April 30, 2025 • 25 mins
Prayer forms the foundation of our relationship with God as we explore three powerful truths: prayer is a priority, a privilege, and powerful. Jesus demonstrated that prayer should be our first response, not our last resort.
• Prayer is talking to God - our vehicle for communion with our Creator
• Jesus prioritized prayer even during his busiest ministry days
• Having direct access to God through prayer is a privilege we often take for granted
• Prayer demonstrates power throughout Scripture - while we pray, God works
• Five aspects of effective prayer: adoration, confession, intercession, petition, silence
• God always answers prayer - with yes, no, or not yet
• Nothing should take precedence over your time with God
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Free audio post production by Alphoniccom.
Welcome and thanks for tuningin.
To Real People, real Talk,relevant conversations that take
(00:21):
you from surviving to thriving.
This is the podcast that goesthere.
My name is Paul Calcoat and I'myour host.
Now let's talk.
Well, good morning, goodafternoon or good evening,
whatever time this podcast findsyou.
I want to say welcome to RealPeople, real Talk, and thank you
(00:44):
so much for tuning in.
At the time of this recording,we are 24 hours away from
stepping over into the month ofMay and, more specifically, the
first Thursday in May, which isrecognized as the National Day
of Prayer here in the UnitedStates of America.
It was created back in 1952 asa joint resolution of the United
(01:04):
States Congress and signed intolaw by President Harry S Truman
, and based on that, I wanted tobring back an episode and a
sermon that I did a couple ofyears ago where it's all about
prayer.
So this is an encore episodethat I hope that you will enjoy
and I hope that you will share.
So God speaks to us through hisword Amen, and we respond and
(01:29):
we speak back to God throughthis thing called prayer.
So in today's episode, I justwant to remind you of three
powerful truths.
I want to remind you thatprayer is a priority, that
prayer is a privilege and,thirdly, that prayer is powerful
.
And this is not an episode orsermon or message to make you
(01:52):
feel bad for not praying, butrather I want to use it as an
encouragement to whet yourappetite for a more vibrant
prayer life.
So, prayer, let's get a workingdefinition for prayer.
In its most simplest terms, itmeans talking to God.
It is our vehicle for communionwith our creator, but all too
often, if we're honest, it goesunderutilized and God forbid,
(02:18):
sometimes it may go unused.
Just like breakfast is the mostimportant meal of the day, I
really believe that prayer isthe most important meal of the
day.
I really believe that prayer isthe most important conversation
of the day.
Now I want you to imagine this.
Imagine going two weeks withouttalking to your significant
other, or two weeks withouttalking to your child, or two
(02:40):
weeks without talking to yourparents, or two weeks without
talking to your parents, or twoweeks without talking to your
favorite person.
Now, would that help therelationship?
Would that hurt therelationship?
As with any relationship, alack of communication has a huge
impact, my friend.
Or put it another way, I wantyou to think about it this way
(03:02):
If your prayers from this weekwere transcribed, would it
produce a single page?
Would it produce a booklet orpamphlet?
Would it produce a researchpaper or would it produce a book
?
In other words, how much timehave you put into prayer this
week?
Because prayer is aboutbuilding your relationship with
(03:24):
your heavenly father that lovesyou, oh so much.
So, of course, let's go toscripture, let's go to mark.
Chapter 1, verses 35 through 39,now the previous verses in this
chapter.
It shows that jesus has beenengaged in a full day, in a full
evening of ministry.
He was teaching in thesynagogue, he was casting out
demons, he was healing the sick,as the entire city came to him
(03:47):
for help.
So you could say that Jesus wasbusy, all right Verse 35.
And rising very early in themorning and while it was still
dark, he departed and went to adesolate place and there he
prayed and Simon and those whowere with him searched for him
and they found him and said tohim everyone is looking for you.
And he said to them let us goon to the next town that I may
(04:10):
preach there also.
But that is why I came out andhe went throughout all Galilee
preaching in their synagoguesand casting out demons.
Emphasis on verse 35.
Rising early in the morning,while it was still dark, he
departed, went to a desolateplace and he prayed.
Although he was busy doing somany good things, godly things,
(04:33):
things for the kingdom, hewasn't too busy to spend time
with the Father.
We see that Jesus demonstratesthat we should do whatever it
takes to attain, maintain andsustain an active life of prayer
.
Listen my sister, listen mybrother.
(04:54):
Please don't get too busy forthe Lord.
Jesus had too much to do to notpray.
In other words, jesus didn'thave time to pray.
He made time to pray, and thatmay be a word for you.
It's not about having time topray, it's about making time to
(05:18):
pray Because we got to realizewho is this person that we're
praying to.
We got to remember and recognizethat it's God, the King of
kings, the Lord of lords, ourprotector, our provider, our way
maker, the person that hasgiven you breath in your body.
I mean, this is our father,this is our friend, who is
(05:42):
trustworthy, who is faithful,who is sovereign, wise and
perfect, and so it's a privilege, it's an honor to commune with
the king.
So, first of all, prayer mustbe a priority.
First of all, prayer must be apriority.
(06:05):
First of all, prayer must be apriority.
We see that in matthew 6, 33says to seek first the kingdom
of god and his righteousness andall these things shall be added
unto you.
It doesn't say hey, wheneveryou have time, I want you to
seek god now, when you getthrough with with work and you
get through with all your otherresponsibilities, if you have a
little bit of time.
Once you seek after the lord,it says to seek God first.
(06:26):
I've heard it said like this isprayer the steering wheel in
your life, or is it the sparetire?
In other words, it may be thespare tire if it's your last
resort, but it could be yoursteering wheel.
That anything comes up, youtake it to the Lord in prayer.
And as we're talking aboutbusiness, I want to tell you
(06:46):
this that, no matter how manythings you have on your to do
list, you always have time forthe thing that's first.
In other words, prayer and ourtime with the Lord should never
be an afterthought.
End up doing a lot of nothingBusy but not productive, active
(07:12):
but not really accomplishinganything.
I want to encourage you tofight for time with Jesus.
If you got to wake up earlier,then set your alarm so you can
spend time with the Lord.
All right, if you got to go tobed earlier so you can get up
early, then so be it.
Do whatever it takes in yourschedule to make time and to
(07:32):
fight for time with the Lord.
And, just like Jesus, we mustsend the multitudes away.
We see that all throughout thegospel, that Jesus will send the
multitudes away so he can spendtime with the father.
And you may not have amultitude of people following
you, but you still have a quoteunquote multitude, and your
(07:53):
multitude could look likedistractions.
Your multitude could be yourlaptop, your phone, social media
or even laziness, apathy,tiktok, instagram, etc.
I don't know what's distractingyou from spending time with the
Lord, but deal with it, myfriend.
So, first, prayer must be apriority and secondly, prayer is
(08:17):
a privilege.
We have this divine invitationto speak with the Lord.
The hymn says it best what aprivilege it is to carry
everything to God in prayer.
Oh what peace we often forfeit,oh what needless pain we bear,
(08:39):
all because we do not carryeverything to God in prayer.
God wants to hear from you.
You may say well, I haven'tprayed in so long, I haven't
gone to church in a while, I'mfar from the Lord.
But let me tell you this thatGod is a father and he wants to
hear from you.
Please don't allow the enemyand his lies to cause you to
(09:02):
stay away from God just becauseyou feel distant.
Just because you feel distantBecause of the ultimate
sacrifice that Jesus did on thecross, we have direct access
into the presence of God.
Take advantage of it.
And even though all of us havesinned and fallen short, isn't
it a wonderful thing to considerthat Jesus still wants to spend
(09:26):
time with you and I?
Please don't allow the cares ofthis world, please don't allow
burdens, please don't allow thebusyness and the vicissitudes of
life to just burden us down tothe point that we fail to
(09:46):
embrace this grand, awesome,awesome, majestic invitation to
be in the presence of King Jesushimself.
So, yes, prayer must be apriority in our lives.
Prayer, indeed, is a privilege.
And thirdly, prayer is powerful.
You can ask Paul and Silas whenthey were in jail, at the
(10:11):
midnight hour, they began topray and sing praises to their
God.
And if you don't know the story, let me go and tell you right
now that God showed up, and Godshowed out and he delivered them
from their situation.
Or you can ask Peter Now.
The church was praying forPeter while Peter was in prison,
(10:32):
all right.
And so the Lord sends an angeland Peter makes it out of prison
and he goes to the house wherethe church was praying.
And I say that to say this thatwhile the church was praying,
god was working, that even whenyou don't feel God moving, you
may not even think that he'smoving, but I guarantee you,
(10:54):
while you're praying, god isworking.
We just have to trust him.
And you may have heard it saidlike this, and it still rings
true that no prayer means nopower.
Little prayer means littlepower, but much prayer means
much power.
Back to scripture Luke, chapter11, starting at verse 1.
(11:16):
Now Jesus was praying in acertain place and when he had
finished, one of his disciplessaid to him Lord, teach us how
to pray, as John taught hisdisciples.
The request was to teach themhow to pray.
He didn't ask to teach them howto preach.
He didn't ask hey, hey, lord,can you teach me how to turn
(11:38):
that water into wine?
Can you teach me how to walk onwater?
Can you teach me how to feedthe 5,000?
Can you teach me how to be rich?
No, they asked Jesus to teachthem how to pray because prayer
is, I want to remind you, is, apriority.
Prayer is a privilege and myfriend.
Prayer is powerful.
It's our opportunity todialogue with the divine, it's
(12:03):
our opportunity to hear fromheaven, it's our opportunity to
fellowship with the Father.
Now I just want to break downprayer just a little bit more,
right here, and before I do, letme also say this that in
Matthew 6, as I talked aboutlast week, where it says and
when you fast, in other words,that fasting is expected, and it
(12:25):
says the same thing aboutprayer.
And when you pray, in otherwords, prayer is expected.
I want to give you five pointsof prayer to give you a starting
point, to give you a foundation, to give you a launching pad of
what are some things that youcan pray about.
One of the aspects of prayer isadoration.
In other words, this is whenyou just worship the Lord.
(12:45):
You can sing to him, even ifyou're not on key.
The Bible says to make a joyfor those things.
They got to be on key.
Now you know, when it's betweenyou and the Lord, you can sing
to him.
That's your time to praise him,that's your time of
thanksgiving, and I'm not sayingyou got to.
You know, use the exact wordsthat I use.
Was you know what this can looklike in my prayer life?
Lord, I want to thank you thatyou are my rock, you're my
(13:06):
shield, you're my buckler,you're my provider, you are my
protector, lord, thank you forwaking me up this morning.
Lord, thank you for yourblessings, thank you for your
protection and just giving Godthe honor, the adoration and the
thanksgiving that's due untohim.
So the first aspect is adoration.
(13:27):
Now the second aspect isconfession.
In other words, we need to takesome time that we confess our
sins and we repent of our sins.
The Bible tells us in 1 John 1,9, if we confess our sins, he
is faith and will forgive us ofour sins and purify us from all
unrighteousness.
As in prayer and we'reconfessing our sins to the Lord,
(13:50):
it's's like a detox, aspiritual detox for the soul, to
get things off your chest andto clear your conscience.
So ask the lord to forgive youfor what I like to call the sins
of commission, the things thatyou commit, in other words, the
things that you do that god toldyou not to do.
And then the sins of omission,the things that you omit to do,
the things that that God hasasked you to do but you haven't
(14:11):
done.
All right, for example, thesense of omission, not praying
enough, not fasting enough, notsharing the gospel enough, the
sense of commission Lord forgiveme for my pride, lord forgive
me for overeating, et cetera.
All right, the third aspect ofprayer is intercession, and
that's just a fancy word.
That means praying for others.
(14:31):
The bible tells us in firsttimothy, 2 1 first of all, our
urge, as supplication prayersand intercession, thanksgiving
be made for all people.
In other words, we are to praybeyond ourselves, pray, pray for
others.
What this could look like?
You can pray for the people inyour life that don't know Jesus.
(14:53):
You can pray that they come toknow him.
You can pray for the people inyour life that are sick.
Pray for others.
If God answered all of yourprayers with a yes, would you
and your family be impacted, orwould the world be impacted?
In other words, we must praybeyond just ourselves.
(15:15):
All right.
So there's adoration, confessionand intercession.
And, number four, we havepetition.
This may be one of yourfavorites, all right.
This is where you talk to Godabout your needs.
You talk to him about yourwants, both big and small,
because he is our father and hecares for us.
The Bible tells us inPhilippians 4, 6, let your
requests be made known to God,let the Lord know what you want,
(15:37):
let him know what you need andthen trust him to answer
according to his will.
And the last aspect of prayer issilence.
Sit in his presence and allowGod to speak to you.
We live in a noisy worldconstant notifications, whether
(15:59):
it's email, whether it's socialmedia, text or calls or
everything in between, and thereare just so many distractions,
so much noise, so much noise.
That's why it's imperative thatwe have times of silence where
we can listen and be refreshedand be reinvigorated by the
spirit of our God.
(16:19):
Right.
So, adoration, confession,intercession, petition and
silence.
And now I want to answer thequestion why should we pray?
Now I want to answer thequestion why should we pray?
We should pray because Jesusprayed and because he tells us
to pray, and that's more thanenough of a reason.
(16:39):
We see in John, chapter 17,jesus praying.
The entire chapter, all 26verses is devoted to praying Now
.
Prayer doesn't get God to dowhat we want.
He's not our butler, he's notour genie, he's not our vending
machine, but rather prayer willprepare your heart and mold your
(17:01):
heart to do what God wants youto do.
Pray because it will align yourheart with the heart of God.
Pray because it will align yourwill with the will of God.
It's in prayer that wesurrender our will and not
impose it.
In other words, prayer istransformational.
It's more about God doing awork in you instead of trying to
(17:23):
get God to work for you.
There's a preacher right there.
You can go tweet that, allright.
So prayer is transformational.
It's not merely a transaction.
All right Now.
Because of this fallen wordthat we live in and the enemy
that we must fight, we simplycannot afford to miss a day of
prayer.
We cannot afford to miss a dayof prayer.
(17:48):
Prayer was so important in thelife of Daniel that he chose to
spend a night in the lion's deninstead of missing a day of
prayer.
How committed are you to prayer?
Now?
I want you to pray because Godanswers prayer.
I remember once I was preachinga sermon, and this is what I
(18:09):
would normally do interact withthe audience.
I'll ask somebody in theaudience and say, hey, can you
give me a million dollars?
And of course the answer is youknow, so far 100 percent has
been no, and I would share thatwith the people so they can
understand this point right herethat God answers all prayer.
So when I ask the person togive me a million dollars and
they say no, they answered myrequest, they answered my
(18:35):
question, but I didn't get whatI want.
In other words, just because youdon't get what you want doesn't
mean that god didn't hear you.
It doesn't mean that god didn'task you, because god will ask
in one or three ways.
God will say yes if what you'reasking him is according to his
will.
Sometimes god will say no.
He could say no.
He could say no because maybethere's some unrepentant sin in
(18:55):
your life.
He could say no because there'ssome unforgiveness in your
heart, or because it's notaccording to his will, or
because God has something betterfor you.
And think about it like thiswhat if you got everything that
you prayed for?
Because I can remember sometime in my younger days you know
just immature prayers and I'mjust so glad that god didn't
(19:16):
tell me yes to everything.
Or I said like this that godloves you enough, just like a
loving father, to say no.
And even when god says no toyou, his no has goodness written
all over it.
So so God would answer yes, orGod would answer no.
Or sometimes God would answernot now and maybe it's because
(19:39):
the thing that you're prayingfor you're not ready for it.
Or maybe he's saying wait so hecan grow you and he can prepare
you, because a blessing toosoon isn't a blessing at all.
So in this message today, inthis sermon today, I just want
to point you to our best andbrightest example of prayer in
(20:03):
the person of Jesus Christ.
He lived praying, he diedpraying, literally his last
words on the cross Father, Icommit my spirit to you, always
talking to the Father.
Father, forgive them, for theyknow not what they do Now.
Jesus, he understood anddemonstrated the priority, the
(20:25):
privilege and the power ofprayer.
He spent the night in prayerbefore selecting the 12th.
In other words, sometimes, ifwe have a major decision coming
up, we need to slow down andpray to God and seek his wisdom
and his guidance.
Before feeding the 5,000, jesusprayed Before raising Lazarus
(20:48):
from the dead.
He prayed, just to name a few,at the Garden of Get and to me
that prayer is one of the mostmature prayers that you can pray
is when you can end the prayerwith nevertheless, not my will,
but your will be done.
Prayer is our lifeline.
It is an opportunity to pourout our hearts of God, to bring
(21:12):
our burdens to him, to cast ourcares on him.
The Bible tells us inColossians 4 to devote
yourselves to prayer.
Time spent in prayer is nevertime wasted, but rather time
invested.
Romans 12, 12 says be faithfulin prayer.
Through prayer we connectourselves with the will of God
(21:36):
and through prayer we arechanged forever.
I want to give you this quote bySamuel Chadwick about prayer,
and here it goes.
The concern of the devil is tokeep Christians from praying.
He fears nothing from ourprayerless studies, nothing from
our prayerless work.
He fears nothing from ourprayerless religion.
(21:57):
He laughs at our toll, he mocksat our wisdom, but he trembles
when we pray.
That's powerful.
And listen, my friend, if youdon't know where to start when
it comes to prayer, start withscripture.
I believe that the best form ofprayer is scripture.
I'm repeating back to God whatGod has already said to me.
(22:18):
For example, I like to prayMatthew 633.
Lord, help me to seek firstyour kingdom and your
righteousness, and I thank youthat all these things shall be
added unto me.
So I will take the scriptureand I will personalize it as a
prayer unto the Lord.
I will use Psalms 51 and 10 andask the Lord to create in me a
clean heart and to renew a rightspirit within me, and I will go
(22:38):
to the Great Commission at theend of Matthew, chapter 28, and
ask the Lord.
Lord, give me wisdom and giveme the boldness and help me to
make disciples to be intentionalin sharing the gospel and
teaching others to obey you.
Oh, I pray about the greatcommandments which is found at
the end of Matthew 22.
Lord, help me to love you andhelp me to love others.
(23:01):
So start with scripture.
When it comes to prayer, nowI'll leave you with this Nothing
to take precedence over yourtime alone with God.
I have to say that one moretime, nothing and no one should
take precedence over your timealone with the Lord.
(23:21):
The most important thing inlife isn't your job, it isn't
your spouse, it isn't yourfamily, it's not even your
ministry.
It isn't your family, it's noteven your ministry, but rather
your personal and intimaterelationship with jesus christ,
because everything else flowsfrom that one thing, or rather
from that one person.
(23:41):
You can be as close to god asyou want to be.
You and only you areresponsible for your level of
intimacy with Jesus, and there'sno neutrality in our walk with
the Lord.
Either you are drawing closerto him or you are drifting away
(24:02):
from him, and that my friendwould do it for today, prayer
must be a priority.
Prayer is indeed a privilege.
Be a priority, prayer is indeeda privilege.
And prayer is powerful.
It will change your life.
So much more can be said aboutprayer, but I just wanted to
give you the basics for today.
And the Bible tells us in thebook of James that we are called
(24:28):
to be doers and not justhearers of the word.
So I want you to take some timetoday to just be with Jesus, to
talk to him, to worship him andjust enjoy him.
Amen and amen.
I just want to say I reallyappreciate you for listening and
I want to ask that you justtake one minute right now to
share this podcast on yoursocial media.
(24:49):
You can hit the share button onthe app that you may be
listening to right now, or youcan take a screenshot and post
it, and I just want to say thankyou in advance, as you help me
to get the word out about thispodcast ministry.
Now go, be all that God hascalled you to be free audio post
(25:21):
production.
Free audio post production by Alphoniccom.
Welcome and thanks for tuningin.
To Real People, real Talk,relevant conversations that take
(00:21):
you from surviving to thriving.
This is the podcast that goesthere.
My name is Paul Calcoat and I'myour host.
Now let's talk.
Well, good morning, goodafternoon or good evening,
whatever time this podcast findsyou.
I want to say welcome to RealPeople, real Talk, and thank you
(00:44):
so much for tuning in.
At the time of this recording,we are 24 hours away from
stepping over into the month ofMay and, more specifically, the
first Thursday in May, which isrecognized as the National Day
of Prayer here in the UnitedStates of America.
It was created back in 1952 asa joint resolution of the United
(01:04):
States Congress and signed intolaw by President Harry S Truman
, and based on that, I wanted tobring back an episode and a
sermon that I did a couple ofyears ago where it's all about
prayer.
So this is an encore episodethat I hope that you will enjoy
and I hope that you will share.
So God speaks to us through hisword Amen, and we respond and
(01:29):
we speak back to God throughthis thing called prayer.
So in today's episode, I justwant to remind you of three
powerful truths.
I want to remind you thatprayer is a priority, that
prayer is a privilege and,thirdly, that prayer is powerful
.
And this is not an episode orsermon or message to make you
(01:52):
feel bad for not praying, butrather I want to use it as an
encouragement to whet yourappetite for a more vibrant
prayer life.
So, prayer, let's get a workingdefinition for prayer.
In its most simplest terms, itmeans talking to God.
It is our vehicle for communionwith our creator, but all too
often, if we're honest, it goesunderutilized and God forbid,
(02:18):
sometimes it may go unused.
Just like breakfast is the mostimportant meal of the day, I
really believe that prayer isthe most important meal of the
day.
I really believe that prayer isthe most important conversation
of the day.
Now I want you to imagine this.
Imagine going two weeks withouttalking to your significant
other, or two weeks withouttalking to your child, or two
(02:40):
weeks without talking to yourparents, or two weeks without
talking to your parents, or twoweeks without talking to your
favorite person.
Now, would that help therelationship?
Would that hurt therelationship?
As with any relationship, alack of communication has a huge
impact, my friend.
Or put it another way, I wantyou to think about it this way
(03:02):
If your prayers from this weekwere transcribed, would it
produce a single page?
Would it produce a booklet orpamphlet?
Would it produce a researchpaper or would it produce a book
?
In other words, how much timehave you put into prayer this
week?
Because prayer is aboutbuilding your relationship with
(03:24):
your heavenly father that lovesyou, oh so much.
So, of course, let's go toscripture, let's go to mark.
Chapter 1, verses 35 through 39,now the previous verses in this
chapter.
It shows that jesus has beenengaged in a full day, in a full
evening of ministry.
He was teaching in thesynagogue, he was casting out
demons, he was healing the sick,as the entire city came to him
(03:47):
for help.
So you could say that Jesus wasbusy, all right Verse 35.
And rising very early in themorning and while it was still
dark, he departed and went to adesolate place and there he
prayed and Simon and those whowere with him searched for him
and they found him and said tohim everyone is looking for you.
And he said to them let us goon to the next town that I may
(04:10):
preach there also.
But that is why I came out andhe went throughout all Galilee
preaching in their synagoguesand casting out demons.
Emphasis on verse 35.
Rising early in the morning,while it was still dark, he
departed, went to a desolateplace and he prayed.
Although he was busy doing somany good things, godly things,
(04:33):
things for the kingdom, hewasn't too busy to spend time
with the Father.
We see that Jesus demonstratesthat we should do whatever it
takes to attain, maintain andsustain an active life of prayer
.
Listen my sister, listen mybrother.
(04:54):
Please don't get too busy forthe Lord.
Jesus had too much to do to notpray.
In other words, jesus didn'thave time to pray.
He made time to pray, and thatmay be a word for you.
It's not about having time topray, it's about making time to
(05:18):
pray Because we got to realizewho is this person that we're
praying to.
We got to remember and recognizethat it's God, the King of
kings, the Lord of lords, ourprotector, our provider, our way
maker, the person that hasgiven you breath in your body.
I mean, this is our father,this is our friend, who is
(05:42):
trustworthy, who is faithful,who is sovereign, wise and
perfect, and so it's a privilege, it's an honor to commune with
the king.
So, first of all, prayer mustbe a priority.
First of all, prayer must be apriority.
(06:05):
First of all, prayer must be apriority.
We see that in matthew 6, 33says to seek first the kingdom
of god and his righteousness andall these things shall be added
unto you.
It doesn't say hey, wheneveryou have time, I want you to
seek god now, when you getthrough with with work and you
get through with all your otherresponsibilities, if you have a
little bit of time.
Once you seek after the lord,it says to seek God first.
(06:26):
I've heard it said like this isprayer the steering wheel in
your life, or is it the sparetire?
In other words, it may be thespare tire if it's your last
resort, but it could be yoursteering wheel.
That anything comes up, youtake it to the Lord in prayer.
And as we're talking aboutbusiness, I want to tell you
(06:46):
this that, no matter how manythings you have on your to do
list, you always have time forthe thing that's first.
In other words, prayer and ourtime with the Lord should never
be an afterthought.
End up doing a lot of nothingBusy but not productive, active
(07:12):
but not really accomplishinganything.
I want to encourage you tofight for time with Jesus.
If you got to wake up earlier,then set your alarm so you can
spend time with the Lord.
All right, if you got to go tobed earlier so you can get up
early, then so be it.
Do whatever it takes in yourschedule to make time and to
(07:32):
fight for time with the Lord.
And, just like Jesus, we mustsend the multitudes away.
We see that all throughout thegospel, that Jesus will send the
multitudes away so he can spendtime with the father.
And you may not have amultitude of people following
you, but you still have a quoteunquote multitude, and your
(07:53):
multitude could look likedistractions.
Your multitude could be yourlaptop, your phone, social media
or even laziness, apathy,tiktok, instagram, etc.
I don't know what's distractingyou from spending time with the
Lord, but deal with it, myfriend.
So, first, prayer must be apriority and secondly, prayer is
(08:17):
a privilege.
We have this divine invitationto speak with the Lord.
The hymn says it best what aprivilege it is to carry
everything to God in prayer.
Oh what peace we often forfeit,oh what needless pain we bear,
(08:39):
all because we do not carryeverything to God in prayer.
God wants to hear from you.
You may say well, I haven'tprayed in so long, I haven't
gone to church in a while, I'mfar from the Lord.
But let me tell you this thatGod is a father and he wants to
hear from you.
Please don't allow the enemyand his lies to cause you to
(09:02):
stay away from God just becauseyou feel distant.
Just because you feel distantBecause of the ultimate
sacrifice that Jesus did on thecross, we have direct access
into the presence of God.
Take advantage of it.
And even though all of us havesinned and fallen short, isn't
it a wonderful thing to considerthat Jesus still wants to spend
(09:26):
time with you and I?
Please don't allow the cares ofthis world, please don't allow
burdens, please don't allow thebusyness and the vicissitudes of
life to just burden us down tothe point that we fail to
(09:46):
embrace this grand, awesome,awesome, majestic invitation to
be in the presence of King Jesushimself.
So, yes, prayer must be apriority in our lives.
Prayer, indeed, is a privilege.
And thirdly, prayer is powerful.
You can ask Paul and Silas whenthey were in jail, at the
(10:11):
midnight hour, they began topray and sing praises to their
God.
And if you don't know the story, let me go and tell you right
now that God showed up, and Godshowed out and he delivered them
from their situation.
Or you can ask Peter Now.
The church was praying forPeter while Peter was in prison,
(10:32):
all right.
And so the Lord sends an angeland Peter makes it out of prison
and he goes to the house wherethe church was praying.
And I say that to say this thatwhile the church was praying,
god was working, that even whenyou don't feel God moving, you
may not even think that he'smoving, but I guarantee you,
(10:54):
while you're praying, god isworking.
We just have to trust him.
And you may have heard it saidlike this, and it still rings
true that no prayer means nopower.
Little prayer means littlepower, but much prayer means
much power.
Back to scripture Luke, chapter11, starting at verse 1.
(11:16):
Now Jesus was praying in acertain place and when he had
finished, one of his disciplessaid to him Lord, teach us how
to pray, as John taught hisdisciples.
The request was to teach themhow to pray.
He didn't ask to teach them howto preach.
He didn't ask hey, hey, lord,can you teach me how to turn
(11:38):
that water into wine?
Can you teach me how to walk onwater?
Can you teach me how to feedthe 5,000?
Can you teach me how to be rich?
No, they asked Jesus to teachthem how to pray because prayer
is, I want to remind you, is, apriority.
Prayer is a privilege and myfriend.
Prayer is powerful.
It's our opportunity todialogue with the divine, it's
(12:03):
our opportunity to hear fromheaven, it's our opportunity to
fellowship with the Father.
Now I just want to break downprayer just a little bit more,
right here, and before I do, letme also say this that in
Matthew 6, as I talked aboutlast week, where it says and
when you fast, in other words,that fasting is expected, and it
(12:25):
says the same thing aboutprayer.
And when you pray, in otherwords, prayer is expected.
I want to give you five pointsof prayer to give you a starting
point, to give you a foundation, to give you a launching pad of
what are some things that youcan pray about.
One of the aspects of prayer isadoration.
In other words, this is whenyou just worship the Lord.
(12:45):
You can sing to him, even ifyou're not on key.
The Bible says to make a joyfor those things.
They got to be on key.
Now you know, when it's betweenyou and the Lord, you can sing
to him.
That's your time to praise him,that's your time of
thanksgiving, and I'm not sayingyou got to.
You know, use the exact wordsthat I use.
Was you know what this can looklike in my prayer life?
Lord, I want to thank you thatyou are my rock, you're my
(13:06):
shield, you're my buckler,you're my provider, you are my
protector, lord, thank you forwaking me up this morning.
Lord, thank you for yourblessings, thank you for your
protection and just giving Godthe honor, the adoration and the
thanksgiving that's due untohim.
So the first aspect is adoration.
(13:27):
Now the second aspect isconfession.
In other words, we need to takesome time that we confess our
sins and we repent of our sins.
The Bible tells us in 1 John 1,9, if we confess our sins, he
is faith and will forgive us ofour sins and purify us from all
unrighteousness.
As in prayer and we'reconfessing our sins to the Lord,
(13:50):
it's's like a detox, aspiritual detox for the soul, to
get things off your chest andto clear your conscience.
So ask the lord to forgive youfor what I like to call the sins
of commission, the things thatyou commit, in other words, the
things that you do that god toldyou not to do.
And then the sins of omission,the things that you omit to do,
the things that that God hasasked you to do but you haven't
(14:11):
done.
All right, for example, thesense of omission, not praying
enough, not fasting enough, notsharing the gospel enough, the
sense of commission Lord forgiveme for my pride, lord forgive
me for overeating, et cetera.
All right, the third aspect ofprayer is intercession, and
that's just a fancy word.
That means praying for others.
(14:31):
The bible tells us in firsttimothy, 2 1 first of all, our
urge, as supplication prayersand intercession, thanksgiving
be made for all people.
In other words, we are to praybeyond ourselves, pray, pray for
others.
What this could look like?
You can pray for the people inyour life that don't know Jesus.
(14:53):
You can pray that they come toknow him.
You can pray for the people inyour life that are sick.
Pray for others.
If God answered all of yourprayers with a yes, would you
and your family be impacted, orwould the world be impacted?
In other words, we must praybeyond just ourselves.
(15:15):
All right.
So there's adoration, confessionand intercession.
And, number four, we havepetition.
This may be one of yourfavorites, all right.
This is where you talk to Godabout your needs.
You talk to him about yourwants, both big and small,
because he is our father and hecares for us.
The Bible tells us inPhilippians 4, 6, let your
requests be made known to God,let the Lord know what you want,
(15:37):
let him know what you need andthen trust him to answer
according to his will.
And the last aspect of prayer issilence.
Sit in his presence and allowGod to speak to you.
We live in a noisy worldconstant notifications, whether
(15:59):
it's email, whether it's socialmedia, text or calls or
everything in between, and thereare just so many distractions,
so much noise, so much noise.
That's why it's imperative thatwe have times of silence where
we can listen and be refreshedand be reinvigorated by the
spirit of our God.
(16:19):
Right.
So, adoration, confession,intercession, petition and
silence.
And now I want to answer thequestion why should we pray?
Now I want to answer thequestion why should we pray?
We should pray because Jesusprayed and because he tells us
to pray, and that's more thanenough of a reason.
(16:39):
We see in John, chapter 17,jesus praying.
The entire chapter, all 26verses is devoted to praying Now
.
Prayer doesn't get God to dowhat we want.
He's not our butler, he's notour genie, he's not our vending
machine, but rather prayer willprepare your heart and mold your
(17:01):
heart to do what God wants youto do.
Pray because it will align yourheart with the heart of God.
Pray because it will align yourwill with the will of God.
It's in prayer that wesurrender our will and not
impose it.
In other words, prayer istransformational.
It's more about God doing awork in you instead of trying to
(17:23):
get God to work for you.
There's a preacher right there.
You can go tweet that, allright.
So prayer is transformational.
It's not merely a transaction.
All right Now.
Because of this fallen wordthat we live in and the enemy
that we must fight, we simplycannot afford to miss a day of
prayer.
We cannot afford to miss a dayof prayer.
(17:48):
Prayer was so important in thelife of Daniel that he chose to
spend a night in the lion's deninstead of missing a day of
prayer.
How committed are you to prayer?
Now?
I want you to pray because Godanswers prayer.
I remember once I was preachinga sermon, and this is what I
(18:09):
would normally do interact withthe audience.
I'll ask somebody in theaudience and say, hey, can you
give me a million dollars?
And of course the answer is youknow, so far 100 percent has
been no, and I would share thatwith the people so they can
understand this point right herethat God answers all prayer.
So when I ask the person togive me a million dollars and
they say no, they answered myrequest, they answered my
(18:35):
question, but I didn't get whatI want.
In other words, just because youdon't get what you want doesn't
mean that god didn't hear you.
It doesn't mean that god didn'task you, because god will ask
in one or three ways.
God will say yes if what you'reasking him is according to his
will.
Sometimes god will say no.
He could say no.
He could say no because maybethere's some unrepentant sin in
(18:55):
your life.
He could say no because there'ssome unforgiveness in your
heart, or because it's notaccording to his will, or
because God has something betterfor you.
And think about it like thiswhat if you got everything that
you prayed for?
Because I can remember sometime in my younger days you know
just immature prayers and I'mjust so glad that god didn't
(19:16):
tell me yes to everything.
Or I said like this that godloves you enough, just like a
loving father, to say no.
And even when god says no toyou, his no has goodness written
all over it.
So so God would answer yes, orGod would answer no.
Or sometimes God would answernot now and maybe it's because
(19:39):
the thing that you're prayingfor you're not ready for it.
Or maybe he's saying wait so hecan grow you and he can prepare
you, because a blessing toosoon isn't a blessing at all.
So in this message today, inthis sermon today, I just want
to point you to our best andbrightest example of prayer in
(20:03):
the person of Jesus Christ.
He lived praying, he diedpraying, literally his last
words on the cross Father, Icommit my spirit to you, always
talking to the Father.
Father, forgive them, for theyknow not what they do Now.
Jesus, he understood anddemonstrated the priority, the
(20:25):
privilege and the power ofprayer.
He spent the night in prayerbefore selecting the 12th.
In other words, sometimes, ifwe have a major decision coming
up, we need to slow down andpray to God and seek his wisdom
and his guidance.
Before feeding the 5,000, jesusprayed Before raising Lazarus
(20:48):
from the dead.
He prayed, just to name a few,at the Garden of Get and to me
that prayer is one of the mostmature prayers that you can pray
is when you can end the prayerwith nevertheless, not my will,
but your will be done.
Prayer is our lifeline.
It is an opportunity to pourout our hearts of God, to bring
(21:12):
our burdens to him, to cast ourcares on him.
The Bible tells us inColossians 4 to devote
yourselves to prayer.
Time spent in prayer is nevertime wasted, but rather time
invested.
Romans 12, 12 says be faithfulin prayer.
Through prayer we connectourselves with the will of God
(21:36):
and through prayer we arechanged forever.
I want to give you this quote bySamuel Chadwick about prayer,
and here it goes.
The concern of the devil is tokeep Christians from praying.
He fears nothing from ourprayerless studies, nothing from
our prayerless work.
He fears nothing from ourprayerless religion.
(21:57):
He laughs at our toll, he mocksat our wisdom, but he trembles
when we pray.
That's powerful.
And listen, my friend, if youdon't know where to start when
it comes to prayer, start withscripture.
I believe that the best form ofprayer is scripture.
I'm repeating back to God whatGod has already said to me.
(22:18):
For example, I like to prayMatthew 633.
Lord, help me to seek firstyour kingdom and your
righteousness, and I thank youthat all these things shall be
added unto me.
So I will take the scriptureand I will personalize it as a
prayer unto the Lord.
I will use Psalms 51 and 10 andask the Lord to create in me a
clean heart and to renew a rightspirit within me, and I will go
(22:38):
to the Great Commission at theend of Matthew, chapter 28, and
ask the Lord.
Lord, give me wisdom and giveme the boldness and help me to
make disciples to be intentionalin sharing the gospel and
teaching others to obey you.
Oh, I pray about the greatcommandments which is found at
the end of Matthew 22.
Lord, help me to love you andhelp me to love others.
(23:01):
So start with scripture.
When it comes to prayer, nowI'll leave you with this Nothing
to take precedence over yourtime alone with God.
I have to say that one moretime, nothing and no one should
take precedence over your timealone with the Lord.
(23:21):
The most important thing inlife isn't your job, it isn't
your spouse, it isn't yourfamily, it's not even your
ministry.
It isn't your family, it's noteven your ministry, but rather
your personal and intimaterelationship with jesus christ,
because everything else flowsfrom that one thing, or rather
from that one person.
(23:41):
You can be as close to god asyou want to be.
You and only you areresponsible for your level of
intimacy with Jesus, and there'sno neutrality in our walk with
the Lord.
Either you are drawing closerto him or you are drifting away
(24:02):
from him, and that my friendwould do it for today, prayer
must be a priority.
Prayer is indeed a privilege.
Be a priority, prayer is indeeda privilege.
And prayer is powerful.
It will change your life.
So much more can be said aboutprayer, but I just wanted to
give you the basics for today.
And the Bible tells us in thebook of James that we are called
(24:28):
to be doers and not justhearers of the word.
So I want you to take some timetoday to just be with Jesus, to
talk to him, to worship him andjust enjoy him.
Amen and amen.
I just want to say I reallyappreciate you for listening and
I want to ask that you justtake one minute right now to
share this podcast on yoursocial media.
(24:49):
You can hit the share button onthe app that you may be
listening to right now, or youcan take a screenshot and post
it, and I just want to say thankyou in advance, as you help me
to get the word out about thispodcast ministry.
Now go, be all that God hascalled you to be free audio post
(25:21):
production.
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