In this sermon, the speaker focuses on the topic of prayer in Luke chapter 11. He begins by acknowledging that familiarity with the Lord's prayer can sometimes cause people to dismiss its importance. However, he encourages the audience to look beyond their familiarity and understand the essence and heart of prayer. The sermon then delves into the first four verses of Luke chapter 11, which include the Lord's prayer and two parables about a friend and a father. The speaker explains that these verses reveal the core of prayer and its significance in relation to Satan, God, the world, and individuals.

To see you all again, I pray you had a refreshing summer. I'm going to ask you before we actually begin to... Once again, we've come to, as we have in the past, to see the Lord. And so I'll ask you please to bow with me. We'll commit our time unto Him and we'll look in His precious Word. Our Father, we do thank you again that we can come to this place and take time out and pause and consider the wonderful ways of the Lord. We can meditate on your Word. We can fellowship with each other and touch the Christ in each other. And we thank you for this great privilege to meet like this. We pray that you would guide and put your benediction upon our gathering. We just pray that you'd meet us where we are and take us where you'd have us. We do trust that you'll guide us now and we commit our time unto you in the matchless and all-prevailing name of our Lord Jesus. Well, as I said, and I'll include Lillian in it, we're so glad to be back and to share with you. And it's been so much fun through the years. And we pray that the Lord would just continue to bless us. We're going to continue in our wonderful book of Luke. When we left off on June 18, remember that way back then? We had hardly come halfway through the book. We finished Luke chapter 10. Now, I hope you don't feel burdened down because we're going to take a second season to look at Luke. We've been on Luke for a couple of years and that kind of thing. The reason it doesn't matter in our gathering is because we don't come to look at a book. We come to look at the Lord. And it doesn't really matter what window we look through, whether we're looking at Luke or Genesis or Matthew or Psalms or Job. We're here to see the Lord. And so we're just using Luke as God's revelation of His Son. Now, I don't believe, even though we haven't met for a long time, that we need a lengthy review because we stopped in such a place we can almost just pick it up again. I'm going to ask you to glance at that skeleton outline of the book of Luke and we'll just touch the big things and get us back into the flow. Does everyone have one of those? They're here. There you go. I'm sorry. There you go. It is. Luke presents our Lord Jesus as the Son of all mankind. And by that we mean He is representative humanity. In other words, He presents the Lord Jesus as the Son of Man, man as God intended men to be. He doesn't come down as male. He doesn't come down as Jew. He comes down as the Son of all mankind. And in a unique way in the Gospel of Luke, our Lord Jesus is presented reaching out to mankind, all mankind. He's the friend of the downcast and the leper and the poor and the oppressed and the rejected and the untouchable. All through the book of Luke we see the humanity of our Lord Jesus. As you can see on that outline, the bulk of the book covers what we call the ministry of the Son of all mankind. Chapter 4, 14 through chapter 19, verse 28. Now for 25 lessons or so, we've been talking about that wonderful ministry. If you've missed that or any part of it and would like it, that's where Lillian comes in. Just see her and she'll make sure you get the cassette tapes. We put all these on tapes so that if you have to be away, you can still follow or use it as a study guide or whatever. And there's no charge for the tapes, so don't be embarrassed or feel shy to ask. Just ask. Lillian has all of that. For the sake of discussion, we've divided his ministry into two parts. The first part, we have seen him as the friend of all mankind. And in that section, we see mostly his action, his works. He's very busy. That's the miracle section. He's doing, doing, doing, doing. Then Luke turns to what we call the teacher of all mankind. Beginning from chapter 9, 51 all the way to 19, 27. And here he begins to teach. Now I'm not saying there are no miracles and that he doesn't do things. But basically, it's teaching. For example, it's in this section that there are 23 parables that God gives. And 18 of them, by the way, are unique to Luke. In other words, you won't find the same parable in Mark or in Matthew. Luke is presenting him as the teacher. Now when we left off, we were in that teaching section. A teacher usually divides his material logically and by topic. And so, for the sake of analysis, we're going through by topic. When we were in chapter 9, 51 to 56, we looked at the topic. How to respond when we're being rejected. When we came to 9, 57 to 62, we looked at the topic of discipleship. When we came to chapter 10, we looked at the topic of mission. Now that brings us this morning to our new material. We're looking at the teacher of all mankind and now he changes topics. This is his Judean ministry. And by that, all we really know is that we're about 6 months before he goes to the cross. We're just very late in his ministry. The topic that we're going to discuss in chapter 11 is the topic of prayer. And so this is the new topic, the topic of prayer. If you'll glance please in your Bible that Luke chapter 11. Let me give sort of an overview of this wonderful chapter. I'd like to call the first 13 verses the essence or the heart of prayer. The core of prayer, the spirit of prayer. In this section you can see there are really two things that he talks about. One is that famous Lord's Prayer in the first four verses. And then he gives us two parables. A parable about a friend and a parable about a father. And those are tied in with this whole section on the essence of real prayer. And then the rest of the chapter sort of gives the outworkings of real prayer. For example, in 14 to 26, how prayer relates to Satan. In 27 and 28, how prayer relates to God. In 29 to 32, how prayer relates to the whole wide world. And then the chapter ends, 33 to 54, how prayer relates to you. How prayer relates to me. And so the whole chapter is on prayer. And the teacher now is going to teach us. I'll ask you to follow along please as we read the first four verses of chapter 11. And it happened while Jesus was praying in a certain place. After he had finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord teach us to pray just as John also 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 also forgive everyone indebted to us. Lead us not into temptation. Now that's Luke's account of what we call the Lord's Prayer. Now before we get into the heart of the real teaching, let me just make some general observations about this particular scripture as a whole. My first observation is you probably noticed Luke's account is different than Matthew's account of the same prayer. Matthew's account is in Matthew 6, 9 to 13. The first difference is there. That Matthew's account, the occasion for that, he gives it in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount. Well, actually not in the middle, at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. But he was preaching. And then he brought in this wonderful prayer. But in Luke, somebody came up to Jesus. He's not preaching. Someone came up and said, teach us to pray. And so then he gives it again in an abbreviated form. It's the same prayer. But one time he preached it, and one time he gave it as a model for all prayer. The second difference that you probably noticed is Luke's account is shorter than Matthew's. They're both short, but Luke's is shorter. Luke leaves out these three things. The expression, thy will be done. See, Luke didn't mention that. And you know that's in Matthew. And in the prayer you pray when you pray the Lord's Prayer. The words, deliver us from evil. Luke left that out too. And then the words at the conclusion, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. Luke didn't mention that. Matthew mentions that. Both Matthew and Luke touch on the spiritual core, the heart of all true prayer. Now some people get upset, believe it or not, if you call this the Lord's Prayer. And I suppose technically they're right. They say, this is not the Lord's Prayer. He didn't pray it. It's the disciples' prayer. It's for us. The Lord's Prayer is in John chapter 17. The great high priestly prayer. Don't get all hung up on those kind of things. Call it the Lord's Prayer. For one reason, the Lord gave it. And that makes it the Lord's Prayer, because He gave it. And once you see the heart of it, you'll know that the reality of that prayer cannot be experienced apart from the Lordship of Christ. That makes it the Lord's Prayer, too. And besides, almost all of Christendom knows it as the Lord's Prayer. So why should we say, well, we're not going to call it the Lord's Prayer. You know what it is, and I know what it is. So let's just approach it that way. Now it's interesting, from Matthew's Gospel, that of all the purposes that are given, here's one of the purposes for this prayer. Of course, this was in the sermon, not in teaching this disciple. But listen to Matthew 6, 7 and 8. It says, when you're praying, do not use vain repetition. As the Gentiles do, they suppose they'll be heard for their many words. Do not be like them. Your Father knows what you have need of before you ask Him. Pray then in this way, Our Father, who art in heaven, and so on. It's interesting that Matthew gives this prayer as a cure for vain repetition. Now the thing that makes that so interesting is probably there's no part of Scripture more vainly repeated than the Lord's Prayer. And this was given as a cure for vain repetition. As you know, there are some who say, we're not supposed to repeat the words of the Lord's Prayer. That is, we're not supposed to say, quote, Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Because Matthew 6, 9 says, pray in this way, or after this manner. In other words, this is sort of a model prayer, a pattern for all prayer. That's true if you're reading Matthew. Pray in this way. But if you're reading Luke, Luke 11, 2, it says, when you pray, say. And so he said, say these very words. Luke encourages us to actually say the words. In other words, what is called liturgical praying. It is not wrong to say the very words. Some folks get all out of shape if you recite the Lord's Prayer. Well, we're supposed to recite it. Not in vain repetition. That's the key. Repetition's not wrong. Vain is wrong. And that's the thing that makes it wrong if we recite it in vain. But if we're real when we say it. You know, we're going to get into this a little deeper as we move on in the prayer. But real prayer is expressed in Psalm 62.8. Psalm 62.8 says, trust in Him at all times, O people, and pour out your heart before Him. What is real prayer? It's pouring out your heart before the Lord. It's not pouring out words. It's pouring out your heart. Sometime the words can line up with the heart and that's good. But real prayer is pouring out your heart. And as you know and I know, sometime a groan can be closer to the heart than a word. Sometime a sigh can be closer to the real heart than the word. And when you groan and sigh, sometime you say, oh, I wish, I don't know how to pray. Oh, you prayed. God heard that sigh. My groanings are heard. According to the Psalm, it says that groaning has a voice. He has heard the voice of my groaning. Has heard my sigh. Has felt my burden. Every time you have a burden, whether you say a word or not, you pray. Every time you sigh. Every time you groan. Every time you look up to the Lord. It says, I will look up and the Lord has heard. He hears your look. Sometime you feel like you don't even have what it takes to look up. And you just feel like He's not going to hear you. Prayer is pouring out your heart. Now ideally, the words we say will express the pouring out of our heart. That's the ideal thing. That's the reality. The reason I say this, I grew up in the Lutheran Church. And we recited this all the time. And after I came to the Lord in reality, I started rebelling against all of it. In fact, I was so upset because I didn't hear the gospel with understanding. I won't say they didn't give it. I'd say I didn't hear it. I didn't hear it with understanding. And when I did, I thought they didn't give it. I got mad at the Lutheran Church. And so I took my hymnal and I ripped out A Mighty Fortress is Our God. Ripped it right out of the hymnal. Because Luther wrote it. And I was mad at Luther because he wrote that thing. I'll tell you now, it's back in my hymnal. And I stopped praying the Lord's Prayer back then. Because I thought that was Luther. It's not Luther and it's Bible. It's Bible. And I've got it back again. I praise God I got it back again. Because of all that is included in this. So we want to be real. We want to pour out our hearts. Some folks just recited and their hearts not poured out. Some folks can't get past the first two words. Our Father. They say it. And they're not even related to the Lord as children are related to a parent and so on. So we've got to be real. Now when we come to a prayer like this, I find advantages and disadvantages to teaching it. The advantages are, number one, it's so familiar. Everybody knows it. Probably it's the most quoted scripture in the whole Bible. I guess the second would be Psalm 23. I don't know. Those are very famous scriptures. And because it's familiar, I don't have to start off and explain it to you. Because everybody knows the word. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. So many know that. Yeah. Another reason that I'm advantaged is because it's short. We're looking at four verses here or five in Matthew. And so it's just a small scripture and we don't have to be all over the place. We can just focus. And so that makes it easy. I'm disadvantaged for almost the same reason. Because it's familiar. And when things are familiar, people are tempted to think, well, I've heard that before. I know all about that. And there's just sort of a little button in there. And they just shut it off because I've already heard that. And because it's familiar, if you take a different twist on it, some people resist. Because it's like an old friend. Don't touch my old friend. And don't say anything about that that I haven't heard before. If we can get beyond that this morning, I think we can press near the heart of God. Why did God give this? What's it all about? And so for the next few minutes, I'd like us to look at this wonderful, wonderful Lord's Prayer. Now before we touch on the main principle, look again, if you would, at Luke chapter 11, verse 1. This is just the background. It happened while Jesus was praying in a certain place. After He finished, one of His disciples said to Him, Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught His disciples. Now you'll notice in the Gospel of Luke, when you see the word disciple, it doesn't necessarily mean the twelve. He uses the word, it can be anybody that follows the law. And there are women disciples as well as men disciples. And we don't know who asked this question. You know, sometimes we think in our lives, I hope I really make a difference in the history of redemption. I don't want to live and die as some bird, just gather up a bunch of sticks, make a nest, rear some young, they fly away and then I die. I want to have some kind of a contribution to this world, make some kind of a splat. Well here's a disciple, we don't know if it was a man or a woman. Here's a disciple, we don't know the name of this person. As far as the record goes, he or she came and said, I don't know how to pray. There's sort of an ignorance there. And this person comes to the Lord and says, Lord, teach us to pray. We don't know how to pray. John taught His disciples how to pray. We don't know how to pray. Here's an amazing thing. An unnamed person and the whole body of Christ in every age and generation is indebted to that person. I don't have a clue who that was. But I praise God for that person. Because I wouldn't have Luke chapter 11 if it wasn't for that person. Now that person probably feels like, oh, I'm just a nobody and I'm dumb and stupid and I'm so ignorant and I don't even know how to pray. Well, aren't you glad that somebody that was ignorant and felt unspiritual went to the Lord and gave it to the Lord. And look how God uses it. I'm going to have a ball at the judgment seat of Christ, not only for how it touches me, but watching some of the strange things I read in the Bible. When some of these people get called up for reward, they're going to be scratching their heads. Naomi, she said to Ruth, go back to your gods. And Ruth said, thy God will be my God. Naomi led her daughter-in-law to Christ when she told her to go back to her gods. She's going to get rewarded for that. Jonah, rebelling against the Lord. Remember, he was thrown off into the water. And the Bible says that the mariners began to fear the Lord. Jonah's going to get rewarded for that. The Seraphimician woman who took Elijah and built a home there, she's going to get rewarded for the contest with Baal on Mount Carmel. You say, how so? Because he that receives a prophet in the name of a prophet, receives a prophet's reward. Everything the prophet did, she's going to get rewarded for. It's amazing how God's going to give reward. And this guy, or woman, is going to get rewarded for giving the church the Lord's prayer. And why? Because they were ignorant and unspiritual. I don't know how you feel about your own walk with the Lord, but I'll tell you, just come as you are to the Lord and you'll be amazed how God will use you in the history of redemption. And it's illustrated here by this particular person. I told you that I thought the first 11 verses of chapter 11 in Luke answered the question, what's the essence of prayer? Now when you come to a passage like this, there's so many questions you can ask about prayer. What's the order of prayer? Should we worship first? Or should we intercede? Or should we confess our sins? Or petition the Lord? Or what's the proportion of our prayers? Those kind of things. But the chief point that God emphasizes in this prayer can be summarized in one word. Prayer is relationship. Prayer is relationship. Now I'm going to be using the full record, in other words, Matthew and Luke, on the Lord's prayer. But I just want to show you how this works. The prayer begins with the father-child relationship. Our father who art in heaven. And then the prayer moves to a holy God, hallowed be thy name. Implied is a sinful creature relationship. He's my father, I'm his child. He's the holy God, I'm a sinner. Then the relationship goes to a king, thy kingdom come, a king and a subject. Then the relationship goes even higher than the king. Absolute monarch, thy will be done, the Lord and the bond slave. It's all relationship. The father, the child, holy God, sinner, king, subject, Lord, slave. Then he pictures God as the source and provider of all. And I'm just a beggar. Give us this day our daily bread. God is the provider of all. Then he's the judge of all the earth, and I'm a criminal. Forgive us our trespasses, we forgive those who trespass against us. Then he's the guide, the shepherd, and I'm a blind man. Lead us not into temptation. See, the whole prayer is relationship. The father, child, holy God, sinner, the king and subject, the Lord and the bond slave, the provider and the needy beggar, the judge and the criminal, the guide and the blind man. And it ends, he's the mighty redeemer. And I'm the captive, the prisoner that needs to be set free. Deliver us from evil or the evil one. Now you're going to notice as you go through the prayer that God gets bigger and bigger. Think of an inverted comb. God gets bigger and bigger. He starts with father, and then he's holy, and then he's king, then he's absolute Lord, then he's the source of all, and then he's the judge, and then he ends up as the redeemer. It just gets bigger and bigger and bigger. On the other side, man, as you go through the prayer, gets smaller and smaller. I'm his son, but I'm a sinner. I'm a subject. I'm a bond slave. I'm a beggar. I'm a guilty criminal. I'm a blind man. I'm a prisoner in chains. And it gets smaller and smaller. And so God gets bigger and bigger, and man gets smaller and smaller. And when you come to the end, in each case, there's a correspondent. He's father, I'm child. He's this, I'm that. But when you come to the end, you have thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory. And there's no counterpart for man. In other words, the prayer ends. He's everything, and I'm nothing. And so it's just relationship. The whole prayer is nothing but relationship. And I'm related to him. And he gets bigger and bigger and bigger the more I pray. I get smaller and smaller and smaller until he's everything, and I'm nothing. Far beyond God giving us a formula or a recipe or some kind of rules for praying, he touches on these big principles. Sometimes we get so bogged down with the details, and we get lost. Should I pray to God the Father, or should I pray to God the Son? Or should I pray to God the Holy Spirit? As if there's jealousy in the Godhead. Should I begin with confession, or should I begin with praying? When it comes to your prayer life, here's something that will always be true. Are you familiar with Romans 8.26? Here's what Romans 8.26 says. We do not know how to pray as we ought to. That's Romans 8.26. If you ever learn to pray, that verse won't be true anymore. You know what that means. That means you'll never learn to pray. And I'll never learn to pray. Because that verse will always be true. No matter how much light God gives you in the subject of prayer, you'll never know how to pray as you ought. Therefore, the Spirit helps your infirmities and groans in you with a groaning that you can't utter. And so we'll never know how to pray, but God has given us a model prayer, not to give us rules, not as a formula, but as a direction. Let me show you some of the signs. I told you a prayer is pouring out of the heart. This Lord's Prayer describes the heart that is poured out. Try to catch the direction. That little thing I gave you on prayer there, the foundation of all prayer is God Himself. It starts with God. For years I thought the starting point of prayer was confession of sin. And every time I came to the Lord, I'd start by confessing all my sins, trying to dig up all this stuff and present it to the Lord. I'm so glad for this prayer because it teaches me I can't begin to confess my sins until I see the Lord. Once you see the Lord, then down the line, confession is going to come. But you've got to see the Lord. Everything begins with God. Isaiah said, I saw the Lord high and lifted up. Then I said, I'm unclean, I'm undone. Don't start by looking in your heart. There's a move these days for this morbid introspection, to look in your heart and dig all this up. How come this happened? Don't get into that. Search me, oh God, and know my heart. Let the Lord do the searching. You don't have to do the searching. I don't have to do the searching. You keep your eyes on the Lord and everything He wants you to know, He's going to tell you. And if I keep my eyes on the Lord, then when I'm ready, and He's ready, then He'll expose my sins. But let me give you the idea. I think this prayer presents a series of sighs. The heart. Pour out your heart. Let me give you the series of sighs. This brother or sister came to the Lord and said, teach me to pray. Alright, let me get into the prayer and lift out these, I don't know what to call them, their movements, their hungers, their yearnings, their direction. We already gave the first one. All prayer has to do with relationship. That's what prayer is about. Here's another yearning. If you go through this prayer, you know whoever is praying this, in reality, is longing to do the will of God. He wants the will of God. That expression, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Do you ever meditate on that? How is God's will being done in heaven right now? Well, we sit in this room. Somebody's in heaven doing his will. Well, who's up there? The triune God is up there. The cherubim are up there. Ezekiel says that they're flashing like lightning, moving wherever he wants to go. The seraphim are up there, flaming fire, doing the will of God. The holy angels are up there, crying holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty. The spirits of just men made perfect. Your friends and relatives that have gone to be with the Lord, they're up there. How are they doing God's will? Do you realize what a prayer that is? Thy will be done on earth the same way it's being done in heaven. You know, sometimes because this is a plural prayer and it's corporate and it's for the whole church, our Father, it's not personal, not my Father. One way you'll get a blessing out of this prayer is make it personal. One of the things I've been praying lately is not thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, but thy will be done in me as it is in heaven. It's a prayer for heaven on earth. And that's a movement, that's not a rule. When you pray, is it out of a relationship with God? When you pray, is it out of a passion, I just want God's will done the same way in my life as it's being done in heaven. That's what I mean by a sigh. And then there's another sigh in this prayer. As you go through the prayer, you see this passion this person has, if we pray this way, it's a passion to be holy, to be clean, to be right. If you miss this, you'll miss the whole prayer. Hallowed be thy name. Forgive us of our sins. Deliver us from evil and the evil one. One of the heartbeats of this prayer is I want to be clean. I want to be holy. That's not a rule. Say, how do you pray? Well, here's five rules. No, that's not a rule. You pray out of relationship. You pray with a passion to have the will of God. You pray with this desire, I want to be clean. I want to be forgiven. I want to be delivered from temptation and sin. And then there's this desire, this other sigh, for the glory of God. Matthew ends with it. Thine is the glory forever. Amen. Luke doesn't omit that sigh. He puts it in the front. Hallowed be thy name. That desire, that God's name be hallowed, that God's name be holy. That's the topic sentence of the prayer. When I pray this prayer, sometimes I put that after every expression. In other words, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Hallowed be thy name. Give us this day our daily bread. Hallowed be thy name. Lead us not into temptation. Hallowed be thy name. Deliver us from evil. Hallowed be thy name. It's a passion that God get glory. I think thousands pray this prayer by reciting the Word. Only God knows, but do they have these longings? I want relationship. Do they have these longings? I want the will of God. I want to be clean. I want God to get glory. Those are big things. And every prayer is to include those things. There's one more yearning and then we'll close off. Notice the request in verse 3. Give us this day our daily bread. See, that's the prayer that God might meet our necessity day by day. Daily bread, just a figure of speech for all that we need. Sometimes we think that's just physical. That's more than groceries. And that's more than rent. And that's more than good health. That's more than a wardrobe. What does it mean, daily bread? Listen as I quote these passages. Psalm 80 verse 5. Thou hast fed them with the bread of tears, and made them drink tears in large measure. When you pray, give us this day our daily bread. How about that? Thou hast fed them with the bread of tears. Are you willing to get that bread? Daily bread? Now listen to Isaiah 30 verse 20. The Lord has given them the bread of adversity, the water of oppression. Give us this day our daily bread. What about adversity? Now listen to 1 Peter 1 verse 6. If need be, you know we say, Lord, provide our needs. If need be, we are in heaviness through manifold temptation. What do you have in mind when you say, Lord, meet our needs? What if you need poverty? What if you need manifold temptation? What if you need trouble? That's daily bread. The idea of daily bread is this, and here's the yearning. Lord, I want to be dependent upon you for all my necessity. That's the essence of that prayer. Do you realize daily bread is the opposite of the love of riches? 1 Timothy 6a, with food and clothing, be content. That's the sigh of praying. We say the Lord's Prayer is a model prayer. What do we mean? I don't know for sure, but I think it means this, those great longings, prayers pouring out of your heart. What is prayer? All prayer is relationship. It's a desire for the will of God to longing to be clean and pure and holy. It's a desire that God get glory. It's dependence upon Him for everything, whatever He brings into our life. See, if we could get some of those sighs into our hearts and into our prayers, I think we'll come a long way in understanding what true prayer is. Now next time, we're going to tie it in to the two parables that follow. That's your homework, by the way. Read verses 5 to 13 and try to understand. These are strange parables. What is this parable of the selfish friend and the evil father? And how does the parable of the selfish friend and the evil father tie into the Lord's Prayer? That's where we'll begin next time. Comments or questions? Thank you so much. In a way that is not ritual, in a way that's more than quoting scriptures in the light of what we said, can we pray, not recite, pray the prayer together that our Lord Jesus taught us to pray? And we're close with that. 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 trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever.