Praying Through Scripture (part 2)

Okay, what I want you to do now is to take your Bible or Pew Bible if you didn't bring one, but each individual should have a

Bible and I want you to find a psalm to pray through I'm gonna give you just a few minutes to try this on your own in a moment

If you want to take one of the psalms of the day It's gonna be 25 55 85 1 15 145.

This is one of the best groups of five In terms of almost all of them are fairly easy to pray through Psalm 23 is such an easy one to pray through the imprecatory psalms aren't as easy if you take any group of five

Sometimes only two or three are easy. Sometimes all five of them are pretty easy today is one of those days But it doesn't have to be one of the psalms of the day.

It can be just a favorite But don't take more than a few seconds here to find one to pray through and in a moment

I'm going to when I say go if you want to move around, you know You want to go to the back of the room somewhere else, please feel free to do that.

I may leave the room But when I say go It's just like for us to not have any whispering or talking because we're only gonna have just a precious few minutes

Anyway, we don't want to distract Others by whispering. So if you want to move go to a corner of the room, whatever feel free to do that But if you would just immediately get into prayer, we'll have so little time and then a few minutes

I'll call us back to prayer and Guys in the back when I when I come up and stand here at the front you can turn the microphone back on Then at that point so any questions about that?

All right. I'll come back and call us back in just a few minutes. Let's pray Let's hate to interrupt people when they're praying

How did it go why was it easier

Okay, so they kept bringing fresh things to mind to pray about good someone else what so it's a flow meaning

Okay, you didn't Bits and starts weren't bogged down. Okay, great

It's a more God -centered way of praying isn't it? It's not just Lord. Here's my list again But it's the things that God wants us to talk about things on his heart

Someone else how'd it go? Focus is your thoughts, right?

Yeah, your mind doesn't wonder when it does Got something to come back to the next verse, right?

It's not okay. What can I think of now to pray that you don't have to think of it? Let's come back to the next verse

Someone else how'd it go? Yes, so it springs you into Spring boards into praying other scriptures as well.

Others come to mind to pray that you have that experience as well good Which is going to happen more than just saying the same old things about the same old things, right?

Okay, so when you get distracted you pray about the distraction. All right someone else

Yes, okay.

So it brings together those different aspects of prayer You've taught that I'm sure as I have, you know those that outline that acrostic for prayer a

CTS, you know begin with adoration Confession Thanksgiving supplication, but you know after a while that can become the same old thing if it's up to you

Okay, I'm gonna start with adoration how am I going to do with the Lord today? well Say it's what

I said yesterday, you know, I'll adore the Lord like I did yesterday And it becomes the same thing

Whereas you pray this way you will find that most of those elements are in all those Psalms Maybe not maybe not in that order

Psalm 51 starts with a confession Is that okay? How do we know it's okay?

Yeah, God wrote he can mess up our outline if he wants to right and Psalm 150 some or nothing but praise that's okay, too

But I believe you'll pray through the scripture You'll find most of those elements in most of the Psalms at least prompted by them from not there on the text

They're prompted by that Good someone else. Sorry Meaning yeah.

Yeah, it's more God -centered way more Doctrinally sound more focused on the right things good someone else.

Yes Yeah Well, you only had about seven or eight minutes

But most of you appeared to be pretty well in the prayer when I came back you could have continued on couldn't you a lot?

easier And you know what if this will work late on Friday night the tiredest time of the week

This will work anytime All right over here some hands You yeah, we're told pray in the spirit

There's a greater sense of that right the more confidence that that's the case when we're praying through scripture

He said like an immediate almost like an immediate audience with the

Lord. It's more like a real conversation with a real person, isn't it? And isn't that the way prayer ought to be?

Because we are having a real conversation with a real person, right? But the difference is

We're not having to imagine God saying things to us away with that This is

God speaking, isn't it? This is God's Word. It is God speaking to me and to us and So like a real conversation with a real person he speaks and Then I respond to what he says

And when I've said everything I want to say then what do you do in a real conversation with a real person?

You let the other person speak you go the next verse and he speaks and you simply respond to that You said all you want to say you let him speak again.

See how easy that is You are freed from the burden of thinking you have to come up with everything that's going to be said in this conversation

Somehow we've gotten into our heads if we have this conversation with God, whatever's gonna be said, we've got to say it all and God's like They're okay.

Come on. I've got a universe to run here What is it didn't you say that yesterday and thousand times before Think I've forgotten

But it's not like that You're freed from the burden of thinking everything's gonna be said you've got to say it and what tends to happen

Well, since we don't have the time or the creative energy to talk about the same things every day

We default into saying pretty much the same things about the same old things and we're bored by that when it's boring

It's hard to pray You are freed from that Burden, don't you hate it when you you are in a situation?

Do you feel like you're having to carry the whole burden of the conversation? husbands protect your ribs from That sort of thing but husbands have been there too

Husbands have been there too. I when I was pastoring people would visit our church and I would Talk to some of these guys and say well

Understand you visited our church Sunday Yeah Well good

Glad you were with us Do you enjoy time with us at our church Sunday? Yeah, well good

Uh Glad you did. We're glad to have you. I'm here to talk to you about that answer any questions

You have you have any questions about about our church? No Come on, man.

Help me out, you know Carry your end of this conversation We hate to be in that conversation especially and if it's all the time and somehow we've got

Into believing that that's the way it is with God. We come to God. He's up there waiting Yeah And we've got to come up with everything's gonna be said and since we hope we're gonna talk about the same things pretty much

Because our lives consist pretty much of the same things, right? Thank the Lord those six things we talked about.

Thank the Lord. They don't change dramatically very often Our family doesn't change dramatically very often

You know, our finances don't change dramatically very often. Our work doesn't change dramatically very often. Thank the Lord So if we're gonna pray about the same things

You know, that's pretty normal Who's got the time or the creative energy to come up with brand new ways to talk about the same things every day?

No one But we don't have to let God come up With new ways to talk about them.

Let him initiate the conversation and you simply respond Anybody can do that So today you may want to talk about being your shepherd the next day.

He wants to talk about his glory Next day he wants to talk about his will for your future.

So I'm 25, you know seeking his will so forth You just respond. That's easy.

Anybody can do that Someone else how to go Anybody?

Yes Go ahead. Yeah, just open the

Word of God and talk about where whatever it is on whatever page that's why I said once you've done this you can open any part of the

Bible and You won't need notes to remember have to do how to do it again next time. Will you?

Once you've done it, it's just so simple Which brings me to this point if you ever teach this to anybody else and it's so transferable

You may not have a couple of hours as I've had to do it. You may not have but 30 minutes But there's two things you must do

You must do if you ever teach this to anybody else first and most importantly give them a chance to try it right then

Otherwise, they'll walk out saying that's a good idea I'll have to try that someday and they never will but now that you've done it even just seven minutes

Some of you are hooked You'll never again Pray the same way you'll never again say the same old things about the same old things because of that seven minutes and You'll never forget how it's like riding a bicycle you never forget and you'll never need notes

To remember how to do it. So give them a chance to try it right then

Second have some opportunity for feedback The testimonial benefit that comes from that is often very powerful as well as giving an opportunity to To teach from that.

I always get the same sort of comments. It's a more God -centered way You know my mind didn't wander

Time seemed to pass so quickly It's it spun off so many other ideas and things especially from scripture to pray about and but there's a there's a great benefit of Hearing you say that rather than me say that sometimes

Especially when everyone can affirm. Yeah, that was my experience too. Just like yours Give them a chance to try it right then give an opportunity for some for some feedback

And one of the questions often get about this is what about a prayer list? Well, I've done this a couple of ways

Back and forth the last 25 years or so. I tend to just let the scripture suggest my prayer list for that day

But if you find yourself failing to pray about some things you want to more consistently pray about you can use a prayer

List you can incorporate a prayer list. It might look something like this You read the Lord is my shepherd who my prayer list needs shepherding

Shall not want who over here needs is in want and so forth So you can you can't accommodate a prayer list or you can just let the scriptures give you the prayer list

Spontaneously as you go through them That day. Uh -huh

Yeah Well, we're gonna come just briefly in a moment to how to do this with with a group but both of you guys have mentioned something here that That's very important is that you'll by praying this way

You'll find yourself praying about some things that you know are on God's heart and things You normally wouldn't think to pray about at least in that way

I'm not gonna call on anybody so don't be afraid to raise your hand But how many of you did find yourself praying about some things?

You normally wouldn't think to pray about can I see your hand? It's just about everybody now But how many of you also found yourself praying about the things you normally do want to pray about I see your hand

Yeah, it's just about everybody isn't it amazing by going through the Psalms like this You'll pray as you've pointed out here.

You'll things will come to mind that normally wouldn't think to come to mind They're not on your list. If your prayer list were as big as the

Boston phone directory You wouldn't think to put these things on a prayer list But you pray for them and they ought to because they're on God's heart but you'll also find yourself praying about the the big six things in your life that Comprise your life

But you'll pray about them differently At the seminary just about you know several times every day

The beginning of class I actually use this But if I didn't it'd be it's the same prayer every day

You know bless the class several times a day how many ways can you think of to say bless the class?

But If we pray through Psalm 23, it's Lord shepherd us in this class today

If it's Psalm 51, it's Lord Forgive us for not always applying our minds as we ought to our studies if it's

Psalm 139 Lord We sense and acknowledge your presence here in room 103 Today, it's the same prayer bless the class and yet it's different every time

It's the same prayer but coming through a different the filter of a different Psalm It's different and so though you pray about the same things

Every time are you prep out the same things through a different Psalm Lord shepherd my family today

There's just something different about that shepherding imagery that energizes your prayer. These are inspired words

And the next day, it's you pray for the same family, but you pray about different things It's the same prayer, you know bless my family, but it's different every day

And it's not just different though. That alone is worth it It's not just different the words we're using are inspired words is a supernatural quality to them

Well, let's see what we've learned here tonight What we've said is that this prayer request whether it's let's just call it praying for your family one way or another

What we usually do is come at it the same old gray colorless way if we could have that the same old things

About the same old things. That's what we usually do But now what we've learned is that we come at the same things.

They're the same old way. We have a Different way to pray. Let's say today you pray about your children your family from Psalm 23 in there

It's Lord. Please shepherd my family today make them your sheep and so forth and just the freshness of The of the new imagery energizes your prayer, but it's not just that it's different These are inspired words the next day

You may pray from 1st Corinthians 13 asking that God would cause your children to manifest 1st

Corinthians 13 kind of love the next day it may be from Psalm 1 You ask the

Lord to make your children meditators on the Word of God Isn't that a wonderful thing to pray for your children or grandchildren?

But would you ever think to pray that if you didn't pray through Psalm 1 the next day?

It may be that you'd pray that they would manifest the fruit of the Spirit the next day You may pray that they would sense the presence of God wherever they go.

It's the same prayer Bless my family, but it's different every day

But it's not just Fresh and novel we should pray these kinds of things

But these are things that are these are inspired words that we're using

Furthermore the Bible says we must pray in accordance with his will first John says for our prayers to be answered, right?

Can you have any greater assurance that you're praying in accordance with the will of God than the pray the Word of God? So there's so many reasons so many benefits to praying this way

Now sometimes I'm asked what about praying through scripture with a group go ahead and run all three of those bullet points up there I'm not going to spend much time on this because It just takes a little bit of time

We we may have a handout for you before this is over that you can get this on my website I can tell you more about where to get that later

But the most important thing you brought this up About doing this together you don't want to try to pray through scripture with a group

Unless the people have done it individually if we had tried to do this as a group 30 minutes ago

It would have been a disaster You have a better idea about how to do that now because each of you have done it individually

You have an idea of what it's like people need to have experienced it individually before they try corporately I mean corporate prayer is always more difficult almost always than individual prayer anyway

So people need to have some experience in this Now if you do if you take this down or later if you have it

I just want you to remember that we've got good better and best here First one's good.

It can work. You just assign each person if this is my class if this is my family So you take the first verse you take the second verse you take third verse you take the fourth verse and we pray we get

Started okay Doing fine second verse third verse, but his verse is Oh Lord dash your children's heads against the rock smash your teeth

And he doesn't know what to say Or he's embarrassed. You know it's So it can work it can backfire to read the psalm aloud dad and this this group may be family

One of the things I'm very big on right now is family worship the latest book I've written a CD where I basically preach the book is on family worship

Maybe a Sunday school class maybe a whole churchwide prayer meeting Second way may be to read the psalm aloud dad or group leader or have each person read it silently

Sometimes I've done it this way to say okay everyone listen I'm gonna read this psalm or I may say look here are the five psalms of the day you pick one and Read it silently.

I'm gonna give everybody a few minutes And then after that I would say now we're going to pray and I want you to pray as many

Of you as are willing. I want you to pray aloud Starting with a verse that impressed you in the reading of this song if more than one person chooses the same verse fine

That can work very well Unless people Get off of that verse

As long as that verse is sort of the springboard into prayer, that's fine But once they get off of that it can begin sounding like the same old things about the same old things

Perhaps best is to read the psalm aloud then you as the leader call out one at a time as needed the phrases

Are the the verses that are the most conducive to prayer? That with it that are the common denominator in terms of ease

So if I'm the prayer leader I might call out verses like the Lord is my shepherd and I'm gonna skip verses like dash the children's heads against the rock

Okay, I'm gonna pick and choose I'm just gonna the psalm that I've read.

I'm just gonna call out Phrases and as many will respond to that if I call out the

Lord as my shepherd and several people pray about the Lord's shepherding in various ways

And when it's quiet I call out the next phrase and so I just throw out the ones out there that are easy

For people to pray from. All right, let's let's move on here. I have my students read the biography of George Mueller In fact, we discussed this in class

Just yesterday and had a slide presentation on the life of George Mueller considered by many the greatest man of prayer and faith in the history of the church

He lived almost all the 1800s in Bristol, England He had four very significant ministries, but he's known almost exclusively for his orphanage

He would in a time in Dickensian England when otherwise they would have been beggars on the street

You know Oliver Twist like like situations Mueller fed clothed housed and educated as many as 2 ,000 orphans at a time over 10 ,000 in his lifetime

Without asking for money just praying for God to provide of course at the end of every year He would produce these annual reports in which he would talk about how

God had Provided how they'd use the money and in those reports by implication let people know that he would gladly receive gifts to the ministry but he never made the needs known or asked for money and He had in those annual reports over 50 ,000 specific recorded answers to prayer 30 ,000 of which he said were answered the same day or the same hour

That he prayed them now there are some people he prayed for for their salvation for 60 years before some of them were saved, but God funneled over half a billion dollars in today's money through Mueller's hand

That's just one of the most remarkable stories. You'll ever read in your life Well George Mueller said that for 10 years into his life of faith

Not when he's a nobody, but he's already known around the world as the great man of prayer and faith

He's been known like this for several years now. He said for 10 years into that life His habit was after getting dressed in the morning.

He would pray until breakfast And sometimes it took him half an hour to an hour

He said before he really got into the spirit of prayer and only then did he really begin to pray

So he would try to pray 30 minutes an hour like trying to start an old lawnmower, you know, that's his heart

He tried to get his heart going finally after a half an hour an hour Okay. All right. Now I feel like pray.

I feel like praying that now I really am pray What do we do five minutes? seven minutes

Cranking on our cold heart. We just kind of grind that out. It's just Judy prayer. Just obligatory prayer We do it because we know we're supposed to do it.

Mueller would keep going until he felt like praying But that often took half an hour to an hour until he said he made one slight alteration in his prayer life

What do you think it was? He began to pray through scripture And he said after that I scarcely ever suffered this way anymore

We think of Mueller's a man who could spend hours on his knees and I suppose he could do that What he typically did he had these five big orphaned houses on dozens and dozens of acres

His quarters were in orphan house number three and they had this brick wall around the perimeter of the property

And he would walk behind that brick wall Take his Bible. He would pray through a passage of scripture Then got to be that people would come out to watch the great man of prayer pray

Well, it gave him the willies just like it would you so he had him build the brick wall real high and he walked behind This wall he prayed he said after he started praying like that.

He scarcely ever suffered Anymore and I can say that since the first of march 1985

Praying this way there is nothing That more quickly kindles my cold heart than praying through scripture

I almost never go to prayer feeling like praying And then charles spurgeon that great british baptist preacher of the 1800s he wrote of your pastor and myself and so many

Said somewhere we ought to pray when we Feel like it Well, I began by saying we don't pray because we don't feel like it but he said we ought to pray when we feel like it because it would be a

Shame to miss such an opportunity But he also said we should pray when we don't feel like it because it would be shame to remain in such a condition

And why can't I think of things like that Well indeed

We don't pray because we don't feel like it you get up at 6 30 or 7 in the morning to pray You don't feel like praying

Cheer up. You're normal You know why you don't feel like it. You're sleepy And you haven't been thinking of god and the things of god for the last six or seven hours you've been dead to the world

So we don't normally wake up with our hearts just instantly on fire for the things of god I mean if george mueller didn't wake up feeling like praying don't be

Surprised if you don't wake up feeling like praying but god said to jeremiah is not my word like a hammer and a

Fire it's like a hammer that breaks hard hearts. My word is like a fire that melts cold hearts

You wake up in the morning. Your heart is cold. You're normal But the good news is we're not subject to those feelings

We can take the fire of god's word and plunge it into our cold hearts so that by 6 35

Just like by 8 35 tonight You begin to feel like praying

If this will work Late on friday night the tiredest time of the week. This will work in the mornings and any other time

Well in closing we'll ask you to turn to acts chapter 4 we're going to put these three texts up there on the

On the overhead. Let me tell you about the first day while you look at acts chapter 4 on the cross

Jesus as you know said Only seven brief things

Brief because he had been nearly whipped to death He was in agony He was dehydrated

And as you know as he was hanging on the cross to get enough breath to speak you had to push up Which would just bring agony on the his feet that were spiked to the cross

But you have to push up on that spike get enough air to breathe. In fact, as you know, that's how they when they wanted to Finally kill them they would break their legs and they couldn't push up anymore and they would die of asphyxiation

So everything he said was very brief, but the longest of the seven things that jesus said was this my god

Why? have you Forsaken me Which is the first verse of?

psalm 22 And psalm 22 is prophetic about what?

The crucifixion there are more details about the physical aspects of crucifixion in psalm 22

Then all the rest of the bible put together all the gospels two of the four gospels simply say they took him and crucified him

And he goes on But we learn more about the physical details of crucifixion in psalm 22. My my tongue cleaves to my jaws.

They can count all my bones They pierced me and all these other things two things lengthy statements said at the foot of the cross

Were prophesied verbatim in psalm 22 That's the passage in the bible

Prophesying what jesus was going through on the cross. I'm confident. That's what jesus that jesus was praying through that psalm

That was the passage About what he was undergoing Now to some degree that's speculation

But we know this we know he prayed the first verse And because he could only speak so briefly i'm confident he's telling us that he was praying through the whole psalm

By telling us that first verse and then continue to pray through that psalm and then at the end psalm 23

Into your hands I commit my spirit from psalm 31

Jesus prayed the psalms And actually chapter 4 peter and john had been threatened

When they've been released verse 23 says They went to their own companions. They went back to the church

And reported all that the chief priests and the elders had said to them And when they heard this they lifted their voice to god with one accord and said oh lord

It is you Who made the heavens and the earth and the sea and all that is in them in your bible? It may be in small capital letters of quotation marks.

Many believe this was from psalm 146 Verse 25 who by the holy spirit through the mouth of our father david your servant said why did the gentiles rage?

And the people's devised futile things Second half of verse 25 all of verse 26 is from where?

psalm 2 the early church Prayed the psalms

Jesus prayed the psalms the early church prayed the psalms go thou

And do likewise Now I began by saying that there's this common almost universal problem in prayer.

See You've got personal spiritual disciplines and interpersonal spiritualism those that we practice alone

Those that we practice with other people. We're to pray alone. The bible says We're also to pray with the church

We're to worship god privately. We're to worship god with the church The two most important personal spiritual disciplines are the intake of the word of god and prayer

With both of them. There's an almost universal problem With prayer the problem is that we tend to say what?

same old things but same old things and that's boring when it's boring We don't pray

We don't feel like praying but there's a simple solution It's got to be simple because god expects all of his people to pray right he gives all of us some privilege of prayer

And so he it has to be simple and the simple answer is to pray through a passage of scripture particularly a psalm

With the other of the most important personal spiritual disciplines the intake of the word of god There's another similar almost universal problem and here it is

It's it's true for our most committed daily bible readers Who by the grace of god they intend to read their bible every day of their life?

They read a chapter they read three chapters. However much it is they close their bible and on most days if pressed they would have to admit what

I don't remember a thing. I read it's not your age

It's not your iq It's not your educational level. It's your Method and there's a simple solution.

It's got to be simple Because god intends all of his people to profit satisfyingly from the word of god, right people all over the world

High low iqs and high everything else Tomorrow we talk about the solution to that problem

Let's pray together. The psalmist said oh you who hears prayer

We thank you lord 6 .7 billion people in the world And us here in this corner of it you hear our prayers and at the throne of heaven

You hear what we say at this point at this moment And like the apostles who came to jesus and said lord teach us to pray that's our prayer teach us to pray as jesus pray

As the early church pray as george muller prayed teach us to pray Cause there to be much lasting fruit from this evening together