Sermon for Sunday June 3rd, 2007

How Do I Pray? by Don Jones

Matthew 6:5-6:8

How Do I Pray Lord?
Matthew 6:5-8


Introduction

Attending church in Kentucky, we watched an especially verbal and boisterous child being hurried out, slung under his irate father’s arm. No one in the congregation so much as raised an eyebrow -- until the child captured everyone’s attention by crying out in a charming Southern accent, "Ya’ll pray for me now!" (Reader’s Digest)

Far too many Christians see prayer in the same way, "In case of emergency, bend knees and pray". Some view God as their heavenly "pop-machine", insert prayer and your wish will come true.

Still others see the need for prayer to be a lengthy time of wailing and gnashing of teeth and only pray kneeling or prostrate on the floor. Some believers are afraid to enter the throne room. They believe themselves to be unworthy to enter.

"The proper way for man to pray," said Deacon Lemuel Keyes; "The only proper attitude is down upon his knees."
"Nay, I should say the way to pray," said Reverend Doctor Wise, "Is standing straight with outstretched arms with rapt and upturned eyes."
"Oh, no, no, no," said Elder Snow, "such posture is too proud." A man should pray with eyes fast-closed and head contritely bowed."
"It seems to me his hands should be austerely clasped in front. With both thumbs pointing to the ground," said Reverend Doctor Blunt."
"Last year I fell in Hodgkin’s well headfirst," said Cyril Brown. "With both my heels a-stickin’ up, my head a-pointing’ down; And I done prayed right then and there; best prayer I ever said, The prayin’est prayer I ever prayed, a-standin’ on my head." (Our Daily Bread , March 10)

1. Secretly

Jesus began answering the question, "How do/should I/we pray Lord?" by giving them a negative example. Verse 5 says,

¡§And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full."

God spoke with Abraham and Abraham spoke with God and so, prayer was simple communication between God and man. God spoke to the Israelite nation like no other. They were the chosen people. They even received the Lord God’s written word.

Generation after generation prayer remained the same but gradually, like all other aspects of religious life in Israel, men of religion changed the meaning and methods of prayer. Prayer became more religious and ritualistic.

Times of day were set as "prayer" times. The most common set times were the third, sixth, and ninth hour (9, 12 noon, 3). Where ever you were you would drop what you were doing and begin to pray.

The "hypocrites" or Pharisees would go to public places at the times of prayer. Why? To be seen by men. They wanted the respect and adoration of people. They wanted every one to think that they were holy, the best of the religious, better than everyone else.

Jesus said don’t do prayer that way and He emphasized the YOU.

But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

Jesus said we are to do our praying in secret and only to the Father. We are to get away from the profane and busy world so that we might enter into our closet, our heart, the inner core of our being. And in so doing we are to lift and listen to our Father who is in heaven. It is our private, intimate, and alone time with ones self and God.

I am afraid that if we do not physically seal ourselves off we will never get this private time with God. Unlike Abraham our Old Testament figures we live in noisy, disruptive cities and homes.

Scripture reminds us that even Jesus withdrew from the multitudes to pray and be alone with His Father. How much more do we need to withdraw and be alone to go before our Lord? We must find our secret place.

2. Simply

Jesus went on to tell us to watch what we say in verse 7.

And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.

Jesus warns of babbling or as the KJV says "meaningless repetition". The Greek word is "ƒÒƒÑƒäƒäƒÕƒÜƒÕƒß" meaning idle, thoughtless speaking. Evidently this is what the pagans did in their prayer time. They would recite the same "mantra" or meaningless words over and over believing they were praying to which ever impotent god they worshipped. The prophets of Baal even slashed themselves as they frantically prayed and danced to Baal. It didn’t work.

Not only were the pagans praying in meaningless ways but this formatted type of prayer had crept into Judaism. It was known as the "Shemanah esray" or "the eighteen". These were eighteen prescribed prayers for all occasions. Devout Jews would pray all eighteen prayers at each appointed time.

I am sure that some Jews truly worshipped and praised God as they prayed these prayers but as we all know the danger of repetition is indifference. We begin to say the words without understanding or meaning them. The prayers became ritualistic.

Spurgeon once said: "There is no need for us to go beating about the bush, and not telling the Lord distinctly what it is that we crave at His hands. Nor will it be seemly for us to make any attempt to use fine language; but let us ask God in the simplest and most direct manner for just the things we want...I believe in business prayers. I mean prayers in which you take to God one of the many promises which He has given us in His Word, and expect it to be fulfilled as certainly as we look for the money to be given us when we go to the bank to cash a check.

We should not think of going there, lolling over the counter chattering with the clerks on every conceivable subject except the one thing for which we had gone to the bank, and then coming away without the coin we needed; but we should lay before the clerk the promise to pay the bearer a certain sum, tell him in what form we wish to take the amount, count the cash after him, and then go on our way to attend to other business.." (The Kneeling Christian)

At a meeting of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, Bobby Richardson, former New York Yankee second baseman, offered a prayer that is a classic in brevity and poignancy: "Dear God, Your will, nothing more, nothing less, nothing else. Amen."

3. Stubbornly

Does this mean we should ask the Lord once and forget about it? The answer is no. Jesus was talking about meaningless words or redundancy. We are to be persistent or stubborn in our requests.

One day George Muller began praying for five of his friends. After many months, one of them came to the Lord. Ten years later, two others were converted. It took 25 years before the fourth man was saved. Muller persevered in prayer until his death for the fifth friend, and throughout those 52 years he never gave up hoping that he would accept Christ! His faith was rewarded, for soon after Muller’s funeral the last one was saved. (Our Daily Bread)

We live in an instant age. For some reason we think our prayers should be answered immediately and we should be aware of it. That is rarely how our Lord works. Our Lord desires our faith to be strong and He takes care of everything. And His answer to our prayers is not always yes. Sometimes His answer is "wait".

4. Successfully

Jesus said in verse 8,

Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

Jesus tells us to go before the Lord with the understanding He already knows what we need before we ask. He has it ready for us. We don’t have to prattle on about what, when, how, or where we need to ask directly what we need according to His Word.

We worship an omniscience God. He knows everything about everyone past, present, and future. Of all beings He knows what you need when you need it, not one second before and not one second after, just the right time. Do we not realize this one truth? We need to quit doubting our Lord, especially in matters of His word and get up from our knees walking in faith.

Augustine said, "It was our Lord who put an end to long-windedness, so that we would not pray as if we wanted to teach God by our many words. Piety, not verbosity, is in order when we pray, since He knows our needs. Now someone perhaps will say: ’But if He knows our needs, why should we speak our requests even in a few words? Why should we pray at all? Since He knows, let Him give what He deems necessary for us.’ Even so, He wants us to pray so that He may confer His gifts on one who really desires them and will not regard them lightly."

This morning you have the opportunity to pray one of the few "instant" prayers in scripture. If you repent, turn to Jesus, and invite Him into your life this moment, scripture says He will come into your heart and you will be saved. All who call on the name of the Lord will be saved. Are you ready to call on Him?