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the Lord's Prayer. We have seen
the example of the Lord's Prayer, how natural, how beautiful, how
powerful it was for the Lord Jesus to come into the presence
of His Father. We have seen the necessity of
it in His life, and thus we feel, we ought to feel, we ought to
be aware of and convicted of the necessity of prayer in our
life. The disciples saw that example
firsthand, and they were moved by that example of the Lord Jesus
to ask him, Lord, teach us to pray. And he did so. He said
to them, when you pray, and in that we have unceasing prayer,
the first elementary point, if we're going to be taught to pray,
is that we must pray. We must pray. We must exercise
ourselves in prayer. We must stop what we're doing
and get to the wilderness. Stop what we're doing and get
to the closet. Stop what we're doing with other people and get
a part with the Lord. or to take some people with us
and go before the Lord and exercise ourselves in prayer. We must get started and get started
today, just like go. Going is the toughest part of
evangelism. Doing, just getting on your knees and opening your
mouth and crying out to the Lord, that's the toughest part. And
then the relationship begins to build one day at a time. And
so we have unceasing prayer. We have childlike prayer. Once
you go, once you do, when you pray, what are you to say? Say,
our Father in heaven. Luke 11, two. Our Father in heaven. Come to the Lord on the foundation
of the relationship of you, a child of God, coming to the Father
whom you love, to the Father whom you desire to be in the
presence of, to the Father whom you desire to glorify, to the
Father whom you desire to please. Our Father. in heaven, our father
infinite in love, our father infinite in wisdom, our father
infinite in power, why wouldn't we go to our father who art in
heaven? By the way, lest I forget, when
you memorize this prayer, I encourage you to memorize it from Matthew's
gospel, chapter six, and I encourage you to memorize it in the King
James. It is a blessing. Our father who art in heaven,
our father in heaven, Hallowed be your name. We come as children. We come boldly as children. We
come as children with the rights of children, as heirs of the
kingdom of God. And yet we come humble. We come
submitted. We come fearing the Lord, even
as we love Him. We come desiring that His name
would be great, that His name would be lifted up, that He would
be feared in our own heart, in the hearts of those that we love,
in the hearts of all of humanity. We desire that he would be honored
and that he would be loved, that his cause would be carried out
and carried forth in the earth. We come with reverent prayer
before the Lord. We don't come flippant. We don't
come foolish. We don't come falling asleep,
if at all possible. We come reverently before the
Lord with thoughts clear, and enunciated in words audibly,
if at all possible. Hallowed be your name. We do not come as Nadab and Abihu. We come humbly. And we come in
Christ Jesus, the Son of God, the only mediator between God
and men. And then we see kingdom prayer.
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom
come. Or as the New King James says,
your kingdom come. Kingdom prayer, long-sighted
prayer, expected prayer, reverse planning prayer, if you will.
Thy kingdom come, O Lord. Thy kingdom come. So often as
we come to our Father, and as we ought to come to our Father,
We're in danger of coming to advance our kingdom. We're in
danger of coming to advance our cause. We're in danger of coming
to advance our name. And right from the outset, it's
about the Father's name. It's about the Father's glory.
It's about the Father's kingdom. Thy kingdom come. And this is a great blessing.
It's a great comfort. One, one, it is our great cause.
This is the great cause. This is why we live and breathe,
that the kingdom would come, that Christ would rule and reign,
that every knee would bow and every tongue would confess Jesus
Christ as Lord. Thy kingdom come. That's what
we're praying. We're praying that Christ would
come, that he would return, that he would sit upon the throne
in Israel, and that all nations would be subject to him. Thy
kingdom come. We're praying that King Jesus
would rule in our own hearts, that he would rule in our minds,
that he would rule in our deeds, that he would rule in our words,
that he would rule in our hands, that he would rule in our feet,
that he would rule in our eyes, that he would rule in the fullness
of our being. Thy kingdom come to every facet
of our person, Thy kingdom come to every man's
heart. While we pray for the eternal
kingdom of Christ to come and for His kingdom to be realized
on the earth, we also pray until that time that the kingdom would
come to the hearts of men, that men would bend their knee, that
men would repent, that men would turn to Jesus and serve Him as
Lord and God and King. Thy kingdom come is our great
uniting passion. It's our great uniting effort. Thy kingdom come. This is our
continual prayer, our unceasing prayer. We're to be found expectant
and waiting for the return of the King, hoping for that day. We're to be praying, come, Lord
Jesus. Come quickly, Maranatha. Come,
Lord Jesus. Thy kingdom This is long-sighted
prayer. Instead of short-sighted, we
get caught up in nation-building right here. And by all means,
we should pray for our nation. And you can even put that as
a tagline beneath this point. But pray for thy kingdom to come.
Pray for the kingdom of Christ to come. And pray for the kingdom
of Christ to come in America. Don't just pray for some party
to prevail. that he prevailed the African
continent, that he prevailed in Europe, and prevailed in Asia,
and prevailed in Australia, and prevailed in North America and
South America, that he prevailed this earth and the hearts of
men, that he prevailed in the pulpits, that he prevailed in
the pews, that he would rule and reign and his people thy
kingdom come. It's long cited. and that it's
eternal, and it's also short-sighted, and that it's now, but it's the
right sight. It's the right sight. It's the
right goal. It's the right all-consuming
effort. Thy kingdom come. This is an evangelistic prayer,
as well as a prayer that the Lord would fulfill properly. The word that Isaiah the son
of Amoz saw concerning Judah, Jerusalem, now that shall come
to pass in the latter days, that the mountain of the Lord's house
shall be established on top of the mountains, and shall be exalted
above the hills, and all nations shall flow to it. Many people
shall come and say, come, and let us go up to the mountain
of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach
us his ways, and we shall walk in his paths. For out of Zion
shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord He shall judge
between the nations and rebuke many people, and they shall beat
their swords, and their plowshares, and their spears, and their pruning
hooks. Nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither
shall they learn war any more. Thy kingdom come, the kingdom
of Christ, and Isaiah proclaims, Isaiah 2, 1 through 4. May it
come to the earth. May Christ come and rule. My kingdom come is in Jeremiah
23, verse 5. Behold, the days are coming,
says the Lord, that I will raise the David a branch of righteousness.
A king shall reign and prosper and execute judgment and righteousness
in the earth. In his day Judah will be saved
and Israel will dwell safely. Right now, Judah, Israel, they're
under threat. Constant threat. The world all
around them wants to destroy them. and Gog and Magog are coming,
and yet they will be saved. Now, this is his name, the name
of he who will come, this branch of righteousness, this one the
Lord is sending. This one will come. His name
is this, the name by which he will be called, the Lord our
righteousness. The one who will come to Jerusalem,
the one who is the branch of David, the one who is the king
who is going to reign and Israel is going to prosper and they're
going to dwell safely. His name is the Lord. Yahweh,
our righteousness. That is such a precious name.
Yahweh, our righteousness. And that's what we're praying.
Thy kingdom come. Yahweh, our righteousness, come. That's the gospel in a name.
Do you get that? Yahweh, our righteousness. How are we saved? Through God's
righteousness. God the Son, Yahweh, His righteousness,
imputed unto us. Yahweh, our righteousness. Of
all the names of Jesus, that might be my very most favorite. He is Yahweh, God, our righteousness. Therefore, behold, the days are
coming, says the Lord, that they shall no longer say, as the Lord
lives, who brought up the children of Israel from the land of Egypt,
but as the Lord lives, who brought up and led the descendants of
the house of Israel from the north country, and from all the
countries where I had driven them, and they shall dwell safely
in their own land." 2,000 years, Israel did not exist. Israel
reborn in 1948. This prophecy is being fulfilled.
You're going to think, wow, that was Look, 70 years ago, Pastor. 60-some years ago. That's a blink
in time. A blink in time. And it's a miracle
that after 2,000 years, a nation long, long dead exists again. The language, long, long dead.
And it exists again. And it exists against all the
odds. Israel should not exist. And
yet it does. Because the Lord, our righteousness,
is coming. thy kingdom come that's our prayer we can talk of daniel
2 44 through 45 where the rock kingdom is coming and all other
kingdoms will be crushed beneath it, and he will rule and reign
forevermore. We can talk of Daniel 7, verse
14, where Daniel prophesied, then to him was given dominion
and glory and a kingdom that all peoples and nations and languages
should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting
dominion, which shall not pass away in his kingdom, the one
which shall not be destroyed. Thy kingdom come. All of the
Bible points ahead to the kingdom of Christ. It all points ahead
to the culmination of God's plan from ages past to have a people,
his own special people, his adopted children, with him forever. He, our Father, and we, his children,
forever, thy kingdom come. Come, Revelation 11, 15. Then
the seventh angel sounded and there were loud voices in heaven.
Loud voices in heaven. They're kind of excited about
the kingdom that's coming and they're getting loud about it.
The kingdom, the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms
of our Lord and of his Christ and he shall reign forever and
ever. All of the heavenly hosts cry
out in celebration that the culmination of God's plan has come to pass.
The fulfillment of God's prophecies have come to pass. That the fulfillment
of your prayers and mine has finally come to pass. Thy kingdom
has come. This is our prayer. This is our
aim. This is our passion. that the
King would come to the hearts of men here and now, that the
church of Jesus Christ would advance upon the earth here and
now. There's another kingdom advancing
on the earth. Do you know that? The kingdom
of Islam, a kingdom of darkness. And they are praying, and they
are marching, and they are passionate, and they are diligent, and they
are committed. Oh, that we would pray, and that
we would be engaged in advancing the kingdom of Christ until the
King returned. Thy kingdom come. Kingdom prayer. Kingdom prayer. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be
done on earth as it is in heaven. Or your will be done on earth
as it is in heaven, as Luke 11 says. And here we see submitted
prayer. Kingdom prayer. Submitted prayer. Submitted prayer. Your will be
done on earth as it is in heaven. Our prayers are not a laundry
list of wants and don't wants. This was pretty good, Lord. We
could do that again. That, not so good. Probably leave
that off the list. It'd be great if we could do
this over here. That's not how we come to the Lord. We come
to the Lord in this manner. Thy will be done on earth as
it is in heaven. And again, this is a vast, universal
prayer, isn't it? But then you begin to unpack
it. You begin to unpack it. And I
always like to start close to home. Thy will be done in my
chest, in my heart, in my mind, in my words, in my deeds, in
my home, in my wife, in my children, in the church. Thy will be done
in the church alone. Every church shouldn't be saying,
what's our niche? What's our agenda? What are we
going to be doing? No, it's, what's your plan, O Lord? Thy
will be done. And then, yes, broadly, your will be done on
earth as it is in heaven, in our city, in our state, in our
nation, amongst humanity. Thy will be done. But unpack the prayer. Unpack
it. Cry out to the Lord that his
will would be done, beginning with your own life, beginning
with your own heart and those in your life. And then reach
out from there. Thy will be done. What a life-changing prayer that
is. What a precious disposition that
is. I will be done. Are we not born
crying out, my will be done? I think so. I think you can hear
that if you listen close to every infant's cry. My will be done. And they'll hit you. You'll suffer
their wrath if you don't do their will when they're young. You must train them. Oh, no,
no, no. No, it's my will be done. I am the parents. I am placed
by God to teach you other lives. And that's a parental task, to
begin to introduce them to the reality that they are subject
to the will of God. They are subject to the plan
of God. They are subject to the authority of God. This is so
very healthy for you and I to pray, thy will be done. And to pray in ceasing is a matter
of regular exercise, a regular portion of our prayer, Thy will
be done. Oh, we can pray, as we've talked
about. Lord, if this cup can pass. Please, Lord. Nevertheless, thy will be done. Lord, it seems like this would
be a real blessing if this would work out this way. Nevertheless,
thy will be done. Lord, what I seem to see coming
there looks terrible. Please, Lord, don't let that
happen. Nevertheless, Lord, thy will be done. Think of our prayers. Lord, bless America. Bless America. Grant the election go this way.
Grant that the market would go this way. Grant, Lord, that whatever
we're praying, and yet the Lord may want to humble us corporately. Lord, stop the advance of Islam
in America. That's a right prayer, because
that's a kingdom prayer. And yet, the Lord may very well
be, in fact, we know he's in control, so he is allowing the
advance of Islam in America. Nevertheless, I think we pray
against it, because it's the advance of darkness. But we still
must say, thy will be done. Would it not have been right
to pray if you were Israel? Lord, here come the Babylonian
hordes. Here comes Medo-Persia. Here
comes Egypt. This is not in order. Here comes
Greece. Here comes Rome. Here comes everyone
and their dog. And they're all trying to drag
us off. Would it not be right to pray? Yes, it would be right
to pray. And nevertheless, the Lord's will was done. And they
were conquered again and again. And there may, in fact, certainly
was always a remnant. There was always a remnant. But
the nation was being chastised. The nation was being rebuked
by their Holy Father. And so the righteous remnant
would be in there praying, Lord! And nevertheless, they would
suffer with the whole and suffer in faith. Thy will be done. And pray for eyes of faith and
pray for strength to endure. Thy will be done. Your will be done. Albert Barnes, the great commentator
of old, says of this, the will of God is that people should
obey his law and be holy. The word will here has reference
to his law and to what would be acceptable to him. To pray,
then, that his will may be done on earth as it happened is to
pray that his law is revealed, his revealed will may be obeyed
and loved. His law is perfectly obeyed in
heaven, and his true children most ardently desire and pray
that it may also be obeyed on earth. Like unto, if you will,
Deuteronomy 29, 29, the secret things belong to the Lord our
God. But those things which are revealed
belong to us and our children forever, that we may do all the
words of this law. obey the revealed law. And Deuteronomy
29-29 is perfect in the context of prayer because we often use
prayer as like this magic genie thing to try to tap into the
secret things of the Lord, the secret plan of the Lord, the
future, and how God's going to work things out. And really,
here, the idea of submitted prayer, the idea of your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven, is that we would obey His revealed
will, His revealed law, that He would direct us, and we would
follow Him. As Romans 12.2 says, do not be
conformed to this world that we transform by the renewing
of your mind, that you may prove what is a good and acceptable
perfect will of God. Prove what is a good and acceptable
the perfect will of God be transformed in your mind. Don't be conformed
to the world anymore, but be transformed by the renewing of
your mind, that you can prove what is the good and acceptable
will of God. Pray that. Pray that, oh Lord,
let me be transformed, that I might prove out what is good and acceptable. What is your will, oh Lord, in
the light of your word? Prayer is not to be an attempt
to break into the secrets of tomorrow, so much as a plea that
we might today, here and now, submit and obey our Lord out
of love unto him and love to our fellow man. Obey in every
facet of our being. Trust and obey. For there's no
other way to be happy than Jesus. Your will be done on earth as
it is in heaven. Submitted prayer, crying out
to the Lord with a humble, submitted heart. Free, free, oh yes, to
say, oh Lord, if this thing can pass. Oh Lord, this seems like
it'd be a real blessing over here. Oh Lord, that thing there
looks terrible. And to cry out to Him with prayer
and supplication, to bring your heart, your concern, your worry
to Him. and not worry, whether leaving
or with Him, and welcoming His will in your
life, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That's perfectly. That's absolutely. That's without
error or equivocation. God's will is done in heaven
without exception. And when Christ's kingdom comes,
when thy kingdom comes, God's will will be done perfectly.
And so we need to conform ourselves to that now in prayer. Your will be done on earth as
it is in heaven. And so we have childlike prayer,
reverent prayer, Kingdom prayer and submitted prayer, followed
by dependent prayer. Dependent prayer. I think it's
very practical here. Very practical. These other prayer
issues, prayer facets, prayer topics, if you will, have all
been vast in their scope. This is very practical. This
is very, very personal. Not that God our Father is not
personal. But right here in our dependent
prayer, verse three, give us day by day our daily bread. Very, very practical, very personal,
and very dependent. And that's really the point,
is we're recognizing our dependence. We're coming humbly to the Lord
and recognizing that it's not our effort, it's not our will,
it's not our intellect, it's not our strong back. It's the
grace of God that provides us bread day by day. It's the grace
of God that provides our daily bread. Daily bread. Now while we look at the kingdom,
and we have kingdom prayers, we're to be long-sighted. When
we look at our sustenance, we're to be rather short-sighted. We're
to trust the Lord day by day. A Jew following Moses. A Jew
in the Sinai following Moses. Day by day, trusting God for
his daily bread, the manna of heaven that he will provide.
Give us, O Lord, day by day, our daily bread. Again, many of your worries and
mine, it's because we're, one, not looking far down the road
all the way to the kingdom, and pray thy kingdom come. And two,
we're not praying thy will be done. And three, because when
we do look long down the road, we're not looking to the kingdom
and his will be done, but we're looking at retirement. We're
looking at that boat we had hoped to have, and that property that
seems so elusive, and that project we wanted to do, and that hobby
we wanted to perfect, these problems, these troubles,
these... And the Lord says, oh no, no,
no. Pray this. Give us day by day
our daily bread. Day by day our daily bread. We
have very American expectations. We have rich people expectations,
always. We live in the richest nation
in the world, the richest time the world's ever known. We expect
comfort. We expect spare footage. We expect
freezers and refrigerators and cabinets full of food. We expect
microwaves to turn on and heat that food quickly. We expect
to throw a few coffee grounds in, or even beans in, in a button.
It grinds them up instantly. Throw those in. In fact, if you
put the beans in the thing, and you push a button, and it makes
coffee. I mean, you can get quite fancy. It's all easy. It's all simple. And we are apt to forget how
dependent we are, how blessed we are. Every now and again,
someone gives us a scenario, a scary scenario about a natural
disaster or an attack of a certain kind coming, and how quickly
we would run out of food, how quickly we would find that the
government the food and the water and the
protection that you need and things quickly become lawless. We need to recognize God's provision. We need to praise God for his
provision and we need to be sure We have bread today. So very
thankful that we have water today. So very thankful that God has
provided abundantly for us. Abundantly. We as Americans,
we cry out if we don't have major medical, completely paid for. And we cry out if our code pays
over $10, right? We cry out if we have to pay
more than $10 for open heart surgery. And I understand as
you compare yourself with other Americans and other jobs and
whatever. I understand, mind you. But compare yourself with
the world and compare yourself with this prayer and put it into
perspective. Give us, day by day, our daily
bread. Day by day, our daily bread. We are blessed. Praise His holy
name. Give us day by day our daily
bread. It's still unfathomable. It's just completely unfathomable
that there are people in the world that don't get daily bread.
And yet, there are people like millions in the world that don't
get daily bread. And so let us not forget that.
If we were in their shoes, if we were born someplace else,
this prayer would have all new meaning. We bow our heads and kneel. Let's
mean what we pray. Let's thank the Lord for His
provision. Thank the Lord for His abundance. Let's remember
out of our abundance to provide for others. If there are people
in the world starving and dying, And we are feasting day by day,
meal after meal, doing nothing about it. There will be accountability. There will be accountability. Give us, day by day, our daily
bread. Now bread, food, is the issue,
the foremost issue there. But again, this is a point, a
topic, a title beneath that. career, education, all of God's
blessings. All of God's blessings. Recognize
that He lashes them upon you. Thankful and satisfied if simply
that is answered. And yet recognizing and going
to the Lord with all our wants and needs and giving Him praise. 1 Timothy 6.6 says, now godliness
with contentment is great gain. Godliness with contentment is
great gain. Godliness and contentment can
go hand in hand. It goes on in verse 7, For we
brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry
nothing out. Godliness, genuine spiritual
godliness, and and there's great gain there. We brought nothing
into the world, it's certain you can take nothing out. It
would be good to get a hold of that, wouldn't it? What can we
take out? Nothing. Except obedience. Obedience. Service unto the Lord. Love unto the Lord and love unto
the saints and love unto the lost. And in that you're going
to hear, well done. Well done, and there will be
heavenly reward. Other than that, you take nothing
with you. And so let us be certain of that
and live in light of that. Verse 8, having food and clothing,
with these we shall be content. Food and clothing, with these
we shall be content. But those who desire to be rich
fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and harmful
lusts which drown men in destruction and perdition." Those who desire to be rich.
And most of us think, oh, that's not me. I don't desire to be
rich. That's not me. Friends, I fear
it's all of us to some We all desire the comforts of
Costco. We all desire the comforts of
the average American home. And on the biblical scale that's
being spoken of here, that's rich, rich beyond imagination. Take the average Christian believer
out of the New Testament world and walk them through Costco. Blow their minds. But those who desire to be rich
fall into temptation and a snare. Don't work to be rich. Work to
glorify God. Work to use the abilities you
have to your best to glorify God, to be a blessing to your
co-workers, and to provide for your family, and for the gospel
of Jesus Christ, and the local church, and other worthy ministries. Those who desire to be rich fall
into temptation. It's a temptation. It's a snare. and into many foolish and harmful
lusts. Because it's all an expression
of self-love rather than the love of God and the love of others.
Harmful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. It's a terrible path to start
down. Terrible, terrible path. You
know, the Muppet Christmas Carol. It really goes into how Scrooge
became Scrooge. And it shows you, perhaps more
than any of the other Christmas carols I know, the fall of Scrooge
into his Scroogeness. As he started out as a pretty
average young man, there were some opportunities before him. And he also had a beautiful,
sweet young lady. a little more success, and her
heart is being crushed, and her heart is wilting, and he's always
got a little more success to get before they can get married,
and finally she gives up, and her heart is his no more, and
his heart becomes all the more cold and dead, and it's gold
that owns his cold heart, and it consumes him. to finally grizzle
the rat comes the Savior. If you haven't seen Come Up With
Christmas Carol, it's very good. Our family enjoys it a great
deal. But the point being, it's a path. You don't just jump to be scrooge. It's a path of perdition, starting
with a desire to be rich. Oh, but I want to serve God,
too. I'm going to love my wife, too. I'm going to love my kids,
too. You neglect your wife? You neglect your kids, you neglect
God. It's a path of destruction. Verse 10 of 1
Timothy 6, for the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.
For it's some have strayed from the faith in their greediness
and pierced themselves through with many sorrows. Don't go down
that path. Instead, daily pray this, give
us this day our daily bread. Give us this day our daily bread. That is our prayer. And that
prayer keeps our heart right, keeps our intentions right, keeps
our focus right, and keeps us thankful, thankful for the Lord's
provision. Dependent prayer. And so we see
unceasing prayer, childlike prayer, reverent prayer, kingdom prayer. Turn this page upside down. No. Must be me. Submitted prayer and dependent
prayer. And then we have repentant prayer. Repentant prayer. And these are
titles. These are subjects. These are
places to stop and stay a while in your list of prayers. You stop here. and you unpack
your sin. You stop here, and you confess
your sin to God. Repentant prayer, verse 4, Luke
11. And forgive us our sins. Forgive us our sins. Now, I find this interesting.
Just first, let's consider its placement. Our Father, who art
in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be
done on earth as it is in heaven. we get to sin. I don't want to
in any way belittle the importance of confessing sin and repenting.
But you aren't first. I want you to put you in your
place because you can be very self-centered and self-loving
in the midst of all your blathering, tearful confessions. I have seen
it too many times. It's a different expression of
self-love. when you're continually caught
up, constantly unworthy, before God, before men, and blathering
on and on and on and on and on about your unworthiness. One
of two things is going on there. You've totally missed the point
of God's grace in Christ Jesus, and you're not saved. Or you're exhibiting, you are
saved, and yet somehow exhibiting this self-centeredness that's
going to distract you and detract from your experience of that
grace that you have experienced. And so be taught. We've asked
the Lord to teach us to pray. He put our sin well down the
list. Not because of its lack of importance.
It's an important issue. But because God is so much more
important. God's agenda is so much more
important. The basic issues of basic And because of our own tendency,
sin is a funny thing. It has all sorts of crappy ways
of coming out. And that is one prevalent way. Historically and presently, historically,
there was a whole era in America and abroad where folks got caught
up in this kind of woe-is-me-ism Christianity, where it was all
the rage to sit around and to write about a form of Christianity. I can't
imagine anyone in the world wanting to convert or come to Christ,
if there were anything else at all. It's not pretty. It's not joyful. It's not happy.
Where's the fruit of the Spirit? Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness,
goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control. There's no room
for it, because I'm such a wretched sinner. And so first, keep it in its
place. That's the first point I see
because of where the Lord put it. Put it over here. We spend
a long time already in prayer focusing on God, focusing on
the will of God, focusing on the kingdom of God and others
coming to Christ. It's God word and it's other
word. Then it comes home to you. Then it comes to you and deal
with you and be broken in your sin and cry out to God. Be repentant. But that is not the end all of
your prayers. That's not where you stay either.
If you're born again from above, you're a new creature in Christ
Jesus. You're a new creation. The old is past. All things become
new. You celebrate that. You rejoice in that. There is
now, therefore, no condemnation. And you rejoice in that. Nevertheless, though, you keep a short list with God.
Again, this is daily prayer. Teach us, Lord, to pray. Okay,
when you pray, pray this. Now put it in its right spot,
and keep it in its right spot. I really am serious in this,
because we all like ourselves way too much, and we all get
focused on ourselves way too much, and it's so much healthier
to focus on God. And that's what God wants you
to focus. It's so much healthier to focus on God's agenda, It's
so much harder to focus on God's people and lost people becoming
God's people. And we want to focus on self.
And one of the great temptations that people fall into, because
it seems spiritual, because there's an element of truth here. It's
right here. It says we're to pray and forgive us our sins.
But you, you can tarry there too long. And you can tarry there
too short. We're to tarry there regularly.
We're to stop by there daily. We're to search our hearts and
search our minds and be honest before God and keep a short count. Forgive us our sins. Well, that
was easy. That was quick. You might want
to pause a bit longer and get a little more personal, a little
more explicit. Name those sins and cry out to
God that he would not just forgive you, but strengthen you against
them, conform you to the image of Christ, renew your mind. Don't just forgive, but by all
means forgive. But Lord, help me to truly repent. Help me to turn from it. Forgive
us our sins. Forgive us our sins. 1 John 1.7
says, But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have
fellowship with one another in the blood of Jesus Christ. The blood of Jesus Christ, His
Son, cleanses us from all sin. What a comfort! What a joy! What
a certainty! What an absolute statement that
we are to embrace and rejoice in! and Yet we sin. We're not glorified. Yet we sin. Sheep prone to water. Sheep prone to air. Sheep often
stupid in sin. That is what we are. Being sanctified,
but not yet sanctified utterly. And so we need a sensitive harps. We need to ask God to show us
our sin, and we need to keep a short account of that sin and
confess our sins. Not get hardened in sin, not
get comfortable in sin, not continue down the path of sin, because
sin begets sin begets sin begets sin, and then it consumes you,
and you'll wake up and have no idea how you got where you got,
but you got there one step of sin at a time. They often become
quicker steps. take a little step, a little
shuffle of the feet in the wrong direction, a little half step,
and then an average step, and then a full step, and then your
gait extends out, and well, that's a pretty good stride, and before
you know it, that's kind of a lope, and you look back, and there's
a clear progression until there's an all-out sprint, and the steps
are about as far out as they can get. And that's the nature
of sitting, until you fall. Give us our sins, Lord. Father, Father, think about it. I know some of you have a story
like mine and my wife's. We were blessed in our young
childhood to be caught stealing by parents. The shame of such
a thing where mom and dad catch you stealing something from the
grocery, something as stupid as a Popeye's spoon. Oh, I've got to have it, I've
got to have it mom, I've got to have it. No, no you're not
going to have it. And then to exercise my covetous
heart and to steal it. To take it out of its package,
put it in my pocket and take it home. And remember, sin makes
you stupid. And so you show up the next morning
at breakfast with sin Popeye spoon in hand. High, it was tan. And that put
a mark on my heart. Stealing, thievery is a shameful
thing. And amongst the sins of my youth,
thievery, for the most part, was not present. I never stole
for gain. I did steal for prank time to
time. But never for gain, because that
left a mark there. But I remember the shame before
my death. Oh, and the store clerk, the
great shame of sin. And I remember the spanking. They made me wait a long time.
I think they were enjoying the night, the unpeaceful night with
the sun in the bedroom, waiting for his spanking. What was I
going to do? Anyway, point B, point B. Go to your father like that child
that you were, because that's a child you still are. Feel the
shame of your sin and go to your father, your father who loves
you. He will forgive you. He may indeed put the rod to
your backside, but he will forgive you. He'll not leave it on your
backside forever. He will forgive you. And remember the sweetness of
that forgiveness. Remember the sweetness after the rod of how
you cuddled up with your father and your mother If you're able
to, and if you can't, then remember with me through my experience
and others. Know that it's true, your Heavenly
Father. He is the perfect Father. He
does chasten, Hebrews 12 tells us so clearly. He does chasten.
And His chastening of times is strong. But it will come to an
end as you learn the peaceful fruit of righteousness. It's not a good idea. Eventually,
they catch you. They'll catch you. I think it was him. Mike's
got a lot of stories about not having a child like that. I don't
know. I don't know. We can edit that out. Repentant
prayer. Remember, your father loves you. He loves you. He wants you to
come repenting. He wants to forgive you. If only they would ask for it. If only they would turn from
their sin. If only they'd stop their rebellion. It is tearing
your heart out that they rebel, that they're destroying themselves,
that they're putting themselves at odds with you, that they're
breaking fellowship with you, that you now have to become the
authoritarian disciplinarian and put the wrong on their backside
in whatever manner that is necessary. that they would turn, that they
would come, that they would run to you, Abba, Father, and make
it right. And you, you, you imperfect,
wretched, earthly parents are ready to forgive. Do you not
think God is ready to forgive? He is. He is. Run to him. Run to him daily. I'm not going to do that. But when they sin, I must. I
must. And the Father must, and He will.
Will. Forgive us our sins, Father.
Forgive us our sins. The longer we go between those
prayers to forgive us our sins, the further we're getting relationally
from the Father. Our hearts are becoming calloused,
and we get used to being at a distance. You all know them. You've all
heard of them. You've all experienced it to some level with your own.
The further they go in sin, the more callous, the harder it gets.
And eventually, they no longer even care. They don't hurt anymore.
They don't care anymore. That's just tragic. And we're just like that with
God. That's why he said, when you pray unceasingly, daily,
when you pray, pray this. Give us our sins. Give us our
sins. Give me my sins. Don't let your fellowship, don't
let your relationship with your Heavenly Father suffer. Give us our sins. Cry out unto
Him. First John assures us that if
we do not, we deceive ourselves, we have plenty of sin to ask
forgiveness for. And it assures us that if we
confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. But let me add this. He is our
faithful Father. He is our faithful Father and
our just Father. Just? What? Faithful, I can understand. He's a good Father. Well, ultimately, our sins are
already under the blood of the Lamb. And yet in the here and
now of our existence, we need to go to the Lord and confess
it and make it right. He is faithful and He is just
to forgive us our sins and cleanse us, to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Unceasing prayer. Childlike prayer. Reverent prayer. Kingdom prayer. Submitted prayer. Dependent prayer. Repentant prayer. forgiving prayer, and protecting
prayer, and delivering prayer, and doxology, braggadocious prayer,
and persistence prayer. We can do it. Don't look, Duncan.
Don't look scared. Do it. Come on now. Do it. Finish strong. Let's pray. Father, what a sweet time this
has been. Really, above all else, celebrating
your fatherhood in our childhood. And that really, I think, is
what prayer is, is the Lord Jesus has shown us and taught us, above
all else, is celebrating your fatherhood and our childhood.
Draw us near, Lord. Be our eye. Fill our hearts. Let us not wander. Forgive us,
Lord, we pray, our sins. Forgive us our prayerlessness.
Forgive us our silence. Forgive us the cold shoulder
Forgive us our obstinance. Forgive us, Lord, and change
our hearts that we would seek you in the morning, in the noontime,
and at night, and every time in between, that we would breathe prayer,
that it would be our sustenance, that
it would fill our lungs and fill our soul We would draw near unto
you, Father, and never leave your presence. We ask this, Lord, in your precious
Son's name. In the name of Jesus.
The Lord's Prayer - Part 4
KINGDOM PRAYER, SUBMITTED PRAYER, DEPENDANT PRAYER, REPENTANT PRAYER
| Sermon ID | 921111828410 |
| Duration | 56:06 |
| Date | |
| Category | Camp Meeting |
| Language | English |
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