I invite you to turn with me this morning to Luke 11, Luke 11, to read together verses 1 through 13, the focus being verses 5 through 10 of that chapter. Last week, you recall as we are nearing the end of our consideration of Paul's letter to the Philippians, we considered his command, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And having considered that in anticipation of, with Pastor Donovan's permission, in anticipation of the series that he is planning to do on the Lord's Prayer, I thought this might serve well to tie the two together to consider God's promised answer to prayer that we find in this parable in verses 5 through 10 of Luke chapter 11. So we begin reading at verse 1 through 13, and again, our focus 5 through 10. Hear now the Word of God. One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples. He said to them, when you pray, say, Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread. Forgive us our sins for we also forgive everyone who sins against us and lead us not into temptation. Then he said to them, suppose one of you has a friend, then he goes to him at midnight and says, friend, lend me three loaves of bread because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me and I have nothing to set before him. Then the one inside answers, don't bother me. The door is already locked, and my children are with me in bed, I can't get up and give you anything. I tell you, though he will not get up and give him the bread because he is his friend, yet because of the man's boldness, he will get up and give him as much as he needs. So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. He who seeks, finds. And To him who knocks, the door will be opened. Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him? Beloved in the Lord Jesus Christ, as we just sang, prayer is the Christian's vital breath, the Christian's native air. And along with that, as someone else has said, prayer is the soul of a man moving in the presence of God. And very simply, that means that there is no true life. There is no spiritual life without prayer. Not that it is prayer that gives us that life to begin with. But once that life is there, by the grace of God, by the power of the Holy Spirit, there will be prayer. In our covenant fellowship with God as His people, we depend upon Him coming to us through His Word, and we also depend on the sacrifice of prayer to be heard by Him. Prayer that is constant. Prayer that is daily, prayer that is faithful, is to characterize the life of the believer in his or her relationship with God. You remember that Paul began his true spiritual, his true Christian life with prayer, and prayer was the last chapter of Stephen's life. Prayer is indispensable to the life of a Christian. That means that we cannot do without it, boys and girls. One anonymous quote says, Living a life without prayer is like building a house without nails. In a day of extreme busyness, beloved, when everything seems to be grabbing at your time and attention, we might ask ourselves, how firm is my life house? You see, the disciples could see from the very example of our Lord, of Jesus Himself, they could see that prayer was vital. They observed Him spend entire nights in prayer. They heard Him pray beautifully, even on their behalf. And therefore they asked Jesus, teach us how to pray. And He teaches them that which we call the Lord's Prayer. But He doesn't stop there. With His parable, He adds a wonderful comfort and assurance as the Lord teaches the promise of answered prayer. Not only does He teach His disciples how to pray, but He teaches them the promise of answered prayer for those who demonstrate dependence upon God, for those who demonstrate intensity in prayer, and for those who demonstrate confidence through prayer. And now we need to understand at the very beginning here, though, that these words of Jesus that He gives here are only for the believer. Only for the believer. Only for the child of God, one who is in Christ Jesus, one who is saved and is already blessed with that confidence of salvation through Jesus Christ. Only for the one who knows by faith that Jesus Christ has opened the way to the Father. Only for that one then, only that one then is able to demonstrate dependence upon God and to demonstrate intensity in prayer. and able to demonstrate confidence through prayer. These words are only for one who is in Christ Jesus, one who prays in the way that Jesus taught. In Ephesians 3, Paul says that through faith in Christ, we may have boldness and access with confidence the presence of God. Beloved, prayer is that precious gift from God to the believer. Because of the work of Jesus Christ, And it is that gift which God promises to hear for those, first of all, who demonstrate dependence upon God. And that dependence, you see, is reflected in the details of the parable. Now, I trust even the boys and girls here. Boys and girls, as we read that, you would be able to tell me what the dilemma, what the problem is, what the host's dilemma is here in this parable. Very simply, he's unprepared. He receives an out-of-town guest late at night. The cupboards are empty. He has nothing to offer. It's midnight and therefore the market is closed. Simply, he is not prepared to give the customary hospitality. Now, in our day, we probably look and hear this and we see rudeness on the part of the guests. How in the world do you dare show up unannounced in the middle of the night? But you see, in the culture of that day, it wouldn't have been so strange. They didn't have snail mail like we have it. The U.S. Postal Service to send out a note three days ahead of time. They certainly didn't have email or instant messaging, even a telephone to call or a cell phone to say, I'm on my way, but you know I got tied up in traffic. I'm going to be a little bit late. It would not have been so strange. This friend, no doubt, had traveled all day long, traveled hard. He was very hungry when he arrived, and the unwritten rules of hospitality required that the man, the host, tend to the friend's needs. And the proper protocol included the fact that he would provide rest and food and shelter and even protection. and that should be no surprise to us. We remember the teaching and the demonstrations in the history of Israel. In Deuteronomy 10, verse 11, the Lord says, Therefore love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. And you remember, I trust, when the two angels who appeared as men came to Lot in the wicked city of Sodom and came to rescue Lot and his family, and Lot took them into his home and provided for them, And when the wicked men came to abuse them, Lot did everything he could to protect them, though they were the ones protecting Lot. And you may remember also from Judges 19, the Levite and his concubine. Do you remember that story where eventually the Levite cuts up the concubine and sends pieces throughout the nation? They're on their way back to Ephraim and they stop at Gibeah for the night. And an old man comes out of the country and says, Come on, you've got to come to my house. You can't stay here because he knew the danger. He provides food for the animals. He provides food for them. He provides shelter. And again, when the wicked men of the city come, he tries to provide protection for the Levite, unfortunately not the concubine. That's what was expected. That's what was given. And we too, beloved, in our day, we are to rejoice. We are to rejoice when we are given the opportunity to provide for and to care for believers, fellow believers, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Not ignore them, but provide for them. Now, boys and girls, again, with regard to the parable, you know I trust that they had no refrigerators or freezers back then to keep food from spoiling for days on end. They did all their shopping on a daily basis. They had no microwaves to quickly prepare a meal, even at a late hour. Yet the practice of hospitality still applied. And this host earnestly desired to care for. He desired to supply for the needs of his traveling friend. He did not want to make him go to bed with a hungry stomach and wait till morning. That was his dilemma. So what is he going to do? Well, he comes up with a solution. He will go to his neighbor. The text calls him a friend. Because for whatever reason, this host, he knows that this friend has bread in his house. And therefore, the solution, the only solution he has, is to go to the only one that he knew could help him. That's the solution. But as we look at this from a human standpoint, we cannot help but notice the imposition. Friend or not, the one with the bread, he's not happy. You want what? Do you know what time it is? it's midnight our health professionals today would say you don't need to eat in the middle of the night anyway it's not good for you it's midnight it's not safe to be out in the middle of the night and to help out this friend would be to disrupt the whole family the children were tucked in the door was locked and the average family did not have their own bedrooms it was probably a one room house and with mats rolled out on the floor for the children next to mom and dad, or as someone has suggested in this one-room house, a raised platform upon which all the family members slept side by side. And therefore, this man had a legitimate complaint. If he were to get up and light a lamp and stumble across the floor to find the bread, he would literally bother and wake up the whole family. It was a major imposition. And again, we understand the response, don't we? Don't bother me. Stop being a nuisance. Stop being a troublemaker. Come back in the morning. But notice the persistence of the host pays. Verse 8, I tell you, though he will not get up and give him the bread because he is his friend, yet because of the man's boldness, he will get up and give him as much as he needs. Because of his boldness, because of his persistence, this bold act has the idea of shameless, not in the way that we think of shameless with one who doesn't care about sexually explicit things or care about wickedness at all, engages in those things forthrightly. But shameless in the sense of it was without apology. He was not embarrassed because this was indeed so important. It was a true need. It was urgent, and that's emphasized by the late hour. He would not have come then if he could have waited until the morning. And therefore, he was shameless, not in a negative sense, but he had no other choice as he sought. He would have done the same for his friend. He was shameless in the sense that he had a proper motive and desire. It was not selfishness that caused him to act boldly and shamelessly to his friend, but it was a motive of love for his neighbor. And now, beloved, there's a comparison and a contrast here that we must notice. The comparison is this. Jesus gives a description of the relationship between the believer, the one who is saved in Christ Jesus, and his Lord. The child of God is brought to see by faith his need, his urgent, his desperate, his cannot wait need. That there's only one who is able to supply for it. The child of God is brought to be deeply conscious that he has nothing in himself and he is of dependence on God for absolutely everything, for His very breath of life. This One who has brought Him to faith and repentance comes to know and believe, as James says, that every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the Father of lights. And this One who is brought to see His greatest need because of His sin and is brought to faith in Christ Jesus is then also enabled by the power of the Spirit to heed Paul's command. To hear it and to heed it in everything by prayer and petition present your request to God. But there's also a contrast here and that is unlike the man with the bread. God will never say to you, don't bother me. He will never say, stop being a nuisance. Quit being a troublemaker. Come back in the morning. Because our God assumes all the responsibility for the care of those whom He has adopted into His family for Jesus' sake. As Jesus said to His disciples on another occasion, don't worry about what you're going to eat and drink. God knows what you need. He will provide it. The believer's dependence upon God, beloved, is for everything. As we said last week, not just the big things in life, but also the small details of life. And not just for the spiritual life as we might think sometimes. indeed we know that that we have depended upon him and him alone to bring us to faith and we continue to depend upon him to work in us that sanctifying power of the holy spirit to protect us in our walk with the lord to to build up build us up in that most holy faith but we also depend upon him for every detail of life the breath of life our hearts to keep beating The food that we eat, the jobs that we have, the clothing that we wear, absolutely everything. Not just for the spiritual life, but also for the physical life, as the Lord's Prayer teaches us, as Pastor Donovan hopes to show us. Beloved, we depend on Him, for example, for strength and intelligence to do the work that He has given us to do at our jobs, as well as we depend on His blessing to work out our salvation with fear and trembling, as Paul says, as God works in us. We depend on His blessing to help us to get along with our co-workers and our neighbors who may annoy us, as well as to fight the forces of evil in the world and in our lives. We depend on Him to strengthen us, that we might indeed be patient in adversity as well as thankful in prosperity. Whatever you can imagine, whatever you can think of, we depend on our God. And the means by which God provides for all that we need is prayer. By and through which we demonstrate our dependence upon Him. We need to make one thing clear here, and that is that God does not need us to pray. He doesn't need us to pray. He doesn't need us for anything else, for that matter. But He has given to us the gift of prayer. It's for our good that we might come to Him and fellowship with Him through prayer. He calls us to confess Him by demonstrating our dependence upon Him through prayer. We sang 434, but I was looking during the offertory at 433. Notice verses 2 through 4. For then, that is in prayer, then is my strength by Thee renewed, then are my sins by Thee forgiven, then dost Thou cheer my solitude with hopes of heaven. No words can tell what sweet relief, therefore my every want I find, what strength for warfare, balm for grief, what peace of mind. Hushed is each doubt, gone every fear, my spirit seems in heaven to stay, and e'en the penitential tear. is wiped away all through prayer. What a gift. And especially today, beloved, in our busyness of life, we must recognize our dependence upon Him. And that includes a need to spend time with God in prayer in response to His Word to us. In fact, that's the most important part of our busy schedules. To fellowship with the only one able to make that busy time productive. And if you feel like your life is being squeezed out of you, then ask yourself, am I missing that vital breath? Am I trying to live that spiritual life without God's help? Without those nails? And be assured, beloved, that God promises to answer the prayer of those who depend on Him, but also, in the second place, for those who demonstrate intensity in prayer. Verse 9 says, So I say to you, ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened to you. I believe those things, asking, seeking, knocking, point to the intensity that we are to have in prayer. But that intensity includes also what we might call that prayer has a serious nature. There's nothing casual about prayer, nothing ho-hum about prayer, as if it's no big deal. as if it doesn't matter whether I pray or not. Prayer is not to be flippant, treating God as our buddy. It is not to be tongue-in-cheek or simply going through the motions because, well, you know, it's probably better to pray than not pray just in case there's a benefit somewhere for me. It's not to be flippant, but serious recognizing the majesty and the holiness and the power of God Because prayer is serious business. To not take this precious gift seriously is to not take God seriously. It is to blaspheme Him. And that serious nature includes waiting upon Him, waiting upon the Lord, yet at the very same time, not being able to wait to pray. I can't wait to pray. Boys and girls, kind of like a baby bird in a nest with its mouth wide open. It's waiting upon its mother to fill its mouth, its beak. But yet, demonstrating that it can't wait. Because indeed, its beak is wide open. And the approach to God in prayer is characterized by asking, seeking, and knocking. Jesus repeats what He had said in the Sermon on the Mount. And this is to be constant today and tomorrow and every time we have a need. And this asking here implies humility and a consciousness, again, of our dependence and of having a need. And the idea behind this asking is that it is to present a petition or a request from one who is inferior to one who is superior. God is the one and only sovereign over all things. And we are as nothing before Him. And our Lord says, ask, as one who is inferior, as one who is nothing, to the only one who is superior. You remember the story of the Pharisee and the tax collector in the temple. The Pharisee asks for nothing. He does not come before God as one who is inferior to one who is superior. Instead, he boasts of himself. He boasts of all that he has done. But the tax collector understands that he is inferior. He understands the sovereign nature of God. He pleads for mercy. Ask, Jesus says. Seeking, then, has been described as asking plus acting. For example, if you pray for an understanding of God's Word, God then gives you and me the responsibility to seek that understanding by diligently searching and examining Scripture. By faithfully sitting under the true gospel preached. By striving to live in harmony with God's will. In that way, God answers that prayer for understanding of God's Word. When you pray for daily bread, you don't just sit back, I trust, I hope, and wait for it to fall out of the sky. You're going to be waiting for a long time, most likely. But God gives us the responsibility to get to work, go get a job, earn a living. Through that means, He provides for our daily bread. And then knocking. Knocking, we might say, is asking plus acting plus persevering. It's ongoing. Never ending. Never give up. In a sense, when someone hears the word Christian, they should also, along with that, think of prayer. One who prays. Knowing that God alone is able to attend to my needs. And beloved, this does not mean that sometimes we only ask and if it's more urgent than we add seeking onto it and if it's even more urgent than that, then well, we might decide to knock. But this intensity, asking, seeking, knocking, characterizes how we are to come before our God every time with urgency and expectancy, knowing that He has what we need and that He gives what we need. In the parable, the man's boldness and persistence teaches us that even when an answer seems impossible, we are to ask. Our Lord says in verse 10, For everyone who asks receives, he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks the door will be opened. And the promise in verse 8 is that God will give us as much as we need. Now the Lord teaches how we are to pray in faith and independence. But our confidence, when I talk about demonstrating confidence through prayer, I'm not saying, we are not talking about that this confidence is in ourselves. We're not saying that this confidence, we gain confidence in how we pray, or we demonstrate confidence in how we pray, but we demonstrate confidence in the One to whom prayer is offered. That's why we are able in faith to ask and seek and knock because of the one to whom prayer is offered. Our God Himself. Our confidence is in Him. And He calls us to pray according to His Word. We can pray confidently according to His Word in prayer that according to His Word is offered again in true faith. Going back to what we said in the beginning, this promise is only for God's children. It is only for true believers. Those who have been saved by Jesus Christ. It's not for everyone. There is much in society that's called prayer today. Prayer is offered in governments. It's offered in national events. It's offered from false religions. It's offered on all kinds of occasions and circumstances. But it is not true prayer. And it is not heard. James says in chapter 1, verse 6, Ask in faith. Our Lord says in John 15, verse 7, If you abide in me and my words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you. Ah, but here's where it gets a little bit sticky, huh? You might say, well, I believe. I pray. I ask. I seek. I knock over and over and over again. but I don't get. I don't get what I want. I don't get what I've prayed for. Boys and girls, maybe you've experienced that. You've wanted something so bad. And you've been taught, take it to the Lord in prayer. You pray and you pray and you pray for a new bike or a new iPod or a new this or something different there. You don't get. Adults, pray for a new house, a better paying job. For healing. Oh, come on. Healing. Certainly. That'll be answered. But you don't get. And that's because, beloved, this asking and seeking and knocking that our Lord commands here, or says we are to give, is qualified by something. What is the believer's desire, or what ought it be? To pray according to God's word. And prayer that is offered according to God's Word is indeed offered in true faith, but it's also offered according to God's will. In 1 John 5.14, John says, Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And beloved, God's will is to pray as Jesus taught us in the Lord's Prayer. We are to pray for His help, to walk in a way that is pleasing to Him, to grow in faith. We are to pray for our daily bread, to pray that God's name be honored, that His will be done. All those things, it includes, God's will includes to give us what we need. Not what we want. Oh, He provides so much of what we want too, but what we need, that's guaranteed without fail. God provides exactly what we need for our good. And one thing else I haven't brought to our attention yet that we need to make clear is that it would be a wrong interpretation of this parable to say that just as the man, because of his boldness, got what he wanted, not because he was a friend, but because he wouldn't let up, it would be a wrong interpretation to say if we keep bugging God, if we wear Him down, sooner or later he'll think, I want to get Him off my back, I'll give Him what He wants. That's not at all the comparison that we are. That's a contrast. We are not to make that comparison here. But we are to look somewhat to verses 11 through 13. Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in Heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him? How much more will our Father in Heaven who is perfect and righteous and pure and has our best interest in mind give us what we need for our good? It begins with the gift of the Holy Spirit. But this also means, beloved, All of this means that sometimes the answer is going to be no. And we are to praise Him when the answer is no, believe it or not. Boys and girls, you don't ever like it when your parents say no. But we are to praise God when He says no. That is to be comforting to us. Paul prayed three times for the thorn in his flesh to be removed. God said, no, my grace is sufficient for you. You might ask for material prosperity and God says, no, because He knows that material prosperity, through that you would become independent and deny Him. You might pray fervently for deliverance from physical weakness and illness and God says, no, because through that weakness He keeps you at His feet. It must be our prayer, beloved, that God would deny us that which would cause us to deny Him. And that He would give us that which we only need to live unto Him. That He would be recognized and glorified and honored and praised through our every situation of life. Our confidence for those who pray in faith according to God's will is that He guarantees to hear because of His own promises. Again, verse 10, For everyone who asks, receives. He who seeks, finds. To him who knocks, the door will be opened. God has promised to hear the prayer of those whom He has said, Come unto me. He has promised that for Jesus' sake. Our Lord Jesus Christ alone is our only and every incentive for praying the finished and perfect work of Jesus Christ because of what He has already accomplished. We don't deserve the Father's ear. We have no claim to His mercy. Yet in Christ Jesus, we are guaranteed an audience with God. And proof of that, beloved, is the cross of Jesus. In Hebrews 6, we are told that Jesus Christ anchored our hope when He went behind the curtain into the very presence of God for us on our behalf. He anchored our hope there. He has opened the way for us into the presence of our Heavenly Father whose arms are open for His children. Jesus Christ has transformed our relationship with the Father so that we are no longer enemies of God who cannot stand being in God's holy and awesome presence. Those who cannot stand to hear His voice as the Israelites once were terrified. But we are saved children who have been transformed by His justifying grace and given a voice that God will hear. You see, beloved, God will not ignore His own work done through Jesus Christ. And the prayers of His people, cleansed by the Spirit of God, the fruit of His grace in our lives. You see, for us, midnight is the best time for refusing a request. Go away. Come back in the morning. But with God, it is never night. There's no inconvenient time with Him for you or I to go to Him. He will not scold you for coming too late. He will not scold you for not coming sooner. You can never impose on Him. He is never bothered by a humble child who approaches Him in faith. He is never taken by surprise. His ear is always turned to you and me because of our Savior. God's promises to believers in Christ Jesus is that no praying saint goes unanswered. No seeking soul does not find. No one who knocks at the door of God's throne room in Jesus' name will ever be turned away. He may not always give us what we ask for, but He will do better. He will give us what we need. Always. Prayer. What a precious gift that Jesus gives. There's nothing greater, nothing more important than an audience with God and beloved. That is what we have in Christ Jesus. Let's turn to Him in prayer. Father, Your Word tells us clearly that in Christ Jesus, all the riches of heaven and of glory are ours. And one of those precious riches that we enjoy on this side of glory is that gift of prayer. because you have known our need. You know perfectly our dependence. And you have given to us that which we need to come to you. We praise your name that you hear us for Jesus' sake. We ask, O Lord, that by your Spirit you would work in us that more and more, day by day, our prayers indeed would be offered from a sincere heart. we thank You, Spirit of God, that You cleanse our prayers so that they are offered, they are brought to the throne of our Heavenly Father for Jesus' sake. Cleansed and pure and appropriate. We praise Your name, O Lord, that You say no when that is for our good. That You say yes when that too is for our good. And give us a contentment and give us that peace that transcends all understanding, Lord. And continue through this too, Lord, to prepare us one day for glory when we shall see you face to face and gaze upon your beauty. Hear our prayer, Heavenly Father, for Jesus' sake. In His name we pray alone. Amen.