Continuing along my prayer thoughts...
I know I've been quoting a lot from Luke, but Luke does talk a lot about prayer. (Or recorded a lot of talk about prayer, I guess.) And I was noticing that prayer seems to be kind of a central theme in chapter 18. Throughout the chapter different points were standing out to me. I touched on the first one in my last post. The second one I notice is very clearly demonstrated in the next parable Jesus tells.
Two guys go up to the temple to pray. (Remember the theme is prayer.) One of them is a Pharisee. This is someone who has studied the law to the extent that he's part of a particular group. He knows what he's talking about Scripturally, and he leads a pretty good life. He doesn't commit a lot of the "concrete" sins like adultery, murder, extortion, drugs, sex, and rock 'n' roll, (ha sorry had to throw that in) and people can look at him and see that he's trying to live a pure life. The other guy is a publican. He's part of a hated class of people, and he likely has committed some of these sins! Extortion was a particularly common problem for publicans to have. They have two different lives, but both come with different attitudes, and I believe if either had had the other's attitude, their results would have been different accordingly (yeah try to dissect that sentence).
The Pharisee walks up and says, "God, I thank thee, that I am not as..." *casts a side-glance to publican and sniffs before clearing throat and piously returning to praying* "...other men are. Extortioners, unjust, adulterers. Or even as...this...*spits out word*...publican." *wraps robes around him, and strides to another column, lifting his hand in the air haughtily* "I fast twice in the week, (Tuesdays and Thursdays, you know). I give tithes of all that I possess."
Whereas the publican doesn't even feel worthy to come as close to God's seat as the Pharisee does, but stands afar off, and won't even look up to heaven, but smites his chest and says, "God, be merciful to me...a sinner."
Then Jesus says that this man went to his house justified, rather than the other! The publican, who likely had committed the "concrete" sins we were talking about went to his house justified, rather than the publican who didn't commit these "concrete" sins but did all these great things. Why? Because of the way they approached God in prayer. I said in my last post that it's hard to be a hypocrite when you pray in secret. I still think there's an element of truth to that. But I should be careful about making a blanket statement like that. I've been learning that even when praying, there's a certain attitude you have to have toward yourself and God in order to get God's attention.
God is drawn to humility! Some of my favorite verses in the Bible have to do with this concept. Psalm 51:16-17 is something I'll occasionally pray and it says, "For thou desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it: thou delightest not in burnt offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken, and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise." It says He won't despise that kind of spirit! Something draws Him to it. 1 Peter 5:5 says to the younger Christians to submit themselves to the elder Christians, and to be clothed with humility, then gives this reason: "for God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble." I love that. It's beautiful. The reason is that God desires us to completely depend on Him. HE's the one who will exalt us in due time. He wants us to cast all our care upon Him, for He cares for us! C.S. Lewis wrote something really profound about pride in Mere Christianity, and I wish I could remember exactly what he said, but the gist of it is that the reason God hates pride so much is that the very nature is of competition. When we are prideful, in a sense, we are trying to compete with God. And His glory can't be competed with. He loves humility because we are casting ourselves at His feet and admitting that we can't do anything to save ourselves, but have to depend on Him. And that's when He's able to work.
Jesus gives a visual example right after he told the parable I was talking about earlier, when little children are being brought to Jesus and the disciples try to get rid of them. But Jesus stops them and says, "Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein." He points them to the humblest member of society--a little child, and tells them that's the same attitude we have to have when approaching God.
In prayer, God is drawn to humility, because humility is just honest. Seriously. Think about it. Where is boasting? It is excluded. If we have an inflated opinion of ourselves, we're just deceiving ourselves. It's not the way things are. In reality, if we were really faced with the glory of God like Isaiah was, like he did we would fall to our face and cry, "Woe is me, for I am undone!" The fact is we ARE nothing. We really AREN'T anything...without Him. The first thing on the list of the 7 things God hates is a proud look. When we come before God, we must come with humility.
Showing posts with label Prayer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Prayer. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Prayers not Players
"Minister who do not spend two hours a day in prayer are not worth a dime a dozen, degrees or no degrees." Yikes. Rough words from an old preacher named Leonard Ravenhill. It shows a striking contrast to my own prayer life. And it seems like most of the world has my mentality of five minute fasts rather than incessant interceding. Okay, I was trying to alliterate, which didn't work out so well, but you get my point.
I want to challenge a statement I seem to hear often in youth groups or Bible studies. "It's okay if you only pray for 5 minutes or read 2 verses, as long as you do it consistently." On a certain level, that's true, and I get what people who make that statement are trying to say. They want to promote consistency, which is great. But praying for 5 minutes won't get you past all the carnality that you've been thinking about for the rest of the 23 hours and 55 minutes in the day. (Okay, minus sleep time for you technical folks out there.) Those two verses you read can't be adequately received unless they're taken in context and studied! God wants us to spend quality AND quantity time with Him. How will we get to know Him better if we don't spend more time with Him?
It's interesting...almost all the examples of prayer you have in the Bible have to do with not stopping. And I'm not just talking about "Pray without ceasing." Let's take a look at a few. In Luke (you can tell I've been studying Luke) chapter 18 verse 1, it says that Jesus spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray and not to faint. The story he tells is about an old unjust judge who doesn't care what anyone thinks, including God! He's not interested in the opinions of others whatsoever. And then there's a widow lady. Can you imagine this poor lady who because of her position is being taken advantage of? Who knows what her adversary was doing to her...maybe afflicting her financially or emotionally or whatever but something was being done that required justice. So this lady gets up her courage to go to the judge. Timidly, she comes before him, and presents her request...and is turned away. Now what would we do in that situation? "Oh, I guess my problem can't be solved. If the judge won't listen to me, nobody will!" Not this widow lady. She persists in constantly going back and bugging the judge over and over and over again about the same thing! And finally, not because of any righteousness on his part, but because he's tired of dealing with her, he grants her request! So Jesus tells this story, then says, "Check out what the unjust judge says." This is a guy who wouldn't fear God or regard man! And if even he responded to this poor lady's petition after she kept coming to him over and over, "shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them?" (emphasis mine.) What I get out of this story is that prayer is supposed to be persistent. Pressing. Continual. God doesn't want us to give up, just because we don't hear anything from Him, or we don't get an answer right away! In the next verse, Jesus says, "I tell you, he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?" Consistent prayer requires faithfulness. If we really believe God and we trust Him and are faithful to Him, we will continue in constant prayer. Remember, we're not supposed to have faith in faith, as my pastor always says. We're supposed to have faith in God, which means that we trust Him whether our prayers are automatically answered or not.
Jesus gives another example in Luke chapter 11, along the same lines! His disciples ask him how to pray, and he teaches them, then gives them the example of a guy going to his friends house at midnight for some bread, and banging on the door, even though his friend's kids are in bed and his friend doesn't want to get up, till the guy finally comes and answers.
One more example and I'm done. (This one's actually not in Luke!) Elijah was one of the greatest prophets who ever lived, and James uses him as an example to us, to show us that prayer works. "Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain, and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months." James is saying that Elijah was human just like us, but because he prayed earnestly, things happened. The next verse says, "And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain and the earth brought forth her fruit." We actually have an account of this in 1 Kings chapter 18. It says that after fire came down from heaven and the prophets of Baal were killed and stuff, Elijah told Ahab that there was the sound of abundance of rain. There had been a drought for three years, and there probably wasn't a cloud in the sky when Elijah said this! But he goes up to the top of the mountain, and he puts his face between his knees, and he begins to pray. Then he tells his servant to go look toward the sea, and the servant goes and looks, and comes back and says, "There is nothing." A lot of times that's how it seems when we pray. Nothing. Isn't weird how hard our flesh fights against praying? What's the big deal? You're setting aside time to talk to God. But it can be so hard to do! And this is one of the excuses I'll throw out. "There is nothing." Why should I pray if I don't feel God? Why should I pray if He's not listening to me anyway? But look at Elijah's response. He doesn't say, "Well, I put my 5 minutes in, we'll see what happens." He says, "Go again." And he prays again. The servant comes back, and there's nothing. Elijah sends him back out and prays. This happens 7 times! Then finally, on the seventh time, the servant comes back and reports, "I see a little cloud out of the sea, like a man's hand." That was enough for Elijah.
The point that I see here is to pray consistently and incessantly. Prayer is more than a ritual or presenting God with a wishlist. It's communicating with the King of the universe! That may sound cliche, but it's very true. My heart is convicting me because of my lack of prayer. It's one of the simplest things in Christianity! The most fundamental, basic thing: pray. Yet, I think there are a lot of people who don't do it! Corrie ten Boom once said, "Don't pray when you FEEL like it. Make an appointment with God, and keep it!" We can get so caught up in all the other stuff that we miss this basic weapon. One time I told a preacher I couldn't figure out God's will for my life and I wasn't sure what to do, and he asked me the most simple question. "Are you praying?" Ha! Well, of course I'm...uh...praying. But it hit me. I really had slacked off on getting up early in the morning and praying. You mean I have to pray to figure out what God's will is?! Maybe! It might help! The great thing about prayer is that it tests how real you are. I'm not talking about praying at church or a convention or the dinner table. Another thing Leonard Ravenhill said is that the secret to prayer is secret prayer. (Matt. 6:5-6) You can preach, teach Bible studies, sing, attend church, give money and still not have the anointing of God...but it's hard to be a hypocrite when you pray in secret.
And that's all I have to say! I'll probably be posting more about prayer in the next few weeks, because I think it's a big deal. Later!
I want to challenge a statement I seem to hear often in youth groups or Bible studies. "It's okay if you only pray for 5 minutes or read 2 verses, as long as you do it consistently." On a certain level, that's true, and I get what people who make that statement are trying to say. They want to promote consistency, which is great. But praying for 5 minutes won't get you past all the carnality that you've been thinking about for the rest of the 23 hours and 55 minutes in the day. (Okay, minus sleep time for you technical folks out there.) Those two verses you read can't be adequately received unless they're taken in context and studied! God wants us to spend quality AND quantity time with Him. How will we get to know Him better if we don't spend more time with Him?
It's interesting...almost all the examples of prayer you have in the Bible have to do with not stopping. And I'm not just talking about "Pray without ceasing." Let's take a look at a few. In Luke (you can tell I've been studying Luke) chapter 18 verse 1, it says that Jesus spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray and not to faint. The story he tells is about an old unjust judge who doesn't care what anyone thinks, including God! He's not interested in the opinions of others whatsoever. And then there's a widow lady. Can you imagine this poor lady who because of her position is being taken advantage of? Who knows what her adversary was doing to her...maybe afflicting her financially or emotionally or whatever but something was being done that required justice. So this lady gets up her courage to go to the judge. Timidly, she comes before him, and presents her request...and is turned away. Now what would we do in that situation? "Oh, I guess my problem can't be solved. If the judge won't listen to me, nobody will!" Not this widow lady. She persists in constantly going back and bugging the judge over and over and over again about the same thing! And finally, not because of any righteousness on his part, but because he's tired of dealing with her, he grants her request! So Jesus tells this story, then says, "Check out what the unjust judge says." This is a guy who wouldn't fear God or regard man! And if even he responded to this poor lady's petition after she kept coming to him over and over, "shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them?" (emphasis mine.) What I get out of this story is that prayer is supposed to be persistent. Pressing. Continual. God doesn't want us to give up, just because we don't hear anything from Him, or we don't get an answer right away! In the next verse, Jesus says, "I tell you, he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?" Consistent prayer requires faithfulness. If we really believe God and we trust Him and are faithful to Him, we will continue in constant prayer. Remember, we're not supposed to have faith in faith, as my pastor always says. We're supposed to have faith in God, which means that we trust Him whether our prayers are automatically answered or not.
Jesus gives another example in Luke chapter 11, along the same lines! His disciples ask him how to pray, and he teaches them, then gives them the example of a guy going to his friends house at midnight for some bread, and banging on the door, even though his friend's kids are in bed and his friend doesn't want to get up, till the guy finally comes and answers.
One more example and I'm done. (This one's actually not in Luke!) Elijah was one of the greatest prophets who ever lived, and James uses him as an example to us, to show us that prayer works. "Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain, and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months." James is saying that Elijah was human just like us, but because he prayed earnestly, things happened. The next verse says, "And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain and the earth brought forth her fruit." We actually have an account of this in 1 Kings chapter 18. It says that after fire came down from heaven and the prophets of Baal were killed and stuff, Elijah told Ahab that there was the sound of abundance of rain. There had been a drought for three years, and there probably wasn't a cloud in the sky when Elijah said this! But he goes up to the top of the mountain, and he puts his face between his knees, and he begins to pray. Then he tells his servant to go look toward the sea, and the servant goes and looks, and comes back and says, "There is nothing." A lot of times that's how it seems when we pray. Nothing. Isn't weird how hard our flesh fights against praying? What's the big deal? You're setting aside time to talk to God. But it can be so hard to do! And this is one of the excuses I'll throw out. "There is nothing." Why should I pray if I don't feel God? Why should I pray if He's not listening to me anyway? But look at Elijah's response. He doesn't say, "Well, I put my 5 minutes in, we'll see what happens." He says, "Go again." And he prays again. The servant comes back, and there's nothing. Elijah sends him back out and prays. This happens 7 times! Then finally, on the seventh time, the servant comes back and reports, "I see a little cloud out of the sea, like a man's hand." That was enough for Elijah.
The point that I see here is to pray consistently and incessantly. Prayer is more than a ritual or presenting God with a wishlist. It's communicating with the King of the universe! That may sound cliche, but it's very true. My heart is convicting me because of my lack of prayer. It's one of the simplest things in Christianity! The most fundamental, basic thing: pray. Yet, I think there are a lot of people who don't do it! Corrie ten Boom once said, "Don't pray when you FEEL like it. Make an appointment with God, and keep it!" We can get so caught up in all the other stuff that we miss this basic weapon. One time I told a preacher I couldn't figure out God's will for my life and I wasn't sure what to do, and he asked me the most simple question. "Are you praying?" Ha! Well, of course I'm...uh...praying. But it hit me. I really had slacked off on getting up early in the morning and praying. You mean I have to pray to figure out what God's will is?! Maybe! It might help! The great thing about prayer is that it tests how real you are. I'm not talking about praying at church or a convention or the dinner table. Another thing Leonard Ravenhill said is that the secret to prayer is secret prayer. (Matt. 6:5-6) You can preach, teach Bible studies, sing, attend church, give money and still not have the anointing of God...but it's hard to be a hypocrite when you pray in secret.
And that's all I have to say! I'll probably be posting more about prayer in the next few weeks, because I think it's a big deal. Later!
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