Gooding, David: 1 - The Pattern of Prayer

My first very present duty is to thank you sincerely for your kindness and generosity in allowing me to break my promise to be with you, uh, at the end of last year. And you did so to facilitate our going to Ukraine, where under God we had a most profitable time. So thank you very much indeed. Now the topic you have asked me to speak about tonight and next Sunday, God willing, is the topic of prayer. And I would like to begin by assuring you that I do not speak as though I were some expert in this realm. And if it were allowed to me next week, I should be spending some of my time inquiring from you how your prayer life is going and where you see in my exposition there are great huge gaps that ought to be filled. Now for tonight, let's begin by reading in the Gospel by Luke chapter eleven. Gospel by Luke chapter eleven. Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray as John taught his disciples. And he said to them, when you pray, say, Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us, and lead us not into temptation. And he said to them, which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, friend, lend me three loaves, for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him. And he will answer from within, do not bother me. The door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed. I cannot give up and give you anything. I tell you, though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his impudence, he will rise and give him what he needs. And I tell you, ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will not find, knock and it shall be opened to you. For everyone who receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. For what father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent, or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to good give, give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him. Now he was casting out a demon that was dumb. When the demon had gone out, the dumb man spoke, and the people marveled. God guide us in our study and grant it shall bear fruit for his pleasure. We have read together one of the most famous parts of the New Testament that deal with the topic of prayer, when in response to his disciples' request, our Lord began to teach them to pray. If we were to examine the context, we should find that this is in that part of Luke where our Lord had recently begun his journey from this earth to glory. The time came, says Luke, for him to be received up, that is to re- be received up into heaven. And he set his face, therefore, to go via Jerusalem, because via Jerusalem was the pathway laid out for our blessed Lord, by which he should travel to glory. Prayer, then, in life's journey. And it is when we see that life is a journey, and that we are not here forever, and we are on our way, if we are believers, to glory. It is when we see that that will add a certain intensity to our prayer life. We haven't got all the time there is. They who sleep eight hours a d- a night, uh, spend, you see, a third of their life in bed, don't they? That seriously reduces the time we have to spare. Now we're told that when our Lord was on this journey, he came to Bethany, and two sisters named Martha and Mary received him into their house. Delightful sisters they were, both of them loved the Lord, and Martha set herself about cooking the dinner. Now, I don't know what you would do, madam, if the Lord Jesus came to you nowadays, to your home or bungalow or wherever it is, and you knew he was coming, uh, to dinner. I, I think I know what you would do. You would put on the best dinner you could possibly invent. All the five courses, I suspect, and Tesco's or Fortnum's and Mason's would be in a great trouble to supply all that you purpose to give to the Lord. You want it to be the very best, wouldn't you? So did Martha. But because she wanted such a wonderfully good dinner, so elaborate, she was very busy in the kitchen when Mary left her to get on with the job and went and sat by Jesus' feet. Martha naturally complained to the Lord Jesus. Look, this isn't fair, she says. She, she wants all the goodies, she wants to listen to your teaching and has left me to serve alone. And there was a great deal, wasn't there, in Martha's protest. When our Lord answered, he said what for Martha, I suspect, would be a surprising thing. He said, Martha, you're busy about many things, and she was with a very good heart and intention. But actually, one thing is necessary, and Mary has chosen the good part. You'll see, if you look at it from Martha's point of view, you will see she wanted to do the very best she can could for the Lord. Of course she did. But if you look at it from Christ's point of view, what do you suppose he would have preferred? Would he have preferred a five-course dinner with all the bits and pieces added in, at the cost that he would get comparatively little time actually to talk to Martha? Or would he prefer a simple two-course affair with oodles of time to be able to talk to the two sisters? He was on a journey. He wouldn't have many more times to spend in their home. And presently in the future, they would come across a very severe trial in the death of their brother. You can understand that from Christ's point of view, he would have preferred a simple dinner with Martha and Mary both having time to talk to him. My brothers, my sisters, we shall have plenty of time to talk to the Lord when at last we get home to glory. But to give him his preference. He would prefer that in this life we made time to talk to him and to talk to him more. You see, if you're going on holiday, well, what you can take with you depends, doesn't it, on what kind of a holiday you're going on. If you're going on the Orient Express, well, you can take all the dresses you can possibly imagine, so you can dress in a different dress for dinner every night, of course. Mm-hmm. If you're going in your, uh, mobile unit, you know, more mobile home, well, you'll have to limit yourself. You'll only be able to take one TV, perhaps, who knows? If you're going hiking, backpacking and all that, you'll have to seriously sit down and consider whether you can take two tin openers with you, or whether you must limit the weight and only take one. And if we are on a journey to eternity, to the glory that lies before us, we do have to sit down seriously, don't we, and consider what we regard as life's number one necessities. One thing is really needful, says Christ to Martha. One thing. Mary has chosen the good part. So it is in our praying that we start to get life's necessities ordered, which things are really necessary. And when the disciples asked our Lord Jesus to, uh, to teach them to pray, there were two parts to the model prayer he gave them. The first part is concerned with God's interests. Our Father, hallowed be your name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. The first part altogether taken up with God's interests, and the second part taken up with ours. Give us each day our daily bread and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves also forgive everyone who is indebted to us, and lead us us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. God's interest first, then. Our interests second. Even as I talk to you, that rebukes me, for left to myself, I find in prayer I'm so much absorbed with my own interests. Lord, help me in this, and Lord, help me there, and Lord, supply this. Whereas if I knew any spiritual etiquette at all, I would want to put God's interests first. Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy name be holy. Regard us as holy. How should we illustrate it to ourselves? You know, I go into many homes, and very often at the first night I'm there, my hostess will say, well, now, uh, uh, uh, uh, David Gooding, you, you, you make, do make yourself at home here. Now, if you should happen, uh, to wake early and you wanted to come down to make yourself a cup of tea in the morning, feel free to come down, you'll see, and make yourself a cup of tea. And all the cups are available, you can use any one of them, you'll see. I don't normally do it, but they are. What I have learned is this, that when my hostess says use any old cup you like, she doesn't really mean what you say, because she has a whole range of cups in the kitchen, in the cupboard suitable for them, you see. Um, she has another range of cups in the best room in the house, and they're in a china cabinet, do you see? Very rarely taken out, do you see? I know better than to take her at her word and use some of those. What if I broke one? They're her great treasure. They're in the china cabinet for everybody to see, regarded as specially valuable. What is our biggest value in life that we would vastly regret if it were spoiled or besmirched or broken? Here our Lord teaches us, our Father, hallowed be your name. There was an occasion when Moses fell foul of that, uh, ambition. He was in the wilderness, and the people had run out of water, and, uh, Moses had taken the whole matter to God, and God had told him to go with Aaron and take Aaron's rod of priesthood, his rod of intercession, and stand before the people, before a rock, and he would just speak to the rock, and the water would come out. But I think Moses was tired. He was at the end of his tether, and he lost his temper with the people. Instead of speaking to the rock, he lost his temper and had, here now, you rebels, have we got to bring water out of this rock for you? And he took the rock and he smoked the rock twice, and the water came out. But God took it very seriously. He said, you and Aaron, you'll never be allowed now to lead the people into the land. Why not? Because you did not sanctify me in the eyes of the people. That is, by your behavior, you did not demonstrate my holiness before those people. You lost your temper. You didn't believe my word. You didn't do what I say. You rebelled against me. And the very moment you were rebelling against me, you were accusing other people of rebelling against me. Here now, you rebels, you said, didn't you? Sorry thing when that gracious man, Moses, lost his temper and misrepresented God before the people. God's nature, of course, is holy. He cannot endure sin. But God's holy nature also delights in restoring his people and crowning them with glory. And in their thirst, they were looking to God to come with compassion upon them and on their cattle and give them drink. And God was longing to show his compassionate heart to them and give the people drink. Whereas Moses lost his temper and called them rebels, misrepresented God, didn't demonstrate God's holiness. Number one value to pray for, to aim at. Father, hallowed, sanctified be your name, which must include one little bit isn't doesn't it? That is, by my behavior, may your name be sanctified and demonstrated to a world at large. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Thy kingly rule, thy kingdom in the sense of God's kingly rule. And the very prayer gives us the promise, doesn't it? Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, and so it shall be. For the Lord Jesus is coming. He shall set up his kingdom. He shall rule from shore to shore, and the king- the kingdom of this world shall become the kingdom of our God and of his Christ. We do not pray in vain, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. But if we pray it, it has its implication, doesn't it? Said our Lord Jesus, for instance, now when you go to your daily work, don't be like the Gentiles, will you? Because when the Gentiles go to their daily work, it is for food and clothes they seek. Don't be like them. And you say, wait a minute, Mr. Preacher, do come down off your pedestal a moment. That's, we do have to go to work, even if you don't in your retirement, you'll see we do have to go to work, and that's what we go to work for, to get food and clothes. Oh, really? Do you really? Is that your prime motivation? If you didn't, if you didn't have to get food and clothes, you wouldn't go to work? Well, if that's so, you're a lot of old Gentiles. That's why the Gentiles go to work. Their first motivation is to get food and clothes. Of course, our Father knows that we need those things, and going to work is one of the ways he has established by which we honestly get our food and clothes. In fact, if we're not prepared to work, and we can work, and we don't provide for our own, then we are worse than unbelievers and have denied the faith. But food and clothes should not be our first motivation, should it? Not the first dividend we seek from our going to work. What would be the first motivation? Well, to seek the kingdom of God, that is his kingly rule. If I pray that one day God's will be done on earth as it is in heaven, thy kingdom come. Mere honesty would say, surely, start with me, Lord. That in my life, my first motivation in going to daily work would that God would rule in my life. I am to seek his kingly rule, and if I do it, not only will I get the food and clothes, but, uh, I shall add thereto his righteousness. That's a very practical thing, isn't it? When I speak to my younger brothers and sisters, why do you go to school? Just to get a career? That's a good thing. You've got to think of your career and take school seriously, haven't you? And if you're a believer, your first motivation in going to school, according to our Lord's prayer, is that w- you seek God's rule. Lord, I'm doing this homework for you. I'm doing it, Lord, as if you set me the job. Help me, Lord, to do it well, so that I might be equipped later on in life to do whatever you have designed for me. I want to read my geography for you, Lord. Help me to be accurate with the facts, to think carefully, and not to skimp my homework. Want to do my physics for you, Lord. Yeah, seek first the kingdom of God, and in all the rest of life's avocations. And then our own needs. Give us this day our daily bread. I knew a good gentleman once, a very, uh, sincere believer he was, but he held s- uh, certain prophetic views that made him think that the Sermon on the Mount in general, and this prayer in particular, was not for Christians of our day and generation. It was for the Jews, he said, for Israel, and not for us, do you see? So he hardly agreed with praying, give us this day our daily bread. Why didn't he agree with it? Well, he said, this will be for people who are persecuted under the Antichrist during the, uh, uh, uh, uh, the Great Tribulation, and they'll need to pray for their daily bread. We don't, he said. We are, our pantries are full of food. Why should we need to pray to God, give us this daily bread when we've got a lot of bread up in the cupboard, you see? I hope you don't agree with that reasoning. Because, you see, if our cupboards are so stocked with food, that we don't need to realize that it is God who gives it. We are missing one of the biggest delights that go with eating the food. It's like the little girl who was out in a, in a hotel for, for the first time, you see, with her mum, and when the waiter served the food, the little girl, uh, watched and her mother s- uh, gave thanks, and she said, mommy, why do you give thanks for it? I mean, we're paying for it today, aren't we? Mm. Give us this day our daily bread. Conscious that each day we eat, it is God who gives it. He is our host, and we are his guests, and we are dependent on his generosity. And forgive us our sins, as we forgive those that trespass against us. In the family of God, that is his rule. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But in the family of God, if we come confessing our sins and expect the Lord to forgive us, he lays down the terms that we in turn are prepared to forgive those who have sinned against us and come repenting and asking our forgiveness. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. The word translation, uh, translated temptation can mean what we normally mean in English by temptation. It can also mean testing. God doesn't test anybody with evil, but God will allow us to be tested. Tempted indeed of the devil, if so it pleased God that we should undergo that test. And God himself tests us to see whether our faith is genuine and our promises serious. And so we rightly pray, knowing our own weakness, Lord, if it could please thee, don't test us too severely. The apostles in the upper room, you may remember, told the Lord Jesus that they would be ready to go to prison and to death for him. But when he came to the Garden of Gethsemane, they couldn't keep their eyes open and pray with him. They fell asleep. He came to rouse them and said, rise and pray, lest you enter into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. Rise and pray. And they sort of came a- a- a- awake and dozed off. And then in the high priest's court, it happened, didn't it? That Peter, who had protest the most loudly that he would never deny the Lord, fell into testing and three times denied him. How we do need to pray. That we be kept, and then God pleases to take us into testing, that he will deliver us from evil. The Lord's prayer, therefore. The first requests, God's interests. The second requests, my interests. But then our Lord went on to talk about praying for something else. And I quote you to from chapter eleven and verse thirteen. If you then, who are evil, know how to good give- give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them who ask him? Or if we translated it more exactly, it would be, how much more will the Heavenly Father give Holy Spirit to those who ask him? Here, our Lord exhorts us to ask for Holy Spirit. But here I shall have to stop and engage with the theologians, and my knees are all a tremble. Because you'll see there are serious theologians and learned men and women in the scripture that would tell me, but here, sir, you are desperately wrong. This, our Lord spoke to the Jews before Pentecost, and they had to pray that God would one day send down the Holy Spirit, but he did that at Pentecost. And we don't have to pray for the Holy Spirit. The very moment we believe the Savior, God gives us the Holy Spirit. You know I agree with you a hundred percent? The very moment we trust the Savior, God gives us his Holy Spirit. In that sense, we don't have to pray for him. Ephesians chapter one tells us that straight out, you'll see. It says, uh, when you heard the gospel of your salvation, upon believing, you were sealed with the Spirit, the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance, and until we acquire possession of it to the praise of his glory. So we don't need to rece- to pray to receive the Holy Spirit. Have we got that clear? Because if that is true, and it is true, then shall we notice at the end of that same chapter, Paul confesses that he prays for the believers, and this is what he prays. That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of of his glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurably greatness, uh, measurable greatness of his power towards us who believe, according to the working of his great might that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead. So yes, we have received the Holy Spirit, and Paul has just told the Ephesian believers they had received the Holy Spirit when they believed immediately. But undeniably, now he prays for the ongoing work of the Holy Spirit in their hearts, that God would give them a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him. You see, my brothers, my sisters, it's one thing to read a fact in the Bible, isn't it? That's one thing, and a very good thing it is to get it into our minds. But there comes a point when, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, our eyes are opened to see it. Have you ever noticed how believers talk? They said, I knew that verse. I've known it since I was a child. Oh, I'd never realized. Ah yes, you'd never realized it meant that. You never saw it. The glory and the wonder of it hadn't gripped your heart. Before it was, so to speak, so many words. We do need that spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him, don't we? That we might know what is the hope of his calling. All that God would, by his spirit, enlighten our eyes to the wonder of it. I go outside some nights and do, when the Irish weather permits me, do what God tells me to do in Isaiah chapter forty. Go on, he says, go out, have a look at it. The thousands, the millions, the billions, not only of stars, but of galaxies. The sheer wonder of it. And the Christ who dwells in my heart made it all. And not only is he seated far above all principality, powers, mights, and dominions, but if you can believe it, God has raised him from the dead and in practice, in in in principle, raised us to sit with him. We're going to reign with him. Oh, if you're going to be some little small thing, like the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. You'd need to work at your studies, wouldn't you, and prepare yourself. At least I suppose you would. Mm-hmm. Going to be the manager of Kellogg's, you would have to do your studies well. Mm-hmm. You're going to reign with Christ. In all the wonderful glories, not only of this universe, but all universes to be. Oh, if I were only had my eyes open to see what is the immeasurable greatness of his power towards me, that is still flowing towards me. You know, they say the old Big Bang, when the universe started, it must have been a colossal Big Bang, do you see? Because they say the power of it is still going, you see? And the scientists can measure some of the, uh, power that is still emanating from that big bang, however multi-million years ago it was. And the power that raised the Lord Jesus from the dead is still flowing. It's flowing towards you, says Paul. Only God give you the eyes to see it. And what is the hope of his calling? Oh, that I would take his calling more seriously. For I have but a little time to stay in this temporary world. I'm on a journey like the Lord was. And the hope of his calling goes beyond this little life into the uncountable ages of eternity. Oh, how I do need a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him. And I shall need the power of God's Holy Spirit, for in chapter three Paul talks in similar terms. He prays that God will be give, eh, will give us to be strengthened by his spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in our hearts by faith, that we might be rooted and grounded in the love of God and be filled into all the fullness of God. The work of the Holy Spirit, the ongoing work of the Spirit in the hearts of God's people. And our Lord tells us that we are to pray for it. He uses two analogies, so let's, before we finish, let's just briefly consider them. He said, now look here, you've got a friend perhaps, and uh, one night, another friend of yours comes from Timbuktu and arrives on your doorstep late at night, you'll see, half past ten-ish or so. You weren't expecting him. And as you greet him at the door, you say to yourself, well, lovely to see you, but you're thinking got got nothing in the cupboard. Well, that wouldn't matter if you're an Irishman. You'd send him to bed and pro- promise him porridge in the morning. But if you're an oriental and you live in the Middle East, you have a visitor come at, it doesn't matter what time of day, you must, you must offer him food. It's unthinkable that anybody should arrive at your doorstep and you invite him in and you don't feed him. It's like that in Turkey to this very present day. If they befriend you and take you into your, their home, they must offer you food, and please don't f- don't say no, I can't stomach that. That insults them. You must take it. Well, anyway, says our Lord, you, you've got a unexpected visitor, and he comes, and of course you, you must sit him down to food somehow. You haven't anything. So you hurriedly, uh, uh, run along the street to another friend of yours, knock on the door, and when he replies, you say, look here, please get up and lend me three loaves. I got an unexpected visitor come. And the muffled voice underneath the pillow says, oh, get lost, man, get lost. Do. I'm in bed with my kids. I can't get up and give you bread. Get lost. Ah, but not the man outside keeps knocking. And I tell you, says our Lord, the chap in bed will eventually get up and give him what he requires, not because he's his friend, but to get rid of the nuisance of somebody knocking on his door at midnight and telling him to get up and give him food. He'll give it to him because of his, and to translate it literally, his shamelessness. He won't take no for an answer. You know, days were a long time ago when GPs would come out and visit you in your house, you see. Mm-hmm. And even at night, in the middle of the night, if you rang them up and said you had an emergency, a GP would perhaps get up and come and visit you. This is a long time ago. I'm talking of my youth, decades ago. And you can imagine a mum in the middle of the night, uh, and a, a 6-year-old has got a tummy ache and is bad way, really, and full of pains, he says. Now the thing is, is it appendicitis or isn't it? And, uh, mum is anxious and call the doctor out if when he comes he finds it's only because the boy's eaten too many plums, the greedy boy, uh, you will see, uh, that would be an embarrassment. So she's be ashamed to have the doctor come out, uh, and it'd only be a little thing. But suppose it's her husband, and he's got severe pains in the chest, and it's a heart attack. She gets on the phone and says, come, doctor. And he says, well, I'll come tomorrow. No, you must come right now. And he says, but I got, ah, but, ah, ah, but. She'll not take no for an answer. You said the woman is perfectly shameless. Yeah, I know, but it's her need that makes her shameless, and she won't get on the phone, or get off the phone until the doctor comes out, you see, because of the need. We need the work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts, of enlightenment, of strengthening. How much do you need it, my brother? Is it absolutely necessary? Because I fear, if you can get through life without it, you will. On our side, it depends how necessary you think it really is. And if you say, but I'm going to have it, by God's grace, I'm going to have it. He holds it out to me in his word. I mean to go in for it. Then you'll constantly pray for it, won't you? Depends how necessary you think it is. I repeat, if we get can get, if we think we can get through life without it, we probably will. But if we can see that we need it, we must have it. We shall go on praying. Though I mustn't give the impression that God is not prepared to give unless we take every opportunity to twist his arm. You don't have to twist God's arm, for there's another side to this story. And the other analogy he uses is this: if you being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, what father among you, if the child asked for a bun, would give him a stone? What mother among you, if the child asked for some fish, would give him a serpent? Of course not. Though we are all sinners, ruined by the fall, we are in that sense evil. We still know how to give good gifts to our children. And shall not your heavenly Father give Holy Spirit to them that ask him? You don't have to twist his arm. It's his initiative. It's his suggestion that he give this working of the Holy Spirit in our hearts. He wants to give it. He guarantees that they that ask shall receive, and they that seek shall find, and he that knocks on the door, it shall be open to him. He wants to give it. It's difficult to give it to those that don't want it and don't see any need for it. On his side, he's all willing. God, so impress our hearts with the necessity, the indispensable necessity of the gracious work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts, that we shall not cease asking and seeking and knocking on the door of heaven. Lord, teach us to pray, they said. And the very next incident starts off like this. He was casting out a demon, and it was dumb. And then Luke, with great practicality, marking the astonishment of what happened. And when the spirit was cast out, the dumb man spoke. Po. That shook the crowd. Man hadn't spoken for years. Now he spoke. It's a cruel thing, dumbness, isn't it? Kind of imprisons a personality. So the personality can't express himself or herself. Can't speak. Our Lord released this man, and the dumb man. Of all the cruel things that Satan does, is to make people dumb so that they don't speak to God. I try to be very careful what I say. I shall never be allowed to come back to Scrabo, you see. And privately, don't tell anybody I ever said this, you see. Uh, uh, you... and when you've heard it, pretend you haven't heard it, I haven't said it. But sometimes I'm in meetings, a long while, and if a certain brother were ever to get up and give a hymn out and pray, it would be like an earthquake. He's never been known to do it before. Not because he couldn't. He could, but he just doesn't, and has got in the habit of not doing it. I withdraw all such criticisms, of course. That was a very, very, very, hmm, unfortunate I said such a thing, wasn't it? But we have to be honest sometimes and confess our feelings. But whether in public or in private, let us ag- uh, constantly come to the Lord and not ask him simply teach us how to pray, but ask him, Lord, please teach me to pray. And he guarantees that the Father will hear our prayers and richly reward us. So shall we commit our meditation to the Lord in In prayer. prayer. Blessed Lord Jesus, we have thought together about thy word on this practical but important matter of prayer. Lord, we thank thee for the willingness of the Father to give. His very character is involved in his promise, and he shall hear our prayers and grant us what we ask. Teach us, Lord, to pray wisely and to pray for those supreme gifts that thou dost hold out before us. Help us in life to get our, uh, i- ideas of necessities sorted out. That whatever blessings, material and physical you give us, we may be grateful in our hearts for them, but remain unsatisfied until thou shalt give us the supreme spiritual benefits of which thy words speak. So bless us now as we go our way, and grant our study might be used of thee for thy glory, for our profit in the days yet to come, for thine own name's sake. Amen.