Secrets of the Secret Place - Part 7

To our seventh session of this class, The Secrets of the Secret Place, tonight we're going to be talking about praying from the scriptures, from the Word of God. It's a very important thing for me, very dear to my heart, so I want us to take this entire session and look at that together. Let's pray. Holy Spirit, come, we ask that you would presence yourself with us now, Lord, and that you would empower us in our secret place relationship with you, in Jesus' name, amen. Now praying and worshipping the Lord from the Word of God is powerful and life-changing. There's a difference between a psalmist and a musician. A psalmist is someone who worships and prays in the Word of God. A musician, you know, we have a stereotype of a musician, this guy that has a guitar attached to his hip and he's always late to everything and never can find his Bible, but that's not a psalmist. A psalmist is someone who has a very dear relationship to the Word of God. David was a Word guy, the psalmist David. Now I have a personal theory. I can't prove what I'm about to say, but I have a theory that David's favorite book of the Bible was Deuteronomy. The reason I think that is because when you look at Deuteronomy and then look at Psalms, when you find a word once in Deuteronomy and then come to the Psalms, for example, you find the word rock in Deuteronomy, and then you come to the Psalms and it's everywhere, rock, rock, rock, rock. You find the word shield in Deuteronomy, and then you come to Psalms and it's like shield, shield, shield, everywhere. He's my shield. In Deuteronomy, you find he's my king. You come to Psalms and it's king, king, king, king, king. Deuteronomy, he's my refuge. You come to Psalms and it's refuge, refuge, all over the place. He's my refuge. What David does, my theory at least, is he gets into the Word of God. His Bible was about eight, the first eight books of the Bible. He gets into the Word of God, and then he starts going deep in the Scriptures, starts praying it, starts pressing into it. And as he's going deep in the Word of God, then it expounds and expands in his heart. And when he writes the Psalms, he's writing from the overflow of his worship and prayer relationship with Scripture. And this is what we want to find in our lives as well. Now, I don't think you can put too much pressure on a verse. I don't think you can overanalyze it or go overboard in squeezing everything you can out of a verse. Psalm 12, verse 6 says, The words of the Lord are pure words, like silver tried in a furnace of the earth, purified seven times. So, before God ever utters a word from his mouth, he puts it into a fiery furnace, pulls it out, puts it back in, number two, pulls it out, puts that word back in the furnace, number three, pulls it out, puts it back in, number four, number five, number six, seven times over. God puts his Word into a fiery crucible before he ever utters a syllable. So, if God puts that kind of pressure on his Word before he utters it, I promise you, you cannot put too much pressure on a Scripture. It won't break. You can go deep. You can press. You can squeeze. You can go after that thing and find the glories of the depths of the Word of God in your secret place relationship with the Lord. Now, I have a personal fantasy. My fantasy is that every musician, worship leader, singer, every worship team member on a platform has a Bible open in front of them. Furthermore, my fantasy is every worshiper in the house of God has the Scriptures with them and a Bible ready to pray in the Word of God. I'm not sure it's ever going to become universal, but there's my fantasy. That's because of the richness of praying from the Scriptures. Now, when you worship and pray from the Word of God, truth enters you. It becomes you. Truth moves from your head to your heart. I don't simply want to know about holiness. I want to embody holiness. I don't simply want truth in my head. I want truth to penetrate my heart and infiltrate my being until everything inside of me resonates with the truth of God's Word. And that's what praying the Word of God does. It moves it from an intellectual kind of, you know, cerebral place into a heart connection where you interact and you dialogue and the Word becomes a part of your life. Now, we interact with the Word of God in at least four ways. We pray the Word. We read the Word. C. We study the Word. Or D. We memorize the Word. And there may be other ways that you would connect with the Word of God as well. But I want to speak about the benefits of praying from the Word of God. Point B in your outline. Number one, it renews the mind. When you are praying from the Scripture and the Scripture enters your heart and your mind and your being, your mind begins to conform to the truth of God's Word. And you are renewed in how you think. Secondly, it brings our emotions into alignment with truth. So that not only how we think starts to be transformed by His Word, but how we respond emotionally. Our emotions sometimes can be like a runaway freight train just kind of taken off on us. But the Word of God will bring our emotions into check so that even the emotions of our heart line up with His Word. Number three, it helps to produce mental focus. Now, one of our common... This is a universal issue for all of us in our secret place. One of our common issues is our minds wander in the secret place. Can I get an amen on that one? I just kind of like... Our minds are always taken off on us. And one of the ways I find that really helps me get my mind on track again is to pray in the Word of God, using the scripture to focus. You know, in Transcendental Meditation and some of the New Age meditation kind of things, the focus many times is in some of those disciplines of kind of going into a mental neutral, almost like an oblivion. If you can just like disengage your mind and think about nothing, and that becomes the goal of some forms of meditation. But when you're meditating in the Word of God, your goal is exactly the opposite. You want your mind alert, engaged, and focused on the truth of God's Word. Now, Mike Bickle has spoken a lot about using a prayer list to help get focused in your prayer life as well, and I've got some of his resources mentioned there in your notes. You can look that up on the internet. Number four benefit of praying the scriptures. It helps us to know how to pray and what to pray for. Because the Word of God, now for me, the Word of God is a prayer manual, 31,103 verses to empower your prayer life, and so when you're praying the Word now, okay, now I know what to pray for. It helps me. It directs me in my prayer life. And a very similar point, number five, it puts authority on our prayer life. Because when you're praying something from the Word of God, there comes this boldness. You just know the Holy Spirit inspired that thing. So I know that I am praying a prayer that conforms to the will of God, and it just gives you a boldness to go after the thing and pray with confidence. I want to share some practical suggestions with you. Point C on praying from the scriptures. I've got number one here. Remember to salt your prayers with thanksgiving and praise. And the reason I put that there is because, I don't know about you, but sometimes I forget to say thanks. Maybe I just assume that I'm a thankful guy, you know? But I stop and I think about it. You know what? It's been quite a while since I just said, thank you, Lord, for this and this. And to give praise, sometimes I find in my quiet, in my secret place, I need a little jog of my memory. You know what? I just need to praise the Lord right now. And when I'm wanting to praise the Lord, there are four categories that I use to help me in that. Point number two here on the line. I praise Him for His Word, and I just love to praise the Lord for His Word. That's awesome. I praise Him for His words. His words are incredible. They are memorable, unforgettable. I praise Him for His name. That's who He is. His character, His glory, His beauty. And then I praise Him for His power, the majestic power of our God. And that little four-point outline helps me. Maybe it'll be a help to you, too. Number three, use any and every form of prayer. As Ephesians 6 says, praying always with all prayer. There's an entire spectrum of prayer that I would encourage you to just get used to exercising yourself. Worship, praise, thanksgiving, intercession, petition, meditation, repentance, adoration, prophetic declaration, warfare, listening, you name it. But you're in your secret place. There's no limit on how you can express your heart to the Lord. Something else I like to do many times is I like to go through the Lord's Prayer. Just as I'm in my secret place, it'll just like, oh, Lord, hallowed be your name. And then I'll just start going through each phrase of the Lord's Prayer. I don't do that every day. But I like to have times when I fit that in because there's a few things in the Lord's Prayer you really do want to be praying from time to time. Lord, deliver me from evil. Do not lead me into temptation. Some of those prayers that are so significant for our lives. Number four, there are three common responses to the Word of God. As you're reading and praying in the Word, you'll find yourself saying, Lord, I believe this. I'm saying yes to it. Lord, give me the faith to believe what you're saying right now. Second thing, you'll find yourself saying, Lord, help me right now. Give me understanding in this Word. I want to see. I want to know. Give me the spirit of wisdom and revelation and the knowledge of you. Help me to see what you're saying in the Scripture. And a third thing you'll find yourself saying as you're praying Scripture is, you'll say, Lord, by your grace, I'm going to do this. I'm going to obey this Word. I'm asking you to help me to obey this Word. Now, what I'd like to do this evening, just because sometimes doing it is better than talking about it. I'd like us to take a little time right now and actually pray from the Scriptures. So for a few moments, go ahead and put your notes aside. You're the outline you're working from and get your Bible. And some of you are you're watching this on video. You're in a living room somewhere. If you want to sit on the floor right now, you can do that. Get comfortable. But what I'm going to do is, you know what? I'm going to ask for some help. Somebody call out a number between 1 and 150. Hey, louder. 22. Okay, turn to Psalm 22. I'm going to pray Psalm 22. I'm glad you said 22. This is one of my favorites. This worked out good for me. I've got about 149 other favorites as well. So what I'd like us to do for a few minutes is what I'm inviting you to do. And you're in a living room, you're in a church hall, wherever you are. I want everyone to connect with us on your TV screen and here in the class. And what I'm going to do is, I don't know how far we'll get. We're just going to do it for a few minutes. I'm going to read the verse. And then I'm just going to kind of talk my prayers to the Lord as though none of you are here. And I'm just kind of in my secret place. And so my goal here is to just kind of demonstrate a little bit of how I pray and interact with the scripture. And while I'm doing that, you do the same thing. All right, you just pray it along and whatever prayers you might have in your heart. My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Oh Lord Jesus, I remember when you quoted this. You quoted this on the cross as you gave yourself to your Father. And today, Abba, I give myself to you like Jesus did. See, on that cross, I abandon my heart to you. And I say, I am yours even in the dark times when I can't feel your presence. When it seems like you have forsaken me, I say, I am yours and I love you unto death. You are my beloved. Why are you so far from helping me? What I don't know sometimes why I can't feel your presence the way I want. Why it seems you're distant. But I say, I love you anyways. I am yours. Help me, my God. Why are you so far from the words of my groaning? I'm pouring my heart out to you today. I'm asking you, hear my prayer. Hear my cry today. Be near to me. Help me, Lord. Oh my God, I cry in the daytime, but you do not hear. And in the night season, and I'm not silent. Lord, I'm asking you that you would empower me to have a prayer life that is day and night. I want to have, Lord, I want to have, I want this thing to be real in my heart. And I want to be actively engaged with you throughout the day into the night. Lord, even when I wake up in the middle of the night, that there would be a prayer in my heart to you. Give this to me, I ask, but you are wholly enthroned in the praises of Israel. Holy, holy. I join with the living creatures right now to say, holy, holy, holy. Abba, you are holy. Jesus, you are holy. Holy Spirit, you are holy. And I thank you that you have made me holy because I am in your bosom. I am surrounded by your love. In your embrace, holy one of Israel, I give you my worship. I give you my praise. Holiness is beautiful. You are beautiful to me, Lord Jesus. Our fathers trusted in you. They trusted and you delivered them. Lord, when I read that right now, I'm just reminded again of how you delivered my mom and healed her of cancer. You healed my brother of polio. You've, Lord, the stories and testimonies from my family, those that are dear to me. They trusted in you and you delivered them. And I know, Abba, that as surely as you have delivered others, you will deliver me. And I call on your name today, Lord Jesus, be my deliverer. Deliver me from this pit. Lift me from this pit. I'm asking you, hear my cry. Deliver me, Lord Jesus. They trusted in you and were not ashamed. Let me not be ashamed. I'm asking you, let me not be ashamed. Answer me. Hear my cry, Lord. But I am a worm and no man, a reproach of men, despised by the people. Lord, you know the reproach that I feel. All those who see me ridicule me. They shoot out the lip. They shake the head, saying, he trusted in the Lord. Let him rescue him. Let him deliver him since he delights in him. Lord Jesus, this is talking about you when you were hanging on the cross. And they said, deliver yourself. They said, if God is with him, let him deliver him. And they mocked and they ridiculed you and your suffering and your pain. Thank you, Lord, for taking that. Thank you for dying on the cross for me. Thank you for this song that is prophetically pointing to your suffering and my suffering and pain. I just got to say again, thank you for Psalm 22. I love this song. But you are he who took me out of the womb. You made me trust while on my mother's breast. I was cast upon you from birth, from my mother's womb. You have been my God. Be not far from me. For trouble is near. There is none to help. Lord, I'm just saying again, you are the only one to help me. I have no other help but you. I'm calling on the name of the Lord today. Help me, save me, deliver me. Well, that's as far as we have time to go tonight in praying this scripture. But I hope that that will give some of us that you're watching this. You're taking this course by DVD. And I'm hoping that just a little bit of modeling will give you a feel for how you can personalize the scripture and pray from the Word of God. Let's come to the last point in our outline, point D. And I'd like to close this session by talking about simultaneously reading from different portions of the Word of God. Now, as I talk about this, I just want to make clear that my heart in this course is not to confine you or restrict you with the things I do. My heart is to empower you and liberate you for you to find your own way with the Lord. So what I'm about to share, please don't feel like it has to be this way. I'm just going to be a little personal with you and share with you how my own personal Bible reading regimen works for me. Point number one, I aim to pray through the Bible every year. I've got a few reasons for that. Number A, for Bible knowledge, I want to know the Word of God. And so I pray, I won't pray, yes, but I read. And by the way, the more you pray the scriptures, you start praying every time you're in the Bible. It's like when you get in a read mode and you're reading, you find yourself praying every time you're in the scripture. And that's what I want you to find. I want you to find that thing awakened in your heart, where every time you open the Word of God, you're instinctively interacting with it and offering your heart and letting that Word empower your prayer life. So point A, I pray through the Bible annually because I want to know the Word of God cover to cover. Point B, I pray through the Bible annually because I want the knowledge of Christ. I want to know Him. And Jesus is revealed through the scripture. And if He's in here somewhere, I want to find Him and know Him and behold Him. And I don't want to miss anything of the revelation of Christ. So if there's something about Him tucked away in some corner, I don't want to miss it because I just neglected that particular book of the Bible. So I just go through every single book. I don't care how tedious it gets. Sometimes I'm reading the whole thing every year. My third reason, I desire to be changed into the image of Christ. And I know that it's the Word of God, as it touches my heart, that transforms me. It challenges me. It rebukes me. It amplifies me. And so basically, I want every portion of the Bible to have a shot at me. I mean, if what I need is tucked away in some place, man, I'm going to go until I can find it because I want the Word of God to whack me everywhere out of the scriptures. I want to be changed into the image of Christ. And point B, to remember previous insights as I'm reading through the scripture. It's very important to me. I will come across where I have underlined something. I'm like, why did I underline that? I must have had something in mind. And so then, oh, that's right. I'd forgotten God gave me an insight in that verse. And it reminds me and refreshes me of the things that I had received in the past. So those are some of my personal reasons. Now, I encourage you to have a Bible reading plan. Not just a, you know, a hit and miss. Well, I just opened the Bible where it flips open and we just kind of go from there. I suggest that you have a specific plan so that it will, your plan, if you follow it, will take you through the entire Bible. For me, I like to do it once a year. And I encourage you in the same. Now, here's my personal Bible reading plan. Number three of your line. I go through the Old Testament once every year. I go through the New Testament twice every year. And then through Revelation once weekly as Mike Bickle has extended to us the Sacred Church. So there's some reasons that I'd like to commend to you to consider simultaneous reading in a variety of places. The variety maintains interest. If you're reading in multiple places in the Bible each day, it just maintains interest because you can get into some books that, you know, so-and-so begat, so-and-so begat, so-and-so. And if you read 10 chapters of that, you know, on a given morning, you're going to be like, shoot me in the head. What kind of a secret place time was that? And so I like to be in a variety of passages in any one given day. And what I find is that when I'm in one scripture and then I come to another passage and read in this passage, many times as I'm reading in the second passage, I'll be like, oh man, I just read something back here in Deuteronomy. Man, those two connect. And when one scripture ricochets off another scripture and provides insight, it just, now that's where you start getting insight into the Word of God. One scripture over here illuminating a scripture over here. Sometimes a third one fits into that and you start getting, oh man, I'm starting to see something now. So I'm a big fan of reading in a variety of places all at the same time. Now, I don't know if you can see it on your TV. I've got some paperclips here in my Bible and I'm just going to say real quickly how it works for me. I start all the time in Psalms or Proverbs. I go through Psalms and Proverbs every year. And I find personally that if I'll just pray the way I enjoy praying, I can just, I go through the Psalms once a year. Sometimes I do a Psalm a day. When I get to Psalm 119, it's not one Psalm a day. Psalm 119 is, well, you know how long that one is. That one takes me about 22 days to go through a day for every letter of the alphabet. But I just, just the way I'll just pace myself and I'll read through the Psalms. And I spend most of my prayer time actually praying from the Psalms. Because I've had a long time crying in my heart, Lord, I want to be a psalmist. And so if you want to be a psalmist, hang out with the psalmists. And that's personally where I connect. After I've had my prayer time in the Psalms and then I come to Song of Solomon. That's where my second paperclip is. And I like to try to work my way through the Song of Solomon, praying through that book. The problem being, I've been stuck in the same verse for about four years. And if God will ever help me, I would like to get past chapter six, verse three. But I've been praying it for four years and I'm still stuck there. Okay. So Song of Solomon, I theoretically pray through that book. All right. Then my third paperclip is Old Testament. I read through the Old Testament every year. And then my fourth paperclip, then I go to my gospel reading. Here I am right now in March 14. And so I'm reading through the Gospels. And then my next paperclip is the Epistles. Here I'm in 1 Corinthians 16. So I'm reading through the Epistles. And here's what I do personally. I divide my reading up as to how many pages I need to read a day to get through the New Testament every six months. So I do it by page numbers as opposed to chapters. That's just what works for me. And then finally, reading in Revelation. Well, our time is up. I would like to encourage you to consider that kind of a reading regimen. It's delightful to my heart. However God leads you, I'm not trying to lay it on you. I'm just encouraging you to find a plan and a way of reading through the Word of God that connects for your heart, that hopefully takes you to the Scriptures once a year and empowers your prayer life. Lord Jesus, would you help us as we pray your Word? Give us a meaningful living encounter with your Word.