Prayer

[0:00] So, prayer. I want to have a discussion this morning. I guess I'd like it to be a discussion as much as possible on prayer. And so, it kind of came out of a small group discussion that we had a few weeks back as we were, well, I think, well, we've got things to pray for, right?

[0:16] We've got serious things to pray for. I think all of us do at some level, right? And so, sometimes you kind of think, all right, and I say sometimes, but let's think about this. I mean, what, why are we praying, right? What happens when we're praying? What do you expect when you pray?

[0:33] What all is going on with that? And so, there's different, I don't want to say there's necessarily different thoughts about that, but one of the things, and I will want to say this, I guess, starting out, I don't really want to make this like a theological thing, right?

[0:49] Because I think theology affects the way that we pray, and what I really want to do is just, we're going to look through some scenarios here in the Bible and verses about prayer, see it happening, and just let the verses speak for themselves, and I guess if for some reason you feel like there's a theological thing that clashes, then, you know, that's for another day. You can work on that, but I just want to look at what we see in Scripture for prayer.

[1:15] So, starting out, and I don't know, how many of you guys use any like digital tools for Bible studying stuff?

[1:25] You guys ever use like, yeah, Nathan, of course, Mr. Techie Nathan back there. I like to use blueletterbible.com. That's a neat website, search engine. There's several of them.

[1:37] But when I put in the word pray, it occurs 146 times in 139 verses in the New King James Bible.

[1:49] Now, when I think I also put in prayer, which a lot of the, some of the verses have pray and prayer together, and again, hundreds of situations, there are hundreds of verses and passages, so praying is just something that's happening throughout Scripture.

[2:06] And so, I want to kind of look at a few here, and I guess I have a few points I kind of want to think about. Well, I hope that in the end here, this helps us in our prayer life, okay? That's the goal.

[2:20] So, let's start out. So, I put in, you know, I'm just going to kind of tell you how I did. I jumped online, and I put it, I have some things in mind, right? But I put in the verses, and I started looking down through there, and I just grabbed a few here and there.

[2:33] So, one of the first things that we see, and you've probably heard about Hezekiah's life being extended. Are you guys familiar with that? So, in 2 Kings 20, verses 1 through 6, it says, Verse 4, So, what just happened there, right? That's pretty amazing.

[3:40] On the third day, you shall go up to the house of the Lord, and I will add to your days 15 years. I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria, and I will defend this city for my own sake and for the sake of my servant David.

[3:55] And so, that's a pretty powerful story, right? So, God first sends word, you're going to die, that's what's going to be. Hezekiah weeps, he prays, and the next thing you know, Isaiah's going back to tell him, Hey, the Lord heard your prayer, now you're not going to die, right?

[4:10] Now, there it is, right? And so, just have that in mind. One of the things, too, I guess, that I was kind of looking at, and just have this in the back of your mind.

[4:20] I don't know if there's a big difference, but there's a little bit of a difference between the prayers, it seems like, in the Old Testament or with God's people, maybe to when I started seeing all the verses, like in the epistles of Paul.

[4:32] And so, kind of keep that in mind a little bit, okay? So, another verse, another passage. So, James. James, if you wanted to go there, it would be James 5, 13 through 18.

[4:44] James points out how Elijah prayed about rain. Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing songs.

[4:54] Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up.

[5:06] And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. So, you know, again, we are under law here, so I know this is not like a one-to-one thing here, but there's something we're looking for. Verse 16.

[5:17] Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. Verse 17. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months.

[5:37] And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit. So, I'm seeing here, if you think about it, praying, and then something happening, right?

[5:51] Prayer and action. And they're praying to God, and God is doing something, right? Just as it is. And, you know, you might think, well, hey, Elijah. I'm not Elijah.

[6:02] James seems to kind of make the point that, hey, Elijah was a man with a nature like ours. That seems to be what he was pointing out. At least that's what I get from it. It doesn't mean that we all have the power of Elijah.

[6:13] I'm not going down that road, but I think, you know, you guys correct me if you think I'm off base here, but I think he's just pointing out the fact that Elijah is a man, just like the rest of us.

[6:25] And he prayed earnestly, and it happened. So, we see prayer, and we see action. You think about Zechariah, okay?

[6:38] Luke 1, verse 13 is that passage. But the angel said to him, Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer is heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John.

[6:50] Now, you know, we know that story real well from the Christmas, you know, story of Christ's birth and everything. But again, you see, your prayer was heard. And so you hear of God hearing our prayers.

[7:02] Now, there's also situations where God doesn't hear prayers. But, you know, I guess what I'm looking at here is that, so far, it's looking to me like God is hearing the prayer of his people, and he's responding, and he's doing something.

[7:17] Okay? At least that's what it says. Your prayer is, you know, your prayer is heard. Let's see, another, well, this is a very familiar verse.

[7:28] Okay? 2 Chronicles 7, 14. If, okay, big qualifier there. If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and heal their land.

[7:46] And so if, and there's a list of things that we do, one of them is praying. Again, that's God's people with Israel. But I think what we can, God himself hasn't changed, right?

[7:57] Now, he deals with us a little differently now through grace. And I think there's a connection maybe with that here in a little bit. But again, prayer seems to be connected with what happens.

[8:11] Okay? There's a connection there. It doesn't mean it's a guarantee, but that's what we see happening. This was an interesting verse. Luke 10, 2, just from the standpoint of prayer.

[8:22] So, and again, I'm not providing a lot of context. Then he said to them, I think Christ said to his disciples, the harvest is truly great, but the laborers are few. Therefore, pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.

[8:39] You think about that. Well, wait a minute. I mean, God knows the laborers are short. It's his harvest. Why do we need to pray and ask him to send laborers, right? And so it's just something to think about here. It looks like prayer is connected with action, and there's a responsibility that we have to pray.

[8:55] And it would kind of seem, well, what if we don't pray, right? What if we don't? That's a big question mark, right? But I just think that's interesting. Pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.

[9:09] Well, okay. Why, right? If he already knows what he's going to do. I'm not saying I don't want to go down that way, but sometimes our theology, I think sometimes we pray.

[9:21] I know this personally, okay? We'll just say testimony-wise. I had a hard time praying for a long time, and I thought, hey, you know what? It's all set. And I'm not saying it isn't all set. I don't really want to get into that.

[9:31] But when I thought about the future and tomorrow already being laid out and already done, how do you pray to ask God to do anything different about it, right? I have this need. I have this problem.

[9:42] And I'm not mentioning names, but I get this. And we do pray according to God's will, right? Because we don't know what God's will is with every situation. We certainly don't. We know what God's will is generally, as far as what he's called us to do.

[9:55] But we don't know what his will is going to be with every situation. But should I pray expecting that God might change the situation? Or am I just praying that God changes me about the situation?

[10:09] What do we see when we read these verses? Right? And so that's kind of what I just want to have in the back of your mind there. In the Old Testament, and as, you know, God dealt with the Jews, there were, if you kind of look down through, if you're on the computer, you see pleads from people, hear my prayer.

[10:29] Hear my prayer, Lord. Please hear my prayer. You know, he doesn't hear every prayer. I don't want to say he doesn't hear it or isn't aware of it. He doesn't respond to every prayer. And again, think of God as our Father, right?

[10:40] My kids ask me for a lot of things, right? And sometimes I respond and I listen, and sometimes I say no, okay? And so that is part of prayer, too.

[10:51] This is a relationship thing that's going on here. We're praying to God. But it seems in the Old Testament that there was a plea for God to hear our prayer, and it seems that, you know, well, let's look at Jeremiah 11, 14.

[11:06] And I think that when God was telling, you know, his prophet, do not pray for this people or lift up a cry of prayer for them, for I will not hear them in the time of their cry out to me because of their trouble.

[11:19] There was a time of judgment right there. And God's saying, listen, you know, you had your chance. That's that. I don't know that that's how that it works today because of the cross, okay? But that is something you see going on there where God isn't necessarily going to hear the prayer.

[11:37] In Proverbs, you know, the sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord, but the prayer of the upright is his delight. What's he delighting?

[11:48] Why is he delight in our prayer? I mean, I know he wants to have communication with us, but just something to think about. But the Lord is far, and again, the Old Testament here with law, I do think there's a little bit of a difference after the cross here.

[12:01] The Lord is far from the wicked. I wouldn't say that the Lord's far from us as we are making mistakes necessarily or sinning because of the cross, right? We're under grace. And so there's some different dynamics.

[12:12] But what I really am trying to catch here, I guess, as we look at prayer, is that God himself has not changed, right? And if he responded to people in the past and if people prayed to him, then he would now too.

[12:25] That part has not changed, I don't believe. In Proverbs 15, 29, the Lord is far from the wicked, but he hears the prayer of the righteous.

[12:36] And so I think that's, I think there might be some differences there from today versus then. But I think that we can feel very far from God when we are in the midst of backsliding and sin.

[12:50] Okay, but if you're a Christian, Christ is in you, you're in Christ, that's it. I don't think there's, you know, there is no far. There's the feeling of far, but you're not. Okay, because that's something that Christ controls.

[13:01] I threw Acts 16, 13 in here just because, again, there's so much prayer going on all the time through Scripture.

[13:13] And I think where the point here is just they went out to pray on the Sabbath day at the Riverside where prayer was customarily made. So prayer was just part of their custom in that time, too.

[13:24] It was just part of everyday life. They did it as a group. They did it privately, whatever. So if we look down here, so that's a little bit of, there's a few samples there from, I guess, maybe some Old Testament stuff.

[13:39] Praying now, what are some things that Paul says about prayer? Romans 8, 26. Likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness, for we do not know what we should pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.

[13:54] And there, I think, is a little bit of a change. I don't think there's anything, you know, with the Jews or with the Old Testament where you see the Spirit helping them pray. And so that's just a distinction, I think, to think about and a comforting thing as we do our prayer.

[14:15] Paul was always talking about praying and praying for other people. What was Paul praying for? That's another thing. It seems that Paul, what we see mostly, the prayers there in his epistles are usually about spiritual growth.

[14:31] There does seem to be less of a focus on healing and all of that. But that could be just because that's assumed, right? That's assumed that why would that have ever changed? Outside of the promises that were given during the kingdom era, right?

[14:44] Like, we know the difference of that. There were things that when God, you know, when Jesus told the disciples, go and ask for whatever and it'll be done for you. Like, we know that's not necessarily the case right now. That was a special thing that was going on.

[14:56] But when I see Paul praying, he says, so if we look at Philippians 1.9, And this I say that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and discernment.

[15:07] So he's praying for knowledge and discernment for other people. And another thing to think about, I've heard it before, sometimes we pray for ourselves to get ourselves in line with God. Well, I mean, here's a prayer.

[15:18] He's praying for someone else. He's praying that something will happen, right? And this I pray that your love may abound still more and more in knowledge and discernment. Colossians 1.9. For this reason, we also, since the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding.

[15:39] And so again, we're praying for something to happen, okay? Praying for God to do something in these people's lives. Let's look at, let's see, 2 Thessalonians 1.11.

[15:54] Therefore we also pray always for you that our God would count you worthy of this calling and fulfill all good, all the good pleasure of his goodness and the work of faith with power.

[16:09] What was that one? 2 Thessalonians 1.11. And then three, same thing, 2 Thessalonians 3.1.

[16:21] Finally, brethren, pray for us that the word of the Lord may run swiftly and be glorified just as it is in you. Praying for something to happen. I desire, therefore, that, see, this would be 1 Timothy 2.8.

[16:37] I desire, therefore, that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting. Romans 12.12.

[16:48] Rejoice in the hope, patient in tribulation, continually steadfastly in prayer. So we don't want to pray with doubt.

[17:01] We want to be steadfast. But what is, you know, I'm just kind of, as I'm looking at it, I'm thinking, what are we doubting if we're praying? Are we doubting that God's going to work? Are we doubting that it's going to do anything?

[17:14] What are we steadfast about? And I think that it's, I think at least here, there is a connection between maybe our expectations that our prayers are going to make any difference.

[17:26] Okay? You know, that would be a question. What do you think that, what are we doubting, and what would be, what would be, would we be being steadfast about?

[17:41] Philippians 4.6. This is a very familiar one. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your request be known to God. Let's see here.

[17:54] I have another. And so, you know, again, do I have any feedback so far? Any red flags? I'll just throw it out here. Luke. Luke.

[18:11] This is actually a passage that kind of started the thing here from small group that I thought was interesting. I just hadn't thought about it for a while, I guess. But Luke 11, 1 through 8, if you guys would want to turn there, you can.

[18:26] Luke 11, 1 through 8. And I just put down here, pray and be persistent, right? And again, I know this is Luke. I know this is, you know, there are some different things going on.

[18:39] But the disciples asked Jesus how to pray. Okay. And so, 11, 1 through 8. Verse 1 of Luke there. Well, all right.

[18:49] Luke 11, 1 through 8. 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.

[19:03] So he said to them, when you pray, say, our Father. So he goes through the Lord's Prayer. Okay. And we know what that is. And forgive us our sins. So I'm going to skip now through the Lord's Prayer.

[19:13] So they asked him how to pray. The interesting thing is, towards the end, and this is connected with what, you know, teaching them to pray. He says, verse 5, He said to them, Which of you shall have a friend, and go to him at midnight, and say to him, Friend, lend me three loaves.

[19:31] Okay. For a friend of mine has come to me on his journey, and I have nothing set before him. And he will answer from within and say, Do not trouble me. The door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed.

[19:43] I cannot rise to give you, you know, I cannot rise and give to you. I say to you, Jesus is talking back to them now. He says, I say to you, Though he will not rise and give to him, but because he is his friend, All right.

[19:55] I'm messing this up. This reads kind of hard. Though he will not rise and give to him, because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence, he will rise and give to him as many as he needs.

[20:06] And so there's that, there's a little parable there connected to the end of praying, as, you know, Jesus is telling his disciples how to pray. And that's an interesting scenario, right?

[20:18] Though you are persistent, okay? And because he's a friend, this guy responds in the middle of the night. But there's a little window there of, again, how to pray to the Lord. That God can be, you know, it sounds like a weird thing to say maybe, but God can be moved to respond, okay?

[20:35] And that's been seen before. I'm thinking of the woman that, you know, was the Samaritan woman, right? And, you know, Christ said, I'm not going to you. I'm going to the house of, you know, of Israel.

[20:47] And she said, well, you know, don't the little dogs even get to eat the crumbs that fall from the table? And he says, you know what? Because of your faith, right? Well, listen, something happened there. And God moves.

[20:59] And I think, so, here's, I guess, getting down to some of where I really wanted to kind of point out as we're thinking about prayer. It's a very relational aspect, okay, of God through prayer.

[21:14] We have access to be able to speak to him and ask him to put our request before him, right? Come boldly into the throne of grace, right?

[21:26] And expect that he will move, okay? Now, he's not guaranteed to, so just think of your relationship, father and son, or father and child, mother and child, right? That's kind of how it works.

[21:37] But, you go to your, you know, if you're a kid, you go to your parent, and you're asking them with the expectation that they know what's best for you, and if it fits in, they're going to respond, and they're getting, you know, I'm hungry.

[21:50] Do you expect, I don't care. Is that the answer you expect? No, and there's verses about that, right? Do I give him a rock? Of course not. So, how are we praying?

[22:00] I guess that is, that is the question. And, do we expect God to do anything? Are we doubting when we pray?

[22:13] Does praying persistently make a difference, right? If you think about the guy at midnight knocking on the door, don't bother me, don't bother me. Yeah, because he's a friend and he's persistent, he gave him the loaves of bread, right?

[22:27] Does that apply to our prayer today? You know? Yes. Yes. Yes. Sure.

[22:42] Do any of the listeners more of the times of prayer should not be due to the hardship?

[22:58] Probably not. I mean, I think sometimes they're due to hardship, maybe sometimes not. I don't know anything about what was the question? So, of all the...

[23:13] Well, actually, with the light, yeah. Were there verses or symbols?

[23:26] Were there others or not related to the heart? So, like, right now, what I'm getting at is talking about is doing this way. So, again, I think there's probably a difference between praying for something random and having perseverance and having hardship and having faith.

[23:52] Sure. And I'm wondering if there are any examples of somebody just praying for something that they might like on the face of the delegation.

[24:07] Right, right. Sure. Yeah. Well, I mean, you know, one of the things I think about is... Let's see here.

[24:20] So, let me flip back. The prayer for... Oh, help me out.

[24:32] The prayer for the kids, right, to have a baby. I don't know that that was out of hardship. That was just out of desire. Where am I at here?

[24:45] You know, I missed one on here about Abraham and Sarah. Unless I'm... I should have numbered my pages. You know, I'm thinking with, like, Abraham and Sarah when Abraham prayed and he wanted...

[24:58] I don't know if that was out of hardship, necessarily. That was just out of desire. I want to have offspring, right? And then those are two prayers that were answered. Yeah.

[25:11] Well, I'm thinking, right, with... When Sarah's womb was barren, right? And so... I'm sorry, I've got... Yeah.

[25:23] So... But there's two situations there where, you know, someone was barren. And those are two prayers I can think of that I wouldn't say are really out of hardship. That's just out of the desire to have offspring and to have family.

[25:37] You know, where God said, I heard your prayer. And, you know, your wife will conceive. Now, you know, some of those are connected with something God was doing. But...

[25:47] I think that's a good question. I didn't really think about it that way so much. But I guess I'll put it back to the context of... One of the reasons that God relates to us as a father is because those dynamics all come through.

[26:04] And so... As a father, he's looking out for the best interest of us. And sometimes that is things that we want. I mean, I just think that it is. He wants us to enjoy our life and the life that he's given us.

[26:16] Now, so... That's something to think about. But I guess I'd have to really look at some of the situations a little bit closer and see if, you know... If they were not from hardship. But I don't...

[26:27] I don't think it always... They always were. Praying for wisdom and praying for spiritual growth. Those weren't necessarily, I don't think, out of hardship.

[26:39] It's just the desire for something good. Right? For God to do a good work. And as we pray for each other, we're praying for God to bless each other. Right? Not necessarily because it's...

[26:50] You know, you're going through some dire situation. You definitely tend to pray then. But... Just some things to think about. You know, I guess with that. Specifically with the New Testament prayers, I guess, in the...

[27:05] Yes? Right. Yep. Yep.

[27:21] Mm-hmm. Yes. Right. Well, it's... God's not the genie in the bottle. Right? I mean, that's definitely... I'm not saying that.

[27:31] Okay? My point is not... Is not that. My point is simply that can you call upon the Lord and will he respond? Okay? And I think, as you look through Scripture, the answer is pretty clearly yes.

[27:47] Okay? And I guess that's one of my main points that I kind of wanted to... to point out about prayer because we have serious things to pray about. You know? Now, you know, if I'm praying for, you know, just some blessing in my life, hey, okay, whatever.

[28:03] I'm probably not going to be on the floor begging, you know? But, I mean, Hezekiah prayed. Was that out of hardship? He didn't want to die. You know? I don't know if it was out... He just didn't want to die, you know, at that time.

[28:15] Yeah. And God said, hey, okay, fine. And I think, and I'm just sitting here trying to remember, I didn't read the rest of the story, but I think it's... Some people have said, well, maybe Hezekiah would have been better off to go ahead and die because it didn't go very well after that.

[28:26] You know, he had a lot of problems after that. But, again, what I guess is in my heart and mind about this from my personal experience is that I've tended to go through and do a lot of praying in my earlier years thinking, I don't really know why I'm doing this, okay?

[28:48] Because I'm just going to say some phrases, and, again, I'm not looking for an argument, but does this match with what we see in prayer? God's already there.

[29:00] It's already happened. It's already done. It's set, okay? Well, why am I going to pray to change anything like that? Why would I do that, right? You know, there are things that God has certainly said will be, and they will be because He said they will be.

[29:18] I mean, that's how I look at that. But I guess as you just look at through some of these that I brought up, and, of course, I'm sorry, I've kind of lost my place a little bit. You don't see people praying like that, right?

[29:31] You see people praying, expecting something to happen, okay? And you see stuff happening. One of the things here down with Abraham and Sarah, you know, when he lied and said that Sarah's my sister, you know, God came to that king and said, hey, you're a dead man.

[29:52] You know the woman that you have is married? He's like, I didn't know that, right? I didn't know that. Are you going to punish me for something I didn't even know? He said that he was a sister. She said she was a sister. And yet, and he says, okay, listen, restore her, okay?

[30:06] Restore her. And then he said, Abraham is going to pray for you, and you'll live. Why, again, is that prayer part of that process? Why is that even, why is it even there, right?

[30:17] You should just restore her, and you're going to be okay. And I'm going to go deal with Abraham about, you know, not trusting me enough, right? And yet he says, Abraham's going to pray for you. And it's, and I don't, again, not necessarily having some totally conclusive things to say, but yeah, Nathan, help me out.

[30:35] Yeah, I think you talked about theology. One of the popular theological systems out there is very deterministic. Everything that happens in our lives is all predetermined, and that certainly is the case with certain things, but it begs the question about what is the purpose of prayer.

[31:01] And some would say, well, the purpose of prayer is not to change God's mind, or get me to do something, or do I want to do the work, but it's to change us.

[31:13] And that may be the case that that's true. The prayer does change us. But when you survey the Bible, that's not the primary reason that people have prayed.

[31:25] Right. They pray to the answers from God. Now there's the whole thing about miracles, and especially healing, and supernatural intervention, and material things, and there's a whole debate in grace circles about whether we should even pray for material things.

[31:47] And some people say yes, and some people say no, and some people say, you know, in the stage of grace, we should only focus on our spiritual things, which I think should be our focus.

[31:59] Sure. Because our eyes are set in the course of eternal matters. But I don't think it's wrong to pray for material things.

[32:13] But I think it can cause us to become jaded, disappointed, when we pray for things, especially when we're not able to pray for material things.

[32:30] Right. Things like that. And we don't see the answer that we want. Right. Right. And we feel like, well, none of this works.

[32:43] Yep. Mm-hmm. But we see in the scriptures, especially in the age of grace, that I think throughout all the ages of biblical history, is that God has determined that there is a vow to do in suffering.

[33:00] Mm-hmm. Right. Right. And so, God doesn't always answer the prayers. Because the way that we in temporal lens of how we tend to do things doesn't always answer prayers in a way that we want.

[33:25] But we shouldn't think that God's not listening. Right. We shouldn't think that He won't respond. We shouldn't even think that we cannot affect what He does.

[33:38] Right. especially when it comes to spiritual matters. That passage in Luke related to the Lord's Prayer basically he was saying God's like your neighbor who's just annoyed enough times that he finally responds to. God's that way.

[34:00] That seems weird and strange to us. But God wants us to appeal to him. The Bible talks about our prayers going up to heaven like a sweet smell of aroma.

[34:13] God wants to appeal to us. He wants to respond to us. Sometimes the Holy Spirit corrects it as it goes up. We sometimes really don't know what to pray for.

[34:26] We pray for it. Right. Yeah. That's true. But I think about spiritual things. For example, you have a friend or a family member that's not saved.

[34:38] Right. And we know what God's will is. Yep. Yep. That God is more than willing to work in someone's life to try to bring them to faith.

[34:51] Now God can't make somebody come to faith. But he can be at work. Yep. And you know, I think sometimes when people, when you see this throughout the Bible, people dig in against God, and God kind of gives up on you.

[35:07] Mm-hmm. He says, okay, I've come after you multiple times, and you have rejected me and resisted me. I'm not going to spend time on you anymore. Mm-hmm.

[35:19] And that's within God's prerogative, right? Yep. But somebody might come along and say, God, this is somebody that I care about. Yep. Would you continue to work on this person?

[35:31] Yep. And what, God will respond if he will work in that person when he may not have other paths. Yep. And I guess that's, I mean, that is kind of, I think that's just a very good way, an accurate way of some of what's in my mind.

[35:45] One of the applications I'm thinking of is that, okay, I mean, I know a situation where there's a child that is, you know, outside of the faith. And, you know, one of the parents is like, I'm not, I'm not going to pray for him because it's part of God's will.

[36:03] I'm not going to pray about that. Well, man, you know, that's not right, I don't think. It doesn't mean that if you pray, God's going to do it necessarily, okay?

[36:18] But you should be praying for your lost, you know, child, your lost son. You should be doing that and expecting that God will hear you and put people around, do whatever, right?

[36:34] Give, maybe just, maybe it's just giving that child more opportunities, whatever it is. And I just think that it, anyway, and I, yeah. Yeah, Brad?

[36:46] Brad? I just think it's I know, I really was trying not to.

[37:01] Yeah, I know. I forgot to pray about that, actually. Yeah. Yeah, I was kidding. Yeah, I think, sure.

[37:21] Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

[37:36] I'm following you.

[37:51] I like that. Yeah. I do, and I think that there's something else I'll just say, I think in connection with all this, like predestination, right? I think it's important in the Bible to really hang on what is just totally declaratively clear, okay?

[38:10] And when you find something that, just when you read it, just begs a question, right? That can't change. What do I do with predestination? There are certain things in certain verses that God's declared that I just can't change these dynamics, right?

[38:24] So if they don't match, then we're going to have to be like, I don't quite know what this means and how that it works, but I will say this. Like, it cannot change things. Like, it can't change these stories, okay?

[38:37] It can't change what we see in Scripture as being totally clear, okay? And sometimes, I don't know, maybe that might help a little bit. So if you go down the predestination route, you tend to not pray for anything to change because it's already set.

[38:52] And then everybody has different bounds all over the place. You get on this thing of, well, there's God's permissive will, and then there's this will and the other will, and I don't know, right? You have a lot of things. They're fascinating.

[39:02] They're interesting. I think they cause more study, but I think we get lost sometimes in the way that we live out our relationship with the Lord, sometimes based upon some of these systems and some of these thoughts, you know, that are possibly question marks.

[39:19] And I guess, you know, again, what, yeah, you know, you're good, Alma? Yeah, I'm thinking some of that, maybe our prayer needs to be about us to be accepting of what's going on.

[39:31] Mm-hmm, sure. Sure. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Right.

[39:45] Yep. Sure. No, and again, that's why, and it's kind of a slippery slope.

[40:02] I am not saying, you know, I don't want to come out here and say, yeah, whatever you need. I'm not saying it's not like God talked to the disciples and said, whatever you ask, you're going to get it, right? That's not what we're saying. That was a time when God was demonstrating something like, these are my people right here, okay?

[40:16] And so when they asked for this to happen, it's going to happen, and it was about a sign. It was about things like that. But I also didn't want to go on this other side of things where God doesn't change.

[40:28] God doesn't respond, and nothing happens when we pray because that's not true, you know, either. And there's plenty of things in life we cannot change. And so while we are still trying to figure out the end verdict of a situation, we pray and ask God for what we want to see happen, all the while knowing that we may have to accept that he isn't going to do that.

[40:48] You know, just like when a kid comes to me and says, hey, Dad, can we go swimming, okay? Yeah, you can go swimming. Oh, wait a minute. Now you can't go swimming, okay? That's just real life. And, yeah, so someone else?

[41:02] Yes. Yeah, right, right. And on the subject of prayer, Jesus was praying to God, right?

[41:12] I mean, I don't know. Again, I want to try to stick with some of that. Just fascinating. I don't know. But, yeah. And, oh, yeah, there's another passage, too, where it says, you know, it's not for you to know the times of the day or the hours.

[41:27] Not even the sun knows, right? Everyone's like, ah! You know, I can't deal with that verse. But, yeah. Well, anyway. So, I don't know. If nothing else, I hope that I have primed the pump upstairs, okay?

[41:42] And, to be honest, I didn't get as much time as I wanted to on this. But, I believe that if you open up the Bible and sometimes use some of these little digital tools to have some fun and you put in pray, you just start reading.

[41:59] Just read one after the next. I mean, there was 139 verses, right? And I didn't read all of them in every context. But, you know, like, Brad, to your point, hey, what was the situation with some of these?

[42:11] You know what? Go home. Plug in pray on Blue Letter Bible. Read through all those things and take a look at it and see. And I guess here's my challenge. Just go to the Bible. Look at prayer and see.

[42:22] Does it look or seem to you that your prayer life now matches what you see going on in there, right? And remembering the context of, you know, that we're living in the age of grace and there are some things that are different.

[42:35] We're not Israel. You know, signs aren't a thing right now as far as that goes and all that. Understand the time that we're living in. But also understand just the power of prayer, the access that we have to the Lord, to God, okay?

[42:50] And, man, that might change your prayer life, right? That's where I wanted to go with it. And if I've just muddied the waters, maybe that at least causes you guys to go out and dig in for yourself and say, Man, Joe made a mess.

[43:04] We're going to clean this up. That's okay. Okay? So I think that's all I've got. We're probably running out of time here. So anything? Any other comments, corrections to be issued?

[43:17] All right. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

[43:33] Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Because that's what's accepted. Sure. And then you get the peace. Yep.

[43:48] Yeah. Yep. What happened back in Matthew, and we stopped praying, and all that, and all that, and all that, and all that was coming. Mm-hmm. We're in grace.

[44:00] Grace said, bring it out. Yeah. They had all out in front of me. Right. I'll do what I think. Sure. No, and I, no, yeah, and I think that to some degree has probably been the case all along.

[44:12] I mean, you know, you hear, you see in the Old Testament that he'll hear, he'll not hear, he'll hear, and you know, sometimes I don't know, if we know why he heard it in here. Who knows? That's a question. Yeah.

[44:26] Yeah. Yeah. Right. Right. So, yeah. All right. Well, let's pray, and, oh, yeah. Well, I have a prayer request. Yes. Okay. I found out yesterday that a really friend of ours in Colorado, his name is Tim, and he fell over 15 feet onto a granite floor, and he broke his back, who broke multiple bones, and he had surgery, and he's still in the hospital, but not real sure how that's going to go.

[44:55] Okay. In his 60s. Okay. Tim? Tim. All right. Okay. All right. Any other prayer requests? Then we'll pray. All right. Dear Father in Heaven, Lord, I just want to pray and ask you, Lord, for you to work in our hearts and our minds about prayer.

[45:14] What is it that you want from us? What is it that we should expect in the realm of prayer to you? And it certainly, I believe, is something about the relational aspect of you.

[45:30] You're not sitting somewhere far off in some place that we can't reach. You've made yourself available to us, and I think that is just an amazing thing to think of.

[45:42] And I wonder how many times we don't take advantage of calling out to you and reaching out to you because we feel like you're just not reachable. And I just know that isn't the case, Lord.

[45:56] So I just pray that as we consider the subject that we will look through it, study the Word, and even today I pray that you might work something through what I presented.

[46:10] I know it probably got a little muddy here and there. But if I pray that you'd use it, you can, you redeem all kinds of things. It might even be this lesson here this morning.

[46:23] And Lord, we want to, we want to pray for Tim that Tanya just brought up and what a tragic thing that's happened to him falling and the situation that he's in.

[46:35] And so, Lord, things to pray about for him. We pray for healing if it would be within your will. We pray that you would heal him. We pray for peace for him. I don't know his spiritual condition, but maybe this would be a time if it needs be that he gets right with you.

[46:49] So we pray, and if not, then we pray that, you know, if he's already a believer, then we pray that you just give him peace and comfort knowing that whatever the outcome, it's ultimately good if we're a believer.

[47:00] We know what we have in store. All of that is done after this journey down here. But Lord, we just pray for him and everyone connected with that situation, any family. That's just hard, hard things, and we have a lot of that in this life.

[47:16] So, Lord, I pray that you just bless the rest of the morning here this morning in Jesus' name. Amen.