Matthew 6:8-15 - Teach us to Pray
Tom Shrader examines Jesus' teaching on prayer in Matthew 6, contrasting authentic prayer with the hypocritical practices of the Pharisees. He walks through the Lord's Prayer as a model that begins with intimacy (Our Father) balanced with reverence (hallowed be Your name), moves to surrender (Your kingdom come, Your will be done), acknowledges dependence (daily bread), and addresses forgiveness and spiritual warfare. Shrader emphasizes that prayer is not about informing God but about aligning ourselves with His will and recognizing our desperate need for Him.
“By our praying, we are instructing ourselves more than we are God.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Sermon on the Mount
Recorded: May 02, 2002
Duration: 41 min
Themes: prayer, humility, forgiveness, surrender, dependence, intimacy, reverence, hypocrisy, struggling with prayer, new believer, feeling distant from god, spiritual dryness, seeking deeper faith, pastor, church leader, young adult
Scripture: Matthew 6:5-15, Matthew 23, Luke 4:43, John 18:36, Psalm 103:19, Isaiah 14:24, Ephesians 4, 1 John 1:9, James 1
Theological Themes: lords prayer, spiritual disciplines, kingdom of god, sanctification, spiritual warfare, biblical prayer, communion with god, pharisaism
Full Transcript
We're working our way through the Sermon on the Mount, and we are at chapter 6, verse 5. Let me just remind you what's going on. I'll tell you up front, I've now taught this lesson twice, and I don't know what it is, but people are sitting and listening. There's not a lot of yucks in this, and normally I think we've got a lot of application and a lot of illustration, and a lot of things that we would say would make it practical. This is very practical, but it's practical in the sense that it's for you to take and to listen and to try to put into practice in your life.
Virtually everybody I talk to says their prayer life is a liability, not necessarily a great asset. And I sense frustration with people all the time about praying and how to pray, and what does that look like, and there's all sorts of books, and there's all sorts of recommendations out on it, but how can we do better than this? The disciple said, Lord, teach us to pray, and then He says, okay, pray this way. It would seem to me that if you really wanted to understand prayer, you might want to go and at least lead with this in your study.
The Context: Against Religious Hypocrisy
By way of reminder, Jesus is speaking in a sense against the scribes and the Pharisees. He said, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. The scribes and the Pharisees were known by the people for their holiness, but Jesus says, don't you be deceived by that. That's all on the outside. Sometime, when you just want to do some reading, this same book, Matthew, except the 23rd chapter, and look at Jesus as He speaks directly to these guys, and He is not very kind and courteous, nor is He soft in His approach to them. You scribes, you Pharisees, you hypocrites.
Well, in this case, the scribes and the Pharisees are engaged in three activities: giving, praying, and fasting. In all three of these, Jesus does not say, don't you pray, and don't you fast, and don't you give. He says, when you do that, just don't do it like they do.
How Not to Pray
So, here's the first thing in verse 5. He said, here's two things I don't want you to do. When you pray, you're not to pray as the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners in order to be seen by men. We saw last week, that's the normal posture for a Jew to pray, to stand. The normal place is in the synagogue or on the street corner. They'd stop, it'd be a time of prayer, they'd pray. So, He's not saying anything about posture or place. He said, here's the problem. They do it to be seen by men.
Your prayer life, your giving, your fasting, the message is really all three the same. Don't you do this in a way where you're trying to address people. These are spiritual issues between you and God. Now, we know that we're supposed to let our light shine so that men will see that, but He's saying, not in these things. These are relational issues between you and God. So, first of all, when you pray, don't pray for everybody else in terms of for their benefit to see you.
Avoiding Meaningless Repetition
He said this, verse 7, and don't use meaningless repetition. Again, He's not condemning repetitious prayer. Paul prays three times, removal of the thorn in the flesh. Jesus, the night before He died, prays, goes and wakes the disciples, prays, goes and wakes the disciples. I'm guessing that there was a repetitive theme in there. I don't know, but I'm guessing all this, not my will, but thy will be done, was a repetitive theme. He's not condemning a repetitive theme. He's saying, don't do it meaninglessly.
Don't let your mind just drift off, and all of a sudden it's way far away. Prayer is intense relational conversation between you and God. If you're married, you've had this experience, where you're talking to your mate, and all of a sudden they begin to talk to you, and then after a while you're going, ah, what was that you were saying? I really wasn't listening. Well, that's meaningless, repetitious listening. We're talking about meaningless, repetitious praying, where you just go through it, and then by the end of it, you just go, gee, what was it I just said?
The Mystery of Why We Pray
He said, don't pray this way, and then He adds this. Don't be like them, for your Father in Heaven knows what you need before you ask Him. Every time I read that, and this gets into some of those, frankly, great mysteries of God's sovereignty, and how does God's sovereignty interact in all this area of prayer, and all that goes with it, because it does raise a good point. God already knows what you need. He already knows what you're going to ask. So what's the point of prayer?
John Calvin writes this. Believers do not pray with a view of informing God about things unknown to Him, or exciting Him to His duty, or urging Him as though He were reluctant. On the contrary, they pray in order that they may arouse themselves to see God, that they may exercise their faith in meditating on His promises, that they may relieve themselves from their anxieties by pouring them into His bosom. In a word, that they may declare that from Him alone they hope and expect, both for themselves and for others, all good things.
Martin Luther says it a little more succinctly. By our praying, we are instructing ourselves more than we are God. So when I'm praying, and we talked about it last week, when I'm praying, what I'm doing is lining my will up to His. Okay, let's say I'm approaching an issue. Here's God's view, here's my view. I'm not praying with the idea of saying, okay, God, come on over here. I'm praying with the idea of saying, okay, Tom, I need you to get over here. It's me to understand me, Him, the situation, what He has to say. I'm trying to bring myself into right relationship with Him and into alignment with His desire. I'm not trying to entreat Him and change Him to my way of thinking. I love that phrase that Calvin uses. I'm not trying to excite Him to His duty or urge Him as though He were reluctant.
Our Father: The Foundation of Prayer
I'm trying to inform myself. So Jesus says, "Pray then in this way." It means literally, "Pray in this manner. Pray along these lines. Here's your example." As we said again last week, there's no mention here of where to pray or a time to pray or a posture to pray. He said, "I want you to follow this pattern when you pray."
Then He goes and gives us what we call the Lord's Prayer: "Our Father who art in Heaven," and so forth. Interestingly, at least as far as I know, nowhere in the New Testament is there one record of any person or any church ever praying this prayer. Apparently, this prayer didn't become necessarily part of the Christian culture immediately. He wasn't giving us a prayer to pray. He was giving us a model.
So what we better understand is, what's the point? What's He trying to say? He's speaking primarily, I think, about attitude as much as anything else.
The Heart of Christian Growth
It begins where really all of conversion begins and all of Christian maturity takes place, and that is an exalted view of God and an accurate view of man. Your challenge, if you're a Christian, and mine, is to let our lives, let our thinking, let everything in us magnify God and minify man. John the Baptist said, "Jesus must increase, I must decrease."
I'll tell you what, there's your secret to spiritual growth. You want to see your spiritual life explode, then you let God be as big as He really is. You will get the understanding that salvation is all of God, that God sovereignly rules this world, that God is who He said He was. We'll talk about it today, and you'll get an accurate view of sin.
A couple of things that are really wrong with the culture that we live in, and I mean even the Christian culture, and one of them is sin is no big deal anymore. It's not that big a deal. Nobody's perfect. What are you all upset about?
The Pattern Jesus Gave
Here's what He says: you pray this way. In Luke's gospel, the scenario's a little bit different in that the setup is this. The disciples come to Him and say, "Jesus, teach us to pray." When they said, "Lord, teach us to pray," and this is not a shot, but He didn't say, "Well, there's this guy named Jabez." I'm not being critical there. I'm just saying He didn't say, "Go pray this." He said, "Pray this way. Here's how you pray." And there's a message.
Our Father: Intimacy Without Fear
Our Father. It begins with the idea of our personal, intimate relationship with Him, that He is our Father, that He is our Dad. Literally, the word translated in the English equivalent, "Daddy," that there's an intimacy here. So all of a sudden, all of the fear is gone. The Jews had such reverence, it was almost fear of God in an unhealthy way. Would not even say the name.
All the fear is gone. The loneliness is gone. The uncertainty is gone. The relationship is established. All of a sudden, I know that He who has all the resources in the world is now part and promise me all the things of my life. Now my relationship is one of father-child obedience.
My daughter Sarah is 22. Golly, I just thought about it. She'll be 23 in August. Yesterday she called and I said, "Hello." I know who it was. She said, "Daddy, what are you doing?" I said, "Well, I'm at work and I got some stuff I got to do. So what are you doing tonight?" I said, "Why? I don't know. What do you want to do?" She said, "Well, you know, one of the girls are in the hospital up at the male hospital. Why don't we go up there today? We'll do this." I said, "That'd be great. Let's do that. We'll plan on it."
A couple hours later, I called and I said, "Why don't we have dinner?" She said, "That'd be great. We'll have dinner." We're all the way up there. We're talking and she's talking. I'm kind of talking about today. I'm commenting on everything. She said, "Man, you're a grumpy old man." I said, "No, yeah, I don't know. I don't know how grumpy old man I am." We're going through and we're just kind of on each other. We're talking about different deals. We go and we have dinner. She said, "What do you think about Haley getting married? What do you think about this?" I said, "What do you think about that? How does that affect us?"
There's great intimacy there. I laid down last night, I was thinking that that's 23 years of joy with that relationship. 23 years of being in the midst of that, where she can say, "Daddy," and there's that personal relationship. Yet there's some authority in that process as well. There's that desire of obedience.
Hallowed Be Thy Name: The Balance of Reverence
Here you go. Here's the counterbalance of that. Hallowed be Thy name. The idea there is holy. Thy very name is holy. It's sacred. It's sanctified. Hallowed be Thy name.
We talk about name in God's name. We're just not talking about G plus O plus D equals God. We're not talking about His name in terms of it's God and that's it. When we talk about the name, we're talking about the character. We're talking about all that He is.
A couple of years ago, I was reading a biography by Senator John Danforth. He was talking about the time that he was really the patron saint of Clarence Thomas through the whole Senate hearing for his appointment to the Supreme Court. There was a lot of talk from Thomas in there, Judge Thomas. I remember over and over and over again, Clarence Thomas kept saying, "What I'm worried about is my name. I want to protect my name." He wasn't saying, "I want to copyright Clarence Thomas." What he's saying was, "I know that when people hear Clarence Thomas, that that's going to, rightly or wrongly, that's going to encompass all that they think and all that they know about him."
Hallowed be Thy name. Holy, sacred is Thy name. Meaning all the character, all the name of the Lord, all the attributes: Elohim, God creator, creator God. Jehovah Jireh, the Lord will provide. Jehovah Shalom, the Lord our peace. All of those.
Now that process, remember, is how do I pray? I begin by acknowledging this relationship. I begin by knowing it's an intimate relationship.
relationship. And then I pray, hallowed, holy is thy name. Thy character, all that you are. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done.
Our Deepest Desire: His Kingdom
Our deepest desire should be to see Jesus' kingdom reign. He's not speaking here about a geographical territory. But He's talking about His sovereignty. Now there's a sense where God already reigns. I think we understand that. That He is the king now from all eternity. That He's in control.
And yet Jesus says, "My kingdom is not of this world" (John 18:36). That kingdom of God, that kingdom that Jesus talks about, that kingdom that He anticipates coming, was a dominant message of His earthly ministry. In fact, in Luke 4:43, Jesus said, "I came to preach the kingdom of God." He says it again, "I must preach the kingdom." From the time that Jesus rose from the dead till He ascended into heaven, the message was this. What was He doing? He said He was speaking to the disciples concerning the kingdom of God.
He is sovereign and rules over all, Psalm 103:19. And yet there's this idea of this earthly kingdom, when Christ will come again. Do you desire that? I mean, is that your thirst for Jesus?
Do You Really Hunger for Heaven?
John Piper asked this question the other day. If you could go to heaven, and all the pain was gone, and all the sorrow was gone, and all the sickness was gone, and everything was perfectly arranged, and you knew all things, and all your friends were there, and there was this joyous relationship, and all your needs were met, and everything was there. If you could go to heaven, and all that was there, but Jesus wasn't there, would you still want to go?
Well, I know the right answer, so I said absolutely not. But I got to tell you, isn't there a little flinch where I get swept away with that for a second? Do you hunger and thirst for Him that way? My sense would be no, and maybe I'm projecting my life into yours. Do you anticipate His kingdom coming?
The minute we hit the first of May, I mentioned it at the beginning, the minute we hit the first of May, for whatever reason, I start thinking about vacation. I start thinking about what's going to happen. I start thinking, for us, that always means ultimately Sea Ranch. Sarah and I, we're the two. Haley's pretty neutral to negative. Susan's negative to more negative, okay? I've been living with that for 23, 24 years now.
Sarah, we're walking into the hospital last night, and she said, "You know, today I was driving along, and I swear I could smell the ocean." I said, "Well, yeah, over at the McKellips and the 101, that's what you smell, is ocean over there. Sewer, honey." But Sarah will say, and she'll say it every day, she'll say, "Every day, Dad, I think of Sea Ranch. Every day, I think of the ocean." And I do a lot, too.
Do you think of heaven every day like that? Do you have the anticipation for heaven that I have for Sea Ranch, or that you have for the next round of golf, or that you have for whatever you fill in the blank with? My guess would be no.
When This Place Feels Like Home
See, that's why, and we're going to talk about it. I'll just give you a little tip. I think next week will be very, very good, the next couple of weeks, because we're going to talk a lot about heaven and earth and stuff and material things. But that's why this place is starting to feel so much like home to you.
I knew when we came in and saw the cars, I assumed it was a funeral. You saw a lot of cars in handicapped parking, so you always assume it is. It is amazing how frequently we grieve at a funeral for all the wrong reasons. It is as though we all want to go to heaven and no one wants to die. And we talk about this, and we kind of massage ourselves with this idea of heaven, but do you really thirst for that kingdom?
Can you say, like Paul, "I'm torn here? I want to be with you, but I even more want to be with Him." Thy kingdom come. That's what He's saying. We thirst for that day when your kingdom will be established here. We may or may not live to see it. We don't know that. We thirst for that day.
Thy Will Be Done
Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. You reign perfectly in heaven. We can't wait for the day when you reign perfectly here. Your will be done.
When we talk about God's will, we need to spend a couple minutes on it, because that word gets tossed about so easily. Most frequently, somebody comes in and says, "I want to figure out God's will for my life." And what they're typically saying is, "Where does God want me to live and all that kind of stuff." That's not what He's talking about. He's saying God's perfect reign.
Understanding God's Will
When we talk about God's will, we basically talk about one of two things. His sovereign will, which is essentially mysterious. It's how God works all things together. It's how Peter can say, "Before the foundations of the earth, by the predetermined plan of God, the Jews took Jesus and killed Him." How does that work? God's sovereign will, it's that way in which He moves in an undeniable way and dictates and declares what will happen in this earth and on this earth. "The Lord of hosts has sworn, saying, Surely as I have intended it is so happened, and as I planned it will stand" (Isaiah 14:24).
Now we also hear of God's will in the scripture, and the word is the same, but it's used a little differently. It speaks of His desire. For example, it's God's will. It's God's desire that you as a Christian would never sin. And yet you do. Now could He intervene and stop you from sinning? Sure He could, but He doesn't. It's not part of that sovereign will. It's His desire. He takes no good pleasure in that.
The dominant way that I think we ought to be concerned about God's will is when we look at this book. What is God's will for you? Well, it's right here. If you're a parent, it's that you fathers don't provoke your children to anger. If you're a wife, it's that you submit to your husband. If it's a husband that you love
your wife. If you're single, it's that you're celibate. What's God's will for your life? It's right here. Thy will, thy perfect dictate, thy deepest desires, those mysterious things that somehow we can't wait to come to this earth. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread
Give us this day our daily bread. I think for us, it's almost impossible to grasp the magnitude that these people did because they understood that every day was going to be a battle just for the basics. Remember the basic of life here: bread.
I was last week with a guy who's a pastor in South Africa, and I think I mentioned some of it in here. It was very interesting. He was talking about how different the culture was. He was talking about how obsessed we are with our children and protecting our children and rearing our children and how possessive we are of our children. He said in Africa, they're your children but they're community property. If a child's fussy, a baby's fussy, any woman standing by will just grab the kid and start to breastfeed it, whether it's her kid or not. You're walking down the street and there's a kid acting up, you just take your belt off and whack the kid. It doesn't matter whether it's your kid or not. Doesn't matter whether he's got an attorney. You just take care of it.
Well, he was trying to relate to the poverty and how you can't even comprehend it here. He said, "My church before I left," he said, "there's a pride there, it's a good pride. They don't want to be embarrassed, they want to be realistic. About the lowest that you can be in our culture is to ask for a drink and not be able to provide it. To say I'm thirsty, that's the ultimate poverty." Doesn't that take on new meaning when Jesus said, "If you're thirsty, come to me"?
So he said, "Before I left the church in the village, all the people, they knew I was coming to America. Well, all they know of America is the president. So they just assumed that I would see the president. And they didn't want me to have to ask him for something to drink. So they took a collection." He said, "They gave and they gave sacrificially." Now he begins to cry. And he said, "They presented to me on my departure so I would not be embarrassed in this country. They presented to me a gift as I went away. They presented to me the equivalent of 25 cents US." And he said, "They had to scrape to get that."
We can't even relate. I'm telling you, you drop a dime out here, you watch how many people walk by and look at it, not even bend over to pick it up. That's true. Some of you are saying, "Where's that dime?" That's the other side of it. Those are the greedy ones. Either way, you're losing this illustration.
Everything Necessary for Life
He said, "Give us our bread." Martin Luther says this: everything necessary for the preservation of this life is bread. Now this is an all-encompassing term, including food and healthy body and good weather and a home and children and good government. All that goes in. Father, we're dependent on you. This is what we're saying. Give—we're petitioning to Him.
As I pray, I start by acknowledging my relationship, acknowledging how holy He is, acknowledging my desire for His reign and His will to be done, petitioning Him. Why? Because I'm needy and He's the provider.
Prayer Born from Need
Why do you pray? It's out of those moments of desperation. That's what that September 11th thing was. That's why you had—I was at the bookstore, you got a cover story on U.S. News and World Report and it's on the Catholic church, but there's a little thing under it that says "Christianity in crisis." I'm not in crisis. And then on Newsweek, I think it was, is doing a similar story and you flip it over and there's a little article and up in the corner it said "unprecedented pluralism." When I thought, well, there's the answer to the crisis thing over here.
That's what September 11th was. Why were all those pagans praying? That drives me crazy. Why were all the pagans praying on September 11th? Because all of a sudden there was this overwhelming need. Who's going to ask? Who's going to entreat? Who's going to beg but a beggar? And if I don't know that I'm needy, I'm not going to ask. And as long as I don't think I'm needy, I'm self-sufficient, I don't need anything.
I was talking to a young guy one day about his dad and his dad is a pretty wealthy guy in this community, a very wealthy guy in this community. And I said, "Where's your dad with Christ?" And here's what he said: "He doesn't need anything. He doesn't need anything. If he wants it, he does it. If he needs it, he buys it. He doesn't have any need." Hey, if you don't have any need, you're never going to ask.
Remember when we started this whole study: "Blessed are the poor in spirit," the spiritual beggars. Why is it that nobody would respond? They don't feel any need. If I'm not spiritually bankrupt, if I think I'm okay, I'm never going to come. That's why this country is so cursed with this wave of spirituality. It's a very bad thing because it's making people who are sinful, wretched, lost people think they're okay. They're not.
Daily Dependence
It says, "Give us this day our daily bread." Why would we say "give us this day" if number one, we weren't needy, and if number two, we weren't convinced that He could meet the need, and that He promised to meet the need? And the operative word, it seems to me, is not just bread that encompasses all things, meaning our very basic things, but it's the idea of daily. I go to Him every day.
When do you pray the most? I'll tell you, when you really are hurting and needy. I was going around the room, got here early. I said, "How you doing?" I'm talking to one guy. I said, "How you doing?" He said, "I'm doing great. It couldn't be any better. I'm doing great. Everything is great." You know what? There is a real test right there. We were at the hospital last night.
We got this girl, I think she's 26, and she's got this disease that the blood cannot circulate through her body. So her hand—they've amputated two of these fingers and a thumb, and we were up there because they had to take her leg off just below the knee, and now the circulation—they're just kind of bit by bit just chopping her away. And every solution, this girl's been sick all her life, every solution has a counteractive measure that kicks in some other disease. See, you tend to pray at moments like that.
But you go over there to Fashion Square and you see all these little 26-year-old chicks, I'm saying counterparts, and they're just chugging their way through there on the way to pick up a little BB shirt. There ain't nobody in there saying, "How you doing? How's the prayer life?" Prayer? I don't need prayer. I pray this card clears. That's my prayer. Nobody praying.
You see that? That's what He's saying. He's pouring His heart out. "Give us this day our daily bread." We're desperately in need every minute, every hour. Why does He say pray without ceasing? Because without ceasing, I need You. Ongoing, I need You. I desperately need You. Give us this day our daily bread.
Why Daily Bread?
What if He gave it to us all at once? We'd be independent. That's just what the stuff does. That's what security does. All those things we want so much. That's what health does. That's what security does. That's what solid business does. It tends to make us independent and self-reliant and cocky and arrogant. That's what it does. If He gave it to you all at once, what would you do? Well, you'd blow it and you'd get conceited all at the same time. So He says give it to us daily.
The Focus on Forgiveness
Now we get into a couple of passages that to me are a little hard to figure out. So we're grateful we only have 10 minutes. Look at verses 12, 13, 14, 15. And again, I mean, this is 101 for so many of you, but when you read through a passage, before you start to study it, just read it and just what's there? What do you see? I mean, just like you're reading a newspaper article. What are those things you see?
Well, one of the things, and since I'm an idiot, I didn't see it until I really started working. Look at the word forgive or forgiven. Circle it. You'll see it six times in there. "And forgive us our debts, as we have also forgiven our debtors." See it there? It is twice. "Don't lead us into temptation, deliver us from evil." Verse 14, "And if you forgive men for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also," here it is for the fourth time, "forgive you. And if you do not forgive men, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions." So one thing we know, this has something to do with forgiveness. So we get that out of there. Forgiveness seems to be the point.
So here's what He's saying. Father, as I pray—so He's talking about Father, so we already have this intimate relationship here. We're talking about Christian to God, servant to master—forgive us our sins.
The Dilemma of Forgiveness
Well, this presents a dilemma for me, and probably for you. Because I thought He died on the cross and I thought they were already forgiven. So do I have to confess a sin in order to have it forgiven? In fact 1 John 1:9, "We're faithful to confess our sin, He forgives us." But if we don't confess it, that doesn't mean He doesn't forgive us. And then do we sit down at the end of the day and recap the whole day and confess every one of these sins? Is that right? No.
Here's what I think He's saying. Look at it. As a Christian, my sins are forgiven. Right? If I'm a Christian, I'm going to heaven. There's this, and I'm going to heaven no matter how much I sin. Now that doesn't become a license.
I'm walking along one day with a guy and we're talking about—he said, he's a very religious guy. He's from a mainline church, a denomination, a very mainline, okay? Very church oriented, not relationship oriented. So I'm explaining what I think is the Christian faith to him, what I think the Bible teaches. And he stops and he says this, "Let me ask you this. You're telling me that if I'm a Christian and I commit murder tonight, I'm going to heaven." And I said, "Yeah, yeah. What else you got?" Yes. And he said, "How can that be?" Well at that point, I knew that I had explained grace to him very well.
Understanding Confession
Why do we go to heaven? Our sin is forgiven. When we're confessing our sin, what we're doing is agreeing with God. That's what the word means. We're lining up. We're agreeing with Him. We're looking at our life. We're looking at these incidents in our life and we're confessing with Him. We're agreeing with Him. If we're people who see sin in our life and acknowledge it, that sin's forgiven. As a Christian, our sin is forgiven.
"Forgive us our debts." Five words in the Greek that we use in the New Testament that relate to sin. They deal with missing the mark and stepping offline. They deal with intentional overstepping, all those different things. This one means literally debt, a spiritual, moral debt. The wages of sin is debt. That's our debt. "Forgive us our debt." It's done. We're pronouncing that. We're acknowledging that.
John Stott writes this: "This certainly doesn't mean that our forgiveness to others earns us the right to be forgiven." See what he says? "Forgive us our debt just as we have forgiven others," verse 14 and 15. "If you forgive, it's stated positively, men for their transgression, your Father forgive you. If you don't forgive Him, He won't forgive you."
The Evidence of True Repentance
Stott said this: "This certainly does not mean that our forgiveness to others earns us the right to be forgiven. It's rather that God forgives only the broken, only the penitent. And one of the chief evidences of true penitence is the forgiving spirit. Once our eyes are open to the enormity of our offense toward God, the injuries which others have done to us by comparison seem extremely trifle. On the other hand, if we've exaggerated the view of offenses of others toward us, the inclination is to minimize"
Our own offenses toward God. Here is the idea. Ephesians chapter 4, Paul said this: "Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other just as God in Christ has forgiven you."
I think I've shared this with you before. In my life, there are many times when I say just do as I do, just follow me. I'll tell you this: I am world class at forgiving. I am one of the great forgivers. You can screw me over a thousand different ways from Sunday and I'm telling you, I don't hold a grudge.
I used to say, I don't get mad, I get even. But boy, when I became a Christian, one of the first things I came across was, wait a minute, I'm supposed to forgive people not because they deserve it, but because I understand how much I've been forgiven. How am I going to hold a grudge against you when I realize the offense I've done to God and He's forgiven me? We have to deal with discipline and all those things if that's appropriate, but we forgive and we forgive and we forgive.
The Cost and Blessing of Forgiveness
Doesn't that mean people are going to take advantage of it? Isn't that what's going to happen? If I forgive, won't these people take advantage of you? Sure! That's part of the deal. That's the deal. I forgive them. How many times? Seventy times seven. That's the message over and over again.
That's the parable. The man who's got the great debt and he's forgiven, he's going down the street and he sees the guy who owes him a debt and he says throw him into jail. Now they come back at this guy, why? It's the same thing. The mark here of forgiveness is a mark of humility where I understand I have this debt before God and I cannot pay that debt. Christ paid it on the cross and consequently, listen, I'm a forgiver.
Why Christian Marriages Should Work
Do you ever think about why Christian marriages should work? First of all, I read it again this week and I'm going to throw up if I have to read it again that Christian marriages fail at the same rate as world marriages. There's no way. There's no possible way that's true. Two born again Christian people do not have a divorce rate equal to this world. Now, church marriages may fail at the same rate, I don't know, but that just isn't true.
Why? Well, because they've got the Holy Spirit and they've got all this. Yeah, they've got all that, but they also have the ability to forgive. That's the key, isn't it? Isn't that the key in a relationship?
I mean, if you're sitting down and I've been there, I've sat there and said, all right, what's the problem? Most often, it's the woman, but it's a generalization. Most often, well, the guy doesn't have a clue what the problem is, but most often the woman will say, well, it was a rainy day in September of 1971 and we've been fueling this for 33 years now. It's to forgive.
Don't Lead Us Into Temptation
And then an equally difficult passage: don't lead us into temptation, deliver us from evil. Wait a minute. Is God going to lead us into sin? Well, James says this: don't any of you say when you're tempted, you're tempted by God because God cannot tempt and God cannot be tempted. So that's not it.
The word that's translated tempt can also be translated trial. I think what this prayer is saying is, Father, look, we are so weak and so dependent. Don't allow us to be tempted here in a way that's going to, in our flesh weakness, ultimately see us sin. God, we're dependent on You for everything.
Now, isn't that the prayer we have? Isn't that the promise we have? Sure it is. Doesn't Paul write a little bit later and he says, listen, I'll tell you this, there won't be one trial or temptation that comes into your life, but I'll provide you the strength to overcome. What are we doing? Well, here you go. My charismatic friends ought to love this. We're claiming a promise. We're claiming that promise. We're saying, God, don't lead us in there. God, You strengthen. This is all about His strength and our weakness.
The Heart of Dependence
One of the Puritan saints of years ago wrote this: "Grant me never to lose sight of the exceeding sinfulness of sin, the exceeding righteousness of salvation, the exceeding glory of Christ, the exceeding beauty of holiness, the exceeding wonder of grace. I am guilty, but pardoned. I'm lost, but saved. I'm wandering, but found. I'm sinning, but cleansed. Give me perpetual broken heartedness. Keep me always clinging to thy cross."
There's the prayer. You are strong. I am weak. God, I am totally dependent on You.
Praying With Passion and Sincerity
Now you're never going to pray this way if you don't believe this stuff. Most prayer lives are dead because we don't pray this way. We pray, well, Father, here I am, got a need, You know it. And I'm in a real jam. Help me out. Amen. Well, you can almost feel the throne rooms in heaven tremble as that baby arrived. There's no passion. There's no sincerity. Why? Because it's just a written, rote deal.
I'll tell you, that's not the way you pray when you're in trouble, is it? That's what He's saying. Pray this way. All the pretense is gone. You're not praying to be seen by men. You're communicating to God. You're saying, You're my Father. Your name is holy. God, I want Your kingdom to reign here. Let it start with me. Let me do thy will here on earth that You have in heaven. God, here's what I need. I need everything from You. My daily bread, I need You desperately, Father. You forgive me as I forgive others because I understand how much I've been forgiven. God, don't allow these temptations to overwhelm me. God, I'm totally dependent on You and Your kingdom and Your power, Your glory. God, I need You desperately.
That's how you pray. Not in some rote way, not meaningless repetition, not to be seen by other people, but with a broken spirit and a contrite heart that pours out your sin, your need, His praise, His worship, all poured out to Him. That's what He says. You pray this way when you pray. That's how you're supposed to pray.
Well, we go, all right, check me off there on the prayer thing. And
I'm with you here on the giving thing. What about fasting? So we'll spend some time, probably not a ton on fasting next week because the principle is the same. The principle is don't do it in a way that's seen before men, but do it.
Then He gets into where's your treasure, my friend? Where are you laying up treasure? Use your head on this deal. These next two weeks are extraordinarily practical. Again, I'm just being very autobiographical - this is the stuff that to me transforms your life because it transforms your relationship with all of the things here on this earth. So we'll look at it in the next couple of weeks.
Father, help us see this. Thank You for this truth, God. We do desperately need You every minute of every day. We acknowledge our sin and our brokenness before You, God. We pray that Your will would be done in our heart - our heart individually, our heart corporately. There will be salt and light on this earth until You come again. We pray in Christ's name, amen.