Sermon On Hindrances To Prayer

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So, as we are finishing now this side study on prayer, the theology of prayer, my hope is that God has used this series in a profound way to open your eyes to the tremendous gift and blessing that we have as God's children to come into His presence, to talk to God as a

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Father, to believe His Word, to depend upon Him and His promises and His faithfulness.

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The aim and goal of this is to get us, as the people of God, talking to God.

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And the reason for that aim and that goal is because God states over and over in His Word that He desires to be a

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Father to His children, and He calls us to come into His presence with bold and confident access because of Jesus.

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He tells us to ask. He tells us to seek. He tells us to knock.

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He tells us things like, you don't have because you don't ask. This is a

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God who actually is not far off. He's not the absentee landlord, the distant father.

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He's not the indifferent parent. He's not the unfaithful dad. He's not the undependable dad.

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He is the perfect Father. He is the one that we can trust. He is the one that cannot lie.

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And He calls us into His presence, and I want to make sure that this is something we all remember as we depart this series.

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There's an aspect to everything we've been talking about that is incomprehensible. And if it hasn't hit you yet,

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I hope that this actually does. You see, in this relationship between us and the

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Father, we're the ones who fall short. We're the offenders. We're the rebels.

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And this is truly the incomprehensible aspect of this entire relationship. He is holy, and we're not.

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He's good, and we're not. He's righteous, and we're not in ourselves. And yet,

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God pursues us and calls us into communion with Him. He calls us into relationship with Him.

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And yet, we're the ones who are the primary offenders. We're the ones that fall short every day. We're the ones that don't have it together.

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We're the ones that can't collect ourselves. We're the ones that are not faithful. And it says that He is faithful even when we are faithless.

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That's the nature of this relationship, and it is incomprehensible. We have to embrace the incomprehensible nature of this relationship, that God is the one pursuing the rebel.

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And this is what makes it so grand and beautiful and glorious. He pursues me, the sinner, purchases me by His own blood.

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He brings about this amazing redemption so that I have peace with Him, and then He continues to beckon me, to call me into His presence, to receive from Him.

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In the bulletin today, we had that amazing passage from Jesus, if you ask anything in my name,

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I'll give it to you. That's a dangerous statement in Scripture.

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It's dangerous also in the hands of those who make the Bible their playground. It's dangerous in the hands of people who manipulate

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God and His character and His sovereignty, and they say things like, well, I can tell God what to do.

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I could speak to my wallet and speak money into it. Wallet, have money. I could speak to God and say, you come down and you give me.

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And so it can be a very dangerous promise when it's not interpreted correctly. But when we think about it in light of God who is perfection, who is the judge of all the earth, always does right, who has a perfect will, who brings about peace and harmony and love in the world, that we can ask anything in His name according to His will for His glory and purposes, and He will do it.

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And this is why the world has cause to fear the people of God in the world.

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This is why the devil has cause to fear the people of God in the world. It's the reason why the queen said about John Knox that she feared his prayers more than all of these armies.

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She feared him talking to God. She didn't want him talking to God. She was afraid of it because she knew that God was listening, and she knew that God would act on his behalf, and that terrified her.

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That's the kind of relationship the saints of God, the people of God have with God. And so my heart's desire in this entire series has been that you and I would walk boldly into the presence of God because of Jesus and have been transformed.

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Have you been transformed? Have you been changed? I know that God calls us to a new way, and God calls us to be in conformity with the image of Jesus.

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It actually says that He that began a good work in you will complete it. He will bring it to completion.

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And God's purpose in bringing a people to Jesus Christ is to conform them to the image of Jesus.

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He doesn't just save you from your sins. He continues daily to save you from your sins.

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He saves you to make you like Jesus. God is about His glory.

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And one of the ways that God intends to glorify Himself according to the Bible is to make you more like Jesus in holiness, in dependence, and I believe with all of my heart on the basis of the

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Scriptures, He desires to make us more like Jesus in terms of our relationship to the

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Father. And if that hasn't knocked you back on your heels spiritually, then

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I want to challenge you to continue to think about it, meditate on these truths, that God actually calls us into His presence into a relationship of conversation and dependence.

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How's your prayer life? How's your prayer life? The foundation of all of this is fundamentally this truth.

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God has reconciled us to Himself through the blood of Jesus Christ. He has brought about peace between us and the

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Father. And because of the good news, because God has become a man in the person of Jesus and lived the blameless and righteous law -keeping life that He did, because He died and rose again, you and I are hiding in Jesus, wrapped up in Christ's righteousness, counted righteous,

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Paul says in Romans 4, apart from works, and will never be counted as sinners in the eyes of God.

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There is no wrath of God for you and I left. There is therefore now no condemnation,

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Paul says, for those who are in Christ Jesus. Romans chapter 8, 1. Romans 5, 1.

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Therefore, having been declared righteous through faith, we have peace with God through Jesus Christ.

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So there is a relationship that we have now of peace with God, not a temporary ceasefire between us and God.

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God hasn't brought us to a temporary shalom with Him, a temporary peace. He has brought about complete peace and perfection, and Paul says this in Colossians chapter 3, that God has given to us every spiritual blessing, that He has actually raised us up with Jesus Christ, that we are seated with Him in the heavenly places.

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And if you ask me to explain that and describe it, my answer is this, I can't. I can't.

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It's too far beyond me as a creature to completely explain in a way that can be fully meaningful this glorious truth that we have peace with God and have been raised up with Jesus Christ to such a degree that God sees us as seated with Jesus Christ, covered in His righteousness.

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That is how we can approach God, always, every day. And you might say this, well,

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Pastor Jeff, I'm kind of a failure. Pastor Jeff, I kind of stink at this Christian life. I'm not very good at it. I blow it every day.

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I blew it today. I might be blowing it now. And we deal with discouragement.

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I haven't been the best father, the best husband, the best wife, the best mother, the best son, the best daughter.

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I haven't loved God perfectly or loved my neighbor as I love myself. I've destroyed the law of God. I've done it daily.

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I stand against God in thought, word, and deed. How can God continue to call me into His presence when

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I'm such a failure? And this gets down to the most important aspect of our prayer life with God and being able to approach

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Him with courage and consistency. We have to consider the truth about our identity in Jesus Christ.

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Who are you? Who are you before the eyes of God, the throne of God?

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Who are you? Are you the failure? Are you the lawbreaker? Are you the unrighteous one before the throne of God?

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The Bible knows nothing about somebody who is in Christ receiving wrath and condemnation from God.

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It knows nothing about a person who cannot approach the Father and depend upon Him.

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And so the truth is we can access God with bold, confident access because of faith in Jesus Christ.

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That is the foundation of this entire series. Because of the gospel, because of Jesus, you have access to God.

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And you're going to, listen, you and I are going to have a relationship of God, relationship with God, of prayer that is full of joy and trust and delight or we are not.

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And one of the greatest hindrances to our relationship of prayer to the Father is discouragement.

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It's one of the greatest tools of the enemy, discouragement. If the enemy can discourage you, he can disarm you.

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If you believe that God is not listening because He's angry with you, that He has wrath for you, or that He sees how much of a mess you are, if you believe that discouragement, you won't approach

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God, you won't talk to God, you won't reach out and cry out to God. The Bible teaches that because of Christ, we have a righteousness,

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Philippians 3, from God, a righteousness not of our own doing, not based on the law of God.

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It's a righteousness from God through faith in Jesus. That's the confidence that we have.

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And so when you hear the voice of the enemy saying, you're not good, you're not worthy, he doesn't want you in his presence, just know that you need to depend upon the words of God and not the words of the enemy.

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I say this often and I'll say it just one time in this message. Every day we have a conflict to come to grips with.

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We have to remember every day that we have three voices that we can listen to on a daily basis no matter what the circumstances.

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One, we can listen to the voice of God. And the Bible says, what about God? It says

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He cannot lie. God cannot lie. It's against His own character and nature.

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It's not something He can do. He cannot do it. People say, can God do anything?

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Well, yes, God can do anything that's consistent with His nature and will. Yes. Well, then can

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God create a stone too heavy He can lift? Well, that's the nature of an all -powerful God. No, He couldn't do that because He's all -powerful.

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He wouldn't do anything that contradicts His nature. And here's what God cannot do. He cannot lie. He keeps

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His promises. His covenant faithfulness can be depended on. Second voice, you and I can listen to on a daily basis.

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We can listen to the voice of the devil. We can listen to the voice of the enemies of God, the spiritual attacks.

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And the Bible says, what about Satan? Jesus says that he is the father of what? He's the father of lies.

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He can't be trusted. He is the father of lies. So you can listen to him. The third voice you can listen to every day is your own inner monologue.

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You can listen to yourself. And you are notoriously unreliable.

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Amen? I think you've demonstrated it and so have I. We're fallible.

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We get things wrong. You fall down. You have errors of judgment.

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You have sins. And so if you look at your history, your track record, you are notoriously unreliable.

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If you look at Satan's track record, he's the father of lies. If you look at God's track record in the scriptures, you see that he cannot lie.

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He is faithful. So every day, you can embrace your discouragement. You can believe that it's true.

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You can believe your own lies. You can believe the lies of the devil. You can listen to the voice of God. When you and I approach the throne of God, we have to do it standing on God's word.

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When the spirit of God drove Jesus into the wilderness, how did the son of God, the

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Lord of glory, do battle with Satan in the trial of Jesus? The spirit of God brings him into the wilderness.

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Here is Israel going into the wilderness in the Old Testament, failing to trust in God's word.

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And he said as much that he brought them into the wilderness to see if they would depend upon his word.

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And they failed. And here's Jesus, the perfect Israelite, going into the wilderness. And when the devil tries to tempt him, how does

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Jesus do battle? Does he physically wrestle him? Does he use the might of the

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Lord of glory that he could have and speak and just make

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Satan go out of existence? What does Jesus do? He depends upon the words of God.

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And Satan flees. And you and I as believers, if we're conformed to the image of God, we have to live in that kind of way, not believing the lies of the devil, not believing our own inner monologue, not believing that our failures have caused

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God to depart from us, but we have to recognize God's promises about our identity in Jesus.

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We're children of God. You have peace with God in Jesus Christ. You have been declared righteous, justified.

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You are counted righteous in Jesus. How's that for confidence in walking before the throne of God daily?

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You see, I said this, I think, at the beginning of the series. I said that we don't often recognize just how amazing this relationship with God is.

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Because you see, we have, as Christians, the cross of Jesus, his resurrection and ascension behind us.

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It's past us. And so we come to Jesus, we're forgiven, we're reconciled to God. All our sins are washed away.

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There's no yearly reminder on Yom Kippur, the day of atonement of all of your sins and the bloody sacrifice.

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You don't see it before you. You don't see the temple any longer and this holy of holies with the veil and no access from us getting in there.

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You don't have the priest entering into that place yearly, offering a sacrifice for his own sins, then for the sins of the people, and then the scapegoat confessing sins onto the scapegoat.

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Everyone's seeing this goat being taken away from the people of God and disappearing. You don't have that reminder and that obvious symbol of God is there and I'm here and there's something between us.

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And so we're indifferent to the gospel and its beauty and power. And that God has those symbols and reminders in the world that something is wrong.

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And something divides us. Something stops us from being able to access the

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Father. And then Jesus does away with all of that. The veil is ripped.

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Jesus gives us access. We don't recognize the power of that relationship that you and I get to enter into the throne room of God every moment and God invites us to it.

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Think about it for a moment. How much does God want us to talk to him? How intimately acquainted is God with our ways and what is his desire for me in a relationship with him?

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And the Bible says clearly, how much should I pray? Well, the Muslims say five times.

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It whittled down to that in Muhammad's account. Well, we'll come down to five times. We'll have five times of prayer a day.

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Five times. People say, oh wow, five times of prayer, that's a lot of praying. What? Five? The biblical, how much should we pray?

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Five times, is that enough prayer? Five times? Bible says this. No, pray without ceasing.

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Rejoice always. Pray without ceasing and be thankful in all circumstances.

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How much does God want you to talk to him? Pray constantly. Keep praying. Keep coming.

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Keep asking. Keep seeking. Keep knocking. Come to me. Pray without ceasing.

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People say, how should I do this? Talk to God. Pray to God. You have moments where you're just walking along your way and you're talking to God.

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Other times where you fall on your knees in the closet and you're talking to God. But here's what God says about how much you should talk to him.

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Keep coming. Keep talking. Don't stop. As a matter of fact, consider when

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I pointed out in the beginning of the series, the Old Testament and Isaiah when God condemned his people. Remember, it wasn't just for injustice and lack of love and sin and breaking the law of God.

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It actually says that God's condemning them and it's really interesting why he says because you don't cry out, you don't strive for me.

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That's why you're condemned. Nobody's crying out for me. No one's talking to me. Nobody's striving for me.

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That doesn't make any sense. That is a divine love that I can't understand. That is a divine love that I cannot understand.

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That God loves sinners like me so much that the condemnation is not so much what I'm doing in terms of breaking certain laws, but he says, you won't strive for me.

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You won't call out for me. That's the level of intimacy that God desires with his people. Come.

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Come. And that's only because of Jesus. There are hindrances to prayer I want to highlight today.

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What are the hindrances to prayer? Now, I know that there's a number of hindrances that maybe you have some other ones and you like to add to the story.

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But here's how I chose to cut the cake. There are, I have listed here, eight different hindrances to prayer that I want to encourage you to consider.

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And I want to encourage myself to consider things to repent of, things to confess to God, and to rejoice in our salvation and forgiveness, and then move forward in a new way of prayer and intimacy with the

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Father. If you're taking notes, there are eight. One, what's a hindrance to prayer?

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Unbelief. Unbelief. And for a text, I want you to go to James chapter one,

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James, the half -brother of Jesus, James chapter one. It's a popular passage and it is challenging.

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James chapter one, verses five through seven. I'm going to go to two.

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I'm going to start off in verse two. Listen to the text. It's powerful. It's powerful. "'Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds.'"

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Right? "'Count it all joy when you meet trials.'" Is that how we approach trials?

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"'For you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness, and let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.'"

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Here it is. "'If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given to him.

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But let him ask in faith with no doubting. For the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind.

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For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord. He is double -minded, unstable in all his ways.'"

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Now, wisdom, by the way, here is not asking for an answer from God. For example, there's obviously, many of you guys know, being in this area, one of the first lessons that you get from the missionaries, the

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Mormon missionaries, when they come to your door, is they give you the account of the first vision. Now, by the way, there were a number of first vision accounts in the 1830s.

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The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter -day Saints today has chosen one of those accounts. There are contradictions in the accounts.

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There is, obviously, there are people that are pointing to the fact that Joseph Smith, when he first started, he didn't bring this story up.

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It actually came later, and it was expanded upon and changed. But in his account, he says that there were so many divisions between the

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Christian churches and so many contradictions, he says, I didn't know which church to join, and he's confused.

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So he reads in James chapter 1, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God.

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And he took that to mean, I need an answer from God, which church do

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I join? Give me the answer, God. That's not, by the way, what wisdom means to a Jew.

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Wisdom is skill in living. How do I apply the word of God?

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Give me skill in living, like the Proverbs. What is the Proverbs? It's all godly wisdom.

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How do I apply the truth of God to my life so I can live in the world, glorifying

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God? And James says this, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God.

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And it says, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it'll be given to him.

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It's not saying, God, give me an answer now, and God has to do it. It's about how do

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I live, God, and it says this, if you lack wisdom, skill in godly living, then ask

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God and he will give it to you. You can depend upon it, but then it says this, but let him ask in faith with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the winds.

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God says this, when you come to me and you ask for this, I promise to give it.

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And here's what I want you to do, come to me and do not do it with any doubt.

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Don't come into my presence and doubt that I will fulfill my promises.

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Don't doubt. Don't be like a wave tossed about by the wind, every which way. You're unstable.

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Don't be unstable. Come in not doubting. Unbelief is a hindrance to prayer.

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If you come into God's presence not believing that God is listening, not believing that God is faithful, then

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God says that's unstable. You shouldn't suppose that you'll receive anything from the

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Lord. You're double -minded, unstable in all your ways. God says this, come into my presence and trust me.

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If you ask something according to my will, believe me. Don't doubt it. Trust me.

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How's that for confidence? God is telling you and I, I want you to come into my presence and ask me and don't doubt.

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No doubting. I want you to believe it. Come into my presence and have that kind of confidence.

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I know that God will do whatever is according to his will.

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And God, I pray now that you will do this because I know, God, what your character is and what your will is.

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It's one of the things that Philip, remember I told you about Philip, who was a friend of Luther. He said about Luther that was so compelling to him is that Luther, one, would pray constantly.

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He said that when things were busy, he would say, I'm so busy, I need to pray more.

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We say the opposite. What do we say? I'm too busy to pray. He says, I'm too busy, I have to pray. And what he said about Luther, he says when he listened to him, he would pray out loud.

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It helped him focus his mind and he wanted even the devil to hear him, to be terrified.

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And it says that Luther's prayers were laced in and out with the word of God.

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He would just pray with the word of God memorized and meditated upon.

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And he says the reason why is that Luther wanted to use the word of God because he knew that God would fulfill his prayers and his wishes if it was according to God's will and so he used the scriptures to guarantee it.

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But watch what that does. Listen closely. This is huge. Please listen. I told you last week that prayer is not so much about changing

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God as it is about changing us. We don't change God and make him better than he is.

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But prayer does change me. And if I'm using the word of God in my prayer life, if I'm meditating on it, if I'm quoting scripture and depending on it, it's not simply changing

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God, it's changing me. My heart gets into conformity with God's heart.

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My desires become God's desires when I rest on his word and prayer. Also resting on God's word and prayer kills your unbelief.

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But another text. I want you to go to another text in terms of hindrances to prayer, unbelief. Go to Mark chapter 11.

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Matthew, Mark, Luke, John. Go to Mark chapter 11 verses 24 through 25.

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Jesus says this. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it and it will be yours.

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This dangerous talk from Jesus is dangerous. Whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it and it will be yours.

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Now I suspect a lot of us are alarmed by that.

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And we're alarmed by it because we know the abuses. You and I know people that believe they can tell

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God what to do. You and I know people that pray for things that are selfish, that are ungodly.

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So for example, Jesus says clearly in the text that you can pray for these things, believe.

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He says, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it and it will be yours. About anything? Fantastic.

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Lord, I believe with all my heart, Jesus, give it to me, give it to me, give it to me, give it to me. I believe with all my heart,

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Jesus, that I'm going to get a $35 million mansion on a hill. On a hill,

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Jesus, I pray in the name of Jesus, I believe it. Or you know people that say things like,

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Father, I'm going to believe with all my heart that you're going to give me a better wife.

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I believe it in the name of Jesus. We pray for selfish things, sinful things.

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Father, I pray with all of my heart, a prayer that this man, this brother in Jesus who offended me,

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I believe it in the name of Jesus that you will destroy his business in the name of the Lord. Right? I believe,

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Lord, that I want you to teach him a lesson in the name of Jesus. Take his business down, Lord, put him on the street for a while, let him crawl around like an animal, eating grass, like Nebuchadnezzar.

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Nebuchadnezzar came out of that fine, Jesus, that's what I want for him. And I pray it in the name of Jesus, amen, right?

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Is that what it means? We know the abuse of it and so we're afraid to believe it, get it? We know the verse is abused and so therefore, because of the abuse, we don't actually believe what

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Jesus said because of its abuse. You know, churches that do that, they abuse the text on prayer and God's promises and in ungodly ways and selfish ways and so what do we do?

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As a result, we revolt from that, we see the promises of Jesus and we choose rather not to believe them because we don't want to become those people who abuse it.

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Listen, Jesus doesn't waste his words. If he said, ask me and I will give it to you, we ought to believe him when he says it.

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It's not a mistake, it's not a promise with nothing behind it, he means it.

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Jesus says he's coming again, you believe it? Do you believe it? Do you believe he's going to resurrect the just and the unjust?

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Do you believe that's a fact? Well, his word also says if you ask anything in his name, he'll give it to you.

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It's as much a promise of God as anything else. Second point of a hindrance to prayer, idols.

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Now pause, stop. Come with me on this one. This requires repentance from all of us.

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A hindrance to prayer is idolatry. We have chosen to find satisfaction in false gods rather than God and we've done it for so long, we're so good at it that we've missed

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God himself, the truly satisfying God, the real God, the true God, the actual

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God. We've chosen actually to have these broken cisterns that can hold no water.

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We've chosen the false gods over the real God. We've chosen the false pleasure, the bootleg pleasure, the bootleg joy over real delight, real joy and we've done it for so long that we have a habit now of switching

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God for the idol. And if you think Christians aren't able to do it, John says in his epistle, last line, he says, little children, that's to Christians, keep yourselves from idols.

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It is, watch, it is a natural inclination of a fallen, sinful person to go off into idols.

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What's John Calvin's famous word on this? He says, the human heart is a natural idol -making factory and it is never idle in making idols.

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It's constantly making them and Jesus saves you, gives you a new heart, draws you in a relationship with him and now the rest of your life and my life is a pursuit now of finding the idols, melting them down and destroying them.

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And every day of my life, I'm going to have to deal with idolatry and boy, do we have them today.

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We are all guilty. We are all guilty. One of the greatest, most powerful, consistent destroyers of intimacy with God is something that sits right in your pocket every day.

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Now, by the way, I don't want to be a buffoon, like there was this, I'll put it on my

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Facebook page later, remind me to do this. I watch like the 20 worst Christian sermons ever, right?

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These are the things I do on my time off, like I want to see like, well, what are they, right? And there's this really amazing one where it's this like fundamentalist, separated

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Baptist minister who's like talking about the television, he has an actual television on like stage with him.

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And he's railing against the television and how wicked it is and how evil it is. And what does he do?

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He's talking about how you can get rid of it in your house. He's like, here's what you do, y 'all, in this evil television and all the evil is bringing into our home as Christians and the evil television.

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Here's what you do. And he gets an axe. He's explaining to his congregation, he's like, this is what you do with your television.

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And your wife runs in, sees you with the axe, she won't say anything to you because you got an axe.

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And he starts swinging the axe against the television. He's like, yee -haw, breaking the television, knocking it down, destroying this wicked evil television while the sermon is being recorded.

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Do you see the contradiction? So you can't say, well, this tool has brought about a lot of sin and so therefore do away with the tool.

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No, the tool is neutral. This tool can be used for God's glory. As a matter of fact, this was given to the world by Christians.

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You're welcome. Listen to Marcus's message on Samuel Morse or my message from the conference of Douglas Wilson on the gospel and social media.

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This is a neutral tool. It can be used for the glory of God or it can be used to sin.

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It can become something that glorifies God in your life or it can become an idol that you go to for peace, that you go to for joy, that you go to for satisfaction.

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This can be one of the biggest gods in my life. And I want to say this, don't tell me that you don't have time to talk to God when

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I see you posting on Facebook constantly. Don't tell me you don't have time to talk to God when if you were to actually get those apps that record your time on the phone, you would see that you spend three hours a day on Netflix and six hours a day on Facebook.

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They say that the average person, 18 to 39 years old today, spends thousands upon thousands of hours a year on Facebook.

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So one of the greatest hindrances to prayer in our lives is the idols. And here's what you have to do with an idol when you find it.

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First and foremost, call it what it is. Second, confess sin. And third, do something about it.

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You can't say, I know this is an idol and do nothing about it. The question is, how am I going to handle this idol?

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We're all guilty. So confess our sin and let's do something about it. When Moses came down and saw them dancing around, doing a rave, they're coming down and they're doing a rave.

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It was like, you know, it was like BC era rave. They had like glow sticks and golden calf, right?

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He comes down and sees the rave happening down there. And what's he do? He has them melt down the idol and he makes them drink it.

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You like it? You want it in your life? Well, then put it into you. Drink it. Expel it.

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Let it come out his waist. It's a symbol for Moses that meant a lot to him. You melt it down and you drink it.

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So when you find an idol in your life, you need to melt that thing down and expel it his waist. Get it out of you.

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And so what's your idol? How much time do you spend on your smartphones or on the internet? How much time do you spend?

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Don't tell me you don't have time for God when you spend 20 hours a week on a smartphone.

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If you were to take it now and put all the hours together and say, this much time is spent in seeking intimacy with God.

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This much time is spent on the internet and doing mindless, mind numbing things.

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What's the balance? What do you think, guys? What do you think is the, if you could take it and make it percentage, how much time is God getting?

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How much time is this getting? Idolatry will hinder your prayers.

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So how do you repent of that? How do you confess it? What is your pattern? What's your pattern of life?

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Confess, repent, and change. Also you need accountability. Tell someone. Tell the brother or sister next to you,

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I'm not spending any time with God in prayer. Would you keep me accountable? Would you call me and ask me how my prayer life was today?

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Would you call me and ask me how much time I spent on my phone today? Keep each other accountable. Husbands and wives, keep yourselves accountable.

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We're all guilty. Little children, keep yourselves from idols is a necessary exhortation because we have a natural inclination to idolatry.

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Idols will keep you from prayer. Third point, what will keep you from prayer? Bad theology. Bad theology will keep you from prayer.

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Two points on that. One, bad theology about God as Father, and two, bad theology about the sovereignty of God.

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One, if you don't understand the beauty, the truth of God as Father, and you don't understand

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His character, and you don't believe His promises, you won't come to God in prayer. If you don't understand that your relationship with God is that of a father to a child, you won't come to God in prayer.

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If you don't believe that God's character is perfect in every aspect, you won't come to God.

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If you have broken theology, you don't come to God. How does Jesus start the

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Lord's Prayer? Our what? That's the opening.

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Jesus could have said a million things. There are so many books on prayer, 10 Steps to Better Praying, the 7

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Steps to Success in Prayer, all these ways to pray. Pray with this formula, pray with adoration, confession, all these things.

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Jesus has it like this. Here's how you pray. Our Father. First, come to God as Father.

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If you don't believe that God is your Father, you won't come to Him. It hinders your prayer life. Two, we won't pray and have a life of prayer if we don't believe that God is sovereign.

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Watch. Why pray if you don't believe that God is sovereign? This is why.

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Watch this. Every Arminian Christian is a Calvinist when they pray, because what do you do when you pray?

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People deny Reformed theology and Calvinism, and they become giants of the faith of Reformed theology when they pray.

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What do you say when you pray? Father, I pray that you open their eyes, God. God, I pray that you turn their heart to you.

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God, I pray that you'd save that person acting like somehow God has something to do with that. If your theology is bad about the sovereignty of God, you won't pray because you don't believe that God has anything to do with the world, that He can affect anything in the world.

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But if you believe what the Bible says that He does according to His will among the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and nothing can stay

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His hand. If you believe that about God, you talk to Him. You can come to God, know that I can ask

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God, and if it's according to His will, He's doing this thing. God, I believe you for this, and I don't doubt.

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I know this is according to your will. You know what's a prayer God will answer? Watch this. Guaranteed answer to prayer. Guaranteed, cannot be thwarted, absolutely will be answered.

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God, make me holy. God, change my life of prayer.

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Father, make me pray like Jesus. That's a prayer that's according to God's will.

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God, give me a prayer life that honors You. God, change the way that I pray and talk to You.

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That's a prayer that God answers. And you believe that God is sovereign over your life and your circumstances, and He can do it.

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Don't doubt, believe it. Bad theology will hinder your prayer.

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Number four, what else will hinder your prayer? Personal and unconfessed sin. Go to 2

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Chronicles 7, 14, 2 Chronicles 7, 14, personal and unconfessed sin.

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Here's the text. If my people who are called by my name humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then

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I will hear from heaven and I will forgive their sin and heal their land. It's a famous verse.

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It's powerful. God says, if you humble yourself and pray and seek

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His face and turn from your wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, I will forgive their sin and heal their land.

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Another text to go along with that is Psalm 66, 18, but the Bible teaches that when we come to God, we need to walk with integrity as we pray.

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Here's the thing, listen. The Bible does teach that He hides His face in relationship.

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In relationship, He hides His face from people who aren't walking in truth and integrity with Him.

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That it actually is true if I am walking in darkness, not in the light, if I embrace my sin,

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I love my sin, I can't expect that while I walk, contrary to the will of God, that I can come to God in prayer and that He will actually answer.

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Because the truth is, when I'm living in unconfessed sin and direct rebellion against God, God is concerned first and foremost with holiness and my sanctification.

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And God will wait until my heart is shaped and changed before He goes on answering prayer.

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That's why He says, humble yourself, confess your sins, I will heal, forgive, and heal the land.

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Number five, a hindrance to prayer is selfish motives. Go to James chapter 4 verse 3,

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James chapter 4 verse 3. This is challenging. James 4 verse 3, it says, actually let's start a little higher there, verse 2.

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You desire and do not have so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain so you fight and quarrel.

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You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions.

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Selfish motives. James is, by the way, if you didn't hear me say it,

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I want to make sure I say this because I think it's powerful. James is Jesus' half -brother.

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This has got to be one of the coolest books for me in the Bible because you have

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James, the Lord's brother, who grew up with Jesus, who knew his prayer life, who knew his manner of life, and he, in this book, it's all about wisdom.

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It's all about actual application of God's word and principles to your life.

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You got to love that about that, right? It's not just like, not to say that Paul doesn't do this, but like Paul, you have like Romans, it's like didactic, systematic explanation of the gospel, it's like point

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A, point B, point C, right? Moving through a lot of abstract concepts and ideas, all beautiful and powerful and necessary.

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But James, the Lord's brother, his whole text is on how to live, how to live.

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And he is so focused on prayer, and he opens up the book in James 1, and he says, if you lack wisdom, ask of God and he'll give it to you.

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He will give it to you. And in James 4, he says, you don't have because you don't ask.

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And when you do ask, you do it not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions.

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And I can imagine Jesus praying, and James just being a fly on the wall, watching his brother, who is

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God, commune with the Father, seeing that prayer life. What was

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James, the Lord's brother, what was his nickname in the early church? Anyone know? Anyone know?

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Leather knees. Yeah. Probably look like camel knees, right? Leather knees. So the early church has a tradition that James, the

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Lord's brother, was known as leather knees because he was constantly praying.

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Where did he learn that from? Like that affects

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James. Jesus' life of prayer had to affect James. He saw his brother constantly communing with the

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Father, and he saw his brother depending upon the Father, trusting in his word, believing him for it.

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That affected James so much that he's constantly on his knees, and he was known as leather knees because his knees are all scuffed up from being on his face before God.

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And James says, well, you don't have because you don't ask, and then when you do ask, you want to spend it on your own selfish motives.

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So selfish motives will hinder your prayer. Ask yourself that.

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Why am I praying this prayer? Why? Is it for me? Why isn't God answering my prayer? Well, what are your motives?

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Is it according to the will of God? Is it for holy purposes, or is it for selfish motives?

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Why are you praying this? Is it for God's glory? Is it for his exaltation, or is it for you?

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Why do you come to God with this? I'm not saying don't come to God. I'm saying ask about your motives.

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God, expose my motives. God, expose my heart. Ask God to deal with your motives. Next, number six.

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Another hindrance to prayer is rejecting God's word. Rejecting God's word will bring about a hindrance to prayer.

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Go to Proverbs 28 .9. Proverbs 28 .9. We're wrapping up here on the final ones.

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Proverbs 28 .9. Here's the text. If one turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination.

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That's a hindrance to prayer. Watch this. If God's word comes into your life, the law of God comes into your life, and you turn away from it, you say, no,

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I don't want to listen to it. I don't want it. It says that your prayer is an abomination to God.

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God is telling you, here's the truth. Here's my word. If you turn away from hearing God's law, it says your prayers are an abomination.

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How do you like that in modern 21st century evangelicalism in the West? We so despise

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God's law in the church. We so dis

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God's law, literally mock God's law. I have seen Christians, professing

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Christians, literally dis God's law in the Old Testament, calling it archaic, calling it harsh, unjust.

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We dis the law of God, and we think somehow we're gonna have God give us a hearing.

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It says if you turn away from hearing God's law, your prayer is an abomination to him.

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That's a hindrance to prayer. Next, number seven, and it's in the

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Lord's prayer. Unforgiving spirits. Mark 11 .25, it's in the

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Lord's prayer. The Bible teaches this. Listen, please listen, this is huge. If you don't forgive, if you're an unforgiving person, the

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Bible teaches that then you're not forgiven. And you might ask this question, well, Pastor Jeff, I thought salvation's a gift.

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I thought it's all about Jesus. It has nothing to do with me. The answer is yes, but if you've experienced that, if you've experienced

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God's forgiveness and his grace, if you've tasted and seen, if you've come to God and had all your sins washed away, then forgiven people forgive.

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It happens because God's there. It happens because you've been before the throne of God condemned, and now you're washed and you're forgiven.

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Jesus teaches forgiven people forgive. If you hold onto bitterness and anger and unforgiveness, the

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Bible teaches clearly if you don't forgive, you are not forgiven.

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And the Bible says clearly, Jesus teaches, Mark 11 .25, if you don't forgive your brother,

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God isn't answering your prayers. So we're on the final points here.

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This is just quick now. Can I ask you to examine that? Seriously, stop for a moment now. Don't let it pass you by.

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I want you to examine yourself, please, in this moment. Are you harboring bitterness and unforgiveness in your heart from somebody?

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Are you holding something against somebody? You know it's there. It's tucked away. You try to pretend like you're not.

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It's there. There's bitterness and anger. You're still holding it over their heads. Is there somebody you haven't forgiven?

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Are you hanging on to it? Because Jesus teaches forgiven people forgive, and if you don't forgive your brother,

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God's not hearing your prayers. Hearing in the sense of he's hearing your prayers. He's not answering your prayers.

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He's not coming and pretending like all is well. You see, you and I are the light of God into the world.

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We are imaging God in his created order. God intends for his image in the world to walk like him.

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God forgives sinners. You and I have to forgive others. What's the famous parable of the unmerciful servant?

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What is it, right? He comes before this master who, he has a debt he could never repay, not in numerous lifetimes.

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Couldn't do it, never happened, and the master says, you're forgiven for free. You go, you're free to go.

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And then what's he do? This servant goes over to another servant who owes him a penny. And he literally says, he chokes him.

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He's so angry. He chokes him. He says, you pay me what you owe me.

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That story doesn't end well for that unmerciful servant. How can we do that?

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How can we hold something against somebody in this world? They desire our forgiveness.

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They're asking us for it. We won't give it. We're still unmerciful. We're still unforgiving, acting like, watch, we have a higher standard than God.

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Bible teaches that an unforgiving spirit will hinder your prayers. Final point, eight, marital sin.

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First Peter 3, seven. First Peter 3, seven.

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Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

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Oh boy. Husbands, the text says, live with your wife in an understanding way, show honor to the woman as the weaker vessel.

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They're heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

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So you mean that strife in the home, difficulty in relationships in the home, hinders my prayer life?

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Yeah. If your prayers aren't being answered by God, you ought to come to God and ask

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God, examine my heart. Am I living in a way that's dishonoring to you with my wife?

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Is the reason, God, you're not answering these prayers, you're not showing up in this way, are my prayers being hindered because of conflict between my wife and I?

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Now some wives might be thinking right now, this is a pretty powerful tool. It's an amazing gift.

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But you know, of course, it is also in the inverse. Wives, it works the other way around too.

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Of course, this is on the husband. Husbands, you do these things so that your prayer may not be hindered, but of course, the point is in family relationships, if we're in conflict and strife with one another, bitterness and unforgiveness, if there's constant attack and no peace, if it's turmoil, if it's just simple behavior in the marriage,

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Paul says, your prayers are hindered. So husbands, repent.

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Love your wives. Walk with mercy towards one another, but husbands especially, you're the head of the home.

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You represent the family before God. You are the head of the home. You represent the family before God.

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You offer a covering to the family, a shepherding to the family. If there is strife in your home, particularly between you and your wife, it says your prayers can be hindered.

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So watch, all of these instances where you have strife between you and your wife, and you let that hang for day after day after day, or you have the silent treatment situation, you know what

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I'm saying? Well, nobody in here knows what that is, right, okay? That's where you have conflict in your home, and you decide, well, here's how

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I'll settle this. We won't talk to each other for two or three days. We'll act like all is well, but there won't be any real fellowship, any real communion.

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Here's the point. If we live like that, expect this. Our Father in heaven is not hearing our prayers when we embrace that kind of strife.

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Husbands and wives, your relationship with one another directly impacts your relationship with the

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Father. You can't say my relationship with God is good, but my relationship with everybody else is marked by hostility and difficulty and strife and division.

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If all my earthly relationships are broken, if there's constant hostility and difficulty, you can expect that that impacts your relationship with the

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Father. The Bible teaches that our relationship with God impacts our relationship with others.

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Our relationship with others impacts our relationship with God. How intimately? Well, it's a kind of intimate way like Matthew 25.

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When I was in prison, you visited me. When I was thirsty, you gave me something to drink. And they'll say on the last day, the saints will say, what?

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God, when did we visit you? When did we give you something to drink? When did we give you something to eat? And Jesus says, as much as you did it for the least of these, you did it unto me.

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Our relationship with God is impacted by our relationship with one another.

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So husbands and wives, here's the answer. Repent, confess, walk humbly with one another.

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Those are my eight hindrances to prayer. And this is my final word. Brothers and sisters, next week we're just gonna go through the

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Lord's Prayer together. Final message on prayer. Can I ask you to do this over this next week?

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Would you seek the Lord, seek his face over your life of prayer in light of these hindrances to prayer?

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There are other things I could have brought up and talked about, but these are, I think, some highlight ones, some banner ones.

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Would you do this? If you wrote these down in these texts, would you go to these texts this week and would you ask

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God to deal with your heart over these hindrances to prayer? My desire is that God would shape us as a church into a praying church.