 We want to take some time tonight and Consider a practical helps for prayer. We've been going through John 16 on Sunday mornings we've spent three weeks in that text and The main point of that text as we've been talking about is drawing near to God in prayer and the Lord's instruction To the disciples to do just that in their time of need They can go to God in prayer and God will supply their need He provides for us through the means of prayer And so as we've worked through John 16 these last three weeks We've learned the importance of prayer I hope pray that's been laid upon your heart the way it has been on mine at prayer is important it is a weighty need for the Christian and as we've worked through the text we really have established somewhat of a systematic theology for prayer and Through that looking at the necessity of prayer the importance of prayer the weight of prayer The place of prayer in the exercise of our faith in Christ in the face of a hostile world in the face of the ministry the great commission that we've all been given and The purpose of prayer the the implications of prayer of the grace afforded to us through prayer as we've learned a lot from that text with respect to prayer and We pray Primarily initially because we understand our need for God if you're in Christ You understand your need for God we talked about that this morning We pray because God the Father loves us Because Jesus Christ at the cross has secured for us access to God in prayer He mediates for us in prayer He is our advocate there for us at the right hand of God the father Even the spirit comes along right when we don't know how to pray as we ought the spirit intercedes on our behalf with groanings which cannot be uttered all this blessing and glory and help Associated with the blessed privilege of prayer So now thinking through that for this evening Thought we'd spend a little bit of time and build on that foundation that the Lord has established for us in John chapter 16 And I want to give you in the next few minutes together I want to give you some practical help with that. Maybe you have as I have in the past struggled with a Plan for prayer how to pray the disciples asked the Lord obviously Luke 11 teach us to pray They needed help with that we all need help at some point or another with that And so I want to give you some practical help. How do we know how to do that which we know we must do with respect to prayer and I want to give you first three Subdivisions if you will for how to think about this right in one respect where to think about prayer as a duty In another respect we're to think about prayer as a dialogue and Lastly, we're to think about prayer as our delight Then I want to give you some practical applications for those, but we want to cultivate through prayer as a duty as a dialogue and as our delight and first and foremost It begins with the fact that prayer is given to us in scripture as a duty Now you can think about Something in the Christian life that is a duty as being oppressive on you or restrictive to you or difficult for you Listen, that is not the right way to think about duties in the Christian life as the Lord would have it in his Infinite wisdom and it is infinite grace and mercy toward us in Christ The duties that he gives us are for our good and we find that when we do our duty We're blessed through that and it quickly becomes our delight, right? But prayer is a duty Paul says in Philippians chapter 4 verse 6. He says be anxious for nothing but in everything By prayer and supplication with thanksgiving Let your requests be made known to God and the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus this morning in John 16 the Lord was Telling them that in him they will have peace that peace in large part comes through prayer dependence upon God, right? So prayer is a duty now. I want to press on you The fact that it is a duty We are mandated by scripture by the word of God to pray and that we are in Obeying the Lord we are to cultivate prayer as a habit through regular discipline you start putting words together like habit and discipline and duty in the same sentence and There some evangelical start getting a nervous twitch because it sounds to them like legalism Listen, it is not legalistic to pray It's not legalistic for the Lord to require prayer and he does so in his word And it's not legalistic for you and I as Christians to devote time to the Lord in prayer. It is not Legalism right need to understand the definition of legalism if you are confused by that you need to have a habit of Regular disciplined prayer now we have Examples of that obviously in the scripture Daniel prayed three times a day, right others throughout history Calvin Luther others Say that you at least need to pray twice daily So it's Luther or Calvin legalistic because they tell you it'd be good for you to pray twice daily. No, no twice daily Prayer is a duty We have to in cultivating prayers of duty guard ourselves against Deluding or destructive notions right that there are other things more important Conceiving of prayer is our duty to God being that it is also required by God in the scripture Helps protect us from putting other priorities in its place If you think that I'm doing the morning right The alarm goes off And you think to yourself you've got this to do and that to do and the other thing to do And the whole day already from the time the alarm goes off the whole day is just stacking up on you Don't forget the importance and the priority of prayer We need to cultivate the duty of putting prayer first Don't Calvin says don't listen to those notions that say let me do this or that first Pray pray we have a need to pray. We've got a responsibility to pray It is our duty to pray It is paramount of paramount importance when it comes to our Christian growth and maturity right we need to pray So conceive of prayer think of prayer as a duty because it is because it is okay But it's a duty think of prayer as a duty like this right it's a Prayer is a duty for the Christian like Wearing a hazmat suit Is a duty for someone handling infectious diseases at the CDC All right, if you don't wear your hazmat suit, you're gonna die right Prayer is a necessity like I think we've talked about in the sermon like walking out of the space shuttle airlock without your space helmet So it is as much a duty to put on your space helmet in order to leave the space shuttle as it is for a Christian to pray Right without it you die you wither you're dried up Eventually cast out as a branch right We must pray sometimes prayer is difficult And it feels like a duty that as Luther would say or Calvin or others have said Pray even when you don't feel like it Even when you don't feel like it you pray you cultivate a habit a discipline Of prayer in your Christian life look with me quickly at romans chapter 15 romans chapter 15 Just speaking paul speaking are alluding to sometimes the difficulty of prayer Romans chapter 15 Down in verse 30 Listen to paul to the to the romans the christians in Rome verse 30 now. I beg you brethren Through the lord jesus christ and through the love of the spirit that you strive Together with me in prayers to god for me There's sometimes prayer feels like a striving right feels like a And agonizing feels like a difficulty feels like work. It takes determined resolve here paul pleading with them begging them To strive together with him in prayer We need to pray and it's that important. It's that important. You know think about um Those that will say in terms of in uh working through text in scripture, right Don't stop studying and wrestling with the text until god blesses you through it Right, so you wrestle and you wrestle and you wrestle we can say the same thing about prayer Don't stop wrestling in prayer. It's like jacob right wrestling with god. Don't stop wrestling I won't let go until you bless me And sometimes that's your attitude in prayer I i'm going to pray and i'm gonna keep praying until god you bless me And it's just a trust and a faith in god that'll do just that We have to wrestle with the scripture until god blesses us sometimes we have to wrestle or strive sometimes in prayer But we need to view it as a duty and we need to pursue it as a duty It is uh important. It is of paramount importance to the christian in their christian life secondly You have to think about prayer or conceive of prayer as a dialogue as a dialogue Not Intuitions right not sitting Silently in the corner of your house in a quiet room The lights off everything quiet so that you can Hear the still small voice of god in your head right or the leading of your heart or the You know what i'm talking about right for people say that and think and conceive of prayers being that they're going to wait to listen for the audible voice of god The dialogue comes through the word of god right Dialogue with god in prayer happens through the word of god If you want to hear that dialogue audibly then you read the word of god out loud I've heard that said before But that dialogue takes place through the word of god Dialogue if you think about duty on one end delight on the other in terms of our understanding and our enjoyment of prayer Dialogue is the bridge in the middle dialogue becomes the bridge between Meditation on the word of god and praying the word of god right dialogue happens through the word of god and what we mean by this We'll look at this more specifically in a moment But praying the word of god right considering a passage of scripture Considering what it says Consider how you're thankful for it Consider how you can confess and repent for sin revealed in it and then considering how you can put your supplications and petitions To god because of it. It's thinking through praying through The word of god and then running all of your prayers all your petitions all of your God glorifying worship all of that through the dialogue of scripture Now we are god speaks to us through his word today the spirit Of god applying the word of god to the people of god and it is Through dialogue and prayer also thirdly. That's all balanced now with delight delight If you conceive of any Christian obedience as duty only Then you've only done half your duty Right, it's only half your responsibility Not only are you required to pray but you are to delight yourself in prayer to god Not only are you to obey but you're to delight yourself in obedience right not only are you to read the word of god But you're to delight yourself in the word of god not only are you to You know glorify or worship god, but you are to delight yourself in god So if you've not balanced all of this with delight, you've only done half the job We are to in prayer. We're to do that which stirs our heart Stirs and warms our affections for god It is true that prayer is a duty but we have to balance that truth with delight. Yes You should pray whether you feel like it or not But yes in that prayer you should warm your affections engage your hearts It's sinful. It's sinful. It's shameful To be cold or joyless or indifferent in prayer now that being said we've all done it to our shame, haven't we? I know I have to my shame oftentimes distracted right laboring striving working just to maintain your concentration for one minute And often having that uh, just be a fight to glorify god in prayer That delight comes from adoration of god in prayer comes from worship of god in prayer All of god now that you think about this as we go from duty Through the dialogue with god's word dialogue with god through his word to now delight That dialogue with god through his words should warm our hearts, right? The word of god should raise our affections the word of god should cause us worship and awe and reverence The word of god informing our understanding informing our hearts should cause us to Hollow his name to reverence him should cause us to spill out with Thanksgiving, right should cause the people of god To repent to confess sin Isn't that a delight that you can go to god in prayer and to confess your sins knowing That he is faithful and just to forgive you of your sins and to cleanse you from all iniquity That is a joy And should provoke in you delight in god it begins with the meditation on scripture It begins with seeing prayer conceiving of prayer as our duty I was um looking at a couple of places this week With respect to how to pray I use a specific way to pray myself. We'll talk about that in a little bit But um, I ran across a a little booklet by martin luther called a simple way to pray And martin luther in the booklet Talks about prayer as being a garland right this garland that's made up of four strands or a beautiful cord Made up of four strands and he divides each biblical command here into four strands as he's reading the text And this again is bridging the gap between dialogue and delight or dialogue and duty meditation and prayer luther's exercise here that he did twice a day every day twice a day Was to pray the word of god bridge the gap between duty and delight and bridge the gap between meditation on the scriptures And his prayer life and so he divides he takes biblical commands Or a section of text in the scripture and he divides them into four strands This garland divided into four strands the first is instruction First is instruction The second is thanksgiving The third is confession And the fourth is prayer so you have instruction thanksgiving Confession and prayer in other words what martin luther says there in describing this is that you turn every text Every text in the bible that you're praying through working through you turn that text into a school text a song book a penitential book and a prayer book Right a school text a song book a penitential book and a prayer book and think about the The school text for a moment you take a text of scripture And you turn it into a school text first you're going to receive from it Instruction right receive from it instructive now you get that instruction Through your study of the bible your study of that text So you observe the text you Interpret the text you come to an understanding of its meaning and then you apply the text to your heart and mind Just through a study you come to what the text means what god intends for it to mean Um, and your application of that so at the beginning it's a school text. You're Looking at the instruction that the text gives you secondly Turns into a song book a song book of thanksgiving Consider how this text whatever text you're studying consider how that text leads you to praise and thank christ Right, so you turn that text into a song book of thanksgiving to god thirdly Consider how the text leads you to confess and repent of sin to confess and repent of sin And then fourth consider how that text would prompt you to go to god and petition and supplication I think about that for a moment. Okay, you come to a text of the bible We'll look at one as an example in a moment and from that text you allow the word of god to inform your prayer So again prayer being a duty that being a dialogue with god through his word And the word of god in the hands of the spirit of god So to speak now teaching you to pray and you pray back the word of god to god when you do that now Think about it. You're praying with in accord with his will aren't you you're praying in accord with his will You're praying in faith faith in him through his word So you're praying in accord with the mind of god when you pray through the word of god so here In this luther says That you're building the habit of a meditative mind. You're building the habit of a meditative mind Do you have problems in your prayer life with distraction? Then pray through the word of god Hard to be distracted when you're focused on the word of god and focused in those four areas right gaining instruction Uh, thanksgiving to god through it confessing and repenting of sin And then prayers and supplications to god You're building the habit of a meditative mind praying through the word of god Luther said this What else is it but tempting god when your mouth babbles and the mind wanders to other thoughts Like the priest who listen to this like the priest who prayed Deus in adjutorium may um intend a farm hand. Did you unhitch the horses? Domine ad adjuvandom me festina made go out and milk the cow I guess the maid speaks king's english, but when you pray you pray and god hears in in latin But you get the impression right you're praying your mind distracted with thoughts of other things Luther makes the point that to help with your distracted mind pray the text Pray the text understand the text and receive instruction Thank god through the text confess sin through the text and then raise petitions and supplications to god from the text He calls it blasphemy blasphemy to approach god in any other way Then through A focused attention on him but to be distracted in that way So think about the example now. We looked at Philippians chapter 4 verse 6 be anxious for nothing Think about that in terms of these four steps. All right be anxious for nothing But in everything by prayer and supplication With thanksgiving let your request be made known to god. So think of it first the text as a school text So how might you in gain instruction? To pray with respect to this text gone. I know that you are sovereign over all things right and infinitely wise my worry My anxiety Betray a lack of trust for you in my heart All things in my life god fall Within the scope of your loving concern for me. And so I can bring everything to you in prayer and supplication right So in in that way as you think and meditate on the text you're gaining instruction from the text You're turning it into a school text for yourself But then secondly conceive of it as a song book or a song book of thanksgiving to god god Philippians 4 6 right what joy and comfort fills my heart to know that I can bring Everything to you in prayer that I can cast every prayer of mine upon you because you care for me And you just praise god of thanking god for his graciousness Thirdly you turn it into a penitential book or a confession of sin God I am prone to worry I am prone to be anxious this particular situation god has got me troubled and I should trust in you god But I am worrying over this. Please forgive me god. I repent of my lack of trust I repent of my failure to acknowledge your sovereignty in this You turn it into a penitential book and then lastly It's a prayer book cause me god informed by your word empowered by your spirit cause me to trust in you Cause me to be anxious for nothing I'm coming to you now lord of my prayer and my supplication that you'll help me in my time of need Right you turn it into a prayer book So just a simple way to pray from luther's own words Turning each text into a garland of four strands now Luther would do that twice a day every day he'd begin With that praying a text of scripture But then the second thing that martin luther would do Is that he would pray every petition in the lord's prayer turn with me to luke chapter 11 Luke chapter 11 And these are just ideas practical helps for you in prayer. You want to consider How to pray a plan for prayer what you can do for prayer. I pray these things will be helpful to you Luther would begin by praying a text of scripture Turning each biblical command into four strands And then he would pray every petition in the lord's prayer you look at luke chapter 11 beginning in verse one Now it came to pass as he was praying in a certain place When he ceased that one of his disciples said to him lord teach us to pray as john also taught his disciples And so he said to them when you pray Say Our father in heaven How it would be your name your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven Give us day by day our daily bread and forgive us our sins as for we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us And do not lead us into temptation but deliver us from the evil one so what luther would do in his Repetition of the lord's prayer twice daily would be to pray each of those petitions and not and he makes A point to note Not in a ritualistic way not using the same words not being heartless in his prayer But considering the nature of the petition and then praying to god in like manner. So give you an example now the first petition In the lord's prayer here is father in heaven. How it would be your name So listen to luther how it would be thy name and say yes lord god Dear father how it would be thy name both in us and throughout the whole world Destroy and root out the abominations idolatry and heresy of the turk the pope And all false teachers and fanatics who wrongly use thy name and in scandalous ways take it in vain and horribly blaspheme it They insistently boast that they teach thy word in the laws of the church Though they really use the devil's deceit and trickery in thy name to wretchedly seduce many poor souls throughout the world Even killing and shedding much innocent blood and in such persecution they believe that they render the a divine service That's praying how it would be your name right luther's example of that So your other petitions there how it would be your name or you would pray your kingdom come right lord I pray god that Through the means of your church your people that the gospel would be pressed into this dark world and its sinners would turn to christ Right and you pray that petition that your kingdom come lord your will be done on earth as it is in heaven We can plot our path, but you lord direct our steps and we holy trust in you for that Your will be done lord give us day by day our daily bread Don't just take it for granted that we have that Pray thank the lord for it and pray that he would continue to give it So forgive us our sins and you list your sins you see that works So luther twice daily would pray the four courted garland and then he would pray each petition in the lord's prayer Since at the end of all that Be sure to say amen firmly be sure to say amen Amen Again not a throwaway phrase like In jesus name is not a throwaway phrase Amen at the end of your prayer confirms your devoted trust in god for what he will do Your trust in god that he hears you your Refusal to doubt That god in his mercy hears you and says yes to prayers offered in his name right Luther says never think that you're there standing alone But that all christians in their prayer are standing there with you making their supplications known to god finish well Amen god has heard my prayer And there is a certainty and a truth that amen communicates that in that that god has heard my prayer These things these two things he would do twice a day every day, and then he would go into prayers He calls them prayers of the heart things that he thought about and needed to pray for So as we think through that again a couple of different ways to think about prayer and quickly in the time left. Let me give you The content if you will or if you're looking for a plan for how to structure your prayer time how to think through A way or a method of prayer Let me give you this for matthew henry if you go to matthewhenry.org you'll see matthew henry's their uh book there called a way to pray Sometimes called a way to pray. Uh, the other title is a method of prayer. We have matthew henry's book on the shelves out here And matthew henry lists Six different ways here or six different components To pray before god give you a plan a track to run on and he begins with adoration I've added to that added to adoration drawing near Drawing near to god and then adoration so you could add a seventh there but Adoration begins with reverence and awe of god Now you could say the fear of god right not a not a slavish fear Where you're in fear of punishment or in fear of condemnation roman chapter eight There's no therefore now no condemnation to those who are in christ Uh first john chapter four talks about perfect love casting out fear Because the fear there that should be cast out is a fear of punishment involving punishment So it's not a fear of condemnation not a fear of punishment, but a fear of awe a fear of reverence of god's majesty I've heard one author Give the illustration It's like someone places a priceless ming vase into your hands when it gets to the point of being priceless You call it a vase right we've got a bunch of vases around my house But when somebody hands you this priceless ming vase puts it into your hands You don't have a fear that thing is going to hurt you You have a fear that it's you're going to hurt it right that you could drop it or damage it priceless ming vase That's a product of respect Of awe so to speak of that vase of majesty In this sense, it's not a fear that god is going to condemn or hurt you It's a fear of you offending god It's a healthy biblical fear the fear of god and we should draw near with that healthy biblical fear on our hearts and on our minds Not to draw near cavalierly or presumptuously But to draw near with reverence and awe of god draw near to god in the fear of god Now that should Provoke us to adoration addressing god with reverence and awe praying Regarding god's Omnipotence right praying regarding not god's omniscience praying regarding his eternality his sovereignty His power his purity praying With an understanding of god's holiness god's justice god's Greatness god's truth god's splendor god's majesty It's a product of awe Aim for god's glory in your adoration. You're aiming for god's glory As you adore god, you come to god in adoration You're drawing near Only because of christ and his work you realize and acknowledge that you are unworthy to draw near to god in prayer So you confess your unworthiness you acknowledge your great need You profess your desire the desire of your heart to be able to draw near to god in prayer You profess and acknowledge your hope and your faith in him and drawing near and your confidence in his gracious condescension to hear you in other words, you're coming to god drawing near in humility Drawing near to god in humility and in adoration. It begins there. Matthew. Henry's second step is confession Confessing your sin before god you are unworthy to be there But he has promised to forgive In christ So you confess your sins the third step is petition Is petition and you can see where like in order to do this right you need time You need time you need a dedicated plan For praying in this way and this is prayer all of these things are prayer that honors god, right? Drawing near in adoration and worship right confessing your sin the the sacrifices of god are a broken and contrite spirit We're to go to god in confession. We're to go to god in repentance now petition Asking for that which you need asking for on behalf of yourself and for others We talked about those concentric circles, right? You begin with You and you work out to your immediate family and you work out to extended family and then friends Maybe co-workers obviously the church brothers and sisters. So you're just praying Laying petitions before the lord things that others have asked you to pray for things that you need to pray for yourself Keep a list keep a list mark down when you have answered prayer when you see answered prayer Sometimes the quantity of those things that you're praying for You can't manage that in one sitting You just don't have the time to get through it all so separate it up by days You know one day pray for the elders of the church one day pray for the leaders of the church One day pray for brothers and sisters in the church another day pray for right make a list and separate those out over days To give you time, but you got to have a plan to be able to do that Next is thanksgiving And Matthew Henry's a way to pray or a method of prayer is thanksgiving And again great way to do that is to pray through scripture pray through the Psalms Give thanks to god augustin talked about we mentioned that this morning augustin talked about when the psalmist prays you pray When the psalmist repents you repent when the psalmist fights you fight when the psalmist thanks god You thank god when the psalmist worships you worship Just pray through the text of scripture that way Next is intercession intercession interceding on behalf of others in prayer And then lastly is a conclusion where you commend Your prayers to god in his name and you say amen right agreeing with scripture agreeing with the word of god acknowledging God's promises in the word of god to hear your prayer and that prayers in his name In accordance with his will in faith without doubting are prayers that he answers It's just resting and trusting in him to hear you and answer your prayer, right? So let me just I I want to conclude by pressing on you the importance as we've talked about in the last three weeks Of committing yourself to prayer committing yourself devoting yourself to this critically important part of the christian life There are theologians throughout the the centuries that have called it the highest of christian graces, right? The blessing of prayer So commit yourself to prayer the way to do that is to conceive of it first as a duty. I Must do this. I must prioritize it. I must devote time to it I need a plan. I need to be I need to walk circumspectly with respect to this. I need to think through it I need to have a determined plan in place to honor the lord in my prayer life Then pray through the scripture. Maybe use the same method that a martin luther or a matthew henry or john calvin used And then delight in it. You'll see god's blessing through it. Amen. All right, let's pray father in heaven lord again We confess our need to you Confess our unworthiness to come before you in prayer Confess our great need our great dependence upon you in prayer and rejoice That we can come in christ and in his name to pray to you our heavenly father And know Because of all that he's done for us that which he has secured for us at the cross We know that you hear us and god you've promised that when we pray In his name according to your will that we have those things that we've prayed for And we thank you lord for that blessed promise and we trust you and depend upon you Lord and seek your your face in prayer Knowing that you are good and kind and gracious lord and you Are there or to help us in our time of need you hear us We thank you for that. What a tremendous blessing lord. May you be praised in jesus name. Amen