 This is going to be a very practical and I pray, a very encouraging message on prayer. I wanna show you three keys that I learned, three truths about prayer that helped to strengthen my prayer life. Let's begin now, but as we do, I want you to leave a comment in the comment section, write higher places, or you can write deeper depths. Let that be your public declaration of faith as you believe for God to take you to deeper places in prayer. No matter where we are in our walk with Christ, we can all go deeper in prayer. Number one, be disciplined. Now, this is a very practical application in terms of our prayer life, but many believers just kind of look right over this. Many believers think that discipline is religious and it's not. Even though prayer is a spiritual act, it still requires our practical participation and this is a very practical step. This has to do with making the schedule around prayer. This has to do with carving out times during the day that you devote to God alone, to prioritize prayer above all else. There's an illustration that I often tell people that I pray will help you. I want you to imagine that there are several glasses like to pour a drink into. Several glasses stacked one on top of the other in the shape of a pyramid. If I were to give you one source of water, one pitcher of water and say that you can only fill to overflowing one of the glasses, which glass would you choose in order to affect all others? You would choose the one on the very top because if you begin to pour water into the glasses on the bottom, there's no way that the water will reach the top. And this is how I look at prayer. This is how I look at devotion with the Lord, spending time in the secret place with Him. I look at spending time with the Lord like filling that first glass because if you can just feel that cup of prayer, if you can just feel that time of devotion with the Lord, that begins to trickle down and affect all the other areas of your life. If you even go to the second tier and pour only into family or in your marriage or in your friendships or maybe in the third tier and you pour into responsibilities, into the business, into the work that God gave you to do, into your calling, all of those other things, then you're going to miss what is actually priority or should be priority, I should say. But when you learn to do the first things first, everything else begins to fall in line. And as we begin to focus on devoting time to the Lord, as we begin to focus on time with Him, then that begins to affect every other aspect of life. Prayer is a discipline before it's a delight. Matthew 6,6 says, but when you go, or when you pray, excuse me, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you and pray to your father in private, then your father who sees everything will reward you. Now in Matthew chapter six, Jesus is specifically addressing the motivation behind the acts that the religious leaders were carrying out. And he was addressing the issue that they had within the heart, namely the issue that they desired to be seen and praised by man. Here, Jesus is telling them that they ought to go away privately. And I think we can glean some truth from this for our everyday life. We can actually devote private time to the Lord that yields much spiritual fruit. The Holy Spirit will give you the desire to pray. You must choose to implement the discipline to pray. So when Jesus talks about going away privately, he's talking about seclusion with God. Now remember, seclusion and isolation aren't the same thing. There's a difference between a moment of seclusion and a lifestyle of isolation. A lifestyle of isolation is not what God has called you to, but he has called you to have throughout your days moments of seclusion with him. In Luke chapter five verse 16, the scripture says, but Jesus often withdrew to the wilderness for prayer. So even as we examine the life of Christ, we can clearly see that Jesus would often step away from the noise of everyday living to spend time alone with the heavenly Father. Matthew chapter 26 verses 40 and 41 say this, and he cometh unto the disciples and findeth them asleep. And saith unto Peter, what could ye not watch with me one hour, verse 41 is key, watch and pray. That ye enter not into temptation for the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. Your spirit desires to pray. Your flesh wants to watch the next episode. Your spirit desires to devote time to the Lord. Your flesh desires entertainment. Your spirit desires to spend time with God, but your flesh is looking for the momentary or maybe even is just being lazy. You don't wanna get off the couch. You don't wanna get up from the chair. You don't wanna go into the next room. And I say this not to condemn you. I say this because I believe that the Holy spirit wants to bring correction. Now, maybe you're the kind of believer who does have some discipline in their everyday life or maybe you have a lot of discipline in terms of your prayer life. That's great, but we can all be a little more focused. We can all be a little more disciplined. We can all devote a little more time to prayer. We can all prioritize the things of God a little more than we are right now. And so when Jesus talks about going away privately, I think we should take him seriously. We ought to carve out that time in the day where we're devoted just to the things of God. There's something very powerful about going away privately, shutting the door and removing all of the chaos from everyday living. There's something about telling your loved ones, I can't be disturbed for the next hour or the next 20 minutes or the next 30 minutes or I can't answer the phone during this time of the day. And the Lord takes great pleasure in that. In fact, you'll find that when you reject things of the world for the sake of your devotion with God, you will sense a burst of the joy of the Holy spirit. This is something I've experienced in my own life. He becomes filled with joy or he overflows with joy when you make those decisions to choose devotion and time with him instead of the things of the world. Now I'm not saying that you can't function or that there's never a time to do anything else. If we locked ourselves away and just prayed 24 seven, then we couldn't fulfill our other Christian responsibilities like serving in a local church or more importantly, being a good spouse or being a good parent or for other things using your spiritual gifts or even evangelizing. We ought to be out and about. We ought to be participating not in the things of this world but in the practical everyday living that God has called us to do. So as the old saying goes, we are in the world but not of the world. And so there's nothing wrong with sharing a meal with friends or maybe going on a nice trip or maybe taking a walk or spending time, you should with your spouse and with your children and with your friends and with fellow believers. But we ought to, in addition to that, take time aside and say, this belongs to Jesus and I'm not going to give it to anyone else but that requires discipline. We have to learn, remember this, the discipline of disconnect. We have to learn what it is to move away from the things of this world, from the distractions that so easily sweep us up and instead go to those places where we can worship and pray and read the word and hear from the Holy Spirit uninterrupted, unhindered where we are not being pulled away by various different responsibilities. So that's number one, be disciplined. Number two, be aware, slow your pace, avoid distraction. Learn to seek the Lord spontaneously. We as believers are commanded by the Lord through scripture to pray without ceasing. What does that mean? Does that literally mean 24 seven non-stop praying with our words out loud or with our thoughts internally or to be locked away in some tower forever? No, the scripture simply there is talking about the lifestyle of prayer, this consistency of prayer, this inviting the presence of the Holy Spirit into our everyday lives. Acts 17, 27 and 28 says this, his purpose was for the nations to seek after God and perhaps fill their way toward him and find him though he is not far from any one of us. For in him we live and move and exist as some of your own poets have said, we are his offspring. Here, the scripture is making it very clear that God is not far from any one of us. He puts your hand in front of your face, that's how close God is. In fact, even closer, he dwells within you. He's more real than this physical reality. Did you know that when you get to certain places in prayer, certain moments, certain depths, certain heights, that in those certain moments, the presence of the Holy Spirit becomes more real to you than your physical body. Then the physical material world around you, I mean, whatever surface is in front of you, you can touch it, you can feel it, you can see things around you, you can sense the world around you. But there are times in prayer when the presence of the Holy Spirit becomes so real, so intense, so visibly manifested. And I don't mean that necessarily literally visibly, I mean that spiritually visibly, where you are just aware of him. There are moments where his presence becomes more real than anything else. And that's how close he is. This is why I say that when we worship, it's not that the Holy Spirit is coming closer. When we pray, it's not that God is coming closer. When we read the Bible, it's not that God is coming closer. No, when we worship, when we pray, when we read the word, it's that we are becoming more aware of that which is always there. God is right there. And when you live in the reality of that, when you live aware of that truth, prayer becomes like breathing in the spirit where it's just this natural flow of communication. Now I'm gonna briefly touch back on point number one so that I can tie it together with point number two. Number one, I mentioned that we should be disciplined. And number two, I mentioned that we should be aware. This has to do with scheduled prayer and spontaneous prayer. And here's something I've learned about believers in general. Believers, generally speaking, and there are exceptions to generalizations, fall into one of two categories. Either they are a little bit more organized and a little more cerebral or they're a little more, shall we say, I don't wanna use the term free spirited because that term is misused all the time. But we'll just say maybe not as scheduled, they're a little more spontaneous. And so usually the more cerebral Christians, they have an issue with emotional encounters with God. Emotional encounters with God make them uncomfortable. Now that doesn't make them right because of course we know that every part of our being was created to respond to God. So of course you're going to feel emotions sometimes when you're having an encounter with God. Not that emotions can lead to an encounter with God, but an encounter with God can certainly lead to having certain emotions. But still, there's that individual who maybe is a little more cerebral, maybe a little more studious. Reading the word, knowing the word, that comes more easily to them than say praying in the spirit or exercising their spiritual gifts or receiving encounters with God. And then on the other hand, you have the Christians who are a little more emotional, a little more given to experience. And again, neither is good or bad. They're just different. And I believe that one could be like the other in both cases and we could benefit to be more like each other in that instance or specifically as I'm describing it here. But these Christians, they have a little more trouble with some of the disciplines of spiritual living. Maybe they don't really like the idea of scheduling prayer. They may be given two ideas like, well, God doesn't like the four walls of the church or we shouldn't be so organized or we shouldn't have leadership structures, right? So both Christians have their strengths and both Christians have their challenges. Typically what I've observed is that those who are a little more cerebral, they're great with scheduled prayer, but they have a little trouble with spontaneous prayer because to them it seems a little odd to kind of just be conversing with God all throughout the day in the car, at school, at work, maybe even in front of people or hearing the voice of the Holy Spirit to speak to loved ones. Maybe they're a little uncomfortable with that. And then on the other side of the spectrum, we have those Christians who are a little more spontaneous and they have a little bit of an issue with scheduling prayer. The spontaneous Christian feels bound by the schedule of prayer and the more structured Christian feels weirded out by the more spontaneous type of prayer. But the reality is we need both. We need to allow the Holy Spirit to challenge us in the areas where we are least like Christ. And the area that I'm least like Christ, maybe you're more like Christ or most like Christ in terms of the other compartments of your character. So we can all afford to bend to the will of the Holy Spirit and the nature of the Holy Spirit will contradict some aspect of us that we've yet to have corrected. And so yes, be disciplined, but also be spontaneous. Yes, practice secluded scheduled prayer, but also practice that spontaneous type of prayer. We need to be both disciplined and aware. When you're disciplined, you have structured scheduled prayer. When you're aware, you have spontaneous prayer. There's those Christians who say, well, I pray all throughout the day, so I don't really need to schedule prayer. No, my friend, you need the benefit of both because you see the benefit of spontaneous prayer is longevity. You have a consistency to your Christian walk, but the benefit of secluded prayer is depth. This is why, by the way, many Christians can go for decades being consistent in prayer, but not really experiencing greater depth because they're not allowing for themselves to get away in the secret place and really focus in on the Lord. So we need to both be disciplined and we need to be aware. You need both. Finally, number three, you need to be spirit led. And if you do these things, and I'm telling you, you can apply these simple truths and you will see an immediate impact on your prayer life. I mean, you can apply these truths right away and you'll begin to see your prayer life strengthened. Number three, be spirit led. Now, let me explain this because I think many might misunderstand this point if I don't go out of my way to explain this. When I say spirit led, I don't mean unstructured. And when I say spirit led, I don't necessarily mean spontaneous. Those are two different aspects of prayer that I've already addressed. Here I'm addressing a third separate, totally different aspect of prayer. And that is that we have to always be guided by the spirit. Now, here's what 1 Corinthians chapter two verses 10 and onward say. But it was to us that God revealed these things by his spirit. For his spirit searches out everything and shows us God's deep secrets. Really listen to the language that's being used here. This is a powerful revelation. This is one of my favorite portions of scripture. For his spirit searches out everything and shows us God's deep secrets. No one can know a person's thoughts except that person's own spirit. And no one can know God's thoughts except God's own spirit. And we have received God's spirit, not the world spirit. So we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us. When we tell you these things, we do not use words that come from human wisdom. Instead, we speak words given to us by the spirit using the spirit's words to explain spiritual truths. But people who aren't spiritual can't receive these truths from God's spirit. It all sounds foolish to them and they can't understand it. For only those who are spiritual can understand what the spirit means. Those who are spiritual can evaluate all things but they themselves cannot be evaluated by others. So here we see this amazing connection that we have with the Holy Spirit that ultimately connects us with God the Father. The Holy Spirit knows the depths of God's spirit. The Holy Spirit knows God's mind, his will, his power, he knows it all, he is God. And he communicates these realities with our spirit. And so we must be spirit led because only the Holy Spirit knows the depths of God. Only the Holy Spirit can guide you into encounters in his presence. The Holy Spirit doesn't just, excuse me, the Holy Spirit doesn't just guide you when you pray. He guides you through prayer. He doesn't just guide you to prayer. He guides you through prayer in that he doesn't just give you the desire to pray. He leads you through the depths of prayer once you begin to pray. Now here's the way that I used to pray. Tell me in the comments if you can relate. The way I used to pray was very rigid, very religious, very legalistic, very systemized. I would approach God and I would think about all of the different things that I had received in terms of teachings on prayer. For example, I would think about intercessory prayer and then I would think about the different aspects and truths in regards to spiritual warfare prayer. And then I would think about praying in tongues and then I would think about prophetic prayer and then praying for others, praying for myself, praying for needs, praying to know God, worship and so forth. So when I would finally go into the place of prayer, I would go down my list and I would try to check off all the different aspects of prayer and then I would begin to wonder in what order do I pray these things? Do I start with worship? Do I start with Bible reading? Do I just go right in and start giving God my needs? How indeed are we to pray? And should I stand when I pray? Should I sit when I pray? Can I pace when I pray? Does God get offended if I'm lying down when I pray? Is that disrespectful to him? Do I have to pray out loud vocalizing everything that I'm praying? Or can I think certain prayers in my mind? And so I would wrestle with all of these different components and attributes and practices of prayer and I would become entangled in my frustration because I was trying to create a formula for how I was to carry out my prayer life. This is what you can do with your list. Take your list of everything you've learned about prayer, the postures, the power, the principles, give them to the Holy Spirit and then say, Holy Spirit, you guide me. So when I begin prayer, and this is not a formula, this is just something that I do, I just wait. I close my eyes, I worship him and I just wait on that leading. And then there's like this moment where while you're worshiping him, while you're focusing or meditating on the word, suddenly there's this like catching up, like the Spirit comes and just quickens you. Psalm 80, 18 says, quicken us and we'll call unto you. You can't call unto him until he quickens you. And so this doesn't mean that you can't approach God by your own will. This means that if you have a desire or by your own will you want to approach God, then that that was a work of the Holy Spirit working on your desires. So he gives you that desire, you go to pray and then he begins to guide you through the depths. He'll tell you and you'll sense that pooling as long as you don't complicate it, as long as you don't get all tangled up in your own emotions, as long as you don't tense up in frustration trying to figure every moment out. Just relax in his presence, trust that he'll guide you. And then there are those moments where there's just this catching up and you feel almost like an eagle soaring on the wind where suddenly there's this strength and vitality and this movement and this flow. You're not fighting him in that you're not resisting him and you're not forcing him in that you're not trying to get him to do what you want him to do. Rather you're flowing with him. You're not fighting, you're not forcing, you're flowing. That only comes by the Holy Spirit. And then hear this, when you get to that place in prayer, when you come to that place in prayer, we're now, you're no longer fighting, you're no longer forcing, but you're just flowing. Now you're not counting down the minutes looking at your watch saying, well, how long have I been praying? Has it been 10 minutes, five minutes, 20 minutes? Now you're so raptured by the beauty of his presence. You're so caught up in the glimpse of his glory that you're no longer counting the minutes or the seconds, but maybe hours are flying by and it feels like only minutes. That is that flow that you find when your spirit led, you can't get there by your system. You can't get there by a formula. You can't figure your way into the presence of God. You can't beg your way into the presence of God. You can't think your way or work your way or perform your way into the presence of God. I'm talking about the manifested presence. Only the Holy Spirit can take you to those depths and when you just relax and stop trying to figure it all out, stop trying to have it all together, stop trying to create your formulas, then the Holy Spirit can do his work. Be disciplined, be aware, be spirit led. Now, Father, I pray you help them do it. Help them to remember these truths and to apply them to their everyday prayer lives. Strengthen them, give them a praying spirit. Put the fire of prayer deep within their soul. Cause them to rise early and seek your face. Cause them to go away and seek your face. Cause them to stay up and seek your face whenever you desire, however you desire. Give them that fire. And Lord, we promise that as you stir that fire within us, that we will allow it to burn and we will surrender to your work. In Jesus' name we pray, say it because you believe it. 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