Sunday School or Small Groups

This discussion comes up quite a bit these days.  The deciding factor for Sunday School vs. Small Groups might just be dependent on what your church facilities are telling you.  Does your church already have a large amount of space where Sunday morning age group teaching can take place?  If so, the Sunday School vs Small Group discussion might be easily decided for you. It would be a shame to not use the space that has already been built.  If, on the other hand, your church would have to build another 15,000 square feet of education space at a cost of $150 per square foot, you may really need to think through the stewardship of that.  It is usually only one hour during the week.  The building may get plenty of use at other times during the week, and if so, maybe it's worth it to your congregation.  But if it will just be for the purpose of Sunday School on Sunday mornings at 9:30, you may really need to weigh your other options.

Small groups in homes are very different from Sunday School in several ways. First, they tend to be in a neighborhood where you might possibly have several un-churched or de-churched people who could be invited to attend.  They may be more likely to come to a home in their neighborhood and build new friendships than they are to show up in a Sunday School class at your church where there are a long list of unknowns for them. Small groups tend to be very relational while most Sunday School classes are built upon the teaching content and personality of the teacher. Small groups usually meet in spaces that do not belong to the church and, therefore, do not come with expenses related to construction, heating and cooling, and maintenance. Sunday School usually meets on Sunday morning before or after worship services. Small groups can be held any day of the week.

Churches that have space for Sunday School may still want to consider small groups due to what they offer as a means of outreach.  People like and even need options in their lives. By offering both Sunday School and Small Groups you can give people the option to study the Bible on Sunday morning at a facility designed for that purpose, or they can meet in a casual home atmosphere at a time that is most convenient for them.  Small group sessions usually meet a little longer than Sunday School classes because more time is given to building friendships and discussing the lesson.  Open sharing is encouraged and welcomed in a small group, but Sunday School classes may be too constrained by the clock to allow everyone to share thoughts openly. Therefore, small groups usually offer people the best opportunity to know one another more effectively.  

My church where I serve as Pastor of Discipleship and Church Administration has both Sunday School (called Bible Fellowship Groups) and Small Groups (called Connection Groups).  We're finding that it is increasing our overall Bible study attendance by about 75-100 people every week right now. Some people attend only Sunday School while others attend only Small Groups.  Some will attend both.  We have a third type of group called Life Classes which meet on Sundays and Wednesdays at the church and operate like short-term special topic studies. Many of the people attending the Life Classes have already attended either a Sunday School class, a Small Group, or both.  I review the list of attendance turned in by all of our groups through Church Community Builder each week and find those individuals who only attended one of the groups. That give us a unique bible study attendance total for the week.  I do this because I'm interested in knowing the number of people we are impacting with our discipleship opportunities.  I also get a total attendance of all groups and this number does count people each time they attended. That tells me the total number of people in all of our groups and is, of course, a considerably higher number. I just use numbers to tell me how we are doing at outreach.  I talk with people in the groups to discover if we are really impacting lives. I also keep track of how many of our groups are spinning off new groups in the year.  It's always a goal to start new groups and we desire for leaders to prepare people for doing so.  

If you are not sure if Sunday School or Small Groups are right for you and you have a nice education facility, I would say "Why not both?".  You may find that it is the most excitement you've had in your discipleship ministry in a long time.  If criticism comes your way for trying something new just remind people that the goal is better and better discipleship and you want to use every avenue available to get there.  In case you're interested in how to start small groups our model has been Real Life Ministries with Pastor, Jim Putman in Post Falls, Idaho.  It's a simple model that is very relational and very reproducible.  I would encourage you to look into it.  

You don't have to choose between Sunday School and Small Groups.  You can do both.  

Why Relationships Matter

Before leaving earth and going to prepare a place for us Jesus commissioned His followers to make disciples (Matt. 28:18-20). He had given us tremendous examples of how to do that.  He spent time with the 72 later in His ministry.  He spent a great deal of personal time with the 12 throughout His ministry teaching them the things that they needed to focus on as they would take His gospel message to the world.  He seemed to be especially close to 3 of them within that group. And then there was “the disciple whom Jesus loved”.  Jesus seemed to be a little closer to John than even Peter and James.  The point is, Jesus was not someone who just knew these men and showed up in their lives occasionally.  He had a close relationship with them and He taught them the importance of relationship when we disciple other people. 

Paul wrote his letters and we saw from his life how important making disciples was to him. He had a close relationship with Barnabas, Timothy, John Mark, Apollos, Priscilla and Aquilla, and many others.  When we really look closely at how making disciples was done in scripture, we see the importance of relationships. We see that discipleship requires a personal investment in another person or persons. 

God, the Father, is relational. The Father was, and continues to be, in relationship with the Son and the Holy Spirit. When He created man and woman He did so with the idea of having a relationship with each of them. He also intended for them to have a special relationship with one another and to help one another.  God gave man and woman to each other to be the relationship above all other human relationships.  He intends for us to be relational people.  All of God’s commandments can be summed up by relationships – love God and love people.

When it comes to discipleship, if we are going to do it like Jesus, we are going to need to invest ourselves in a relationship with the one we are discipling.  Jesus never intended for his Church to attempt real discipleship from a pulpit once a week.  Don’t get me wrong; there is definitely a place for expositional teaching and preaching. But real discipleship is done in the context of individual relationships.  This is why small groups are so important. 

Small groups usually consist of between 2-10 people.  They are led by a spiritually mature leader who has the goal of helping the disciples under his care grow to the point that they can go on to disciple others.  As the close relationships are developed, the leader begins to get a sense of where the disciple is in his level of spiritual growth.  He listens to the kinds of questions being asked, the attitudes being exhibited, the comments being made, and watches the involvement in service for the Lord. The leader teaches the disciples the things needed to mature so that he/she can go on to do the same for another young believer. The leader gauges when the disciple is ready, much like a parent watches for signs that their child has become a young adult and begins to give them more freedom and responsibility. 

This kind of discipleship takes time.  We must be willing to invest in another individual to be obedient to the Great Commission.  We can’t just show up to teach a class once a week and believe we are doing discipleship.  We never see that model in scripture. Jesus taught the masses but He did so to call people to Himself.  We should call people to Jesus but we need to go further and develop close personal relationships with people so that we can monitor and help them to grow into Christ-likeness.

Please don’t think that I’m against expositional teaching.  It has its place.  Its place is to impart information, share knowledge, explain the scriptures, and challenge thinking. We can even challenge people to make a new commitment through expositional teaching.  But how will you know if the commitment made has been followed through on.  You must have a close relationship with the disciple to know that. 

Who knows you best?  Your family does.  They live with you, play with you, eat with you, see you at your best and at your worst.  In order to really do discipleship the way Jesus intended, we need to know the people we are discipling and they need to know us almost as well as our own family.  You don’t get that from expositional teaching in a classroom setting. 

I hope you understand that I’m not concerned with doing away with exposition.  I believe it’s important and we have some very fine expository teachers in our churches. I am concerned about us fulfilling the Great Commission and carrying on effective discipleship for future generations.  Maybe your thinking has been challenged, and if you’re not currently in a discipleship relationship with at least 2-10 people, I hope you understand that you can and should make this a regular part of your life. If you need guidance in how to get started just comment and let me know you need some help and I'll be glad to offer some direction.  The future of the Church depends on it.  

How to Pray Effectively

Last week we discussed six reasons God wants us to pray.

•      God desires a relationship with us and that comes through prayer.
•      God is ready to help in our time of need.
•      It is God’s will that we should pray.
•      Prayer helps us avoid sin.
•      Through prayer, our joy is made complete.
•      Through prayer, we confess known sins and ask God to show us un-confessed      sin. 

 This week we will look at six parts of prayer that will help us remember how to do it effectively. 

There are two main categories of prayer:   Responding Prayers and Asking Prayers

We will look first at responding prayers. The purpose of responding prayers is to identify with God by becoming like Him.  We respond to God four ways:

•      Confession
•      Praise
•      Worship
•      Thanksgiving

Confession is to say the same thing as God does, or agree with Him, about our sin.  When we see and understand the holiness of God, we can’t help but confess that He is holy and we are not. 

We will look at several scriptures from Psalms because Psalms contains many prayers.  Some are written as poetry or songs, others are not.  The first one we will look at that shows an example of confession is Psalm 51:1-4, and 10, and 12  “Be gracious to me, God, according to Your faithful love; according to Your abundant compassion, blot out my rebellion.  Wash away my guilt, and cleanse me from my sin.  For I am conscious of my rebellion, and my sin is always before me.  Against You-You alone-I have sinned and done this evil in Your sight.  So You are right when You pass sentence; You are blameless when You judge.  God, create a clean heart for me and renew a steadfast spirit within me.  Restore the joy of Your salvation to me, and give me a willing spirit.”   

Confession is our response to the holiness of God.  It expresses a desire to be made clean.  As we have mentioned before we don’t have to make an appointment to come see Daniel or any of the other pastors in order to be cleansed.  We can go directly to God because of the blood of Jesus Christ that was shed on our behalf.   The best way to begin your prayer time in the morning is by confessing known sin and asking God to show you un-confessed sin.  Also, we should keep a very short sin account by confessing sin as it happens.  Someone said “If you feel like you’re further from God than you once were, guess who moved.”  Un-confessed sin can move us away from God because we experience the kind of fear that Adam and Eve had after they sinned.  They went and hid.  They had never done that before.  Confession of our sins, immediately and specifically, keeps our relationship with God healthy.

Another way we respond to God is with Praise.  Praise is responding to God’s attributes.  God reveals His attributes or character traits because He wants us to become like Him.  As we grow in our knowledge of God, especially through our study of God’s Word, we will know His attributes more fully.  When we know what God is like, we absolutely want to praise Him.  Praise is all about lifting up and focusing on God’s attributes.  The Book of Psalms is full of praise.  One example is in Psalm 145:3-7  “Yahweh is great and is highly praised; His greatness is unsearchable.  One generation will declare Your works to the next and will proclaim Your mighty acts.  I will speak of Your glorious splendor and Your wonderful works.  They will proclaim the power of Your awe-inspiring works, and I will declare Your greatness.  They will give a testimony of Your great goodness and will joyfully sing of Your righteousness.”  I really believe that regular daily reading of Psalms in addition to the other parts of the Bible we are reading is an excellent practice.  We will learn more about the attributes of God and how to praise Him as we should.  He is worthy of our praise. 

God is also worthy of our worship.  Worship is responding to God’s glory.  God’s glory is the evidence of His attributes.  God reveals His glory through what He does.  Creation reveals God’s glory.  Worship is adoring, loving, and honoring God for what He has done.  An example of worship from Psalms is in Psalm 42:1-2 “As a deer longs from streams of water, so I long for You, God.  I thirst for God, the living God.”  And another example: Psalm 96:4-6 “For the Lord is great and is highly praised; He is feared above all gods.  For all the gods of the peoples are idols, but the Lord made the heavens.  Splendor and majesty are before Him; strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.”  When we see all of the incredible things our God has done, we can’t help but respond to Him with our worship.  He is worthy of worship.  As we go throughout our daily life, everything we do can be to our God.  We can offer our work, our play, or relationships, our shopping, our driving, our speech, and everything else to Him as worship.  Therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your spiritual worship.  Romans 12:1. 

Another way we respond to God is with Thanksgiving.  Thanksgiving is responding to and participating in God’s blessings.  Ephesians 5:20 tells us to thank God in everything.  Thanksgiving is not just an event or a statement.  It is an attitude.  God wants you to have an attitude of gratitude.   Psalm 118 has some wonderful reminders for us: “Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His faithful love endures forever.    I will give thanks to You because You have answered me and have become my salvation.  You are my God, and I will give you thanks.  You are my God; I will exalt You.  Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His faithful love endures forever.”  Psalm 118:1, 21, 28-29

What we see here in this Psalm is that the Psalmist cannot get over how good God is.  And we shouldn’t either.  God is good all the time and all the time God is good.  Even when things are not as we would do them, God is still good.  His wisdom is so much greater than ours and He is always working out His sovereign plan.

So, we see that there are four ways to respond to God in prayer:

•    Confession – agreeing with God about our sin.
•    Praise – responding to God’s attributes; who He is.
•    Worship – responding to God’s glory; what He has done. 
•    Thanksgiving – responding to and participating in God’s blessings. 

There are four types of responding prayers and there are two types of asking prayers:

The first type of asking prayer, and the one we are probably most familiar with, is Petition.  Petition is asking for yourself, family, church, or group you may be in (country, workplace, etc.) as you are led by your Heavenly Father.  David prayed for himself in Psalm 25 “Lord, I turn my hope to You.  My God, I trust in You.  Do not let me be disgraced; do not let my enemies gloat over me.  Make Your ways known to me, Lord; teach me Your paths.  Guide me in Your truth and teach me, for You are the God of my salvation; I wait for You all day long.”  Psalm 25:1-2, 4-5  Notice that David is praying for himself, but He is focusing on God more than he is on himself.  This verse is a good example of how we should come to God with a right heart-attitude.  We may be asking Him to do something for us but the thing we are asking is certainly within His nature to do because of the attributes that we know of Him. 

An often misused verse is Psalm 37:4 The King James Versions says it this way “Delight thyself also in the Lord; and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.”    Many have read that and said well, if I enjoy the presence of the Lord and live a joyful Christian life, then when I pray, God will come through.  God is not to be manipulated and He certainly isn’t going to be told what He must do.   Hear the same verse from the Holman Christian Standard Bible translation.  “Take delight in the LORD, and He will give you your heart's desires.”  When we delight in spending time with God; when we stay tuned into Him every day; when we are constantly seeking to live in the center of His will, not because we have to, but because our love for Him compels us to; then He gives us our heart’s desires.  This means our heart desires what God’s heart desires.  The more we delight in God, the more He shows us His desires, and His desires become our desires.  Then, we can be assured that we are asking the things that are in line with the will of God. 

Notice a prayer of the early church in Acts 4 “Master, You are the One who made heaven, the earth, and the sea, and everything in them.  And now, Lord, consider their threats, and grant that Your slaves may speak Your message with complete boldness, while You stretch out Your hand for healing, signs, and wonders to be performed through the name of Your holy Servant Jesus.”  Acts 4:24, 29-30    Because our petitions should be directed by our Heavenly Father, through this kind of prayer we become more like the person God wants us to be as He accomplishes His purpose in our life. 

Another type of asking prayer is Intercession.  Intercession is when God leads us to pray for someone else.  Through intercession we work with God as His servant.  Through intercession God accomplishes His will among His people.  Paul prayed for the Church at Ephesus “I pray that He may grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, and that the Messiah may dwell in your hearts through faith.  I pray that you, being rooted and firmly established in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and width, height and depth, and to know the Messiah’s love that surpasses knowledge, so you may be filled with all the fullness of God.”  Ephesians 3:16-19.  Notice the important things Paul was praying for the people of this church:  strength and power, faith, love, to know the Messiah’s love, and to be full of God.  That’s strong praying!  Do you pray that way for other people or do you just stop at “God, help James find a job.”   Or, maybe “God, Mary has cancer.  Please help her get well.”  When you pray those types of prayers do you even know if you are praying the will of God?  Do you pray that way because that’s what seems to be the most natural way to pray?  If we are really led by God in our interceding with people, then we first pause and seek the heart of God in how we should pray for people. 

So, we have talked about 4 types of Responding Prayers and these are the place to start in prayer:

•    Confession of sin
•    Praise God for His attributes
•    Worship God for what He has done
•    Thanksgiving for His many blessings

And we talked about 2 types of Asking Prayers:

•   Petition – asking for myself, or my family, my church, or my group as I am led by      God
•   Intercession – asking for other people as I am led by God

Why God Wants Us to Pray

The Question we may hear:   "If God already knows everything before I even pray it, then is it really necessary for me to spend time talking to Him about it?  Certainly His time is more valuable than that." 

The first reason God wants us to pray is, He desires a relationship with us.  Imagine that!  The God of this incredibly vast universe; the God who is present everywhere at once, is all knowing, and is all powerful, really desires to have a relationship with you, and He is most able to enjoy that relationship with us when we pray.  We can be assured of His closeness when we pray.  Imagine that as you begin to speak to God, he leans over cupping his hand to his ear because he desires to hear every word.  He loves you.  He loves the sound of your voice.  He isn’t so much worried about whether or not you are expressing every word eloquently.  He just loves hearing you speak to him from your heart, a heart that is bent toward a love relationship with Him.  When we pray, it’s as if we exhale the desires of our heart and inhale the desires of the heart of God. 

We don’t decide to pray because there is nothing else we can think of to do.  We pray because it’s the best thing we can do.  We don’t just have to stand there wondering what we can do – we can pray something.  When there is trouble, what is your first thought, “Oh my goodness, what am I going to do?” or “Let’s just stop right now and pray?” 

A second reason we are to pray is that our Lord is ready to help us in our time of need: 

Hebrews 4:16 “Therefore let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us at the proper time.”  HCSB

We may not fully understand everything there is to know about prayer, but we can be assured that if we are a child of God, we can go into His presence and make requests of Him.  In fact, He encourages us to do so.  God has made a way for us to come to Him by the shed blood of Jesus Christ.  He has instructed us to come to Him and He desires for us to come to Him.  This word for “boldness” in Hebrews 4:16 is sometimes translated “with full confidence”.   We don’t have to hope God hears us when we pray.  He is ready, willing, and able to hear us when we pray.  He desires communion with you.  He wants to show you that He loves you.  He wants to spend time with you.   And don’t feel like you need to do all the talking either.  As we read in Psalm 46:10 “Be still and know that I am God.”  Sometimes our prayer needs to just be praise to God for who He is, thanksgiving for all that He has done in our life.  Part of a vital prayer life is just enjoying His presence. 

A third reason to pray is:  It’s God’s will for us to pray.  Paul writes in 1 Timothy 2:8  “Therefore I want the men in every place to pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or argument.” 

In Luke chapter 18, verse 1, “And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart.” ESV  From this parable that Jesus told His disciples we learn that sometimes when we pray we don’t get an answer right away but we are to persist in prayer.  Keep praying!  Don’t stop!  Don’t give up easily!  You may eventually get a different answer from what you expected or wanted, but even this builds our faith because we are assured that our Heavenly Father has heard and responded.  The point in this persistent praying is not that we should strive to grab God’s attention; we already have it.  The point is to have the heart of God; to align your heart with God’s heart.  That may take some time in prayer before you fully align with the heart of God on a matter because when you begin you may have your own personal desires in mind.  Just keep on praying until your heart is aligned with his heart.

 

A fourth reason to pray is to avoid sin.  You’re really not likely to be able talk to your Heavenly Father and sin at the same time.  In Matthew 26:41 Jesus told his disciples to “Stay awake and pray, so that you won’t enter into temptation.”   When we pray God give us strength to overcome sin.  Also, if we are tuned into talking to God, our attention is on Him rather than on the temptations of the world that so easily entangle us. 

A fifth reason is “That your joy may be made complete” John 16:24.  There is no more joyful place for us than in the presence of the Lord.  You may have thought to yourself at times, “I wish I could just stay in the presence of the Lord all day.”  The reality is that you can.  God is always available.  You can be walking into WalMart, driving down the highway, sitting in the doctor’s office, getting your hair cut, washing the car, cutting the lawn, folding the clothes, cooking dinner, washing the dishes, playing ball with your kid, working at the office, etc and you can spend time with God in prayer.  When we approach prayer that way, we have the promise from God’s word that “our joy will be made complete.”  On a scale of 1-10, how joyful are you?  If I asked those closest to you, what would they say?  Now, how much time each day do you spend in prayer?  God’s Word is true.  The more time spent in prayer, the more complete joy we experience.  You may be thinking, “Well, I have things to do.  I can’t just pray all day.”  Really?  Let’s take a look at a short video clip about understanding that everything we do throughout our day is really about God.

 If we want our day to be everything God intends it to be, we need to pray.  God will accomplish through us what we pray about.  Pray throughout the day with an expectancy that God will use you in the lives of others.  He certainly wants to, so it’s a good practice to align your will with His will through prayer. 

A final and very important reason to pray is to confess known sins and have God show us un-confessed sin.  1 John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”   God stands ready to forgive confessed sin.  He wants you to be cleansed.  The goal is that you would be holy, as He is holy.  You can’t be an effective witness, disciple, parent, boss, employee, son or daughter, husband or wife, brother or sister, or servant of the Lord with un-confessed sin in your life.  

If you feel that your prayers are just hitting a wall sometimes, it could definitely be un-confessed sin in your life.  So, another very important reason to pray is to confess known sin and have God show you un-confessed sin. 

So, let’s go over the six reasons we should pray once again:

1.     God desires a relationship with us and that comes through prayer.

2.     God is ready to help in our time of need.

3.     It is God’s will that we should pray.

4.     Prayer helps us avoid sin.

5.     Through prayer our joy is made complete.

6.     Through prayer we confess known sins and ask God to show us un-confessed sin. 

We are going to get in groups of 3-4 people and spend some time praying with and for one another as well as for the ones on our prayer list.  Before we do that, you may feel the need to come to the altar and pray and confess something to the Lord or you may rather do it right where you are.  But if there is something you need to confess, I encourage you to do it.  Then you will be more ready to pray. 

Next week our focus will be on how to pray effectively.  

Don’t Just Stand There! Pray Something!

(This is the introduction to a series of blogs over the next several weeks.  It is the intro to a study on prayer taking place at Canaan Baptist Church on Wednesday evenings which began April 23, 2014)

It’s easy to understand why so many questions surround the topic of prayer.  People struggle with not getting the answer they were seeking, feeling like they didn’t get an answer at all, talking to someone they can’t see – or hear, and not really knowing if they are doing it right or wrong.  The questions can range from a curiosity with how prayer works, to a complete lack of faith in the practice.  You would think that non-believers would be the main people to struggle with prayer, but really believers also struggle with it quite a bit.  They know they should, but getting started, staying consistent, and keeping it fresh so that it does not become something that is simply repetition, all seem to be concerns for believers with whom I have talked.

We have a lot of scripture about the importance of prayer:

Ephesians 6:18 “Pray at all times in the Spirit with every prayer and request, and stay alert in this with all perseverance and intercession for all the saints.” HCSB

1 Thessalonians 5: 16-18  “Rejoice always!  Pray constantly.  Give thanks in everything, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”  HCSB

Hebrews 4:16 “Therefore let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us at the proper time.”  HCSB

1 John 5:14-15 “Now this is the confidence we have before Him: Whenever we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.   And if we know that He hears whatever we ask, we know that we have what we have asked Him for.”  HCSB

Mark 1:35 “Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, He got up, went out, and made His way to a deserted place. And He was praying there.”  HCSB

Luke 5:16 “Yet He often withdrew to deserted places and prayed.”  HCSB

Luke 6:12 “During those days He went out to the mountain to pray and spent all night in prayer to God.” HCSB

Acts 1:13-14 “When they arrived, they went to the room upstairs where they were staying: Peter, John, James, Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew, Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, Simon the Zealot,and Judas the son of James.  All these were continually united in prayer, along with the women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, and His brothers.” HCSB

Here are some questions we hear asked at times.  Maybe you have even had some of these thoughts at one time or another.

The universe is an incredibly vast space that seems to go on forever.  We don’t even know big it is.  Even with the most powerful telescopes we have today, we still can’t really see all of outer space that exists.  We look at the tremendous number of stars and planets and know that there is so much more that we don’t understand and we think about the God who created it all.  He has to be a really big, powerful God. 

Does the God who created the universe (the giant universe that goes on in every direction into places man cannot even see yet) really care about the things that are on my heart?

God has the ability to be everywhere at once.  He is omnipresent.  He cares about every detail of your life.  He knows everything about you and me.  He knows every hair on your head and every freckle on your body. He’s omniscient, or all knowing. He is able to do anything He desires to do.  He has the power to do anything that needs doing.  He is omnipotent, or all powerful.  God’s word teaches us that the God of the universe, who is able to be everywhere, knows everything, and has all the power to do what needs to be done, wants to hear from you.  He loves you.  He desires relationship with you and He made a way through prayer.

 

Hear Hebrews 4:16 again, “Therefore let us approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us at the proper time.”  HCSB

We can be assured that this huge, powerful, all knowing, present everywhere God listens when we pray.

If God already knows everything before I even pray it, then is it really necessary for me to spend time talking to Him about it?  Certainly His time is more valuable than that. 

We are going to look at the Lord’s Prayer during the next few weeks.  But look at the scripture before the Lord’s Prayer.  Matthew 6:6-8.

“But when you pray, go into your private room, shut your door, and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.  When you pray, don’t babble like the idolaters, since they imagine they’ll be heard for their many words.  Don’t be like them, because your Father knows the things you need before you ask Him.”

The Father already knows what you need.  You don’t have to convince God to care about what you care about.  He already does care about those things because they’re concerns for you.  You don’t have to beg and babble on and on about what you need.  Just ask in faith, knowing that whatever God does is going to be part of His perfect plan.  Again, it’s all about the relationship, not about getting what we think is best for us.  We are like a child coming to his father.  We really need to tell Him what’s on our heart, not because he doesn’t know, but because that’s how we build our relationship with Him.  Sometimes a child comes and says, “Daddy, I want...”  But that doesn’t mean it’s best for him.  Our Heavenly Father always parents perfectly. The fact that He may say “No” to whatever we are asking for does not make Him any less perfect.  God is good all the time and all the time God is good.

How can we be sure that time spent in prayer is worthwhile? 

Prayer is absolutely worthwhile.  As mentioned a moment ago, it’s where we find the relationship with God.  If you claim to be married but you never talk to the person you are married to, what kind of relationship do you really have?  God desires to hear from us. He speaks to us through His Word, the Bible, and by the Holy Spirit.  He hears from us when we pray.  He loves hearing from us.  If you have children, you wouldn’t like it very much if your children stopped talking to you.  You would want to hear from them.  We will spend a larger amount of time over the next few weeks discussing what we should talk to God about.  Rest assured, the point of prayer is a relationship with your heavenly father.  There may be times when you are struggling to ask God for anything for yourself.  In those times, intercede for other people.  We can always find someone who needs prayer.  Stopping what we are doing and praying for people at the moment they are sharing their need says “I care.” 

  

Does prayer make a difference?
 

It definitely makes a difference.   E.M. Bounds, wrote on p. 9 of his small but impactful little book,   “Power Through Prayer”, “What the Church needs today is not more or better machinery, not new organizations or more and novel methods.  She needs men whom the Holy Spirit can use – men of prayer, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Spirit does not flow through methods, but through men.  He does not come on machinery, but on men.  He does not anoint plans, but men – men of prayer.”  The Holy Spirit flows through all Christ-followers.  However, Christ-followers who are not deeply devoted to communion with God each day through prayer become powerless to accomplish anything for His glory.  If you want to have the mind of God on a matter, prayer is the way to know it.  Prayer is definitely a difference-maker.  We are powerless without it.

Since there is so much suffering in the world, so many people needing to be saved, so many who are hungry and need all sorts of ministry, do we really have the time to pray?

Once again, you can try to do something about all of that without prayer but your effectiveness will be limited.  We are finite, God is infinite.  We are limited in our ability, God is limitless in His ability.  We know some things about a particular need, God knows everything about it.  We witness to people hoping they will be saved and we worry and fret and beg and keep begging over and over again for them to be saved, and cry ourselves to sleep over their salvation; God already knows whether they will be saved or not.  And salvation is His alone.  We do have a responsibility to tell people about Jesus and pray for their salvation.  But always remember, you are in the telling business, He is in the saving business; so pray for Him to save that one you love and have been witnessing to.  If we try to do everything that needs to be done in our own power, we will most definitely run out of power.  We must have the power of God on our life to accomplish what He needs us to do.  We also need the realization that whatever we are incapable of doing, He is more than capable. We are an instrument for His use but we are powerless on our own.   We can get so busy for God that we don’t take the time to pray and soon we are ineffective for Him.  Or, we can pray and seek Him, and ask Him to empower us and guide us in what we should do?  He will. 

Over the next several weeks we will discuss more fully, why God wants us to pray and how to do it effectively.  We will talk about different kinds of prayer.  We will think about what it means to pray without ceasing.  We will hear from scripture as well as from great men of prayer.  

The Holy Spirit - Forgotten but not Forlorned

If you're like many believers, you have no difficulty in remembering that God the Father is all around you.  We see His creation, pray to Him, read His bible, and even talk to other people about Him a lot.  We are... or should be... troubled when we hear His name taken in a disrespectful and unholy way.  We tell people how much we love Him.  We are quite tuned in to God the Father.

Jesus, God the Son, is certainly easy for us to stay mindful of as well.  His cross is worn as an adornment around the neck and on t-shirts.  There are hundreds of very fine and memorable songs that have been written about Him.  We read the gospel accounts and learn about His birth, we see his parents confusion by his need to be in His Father's house at 12 years of age, we learn of His last three years of His life when He revealed who He was and why He had come, and we read of His death, resurrection, and ascension.  Thousands of paintings have been painted depicting Him in hundreds of different ways.  We have so many visual, written, and oral reminders of Jesus that He is even easier to picture in our mind than God the Father.

But what about the Holy Spirit?  In some circles the Holy Spirit is the person of the trinity who really makes you do seemingly bizarre things, like speaking in tongues.  In other groups the topic is avoided altogether because we certainly wouldn't want to be "one of those", would we?  How many pictures of the Holy Spirit have you actually seen.  Other than in a church service, have you ever heard a song about the Holy Spirit?  He has no movies that I am aware of, and no musicals on Broadway either.  So, who is the Holy Spirit, what is He doing, and how should we think and speak of Him? 

The Holy Spirit is the third person of the trinity, who, as described in Galatians 5:17-25, helps us overcome the desires of the flesh.  He lives in us, working through us, filling our life with Himself, and providing us with a changed life that is characterized by fruit in our life.  According to v. 22, that fruit includes "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control". Compare that to your life before you became a follower of Jesus Christ.  Without the Holy Spirit in your life you may have been characterized by the works of the flesh talked about in v. 19: "sexual immorality, moral impurity, promiscuity, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and anything similar".   As you can see from these verses, a person who is filled with the Holy Spirit will enjoy a much happier life.  Most other people will be more drawn to a person who is filled with the Holy Spirit; even if they are not a believer yet. 

Jesus explained to His disciples in John 16:7 that He must go away so that the Holy Spirit could come.  When Jesus was with His disciples, He could only be one place at one time.  He had limited His own omnipresence.  However, in leaving here and ascending to the Father, He sent the Holy Spirit to believers.  The Holy Spirit has the ability to be in everyone and in every place where there is faith in God's Son.  The Holy Spirit works to empower us, to intercede on our behalf, to fill us with the fruit mentioned above, to keep us from evil, and to guide us in all wisdom.

Francis Chan wrote a book recently entitled "Forgotten God".  His point throughout this book is that the Holy Spirit is the person of the triune God that we have too often ignored and failed to allow into our life as we should.  But we can't continue to do that.  If we are followers of Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit is to us what water is to the physical body.  We must have water to continue to live.  The follower must be filled with the Holy Spirit to live the life God intended.  Simply sucking air and eating and sleeeping and going through life is not what God intended for you.  He has big plans for your life.  He has incredible things he wants to do through you but can only do it if you are filled with the Holy Spirit.  This happens when we die daily to self and ask God to fill our life with the Holy Spirit.  Run to the Holy Spirit and ask Him to fill your life.  Be filled daily.  Enjoy all that the Holy Spirit wants to do through you.  He's ready to give you the life God intended.

Involving Your Learners in the Lesson

Jesus, the Master Teacher, knew that in order for real discipleship to take place, He had to move his learners from simply receiving information, to a real life-change.  As mentioned in my two prior posts, he used stories and he used illustrations of all sorts.  One other way that Jesus accomplished His goal was to involve His learners in the lesson he wanted them to get.  An example of this can be found in Mark 2:15-17. 

Jesus wanted His disciples to understand that He came to call sinners to repentance.  One day He showed them this by going to Levi's house (also called Matthew).  Levi was a tax collector and considered by the Pharisees to be about as low as you could get.  They questioned why Jesus would eat with sinners and tax collectors.  Jesus used this time to explain to everyone present why He had come, "Those who are well don't need a doctor, but the sick do need one.  I didn't come to call the righteous, but sinners."  Of course, he could have just said that, but do you think they would have remembered it as well?  No, it was memorable because of what they saw, heard, and felt that day as they looked at Jesus dining with sinners and tax collectors.

On another occassion, as he finished eating the passover meal, Jesus washed the feet of His disciples. (John 13:4-17).  He could have easily just said "Okay.  Listen to me.  You need to humble yourself and serve one another."  But instead, He showed them what He wanted them to understand.  He washed the feet of each individual in that room.  They knew who it was who washed their feet, and they were humbled.  Then He closed it out with "You should do just as I have done for you." (v. 15b).  Do you think they got it?  Of course they did.  They had just seen the Son of God humble Himself and wash their feet.  Soon they would see His ultimate act of humility.  They would watch Him die for those He loved.  The lesson stayed with them.  Many of them would also die a cruel death for their faith, but they would remain humble even unto death.  They had understood.  They had remembered.  Real transformation had taken place in this group of disciples. 

As teachers, we are called to pour everything we can into the lives of our learners.  The goal should be that they will go on to do for others as we have done for them.  In that process, we give it everything we have.  We study to make sure we understand the passage of scripture completely.  We plan our lesson with the desired outcome in mind.  To get there, we use every tool we have at our disposal.  We use questions that create a hunger, we use illustrations to illuminate the mind, and we involve our learner in the lesson so that he remembers what he saw, heard, and felt.  We can use games, role play, debate, problem-solving groups, paraphrasing the lesson, individual writing or drawing, and a host of other methods.  Whatever you do, make sure the method gets you to the desired change and makes the scripture passage memorable.  Jesus always made sure the truth was what they remembered, not just the method.

Teachers, we have a high calling to make a difference in the lives of our learners.  We should "study to show ourselves approved unto God, a workman that needs not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth." (2 Timothy 2:15)  Part of not being ashamed is to be able to know that we did everything we could to make sure we made it memorable.  God's Word is too full of life for us to make it boring.  Teaching the Word of God is something to be passionate about and it is best accomplished when we have close relationships with our learners and involve them in the lesson.  "Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you.  And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age." (Matt. 28:19-20)