Pray According To The Power At Work Within Us

Good morning, church. We're glad you're here. You're well. You're healthy. Some of the brothers and sisters and families are out because of health reasons.

And we think of them, remember them in our prayers. We do want to turn our attention to the preaching and reading of God's word this morning from Ephesians chapter 3.

And as soon as you have the reading from Ephesians chapter 3, starting with verse 14, I do ask that you stand for the reading of God's word.

Again, the reading is from Ephesians, the third chapter. Starting in verse 14, hear ye this morning the word of the

Lord. Paul says, for this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend of all the saints what is the breadth, the length, the height, and the depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled of all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever, amen.

You may be seated. May I ask the

Father's blessing over our message. Father, we do thank you that every tribe, every nation, every people find its origin in you, the

Father of the celestial lights, to whom there is no variation like casting shadows. God, we thank you that this morning you have brought us here to this place of worship.

We think of our brothers and sisters who are out with COVID or other ailments or our family things that are going around in their lives, and we pray,

God, that you'd meet all their needs according to your riches and mercy in Christ Jesus. We thank you, God, that you are a

God who hears us, not because of any merit that we have earned, but because of the shed blood of your son,

Jesus Christ, to whom belongs all the glory, who alone is worthy, and we ask these things in Jesus' name, amen.

Well, church, last week, I preached through Ephesians 3, verses 14 to 19.

Today, the main passage is gonna be verses 20 and 21. However, I will be going back into some of the verses that we went into last week as a way of reminder so that it can kind of bring together today's message in a coherent way, and today's topic is the topic of prayer.

I want you to know that prayer is such an important thing in the Christian life. It is often one of the things that we take most for granted.

When we pray, and we come to church, and we hear prayer, and we see people praying, we have a prayer service at 2 p .m.

every Sunday as well. We pray for a purpose and for a reason, and today,

I wanna discuss to you what it is exactly that we do when we pray, and what is prayer.

See, the Apostle Paul ends his treatise on the mystery of the gospel of Christ from chapter three, verses one through 13.

Paul's talking about the mystery, the unraveling of the mystery of God's will for us through the gospel, and God's mystery, get this, is that at one time, a long time ago,

God had only one covenant people. God made a promise to a man named

Abraham and said that through him, he would be the father of many and that his seed would be as innumerable as the stars, and yet Paul, understanding that God used a particular people one time, a long time ago, is now revealing to us in the fullness of time through the incarnation of Jesus Christ by means of his death, burial, and resurrection, that God has opened a new and a better way for us to have access, fellowship, communion with the holy

God of the universe, and what God did is that he opened a way for people who are both

Jew and Gentile to know, experience, and be in fellowship with the

God of the universe. How amazing is that? That God throughout redemptive history has been unraveling this mystery that is ultimately fulfilled in the person and work of Jesus Christ.

Paul, unraveling this mystery for us in verse 14, then goes on to pray a prayer of exaltation to the father where he says in verse 14, for this reason,

I bow my knees before the father. For this reason being the reason of the unraveling of God's mystery through the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, that Jesus is now the savior not only for the

Jews, but also for the Gentiles, that salvation has come to the household, not of just of Israel, but to the whole world, and that the nations can now serve and worship the

God of Israel through the person and work of Christ. And for this reason, Paul bows his knees, he bends his knee before the father from whom every family and heaven on earth is named.

Verse 16 says that according to the riches of His glory, that He may grant you to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in your inner being.

Paul is now praying for the strength of the saints to be strengthened in their inner man that is the true self.

You are a composite, dear brother and sister. You are not just merely the flesh in which you inhabit.

There is something greater, deeper within you that makes you who you truly are. I wanna give you an example of that.

For four years, I was an addiction counselor in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, and I used to work in a program called

Breakout at a facility called Hope Mission. And this was my dream job.

I absolutely loved this job. And part of my job was I was a case manager and I worked with men, particularly men 18 and over who had addiction problems in their lives.

And one of the things that we also provided in our facilities was what was called a detox center.

So if someone came to our facility and they were intoxicated or coming off of any drugs or alcohol, we'd put them into this detox center which would meet their physical needs and rehabilitation.

Because someone who is using drugs and they're coming off of the drugs, it is extremely gruesome the things that their body goes through.

It's called withdrawals. And when they're going through withdrawals, their body just is going through a terrible time of transition as they're coming off the drugs.

Now, what we noticed, however, is while these folks are detoxing, at about two weeks, the body is completely detoxed.

And people who are naturalists, who believe that the body, the physical life is all that there is, would imagine that maybe after, as soon as the drugs are out of their system, they're good, right?

They've got no trace of that chemical dependency anymore. There's no trace of the drug in them.

There's nothing biologically in them that would have them go back to their drug or lifestyle of choice.

Now, the reality is, is that a person can go to a rehab center, can become detox, get the drugs out of their system.

And yet, the true problem has not been solved. Why? Because dear brother and sister, the truth is, is that the problem that we all face is usually more interior than exterior.

It usually deals with the heart and not the biology. It deals with the inner man more than it does the outer man.

But what we see, if all that which we see, the outer man, the physical man, the outer self, if that's all that there is, then people who are in detox and as soon as they get off that chemical dependency, they should be good.

But they're not. Because the reality of the fact is this, that every single person made in the image of God was made both of a flesh, an exterior, and with an interior that cannot be seen with human eyes, but is rather experienced.

It's lived. It's the true you. It's the inner man, your soul and spirit that God fashioned and created.

This is what it means when God's word refers to being strengthened in the inner man.

You are again a composite. You're not just flesh.

You're not just soul. You are body and soul. You are both of these things coexisting in one being.

But when we treat people in addictions, for instance, we can't just treat the physical because then that will not solve the problem of the spiritual.

Man is both physical and spiritual. Paul, recognizing this truth, gives all the glory to the

Father, the maker of heaven and earth, of whom every family on earth is named. And he says in verse 16 again that according to the riches of his glory, he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his spirit in your inner being.

Brothers and sisters, we are in desperate need of strength. And I would even go as far as to say that we are in desperate need of strength when we pray.

When we pray, not only do we ask for strength, but we can receive it and we also need it even to utter words when we speak to the magnificent presence of the

Lord God Almighty. Paul again ends this treatise on the mystery of the gospel with a prayer of thanks to the

Father. And it culminates in this wonderful, God -exalting doxology, the doxology of praise and glory to God.

Again, in verses 14 to 21, Paul offers his prayer and praise to God. And in it, we learn about the power of prayer and the privilege that is ours as Christians to be recipients of the grace and the mystery of God.

If you're following along in today's insert, I want you to follow and write this along in the first line.

Prayer is communion. So the question is, what is prayer?

Why do we pray? First and foremost, prayer is communion.

Think of what that word means. When we think of the word communion, maybe we think of the communion table, the elements that we see in the table that we receive on the

Lord's day every Sunday. Maybe we think of a communion of fellowship or discussion.

We think of a relationship. Well, all these things are true, brothers and sisters, but in the reality of what prayer is, prayer is humble speech to an exalted

God. Prayer is when the creature gets to commune, speak with the

Creator. You may not realize the weight of that in this moment, because likely all of you here have prayed, you've been prayed for.

But friends, I want to lay on you the gravity of what I speak of today.

The gravity is this. You, dear brother and sister, dear friend, creatures of the dirt that God made

Adam and Eve. Remember in the garden, he says that he grabbed man from the dirt, from the dust of the earth.

He fashioned and molded and breathed into him the breath of life. That's the soul life. And then he became a living soul.

Became a living being. When you, dear creature of the dirt, get to commune and speak with the holy

God, Yahweh. How amazing is that?

I can barely contain myself when I think of it. Genuinely, because I know who and what

I am. But I also, in prayer, get to see who and what he is.

And in doing so, I recognize that my feebleness, my weakness, my humanity in my flesh and in my soul, that I am in desperate need of my

Creator. And out of that recognition, I also get to speak with the one who made me.

This is no mere trivial matter, dear friend. This is incredible, awe -inspiring.

Because you and I can have fellowship, communion, and speak with the grand

Creator of us all. Imagine the privilege that would be yours if you got to speak to a dignitary.

If you got a phone call from the President of the United States or the Queen of England, or your favorite artist, or your favorite philosopher or theologian, whatever the case may be.

Imagine the privilege that you would feel if you got a phone call from such a person.

They want to talk to you. Like me? You want to speak to me? But why would you want to do that?

I've got nothing to give. I've got nothing to offer. And friends, that's the reality that we get to enjoy every single day.

In prayer. That God not only commands but He desires for us to approach

Him in prayer. And He wants to hear from you. He wants to know your day.

He wants to know your heart. He wants to be in relationship and fellowship with you. With me, a sinner.

One who is made of the dirt and yet God exalted above all the heavens wants to speak with me.

And wants me to speak with Him. That truly is mind -blowing.

It's truly amazing. Prayer is communion with God.

It's fellowship. It's a relationship. So when we ask ourselves, why should we pray? Why is it so important that we pray?

Why does this church here pray so often and so much? Why do we dedicate a whole hour of our afternoon at 2 p .m.

when we gather again for our prayer service? Why do we spend so much time on prayer? Friends, that's why.

Because really the privilege is ours that we can be friends of God and we can approach

Him in prayer. But we approach Him only in and through the name of Jesus.

So if you're following along that last part, prayer is communion with God that is done through Jesus Christ.

I want you, if you can, turn to John chapter 14. John the 14th chapter.

I want to read to you what the words of the Lord Jesus Christ was to His disciples in John 14.

Verse 13 and 14. Christ our

Savior said the following, again, John 14. And starting in verse 13,

He says, Whatever you ask in My name, this

I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the

Son. Verse 14. If you ask Me anything in My name,

I will do it. Do you see the power of prayer?

Do you see the power that is to approach the Father in the name of Jesus Christ, our blessed

Savior? That not only do we speak about this deity, this Creator, this

God in the abstract, but we can know Him personally in and through Jesus Christ.

And Jesus Christ, notice what the Lord Himself says again. He says, Whatever you ask in My name,

I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. God is glorified when we approach

Him in Jesus. Incredible. So why ought we to pray, friends?

Because God is glorified when we approach Him in Christ. God is magnified and made great when we come to God in Jesus' name.

Now, I want to also unravel this in your Bible study earlier this morning. We went a little bit into this.

But I want you to know that we as Christians, we approach God in prayer through and in the name of Jesus.

So you'll recognize when we pray, we often say in the beginning or end, we say, In the name of Jesus, or in Jesus' name, we pray,

Amen. I want you to know that that is not some simple incantation.

This isn't some version of a good luck charm so that we can, you know, reach the ears of a divine

God. Instead, I want you to know that when we say in the name of Jesus, it is to recognize the means by which we approach the

Father. And it's more of a heart and mindset than it is words that come flowing from our mouth.

We approach God in and through the name of Jesus, particularly because of what

Jesus has done for sinners. What has He done for sinners? Well, in the fullness of time,

God sent forth His Son to be born of the Virgin, to be a holy, perfect, blameless man, never sinned, never fell short of the mark.

And the Bible says that He offered His life, His blood as a ransom for many.

That is to say that in the Old Testament, if you remember, prayers were made to Yahweh in no particular name.

In the Old Testament, there's no call to pray in the name of. They would just pray to Yahweh.

But what was underpinning that prayer life, what was underpinning that prayer language in the

Old Covenant, in the Old Testament, was the sacrificial system.

The sacrificial system that we saw instituted in the temple worship was the means in which

God's people can be forgiven of their sins and approach God who is holy so an unholy people can approach a holy

God through the shed blood of another. But we know from the Bible that even in the

Old Testament and we see in Hebrews, in the book of Hebrews, that the blood of goats and the blood of bulls were only a temporary shelter for sin.

They themselves could not actually fulfill and appease the obligation of sin, but they were simply meant to be covering.

So the underpinning reason why saints in the Old Testament can approach God was because they had a pardon for sin that was temporary.

But we see in Romans 3 that God also overlooked the sins of many in the past because they were looking forward to the propitiation of sins that would come through Jesus Christ.

And so ultimately, the only means by which we can approach God, an unholy and unclean creature of the dirt can approach a holy, magnificent God is through the shed blood of an innocent one.

And yet here as Christians, we get to recognize and live in the truth and the reality that we have received the shedding of blood of another.

And it's the blood, the perfect blood of Jesus. And so when we say that we come and we pray in the name of Jesus, it is recognizing that in Jesus, we who were once far off have now been brought near by the blood of Christ.

And you and I can pray with our heart and with our lips and our prayers can be heard not because of anything that you do, not because you're so great, not because of anything you've merited, but because of the merit of another, namely

Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. It's okay to say it. It's okay to say amen, brothers and sisters.

Amen. We're talking about prayer here. We're talking about what it is to approach this awesome

God. Words escape me. And Jesus says in again, in John 14 verse 14, if you ask me anything in my name,

I will do it. If you ask Jesus. So one of the cool things is that we believe and we worship a triune

God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Now, prayer to a creature would be wholly inappropriate, heretical and damning.

Yet Jesus here beckons us to ask him anything. So in prayer, you and I can speak to Jesus, to our

Lord and Savior. Friends, this is a privilege I had not had for the first 16 years of my life.

And if you know, I grew up as one of Jehovah's Witnesses. And one of the doctrines of Jehovah's Witnesses is that Jesus Christ is a creature, not creator.

That Jesus Christ is not God, but rather he's Michael the Archangel. That you're not to pray to Jesus, but only in the name of Jesus.

So Jehovah's Witness will pray to God, the Father, the Jehovah, and they'll often end their prayers within the name of Jesus.

So recognizing him as somewhat the mediator between God and man. But friends, one of the things that helped me come to know who

Jesus was, was when I was reading scripture for myself one day, I shared this testimony before, and I also get to share it on a couple of podcasts throughout this week.

I posted on my Facebook page. But one of the things that helped lead me to faith in Jesus Christ was one day

I was just, I decided, you know what, I wanna know who Jesus is. I've been debating back and forth in my mind, is

Jesus God? Is he not God? So I just started to write down reasons why Jesus is God, reasons why he's not

God. And I just started going back and forth with different scriptures, and I find myself then, now, two in the morning, and I still haven't figured it out.

And I'm frustrated. I made a vow to God. I said, God, I'm not gonna go to sleep until I figure this out. And I'm like, God, I still haven't figured it out.

Like, why would you do this to me? Why won't you just reveal yourself to me? Why is this so difficult?

And then I said, you know, I'm just gonna read a couple more verses, and then I'm gonna go to sleep. Reading from Book of Acts, chapter seven, where Stephen, or Stephan, is being martyred.

For his faith. And in verse 59, Stephen makes a remarkable statement. It says in the text, he says, right before he's killed,

Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. He said,

Lord Jesus. And the footnote of my Jehovah Witness Bible, I think the word that they use in the text, it says, and Stephen entreated, or yeah, he entreated and said,

Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. And the footnote of the Jehovah Witness Bible says, or prayed to. And it came to my mind at that moment, you know what?

I could just ask Jesus who he is. Because if Stephen can talk to Jesus, and he's in heaven, we see that in the text in chapter seven, where he sees heaven open, and he sees the

Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Father. And if Stephen can speak to Jesus while he's on earth, and Jesus is in heaven,

I can speak to Jesus. And so the words came out of my mouth, and it was this, Lord Jesus.

And at that moment, I knew. I knew Jesus was

God. I knew he was the Savior. I knew he was the one who made it.

I knew in a better way for me to approach Jehovah, my Father. And in Jesus, I knew

I had found eternal life. Blessed be the Lord Jesus Christ, amen.

Amen. And because of this truth, it changed my life.

I could approach not only the Father, but I can approach the Son in his name, and he will hear from heaven.

And he says, anything that you ask me in my name, I will do it. On that very day, I begged the

Lord Jesus Christ for forgiveness, and he richly gave it. That day, I asked the Lord Jesus for salvation, and he gave it in abundance.

And he saved my soul even to the uttermost. Friends, that's the Jesus that we serve and know.

That's the Jesus that we can approach in holy prayer. That's the Jesus I present to you this morning.

The Jesus who can save your soul and bring you into a right standing and relationship with the

Father. Praise be to God. In one of the catechisms in the

Westminster, shorter catechism on the topic of prayer, it gives us a very dynamic answer to what prayer is.

So just in case we're still wondering what prayer is, the Westminster shorter catechism says this.

Prayer is an offering up of our desires unto God for things agreeable to his will.

In the name of Christ, we're confession of our sins and thankful acknowledgement of his mercies.

So simply put, prayer is a mode of communication where the temporal meets the eternal.

It's where the creature can reach the ear of God. And the

Bible makes it clear that the prayers that are acceptable to God are the ones that are made in the name, the authority of this

Jesus who I just declared unto you. Now in the next bullet point, if you're following along in today's teaching, acceptable prayer begins with what

I just mentioned. When Christ dwells, I want you to write that in there. When Christ dwells in us through faith.

And that's what we see again in our main text or one of the main texts in Ephesians 3, in verse 17, where Paul says the following, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, that you being rooted and grounded in love.

And so the way that our prayers can be heard and be acceptable to God is if we be in Christ.

If Christ dwell in you. As Reformed brothers and sisters, we believe that regeneration comes prior to one's declaration of faith.

God must dwell in you. Christ must be in you before you can even utter the words,

Lord Jesus. Before you can confess of your mouth the grandeur of God, God has to change your heart.

And so we believe that acceptable prayer begins when Christ dwells in us through faith.

And that's a very important aspect. That when we approach God and when we pray, we pray with an attitude of faith.

Because without faith, the Bible says, no man can possibly please God. We must have faith.

Now what is faith? If you ask anyone in the world, you'll probably get an answer similar to this.

Faith is believing in something there's no evidence for. How many of you guys ever heard something to that degree? Many of us, right?

Can I say something? Wrong. That is not faith. Not the faith that we find in Holy Scripture.

If you guys are familiar with the text, Hebrews 11 .1 says that faith is the assurance of the things unseen, the things which we have hoped for.

It's assurance. It's a knowledge. It's a knowing. It's not accepting or blindly accepting something.

There's a word for that in the English vocabulary and it's called blind faith. Blind faith is believing in something you have no evidence for.

And many in the world indeed do have blind faith. Blind faith in many different and various things.

But what we hear as Christians, we do not adhere to blind faith. But instead, we have faith in the assurance of the things unseen.

And it's primarily faith in Jesus Christ. You know, one thing the world cannot come against is a testimony of a changed life.

This is why in the book of Revelation, we see that the saints overcome by the word of their testimony.

It's because regardless of what the world may say or throw at you, one thing that can never be taken from you is your testimony.

The world can't take it because God gave it. And that which God gives, only He can take away.

And He promises us this sure truth and foundation that those who He has received and to whom

He has given eternal life, not one will be lost. So your testimony, your faith, may it never be lost, may it only grow in strength and from power to power so that you may tell the magnificent glories of Christ.

This is again why faith is so important. Faith is the assurance of the things unseen. We must approach

God in prayer with faith. That means that we approach Him with an expectation that He will act.

So when you pray, do you believe that God, one, hears you?

And two, that He's able to do far more abundantly than we can even ask or imagine?

The answer should be yes. That my God not only hears me, but my

God supplies me. Not only does my God hear me, but my God empowers me.

Not only does my God hear me, but my God also gives me all things needed for life and godliness in Jesus Christ.

And this is why we ought to always approach God the Father with faith in our hearts, knowing that we are heard and knowing that He will act.

He will act. Blessed be the Father of our

Lord Jesus Christ. Powerful prayers in the next part of this teaching, powerful prayers are rendered when we come to know the love,

I want you to write that in there, the love of Christ. Prayer that's effective is prayer that's not just done in faith, but out of love.

Love proceeds from faith. Just think of it even in the relationships that we have in our lives.

You know, when you ask someone, why do you love your spouse? Or when your spouse or your girlfriend or boyfriend asks you, why do you love me?

And at that moment, it's almost hard to put into words, isn't it? Because in the reality, it's because you can't.

You can't always put into words why you love someone. You just know that you do.

It proceeds from faith. Love is necessary when we come to God in prayer.

Because we're not talking to the principal of our school. We're not talking to a boss. We're not talking to some far out exalted creature.

We are talking to the Father of our souls. And our Father loves us.

And he has demonstrated his love for us that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. But God also demonstrates his love for us and that he desires for us to come near to him in prayer.

He desires that. And so we approach him in love. And we say, Father, out of love,

I want you near. And I want to be near you. The Bible says, draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.

So approach this God with love, the love of Christ that fills us with the fullness of God.

You can write that in there as well. It fills us with the fullness of God. It's in verses 18 and 19 of Ephesians 3.

It says again that you may be rooted and grounded in love, that you may have strength to comprehend of all the saints, what is the breadth, the length, the height, and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

We went over this in detail last week. I just want to quickly remind you why prayer is so powerful in Christ and knowing the love of Christ, which sets us free.

But now in verse 20, we see this magnificent doxology of praise.

Paul writes this at the conclusion of his prayer for the Ephesian church. He says, now to him, now to him.

If you remember, if you were here for our Sunday school, we taught a lot about the Lord's Prayer. In the

Lord's Prayer, Jesus taught us to begin with this, our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.

Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And so the prayer that Jesus modeled for us is a prayer that begins with the glory and the majesty of God, that he, the

Father, is the exalted one who is in heaven. His name be made holy. It's what the word hallowed means, to make holy, to sanctify, to set apart.

Your name be made great. Your name be holy. And it's similar to how Paul begins in verse 14.

For this reason, I bow my knees. It's a symbol of submission before the

Father. And then how does he end this prayer? Similar to how the

King James Version ends the Lord's Prayer, which it says, to him be the glory and the power forever and ever.

Amen. And Paul goes on to use similar language. Now to him, he closes, who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think according to the power at work within us.

This text absolutely blows my mind. I want to read that again.

Verse 20. Now to him who is able. Your God is able.

You're often not able. You're often, you fall short. Even as a

Christian, you may not always have the strength or the power to do that which you want to do. But you know who is?

The one who we can approach in prayer. He is able to do far more abundantly.

I just love this language that Paul uses throughout Ephesians. Probably why this is one of my favorite books of the

New Testament is because Paul uses a high, lavishing language and heap of praise to God.

He says he's able to do far more abundantly. Think of that word abundantly. Abundance.

Abundance means that you have more than enough, more than what you need, more than what you ask for.

He says he's able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think.

Isn't that incredible? Do you not see the love of the Father for his people?

Do you not see the riches of Christ through grace being poured out for you and for me?

That he's able to do far more abundantly according to the power at work within us.

What a change. Notice the trajectory of this text. Him, God, who's able to do far more abundantly than we ask or think.

So it's all exterior. It's all God out there who's able to do this. But then it says, it closes this thought with saying, it's the power that's at work within us.

So God isn't only on the outside. He's also working in and through the inner man.

He's working in you, not just outside of you. And that's why prayer is so magnificent.

Why prayer is so powerful is because not only can God work on the exterior, on the outside, but the power that he has set in motion through prayer is already at work in you.

It's already in you. It's the same power that rose Jesus from the dead, the power and the gift and the anointing of the

Holy Spirit. This is why he is able to say that God is going to be able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think according to the power at work within us.

That's the power of the Holy Spirit. Second to last line in our insert,

God can do far more abundantly abundantly than we ask or think by his power at work within us.

Abundantly in power. God has a power that he is working in and through you. What a privilege it is that we can offer our prayers to him who is working in us that which is pleasing in his sight.

Never forget there's power in prayer. I know that's a cliche.

You hear a lot of sermons like that. You've heard a lot of preachers like that. You've heard a lot of books on that, but it's true.

It's so true and it's truer than you or I can even imagine.

Because the power that is at work in us and through us and for us in Christ is able to do far more abundantly than we ask, think or even imagine.

How amazing is that? He goes on to end this doxology in verse 21 when he says this to him, be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus through all generations forever and ever.

Amen. You see what Paul ends and how he ends his prayer of doxology.

He reminds us to whom belongs the glory. You see, often, sometimes in our prayers, in the prayer of many people and Christians even, people often seek their own glory.

God, help me to do this. Help me to do that. You know, the number one problem with prayers today that are uttered in the name of God is because they sound a lot like this.

Our father who are in heaven, me, me, me, me, me, me.

Versus the prayer that we learn in the Lord's prayer and even the model that Paul is setting for us here.

Our father in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done. Not me, but you, thy.

Not my glory, but his glory. Mine is not the glory forever and ever.

Amen. My life and existence isn't the center of all things, but rather his is.

And because we understand the gravity of who God is, our prayers, rightfully so, ought to follow the same language and standard that of course we ask

God for our needs. It's okay to ask God for our needs. Jesus taught us that.

Ask for our daily bread. Ask God to forgive you your sins. Ask God to empower you to forgive others.

Ask God to lead you not into temptation, but away from temptation and out of the snare of the evil one.

Those are all God honoring prayers. It's okay to pray for oneself, but oneself is not the center of our prayers.

The center of it is God himself, the glory and the majesty of who he is.

And we as Christians get to be participants in receiving from him this gift of power and prayer.

And that's why it says in verse 21, to him be glory in the church. God has ordained for his people, the church, to be a people of prayer, which is again answering the question we asked earlier.

Why do we here at Silicon Valley Reformed Baptist Church, why do we pray so much? Why do we emphasize prayer so much?

Why do we have a whole service later in the afternoon devoted to prayer? It's because of this. It's because of God and who he is and the gift and the power that's at work in us that we can approach him through the name of Jesus.

God wants to be glorified in the church. And God is glorified in the church when his people humble themselves, pray and seek his face.

And that's how God heals a people. 2 Chronicles 7, verse 14, a very famous text, especially in the time and days that we're living in today, that if his people who are called by his name would humble themselves, that's to remember that they are lowly.

The word humble means lowly, means to be low in comparison to something that's high or great. And because we are creatures of the dirt and of the dust, we're to remember that we are to approach our

Father in heaven as humble, lowly people. And if we approach him in such a way,

God will hear from heaven and he will heal our land. He'll heal the land of your family.

He'll heal the land of your brokenness. He'll heal the land of your finances, of your relationships. He'll heal the land of our church and he can have the power and he is working in us the healing even of the nations.

And we know this is true because in Revelation 22, out of the throne of God's grace flows this river of life and the river that flows from the throne of God is producing and watering these trees and the trees of life and the trees of life bear fruit that is for the healing of the nations.

God is working all these things out and more in and through the church.

Therefore, God desires for the church to be a people of prayer, to be a church in which he can glory in and be glorified in.

And of course, Paul then goes on to say, in Christ Jesus also. God is glorified in our prayers when we pray in the name of Jesus.

Again, that's a position of the heart. It is to know and acknowledge Christ as the offering for sin who allows us to come near to God through faith in Jesus.

And it says to him, be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, all generations.

So how often should we pray? Why should we pray?

We should pray forever and ever because even when we are in the presence of God, our prayer language shall be pure and true.

And before we even speak a word, he will answer. That's the promise that we have even when we see him face to face.

And we will continue to pray forever and ever, even to the glory of the triune

God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The last part of that teaching and today's insert

God honoring prayer is that which centers on his glory in the church and Christ forever.

Amen. I want you to write in that word. Amen. And the last point I'll make is why do we use that word?

Amen. Amen to close our prayers where the word amen simply means so be it or so shall it be.

And so when we pray and we say amen, when you're hearing a preacher preach and you feel in your soul an affirmation for that, you say amen.

Amen. And you say it because it's an affirmation. So shall it be.

May it be so. And Jesus Christ himself, when he was on the earth, if depending on your translation, many of your translations say when

Christ would speak, truly, truly I say to you, you know what the word in the Greek is? Amen.

Amen. I say unto you. He says amen. Amen. May it be.

May it be. And so friends, when we close in our prayers, when we hear a preacher preach, when we feel in our soul an affirmation of truth that is from the word of God, we say so shall it be.

May it be amen and amen all unto the glory of the

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Let's pray. God, exalted in the highest of heavens, our

Lord, our Redeemer, our King, our Husband, our everything, we thank you,

God, that you have given us this most precious gift of prayer.

And not only have you given us the gift of prayer, but you've given us the means by which we can pray.

And that was the Lord Jesus Christ, who through his shed blood was able to make us clean and whole.

And God was able to make for himself one new people out of the two, out of Jews and Gentiles, fulfilling the mystery of his will.

To bring all things under the headship and administration of Christ, even for the fullness of time, that we ourselves may be filled with the fullness of God, that we may know his love, the depth, the height of his love for us.

Lord, how unsearchable are your ways. How great is your love towards us, that neither life, nor death, nor angels, nor demons, nor authorities here, nor things present, nor height, nor depth, can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus, our

Lord. Thank you so much for this amazing love, for this amazing grace, that we get to speak to you, the sovereign ruler of all things, and can be heard by you because of Jesus.

Words cannot express, oh Lord, how great and magnificent this gift is.

As your scripture says in Romans 8, Holy Spirit, intercede for us, with words and groaning that cannot be expressed.

Words fall short, there is no vocabulary that can ultimately fulfill and satisfy what it means to approach you,

God. Thank you so much for all that you've done and continue to do. Bless your people, and give us strength to comprehend the love of Christ.