January 22, 2012 - Pastor Doug Caister
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If you are like me, you probably want to grow your prayer life. You would also like to see more answers to prayer. If this is the case in your life, then we all must learn how to better persevere in prayer. Persevering in prayer must have been very important to Jesus because He taught more about persevering in prayer and its benefits than any other topic related to prayer!
Jesus gave a model on how to pray, some prayer blockers like unforgiveness, but then He really got into persevering in prayer. My personal impression is prayer is less style or "glam" and more determination. Its more gritty and pretty. No style points, just guts and grit. In our time today, I want to go through these passages and show at least 4 benefits of persevering in prayer. Then I want us to see how Jesus modeled it for us to see and with His help, we can begin practicing it this week.
Before I go further, it will be helpful for you to think of an area where you could use more grit and tenacious determination in your life. Some area where if you can learn to persevere in prayer over a period of time, you would LOVE to see progress. It might be in a relationship or some other struggle where you may be tempted to give up. Do you have one? Good, then lets jump in.
Matthew 7:7-11 - Person character growth.
7 "Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.
9 "You parents &emdash; if your children ask for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead? 10 Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake? Of course not! 11 So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him.
What is the good gift? Its God's gift to serve Jesus successfully. Jesus is winding down his sermon about what life in the Kingdom of God can look like to those who learn it by apprenticing with Jesus. Jesus is casting a vision of a new life free from sinful anger, worry, and broken relationships. Instead Jesus shows the way of righteousness. All of this has to do with who a person is on the inside - their character. Your character is who you are when no one is watching.
How does a person change their character? By prayer and practicing what Jesus said to do. The good gift from God is to become more like His Son Jesus (Romans 8.28-29). That would bring both glory to God and Christ His Son.
Let me get real practical in how this can work. Lets use anger as an example. If you find yourself becoming angry with someone. Instead of praying something like, "Jesus help me not to get angry," expand it to asking God to help you with specific changes you wish to make. If for example, you find yourself getting angry while driving, then think specifically how Jesus would drive your car and pray to do the same thing. Imagine Jesus Christ with you in the vehicle, almost like driver's ed, helping you obey His commands. This may take 2-3 weeks of doing this every time you drive, but if you desire to obey Jesus, then keep on asking, keep on seeking, keep on knocking in specific prayer and you will have a break through. What is the good gift the Father will give you? A patient, loving, serene spirit within you as you drive and sinning less and less!
Personal character growth is preceded by prayer and lots of practice doing what Jesus would do. Name your character sin and God's solution will involve prayer and practice.
Luke 11:5-13 - Receive the Spirit's power & more faith.
5 Then, teaching them more about prayer, he used this story: "Suppose you went to a friend's house at midnight, wanting to borrow three loaves of bread. You say to him, 6 'A friend of mine has just arrived for a visit, and I have nothing for him to eat.' 7 And suppose he calls out from his bedroom, 'Don't bother me. The door is locked for the night, and my family and I are all in bed. I can't help you.' 8 But I tell you this &emdash; though he won't do it for friendship's sake, if you keep knocking long enough, he will get up and give you whatever you need because of your shameless persistence.
9 "And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.
11 "You fathers &emdash; if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? 12 Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not! So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him.
Jesus gives a story of a man in need of some food for an unexpected guest. In the story, Jesus said the man inside the house was bothered by being disturbed and acted not out of friendship but through the knockers shameless persistence. Jesus said God the Father is completely opposite of this. Bring the attitude of shameless persistent knocking to God and He will not be bothered and in loving friendship, He will respond because unlike the man in the story, He is unselfish and generous.
Jesus said, tenaciously seek after God and "He will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him." From Jesus' perspective, anything we ask for is of less importance than asking for the presence of the Holy Spirit. What could be a better gift from God than God Himself?! With God all things are possible. If God is for us, then who can be against us?
Not only having God's presence with us make all things possible, but will build our faith. When we understand two things about God, it will surely increase our faith. 1) The power and presence of God by the giving of His Spirit and 2) The loving heart of God for His children. He is not bothered by our continually coming to Him, but Jesus said He welcomes it!
There was a little boy who tragically lost his Mom to death. He could not sleep at night and for a season slept with his father. As he lay in the dark, the boy would say to his father, "father is your face turned toward me?" His father would reply, "yes, I am turned toward you." Then the boy would say, "good" and drift off to sleep.
Guys, not only is God's face turned toward us, but Jesus is telling us that to those who seek, they find and the door will be opened to us as we persist in prayer. We will receive the Holy Spirit and our faith will grow!
Luke 18:1-8 - A more focused life.
1 One day Jesus told his disciples a story to show that they should always pray and never give up. 2 "There was a judge in a certain city," he said, "who neither feared God nor cared about people. 3 A widow of that city came to him repeatedly, saying, 'Give me justice in this dispute with my enemy.' 4 The judge ignored her for a while, but finally he said to himself, 'I don't fear God or care about people, 5 but this woman is driving me crazy. I'm going to see that she gets justice, because she is wearing me out with her constant requests!'"
6 Then the Lord said, "Learn a lesson from this unjust judge. 7 Even he rendered a just decision in the end. So don't you think God will surely give justice to his chosen people who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8 I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly! But when the Son of Man returns, how many will he find on the earth who have faith?"
This is another story Jesus told to paint the stark contrast between our Heavenly Father and a character in a story. This time its a vulnerable widow with no one to help. The only thing she had going for her was her persistence! The judge cared nothing about the needs of people, especially this ladies' need. Yet her persistence wore him out and he addressed her need.
Once again Jesus is saying to us, "Imagine what can happen when you bring this kind of tenacious persistence and pair that with a Heavenly Father who cares deeply for His chosen children, especially those who are weak, vulnerable and have little help but God Himself.
Then Jesus said, "But when the Son of Man returns, how many will He find on the earth who have such faith." This story comes right after Jesus spoke about His 2nd Coming (Luke 17). Its almost as if He wondered out loud, how many people will be this focused? This lady's whole life revolved around gaining justice from a judge.
Let me get real personal with you. When Jesus returns, how many of us will he find that are intently focused on seeking Father, His Kingdom and His righteousness? Guys, It only comes from logging in the hours in prayer with Christ to the Father. The average person in the US spends 4 hrs a day watching television and 2 hrs a day on the Internet. The average time in prayer in the US is just under 5 minutes. I'm not sure this is the kind of focus Jesus is looking for. The good news is if we decide to change this around, the results will probably be startling! We all grew up in a world with a "give-up" mentality modeled all around us. Quitting and giving up is just too easy to do any more. What if we zeroed in on another model...
Mark 14:32-42 - Jesus Practicing What He Preached
32 They went to the olive grove called Gethsemane, and Jesus said, "Sit here while I go and pray." 33 He took Peter, James, and John with him, and he became deeply troubled and distressed. 34 He told them, "My soul is crushed with grief to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me."
35 He went on a little farther and fell to the ground. He prayed that, if it were possible, the awful hour awaiting him might pass him by. 36 "Abba, Father,"[a] he cried out, "everything is possible for you. Please take this cup of suffering away from me. Yet I want your will to be done, not mine."
37 Then he returned and found the disciples asleep. He said to Peter, "Simon, are you asleep? Couldn't you watch with me even one hour? 38 Keep watch and pray, so that you will not give in to temptation. For the spirit is willing, but the body is weak." 39 Then Jesus left them again and prayed the same prayer as before. 40 When he returned to them again, he found them sleeping, for they couldn't keep their eyes open. And they didn't know what to say.
41 When he returned to them the third time, he said, "Go ahead and sleep. Have your rest. But no—the time has come. The Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners. 42 Up, let's be going. Look, my betrayer is here!"
Soon after this, He would accomplish His mission on the cross. Yet in the story, Jesus went back and forth to His disciples, then He kept knocking, asking and seeking His Father in prayer. Seeking not his own will, but seeking the heart of His Father in heaven.
Hebrews 5:7-8 - Jesus Not Exempt
7 While Jesus was here on earth, he offered prayers and pleadings, with a loud cry and tears, to the one who could rescue him from death. And God heard his prayers because of his deep reverence for God. 8 Even though Jesus was God's Son, he learned obedience from the things he suffered.
Prayer is more gritty than pretty. Its getting down in the dirt, clenching your teeth and joining Jesus on the ground, crying out, logging in the hours and ultimately entrusting ourselves to our Heavenly Father. This is the kind of stuff God's Spirit empowers, refines and ultimately blesses as we come out on the other side with a faith worth more than gold (not to mention with more and more answered prayer!) Lets pray.
Digging Deeper:
- Jeremiah 29:12-13
- Luke 18:1-8
- Matthew 24:12-13