Biblical Prayer: The Pattern Pt. 1

Okay, so biblical prayer is our main topic for the whole study.

Tonight is part 5 and the title is Pray Like This. So for just a little review as an introduction, we've examined the purpose of prayer.

That was our first session. Then we've looked at false teaching on prayer.

We looked at a lot of erroneous and error -filled teaching on prayer.

Then we examined two questions, remember, from R .C. Sproul's book, If God is Sovereign, Then Why Pray?

And then secondly, Does Prayer Really Change Things? Those were two separate sessions as well. And then we examined what prayer should not be.

That was in our last session. And again, for the next several weeks, we're going to be examining prayer using the example of our

Lord Teaches disciples in Matthew chapter 6, verses 5 to 13. In this text,

Jesus gives us an inspired pattern for prayer, and I use the word pattern very decidedly.

After some words of caution, which we covered last week, this is what we read in verse 9.

He says, Pray then in this way. King James Version says, After this manner, pray ye.

It means the same thing, to do good translations. Dr. Martin Lloyd -Jones said that prayer is one of the most vital subjects in connection with our

Christian life. Prayer is beyond any question the highest activity of the human soul. Man is at his highest, at his greatest and highest, when upon his knees he comes face to face with God.

Some great words from the good doctor. Now remember the context for this prayer, because we always want to keep context in mind when we're interpreting anything.

The context is the Sermon on the Mount, and I'm just going to give a little bit of a brief explanation.

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus has explained the true meaning of the law of God, as opposed to the pharisaical teaching where they were trying to hold to the minutia, to the letter, and Jesus debunks that and goes and shows that it's the condition of the heart, it's the heart attitude that's the most important.

Just because you haven't stuck a knife in somebody doesn't mean you're not guilty of murder. So then he addresses how the

Christian should live in society. That's the whole purpose. We've got three chapters of the book of Matthew in the

Sermon on the Mount, and remember, keep in mind that he is addressing his disciples distinctively.

Now we know that other people came and joined in the crowd based upon some things he says later on, but he's speaking most directly to his disciples.

In other words, the sermon is addressed to believers. We come to this portion of it, and he addresses the high priority of prayer.

He says, pray then in this way. Now what does he mean by that, pray then in this way?

Because believe it or not, it seems like that would be a rather simple question. What do you mean? What does he mean by that?

He doesn't say pray these words. There's nothing in this text to indicate that Jesus ever meant that us to recite the words of the prayer, and that's the way we should be praying.

It doesn't say we can't, because we can recite many portions of scripture back as prayers to God, and so it's perfectly acceptable, and we even sing it, and that's all acceptable, but that's not the main purpose of this prayer.

He says pray after this manner. What he's doing is he's giving us a pattern for our prayers.

Thomas Watson said, commenting on these verses, he says, God prescribed

Moses a pattern of the tabernacle, Exodus 25 .9. So Christ has here prescribed us a pattern of prayer.

The meaning is, let this be the rule and model according to which you frame your prayers.

I love the way he puts that. Let this be the rule and model according to which you frame your prayers.

John Calvin said, we ought to examine our prayers by this rule. And Watson again said, as the moral law was written with the finger of God, so this prayer was dropped from the lips of the

Son of God, and as Solomon's song for its excellence is called the

Song of Songs, so may this well be called the Prayer of Prayers.

And though this prayer is short, it's really only a few words in comparison to the whole rest of scripture and some of the other topics.

It's very short, but it's comprehensive. In other words, it covers pretty much everything that we need to know about prayer.

It contains a whole system of divinity. If you go through that, you can find a whole systematic theology in it.

It speaks with clarity. Jesus doesn't mince words. He's not using overly flowery words.

He speaks very clearly, very directly. It's easy to understand.

You can teach this prayer to a child and they can understand what it means. And it's complete.

You don't need anything else added to it. And in sum and substance, it contains all the areas that we need to communicate to God.

All of that is bound up in this short prayer. The Apostle John said in 1

John 5, 14, and this is a favorite to be quoted, and this is the confidence which we have before him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.

Christians, we love that. If you don't love that, there's something wrong with you. But I mean, that's a tremendous promise.

So the question is then, well, how do you pray according to his will? It's not simply tacking at the end of the prayer in Jesus' name or according to his will.

How do you pray according to his will? Pray like Jesus taught his disciples to pray. If you want to know how to have your prayers answered, look to the prayers that Jesus taught.

Pray like this. Pray after this manner. For the sake of our study,

I'm going to be referring to this as the model prayer instead of the Lord's Prayer. I do that, again, for a reason.

I think John 17 is more accurately the Lord's Prayer, and for a lot of reasons.

This one is not Jesus himself praying, but his instruction on how we should pray, so I've labeled this the model prayer.

That's not new with me, but somewhere along the line I picked it up and I just stuck with it, that this is the model prayer.

The prayer has three main parts. The preface, the petitions, and the conclusion.

Tonight we're going to focus just on the preface, because, even in the preface, it is just rife with meaning.

Verse 9. Pray then in this way, our Father who art in heaven.

Our Father. Notice how he begins the prayer. He says, you want to pray?

Pray then in this way, our Father. The question is, how is

God our Father? It may seem like I'm splitting hairs, but I don't think

I am. In one sense, as the creator of all things, God is the Father of all men.

Every created person can look in that sense that God is their

Father, but that's not the sense in which Jesus is using the term here. Paul captures the essence of fatherhood, the fatherhood of God in particular, in Romans 8 .15,

in which he says, you have received a spirit of adoption as sons, by which we cry out,

Abba, Father. Notice what Paul is saying. How is

God our Father? By adoption. Just a couple of words.

That word, Abba, interestingly enough, when I first heard this, that word just struck me.

I have actually seen it portrayed in movies where a Jewish man or woman was calling out to his or her father and saying,

Abba, Abba. You can feel the passion. Really, the best translation of it is daddy, or dad, or something similar to that.

Interestingly enough, the word does not originate in the Greek. It comes from the Aramaic. It's an

Aramaic word, which of course Jesus spoke, and most of the Jews of the first century spoke that as well.

Here it is. It's Abba, and then patri. That's what he's saying.

It's by adoption that we cry out to God as our Father. Abba, Father.

We become children of God by adoption, then we can call God Abba, Father. How are we adopted by God?

Another important question. By faith. Galatians 3 .26,

for you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. It's not the natural thing.

It's only those by faith. So it's only those who have been called by God into this special relationship who can truly call him

Father. Many people call him Father, but they're illegitimate, and they really have no cause to refer to God as Father.

John tells us in John chapter 1 verse 12, but as many as received him through them he gave the right to become children of God, even those who believe in his name.

You look at some of these verses, and you see it is a right, it is a privilege that is only granted, but as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become children of God.

We can't just call God our Father by ourselves, in and of ourselves, especially in our depraved nature, but it has to be something that is given to us.

Does that sound like Reformed theology? I think maybe so.

But notice, he gave the right to become children of God. Let me just pause here for a second.

I want you to just dwell on that fact for a minute. You have been granted, it has been given to you, the right to call

God your Father. That's an amazing thing. I mean, to have the

God of the universe, the supreme potentate, almighty

God, and we're going to actually do a little study up a little bit later, not today, later in the study, of some of the names of God.

It's important for us to realize who this God is, who we have the right to call our

Father. Now we have the right to address

God as our Father when we come to him in prayer. But God is a different type of Father.

He's not like our earthly fathers. He will never let us down. As much as we may love our earthly fathers, there comes a point, no matter how good our earthly fathers are, there comes a point where every father is going to let his children down at some point.

Not that we try to, but you know it's going to happen. But God is the perfect Father.

Matthew 5, 48, Therefore you are to be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Notice, we have a perfect heavenly Father. Wouldn't it be great, dads, if we could be perfect fathers to our children?

There's so many times you just scratch your head and say, I don't know what to do. That was my father's favorite expression for me.

I don't know what to do with that boy. I think I tested his sanctification.

How is he the perfect Father? He is all wise. First Timothy 1, 17,

Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory forever and ever.

Amen. So he is all wise. He is love. This is all talking about how the perfection of God.

First John 4, 16, And we have come to know and have believed the love which

God has for us. Why? God is love. And the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.

And then he loved us when we didn't deserve it. But God demonstrates his own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners,

Christ died for us. Look at this. This perfect Father condescends and demonstrates his love towards us in that while we were yet sinners,

Christ died for us. He loved us even when we don't deserve it. God is the best

Father because his resources are limitless. Think about that. Ephesians 3, 8,

To me the very least of all saints that this grace was given to preach to the Gentiles the unfathomable riches of Christ.

There is nothing that he cannot give to us that we need. Whatever we ask for in faith, if we're asking according to his will, he has the ability to answer that prayer because the unfathomable riches.

Now this is probably more talking about the spiritual riches, this particular verse.

But, Psalm 50, verse 10 -11, For every beast of the forest is mine, the cattle on a thousand hills.

Oh, for you literalists, I hope you don't take that literally. Cattle on a thousand hills because who owns the cattle on a thousand first hill?

But he says only a thousand. We know it's a metaphor.

It's hyperbole. So when you think of a thousand years, we won't go there.

We'll get to that in Daniel maybe. I know every bird of the mountains and everything that moves in the field is mine.

That's our heavenly Father. God is the best Father because he transforms his children from sons of darkness to children of light.

Just think about how he's our Father. First Corinthians 6, these are some of my favorite verses.

9 -11, Nor do you not know that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Do not be deceived, neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor effeminate nor homosexuals nor thieves nor the covetous nor drunkards nor revilers nor swindlers shall inherit the kingdom of God.

None of those people will inherit the kingdom of God. And here's my favorite part of the verses.

And such were some of you. Notice the tense. Such were some of you.

But you were washed. You were sanctified. But you were justified in the name of the

Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. Transforms us from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of his dear

Son. God is the best Father because he never dies. There's almost nothing, nothing harder than to lose a dad.

My dad went home to be with the Lord back in 2007. And I miss him dearly.

He was a great man. He was a great man. He was a great dad. But he died. He came to the end of his life, and it was his time.

God never dies. Sooner or later, all earthly fathers die.

Only God our Father is without beginning or without end, which means he's always there for you.

God is the best Father because, well, just look how he treats his children. The children of God have greater honor than kings, according to the

Word of God. Isaiah 43, 4, Since you are precious in my sight.

Look at that. This is God speaking about his children, and he says,

You are precious in my sight. Since you are honored and I love you. See how he's speaking?

This is what it means to be in a father -child relationship with God. I will give other men in your place and other peoples in exchange for your life.

See what he's saying? He says, Don't worry. I'm not going to hurt you. I'll hurt them. You are honored and I love you.

Malachi 3, 17, They shall be mine, says the Lord of hosts, on the day

I make them my jewels. When was the last time you were compared to jewels? Just think of all the beautiful gemstones that there are.

And God says, You are my jewels. God is the best

Father because look how he treats his children. He calls them the excellent of the earth, the majestic ones.

Psalms 16, 3, As for the saints who are in the earth, they are the majestic ones in whom is my delight.

He delights in his children. Us sinful, ungrateful, wayward sinners were his delight.

He delights in his children. That's because he's our Father. That's what it means to be a father.

He calls his children his glory, Isaiah 46, 13. I'm just giving you a couple more here.

He has made us kings and priests, Revelation 1, 6. His children are joiners with Jesus Christ, Romans 8, 17.

And then verse 9 continues. Not only does he pray then in this way, goes through and our

Father, but look at the last part. It's not just our Father, it's our Father who art in heaven.

And that's important. What does it mean, our Father who art in heaven?

In this context, he's not referring to a physical location. For Solomon says in 1

Kings 8, 27, But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain thee, how much less this house which

I have built. God cannot be contained to any one location. He is omnipresent.

We know that. However, what

Jesus is saying is that when we pray, we look beyond the physical realities and the limitations of this world to the heavenly things.

When we pray like this, we recognize that his throne is in heaven, which is the symbol of his sovereign power.

So our Father is the sovereign who is seated on his throne in heaven with all power and all authority at his disposal.

Psalm 2, verses 1 to 4. Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples devising a vain thing?

This is one of my favorite Psalms by the way. The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the

Lord and against his anointed. You ever feel like that? Like the whole world's against us?

Feels like that sometimes, doesn't it? And this is what the world says.

Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us. He who sits in the heavens laughs.

The Lord scoffs at them. The Lord is not concerned. He doesn't even break a sweat.

He scoffs. When we pray like this, our

Father who art in heaven, we recognize that his throne is in heaven and we acknowledge his glory and majesty.

We don't talk in terms like that. We live in a republic. I almost said democracy.

We live in a republic and we have a president, but we don't talk in terms of glorious and your majesty and all.

But we need to focus into the heavenly realm. God is king of kings.

He's Lord of lords. And so we acknowledge his glory and his majesty. Just think of the vision of Isaiah in chapter 6 as he comes to the throne and he talks about what he saw.

Almighty God sitting on the throne and the train of his robe filled the temple.

And there was smoke and fire and angels around him, seraphim saying, holy, holy, holy.

I love what E .V. Hill said to that. He says, he's not just saying holy, holy, holy. He says, they're saying holy every time

God does something. He says, there they are. They bow before God and they go, holy.

And then they look up and he's done something magnificent again. They go, holy. He'd look up, he's done something else magnificent.

They go, holy. He says, that's why he spent all the time going, holy, holy, holy. It's a good picture of who

God is. When we pray like this, our father who art in heaven, we recognize that his throne is in heaven and we acknowledge his omniscience.

He knows all things and he is all wise. When we pray our father who art in heaven, we are comforted because we are reminded nothing can stop him.

It's like being on the neighborhood and having the biggest kid on your team, but much more so.

When we pray our father who art in heaven, it prevents us from thinking more highly of ourselves than we ought to think, which is something we all need.

Now to conclude this, just a couple of thoughts. It's important that we pray both parts of this preface in order to keep the proper perspective of God.

He is our loving heavenly father who only desires what is best for his children. That's the part we like.

But he is also this majestic, glorious being who is also a consuming fire.

Our father who art in heaven. Both are equally true.

Thoughts or questions concerning the prayer. And all we've covered so far is just the preface.

No? We all good? Okay. Pray then like this, our father who art in heaven.