is prayer for kings and those in authority. All men means all types of men, not all people universally. Calvin says on this passage, By all men, Paul means not individuals of all nations, but all classes and ranks, since it was intended to counter the Jewish notion that salvation was for them alone. Again, not slave or free, not Jew or Greek, not male or female. Everybody comes to the Lord on equal footing, as I said earlier. But it's all classes, all walks of life, all types of people. Not merely Jews. The world refers to all nations, not every individual. We talk about God so loved the world, we think of John 3.16 and verse 17. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. It doesn't mean every single person in the world. The world doesn't mean every person, like, number for number, head for head. But people from every nation, let's look at Revelation verse 5. Many of you, if you've read through this before, you'll kind of know where I'm headed with this as I reference Scripture to help us understand Scripture. Revelation chapter 5, verse 9. And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof. For thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation. If world at that point meant every individual, everyone would be saved. This would be a contradiction to scriptures, other scriptures. We have to let scripture speak for itself in its totality and use it to understand. We use the more clear passages to understand the less clear passages, what the divines call the analogy of faith. Christ's death guarantees salvation for all walks of life. All walks of life. So the Gospel call is universal in as much as it goes out to everyone. Freely. We talk about Isaiah saying, come to the well and buy without money or without price. Doesn't matter if you have a lot or you don't have anything. Doesn't matter if you need stuff or don't need stuff. You need salvation. Irrespective of your status, your gender, your circumstance. Your bank account, your facial expression, your facial features, the pigmentation. It doesn't matter. God says, come to the well and buy without money or without price. The gospel call goes out to everyone. All walks of life can be saved. Listen to the shepherd and respond to his voice. Pay attention to what he's saying. He came to save you. He came to save you, I think it was Paul Washu who said, the gospel teaches that Christ saves us to Himself from Himself. Because Christ is coming back to judge the world. And by drawing us to Himself, we are actually more than conquerors. We will rule and reign with Him and we will be spared from His wrath in the future. Listen to the Shepherd's voice and respond. It goes out to everyone, all in this case, all people, all walks of life, without money, without price, without status, Jew, Gentile, male, female, old, young, black, white, Mexican, Asian, it doesn't matter, none of it matters. The Gospel call goes out. Augustine said that God's call is broad, but His saving work is particular to His people. Charles Hodge, in his Systematic Theology, said, Christ is the universal Savior in offer, but the particular Savior in application. Christ talks about it when He talks about fishing. There are some fish that escape that net. When you talk about being fishers of men, that's what we do. That's what godly elders do. They spread the gospel, they share the gospel, they offer the gospel freely to all who would hear it and respond to it. There are some people who escape. That's the sovereignty side of things. God's sovereignty with regards to election is His department. It is our department to share the gospel offered freely to all men everywhere. without any after-all-you-can-do, without any addition to it, without any subtraction from it. And all men everywhere respond to the Gospel according to God's will. And ultimately, we're talking about leading a life of holiness and prayer. We get out of the limited atonement aspect of that portion, recognizing that the Gospel is shared universally, because the goal is to live a holy life in prayer. Look at verses 7 and 8 of 1 Timothy with me. We talk about Christ being the one God and one mediator. And He gave Himself a ransom for all to be testified in due time. And Paul is saying, look, I'm ordained to be a preacher and an apostle of that thing. It's not just a preacher and an apostle in general, it's specific to the gospel of Jesus Christ. He's called to be a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth, faith and verity. He said, I will, therefore, that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting. Paul affirms a divine calling to preach the Gospel universally. Because Paul was the Jew's Jew at the time, and he's the apostle to the Gentiles. He speaks to everyone. If you go back and read the book of Romans, he speaks to Jew and he speaks to Gentile. And that language permeates what he says throughout the Book of Romans. He's referencing Jewish history. He's referencing the reality of the Gentile inclusion. And ultimately, when you go back and read the Old Testament in light of what Christ did to fulfill it, you start recognizing areas where there was always a discussion of the engrafting of the Gentiles. You start seeing that the Gospel, as it's proclaimed, veiled though it may be in the Old Testament, was always going to include non-Jewish people. Because again, no Jew, no Gentile when it comes to Christ Jesus. The gospel call goes out universally. And Paul says he wants, he wills therefore that men pray everywhere. Lifting up holy hands, not necessarily literally, we think of a posture of surrender and purity. The idea of lifting up holy hands, surrendering your will, being subservient to the will of God. We don't necessarily need to take that hyper-literally, but we do need to recognize that it is a posture of submission. a posture, at least physically, of course, in the literal sense. But in the spiritual sense, there is a sense where as we go to the Lord in prayer, we are submitting our wills to His. And we're recognizing, without wrath and doubting, prayer has to be offered in faith and with an idea of being united by the blood of Christ. We can't just say, well, I'm going to pray for this guy, but I'm going to pray this kind of backhanded prayer. I'm going to go through the motions. I'm not really going to be praying for the people in authority. I'm not necessarily going to mean it. I'm going to go through the motions. And this is a problem. This is what we do sometimes. And it's not just about prayer. We'll take a bit of a rabbit trail. Many times we try to go through the motions of a godly life. And hope for the best when it comes to doing the things on the outside, but not doing the things as a result of believing them on the inside. God says I have to pray for my leaders. Oh, I'll pray for them, alright. I'll say the words, but I won't mean them. You're not fooling anybody. You can fool me, you can fool your family, fool other people that may hear the words and they think, oh, well, he prayed for people in authority. Because prayer doesn't have anything to do with a horizontal relationship with one another. as much as it does a relationship to the Almighty. And if we try to go through the motions, whether it's prayer, or whether it's submission in some other way, or whether it's obedience to the Lord, if we just try to go through the motions of doing Christianity, it's not the same thing as living a Christian life. Because a Christian life comes as a result of having a heart transplant, and a renewed mind, and being made a new creation, being born again. You can live Christianly without being a Christian. You're not fooling anybody in heaven. The Lord sees, and the Lord knows. What Paul is talking about, look, without any sort of backhandedness or illegitimacy, without wrath, without passive aggressiveness or anything like that, pray. Submit. Go to the Lord on behalf of other people, trusting that the Lord's going to do the work. That's really what prayer is. It's trusting that the Lord's going to do the work. Whatever the work might need to be. Might be conversion. Might be comfort. It might be encouragement for somebody to trust them, to trust Him, to make the decisions that need to be made. Whatever the thing is, it's trusting that the Lord will do the work. Martin Luther said, the heart of the Christian life is prayer rightly offered. I think that's a helpful qualification at the end. Prayer rightly offered. Because we can go to the Lord with all sorts of passive-aggressiveness or hard-heartedness, or bland, rote, dead religious ritual. We can do that with any attribute in the Christian life. We happen to be talking about prayer now. But we can do that. We can go through the motions. And what Luther's qualification was, the rightly offered, is exactly what Paul's talking about here. Without wrath and doubting. Go to the Lord in faith. Go to the Lord trusting that He's going to answer. Now, maybe that's sometimes what keeps us from doing it. Remember Jonah, look, I didn't want to preach to them, because I knew, boy, I knew, if they repented just a little bit, you would be merciful. I'm paraphrasing the tirade at the end of Jonah. Maybe we're like that sometimes, and if that's the case, then we need to read these words and redouble our prayer efforts that the Lord would remove that mindset from us. We all struggle to not have that mindset. But Paul says, without wrath and doubting, Luther says, prayer rightly offered. And Machen, J. Gresham Machen, reminds us that a praying church is a powerful church. You might not have a lot of numbers. We don't, right now. The Lord may bring 100 people next Lord's Day. The Lord may take some next Lord's Day. That's up to Him. But a praying church, going to the Lord without wrath or doubting, on behalf not only of ourselves and our families, But other people in our congregation, the elders of the church, the denomination as a whole, the presbytery, our leaders, on a regular basis, boy, without wrath or doubting, you could have two people in a church like that. And that's a powerful church. John Knox said, when you have God on your side, you're always in the majority. Ian Paisley said, it's better to have God for you and the world against you. than God against you and the world for you. Like a praying church, trusting in the Lord. There's power there. But it's not our power. We're trusting in the Lord's power. But it takes humility. It takes boldness to be that humble. Say, you know what, I don't like the people that are in charge. And it doesn't matter who's in charge, because somebody always has a beef with the people that are in charge. If your guy or your girl, whatever the case may be, if the party that you like is not in power, you're going to have a problem. For your neighbor, it might be the opposite. But for us, we've got to go back and remember what happened when Joshua asked the angel of the Lord, hey, are you on our side or are you on our enemy's side? He said, no, I'm on the Lord's side. That's where we need to be. And the Lord, through Paul, writing to Timothy, preserved for us, says pray. Pray for the authorities in your life. Submits your will to theirs, to his, the father's. The gospel call is going to go out. He's going to convert who he will. because His sheep know His voice. The goal is to live a quiet, peaceful life, praying for other people, living a holy life, submissive to the Father's will, through Jesus Christ, by the Spirit, according to the Word. And ultimately, to walk in holiness, to continue to pray, to continue to trust in the Lord. Don't be backhanded. Don't be dishonest. Trust that when you pray, God is going to do the work in your life and in the lives of the people for whom you pray. That's where we are. We have to intercede for people like Paul says in the beginning. We intercede, we give thanks, we offer supplication, we confess our sins. And by doing that, we are consistently submitting our will. It removes sinful pride. It removes arrogance and haughtiness, and we don't sit in the judgment seat over other people and say, these people can't be saved, or those people can't be saved, because they're not like me, or I'm not like them. No. Those people are just like us. We're all in desperate need of the Gospel. And that's why it's beautiful that it's offered freely to everyone. so that whoever has ears to hear will hear and repent and believe. And we get to play a role in that. Not only by what we say to others, but what we say to the Lord and the posture that we have as we go to Him in prayer. So let's stand as we do that. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, it's hard to trust in Your sovereignty. As we come to you in prayer, there are many times that we fear that you're going to answer those prayers, because we fear that you will answer them in a way that we don't like. We actually just want you to baptize our good ideas. Please forgive us for those times. Help us to pray for everyone who's in authority, kings and everyone else, so that we could live quiet, peaceful lives in godliness and honesty. Help us to be a party to sharing the gospel and calling all men everywhere to repent. You winked at sin in the past, but you call out all men everywhere to repent now. And so Father, we ask that you help us to do those things. Help us to submit our lives to your will. Help us to trust that you're going to do the work, and then make us okay with the results. Because sometimes your will is different than ours, and your will is better. So help us to be okay with your will. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen.