Basics with Beth Jones

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hi guys, I'm Beth Jones and welcome to the Basics
with Beth, where learning God's Word is a joy. In
every message, we will do our best to teach you
the Bible basics in such a way that it strengthens
your faith foundation. In addition, I want to empower and
equip you so that you have confidence to share these

(00:24):
Bible basics with others. So lean in and listen with
your heart. If you'd like to know more about our ministry,
just go to the Basics with Beth dot com and
get all the scoop. With all of that said, now
let's jump into today's message. As they said, we're starting
a new series today called Devo and just talking about

(00:47):
a relationship with the Lord and our devotion life with
the Lord and developing this relationship with the Lord. And
you know, if you didn't, how many y'all didn't go
to youth camp or kids camp as a Christian young person?
You did not, We'll see all the fun you missed
out on Father Abraham and deep and wide and what else?

(01:08):
Give me some other ones. I got the joy joy.
How many of you remember I got a river life?
Well you're gonna hear that one in a couple of weeks.
Things to look forward to. So, as we said, we're
in a series called Devo talking about our relationship with
the Lord, and we're just gonna dive right into it.
Lots and lots to cover. So if you need a Bible,
raise your hand. The ushers will get you. On this week,

(01:32):
we're gonna talk about making the connection with God in prayer,
and we'll talk about that whole idea of prayer. The
next week is with Devo Week two, and in that
week we'll talk about making the connection with God through
the Word. Because really, how many of you know the
goal that, the bottom line really I'm being a Christian
is making the connection with God. It's not about being religious.
It's not about going to church. It's not about listening

(01:54):
to worship CDs in your car, it's not about reading
your Bible per se. It's about making the connection with
the Lord, having fellowship and a friendship with the Lord.
And so that's what we're going to talk about. And
the reason why this is so important, I believe a
couple of reasons why this is so important. How many
of you know you're supposed to pray? I think everybody
should be raising in their hand. How many of you

(02:16):
know we're supposed to read the Bible. We all know that, right,
So it's really not a matter of people having even
the knowledge that they're supposed to or even the desire
to do so. Usually what it is is they don't
know how to do it. Okay, well, I'm supposed to pray,
but what am I supposed to say in prayer? What
do I do in prayer? I'm supposed to read the Bible?
But what am I supposed to read? And how come
it feels like God doesn't talk to me sometimes? And

(02:37):
so you know, what do you do? Then? What are
you do when you're reading the Bible and it feels
really dry? That's what we're going to talk about in
this series because what I've observed, and maybe some of
you have observed this too, is this what keeps a
Christian in the race. You know, how many of you
have discovered being a Christian is not the fifty yard dash.
It's a marathon. It's a lifetime marathon. It's an eternal marathon.

(03:01):
And so what keeps a Christian fired up and hydrated
and refreshed in this race? This marathon of the Christian
life that we're called to live. What keeps a Christian
fired up? What is it that causes a Christian not
to get shipwrecked in their faith? That causes a Christian
not to become another casualty? How many of you know

(03:21):
Christian casualties? You know, they accepted the Lord one day,
they prayed the prayer one day. Jesus came into their
life one day, and maybe they walked with him for
a little bit. But you know what happened? How'd they
fall off the wagon, so to speak? What happened? Why
they quit the race? Where did God go in their life?
Y'all ever wondered about that? Well? I believe this subject

(03:43):
we're going to talk about is very, very important as
it relates to that, because people that have a devotional life,
not a religion, not perfect church attendance, a devotional life,
a devot life. People that have that life, you will
be in it for the long haul because it's a
relationship with the Lord. It's not a religion. It's not

(04:04):
a list of dos and don'ts. It's not a list
of all I blew it again. It's not that it's
a relationship with the Lord that you and him get
so knit together, you get so intertwined with him. It's
such a personal relationship and you really get to know him,
and he really gets to hear your heart, and you
really have this bond and this fellowship. You wouldn't even
dream of walking away, walking away, it's not even a question.

(04:27):
How could you walk away from your best friend? You couldn't.
How could you get lukewarm on your best friend? How
could you get half hearted on your best You couldn't
if it's a real relationship with a guy. But if
it's not that for us, then it's easy to drift.
And we, like I said, no, lots of folks and
so to you, they're not bad people, but they drifted

(04:52):
why because maybe in this area of the devotional life
they didn't really quite know how to connect. It just
got tired of punching the time clock, unch in the
God time clock. But it didn't mean anything to them,
Nothing tangible was happening for them in their heart of hearts,
in their life. Well, that's not what God wants, that's
not his highest and best amen. So that's what we're
going to talk about. And it's for a couple groups

(05:13):
of people. And again a few months ago, the Lord
sort of put this topic on my heart for you all.
And and it's for this reason because we have a
lot of people in the church that are new Christians.
You've been walking with the Lord for just a very
short time. You're new at getting to know the Lord,
and so you've probably never heard much about or been
taught much about how to spend time with the Lord.
How to have a quiet time, that's what some people

(05:33):
call it. How to have a prayer life, how to pray,
how to read the Bible, how to have this separated
set apart time with the Lord. Maybe no one's ever
taught you the how to's, and so you're kind of
feeling guilty, and you're kind of just, you know, struggling along.
And so the purpose of this is to be really
practical to help you that are new especially, But then
also it's for some of us that have been walking

(05:55):
with the Lord for a while. And I want to
look at a couple of verses that hit both groups
of people. If you'll turn over to two Corinthians eleven,
verse three, This is a passage for the new Christians,
for the old Christians, for everybody. Listen to this verse.
He said, I fear that somehow you will be led
away from your pure and simple devotion to Christ. The

(06:18):
Lord doesn't want us to be led away. He doesn't
want us to be a casualty. He doesn't want us
to be led away from the pure and simple devotion
to Christ. And so for you knew Christians, boy, if
you get a hold of this stuff at your early
stages of walking with the Lord, it'll serve you for
the whole rest of your Christian life. It'll serve you
for the whole marathon, because you'll really know him. Then

(06:39):
there's this other verse in Revelations to verse four. I
want to look at this because this might fit some
of you that have been walking with the Lord for
a while, and this can happen, and it's not what
you want, and it's not what God wants. But I
have this one charge to make against you. Jesus spoke,
He said this, I have one charge to make against you.
That you have left, abandoned the love that you had
at first. You have deserted me, your first love. Remember

(07:02):
them from what heights you have fallen, repent changed the
inner man to meet God's will and do the works
you did previously. When you first knew the Lord. Well,
you know sometimes when you've been walking with the Lord
for a while, and you know you've read the Bible
through a couple times, and now you're not reading Colossians
for the first time. Now you're reading it for the
tenth time or the hundredth time, and you can get

(07:24):
a you can get dull to things spiritually, and people
can fall away in their heart. They can fall away
from their first love. Y'all know what I'm talking about.
You can fall away from that if you don't feel
the you don't feel the fire, you don't feel that
passion for the Lord. It's just kind of same old,
same old. And so Jesus said, Hey, some of you
don't fall away from your first love. And here's the answer.

(07:48):
Return and do the things you did when you were
first a Christian. Go back and think what were some
of those things you did at the beginning. Did you
read your Bible a lot more at the beginning? Did
you talk to me from your heart of hearts? And
you didn't try to be religious, You didn't try to
pray some prayer you thought I wanted to hear you.
Just talk to me out of your heart. Do that again?
Did you stay up till two or three in the

(08:09):
morning reading your Bible. Do that again, return to the
things you did at the beginning. That's why it's so
important for you that are at the beginning to get
a hold of this stuff. I know in my life,
I became a Christian after my freshman year in college.
I was nineteen years old, and it was so dramatic
for me. I mean, I couldn't believe the good news.
I could not believe the good news. I couldn't believe

(08:30):
that you would know for sure when you died that
you would get to go to Heaven. That was awesome news.
I just couldn't believe that God would even want to
know me, that I could have a relationship with Almighty God.
And I remember as a new Christian being so hungry
for the Lord. And some of you remember this, Think
back being so hungry for the Lord. You'd stay up
till two and three in the morning reading your Bible.

(08:50):
Everything was so new. The Gospel of John was so new,
Psalms were so new, Proverbs was so new. Everything in
the Bible was so new, and it was so excited.
And it was just like eating, like you are a
starving spiritual person and you were just eating the word.
Do y'all remember that? Some of you do? You remember
that time? And I remember that Second Chapter of Acts

(09:11):
was a Christian singing group. How many if you've ever
heard a Second Chapter of Acts? That tells you how
old we are. They were one of the very first
Christian contemporary Christian groups back in the day. And they
had an album that came out album. Yes, that would
be a thing that we used to use. They had
an album and it was called Mansion Builder. Did anybody
have that album? It was awesome? It was my favorite.

(09:32):
So they had this album, mansion Builder, and we'd put
that on a record player, my sisters and I. We'd
put that on the record player in the basement and
we'd go to bed and we'd get up in the
middle of the night and flip it over and play
it again, and flip it over and play it again
and flip it over. So we half slept, half just listen.
It was. It was the first time I'd heard Christian
worship music. I've never heard of such a thing. Didn't
sound like Black Sabbath Alice Cooper. Yeah, I threw those

(09:59):
albums out. So that was the first time to hear
this kind of music, and it was so worshipful and
so heart connected with God. And you just stay up
and listen to music, and you'd praise the Lord and
you'd sing, and you'd talk to him about everything on
your heart. Well, okay, what happened to that? Some of us?
What happened to that? You got giddy? Almost got giddy

(10:20):
because you got to spend time with the Lord. You
got to sneak away and just spend some time with God.
What happened to that? That's how the Lord wants it,
because it's a relationship. It's a personal relationship, and this
devotional life that I believe he wants to stir up
in us. It'll educate some of you that don't even
know what a devotional life is or quiet time is.
But those of us that do know, the hope is
that it refreshes us and put some fresh wind in ourselves.

(10:44):
All right, So let's talk about this then, this whole
idea of prayer. Today. We're going to talk about prayer,
connecting with God through prayer. Matthew six, verse six, Why
don't you turn that, I'll turn there and I will pray, Father,
thank you for your word. Thank you, Lord, that you
talk to us and you give us your word, and
you help us, and you give us wisdom, and you
give us insight. And Lord, thank you that we can

(11:04):
talk back to you. We can talk to you from
our heart of hearts, and that's what you want. And
so Lord, today we just pray that you will speak
to each one of us in this message, stir us up,
refresh us, remind us, Lord of how to have a
devotional life with you, how to have a prayer life,
a prayer life with you. We thank you, Holy Spirit.
You're the teacher and the revealer, and so we lean

(11:25):
on you for this whole time together in Jesus's name.
And everybody that agreed said amen. Matthew six. Verse six.
Jesus said this, he said, when you pray. So when
he says the phrase when you pray, what does that
presuppose that you will pray? When you pray? He's taking
it for granted that you're gonna pray. When you pray,

(11:46):
go into your most private room and closing the door,
pray to your father who is in secret, and your father,
who sees in secret, will reward you openly. So let
me just talk about a couple of real basic things
as it relates to prayer, and then we're going to
talk about three. How two's a couple of basic things
on prayers. Sometimes people ask that question when do you pray?

(12:06):
Where do you pray? And then specifically how do you pray?
So let's talk about this. It says, when when you pray,
how many of you are early morning prayers? You pray
in the morning? Okay, quite a few hands. How many
of you are late night prayers? Okay? About equal? Maybe
how many of you are noonday prayers? Or whenever you
can catch time you pray? Yeah, lots of hands. Well,

(12:30):
he said when you pray, which implies there ought to
be a time. And maybe if we're just kind of
like random, maybe a lot of us are random prayers.
I just pray and it's sort of random. Well, random
isn't the best. I've had random seasons. Random is not
the best. A regular time is the best. So what's
a regular time when you pray? What is it for you?

(12:52):
Can you get up a half an hour earlier, can
you stay up a half an hour later? Can you
use your lunch hour when the kids are napping? When
is your time? Sometimes people say, well, I just pray
all the time. I just pray all during the day.
That's good, and that's great. We all should do that.
But Jesus is talking about a specific devotional time. Here
is talking about a quiet time. He's talking about secret

(13:14):
place time here, when you pray. Pick that time when
you pray, then go into your secret place, into your
solitary room, your closet. One version says, So the second
question is where do you pray when you pray? You
need to have a time, a regular time, a daily
time that works for you. And then he says, go
into this stroom. So where do you pray? Where's your

(13:35):
prayer place? How many of you at your car? How
many of you it's a lazy boy or the couch
in the family room. How many of you it's kneeling
by your better laying in your bed, which is it
can be dangerous laying in your bed. You can fall asleep.
How many of you have like, yeah, watch and pray, Yeah,
watching your eyes closed, So the bed's not always the

(13:58):
best one unless you're knel by. What else? Who else
has got a place? Tell me your place? The shower? Okay?
What else? Walking? Anybody else got a place, the school
bus yay, good one. Huh the treadmill, that's a good one. Exercising.
So you need a place. You get the idea, what's

(14:20):
the place for you? You got the when? Now where's
the where? Where do you pray? What's your place? And
then the thing is people say, okay, but yeah, when
you're praying, like, all right, how do you do it? Like?
Do you do you have to be kneeling? Do you
have to be standing? Sitting? Walking? What's the position? The
position is whatever position works for you. I mean there
is something about kneeling. There is something about laying before
the Lord, there is something about walking. I mean, all

(14:42):
of the positions are fine. You find the place for
your secret time with God, you find the house, you
find the whares, and then if you want to kneel, sit, stand,
lay down, whatever. Of course, the goal is stay awake.
Whatever position you pick. Aymen, okay? So what else? People say? Well,
when you pray, like, you know, should you say it
in King James, like, verily, dearest, heavenly Father, thou wast

(15:05):
our greatest? How do you talk to the Lord? You
talk in your language. Jesus had a lot to say
about about that. He said, people think they will be
heard for their much speaking. People think if I go
on and on and on with this flowery prayer, God's
going to be impressed. No, he said, hush, just talk normal,
be human, be normal, be yourself, talk from your heart.

(15:29):
Another place, Jesus talked about vain repetitions, just saying this,
saying that our father ten times is not going to
do it. Vain repetitions. Jesus wasn't into that. He said, no,
when you pray, when you pray, go into your secret place,
into your closet, and then pray to your father from
your heart of hearts, and your father, who sees in secret,
will reward you openly. Amen. All right, So what other

(15:53):
thing about this? Turn over to James chapter five, verse sixteen.
And as you're turning there, I just wrote a column
on this book book. Some of your girls have read
about it in the bathroom note. But this is a
great book called Left to Tell. It's about a Rwandan
girl that was in Rwanda during the Holocaust. There. Her
name is Immaci Lee and I can't pronounce her last name.
She was during the in the genocide, the Holocaust in Rwanda.

(16:15):
She was over there hiding the killers were hunting her
and her family, the Hutu and the Tutsis where at war.
They were being hunted by killers. And God spared her life.
And God saved her life, and she ended up hiding
in a bathroom, a one stool, one sink bathroom for
three months. She had to hide. She couldn't come out.

(16:37):
She was in a pastor's home. There was a wardrobe
covering the door, so the killers couldn't find not just her,
her and seven other women had to hide in this
bathroom for three months. It was so small there was
not enough room for all of them to sit down
at the same time. Three months, day and night, twenty
four to seven couldn't come out. He would try to
get food into them so they didn't die. But she

(16:58):
lost over like seven sixty or seventy pounds in the
three months in hiding, and God spared her life. But
she talks about in that hiding that even though she
was being hunted by these killers, and even though the
enemy was whispering in her ear, she went to her
secret place with the Lord. And she says this. She says,
I found a place in the bathroom to call my own,

(17:20):
a small corner of my heart. I retreated there as
soon as I awoke, and stayed there until I slept.
It was my sacred garden where I spoke with God,
meditated on his words, and nurtured my spiritual self. I
entered my special space through prayer. Once inside, I prayed
non stop. She talked about hooking up with God, making

(17:41):
the connection with God in this secret place of her heart. Well,
her actual literal place happened to be a bathroom with
seven other women that you couldn't all even sit down
at the same time. God wants us in our daily,
luxurious life. How many of you know a lot of
us will never face that kind of persecution or threat,
but God wants us to enter into this secret place.

(18:04):
And how many of you in your own Christian life?
You know, maybe there's some things the Lord's allowed you
to do and to you know, participate in and so on,
But how many for how many of you the best
part of your Christian life, like the thing you would
never give up? You know, there's a lot of things
you could give up, but the thing you'd never give up.
How many of you you've tasted it enough to know
that the thing you could never give up is your
prayer life. Raise your hand, I mean some of you've

(18:26):
got it. Listen. If you honestly can't raise your hand,
be encouraged because there is a place for you in prayer.
God has a place for you in prayer. If you've
never tasted this, I'm telling you, you are missing out.
There's no human relationship like it. There's nothing like it
to talk to the living God and then have him

(18:47):
talk to your heart and to know that he hears you,
and to know that your words aren't just bouncing up
against the ceiling tiles. To know that the Almighty God
has heard you and there's a relationship there. And he's
not mad at you. He's he takes placere you. He
likes you, He enjoys your fellowship. One verse we're not
gonna look at it, but it says that God has
called us into fellowship with him and his son. This

(19:12):
is something God wants. This is what he wants with you.
Not in a way that's like some obligatory thing and like,
oh brother, check it off my list. I spent time
with God. No, God has called you, He's called me.
He's called us into this relationship, and God forbid we
get so busy with life and even so busy in
ministry can happen to us just like you. You can

(19:32):
be so busy serving the Lord, you forget to spend
time with the Lord. We've had seasons like that. For honest,
we could tell you we've had seasons like that, been
so busy serving the Lord, we forgot to spend time
with the Lord. But you did the same thing in
your job and your business, in your life with your kids,
with your family. It's a temptation for all of us.
But I think the Lord's trying to stir us up

(19:53):
and saying, hey, Kave, you have see listen, I got
some really good stuff for you guys. If you only
knew what was ahead, it's gonna be amazing. It's gonna be.
But what I need is I need a whole group
of people that aren't all into some big building somewhere.
I need a whole group of people that are all
really big into me, really big. I'm really big in them.
We all have a really tight personal relationship with the Lord. Amen.

(20:17):
So James four or five or sixteen, this versus the earnest, heartfelt,
continued prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available,
dynamic in its working. I just want to mention that
verse because the part we're not going to talk about
because when you talk on prayer, there's a lot of
different directions you could go and should go. But with

(20:37):
our time, we're not going to talk about the last
half of that that when you pray, it makes tremendous
power available. Prayer is such a mighty moving force. It
can move mountains, Prayer can change circumstances. Prayer can do
the impossible. What is impossible with man is possible with God,
and many times it's done through prayer. I mean, the

(20:59):
things that can happen through prayer are amazing. And there's
a lot of dynamics we could talk about about. How
to pray in faith, how to pray in agreement, how
to pray in the spirit, in tongues, in a variety
of different ways. There are a lot of ways we
could talk about, but we're not going to because of time.
Just know, there's a planet called prayer that if you

(21:20):
have never visited, God's saying I've called you to it,
really like you to come to my planet here. What
we are going to talk about is more the heart
element of it because that's really the devotional side of it.
The devo side of it is the heart side of it.
So the first half of this verse says, the earnest,
heart felt, continued prayer of a righteous person makes this

(21:43):
tremendous power available. That's what we're going to talk about.
How is it that you pray from your heart? How
is it that it's more than just wrote, more than
just tradition? How do you pray earnest, heartfelt, continued you
stay with it? How do you do that? We're going
to share three little nuggets, three little ways. It's easy
to remember, and so I think it will help all
of us to be encouraged to do it. Don't just

(22:05):
hear about it, but actually do it. So our letters
are how many if you've ever heard of what's that
guy's name, the cook Emerald? Who's ever heard of Emerald Legassi? Legassi? Right?
He puts, you know, spices in a little garlic here,
in little salt and pepper here. And then what does
he say? He says, Bam, Well, that's what we're going
to talk about, the Bam way of prayer. All right,

(22:26):
So we're gonna talk about these three letters. B Am.
The bee stands for in our prayer life, what do
we do? Okay, I found my place, I got my time.
I'm here ready to talk to the Lord. What do
I say? The bee is where we start. It starts
with brag on God. Take some time just to brag
on the Lord. We'll talk about that. The letter A
stands for admit your dependence on God, and the letter

(22:49):
M stands for make your request of God. So let's
talk about these three things. And you know it can
take you ten minutes, It can take you an hour
and a half. It can take you three hours, it
can take you thirty minutes. Whatever you want. How much
time can you give to God? How much time can
you spend communicating? And then here's where you start. You
start with the bee brag on the Lord Psalm one hundred.

(23:09):
You might want to look this one up. Psalm one
hundred is a great passage. But here's here. It is
in the Message Bible. It says, here on your feet
now applaud God, bring a gift of laughter. Sing yourselves
into His presence. Know this God is God, and God God.

(23:29):
Get the idea. God is God is God. God. He
made us. We didn't make him. Were his people, his
well tended sheep. Enter, enter his presence. We're talking about prayer.
Now enter, Where do you start? Enter with the password?
Thank you, Make yourselves at home, make yourselves at home,
be normal, be relax, make yourselves at home, talking, praise,

(23:54):
thank him, worship him. So where do we start? We're
taking this time with God in our secret. Where do
we start? We start by bragging on the Lord and
he says, here, enter with the password. It's really just courteous,
Just a courteous way to start, is we enter with thanksgiving?
You start? How many of you know it's not it's
not in good taste to come into somebody's presence and

(24:17):
just immediately begin demanding things, immediately, begin making requests of
all these things you want, all these things you want
them to do. How many of you know that's just
not courteous, that's not in good taste. How many of
you know Our kids know that, our teenagers know that,
Our little kids learn this at an early age. They
want something from mom and dad. What do they do? Mom? Dad?
Have I told you lately that you're like the best

(24:40):
parents ever? Have I told you how much I love you?
Have I told you how cool you are? What do
you want, honey? Well, I mean, kids know this. Shouldn't
we know this? Shouldn't we know that? It's just in
good taste. And we go into God's presence to brag
on him, to thank him, to praise him. So let's

(25:00):
start with thanks. We'll talk about thanks and praise. They're
two different things, and they're both very important. Thanks is
thanking God for what he's done. Praise is praising God
for who he is. So it's just courteous, it's polite
to come into his presence with thank yous, Lord, Thank you,
Thank you that I get to talk to you today.
Thank you that I live in America. What are you

(25:22):
thankful for? Lord? Thank you that I'm married and have
four kids. Thank you for this church, Lord, Thank you
for our house. Thank you that we don't live in
a raq Amen. Lord, thank you that we have enough
money to buy gas, even though it's ridiculously priced. Thank
you Lord, Thank you what do you think? Thank you
that I have a job. Thank you Lord that I'm healthy.

(25:43):
Thank you that I can see. Thank you Lord that
I have a Bible or ten. Thank you Lord, I
have some CD worship tapes. What are you thankful for?
Just I mean that could take you an hour. God,
just thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you for
my family, thank you for my upbringing. Thank you that
we got to go up to Lake Masaki and go
fishing and I learned how to catch blue gills. Thank

(26:03):
you for that. Lord, Thank you that we went to
Cedar Point. Kids. What are you thankful for? Lord? Thank you?
Schools almost out. Lord, thank you. I mean, from the
littlest to the biggest, it's just in good taste. It's
just courteous. And listen. This has been This has hit
home with Jeff and I this last year because because

(26:24):
this is what's occurred to me. It's like, how many
of you when you do something nice for somebody, you know,
you do something nice for somebody, you bless them with something.
You're in a position to be able to bless somebody,
and so you do. Those of you that are employers,
you have employees, you bless them with a raise. Those
of you that are parents, you bless your kids with
nice things. Those of you in life you bless your neighbor.
You bless this when you bless that one. You've given

(26:46):
people things, You've taken people places, You've done nice things
for people, And how many of you you didn't do
it to be thanked, That wasn't the reason you did it.
But how many of you, when you are thanked you
appreciate that because it tells you, you know, they didn't
take it for granted, They weren't ungrateful, they weren't unappreciative.
It tells you they at least recognize an effort was

(27:07):
made on their behalf to bless them. How many of
y'all appreciate that? But then when you're not thanked, and
you didn't do it to be thanked, But when you're
not thanked, how many of you you sometimes might feel like, wow?
Do people just think they deserve things? Were people just ungrateful? Parents?
How many of you when your kids are ungrateful for

(27:28):
the blessings you've given them, how many of you are
demotivated to further bless them? But you love it when
your kids are thankful. You didn't do it to be thanked.
But listen, if that's how we feel, we appreciate being appreciated.
You appreciate it when you've made an effort or a
sacrifice to bless somebody. You appreciate it when they appreciate it. Well, then,

(27:49):
how much more God? Here, He's done all these nice
things for us. Here, He's saved us with his blood.
He's wiped away all of our sins. He lets us
live in America. He lets us be Christians and not
be persecuted. When you think of all the things that
God has done for us, and you think if we
have not thanked him, you see, like, wow, a bunch
of ungrateful, spoiled, rotten brats. We don't want to be

(28:12):
like that, do we? Spoiled Christian brat? But God forbid
that we'd ever be a spoiled Christian brat, Just all
upset mad at God because he's not doing things as
fast as we want. He's not doing it how we want,
He's not doing it when we want. I thought this
faith stuff worked. Instead of being thankful, and all the
people said being thankful, I mean, I've purposed in my

(28:34):
heart at least once a day, if not more. I
mean in my car, I spend a lot of time
just thanking Lord, thank you. I just don't let me
neglect to say thank you. I know how important thank
yous are, and I don't want you to ever think
I'm taking anything for granted. I'm not. I'm recognizing any
good thing in my life is because you blessed me.
And I want you to get the thanks and the credit,
and I just want you to know I appreciate it.
I am really thankful. I appreciate I'm not going to

(28:56):
be some ungrateful Christian. Amen. So what I'm I'm staying.
In your prayer life, you start off bragging on God,
a praising God and thanking him, thank him for what
he's done, and then praise him for who he is.
You spend some time just you get to magnifying glass out,
and instead of magnifying our problems and all the things
we're going through, we take that magnifying glass and we
put it up on God. We go God. You're the

(29:19):
most high God, you are almighty. You're the creator of
the ends of the earth. You are the God. And
I know you, and you're all powerful, and you're all wise,
and you're all knowing, and you're my father and i'm
your daughter. And Jesus, you're not just my lord, but
you're my brother. And you didn't call me your servant,

(29:40):
you called me your friend. I praise you for that.
Whatever you know about God the Father, whatever you know
about Jesus, whatever you know about the Holy Spirit. And
it may not be that much that you know. That's okay.
Whatever you know, you get the magnifying glass out and
you take a few minutes and you praise God for
who he is. God, I just praise you. I just

(30:01):
want you to know. I praise you. You get the glory,
you get the honor you are God. I praise you. Well,
this is the first chunk of our secret time with God,
our prayer life, our devo life. Brag on the Lord.
All right, And there's a lot we could say, but
we're gonna move to the next one letter A. Admit

(30:24):
our dependence on the Lord. This is a great time
in our prayer life. This is a great time just
to kind of get humble before the Lord, to quiet
our hearts before the Lord and admit our dependence. It
says in James, when you bow down before the Lord
and admit your dependence on him, he will lift you
up and give you honor when you humble yourselves, When
we admit our dependence on the Lord, when we humble

(30:45):
ourselves under God's mighty hand, He'll lift us up. So
in this time of our prayer life, we just admit
our dependence. This would be like the time of surrender,
the time of consecration, the time of humbling ourselves before
the Lord and just think, God, I just want you
to know I'm consecrated to you. I just want you
to know. I know that I was bought with the price.

(31:07):
I'm not my own I belong to you. So whatever
you want, you're the boss. You're the lord of my life.
This is when we say, like it says in Psalm one,
Pint thirty nine, this is when we say, search me thoroughly,
Oh God, and know my heart. Search me God, and
try me, and know my thoughts, and see if there's
any wicked way in me, and lead me in the
everlasting way. This is when we kind of get a

(31:29):
little bit introspective. Not to the point that you become
some lowly, unworthy worm, because that's not what the Bible
teaches us. Jesus made us the righteousness of God in Christ.
But this is when you talk to the Lord and
you say, God, search my heart. Is there anything in
my attitude? Is there anything in my life that's displeasing
to you? Is there anything going on in my heart
that's just it's not right. And those of you that

(31:51):
deal with maybe guilt and condemnation and shame, maybe you've
blown it. You've sinned, you've blown it. Don't run from God.
Run to God and in the secret place during this time,
this is when you run right into his arms and
you say, God, I blew it. I admit my dependence
on you. God, you gotta help me. If you don't
help me, I can't do this thing. I ask you

(32:11):
to forgive me. Lord, wipe it all away with your blood.
Forgive me. And God, I'm choosing to turn from it.
Now help me. I'm asking you to help me. This
is this time in our prayer life. We get humble
before the Lord. We admit our dependence, and we talk
to him about all these things, your devotion to him,
your consecration to him, your surrender. Let him search your heart.

(32:32):
This is what keeps because you know, being a Christian
is a heart thing. If we don't keep our hearts
tender before the Lord and peer before the Lord and right,
then what will happen is that they'll get crusted over,
they'll get hard, they'll get calloused. We can get stiff necked,
hard hearted, and if we're not careful, then we can
fake it. Then we begin to fake the Christian life.

(32:56):
I mean. And you know it doesn't take long to
be around church. You can learn the motions. You can
learn how to say the right thing and nod Wright
and smile right and raise your handwright and say hello, Luljah,
praise it. You can do all of that and fake
the whole thing. But if your heart's calloused over, if
your heart's hard, and you think, God, my heart used
to be tender before you, what has happened. I've let

(33:18):
too many offensive things get in there. I've let too
many hurts get in There've let people bug me, I've
let this bug me, I've let this offense. I've let
all the stuff get in there. What happened? And the
Lord's saying, listen, I want a devotional life with you.
Just come to my presence, and when you get to
this part of your Christian life, admit your dependence on me. Repent,
if you need to surrender, give it up, let it go,

(33:41):
cut the string amen. And then finally, what do we do?
The last thing we do and our time is just
about it. But I do want to mention this is
we make requests at this point. You know, our heart's
in a good place. We're just in a good presence
with the Lord. And say, okay, God, now you send
your words some things, and I want to make some requests.

(34:03):
Here's the request one John five, fourteen and fifteen. This
is the confidence, the assurance, the privilege of boldness which
we have in Him. We are sure that if we
ask anything, make any request talking about making requests according
to his will in agreement with his own plan, he
listens to and hears us. And if since we positively

(34:24):
know that he listens to us in whatever we ask,
we also know with settled and absolute knowledge that we
have granted us as our present possessions the requests made
of Him. Now this is I'm gonna tell you a
couple things in this one. This is the time you
can make a request of the Lord God. If I
ask anything according to your will, I know you hear me.

(34:45):
And if I know you hear me, I know I
have the petition. So the question is, how do you
know if it's his will you're gonna make a request.
I mean, this is where you can pray for yourself,
for your husband, for your wife, for your kids, for
your job, for your church, for your city, for your
pres for your nation, variety of things. But how many
of you know? There are many, many things to pray about?

(35:06):
So how do you even know where to start? Because
it can be overwhelming. You'd have to spend four weeks
in prayer just to cover everything that needs to be covered.
So how do you even know where to start? What
request to make that are according to His will? How
do you do that? Here? Let me give you this
little helpful hint. Rather than just charge in there and

(35:27):
just start praying all these things out of your head
what you think you want or need, which is one approach,
But rather than doing that, it's almost better during this
little section, It's almost better to pull back a little
and go, Okay, God, I'm going to make some requests,
but I know that prayer begins in you. What are
your desires for me? What is your desire? What is

(35:49):
your will? What's on your heart? For my city, for
my church, for my family, for my nation? What's on
your heart? Because if i'll just get quiet here for
a minute and listen to what's on your heart, then
I can pray and agreement with what is your will,
and I'll be sort of like right on the money,
right on time. My prayers will be dynamic in the

(36:09):
sense it's not just some mental prayer. It's a living
relationship with a living God, hot off the press kind
of prayer. So how did you do that? Look at p.
Seventy seven, verse six. The reason this is important because
if you've ever used a list, how many of you
have used lists to pray? Anybody used a list? Okay,

(36:31):
pray for these things on my list. Pray for the governor,
Pray for the police department. Pray. Well, here's what happens
with the list. In some ways, it's good. It keeps
you on track a little bit. But here's what's bad
about a list. If your name is at the top
of the list, and the top five names, how many
of you know the top five names get prayed for
really good? You know Dan's on number one. Oh God,

(36:52):
blessed Dan. Oh Lord, just bless him. Just open the
eyes of his heart, just speak to him, just fire
him up. And Lord, Kelly, pray for Kelly. She's such
a sweetheart. And I just pray God, you just fill
her with the knowledge of your will in all spiritual
wisdom and understanding. Help Kelly and Dan. Lord to walk
in them are worthy of you, fully pleasing to you. Lord,

(37:14):
Just bless Dan and Kelly. And then there's Michelle, Father,
Michelle Kester and Scott Kester and their whole family. Lord,
bless the Kesters. They've been faithful. They sit in that
fro row every service. Lord, just bless that family and
encourage Ross. Just today, Lord, put encouragement to his heart.
Let him know that you know him, you got his number.

(37:34):
Just to bless those Kesters today. Lord, Well, the Oswaltz
and the Kester's just got some good prayers. I believe
what I pray it. Amen. But then I see Pam
Stinch Come. I say, oh God, bless Pam. No, Lord,
I'm just about out of time. Father, touch Pam. Bless
her all right. And then I see Lisa, Lord, Lisa,

(37:59):
she's a firecracker. Lord, just dutch her today. And then
we see Carol Lacy. We see, Oh God, Carol Lacy.
What a prayer warrior. Just Lord, help her pray. And
then we look around and say, oh Lord, look at
all these people. You know them all, You know the
hairs on their head, You just know every single one

(38:19):
of them. Father, I'm just gonna lay my hands on
the list. I'm just gonna pray for all of them
right now, just touch them all. Well, if you're on
my prayer list, where would you like to be one?
Or two? Because the rest of them didn't get a
whole lot? Right. Well, that's why praying in a list
isn't so good. It's okay, but it's not the best.

(38:39):
What's the best is this one, Psalm seventy seven. I
meditate within my heart, and my spirit makes diligent search.
So enforces meditate within your heart on your bed and
be still. What this is is right before you begin
to make requests, you kind of get still and you
meditate with the Lord from your heart. You get the
radar going. All right, God, before I start just blabbing

(39:01):
here with a bunch of requests. What's on your heart? Lord?
You know my list? You know all these people in
all these faces? Who needs prayer today? Lord? Who do
you want me to lift up? What's going on with
my kids? What's going on with my husband? What's going Lord?
What do you want prayed about? Hey? You just meditate,
you search, your spirit makes diligent search, and then what

(39:22):
will happen is desires thoughts. People will come to your mind,
they'll come to your heart. Desires will come to you.
You'll have a desire for some reason today to pray
for the Portage City Council for some reason. Today, You'll
be praying for a coworker for some reason today, this
person that you really don't know very well. They're just
on your heart. Well, what is that? That's God, that's

(39:42):
God's and I've called you into fellowship. Let's together have
this relationship and let's really do some cool stuff where
you'll see actual results from the request that you make. Amen,
let me read these two things and then our time
is definitely done. But I want you to see these
because this is an example that this is an example
of some people in the church that they were letting

(40:03):
their spirit search diligently. They might not even even known
they were doing it, but they did it. And listen
to this. We get one email from a gul She says,
Oh my, I am so, so so excited. This is weird.
Just last Sunday after church, we drove by the cathedral
and I told my hubby, I'm excited about the new
building project, but I just wish we could have moved
to the cathedral it's such a cool building and so visible.

(40:27):
And then Monday the news article that there was an
undisclosed buyer, and Matt and I wondered who it was
and commented on how weird it was that I just
said that, And now today I find out it is us.
I am thrilled beyond words. I am so excited. I
just want to shout it out and invite my whole
school building there. And then she goes on to say

(40:48):
she's excited about what Gou's doing here. Well, what happened, God,
by his spirit was causing her spirit to pick up
something about the cathedral. Then we get this email from
another fellow. He said, I just arrived home at nine
pm evening to have my son tell me about the
new relocation of KVFC. I did see the article, and
I'm very excited to see what God has in store
for the church. I'm not sure that you are aware

(41:10):
of this, but God had put it in my heart
to pray for this property. This is a person that
attends KVFC. I have been walking my dog around this
property at the cathedral every day since the notice that
it was going up for sale. My prayer has been
very simple. I prayed that God would re establish his
church and his people on this site, and that he
would build a church bigger than this county could dream for,

(41:33):
and that he would build a mighty congregation that has
the love of Christ in them to be able to
go out and save the lost. He didn't even know
what church he was praying for. He was just praying
that God would do that for a church. I now
see firsthand that persistence pays off and that God does
answer prayer. By the way, another unique thing about this
church that will become the new KVFC is that I

(41:53):
live directly behind it. Isn't that cool? But what was that?
That was a person that was walking and making requests.
But they let their raidar, they let their spirit search,
they let their heart meditate, and they picked up in
this spirit. They picked up something that was on God's
heart and they prayed about it. And then they now
get to be blessed by seeing this wonderful testimony that

(42:15):
they had a part in praying. Isn't that cool? That's
a bam. Isn't that good? So that's what we're talking about.
Brag on God, admit your dependence, and then make your request.
But before you make requests, just pull back a little
and listen to the Lord, so that your request are
really in sync with his will, his heart, his time
for you and for those you pray for. And all

(42:36):
the people said, praise the Lord. Well, our time's up.
But I do have a few lott giveaways. Let me
have that basket, anyone, Joe. We want to help some
of you get a jump start. And there's tons of
books and tapes and all good stuff in the bookstore
on prayer if you want some help in that, because
this is just to kind of refresh, you know, refresh
a little bit. But how many of you are here,
and you've been a Christian for three months or less?

(42:57):
Let me see your hand if you've been at We
have a gift for you. If you've been a Christian
for three months or less, hold your hand real high.
The ushers will take it to you. Okay, there's somebody
back there. This is called My Heart Christ Home. It's
a great book on a devotional life and spending time
with God. So is there anybody else? There's somebody back
there here, guys, I'll toss them to you. Who else?
I think I've got ten? There's somebody right there I'm

(43:20):
gonna throw that one. There a couple rows behind you.
Somebody back there? Did I see a hand? Okay? Oh sorry,
I'm left handed. That wasn't good. All right, left hand
is not gonna help you either. Okay, who else? Raise
your hands? Three months or less? Here go three months
over here? Anybody? Okay, there's a down the back. Great

(43:42):
praise Lord. You guys are gonna love this book. How
many of you six months or less you've been walking
with the Lord Jesus has been your best friend for
six months or less? Yay, I got three laughs, So
let me see your hands. If you're six months or less?
Anybody else on the sixth month? Okay? How about a
year or less? Twelve months or less you've been walking
with the Lord? Okay, yay? Oh get three hands right there?

(44:04):
Well there's four. But can you too share? Or go
to the bookstur and get another one afterwards? Okay? You four?
That head your hand up there. You're all family? All right? Good,
you guys can share. Then the family that prays together
stays together, so read it and pray. All right. Finally, finally, finally,
in your announcements, you should have gotten one of these.
Pull this out because this is very helpful. We'll talk

(44:27):
about it this week, and we'll talk about it on
week two. But sometimes when it comes to your prayer life,
you want to do it, you have the want to,
but sometimes, like the Bible says, the spirit is willing,
but the flesh is weak, and so accountability helps. It
helps if you have somebody that will hold you accountable.
And what that means is you say to somebody, you
take this little form on the backside, you put your name,

(44:48):
your phone number, and your email address, and you keep
the biggest piece that's got all the little check boxes.
You keep that one, but you rip off the bottom
and you say to somebody, you say, listen, will you
hold me accountable for the next twelve any one days?
I want to pray every day. I want to brag
on God. I want to admit my dependency. I want
to make requests. I want to do this every day
for the next twenty one days to get this habit

(45:10):
re established or established in my life. But I need
somebody to hold me accountable and call me up and
say did you do it? I need somebody to email
me and make sure that I'm staying on track. Will
you be my person. You rip that off, and then
what they'll do is they'll either call you or email
you every day or every couple days or once a
week to check in on you and to hold you accountable.

(45:30):
And you might want to do it back and forth
with one another. This is a great way to discipline yourself,
to self govern your own life in such a way
that you do it all right. So I want to
encourage you to take advantage of this little card, and
whatever card you don't use, leave them on your chair
and we'll use them also on week two for the
word Okay, praise alerd. Hey, guys, thank you so much

(45:52):
for joining me for today's message. If you'd like to
access more of our teaching, online courses and other resources,
I want to invite you to download our brand new
Basics with Beth app from the Apple Store and then
go to the Basicswithbeth dot Com to select the plan

(46:15):
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(46:39):
that enable us to take the Gospel Basics to the world.
Thanks again for joining me today. God bless you, and
I'll see you next time, right here on the Basics
with Beth