Lord, Teach Us To Pray

Amen, church.

We're gonna turn our attention now to public reading and teaching and preaching of God's Word from Luke

chapter 11.

So if you have a Bible, please turn to Luke chapter 11 as we continue our sermon series through the

gospel of Luke.

We're gonna be looking at verses 1 to 13.

When you have that, please do stand for the reading of God's Word.

Again, our main text this morning is Luke chapter 11, verses 1 to 13.

Hear ye this morning the word of the Lord.

Now Jesus was praying in a certain place and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us

to pray as John taught his disciples.

He said to them, when you pray, say, Father, hallowed be your

name.

Your kingdom come.

Give us each day our daily bread and forgive us our sins as we forgive everyone who

is indebted to us and lead us not into temptation.

He said to them, which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, friend, lend me

three loaves for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey and I have nothing to set before him.

He will answer from within.

Do not bother me.

The door is now shut and my children are with me in bed.

I cannot get up and give you anything.

I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because

of his impudence, he will rise and give him whatever he needs.

And I tell you, ask and it will be given to you.

Seek and you will find.

Knock and it will be open to you.

For everyone who asks receives and the one who seeks finds and to the one who

knocks it will be opened.

What father among you, if his sons ask for a fish, one said instead of a fish,

give him a serpent or if he asked for an egg, we'll give him a scorpion.

If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more

will the heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?

This is the word of the Lord.

You may be seated.

Let us pray.

Father, it is indeed fitting that on this occasion you have placed before us in

your word a teaching on prayer through

the mouth of the master himself, Jesus Christ.

We pray Lord that you would now incite in our hearts and our minds a desire to know

the purpose and the power of prayer and that Lord Jesus indeed

teach us this morning how to pray for your glory and name's sake, amen.

Prayer is a powerful and effective thing.

Prayer is a necessity for the Christian.

This morning we were talking about our Sunday school, the necessity of church

membership, the necessity of baptism, but there's a necessity here that we need to speak

of.

It is a necessity of being in communion, in being in communication

with our heavenly father.

Those of us who have earthly parents, we try to make it a thing in our lives where we

communicate with our parents.

We call them, maybe we call them on special occasions such as Christmas, New Year's, birthdays,

and we try to stay in communication with our parents as best as we can.

But there's a communication that is often neglected in the church, that's often

neglected in Christian homes, it's often neglected in personal Christian lives, and

it's our communication with our heavenly father.

Notice how this opens up in Luke chapter 11.

Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him,

Lord teach us to pray.

What an interesting scenario, Jesus is praying, the disciples are observing him pray, and

after he finishes his prayer, the disciple asks, Lord teach us to pray,

teach us to pray.

What's of interest here is that you would imagine one of the reasons why the apostles and the

disciples were chosen was because they were of some spiritual maturity.

They should already know how to pray.

They've been taught in the synagogues by rabbis in God's word what prayer is and what prayer

ought to sound like, and when observing Jesus, they maybe notice something a little bit different.

When you look at the Old Testament, and you see the prayers of the prophets, you see the prayers of the

kings, you see the prayer of holy men and prophets, you notice that there always seems to be

a separation between this holy and infinite God and the one

praying.

I think as an example, in Isaiah chapter six, when the prophet sees

the Lord high and lifted up in his chamber, high and lifted up in his throne room,

and what does the prophet see as he sees this incredible God, Yahweh, Jehovah, upon

his throne?

He says, woe is me, for I am an unclean man, and I live among a people

of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen Jehovah of hosts.

Certainly, he thought he was finished.

He saw this holy and excellent God, and he saw himself for who he truly is, a sinful

man who is deserving of death.

He saw this chasm, this great gap between creator and creation.

He saw this gap between a holy God and an unholy man.

He says, who can bridge this gap?

How can me, even a prophet of God, come and approach this grand Jehovah?

And yet, in the New Testament, when you see Jesus Christ and how he

prays, and how he approaches the creator, how does he open,

what does he pray, how does he tell us to.

Pray?

With the terms of father, father.

That's how Jesus approaches this holy and awesome God.

You don't typically see this term used in prayer in the Old Testament.

Jesus prays different than anyone has ever prayed before him,

so the disciples were looking for a model on how to pray.

I want you, if you're following in today's notes, in the bulletin, in the answer that was given to you this morning, I want you

to write this.

Disciples were looking for a model on how to pray effectively.

Again, the disciples were in close proximity to Jesus, likely hearing him pray, and as they hear him

pray, they ask, Lord, teach us to pray.

Now, again, these are religious and devout Jews.

Did they not know how to pray?

What were they looking for?

What they were looking for was a model.

Notice again what it says in verse one.

It says, when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray as John taught his

disciples.

What they were looking for was a model, like John the Baptist taught his followers to pray, so now the disciples of Jesus want

insight and a model for effective and anointed prayer.

Again, we have a few examples of Jesus praying throughout the gospels, and this one is,

he's about to teach in Luke's version of the Lord's Prayer, is significant.

I want you to put yourself in the disciples' shoes for a moment.

Can you imagine being in the presence of Jesus when he was praying?

Think about that.

Consider what it looked like in the Old Covenant, in the Old Testament, when men of God

prayed, and they prayed with their faces towards the earth, prostrate, praying to God and saying,.

Woe is me, woe is me.

Yet, when Jesus prays, likely with his head up, his hands reach towards heaven,

and he begins with the words, Father, Father.

What a difference.

In verse two, it says, he said to them, when you pray, say, Father,

hallowed be your name.

I saw a video on the internet maybe two days ago of this really cute kid,

and this mother asks this little daughter, and the girl's probably four or five years old, and the

mom asks the daughter, sweetie, what is God's name?

And the little girl says, his name is Howard.

Howard?

Where'd you get that from?

Well, it says, our Father in heaven, Howard be your name.

There's an innocence there.

There is a closeness there that this little girl feels like she can have with God,

incorrectly not naming him the right name, but she has this, not this fear, but

rather this closeness of saying, well, yeah, this is God.

I thought his name was Howard.

But instead, what Jesus teaches us here in this prayer is to approach this

person, approach this God with the title and term of Father.

Now I'm not sure what age I figured out what my dad's name was, probably maybe first, second

grade where I figured out that he had a name other than dad.

But the point is, is that Jesus is pointing to a new kind of intimacy with the creator,

an intimacy that had not yet been made known amongst the people of God.

And why is it that Jesus can now demand and call his disciples to refer to God as

Father was because through Jesus, this holy and distant God,

who in the Old Testament put out all these rules and regulations in order for an unclean people to approach him, is

now making himself accessible and approachable through his son, Jesus Christ.

Jesus is the new and the better way to God, according to the writer of Hebrews.

Jesus is that curtain that is broken in the middle so that we now have full

access to the Father through the shed blood of Jesus Christ.

So that when we pray, we pray this, Father, hallowed be your name.

Our Father has a name.

We sang that name twice today in our liturgy.

That name being the divine name of Yahweh, sometimes translated as

Jehovah.

I have a friend who is a Hebrew scholar, and he teaches out of the

University of Tel Aviv.

And when I say a friend, I actually mean a friend.

And I've had dinner with him on several occasions, and he is a brilliant man.

He's not a Christian.

He's what's called a Karaite Jew, not a Karate Jew, but a Karaite

Jew, which is essentially the Jewish version of a Sola

Scriptura Jew.

So he's not rabbinic.

He doesn't believe in the rabbinic traditions of Judaism.

He rejects the Talmud, which is the rabbinic traditions of Judaism, and embraces a holistic

Sola Scriptura view of Scripture from a Jewish perspective.

And my friend Nehemia Gordon, he believes that the divine name is actually not even

Yahweh, nor is it Jehovah.

In his studies, he believes that the name of the holy and true God of Israel, where we get the

Hebrew term, the Tetragrammaton, Yud -Heh -Vav -Heh, the four -letter word of God in Hebrew, is

Yehovah.

He believes that Yehovah is God's holy and precious name as revealed in Holy Scripture.

And this God, whether you call Him Yahweh, whether you call Him Jehovah, whether you call Him Yehovah,

please don't call Him Howard, but however you call Him Lord, Master,

Sovereign, El Shaddai, El Gabor, all these terms, there's a new term

by which we can now call Him through Jesus Christ, and it's the term Father.

He's no longer just our Lord.

He's not just our Sovereign.

He's not just our Master.

All terms denoting someone who is far greater than you, but now there's a relational

term that we can use with our heavenly Creator, and it's that of

Father, which now means I.

Am a son.

I am not just a creature that He has made.

I am no longer just a thing in His universe.

I am now a son or a daughter of this Most High God.

So when we pray, hallowed be Your name, I want you to write this in your notes if you're.

Following along.

When we pray, hallowed be Your name, what we are asking is for God's name to be made.

Holy.

That's what the word hallowed means.

When the Scripture says, hallowed be Your name, that word hallowed is an old English term from Elizabethan

English, which means to make holy or to sanctify.

Other translations of the Bible use the term, let Your name be sanctified.

That is again, to make something holy or sanctified.

So know this, an effective prayer is one that does not start with

me.

When you look at the world and you look at how the world prays, it might start with God,

me, me, me, me, me, me, me, and God, please, please, please, please, please,

and God, thank you, amen.

And that's how most prayers go.

Prayer today in the world is very pagan.

Why?

Because when you hear the average prayer of maybe even the average Christian in America today, it's

more man -centered than God -centered.

It's about what God can do for me instead of what I can do for God.

It's about how I can get the wishes of my heart and not please the heart of the one

to whom I'm speaking.

Prayer has become a selfish, self -centered endeavor where we think of God as God

the magic genie and not as God the Father.

And prayer has become effectively the rubbing of this magic lamp where we can now

get our wishes fulfilled, and this is how many Christians today in the church even view it,

especially among those who believe in some form of prosperity gospel where they can just name it

and claim it, where Jesus to them is just an ends to a mean.

But instead, we should have a different view of prayer, how Jesus teaches us to pray.

It doesn't begin with me, me, me, me, me, but rather, Father in

heaven, hallowed be your name, that at the forefront of our prayer

life is the holiness, sanctity of God, his person and name.

It is an honoring of the Ten Commandments where God says, thou shalt have no other gods before

me, and thou shalt treat my name as holy.

We treat God's name as holy by approaching our Father with a sense

of awe, a sense of holiness.

An effective prayer is centered around the glory, fame, and holiness of

Almighty God.

And it's not in just the mere repetition of these words that we find power, but it's in

the truth and heartfelt conviction of this truth that we find anointed and effective

prayer, where we truly have in the forefront of our hearts and minds the holiness

of our.

Father.

You see, part of the problem today is that we don't know how good of a Father we

actually.

Have.

If we grew up with a good dad, sometimes we take things for granted.

We don't recognize how good we have it until the father is removed

or when we go to, we grew up as adults and we have our own lives and we see how other fathers are or how

hard the world actually is.

We forsake this intimacy, this grandeur, this mystery of prayer

because we have not yet come to fully recognize the power, the fame, and the holiness

of our Father.

I tend to think of times of which in our culture, celebrities are put on a pedestal.

And I've seen several times in which kids become very ungrateful

because of their status and because of the fame of their parents.

And yet, there's been certain times where I've been impressed by certain celebrities and their kids, where their kids

don't even know that mom or dad is a celebrity until much later in their teen years where they maybe see them in a movie or

they say, you're in the Avengers too?

And this is the heart and the attitude that I think we need to have with our Father.

We, on one hand, should recognize the fame and grandeur of God, but at the same time,

have this relationship where He's all those things.

He's God, He's Creator, but He's also my Father.

Know who your Father is and you'll have a greater appreciation for who you

are in Him.

Again, an effective prayer doesn't start or center around me, it centers around Him.

Which is why in the next breath, Jesus says, setting that perfect model of prayer, Father hallowed be your

name, your kingdom come.

I want you to write that in the notes.

Your kingdom come.

That is to say that, and it's to demonstrate where our hope, I want you to write in that word hope, is

for the future.

Where is your hope for the future?

Is it in your work and your relationships?

Is it in your hopes and dreams?

Is it in what you'd like to accomplish for the future?

Or is your hope set upon what God will accomplish in the future, and

what He has accomplished through His kingdom?

One of the central tenets of the teaching of the Bible, certainly one of the

major themes of the Gospel of Luke, is the kingdom of God breaking into the world.

The kingdom of God is a central tenet of Christ's earthly ministry and teaching.

I want you to ask yourself this question, do you find yourself anxious about the future?

Some of us are on the precipice of major change in our lives, and we're sitting on the precipice of change, and

it might lead us to anxiety, it might lead us to stress, it might say, I don't know what this next season of life is going to look like if I go to the

left or I go to the right, what the future holds.

It's true, while we do not know perfectly what the future holds, we know who holds the future, and

that's our King, Jesus Christ.

There's much uncertainty in this world, but there is one certainty that you can rejoice in

today as Christians, and that's the kingdom of God, that God's kingdom is

firmly established by the hands of the Lord's anointed servant, our Messiah,

Jesus Christ.

We hold on to the great confession that God's kingdom is the only solution to the troubles of

mankind, and when we hold to this great confession of faith, that with the second

advent of the Lord of lords and King of kings, he shall have indeed everlasting dominion

from sea to sea, and will demolish every other rule.

I want you to consider with me in Daniel chapter two, you can turn here if you'd like, in

Daniel, the prophetic book of Daniel, what kingdom Jesus has

in mind when he asked his disciples, to pray, your kingdom come.

In Daniel chapter two, verse 44, the

prophet Daniel interprets the dream.

He says in Daniel 2, 44, in the days of those kings, the God of heaven will set up a kingdom

that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another

people.

It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms, and bring them to an end, and it shall

stand, how long, forever.

God's kingdom will stand forever.

This is the same kingdom that the Lord Jesus calls us, beckons us to pray, your

kingdom.

Come.

Can I give you good news, church?

Daniel chapter two, verse 44, is being fulfilled today.

So if you ask yourself, is there any truth or validity to the Bible's

prophetic claims, and the answer is yes.

The kingdom is established now, here, today, and this

church that you are standing in or sitting in this morning is an embassy of that

kingdom, because Jesus Christ is today king of kings and Lord

of lords, amen?

Go to Daniel chapter seven for a moment, just to make this point even clearer.

It says in Daniel chapter seven, verse 13, and I saw the night visions, and behold,

with the clouds of heaven, there came one like a son of man.

He came to the ancient of days, and was presented before him, and to him was given dominion,

and glory, and a kingdom that all people, nations, languages should serve

him.

His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom, one

that shall not be destroyed.

The question is, when is this fulfilled?

Are these events fulfilled in the life ministry of Jesus, or will it be

fulfilled in a future second coming?

While we confess and believe that Christ shall again come in glory, and he shall

come not in relation to sin, but instead to bring forth everlasting salvation to

all those who have waited upon him, and indeed, to usher in a new heavens and new earth, we also

believe and confess this, that Jesus is seated today upon his throne.

Jesus, according to Psalm 110, the Lord said unto my Lord, sit at my right hand

until I make your enemies my footstool.

Is Jesus not today seated at the right hand of God?

When the first Christian martyr Stephen, before his life was taken from him, what vision did.

He see?

But the heavens opened, and the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of

God, so that despite all the trials that Stephen was going through in that

moment, facing certain death, he looked to the future with great optimism.

Why?

Because he saw who was at the right hand of God, even Jesus Christ,

our Savior.

So Jesus today is seated at the right hand of majesty.

He's received indeed a kingdom and a people of all nation, tribes, and languages.

He's indeed ruling in his dominion, an everlasting dominion that shall not

be destroyed.

And so when Jesus invites us to pray, Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come,

your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

God's kingdom today is a heavenly kingdom.

We hold fast to this heavenly hope, this heavenly kingdom.

Our citizenship is not here on the earth, but it is instead in heaven according to Paul in Philippians chapter three.

Our citizenship is in heaven from where we await the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.

So when we pray, your kingdom come, your kingdom come on earth, and that kingdom shall

come upon the earth.

And the church is a local embassy of that kingdom, but yet we do not yet see

all his enemies under his feet, but that shall certainly be the case when the Lord Jesus returns in

glory and shall put an end to his final enemy, that final enemy being death itself.

So we have much to look forward to in the future.

We have much hope because God's kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and it shall

put an end to every earthly kingdom.

We look at the world around us, I was just reading this yesterday, you know that doomsday clock that they have,

I think it was in Sweden, Switzerland, somewhere, and they say we are five minutes

till midnight, midnight being doomsday.

And every couple of years they look at world events and they say, how close are we to absolute.

Disaster?

And even the world knows it's not looking good.

And why is it not looking good?

It's because humanity continues to put its faith in princes and noble

men and the rulers of this world, but us as Christians, we recognize that our

hope is not in who's in the White House, but rather who's in this house, Jesus

Christ, the true King of kings, the ruler of the kings of this earth.

And our hope is not upon the kingdoms of this world, but rather upon God's kingdom.

This is what effective prayer looks like, is when we know that the answer

is before us in heaven and not behind us in the world.

The world will never be able to satisfy the demands of life, nor will it provide true

hope for the future.

Instead, our hope comes from looking forward to Christ's kingdom.

So then the next part of the prayer that Jesus teaches us is in verse three, where he tells us that we ought to pray this

way, give us each day our daily bread.

So the prayer starts, our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be

done on earth as it is in heaven.

So it starts and it centers upon the glorification of God's name, the glorification of his kingdom to come,

his will being done.

So it focuses heavily upon the greatness of God and our dependence upon him.

And part of our dependence upon God is knowing where our bread comes from, where all the

basic necessities of life truly find their source,

and it's in the creator.

Well, you might say to yourself, well, I buy my own bread, I've got my own

job, I've got my own riches, I don't have a need for someone to supply me, I

supply it myself.

And you would be well to think that way if you were an American, rugged individualism, you can pick yourself up by

your own bootstraps, and you have all that you need to be successful in this country.

But actually, we all, from the greatest of us to the least of us,

from the richest of atheists to the poorest of Christians, all find our true need

and sustenance in the Lord God, in our creator.

Every good thing that even the most vile atheist has comes from the good hand of a good father.

Every good thing that the Christian has flows from the blessing and the abundant hand of.

Our creator.

I think of Psalm 73 where it says that God shall open up his hands and satisfy the desires of every living creature.

That's the type of God that we worship, that the reign of common grace falls on the wicked

and on the righteous, that all good things in life come from a good father.

But do you recognize this provision?

Do you recognize this good father?

We're also commanded to pray likewise in verse four, and forgive us our sins as we ourselves

forgive anyone who is indebted to us, and lead us not into temptation.

If you're following in today's notes, we ask God for our provision, that's our daily bread.

Don't forget to ask God for your daily needs and provision,

and we'll see in a moment why that's the case, why it is that we should ask God for our daily provision and needs.

But along that line, he's also asking us to do something, and it's to

forgive our spiritual debt due to sin.

So we're asked to forgive those who have sinned against us, those who may be indebted to us.

Now that's where it starts getting tough.

That's when prayer, you begin to see the true heart and intention of prayer.

It's not so much to change God's heart or mind, but rather it is a place in which God

can change our hearts and our minds to be more aligned with his.

So sometimes when we pray, again, it's like, give me, give me, give me, me, me, me, I want, I want, treating

God like some sort of genie, but instead he's a father, not a genie.

And this is the part in which prayer gets tough, where God is reminding us to not only

seek forgiveness of sins through him, but also to remind us that we too must forgive

others who have sinned against us.

Because just like we are sinners and we can go before and petition the throne of mercy and grace,

so too are we called to petition and forgive those who've sinned against us personally.

And that's not easy.

It's easier said than done.

Have you ever been betrayed?

Have you ever been hurt?

Have you ever been made to feel worthless?

Have you been stolen against?

Have you been harmed?

Have you been sinned against in some way?

It's not so easy to forgive that person then.

Yet, what is being called here is a radical life of

forgiveness, of forgiving, and forgiving upon the basis and merits

of Jesus Christ.

And so, when we ask for bread on the one hand, we must be willing to extend

that same bread, that same compassion, that same mercy to those

who've harmed us, to those who are indebted.

To us.

This is a radical call of prayer, not that we change God's mind, but that he changes our

mind through this process of prayer.

Due to the sin of pride, it can be very difficult to ask for help, let alone for a provision in

forgiveness.

Yet, Jesus said that it would be the meek who inherit the earth

under his kingdom.

And this highlights the need for our prayer lives to be baptized in humility and to

be baptized in total dependence upon the Savior.

That's exactly what Jesus is preaching and teaching us here in the Our Father prayer.

He's teaching us humble, meek dependence upon him, even for such

lowly things, such as bread, and such high things, such as forgiveness.

Everything in between is to be bathed in humble dependence upon the Savior.

Likewise, it says here in this text, and lead us not into temptation.

A word of warning here, brothers and sisters.

Many of us think, because of the pride in our hearts, that we are sufficient within

ourselves to fight temptation.

So what that often looks like in the Christian life is not an avoidance of sin, but rather we

run as close to the fire as we can and we say, it's not going to burn me, it's not.

Going to burn me.

I can run right up to the fire, I can get as close up as I can and think I'm immune to it.

No, that is pride.

That is danger.

And yet, what God tells us and he calls us to is to pray, Lord, lead us not to temptation.

That is then to follow in the footsteps of Joseph, for instance.

When he was tempted with sexual immorality with Potiphar's wife, he didn't

entertain that thought, yet he turned and ran the other way.

We are called not to get close to the fires of sin, rather when we see the danger of sin, we see the

danger of temptation rearing its ugly head, for this is not a condition that, this is a condition which we are

all immune to as a common race.

We all sin, fall short of the glory of God, we are all faced with all sorts of temptations and there is no

temptation given among men by which it is uncommon.

We all share in common temptations.

Therefore, when we see these temptations arising, we are not to entertain it, we're not to

run as closely as we can to it, rather we are to run in the other direction.

Flee and ask the Lord, Lord, lead us not into temptation, but as in

Matthew's account of this prayer, but deliver us from evil.

Deliverance is the answer.

You will not be able to withhold and withstand temptation as long as you

entertain it.

You must turn the other direction and flee, flee.

Don't think you're powerful enough, big enough, strong enough in order to wrestle with temptation on your own.

You're called to flee from it and this prayer reflects that.

Lord, lead us not into temptation.

What that looks like is saying, God, remove from me

the desire, remove from me the

things that are leading me to sin.

Jesus puts it this way elsewhere in the Gospels, if your hand causes you to sin, what are you to do with it?

Cut it off.

If your eye causes you to stumble, you pluck it out.

Okay, so we know this is not literally, you know, Jesus saying to be maimed or

to cut your body parts, but what he's saying is this, when temptation and sin

arises, don't just scratch at your hand, don't just rub at your eye, but

remove violently the things that are causing you to stumble.

So whether it's, for instance, the temptation of being on your phone and seeking

pornographic images, it is not totally inappropriate for you to remove

these things from your life.

Maybe something as simple as getting what's called a dumb phone because you cannot

withstand the temptation at this moment.

Maybe it's removing yourself from a certain work environment and if you have temptations at your work

or your school, maybe God is calling you to remove yourself from those.

Situations.

Whatever temptation, whatever trial, whatever circumstance you find yourself in, God always

provides a way out.

He always provides a way out.

Why?

Because he's faithful and he's a good God.

To seek more of this good God, notice how Jesus frames this in the next chunk of this text.

Verse five, it says, and he said to them, which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, friend,

lend me three loaves for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey and have nothing to set before him.

He will answer from within, do not bother me, the door is now shut and my children are with me in bed.

I cannot get up and give you anything.

Here Jesus gives a scenario where there's a need and there's someone who can meet that need yet they're

unwilling and Jesus is trying to let us know our father is not like that.

Our father will answer the call anytime you come to him,

anytime, at any hour, for anything, God will hear you.

God will answer you because he's a good father.

If you're a child, if you're older and your children are out of the house, if you're a good father, you're a good

mother, when that child comes knocking with something important, with something serious, you open the door.

How much more so our heavenly father that when we come knocking because of the

stresses, the necessities of life, because of the challenges of life, how much more will he answer the.

Call?

This also comes brilliantly with the teachings we've been going through in our catechism about the effectual call of God.

When God calls, it's effectual, meaning it is effective and when we pray in Jesus' name and we

come to God with a broken, contrite heart, he will by no means cast us out.

He's a good God, he's effectual, and he's effective in opening the door when we

come to him as children, which is why it goes on to say

in verse 9, and I tell you, ask and it will be given to

you.

Seek and you will find.

Knock and it will be opened to you.

Does not say ask and if you're lucky, you might receive.

It doesn't say knock and if it's at a good time, the door will be opened.

It doesn't say that if you seek and you've got it all together, you'll

find.

No, instead it's the opposite.

Whatever condition of life that you find yourself in, you seek

from a heart of sincerity, truly.

You'll find.

Truly, Christ will open that door and he will hear you and he will treat you

as a son or.

Daughter.

For everyone, verse 10 it says, everyone who asks, receives, and the one who seeks,

finds and to the one who knocks, it will be opened.

What surety, what certainty we have as Christians.

There's a certainty, there's a relationship here that gives

us this certainty as believers that when we knock, it will be opened, that when we ask,

it will be answered, that when we seek, it will be found because

our God is a good father.

I want you to write this in the notes.

Jesus shares a parable to highlight the need for persistence in these three things.

One, asking, asking, elsewhere in scripture Jesus says, you have not

because you what?

Ask not.

You have not because you ask not.

God and sometimes, especially maybe in reformed brothers and sisters, we might get into this trap where we

think, well, God is sovereign.

God knows what I need.

Why do I even have to ask him?

Well, the reason you ask is because he's good

and because he will extend grace and mercy.

But if you approach him with this notion that God is, well,

he knows everything and therefore he should just give it to me, that sounds more like an entitled son

than a good son.

And if you know anything about being a parent, we don't treat entitledness very well.

We want people to be, our children to be humble and that's why we teach some manners and when we

ask our children to ask something of us, we ask them to recite please and

thank you.

Do not forget your please and do not forget your thank yous and your prayer life.

Approach God with humility.

So we are called to be persistent in asking.

We're called to be persistent in seeking, seeking.

So often in life, we again seek after the wrong things.

God is reminding us, seek after that which is good, that which is lovely, that which is heavenly, that which will be for

your good.

Seeking kingdom first.

Jesus says if you put forth the kingdom, all these other things shall be added to you.

And of course, the last one, he wants us to be persistent in knocking, in knocking.

This imagery of knocking obviously connotates that there's a door and you're on the outside of it

and you want to get in.

And it's persistence, it's in humility that we get in through that door.

And there is a door, brothers and sisters, and there's two actually.

There's a door that is narrow.

There's a door that is difficult to go in through.

And Jesus says, I am the door of life.

And there's another door that is broad and spacious and many

go through it.

And that's a door that leads to destruction.

We must be persistent as Christians to knock and seek the door which

leads to life.

And that door is Jesus Christ himself.

Do not stop seeking, do not stop asking, and do not stop knocking.

Even once we get on the other side of that door, we find in Jesus this

precious mystery, this unraveling of God himself in the personal work of

Jesus where we get to greater and greater degrees of knowing him.

And I almost like to put it this way, behind the door of faith is another door.

And that door leads to more knowledge, wisdom, clarity, and more to

that perfect image of Christ.

And so, sanctification is like walking through that door and seeing how much more there is to grow,

how much more there is to learn, and how the depths and the riches of Christ are for

those of us who put faith in him.

To never stop asking, never stop seeking, and never stop knocking, for Jesus is an

inexhaustible fount of all these good things and more.

Which is why he then closes this bit of scripture here in verse 11 saying, What

father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a

fish give him a serpent?

Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?

Giving us these kind of preposterous notions and pictures.

If your son asks you for something that is needed, it doesn't say, if your son

asks you for a Ferrari, or a BMW, or $20 ,000, or all these

really nice cool things that would be nice to have.

No, he focuses on the necessities.

If your son needing fish to eat or an egg to eat, these are basic necessities of life.

Will a good dad give him instead a scorpion, that which can harm him and not feed him?

In the same way, God doesn't desire to harm us, but rather in our natural

needs, in the things that we need for life and holiness and godliness, God will give you

what is needed because he's a good father.

But beware, this doesn't mean that he will always give you what you want.

Remember, church, he's God the father, not God the genie.

And God the father knows what's best for his children.

He knows what's best for you.

And maybe that promotion you're looking for isn't what you need right now.

Maybe that wealth or riches you're looking for isn't what you need at this moment.

Maybe that spouse relationship you're looking for isn't what you need in this moment.

Instead, keep seeking, keep asking, keep knocking, and the door

will eventually be opened to you who trust in the goodness of this awesome

heavenly father.

Which is why in verse 13, if you then who are evil, Jesus knows the true state and condition of man.

Those of you who are evil know how much, how to give good gifts to your children.

How much more will the heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to those who

ask him?

So prayer comes with this promise that our father gives good

gifts.

I want you to write this in the last part of today's teaching.

That our father gives good gifts and will indeed give us the

greatest gift of the Holy.

Spirit.

The gift of the Holy Spirit to his children.

God grants us the same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead.

The same spirit that hovered over the surface of the deep at creation.

That same spirit he gives to his children.

Do not overlook the power of the spirit in the ministry of

prayer.

The Holy Spirit is God the third person of the blessed and holy

trinity.

Jesus assures us that he shall give us God the Holy Spirit to

dwell in us, not only to regenerate us, not only to set us

apart in this ungodly world, but also to sanctify us.

So that in the future, when Jesus returns in glory, we shall be

like he is.

And we will have faces shining as brightly as the sun

because of the indwelling of the spirit bringing in us to a closer image of Christ.

You can receive this free gift of the Holy Spirit today.

And the Bible tells us this is how we can receive this gift from a good father.

Because God has given us the greatest gift to mankind.

The gift of his only son to humanity.

The Bible says this and you're aware of this text fairly well.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son so that all those who may believe in him may not perish

but have everlasting life.

God yes indeed has made a way for us to receive this gift of eternal life.

This gift of the Holy Spirit through his son Jesus who lived a holy and perfect

set -apart life.

Jesus never sinned unlike us of which the Bible says all of us have gone astray.

Every man has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

Yet Jesus stands alone in human history as he who was truly without sin.

Jesus lived the life that you and I could not live.

Holy, perfect, blameless, and yet died a death that we all deserve.

He was crucified on a Roman cross next to two criminals.

It was said of him that he was guilty yet was without guilt.

Was without sin.

Which is why the apostle Paul writes of this one saying that he who knew no sin

became sin on our behalf so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.

And he who had no sin became sin on our behalf dying a death that we all deserved

on the cross.

And on the third day God did not forsake his son but rather raised him from the dead demonstrating who

had true authority over life and death itself, even Jesus Christ the blessed one.

And this Jesus beckons and calls all of us today to trust in him, believe on him, and.

Be saved.

Repenting of our sins, turning away from our former course of life, and putting all of our faith in

him, asking, seeking, and knocking so that he may grant us the gift of the Holy Spirit,

the gift of belief, the gift of regeneration, the gift of justification, the gift of

sanctification so that one day we receive in full the gift of glorification unto the praise of his

name.

And because of this we call and beckon you to turn, repent, and trust the Savior.

May you do so today.

Let's pray.

Wonderful, blessed Father who

art in heaven, indeed hallowed be your name, that

your name would be sanctified amongst this people, that it would be sanctified in our hearts,

that it would be made holy and great among your people.

Oh Lord, Father, we come and approach you, not just with the

same fear and trembling as the Old Testament saints, but also knowing, Lord, yes, you are consuming fire,

yes, you are almighty, yes, you are enthroned far above all creation, yet you have come to us

in a way in which we can truly recognize and have fellowship with you as our Father.

We thank you for this new and better way through the shed blood of your Son, Jesus, who made this

way possible by means of his perfect obedience, his sufferings, even so far as

death on a cross.

Therefore, Lord, you have highly exalted this Jesus and given him the name that is above every name,

so that at his name every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess to the glory

of you, Father.

And Lord, help us to internalize these precious truths, that this sermon would not be lost on

us, that this teaching, these words from our Savior would not be lost on us, but Lord, that we would turn these

things into action, that we would truly learn even today how to pray,

and that we would find in you the hope for the future as your kingdom come, as your

will is done on earth as it is in heaven.

And Lord, indeed, give us today our daily bread and forgive us our sins

as we fall short of that perfect mark.

But Lord, help us to be reminded, Lord, that even as we seek forgiveness, we must also

then extend forgiveness to those who have sinned against us.

And Lord, please lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For yours is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, both

now and forevermore.

And we pray for the gift of the Holy Spirit to be upon your people in the name of Jesus Christ.

Amen.