June 9, 2021
Author: Pastor Gordon Cook
June 09, 2021
“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 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 get 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
whatever he needs.
And I tell you, ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and it will be opened.
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 give good gifts to your children, how much more will the
heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
Luke 11:1-13
I want
to focus on the verse where He says, “You are evil know how to give
good gifts to your children” (v. 12). We know God is not evil, God is
good. I was thinking when we approach God, there are two Biblical
concepts that we must always
keep in mind when we go to the Throne of Grace. We must not only have a
proper view of God, but we must have a proper view of ourselves. There
are two words that I think are very key words—and you could argue this
from your Bible, and to some degree I will--when it comes to
understanding who we are, and will shape our prayers.
The first word is “saint.” Do you ever call yourself a saint? Probably not. I
think the Roman Catholics stole that word from us and we haven’t used
it very well. That word is used more than any other word to describe
the people of God in Scripture. If you go to the Psalms, you will find
that word “saint” pops up quite a few times. In almost every letter the
Apostle Paul writes, he calls them “saints.” So that word is used in
almost every one of these epistles, sometimes many times.
For
example, in Romans it is used 9 times. After telling them you are
loved by God and called to be saints (Romans 1:7), he tells them 8 more
times “you are saints! You are saints!” In Corinthians, he uses the
term 12 times. Ephesians, 10 times. Philippians, twice. Four times in
Colossians. Twice in I & 2 Thessalonians. Literally, saint means
“holy ones.”
So again, how often do you think of yourself in those terms. “I am a saint.” Have you ever said to a brother or a sister in Christ, “you are a saint!” That is the word that Paul frequently used. It is a wonderful Biblical word and concept.
So
we are “holy.” In what sense are we holy? In two ways. We are holy
because of an imputed righteousness. We are perfectly holy in the sight
of God. We also have an imparted righteousness. When God saves a
sinner, He breaks the power of sin, doesn’t He? Definitive
sanctification is taught in Romans 6. There is also progressive
sanctification. So this is what is true of all of us. If you are in
Christ, you are perfectly holy in Christ because of his imputed
righteousness. And we are definitively and progressively righteous in
Christ because of His imparted righteousness. There has been a
fundamental change in us the moment we believed on Jesus Christ. So
that is a very important word. When you are coming to pray: who am I? I
am a saint in Christ.
The
second important word is “sinner.” Sometimes people ask the question,
“should we regard ourselves as sinners or saints”? What is the answer?
It is not either/or, is it? It is both/and. In spite of all we have
in Christ, we are still sinners. The Apostle Paul could cry out, Romans
7, “O wretched man that I am!” (v. 24) And he could say of himself, “I
am the chief of sinners” (I Timothy 1:15). I don’t think he was trying to use hyperbole there—he really believed himself to be the “chief of sinners.” Jesus taught us to pray, “Our Father which art in heaven…forgive us our sins”
(Luke 11:4) Jesus even says, “If you then, who are evil…” (Luke
11:13) He’s talking to disciples: you are evil. Is that you? Yes, that
is me!
We
are saints, but we are sinners. Jesus uses some very strong language
when speaking to his disciple friends, “you who are evil.” We tend not
to think of ourselves as saints—you are! But we don’t think of
ourselves as “evil.” We kind of lose on both ends. We don’t appreciate
how blessed we are in Christ. And we don’t appreciate how bad we still
are because we are sinners. John Newton on his deathbed said, “I have a
great Savior, and I am a great sinner.” When we pray, brethren, remember who you are! You are a saint, but you are also a sinner.
BACK