I invite you to turn tonight to the book of 2 Kings, 2 Kings, and then I'll have you keep open the Blue Psalter hymnal as we reflect a bit on the importance of prayer as it's introduced to us in the back on page 57. I'm going to read a portion of 2 Kings chapter 19, you'll find that on page 413 in your pew bible 4 13 this is hezekiah as sennacherib has sent a threat letter to him has sent a threat letter to destroy to destroy his kingdom and the emphasis here becomes on prayer so i'll read a section here of second kings chapter 19 beginning at verse one as soon as hezekiah heard it he tore his clothes and covered himself with sackcloth and went in to the house of the Lord and he sent Eliakim who was over the household and Shebna the secretary and the senior priest covered with sackcloth to the prophet Isaiah the son of Amoz. They said to him thus says Hezekiah this day is a day of distress of rebuke and of disgrace. Children have come to the point of birth and there is no strength to bring them forth. It may be that the Lord your God heard all the words of Rob Sheka, whom his master, the king of Assyria, has sent to mock the living God and will rebuke the words that the Lord your God has heard. Therefore, lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left. And now we'll skip down to verse 14. Verse 14. Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it. And Hezekiah went up to the house of the Lord and spread it before the Lord. And Hezekiah prayed before the Lord and said, O Lord, the God of Israel, enthroned above the cherubim, you are the God, you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth you have made heaven and earth incline your ear o lord and hear open your eyes o lord and see and hear the words of sennacherib which he has sent to mock the living god truly o lord the kings of assyria have laid waste the nations and their lands and have cast their gods into the fire for they were not gods but the work of men's hands wood and stone therefore they were destroyed so now oh lord our god save us please from his hand that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you oh lord are god alone then isaiah the son of amos sent to hezekiah saying thus says the lord the god of israel your prayer to me about sennacherib king of assyria i have heard and there will end. The reading of God's Word. And tonight I ask you to please turn to the back to page 57 of your Blue Psalter hymnals, page 57. And I'd like to confess these together tonight of what we believe about prayer and why prayer is so important. And this will be sort of an introductory sermon to the subject of prayer. Question 116, why do Christians need to pray? Because prayer is the most important part of the thankfulness God requires of us. And also because God gives His grace and Holy Spirit only to those who pray continually and groan inwardly, asking God for these gifts and thanking Him for them. How does God want us to pray so that He will listen to us? First, we must pray from the heart to none other than the true God who has revealed Himself in His Word, asking for everything He has commanded us to ask for. Second, we must acknowledge our need and misery, hiding nothing, and humble ourselves in His majestic presence. Third, we must rely on this unshakable foundation. Even though we do not deserve it, God will surely listen to our prayer because of Christ our Lord. That is what He promised us in His Word. What did God command us to pray for? Everything we need spiritually and physically as embraced in the prayer Christ our Lord Himself taught us. And we'll just say it. What is this prayer? Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. And when you pray, Those words were given by Jesus himself when he was instructing and giving instructions to his disciples about the subject of prayer in his Sermon on the Mount. And Jesus, of course, never began by saying, if you pray, Jesus clearly was assuming that the Christian would make prayer a priority in the course of his life, a necessity. It was John Bunyan who once said, Pray often, for prayer is a shield of the soul, a sacrifice to God, and a scourge for Satan. He also said, Prayer will make a man cease from sin, or sin will entice a man to cease from prayer. Prayer is such an important part of the thankfulness of the Christian life. And we jump tonight into this section, particularly in the Heidelberg Catechism, helping us to understand the importance of prayer. And I want to begin tonight by saying a few words by way of introduction about prayer. I realize prayer is something that is so important for the Christian life. I think it's really helpful. We've been doing all these series, working through books of the Bible. And as you know, I am a big book of the Bible kind of preacher. I love to work through books of the Bible. But this is really important to stop tonight and think a lot about all of the instruction and the way that Jesus taught us to pray. Because I'm sure all of you tonight feel this is one area of the Christian life that can be improved and should be improved. These statements that I read from Bunyan are expressions of experience of somebody who has learned the discipline of prayer. I always think of those words by the Apostle Paul where he said, I have learned in every circumstance to be content. Prayer is also a learned thing. It's not that we just come out of the womb praying, we come out of the womb crying, you know that. But it's been often said, as many quote prayer, that prayer itself is the Christian's vital breath. It is necessary for the Christian life. Look, the framers of the Heidelberg understood that. Why is it necessary? It's necessary. A lifeline, if you will, directly to God that you can talk to Him. You don't have to go to priests. You don't have to go to me to talk to God through me. You can go right to Him. You thought of the blessing of that. You thought of the importance of that. You get to come to the King. You get to speak to Him, and He hears you. As you read through the Scriptures, you'll find that those in the past and those whom the Lord used to inspire the Word, and as the Word was inspired by the Spirit, and as they wrote and described the Christian life, they are constantly communicating to us that God chose prayer as an avenue by which He would come and rescue and help and strengthen and benefit His people. He would come to the aid of his people. He would come and rescue his people. He would come and deliver his people. He would help his people. So much so that you have constant, incessant commands given in the New Testament, not in a first-use way of the law, but in a third-use way, commanding us as Christians, in a rule of gratitude, to continue earnestly, Colossians 4, in prayer being vigilant in it with thanksgiving the lord um the lord wanted this to be a way of life for us it's not earning anything not earning salvation and i think sometimes we put ourselves back under the law in the wrong way by thinking that if the more that we pray the more god accepts us that is out of the discussion right now that is not what we're discussing the christian is right with God the Christian has been forgiven but prayer itself is a discipline isn't it and there are there are consequences in the Christian life when we are not praying that doesn't mean necessarily that we're not Christians we have to be careful with that one of the goals then of the pastor is for himself to become more a man of prayer and to help the congregation become people of prayer if you look at congregations that are divided and ripped apart and not doing well i think you will often see that there is not a lot of prayer either corporately in worship and privately by the members and the pastor the lord knows the lord knows it was claimed for augustus caesar that he found rome as one writer wrote rome a city of wood and he left it a city of marble. The pastor who succeeds in helping his people and changed them from a prayerless to a prayerful people has done a greater work than Augustus in changing a city from wood to marble. After all, this is one of the primary works of the preacher. He is often dealing, this pastor said, with prayerless people, people of whom it is said God is not in their thoughts. Such people he meets everywhere all the time. His main business is to turn them from being forgetful of God, from being devoid of faith, and from being prayerless so that they might become a people who habitually pray, believe, and remember the Lord. I'm sure, as I said, this is a discipline that's challenging for us. And we all agree tonight, beginning right here with me, that this is the area that needs improvement. But I would say at this point that it's one of the most challenging disciplines for the Christian. And I say that tonight, it is a discipline. Disciplines are hard for us, aren't they? We live in a day where we aren't disciplined much about anything, are we? I don't know if there's ever been a time when we're more distracted. I sort of hinted at that this morning, that we have so many gadgets, so many things, so many movies, plugging into Netflix, so many toys. We're busy all the time with that stuff, right? We're busy with the things that we do. And when we say we're busy, we're not busy for that, but the challenge is then to have the time to drop the knee and spend time in prayer. Well, my goal is to help you take away what we think is the mountain of this great duty that we just can't seem to accomplish well. We come into this with somewhat ideas and assumptions that God expects great things from us in prayer. Ever notice that some of the greatest prayers in the Bible are the shortest? You ever notice that the one prayer that's highlighted the most is God, be merciful to me? Ever notice that Jesus got pretty excited about the prayer, God, be merciful to me, a sinner, and said, That's the one I'm after right there. We'll talk about that. Prayer is what, boys and girls? It's talking with God. Prayer is talking with God. If we understand prayer as having this ongoing dialogue and discussion with the great and almighty king who made heaven and earth, as Hezekiah realized in his prayer, why would we neglect it? There really is nothing more important that we could be doing. But why would we neglect it? Well, you know, it's because of the presence of sin. It's the struggle of distraction. It's one of the most neglected duties. It was James Boyce who said, for most people, few doctrines with Christianity are more misunderstood than that of true prayer. It is totally misunderstood by non-believers and it is misunderstood by many who profess the name of Jesus. The problem may be traced to the fact that so few persons know God well enough to be closely associated with Him in prayer. I think that's true. Maybe part of the problem tonight as we begin this series is to think maybe we simply still after all these years have not understood prayer the way that we should. Why do we need to pray? Why is it necessary? God is omniscient. God knows everything. He knows everything you need before you ask. Why in the world do we need to pray? How should we pray? What should the content of prayer be? All those things we're going to consider here in the next few weeks, but my goal is not to guilt you into conviction to do it. That's not my goal. I could do that. But I don't ever believe, and I think that often happens on the subject of prayer, that that really produces the kind of spirit and heart the Lord is after in prayer. I constantly believe that it has to be driven by the love of God in Christ as you have received that and known it. That's going to begin to birth in your life expressions of prayer in the natural course of your living and moving about in the course of your days. You ever been walking and all of a sudden there's a bursting out of prayer, thank you, Lord, for your wonderful works and your wonderful ways. I said before, we think prayer is this. You remember my story? That I was confronted from the pulpit years ago by a man who said to me, Pastor, when you're praying from the pulpit, you need to keep your hands folded. And I said to him, Dear parishioner, when you're praying from the pew, you need to keep your eyes closed. Right? Yeah. This is how we think about prayer, don't we? We have all these assumptions when we come to it. Tonight, I want to consider some of this. And again, I want to say up front, my goal is not to guilt convict you into it. That doesn't help you. I understand conviction's good, but not to guilt you into it. You'll notice here, particularly tonight, in Lord's Day 45, you'll notice that some of the proof texts, and if you ever say, if you're new here tonight and you're a visitor, and you say, why in the world are you reading the Heidelberg Catechism? You'll notice there that everything that we believe and confess is put down in proof text in the scriptures and there's a proof text there that I couldn't get away from as I was preparing this sermon and it was there in the second question and answer where it was Psalm 145, verse 18 and 19. And I went back and read that and I thought, that is it. That is beautiful. Here it is. The Lord is near to all who call upon Him. He fulfills the desire of those who fear Him. He also hears their cry and saves them. Does it get better than that? Does it get better than that? The Lord is near to all who call upon Him. A few weeks back, if you were here, you'll remember that I preached Philippians chapter 4, where I was dealing somewhat with the subject of prayer and anxiety. And remember how Philippians 4 goes, Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God and He's going to do something for you. The peace of God will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. There was a verse right before that that was an interesting verse. It said right before he called us to pray, the Lord is near. And I took that as, the Lord is coming soon. And I really appreciated Dr. Clark coming up and said, yeah, that's one way it's been taken. Do you realize also throughout the history of the Septuagint in the Old Testament when it says the Lord is near, notice it didn't say the day of the Lord is near. The Lord is near. I went back and I thought about that and I think he's absolutely right. The Lord is near. Therefore, pray. It's a covenantal nearness to us of grace. He is covenantally near you. That is the great motivation of prayer. And they picked up on it here. The first question tonight asks, then why do we need to? Think about the sweeping answer than being God is near you and then to think about all that it took to make that happen. That's where I want you to think a little bit because that motivates prayer. You'll remember Psalm 139 a few weeks ago that we discussed and we were able to look at that you are acquainted with all of my ways. You know all of my thoughts before I've even thought them. You know everything about me. Am I going out? Am I coming in? All of that special statement. You'll notice there in Psalm 139 when it says this is how, in the catechism here, how we show gratitude, it assumes that, and that psalm assumed that, that knowledge of God was not a dangerous thing anymore for us. Remember that? Remember the Lord said He knows every thought and He's going to judge every word. When we're in Christ, that scary understanding of the knowledge of God, the psalmist had no fear of it anymore in the sense that God is against us. He understood perfectly God is for us, and that nearness, that covenantal nearness, that gracious relationship that's in place has now produced a sense of real peace between us and God so that we get to enjoy Him this way in prayer. Enjoy Him. And so then when you come to the New Testament and it's constantly calling us to prayer, you'll notice that in most of the cases when it's calling us to prayer, it's always preceded with what? rejoice rejoice rejoice in the lord think of first Thessalonians 5 rejoice always pray without ceasing you have this perspective of the lord's favor to you his blessing upon you his care for you his love for you that has created pure and lasting joy in your hearts and now that nearness means you can talk to him and he's not against you prayer seems to be to me sandwiched between the call to to joy and the call to be thankful joy thanksgiving all immersed by prayer now again to challenge us a bit i think there are certain things that prevent us to pray i i use uh john pains again excellent lecture this week uh where he gave five reasons because he had a whole lecture on prayer that providentially i was able to sit there this week and listen to and he had five reasons that he said people generally don't pray or people have a hard time with prayer and i think they're right the first one he said it was just simply spiritual apathy that fills us you know that over time it's easy to grow apathetic apathetic in our walk there's there's the problem of pride and self-reliance isn't there i mean it's absolutely true when jesus said to his disciples apart from me you can do nothing if truth be told we're often in the course of life so running around busy we're trying to do this ourselves and there comes the anxiety and that's a form of pride in our lives because prayer is the best posture of what? We're going to look at it in a minute. Dependence. He also mentioned here habitual unrepentant sin in the course of our lives. There are besetting sins that happen. And besetting sins, things that happen in the course of our lives that we have chosen to walk down paths. He mentioned pornography. It most certainly has an effect on prayer. You won't be doing it. Guilt, you know, certain sins, especially that sin, it has the effect of utterly making you feel dirty. And why would anyone dirty want to talk to God, right? See what it does? Satan loves that. Satan loves to do that to you. Fourth one, he said, is you're crazy busy using Kevin DeYoung's book. Fifth one, he says the challenge also is worldliness. And I'll confess that. When we're so into the world, the things of the world, the love of the world, it's hard to pray. So I think you have to realize the struggle of it as Peter did when he had an intention to love his Lord but found himself and Dr. Clark had a great message the other day on Romans 7 about the things that I will to do that I don't want to do. That's that constant struggle in the course of our lives and that is discouraging, isn't it? Discouraging. So what do we do? What do we do? Well, the Lord calls us to pray. Remember, it was Jesus' words when He said, in the hardships of life, I want you to pray and not lose heart. And He told a whole parable of a little widow who had been robbed and stolen from, and the Lord wanted her to know and you to know He cares. Why do we need to pray? Notice what's said here tonight in our Heidelberg. What a beautiful statement, isn't it? Because in all of your distresses, needs, and anxieties, you can go right to him and he has for you something wonderful grace and the holy spirit what an encouragement to pray i have grace for you and i have the holy spirit for you i will give without measure more grace and the holy spirit i'll pour out to help you You'll remember in Romans 8, where you had that struggle in Romans 8 of not even knowing what to pray for as we ought, as we groan inwardly in all of the struggles of life. It is the Spirit whom the Lord gives us who then overtakes prayer. And guess what He does? With words that you don't even hear or groanings that can't be uttered, He begins to pray for you in you because you often don't even know what to say. That's a wonderful thought, isn't it? So prayer, as we looked at tonight in this particular section, has the particular benefit of putting us on our knees before God in a posture of dependence. That's the other thing that's so important, isn't it? Why we need to pray. Because we're the most independent people we can be. In church life, in life, in everything, we're doing it ourselves. Prayer is the greatest expression in the Christian life of dependence. Satan's out for you. Satan's shooting darts at you. He's got a lot of minions to do it. He's got a lot of devils to do it running around. And I love what one pastor particularly said, that there is nothing more troubling to the devil, nothing makes him tremble more than when a saint who is facing trial and temptation falls on his knees before the living God to pour out his heart to him the devil is terrified of such a thing because he knows the triumphal grace that will come down from the throne upon the weary soul for deliverance and what it means for him is defeat again it's a pretty good reason to pray isn't it another defeat comes God knows what's best for us you should never hear these calls to prayer as something that's a burden what the lord is doing is not laying a burden on us what the lord is doing is he knows what you need he helps you constantly even when you don't praise that good for to you but he knows what you need and he knows this is what you need to often get through this life it's a help to you it's an aid to you it's a resource it's a westminster or confession even goes so far as to call it a means of grace you would say a little more informally it's an imperative for the christian life because you need it the lord knows what's best he knows everything so the the whole emphasis here then on the necessity of prayer why we need to prayer pray is because the lord is number one willing and able to help you in all of your distresses He desires to help you. He's willing to give you the grace and the Holy Spirit for all of these things. And we begin to move then into what is essential to true prayer. What is essential to true prayer? And I love what Lord's Day 45 says. It's so beautiful. Listen to this. First, we must pray from where? The heart. Calling upon the one true God only who has revealed Himself in His Word. For all that He's commanded us to pray for. That's what we're going to look at in the coming weeks. Second, we must thoroughly know our need and misery so that we may humble ourselves before God. And third, we must rest on this firm foundation that although we do not deserve it, God will certainly hear our prayer for the sake of Christ our Lord as He promised us in His Word. I like that because it outlines for us what pleases God in prayer. I think it's important to say today, notice how prayer is treated. People go through something tragic. If you're older and don't have a Facebook account, bless you, you know, bless you. But if you do have a Facebook account and someone goes through something tragic, what are you seeing all over the wall today? Thoughts and prayers. Thoughts and prayers. Sending prayers. What is that? Sending prayers to who? I don't get it. Thoughts and prayers, thoughts and prayers. It's nice, but what does it mean? Is prayer just used? Do you really believe that's happening? It's kind of the default thing we say. I'm going to pray for you. I'm going to pray for you. And we should. If we're going to say it, we should, shouldn't we? Do you know not all prayer is heard? A prayer of an unbeliever is not heard. You know that. Whatever is not heard from faith is sin. I think of Proverbs 28, one who turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination. Proverbs 15, 29, the Lord is far from the wicked, but he hears the prayers of the righteous. David even went so far as to say, and we're going to sing, if I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me. That was protection for him at times. But then there are those prayers that are just irreverent. I think there's two dangers here. there's the danger of the holier-than-thou prayer, where we use all the old King James language to sound very holy. Lord, thou who hast made the heavens and the earth. Spurgeon heard a seminary student doing that and he told them, stop it. Because it came across so artificial. It came across so condescending. And no more did you ever think God was near. No more did you ever think God was near to his people. God was way up there somewhere. Then there's the other problem. I don't want to be overly judgmental, but you know you have to critique things. I was in a coffee shop and a dear brother, sincere. But in Linden, whenever you're in a coffee shop, everyone's praying. I was up there two weeks ago at Jason's service and I overheard a youth pastor praying. We got to talk and we had a great discussion. I really appreciated our discussion. But the prayer was so irreverent that I couldn't get it out of my head. God, we just expect you to do something big here. See the other extreme? God, we just. God, we just. God, we just. And Lord can be so overused that it becomes a vain repetition this way. We expect you to do something miraculous just to intervene God and take care of it all. And I thought to myself, I appreciate his zeal. I appreciate the sincerity of what he's after. But the brother needs help. The brother needs help. And that's why we study this. The prayers can be so superficial that they lack any knowledge of Scripture. They lack any understanding of who God is. And we're talking to him irreverently. So you see the two dangers here. Notice here the way that Lord loves prayer. First, from the what? Heart. The Lord shows us this everywhere from the Scripture. Pray for one another that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours. Fervent prayer. And he prayed earnestly that it would not rain. And it did not rain in the land for three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit. Read some of the intercessory prayers of the saints in Scripture. Listen to Jesus' prayer in John 17. Did you hear Hezekiah tonight? That was a heartfelt, beautiful prayer that understood his God, that knew his God, confessed him, you made all this. Deliver us, Lord. It wasn't a long prayer. How about this one? In those days, Hezekiah became sick. This is the next chapter. And was at the point of death, and Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, came to him and said to him, Thus says the Lord, set your house in order, for you shall die. You shall not recover. Then Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, saying, Now, O Lord, please remember how I have walked before you in faithfulness and with a whole heart and have done what is good in your sight. And Hezekiah wept bitterly. And before Isaiah had gone out of the middle court, the word of the Lord came to him, turn back and say to Hezekiah, the leader of my people, thus says the Lord, the God of David your father, I've heard your prayer and I've seen your tears. Behold, I'll heal you. He healed him. On the third day, you shall go up to the house of the Lord and I'm adding 15 years to your life. I will deliver you. And this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria and I will defend this city for my own sake and for my servant David's sake. You hear that? From the heart, I heard and I answered. It's sincere. It's a cry sometimes in the midst of distress dependent on the Lord. Second, your prayers have to acknowledge your need and misery. This is what bothers me most today about prayer, the lack of this confession. I noticed, I used to listen to the radio, and there's this absurd notion out there in the evangelical world that you no longer as a Christian have to ask for forgiveness for your sins anymore. That has been taught regularly on the radio for many years because Jesus already forgave them. So why are you running around asking for forgiveness if Jesus already forgave them? And that would be true if you no longer sin anymore. But you know what sin does to you, right? It makes you feel dirty. It discourages you. And we're still in the fight, and we're prone to new evils, and sin disrupts the relationship. What do you, when you sin, where's the last place you want to be? Church. You just, you give up. You feel like giving up. The Lord's not holding that against you. He's inviting you to prayer so that you will be honest and open for him so that he then will answer and assure your heart. That's the benefit of this. He dislights to assure your hearts. Think of what happens together as we come together in worship and we confess our sins. And then what do we do, boys and girls, what do we do? We pray to the Lord, and then what comes right after that? Son, forgiven are your sins. He wants to declare that to you. Prayer, come to him. But as Bunyan said, your sin can keep you from coming. And you can avoid that. Think of Daniel's prayer for me. We'll close here. I don't want to go too much longer. But I want you to hear Daniel's prayer in distress of his life. I, Daniel, understood from the Scriptures, according to the word of the Lord given to Jeremiah the prophet, the desolation of Jerusalem would last 70 years. So I turned to the Lord and pleaded with him, In prayer and petition, in fasting and sackcloth and ashes, I prayed to the Lord my God and confessed. And here it is. Listen to this. Just a few sentences. Lord, my great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with those who love him and keep his commandments, we've sinned and done wrong. We've been wicked and have rebelled. We've turned away from your commands and laws. We've not listened to your servants, the prophets. A whole different spirit than what we saw in Acts 7 today, isn't it? Who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our ancestors, and to all the people of the land. Lord, you are righteous, but this day we're covered with shame. The people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem and of Israel, both near and far, in all the countries where you've scattered us, because our unfaithfulness to you, we and our kings and our princes and our ancestors are covered with shame, Lord, because we've sinned against you. And listen to how it goes on. The Lord our God is merciful and forgiving even though we've rebelled against Him. We've not obeyed the Lord our God or kept the laws He gave us through His servants, the prophets. Here's how it ends. Give ear, our God, and hear. Open your eyes and see the desolation of the city that bears your name. We do not make requests of you because we're righteous, but because of your great mercy. Lord, listen. That's from the heart. Lord, forgive. Here and at. For your sake, my God. You're my God. Do not delay. Because your city and your people bear your name. Beautiful. It's beautiful. Finally, tonight, the Lord wants you to know we pray that we should pray even though we don't deserve it. He promises you He will hear your prayers. he'll hear him he is calling us to have faith when we come to him where james says don't doubt he loves you don't doubt don't be like a wave of the sea pray in faith we're going to unpack in the next weeks what god commands us to ask but notice here everything that you need for body and soul he cares about your bodies he cares for your souls everything you need physically and spiritually all of it he invites you to come to his throne of grace i close with this this is my favorite quote on prayer and i hope this encourages you tonight this is what we're going to unpack here in a few weeks prayer is nothing but the promises reversed to God's Word formed into an argument and retorted by faith upon God again. In doing that, it brings ultimate comfort. Did you understand that? One of the best ways to pray is to take all that God has promised. Do you know how many promises are in the Scriptures, boys and girls? They're everywhere. That He loves you. That He'll never leave you nor forsake you. That He cares for you. That heaven's reserved for you. I could go all night. Take those promises and pray them back to Him. This is what He's inviting you to do. Look at all the stuff happening in the world and in the church and in your lives and pray the promises and watch what happens. He'll comfort your hearts. He'll strengthen your lives. God loves when we take His inspired thoughts, that's why we sing the Psalms, in the areas that we need And we spiritually and physically, as the author said, retort them back to God. Speak them back to God. He said it. Pray it to him. Jesus has said, I'll give you everything you need for a life pertaining to godliness. I'll care for you. I'll watch out for you. I'll shepherd you. You have a Savior right now who prays for you. You have an intercessor for you. Who every step of the way when he was on earth prayed for you and will not lose you. So why not talk to him? You notice Stephen prayed right to Jesus this morning? Did you notice that? As we begin this series on prayer, consider how important it is for your life. Consider that it's a necessity for the Christian life, for what God has to strengthen and help you. And consider that God has told you tonight that it is a great avenue in which you may communicate with him and rehearse and learn and pray his precious promises. And may this beautiful ongoing dialogue between you and your covenant God, your gracious King, bring you the peace that the scriptures say is yours in Christ Jesus. Amen. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, you are so wonderful to give us inspired scripture all over by your spirit that teaches us to pray. and that You don't want us guilted into this but that it would be the natural response of a heart that understands that You're near to us that You love us in Christ and that You will certainly hear because of Him and that You've made a way for us to come right to the throne of grace without a priest, without a Pope without anything like that but right to You in Your Son give us more grace and the holy spirit that we might be more of a praying people we need it and we need your help even to do it guide us then in it this week let us talk to you and um to praise your holy name that we would more and more hear the blessing of it that it would be sandwiched as it is with a rejoicing life for your near to us a thankful life that we would be a people always praying and talking to our wonderful covenant god receive our thanksgiving tonight for such a wonderful day in your house blessing us with your word in jesus name we pray amen