Prayer- Getting What You Really Want

Written by Ed Allen
Saturday, 28 August 1999 19:00

Effective Living in a Busy World

John 16:24 says, "Until now you have not asked for anything in My name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete." The disciples saw this reality in Jesus. Who can blame them for asking Him to teach them how to pray in Luke 11:1, "Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples."

Luke 11:1-10

One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, "Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples."

(2) He said to them, "When you pray, say:

"`Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. (3) Give us each day our daily bread. (4) Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us. And lead us not into temptation.'" (5) Then he said to them, "Suppose one of you has a friend, and he goes to him at midnight and says, `Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, (6) because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have nothing to set before him.'

(7) "Then the one inside answers, `Don't bother me. The door is already locked, and my children are with me in bed. I can't get up and give you anything.' (8) I tell you, though he will not get up and give him the bread because he is his friend, yet because of the man's boldness [5] he will get up and give him as much as he needs.

(9) "So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. (10) For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.
 
 

The prayer He taught them was broken into several parts:

"holy is Your name"

• The prayer begins with adoration of God.

"Your kingdom come"

• It?s a prayer for revival.
• Here is our will in agreement with God?s:
• Every time we pray, our horizon is altered, our attitude to things is altered, not sometimes but everytime, and the amazing thing is that we don?t pray more. -Oswald Chambers
• We want what He wants because what He wants is right and good.
• We want what He wants because we want Him to shine; we want Him to look good.

Requests

• "Give us what we need"
• We have been given the right to ask make requests of God.
• We must be careful
  to pray with the right motives and we must receive material goods from God with right heart so as not to allow idolatry:
  We can?t?or I can?t?hear the song of a bird simply as a sound. Its meaning or message (that?s a bird) comes with it inevitably?just as one can?t see a familiar word in print as a merely visual pattern. The reading is as involuntary as the seeing. When the wind roars I don?t just hear the roar; I "hear the wind." In the same way it is possible to "read" as well as to "have " a pleasure. Or not even "as well as." The distinction ought to become, and sometimes is, impossible; to receive it and to recognize its divine source are a single experience.

  -C.S. Lewis
   

  • "Forgive us our sins?"
  • We must ask forgiveness, because we never get it right.
  • "Lead us not into temptation?"
  • Protect us from our natural tendencies.
  
   

We know what the disciples were thinking: sounds simple. So why don?t I get what I really want?

Jesus used the parable in Luke 11:5-8, to teach these things:

• We have been given the right to pray for others.
• We have been given the right to pray with persistent boldness.
• Prayer is a powerf
  means of getting what we really want.
  When McCluskey married and started a family, he decided to invest one hour a day in prayer, because he wanted his kids to follow Christ. After a time, he expanded his prayers to include his grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Every day between 11 a.m. and noon, he prayed for the next three generations.

  As the years went by, his two daughters committed their lives to Christ and married men who went into

  full-time ministry. The two couples produced four girls and one boy. Each of the girls married a minister, and the boy became a pastor. The first two children born to this generation were both boys. Upon graduation from high school, the two cousins chose the same college and became roommates.

  During their sophomore year, one boy decided to go into the ministry. The other didn?t. He undoubtedly felt some pressure to continue the family legacy, but he chose instead to pursue his interest in psychology. He earned his doctorate and eventually wrote books for parents that became bestsellers. He started a radio program heard on more than a thousand stations each day. The man?s name was James Dobson. Through his prayers,, George McCluskey affected far more than one family.?Loyal J. Martin, Newton, Kansas. Leadership, Vol. 16, no. 4
   

  • P.U.S.H. = Pray Until Something Happens
  • Sometimes we don?t get what we want because we give up too soon.
  • Such persistence teaches us dependence.
  • Such persistence refines us.
  • "Ask?" God has made a promise to us.

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