The ABC’s of the Christian Life (13): Following Jesus Christ Rightly (7) – A Life of Prayer

First Baptist Church Leominster

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Well, we're working through this series, the ABCs of the Christian Life, addressing how we might follow

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Jesus Christ rightly. I'm beginning to run out of themes or ideas.

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I certainly welcome any suggestions. This matter today has to be, of course, addressed, because how can anyone follow

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Jesus Christ rightly if they're not praying on a regular basis, faithful basis?

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And so in order for us to follow Jesus Christ rightly, we must be ones given to prayer. If we're not prayed frequently and faithfully, then we may conclude we're not following Jesus Christ in a right manner.

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We're not de -Christianizing anybody here, not saying you're not a Christian, but you can't be a

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Christian experiencing the blessing of God on your life if this matter of prayer is not characteristic of your life.

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And so prayer is a wonderful privilege, but it's also an important responsibility for the believer in Christ.

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God has invited us to come to him with our concerns and our requests. What a glorious privilege that is, isn't it?

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And we may, of course, confidently come before him knowing that he hears us when we pray.

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We read that in 1 John 5 just a few minutes ago. There's a confidence there.

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And so we're to be diligent and faithful in prayer as the Holy Scriptures constantly affirm to us.

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Our Lord once told his disciples, men always ought to pray and not lose heart.

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And one can lose heart in this matter of prayer. That can happen. Consider these verses.

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I just cited a few that emphasize this matter of prayer. Romans 12 .12, that we are to be always rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer.

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Does this characterize your life? Is a good question to answer. Ephesians 6 .18,

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Paul described Christians, these Christians that they should be praying always with all prayer and supplication in the

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Scripture. Being watchful to this end with all perseverance and supplication for all the saints.

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That's gonna take some time, isn't it? An effort to be faithful to that injunction.

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He commanded the Church of Colossae, continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it with thanksgiving.

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And to the Church of Philippi, be anxious for nothing but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving.

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Let your requests be made known to God, everything. James urged the brethren, confess your trespasses to one another, pray for one another.

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This praying for yourself is a full -time job, let alone praying for one another faithfully too. Peter wrote to his disciples, or to the disciples, but the end of all things is at hand, therefore be serious and watchful in your prayers.

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And so the mandate is clear, we're to be a praying people. Everybody acknowledges that. We're to be serious, we're to be deliberate and specific in our prayers, we're to be expectant, confident, and grateful that our

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Lord hears us and that he will answer us when we lay our petitions before him.

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This is a given. Now, prayer is just something that's true to true

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Christians. I think it's one of the things that assured

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Ananias that Saul was converted on the road to Damascus. You know, he had gone, started out on that road, breathing out threatenings against the disciples, seeking to bind, imprison, take back to Jerusalem Christians, and then he gets converted.

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Ananias was a little reluctant to go to him, and the Lord told Ananias, behold, he's praying. He was praying to the

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Lord Jesus by the time he got to Damascus, when he was breathing out threatenings against the disciples of Jesus when he started out to Damascus.

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A great change took place, and it affected his prayer life.

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Jonathan Edwards believed that prayer was so conducive to the Christian life that if one did not pray, it revealed him to be a hypocrite, not a true

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Christian. And if you want to read one of the most convicting sermons, if you like that kind of thing, this is one.

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It was entitled, Hypocrites Deficient in the Duty of Prayer.

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And he talks about how hypocrites may pray for some time, but they're deficient in the duty.

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They leave off praying. And he said this, and this is rather confrontive, convicting.

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I would exhort those who have entertained in hope of their being true converts, and yet since their supposed conversion have left off the duty of secret prayer and do ordinarily allow themselves in the omission of it to throw away their hope.

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In other words, don't think yourself a Christian. If you have left off calling upon God, it's time for you to leave off hoping and flattering yourselves with an imagination that you're the children of God.

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Probably it will be a very difficult thing for you to do this. It is hard for a man to let go and hope of heaven on which he has once allowed himself to lay hold and which he has retained for a considerable time.

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True conversion is a rare thing. But that men are brought off from a false hope of conversion after they are once settled and established in it and have continued in it for some time is much more rare.

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In other words, it's hard to show and convince a hypocrite he doesn't have salvation.

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That's what he's arguing. Those things in men which, if were known to others, would be sufficient to convince others that they are hypocrites.

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In other words, if we looked in somebody else's life and we saw what's really in ours, we might conclude readily he's not a true

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Christian. Those things which would be sufficient to convince them concerning others and cause them to cast others entirely out of their charity or love will not be sufficient to convince them concerning themselves.

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They can make larger allowances for themselves than they can for others. Boy, isn't that true.

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You cut yourself some slack, but not somebody else. They can find out ways to solve objections against their own hope when they can find none in like case for their neighbor.

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But if your case be such as is spoken of in the doctrine, and basically the teaching is that hypocrites are deficient in the duty of prayer, it is surely time for you to seek a better hope.

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In other words, you better get concerned about your soul's salvation and seek Christ, is what he's arguing.

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And another work of God's Spirit, than ever you have yet experienced, something more thorough and effectual.

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When you see and find by experience that the seed which was sown in your hearts, though at first it sprang up and seemed flourishing, yet as withering away as by the heat of the sun, or as choked as with thorns, in reference to the parable of the sower, this shows in what sort of ground the seed was sown, that it is either stony or thorny ground, and that therefore it is necessary you should pass through another change, in other words, truly be converted, whereby your heart may become good ground, which shall bring forth fruit with patience.

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And so he emphasized in that message about professing Christians who may discover in reality they're not true

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Christians if they are truly deficient in this duty of prayer.

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And yet, thankfully, he goes on to acknowledge, I didn't quote that, quote him there, that true

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Christians fail to pray faithfully and consistently all the time. And that was a little bit of encouragement that Edwards provided when he said that.

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Or they leave off importunate prayer, that is, prayer that persists until the answer is granted by the

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Lord. We tend so often because we're less than confident that God hears us or is willing to grant our requests of him.

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That's why we often leave off or quit praying. We lose confidence, perhaps. We begin to doubt that God is going to hear us, and so we don't pray as faithfully, consistently, and in an importunate manner as we should.

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And so first, let's recognize it's a common spiritual problem for the Lord's people to doubt that God hears them and that he will answer their prayers.

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Pastor, pray for me. God will hear your prayer, but he won't hear mine. I wonder if that's sometimes the thought of some people.

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They doubt God hears them. I think doubting God answers prayer on the part of an individual may be discovered in one of four reasons, and there may be more, but I thought of four.

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Let's briefly go through these because we've got a long way to go here. First, doubt that God hears us often exists because of our personal failure before God.

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And every one of us are subject to failure before God, but oftentimes that will be an impediment to our confidence that God will answer our prayer.

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Yes, through our own refusal and failure to meet a certain condition or conditions that God has placed in his word,

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God may justly refuse to answer our prayer, but all too often, this will lead us to doubt that God will hear us.

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Consider the psalmist. Come and hear all you who fear God, and I will declare what he's done for my soul.

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I cried to him with my mouth, and he was extolled with my tongue. If I regard iniquity in my heart, the

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Lord will not hear me. The idea of regarding iniquity is to cherish it with a refusal to repent of it, and God basically, the psalmist says, the

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Lord will not hear my prayer if I cherish, if I dwell upon and refuse to deal with a sin.

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God declared to Israel that he would not hear their prayers due to their unrelenting and unrepentant sin,

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Isaiah 1, where the prophet is setting forth the judgment of God upon Jerusalem and Judah for their failures, and all this time, they thought they were the righteous, holy people of God, blessed of God, as they were going to the temple daily and offering their sacrifices and praying, and if you drop down to the emboldened italicized font, you see what

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Isaiah declared, or God said to Isaiah, when you spread out your hands, that's the posture of prayer,

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I will hide my eyes from you, even though you make many prayers, I will not hear.

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Your hands are full of blood. They were living in an unjust manner, and God would not hear their prayers.

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Although they were praying in the temple, they seemed to be fervent, they thought that they were in the favor of God, but in reality, they were not.

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In another place, Isaiah spoke a word to Israel, telling them that God would not hear them due to their sin,

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Isaiah 59 .2, your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you that he will not hear.

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And so oftentimes, you know, Christians will doubt that God will hear and answer their prayer because they haven't been living rightly before the

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Lord, and it may cause them to fall off in their prayer life because of this failure on their part.

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A second reason that we may doubt that God hears us is when we pray for things or for persons that God has determined he will not bless.

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And the Bible speaks a great deal about this. We shouldn't assume that God is trying to bless everybody, everywhere, at all times.

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He's not. Jeremiah was faced with this issue. Jeremiah was concerned about his people in the days of the

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Babylonian Empire, and Jeremiah knew that God's judgment was coming upon Israel, upon Jerusalem, upon the temple, and he was praying.

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He wanted God to spare his people, and God basically told

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Jeremiah, don't pray for this people. He stopped calling them my people, covenant language. He started referring to them, to Jeremiah, stop praying for this people because I have no regard for them.

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It was not due to Jeremiah's failure that God wouldn't answer him, but it was due to the fact that God had determined he would not bless

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Israel, that generation, due to their sin. So in Jeremiah 7 .16,

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therefore do not pray for this people. See, they'd broken their covenant with God. Nor lift up a cry or prayer for them, nor make intercession to me, for I will not hear you.

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God would not hear Jeremiah. And later God said to the prophet again, so do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or pray for them, prayer for them, for I will not hear them in the time that they cry out to me because of their trouble.

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When God is determined to bring his judgment upon a people, he may not answer the prayer.

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I don't know about you, but sometimes I wonder about praying for some things, whether or not

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God is determined in his judgment that he's not going to bless, he's not going to answer.

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Yet again, God said to Jeremiah, do not for this people for their good. When they fast,

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I will not hear their cry. When they offer burnt offering and grain offering, I will not accept them, but I will consume them by the sword, by the famine, and by pestilence.

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And sometimes that's the case. You just can't, the Lord doesn't give you the faith, as it were, to pray for a person or a situation because you just feel like, you know, the

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Lord has written judgment across that. Thankfully, God is a

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God of mercy, however. And so that should stimulate us to continuing prayer.

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A third reason we may doubt that God hears us is when we fail to pray in faith. James wrote of God's refusal to answer prayer that comes forth from one who doubts

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God's ability. And that's important. You doubt God's ability, not his willingness, but his ability.

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We should never doubt God's ability. Regarding anything. He called this world, you know, into existence by his mere word.

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Imagine that. Took no effort, because God is infinite in power. In other words, he wasn't strained in any way whatsoever.

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He spoke, and it was. And we should never doubt God's ability. But James wrote, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally without reproach, and it will be given to him, but let him ask in faith with no doubting.

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For he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the

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Lord. He is a double -minded man, unstable in all his ways. Don't ever doubt

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God's ability. The problem doesn't lie there. Now, again, we need to make a distinction between having faith in God's ability and having faith in what

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God's will is in, say, any given specific request. We are never to doubt

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God's ability, but there are times when we might doubt

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God's willingness, as we've already mentioned, alluded to. I believe the double -minded man that James writes about was one who errs in this matter.

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He doubts God's ability. Think about the record of two blind men being healed by Jesus in Matthew's Gospel.

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Jesus departed from there. Two blind men followed Him, crying out, saying, Son of David, have mercy on us.

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When He came into the house, the blind men came to Him. Jesus said to them, Do you believe that I am able to do this?

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Do you believe in His ability? They said to Him, Yes, Lord. Then He touched their eyes, saying,

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According to your faith, let it be to you. And their eyes were opened. The Lord's ability was questioned there, and He brought that to their attention.

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We are never to doubt God's ability to answer our prayers. If we do doubt, let us not think that we will receive anything from His hand if we doubt

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His ability. But though we may have no doubt in God's ability, we may have legitimate doubts in God's willingness to grant our requests.

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And this is implicit in our prayer requests. That's why we always append our prayers with the expression,

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If the Lord wills, because we don't know many times if it's the Lord's will that He would heal a person, enable a person to recover strength or health.

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We just don't know. And so we are to ask in confidence of God's ability to grant our requests, but we ask humbly, submitting to His wisdom and purposes, if we don't know for sure that it's

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His will to grant our petition. I like the story of the leper who came to Jesus.

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Behold, a leper came and worshiped him, saying, Lord, if you're willing, you can make me clean.

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I love that. Notice there's no doubt whatsoever about Jesus's ability. None whatsoever.

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You're able to. Are you willing to? And Jesus put forth

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His hand, touched him, saying, I am willing to be cleansed. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed.

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This leper did not doubt our Lord's ability to heal him. However, he did have some question as to whether or not the

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Lord was willing to do so. Now, you and I should have encouragement and assurances that the Lord is a gracious, merciful

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God, and He delights in showing mercy. And so we shouldn't necessarily doubt

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His willingness. He's a good and gracious God and oftentimes is willing, maybe even when we doubt it somewhat.

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But His problem was not a lack of faith. Basically, when we yield to the

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Lord's will, we're acknowledging God's prerogative of governing His world and His way and our lives in the manner that He sees fit.

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But many times we don't know if it's the will of God. Some say, hey, it's always the will of God that He heals sick people.

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If you don't get healed, it's because you don't have the right, you don't have faith. That's not biblical. Paul had the power to heal as an apostle, one of the signs of the apostle.

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But he left Trophimus sick in Miletus. He didn't heal Trophimus.

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And apparently it was the will of God that Trophimus be left in Miletus sick and not to continue with Paul at that point, even though Paul had a great ability given to him.

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There's a fourth reason, however. Some doubt the willingness of God to hear and answer their prayers. They do not doubt, perhaps because of a possible failure of their own.

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They do not doubt because they suspect, pardon me, they do not doubt because of a failure of their own. They do not doubt because they suspect

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God has determined He will not hear a prayer respecting a rebellious person or people. Nor do they doubt

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His ability, but they doubt the goodness of God and His general approachableness and willingness to hear them and answer them when they pray.

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My grandfather was born in Minnesota in 1887.

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Grew up in a Lutheran church. And I have a little bit of hope for his soul.

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He became an oil driller out in Southern California in the desert when he walked out there when he was 16.

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Can you imagine that with his friend? But my grandmother told me this story that when he was just a teenager, there was a hellfire and brimstone sermon going on in the

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Lutheran church. It was really hot and heavy. And it so distressed my grandfather, he ran out of the church affirming, no, no,

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God loves me. God loves me. And he had a sense of the compassion and mercy of the

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Lord that seemed to govern his thinking. We ought to have a sense that God is a compassionate and merciful

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God. And so some doubt the goodness of God and His approachableness.

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He's a hard test, Master, and He may not hear my prayer. Well, I believe it's this kind of thought or regard toward God, a hesitancy to believe

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God's willingness to help His people, that we have the Lord's instruction to us in Luke chapter 11, verses 1 through 13.

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And so let's look at this passage. Everything we've said thus far is introductory. We've now arrived to the passage

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I want to give attention to. Luke 11, 1 through 13. And we're going to have to pick up our speed here.

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We're not going to get done. Here we read, Now it came to pass, as He, Jesus, was praying in a certain place, when

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He sees that one of His disciples said to Him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.

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So He said to them, When you pray, say, Our Father in heaven, hallowed be

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Your name. Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us day by day our daily bread.

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Forgive us our sins. For we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.

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And He said to them, Which of you shall have a friend and go to him at midnight and say to him,

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Friend, lend me three loaves. For a friend of mine has come to me on his journey and I have nothing to say before him.

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And he will answer from within and say, Do not trouble me. The door is now shut. And my children are with me in bed.

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I cannot rise and give to you. I say to you, though he will not rise and give to him because he is a friend, yet because of his persistence he will rise and give him as many as he needs.

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So I say to you, Ask and it will be given you. Seek, you will find. Knock, it will be opened to you.

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For everyone who asks receives. He who seeks finds. To him who knocks, it will be opened.

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If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish?

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Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly

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Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? These words of our

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Lord are set forth in the context of our Lord's final journey from Galilee to Jerusalem. And it's recorded in Luke's Gospel, beginning with Luke 9 .51,

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travel narrative from Luke 9 .51 to Luke 19, when he finally arrives to Jerusalem.

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As the Lord departed from Galilee, a shift of emphasis takes place in Luke's Gospel, whereas before he left, he was preaching largely to the crowds.

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During this travel narrative, he still preaches to crowds, but really the emphasis is on instruction to his disciples.

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It becomes more personal, personable, the Lord's instruction to his disciples.

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And here he's teaching them regarding prayer. It's initiated by this entreaty for instruction.

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Verse one, one of Jesus' disciples, teach us to pray. This reveals he knew the importance of prayer, but it also revealed somewhat of his ignorance regarding prayer.

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That is in contrast to what John the Baptist and his disciples knew. He felt they really knew how to pray and he wanted to be instructed similarly.

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So we see the importance of prayer. Why is prayer important? Several reasons can be cited and we're going to go through this quickly.

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Well, first, good things do not happen unless prayer is offered. Prayer is the appointed means that God uses.

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We as Reformed persons can fall back on God's sovereignty all day long, but if you pray not, you're not going to receive.

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God has appointed the means by which we receive things from him, the means of prayer.

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Good things do not happen unless proper prayer is offered. And what we mean by proper prayer, two things.

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Prayer must be offered with right motives. You know, if you're asking

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God simply to please yourself, obtain things for selfish reasons,

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God will not answer you. And prayer is answered by God when proper things are requested, proper motives and proper requests, proper things are requested.

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And so James wrote, you do not have because you ask not. When you ask, you do not receive because you ask with wrong motives that you may spend it on your own pleasures.

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Thankfully, God does not give us everything that we ask. We'd be in a world of hurt, wouldn't we, if God gave us everything we asked.

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He only obligates himself to give us good things, and that's what Jesus said in the parable, didn't he?

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He says, a father who gives things for our temporal and eternal good. And so proper prayer must be offered.

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And then good things do not happen unless persistent proper prayer is offered. There's an emphasis the

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Lord Jesus gives about this matter of importunate prayer, persistent prayer that doesn't give up.

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And we'll probably get to it, but he really sets forth a contrast. If this friend refuses to come out and grant you what you need, how much different than that friend is

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God? So it's a point of contrast where the lesson is. The Lord Jesus is expressing just how readily and willing and desirous it is for God to answer the prayers of his people.

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But again, not only is this question of this disciple revealing his understanding of the importance of prayer, but also it reveals his ignorance with respect to prayer.

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Many people would acknowledge their weakness in praying often, but not many acknowledge their ignorance about praying.

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But we should ask ourselves, are the things which are set forth here by the Lord Jesus as essential for proper prayer, characteristic of our praying, do our prayers follow the pattern of Scripture, or do we just have a wish list?

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You know, you'd be sitting down and writing a letter to Santa Claus. Is that the kind of prayer list that we have?

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I hope not. But what does the Scripture say? We should ask ourselves, do our prayers reflect the patterns laid out for us in Scripture?

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Do we pray for one another, requesting for one another the kinds of things the New Testament writers set forth as proper things to request from our

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God? And here are some examples. All right? Praying for spiritual knowledge.

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Do we pray for that? Prayer for discernment. Give me wisdom, our Lord, that I can see the world as you see it.

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Make wise assessments and decisions. Pray for spiritual growth. Do you assume that's just going to happen?

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It takes place through praying for spiritual growth. Paul says, Since I heard of your faith in Christ and your love for all the saints,

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I cease not to pray for you. And you read in Colossians 1, he was praying for their spiritual growth.

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Do you pray for your spiritual growth, for others' spiritual growth? Pray for spiritual power and boldness in your witness.

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Pray that we might know the unique and discriminating love that God has for those in Christ.

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Paul was praying that the church at Ephesus would see it. God has a love for you.

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He says it's in Christ. He says it passes all ability to conceive.

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It passes understanding. And you need the Holy Spirit to inform you, to make this relevant to you, to understand the height, the depth, the breadth of the love of God that God has for you in Christ.

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Do we pray to that end? These are the kinds of things that Scripture sets forth should be the topics of our prayer.

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And so I fear that we too are generally quite ignorant of what we pray for, that is, what's most needful for one another and ourselves.

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But we should be informed about this. And so we should be, as this disciple, Lord, teach us to pray.

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In the same way that John the Baptist taught his disciples how to pray. One more thing.

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Notice carefully, the disciple says, requested of Jesus, Lord, teach us to pray as John also taught his disciples.

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I might be pressing it a little with more detail than I should. I don't know. John the

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Baptist was a good man. He was a good prayer and he was a good teacher. Really, he didn't request,

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Lord, teach us to be disciples like John the Baptist taught his disciples, but teach us to be like John the

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Baptist who taught others how to pray. You see that? It's very subtle.

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And so may the Lord help us to be as John the Baptist, teaching others to pray. That should be our desire.

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Let us go beyond merely asking the Lord to teach us to pray, but let us ask God that he would make us as John teachers of prayer to others.

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It would greatly further the kingdom if we could do that, right? And then we have the example of the model prayer from which probably most of us are familiar.

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It's a pattern prayer that the Lord set before us. Categories are set before us.

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And there's an order of priority as well as importance. And so our

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Lord Jesus first said to his disciples, when you pray, say, Our Father in heaven. Normally we pray to the

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Father through the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's how we gain access to the

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Father and through the power and illumination of the Holy Spirit. But it's not wrong to pray to the

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Lord Jesus on occasion. Lord Jesus received my spirit. Wasn't that Stephen's words when he was being stoned?

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And even praying for the Holy Spirit, but most frequently and commonly, the normal pattern, we pray to the

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Father through the Son and the power of the Holy Spirit. Pray our

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Father who art in heaven. And so the Lord Jesus taught and encouraged disciples to view

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God as their Father, who is approachable, willing, even eager to hear from his children and grant their requests.

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Now note that when we were to pray, we were to pray Our Father. He did not say, when you pray, say,

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My Father, although an individual believer praying that way would be perfectly appropriate, but that's not the focus of our

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Lord. When you're praying as disciples pray Our Father, there's a collective sense here,

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Our Father. Perhaps a stress here is not on individual prayer, but rather prayer offered in the assembly of the people of God.

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The privilege to regard and pray to God as Father, however, belongs to true believers in Jesus Christ. Everybody knows the

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Lord's Prayer. I imagine, you know, in this New England here, in this setting, you know, if I were to, you know, say at a funeral service that's filled with people who are not devout

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Christians, I said, let's say the Lord's Prayer. Most would be able to say it out loud, and they would pray

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Our Father who art in heaven. But actually, that's a petition that only the true Christian can legitimately make, because God is only

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Father to people who know Jesus Christ. God becomes

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Our Father through faith in Jesus Christ where adopted as children. Before we believe on the

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Lord Jesus Christ, God is not our Father. God's our Creator. God is our

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Judge. God is our King, our Governor, but He's not our Father. But when you become a

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Christian, that relationship with God changes, and God becomes a Father to you, and you

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His child. That's very important. And Jesus was teaching them to pray,

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His disciples to pray to their Heavenly Father as one who is approachable, who cares for them, who's only gonna give them that which they need and that which is helpful and beneficial for them.

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And so, if you're a devout believer in Jesus Christ, you may join with all your brothers and sisters in Christ in the wonderful privilege of addressing

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God, Our Father in heaven, and you may be assured that God cares for you as a father cares for his children.

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Secondarily, hallowed be thy name. This is the first request, actually. And of course, it's a request that God be glorified, that He be honored.

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That should be our primary concern in life, in the life of our church, that God would be glorified in all things.

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And what do we mean by that? By bringing people to understand more clearly who He is and to bring them to appreciate more fully who

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He is, to glorify Him, to praise Him, and to be awed by Him, grateful to Him, thankful to Him, overwhelmed as to who

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He is. And that should be the desire for our own souls, but that should be our desire for one another as well.

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We pray that God would be glorified, that we would see Him more fully. He's an infinite God. We're gonna spend eternity growing in our understanding of Him, I believe.

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But may the Lord help us to desire and to see His name hallowed, glorified.

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And then your kingdom come is the next petition. And one has to understand, of course, the kingdom of God is presented in different ways in the

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Scripture. There's a sense in which God has always been king, always will be king, because He's a creator in His sovereignty.

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But after the fall of man, no one was willingly subject to God as king. And so God through history, basically, is interjecting a mediatorial kingdom, a kingdom mediating between Him and fallen man and bringing

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His creation back into willing submission to Him. And when Jesus returns, He will have accomplished that.

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All of His people who are saved are willingly calling upon Him, Lord, and even His enemies will bow the knee and confess with the tongue,

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Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father. Even they will be willingly submissive to God as they're sent off into eternal damnation.

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And so there's a sense in which the kingdom always has been. There's a sense in which the kingdom has been coming.

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There's a sense in which the kingdom came when Jesus was here ministering on earth. There's a sense in which the kingdom of God was inaugurated with the enthronement of Jesus upon His ascension.

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And certainly there is a sense in which the kingdom is yet to come when Jesus returns and His mediatorial kingdom will be fully manifested and all the world will see it.

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You and I as Christians see the kingdom of God with our eyes of faith. Jesus is Lord. When He comes again the second time, every eye will see

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Him physically and everyone will acknowledge it. But we see Him now as King and as our

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Lord. And so we're to desire His kingdom to come, become realized in our lives as we yield more to Him.

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And we also pray that His kingdom come, that the Lord Jesus would return and bring an end to this fallen world and bring in everlasting righteousness.

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And so we are to pray that the will of God be done. Your kingdom come,

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Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. When we talk about the will of God being done, we have to distinguish between the kinds of will of God that are set forth in Scripture.

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There is a will of God's decree. He decreed everything that takes place in history, even before creation.

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Every minutia of history, as Charles Spurgeon said it so wonderfully, I believe that the unsettling of the dust on the leaf of a rose by the feet of an aphid is as much ordained of heaven than the marching of armies to vanquish the earth.

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From the smallest to the greatest is decreed by God. And so God's will of decree, every last detail is realized.

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It cannot be frustrated. But apart from God's will of decree, there is God's will of command, sometimes called

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God's preceptive will. And this is his will of command.

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And that's very rarely followed, isn't it? Except by his people.

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And when we pray for God's will to be done on earth, we're talking about, we pray that the man here on earth, fallen man and Christians, conform their thinking and their lives to the commands of God, the will of God, the decree of God.

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Not the decree, but the precepts of God, the commands of God. And then finally, we come to the next petition, give us each day our daily bread.

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In other words, the things that we need in life. That's important, but it's down the list of importance.

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And oftentimes that gets elevated to the top of the list, and it shouldn't. The daily bread carries the idea of the things that are necessary to sustain life day by day in this world.

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It would include clothing and housing and money to pay the bills and get by.

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Give us our Lord, our daily bread. It's a recognition that he is our provider.

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You know, woe on you if you think that Washington DC is your provider. Washington DC is a poor

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God. You'll be disappointed by and by. And I think that's one of the lessons the world's teaching us, that you shouldn't deify government.

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There's only one God, and he should be our provider. And then forgive us of our sins, of course, is a request.

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And in the same manner that we forgive all, forgive everyone who sins against us.

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And so there's a condition placed. Do you ask God to forgive you in the same manner that you forgive others?

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Think about that. I hope he forgives me more than what

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I request for others. But we ought to be requesting, God, please forgive them. They know not what they do, is what

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Jesus said on the cross. And lead us not into temptation. All right?

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Now, God does not, of course, tempt anyone. But he providentially leads us.

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And there are times when we can find ourselves in a place of temptation. Pray that he doesn't lead you there.

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Now, thankfully, the Lord delivers his people from temptation once they're in it. And that's a wonderful thing.

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But it's much better never to enter temptation than to have to pray to get out of it. Right? Pray, lead us not into temptation.

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Keep me, Father, from being in a place where I would be susceptible to falling or failing.

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Well, and then on top of page 10, you have an encouraging word on the readiness of God to answer prayer.

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That's what you have in verses 5 through 8. There's a point of comparison. Although a friend may be reluctant to give you the things you ask him because he's inconvenienced, yet he will do so because of your persistence.

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In the same way, be persistent in praying to God. There's the comparison. Don't be discouraged by what seems to be

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God's reluctance to answer you because you've not received what you need. It's only a perceived reluctance.

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Jesus is saying that he's not reluctant. And there you have the point of contrast. Although we can account for our neighbor's reluctance of giving us what we need because we're inconvenienced in him, we should not think of God in these terms.

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In contrast to the reluctant friend, our Father is willing to give us what we need, and therefore this should encourage us all the more in our continual asking.

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And so we should not doubt our Lord's willingness. And that's really the whole point of these verses, verses 5 through 8.

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Do not assume, do not think for a moment that God is not willing to grant your requests.

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That's what he's assuring them. He's as a father who cares for his son, his children.

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And then he gives an emphasis on the certainty that God will answer prayer. Asking, seeking, knocking.

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Those are present tense verbs. Continuous action. Importunate prayer. Keep on asking.

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Keep on seeking. Keep on knocking. Because that is the one who will have his prayers answered.

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And then we have the promise that God will give good things. I really wanted to get to this before we close because it's so very important.

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Verses 11 through 13a, another contrast is given. A human father is described in contrast to the heavenly

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Father. A human father would not be so cruel to deceive or harm his children by supposing to give them what they ask but giving them in its place something that was harmful to them.

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Do you think God is any less? You should not think

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God is anything but more willing to give everything good and needful to his children who ask him. You see, the

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Lord Jesus is in every way is trying to encourage and exhort his disciples to ask with a sense of confidence and assurance that God will hear their petitions.

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But this last promise is really the kicker. Notice how the

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Lord Jesus said, the promise of the Father was that he will give you the Holy Spirit. This pretty much transitions into what we'll be addressing next week.

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Of course, the matter of sanctification, we need the Holy Spirit. And so the

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Lord Jesus says, how much more will the Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

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It's amazing when you read the comments of people about this verse.

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For example, the old dispensationalist, the classic dispensationalist C .I.

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Schofield, for example, said that petition does not apply to you and me.

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When Jesus said to his disciples, how much more is the Father willing to give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?

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Schofield basically says that Jesus was talking to the Jews under the law before Pentecost, and therefore to go back to that petition is to deny the truth and reality of Pentecost.

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It does not apply, is what he's saying. In fact, if you look at the last clause of that block quote, right in the middle of page 11, to go back to the promise of Luke 11 .13

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is to forget Pentecost and to ignore the truth that now every believer has the indwelling spirit.

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In other words, it's not a promise to you and me, is what they believed.

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And there are a lot of people in pulpits that believe that. Now, I think because of Pentecostalism, the charismatic movement, it's robbed a lot of evangelical

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Christians of their responsibility and privilege to ask the Father to give them the

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Holy Spirit. This was not strange to the Puritans or the Reformers.

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They would ask the Father to give them the Holy Spirit. And it was not denying that they weren't already converted and that they already had the indwelling and the sealing of the

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Holy Spirit, but they were asking God the Father to give them the Holy Spirit to enable them to live as Christians and to empower their witness to the world.

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And what I'm saying is, out of reaction to our Pentecostal and charismatic friends, we don't want to be like that.

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We don't pray for the Father to give us the Holy Spirit like we're commanded to and urged to do by the

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Lord Jesus. Here's another very prominent person for whom I have the highest regard, but he's dead wrong in his understanding of this passage.

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What does it mean to be spirit -filled? Let me give you a short theology lesson. We'll call it Theology of the

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Spirit -Filled Life. When you were saved, the moment you received Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit came to live within you.

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Amen to all that, okay? There is no Christian who does not possess the Holy Spirit. Amen. If any man have not the

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Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. Yet it's amazing how many Christians think they do not have the Holy Spirit.

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I have sat in church, heard sincere people pray, O God, send your Spirit, and have thought to myself, No, He is here,

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He is here. I've heard people say, God, give me more of your Spirit, as if He came in doses.

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The Holy Spirit is a person. He lives within me. Know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost? So many times we ask for what we already have.

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In other words, you don't need to pray for this, is what He is saying. You already have the Holy Spirit.

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Have you ever analyzed your prayers? You pray, God, give me more love for so -and -so. The Bible says, The love of God is shed abroad.

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Anyway, He goes on to talk about how all these graces are already yours, so why ask for them? And you shouldn't pray for the

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Holy Spirit, He says. The conclusion one must draw from these comments is that Christians should disregard the teaching of the

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Lord to His disciples here in Luke 11, verse 13. And I think that's terribly wrong.

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Drop down and look at Matthew Henry's comments, page 12. The encouragement

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He, Jesus, gives us to hope that we shall speed in this prayer, your

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Heavenly Father will give. It is in His power to give the Spirit. This is

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Matthew Henry, the Puritan. He has all good things to bestow wrapped up in that one. But that is not all.

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It is in His promise. The gift of the Holy Ghost is in the covenant. Acts 2. And it's here inferred from parents' readiness to supply their children's needs and gratify their desires when they are natural and proper.

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If the child asks for a serpent or a scorpion, the Father in kindness will deny him, but not if he asks for what is needful and will be nourishing.

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When God's children ask for the Spirit, they do, in effect, ask for bread, for the

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Spirit is the staff of life. Nay, He is the author of the soul's life. If our earthly parents, though evil, be yet so kind, if they, though weak, be yet so knowing, that they not only give, but give with discretion, give what is best in the best manner and time, much more will our

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Heavenly Father, who infinitely excels the fathers of our flesh, both in wisdom and goodness, give us

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His Holy Spirit. If earthly parents be willing to lay out for the education of their children to whom they design to leave their estates, much more will our

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Heavenly Father give the Spirit of sons to all those whom He has predestinated to the inheritance of sons.

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Matthew Henry is clearly affirming you are to pray to the Father that He gives you the Holy Spirit. I love the way

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Charles Spurgeon addressed it. He addressed some in his day, in the middle of the 19th century, who said you shouldn't pray this prayer.

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It appears plainly enough from the text that this Holy Spirit is to be given in answer to prayer. Didn't we hear some time ago from certain wise brethren that we are never to pray for the

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Spirit? I think I heard it said often. We have the Holy Spirit and therefore we are not to pray for it.

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Like that other declaration of certain of the same brotherhood that we have pardon of sin and are not to pray for it.

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Just as if we were never to pray for what we have. If we have life we are to pray that we have it more abundantly.

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If we have pardon in one respect we are to ask for a fuller sense of it. If we have the Holy Spirit so that we are quickened that is made alive and saved we do not ask

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Him in that capacity. But we ask for His power in other directions, for His grace in other forms.

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I do not go before God now and say Lord I'm a dead sinner quicken me by thy Spirit for I trust

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I am quickened of His Spirit. But being quickened I now cry Lord let not the life

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Thou has given me ebb down till it becomes very feeble but give me of Thy Spirit that the life within me may become strong and mighty and may subdue all the power of death within my members that I may put forth the vigor and energy which come from Thyself through the

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Spirit. O you that have the Spirit you are the very men to pray that you may experience more of His matchless operations and gracious influences and all the benign sanctity of His indwelling may seek that yet more and more you may know

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Him. You have this as your encouragement that God will give the Holy Spirit to them that ask

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Him. Ever since certain brethren gave up asking for the Holy Spirit they have not had it or Him and they've gone aside into many inventions.

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Okay, the whole idea of developing technique began in the middle of the 19th century wasn't it?

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The technique in doing things means that this is how you accomplish the work rather than by the power of the

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Holy Spirit. If they will not ask they shall not have but be it yours and mine to wait humbly and patiently upon the

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Lord that He may daily give us of His Spirit. No miracles do we seek but all the spiritual uplifting which the

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Holy Spirit gave to men of old we need and He can give it to us still. And though He will not reveal new truths we do not want that He should for we have already the complete gospel revealed

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He will bring home the old truths to our souls and make them potent upon our consciences and upon our lives and this is what we want.

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We should all pray throughout the day and onward that God will give to His church more and more of His Holy Spirit.

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Amen, Charles Spurgeon. But how many fail in this respect?

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We need the Holy Spirit or we're not going to be able to live as Christians. And the

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Lord Jesus was clearly teaching His disciples to pray. Pray that the

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Father give you the Spirit. That's not a denial that you're not born again.

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It's not a denial that He hasn't sealed you. It's not a denial that He doesn't indwell you. But it is a request that there is a fresh and full manifestation of the

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Holy Spirit for how else are we going to live before Him unless He enables us to do so.

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And so may the Lord help us to be faithful praying Christians. And may we pray intelligently and may we pray expectantly with confidence and yet at the same time with a sense of humble acknowledgement that His will,

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He knows what's best and so we surrender it to Him in the end. May your will be done, not mine.

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Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for Your Word and for the blessed promises that we have as Christians.

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And we thank You, our God, that we can call upon You as our Father through faith in Jesus Christ. You've adopted us into Your family as sons and daughters and we thank

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You for this. And so You, Lord, have bound Yourself to answer our prayers. You have not committed

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Yourself, bound Yourself to answer the prayers of the unsaved, although in Your mercy You may do so.

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Thankfully, but You have committed Yourself to us, our God, we who believe on Jesus, that You will answer our prayers.

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Help us, our God, to be faithful in this matter and may we see, Lord, Your power manifested.

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May we see, Lord, our own selves, our lives experiencing a great manifestation of Your presence,

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Lord, and the development of holy character within our lives and the ability, our

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God, given by the Holy Spirit to conquer sin and to resist and overcome temptation when we enter it.