We've been talking about why we got into, as we've been going through the five W's of prayer, we finished the what about prayer. As you remember, we finished up with what is waiting on God. We talked about that for, I think, a few weeks. And then, last week, we got into the question of, or the why of prayer, and we talked about kind of an introduction to that, and talking about the importance of prayer, and gave some verses on that. And last week, we got through, I think I have three points on why, I think there's a few more, but I have three down right now. of why prayer is important. And the first one that we went over last week, just a quick review, is that it makes us more like Jesus. We looked at how prayer was a big part of Jesus's life, and that Jesus prayed before every decision. And then those three points with the passages that we looked at was Jesus prayed with others, Jesus prayed for others, and then Jesus prayed by himself. Prayer was very important to Jesus. And again, you mentioned we can read books about prayer, and there's many good books about prayer. We can look at great men of God who were men of prayer, and God moved in their lives because of these men's prayer. And we know, we've been looking at it and talking about it with the Great Awakening, the revivals that we've seen in our country and in the world were all brought to pass because of prayer, not because of great preaching, but because there were some people that were dedicated to praying for revival, praying for God to do a work. But there's no better example to go to, no better person to learn from about prayer than Jesus Christ. And I have us here in John 17. It's a longer chapter. I know we've made mention of it It's not very long, but it's longer than we want to read the whole thing tonight, but I encourage you last week, but if you've never read John 17, it's a great chapter. It's what I like to call the Lord's Prayer, not the model prayer that he gave that I know the Catholics and many others call the Lord's Prayer. That would be his model that he gave the example of a prayer and kind of a pattern to follow for our prayer. But John 17 is really the Lord's Prayer. That's the prayer that he prayed to God and is the example for us. We know that was prayed in the garden and we have bits and pieces of that in the other Gospels as well. But chapter 18 is when he was betrayed there in the garden and we have Mark and Mark and Luke and Matthew, I believe they all give part of this prayer, but John has the biggest portion of it. We know John was the closest, he was known as the beloved according to his gospel that he wrote, but he has a lengthy portion of his prayer. And we looked and made mention of it the first I think the first five verses, Jesus prays for himself. We made note of that last week and how Jesus did pray for himself, but we also may note that Jesus prays for others. In verses 6-19, he prays for his disciples, and in verses 20-26, the end of the chapter, he prays for believers. And so Jesus prayed, and we know what we remember the most about Jesus' prayer is how he prayed for God's will to be done. He prayed for the cup to be removed, and that's probably the most famous portion of that prayer. And we're going to talk a bit about that this evening. But John, the next point that we have, as we talked last week, it makes us more like Jesus. And this is very similar. in a way, as long as we open our heart to it and put our hearts in tune with it. But it not only makes us more like Jesus, but it shows us the heart of God. It shows us the heart of God. And again, if we have an open heart and we have a desire to put our heart in tune with God's as prayer, the heart of God is revealed through His Word as well. But in prayer, God's heart can be revealed to us or shown to us as well, especially when we couple prayer with our Bible reading. As I've mentioned repeatedly, when we read the Bible, we should couple it with prayer. Those should go together. Now, there are times when we pray without reading God's Word, but when we read the Bible, when we have that time and we spend in reading and studying God's Word, we ought to pray Now pray before it, pray after it, but we put Bible reading and prayer should be put together. Now there's times we're told to pray without ceasing and we talked about that. As we go throughout our day, if we have a heart for prayer, the Lord's going to lay someone or something on our heart. And we ought to pray for it. Whatever we're doing, pray in your head. Pray silently if you're by yourself. Pray out loud. There's nothing wrong with praying out loud if you're by yourself. Use your voice. I think that's a blessing. It'll be a blessing to you. And I mentioned it. It'll help you stay focused, I think, sometimes in your prayer. Keep your mind from wandering as you pray. out loud, but the heart of God, and you read the scriptures, I think, from cover to cover, we know that God is a loving God. So, the heart of God is going to be shown. Yes, we're going to see that He's holy. And we can find that God is holy from cover to cover. We're going to see that God is just and righteous. And we see that from cover to cover. But from cover to cover, we also see that He's a loving God. And we know that John 3.16 gives us the Gospel in a nutshell, shows us how great His love was for God's soul loved. They loved the world so much that He didn't want us. He knew because He's holy and just and righteous, there has to be a punishment for the sin that was brought in by one man, as Romans 5.12 tells us. And death was passed on to all men because of that sin. But because He loves us, He sent His Son to die on the cross. And whosoever shall believe in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life. And we see in John 17, verse 21, just one verse, and this whole chapter shows us the heart of God, the heart of Jesus Christ. 21 says that they all may be one as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. Well, where's the heart of God? And this is the heart of Jesus Christ praying to God. Well, the heart of God is that all men would be saved. He sent His Son to die on the cross for all mankind. No matter how big your sin is, there's no sin that's so big that there's not enough of God's love and God's grace to be extended to us. But we see that heart of prayer in this prayer, but we know that God's will, oh, and I think that's, somewhere I have the passage right, in 1 Peter, we know that God's will, I think that's 2 Peter, sorry, 2 Peter chapter 3 and verse 9, God's will is that all men would be saved. We're going to get to that in a second. But the heart of God, it shows us the heart of God. When we put our heart in tune with God, and this is part of revival. Part of revival is getting our hearts in tune with God, allowing the Holy Spirit to work on our hearts and show us those things in our hearts that we need to remove from our hearts so that our hearts can be in tune with God's, as Jesus's was. And Jesus had to have a relationship with his Father. Yes, he was one with the Father, and he was 100% God, but he was also 100% man. And we know that Jesus had to keep up his relationship with his Father. He spent time in prayer. He spent time in fasting. We know that he spent 40 days and nights in the wilderness praying and fasting. spent the hours here through the night before his betrayal with his father, even in agony. But we talked about last week that before every decision he made, he prayed. But any relationship involves communication. We think of our earthly relationships that we have today with husband and wife, parents and children, friends, any relationship that we have is strengthened or continued, kept going by communication. If we just cease to communicate with a person, our relationship will start to dissolve and will start to grow distant from one another. But it takes communication to strengthen and build that relationship. If you remember back when you were dating your spouse, it was all based on communication. You wanted to know everything that you could know about them. You would spend time with them. You wanted to go on a date and spend time and just talk with them. What kind of a relationship would it be? You go out on a date and neither of you talk. You just sit there and you eat your food and you sit there and do absolutely nothing. Or what would it be like if it was just a one-sided conversation? You go out and you just do all the talking and the other person never does any talking. A relationship involves communication. It needs to be strengthened by communication. I believe Jesus was able to have such an intimate and close relationship with his Father because of his prayer life. And again, there's no better example of the prayer life that we can have. And each one of us can have a prayer life like Jesus Christ, that we can have and should have. There's no better example than the example that is Jesus Christ and His prayer life and how He prayed. We know, and I think I'm jumping ahead, but He spent a whole night in prayer, in praying before He picked the twelve disciples and seeking His Father's will. but he was able to have that close relationship because of his prayer life, because he communicated with his father. The relationship with God is not just a one-way relationship, it's two-way. The Lord speaks to us, and we talked about this early on, probably a couple months ago, but he speaks to us in many different ways. He'll speak to us through his word. As we read it, he'll speak to us through his word when we hear it taught and preached in church, but he'll also speak to us through other people, whether that's our spouses, if you're young, your parents, your friends, brothers and sisters in Christ, our pastors. The Lord, God will speak to us through that. He talks a lot about counsel. in the multitude of councils. And it talks about that. The Lord will speak to us through those councils as we seek that out. But He also speaks, I do believe the Lord speaks to us in prayer. As we go to prayer, and God can reveal His will through prayer and through the reading of His word. And He'll give us, I know that was one thing, when I was praying about coming here, My dad, when I first started praying about taking the pastorate here, my dad and I talked and he said, you know, make sure it's the Lord's will. Don't just go because you want to go and you love the area and it's something that you want to do. But he said, you know, make sure it's the Lord's will. And he said, you know, spend time in prayer and spend time in God's Word. And one thing that my dad does is he looks for a verse. In his devotion time, as he prays, he always asks God for a verse in the Bible that kind of solidifies his will as the Lord speaks to him in prayer. And God always gives my dad a verse. Now, the verse doesn't say, you know, I know he has a verse, I can't tell you what it is for when God called them to be a missionary to Russia. And it wasn't a verse that said, Jeff Christian, sell all your stuff, pack it all up and move to Russia. There was no verse that said that, but there was a verse that the Lord really spoke to him and said, hey, I'm showing the heart of God, showing God's will to him. And I know the Lord did that for me as well, gave me a verse, but also spoke to me in prayer and I knew. As I prayed, the Lord was speaking to me. And again, it's not an audible voice that we can hear with our ears, but if you've heard it, it's almost as if it's an audible voice. When God speaks to you in prayer, it's as if He's right there, and He's speaking to you and saying, hey, this is what I want you to do. This is my will. And oftentimes, if we're looking for it and asking for it, He will give us a verse as well. And one of the verses that God gave me as I prayed is in Psalm 37, and I believe it's verse number 4. Delight thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thy heart. The desire of my heart, I never imagined I would live up here, but the desire of my heart was to live up here. And I told God, I was like, Lord, I don't want to go there if it's just because I want to, because this is my desire. But I decided to put God first and His will first. And then that day as I prayed and spent time in prayer, I read Psalm 37 into my devotion time and came to that verse. And the Lord just spoke to me and said, you've delighted yourself on me. My will is the desires of your heart. Obviously, it was God's will and every step of the way. The Lord will show His heart in matters of that as well, but He speaks to us, and that relationship is able to be strengthened. And what does James tell us in his book, draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you." When we take that step towards God and put ourselves, as we've talked about, within reach of the hand of God, as Daniel prayed for that touch from the hand of God in Daniel chapter 10, God never walks away from us. God never distanced Himself from us. We distance ourselves from Him, but as we take that step back towards God, God then takes a step. And our step towards God is spending time with Him in His Word. Spending time with Him in prayer. We're seeking Him out. We're desiring to be close to Him. We're desiring to know Him. And when we do that, when we take that step towards Him, and seek to know Him, and seek to communicate with Him, and build our relationship with Him, He will draw nigh to us. He will take a step towards us. And He will speak to us and communicate with us as well. He was able to have that relationship because of his prayer life. And as I just talked about, prayer is how we get to know God. Our theme for our church this year is knowing God. You know, we're praying for that. Some of the messages are along that line and on that topic. It's a topic of our Revival Services. Knowing God, getting to know God on a personal and an intimate relationship or level, and having that intimate relationship just as Jesus had with His Father and just as Moses had with God, as it is said of Moses, that God, and I think that's in Numbers chapter 11, that God spoke to Moses face to face, as a friend speaketh with a friend. and he spoke to Moses in a way that was different than any other prophet that ever lived. It was Moses had a special and intimate relationship with God. And sometimes we look at these Bible characters like Moses and David was another one that had a very close and intimate relationship with God. We look at some of these Bible characters and we put them up on this pedestal and they are great Men of God, and God used them. Read that prayer of Moses in Exodus 33. It's a great prayer, a powerful prayer. And we ought to pray that as well. Show me now the way that I may know Thee. But they were just men just like you and I. They were men with faults. We know David's sin many times. And his greatest sin that comes to all of our mind is his sin with Bathsheba. But what was he still known at hundreds and years later and still today as it's recorded in God's Word? A man after God's own heart who fulfilled all of his will. That was an imperfect man. That was a man after God's own heart that fulfilled all of his will. Look at Moses. Moses still had that special relationship. Even the day that the Lord took him home to be with Him up on Mount Nebo, God still spoke to him face to face as a friend speaks to a friend, even though God was taking him home and not giving him the blessing of being able to go into the promised land because of his sin of disobedience and unbelief there in the wilderness with smiting that rock. when he was supposed to speak to it. But I was an imperfect man that had a special relationship with God, and God showed him the promise. Hey, this is what I had for you. I loved you so much. I had this blessing, this promise for you. And you get to see it, but you miss out on it. But these men, they're just like you and I. What these Bible characters achieved in their relationship with God, it's not out of our reach. It's something that we can do. No, we're not going to see miracles. We've been going through the book of Acts. We're not going to be able to heal people as we go into church, the beggar there. We're not going to see things like that happen, but we can have a relationship. just like they did. We can have the Holy Spirit work in our hearts and lives, and have the power of the Holy Spirit on our lives, and be filled with the Holy Spirit, just as those apostles, and that church in Jerusalem, just like the filling that they experienced. thousands of years ago now, we too can experience that. Those stories and these characters are put in this book so that we can learn from their example and see that prayer. Again, as we read through Psalms, as we read through the prayer of Moses, we ought to pray that prayer as well. Pray through those scriptures, pray through those Psalms, pray through the prayers that Moses prayed. But you'll find also that prayer As you pray, and as you have a heart for prayers, as characters like Moses and David did, and we can even look at modern men of God today, that prayer is humbling. The more we pray, as I've mentioned, the more we pray, the more that we know Him. The more we spend time in God's Word, the more that we pray, the more that we will get to know God, the closer our relationship will be. It draws us to Him and that can become very humbling because the more that we know God, the more we will see how unworthy we are. Now, we're told in Hebrews that we can boldly come to the throne of grace, but we see how unworthy we are to come to that throne of grace. But by God's grace, we're able to come boldly to that throne of grace. That's something by God's grace He's opened the door. The veil has been torn. We no longer need a high priest to go into the Holy of Holies, to the Ark, and give the sacrifice for us. We're able to go to God in prayer directly. And that's a blessing. That's by God's grace that we're able to do that. But the more that we get to know Him, the more that we see how unworthy we are and it humbles us. Because as we build a relationship with Him, as we speak with Him, He will speak to us and He will reveal things in our lives. As David prayed and asked God to search him and show him anything in his life that needed to be revealed, told him to try me and to know his thoughts. to see if there'd be any wicked way in them, and then said, and lead me in the way everlasting. And the Lord will reveal those things. And as we get to know Him more, we'll find that our life is going to start being molded more and more like the life of Jesus Christ. And as we do that, we will realize again how unworthy we are. We'll also realize our dependency on Him will grow. We'll see how much we need Him. in our lives, for that relationship, to know Him, for Him to draw close to us as we draw close to Him. That's a humbling experience as He deals with our hearts and reveals those things. But as Job said, sometimes He doesn't just show us the things, hey, this needs to be removed from your life. Sometimes He tries us. As David prayed, he said, try me. He told God, God put me to the test and try me, put me through a trial to reveal those things. And sometimes God has to put us through things and sometimes we don't ask for them, but he sees our heart and says, hey, you're not where you need to be and you're going to have to go through this. And sometimes we have to learn. you know, as we tell our kids and as we had to so often, sometimes we have to learn the hard way. And sometimes it's not, you know, God doesn't bring trials in our life necessarily because we're in sin, and He will. He'll deal with us and He'll chastise us because of our sin, but sometimes He just wants to test our faith, He wants to strengthen our faith, He wants to strengthen our relationship with us, so sometimes He'll put us through a trial, He'll put us through fire, but as Job was able to say in the book of Job, when I am tried, and Job knew when I go through the fire, when I go through the trial, when the Lord applies some pressure to my life, some heat to my life, and He's molding me, and He says, I shall come forth as gold. because gold is purified by heat as it's heated and that the impurities are scooped off and then it is let to harden and then it was it's applied to the heat again and melted and the impurities rise to the top ones again they're scooped off and you continue to do that until you have pure gold. And that's what God does with us. Yes, sometimes we have to go through heat and Job went through some great trials. that are hard to imagine going through. Losing all of his children. His wife even telling him to curse God and die. Losing everything. All of his belongings, all of his riches. And as he went through and he stayed faithful and was strengthened through that, grew through that, learned from that, The Lord blessed him at the end of his life greater than he was blessed before that trial. Sometimes God puts us, and Job was a righteous man, he was living for God, and God still tried him and tested him and let Satan test him. As you look at that conversation back and forth, we will come forth as gold, but it's a humbling. Job was humble as God took everything from him through that. But also, as we move on from being humble, the more that we pray, the more that we'll know Him, and realize our need for Him, and realize our unworthiness. But also, the more that we pray, and again, I'm coupling prayer and reading God's Word together, but the more that we pray, the more that we know Him, and then the more that we know Him, the more that we will love Him. The more that we'll love Him. The more that we love Him, the more we will desire to follow Him. And what did Jesus tell His disciples? If you love Me, keep My commandments. He said, if you love Me, obey Me. If you love Me, today what is He saying to us? If you love Me, get in My Word. If you love Me, obey My Word. If you love Me, spend time in prayer with Me. The more that we get to know God, the more that we'll love Him. As we see ourselves, how unworthy we are, we see how great He is, and then we really see what God did for us in giving us life, but also giving us our new life and saving our souls. Sending His only begotten Son, and we really see the full picture of everything that God has done in our lives, the more that we love Him. And you'll find that the same with an earthly relationship. The more that I got to know my wife, the more that I loved her. As you draw closer in a relationship, the more you'll love that person, even a friend outside of the marriage, outside of that love, a brotherly love as well, the more you get to know a friend, the more you love them. And the more you love them, with an earthly relationship, the more you'll want to know more about them. And it's the same with God. The more that we get to know Him, the more we'll love Him. And the more that we'll love Him, the more we'll want to follow Him. and the more we'll want to know Him, and it's a cycle, and we just continue to grow and grow, and what's wonderful about that is we never get to a point where, okay, I know everything about God that I can ever know. We could memorize this entire book, if it was possible, from cover to cover, and not know everything about God. What did John say at the end of John? He couldn't write everything about Jesus Christ, everything that Jesus did. It was impossible. No scroll could hold it. There wasn't enough ink to write it. We can never know, and we just continue to grow closer and closer to God, and that ought to be where our heart is. I believe that's where David's heart was, even through times that he drifted away from God because of sin. He was always in that cycle of getting to know God more and more. And the more that we love Him and follow Him and obey Him, the more that we'll love one another. And this is really where the heart of God is shown to us. God's heart is to love everyone. He loves the world. And for God so loved the world. And His will, as we talked about in 2 Peter 3, 9, is that all would be saved. 1 Timothy 2, 3 and 4 says the same thing. That's God's will. It's His desire. John 3.16, for God so loved the world. And we're told in Romans that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. He commended His love towards us while we were yet sinners. He loves the sinner. And as the heart of God is shown to us, as we have a heart for Him and to know Him and draw closer to Him, that heart will be shown to us. And as we allow Him to work in our hearts, our heart will begin to be in tune with God's, and we will find part of revival, as I mentioned in the beginning, is having a burden for lost souls around us. That comes in revival. Yes, you look at those great revivals. People came to church. They didn't know why they were coming to the service, to the tent meeting, or whatever. They were just there. And they would say, many of their testimonies are written down, they'd say, I don't know why I went to church, I don't know why I came. They came and they heard the gospel and they got saved. But many other people, as they were revived, they went out and spread the gospel, and you see hundreds and thousands that were saved, lives that were changed, countries that were changed. Just as our country, the first great awakening, led a group of believers to start the war for independence and to build, to found and build a nation that was built on God's word to give religious freedom that we enjoy here tonight as we sit, as we're here in this building tonight. But it shows us the heart of God and that comes in revival as we're showing the heart of God. And when our heart is put in tune with God, we will also have the heart of God, having to love for one another, that brotherly love that ought to engulf our Christian life and be infused in every area of your life, the love for brothers and sisters in Christ, but also the love and having a burden for lost souls around us. So it shows us, the first one makes us more like Jesus and then shows us