October 6, 2021
Author: Pastor Gordon Cook
October 06, 2021
“Men ought always to pray and not lose heart.”
Luke 18:1
Jesus is letting us know that when it comes to prayer there is a
danger we could lose heart. When we lose heart we often find that we
either become rather careless or our prayers get muted or we even stop
praying. We need to be reminded rather regularly of the importance of
prayer.
Why is prayer important? If I asked you for ten reasons why prayer is
important I am sure most of you could come up with more than ten
reasons. I am going to give five and these are not necessarily the most
important ones.
1. Because we witness a high level of engagement and commitment to
prayer in Scripture by Old Testament and New Testament saints. It is
hard to find a person in your Bible who gets a high profile, whether it
is Abraham, Moses, David or Hannah, that is not committed to prayer.
They were all committed to prayer. When you turn to the New Testament,
if you read the letters of the apostle Paul, many begin with prayer,
also an outburst of prayer sometimes halfway and at the back end he
often sums up with another prayer. Lengthy prayers are often found in
the Pauline epistles. Jesus was the best of the best, the perfect man
certainly when it came to prayer. In Luke’s gospel, Luke mentions at
least nine distinct occasions when Jesus prayed: at his baptism, after
he did miracles, before the choosing of the twelve, before he taught his
disciples about the coming passion, at the transfiguration, the return
of the seventy, when he taught his disciples how to pray, in the garden
of Gethsemane, and at the cross. Jesus died while praying. The most
godly of saints were actively committed to prayer.
2. Jesus gave
specific instructions as to how to pray. Everything Jesus teaches us is
important, he never wasted a word. He taught us a lot about prayer. He
focused upon prayer more than any other religious activity. Think of the
Sermon on the Mount, he deals with fasting and with alms giving. But in
terms of how much time or talking he does about prayer it far exceeds
either one of those other religious activities. So Jesus gives a lot of
air time to prayer and also two of his parables are shaped by prayer. In
the parable of the persevering widow and also the parable of the
publican and the sinner who go up to the temple to pray. Jesus gave a
substantial amount of teaching to prayer.
3. The New Testament
church prayed. When you open up the book of Acts in chapters 1 and 2 you
get a snapshot of the church. Acts 2:42, “They devoted themselves to
the apostles teaching, to fellowship, to the breaking of bread and
prayer.” The church was found praying. There is a great emphasis upon
corporate praying in the book of Acts, Acts 1, 2, 4, 12, and 16. The
church was never a prayerless church. Most churches don’t have a prayer
meeting, it’s kind of sad. The church in the New Testament gave
themselves to prayer, corporate life was shaped by prayer. If we are
growing as Christians and as a church prayer should have a higher and
higher priority, not less and less.
4. The warfare context of
Ephesians 6. Paul picks up that war analogy where he draws that big
graphic of that well-armed, well-equipped soldier. After describing the
various pieces of equipment, the sword of the Spirit, the shield of
faith, the breastplate of righteousness, the helmet of salvation,
the gospel shoes; he mentions the importance of prayer. He says,
“Praying at all times in the Spirit with all prayer and supplication.”
He is saying you cannot fight this fight without prayer. Prayer is
effective when it comes to using those weapons effectively and when it
comes to putting on the whole armor of God.
5. The clear mandates
to pray. Prayer is never suggested, it is commanded. 1 Thessalonians
5:17, “Pray without ceasing.” It is put in an imperative form, the verb,
so it is a command, this is what Jesus is requiring of us. Jesus gives
us that clear directive in Luke 18, “Men ought always to pray.”
We should always be praying. I really believe the more you love
Christ, the more you love God’s people, the more you love lost sinners,
the more you will pray.
Spurgeon was probably the most influential, evangelical preacher in
human history, (obviously he was post apostles), and he couldn’t
remember preaching a sermon where someone wasn’t saved. Whenever
Spurgeon was asked as to the secret of his ministry he replied, “My
people pray for me.” A story is told of someone coming to the church to
see how it was set up and they went down to the boiler room and that is
where people were praying. Every Sunday a hundred people would gather to
pray for the ministry of C.H. Spurgeon.
Pray for more of an earnest praying, more regular praying and more consistent praying privately and corporately.
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