Keep on Praying

Speaker 1: 0:00

All right, okay. So it has been a crazy four years, a wild ride of a lot of trust in God, and I am so excited. And for this year, as we head towards the future of our church, we want to make sure that our church is built on prayer, that we're a church built on prayer, we're built on Jesus, we're talking about Jesus, we're talking to Jesus. And because we aren't just a social club where you pay your fees and you hang out with people who look like you and vote like you and talk like you in a place that's just here to serve you no, no, no. We are the church. We're the church where we give generously because our hope is to see everyday people like you and me learn how to become Jesus followers. And a story I've got to share real fast. Originally I wasn't going to do it, but I felt like it was so cool to share Something that came out of our 21 Days of Prayer and Fasting that we today is our last day, our 21 Days of Prayer and Fasting. A cool story that came out of it this couple from our church, out of nowhere, it hit me up and they said hey, jacob, we want to do something really generous for the church and I was like, okay, yeah, sure sounds good to me. And they end up telling me they said we want to sponsor the salary of your part-time pastor. And I said we got one part-time pastor who runs our groups and stuff like that, and I said oh, what? Okay? He said not only do you want to sponsor a salary, we want to make him full-time, and so we want to give to the church that he'll be able to work full-time and leave his other jobs so that he can help farther this mission help everyday people learn how to become Jesus followers. Can we give God some praise for that? I'll tell you, I've been in church for a long time. That doesn't happen, okay. So that's just something that God is doing at our church, this radical generosity. And we are determined, guys, I'm going to tell you, we are determined to continue to be a diverse church. We believe that our church services should be a preview for heaven. So we're going to. We're inhabiting people from different tribes and tongues of worship God. So we want to continue to do that and we want to lead by serving, because that's what Jesus taught us to do, and we want to be built on prayer. We want to be built on prayer.

Speaker 1: 2:09

There's been some awesome stories from this 21 days of prayer and fasting and there's been some hard stories. There's been some people at church. They've been dealing with some difficult people there in this 21 days of prayer and fasting and it's been tough. But here's what we've learned. Here's what we learned as a church during this 21 days.

Speaker 1: 2:25

And you're going to say, jacob, this sounds so elementary, but here you go. Sometimes we got to get back to the basics. Here's what we learned that prayer is simply talking to God. Prayer is simply talking to God. We don't need to complicate it, we don't need to make it all mythical, we don't need to make it all. It's just talking to God.

Speaker 1: 2:42

We're coming to talk to God and I want to take you to the deep end today. I want to have a deep message for you today, and not deep as in I'm going to use a bunch of Greek and Hebrew to get my point across. No, I'm going to talk. I want to bring you to the deep end as far as deep application, because if we can't apply this word to our life, then what's the point? We got to be able to become everyday people who have our struggles, who have our anxieties, who have our fears, who have our ups and have our downs, and we got to still, through it all. Look towards Jesus, follow Jesus and say Jesus, I'm going to apply what you teach me in my life every single day. And so here you go, I'm going to take you to the deep end, because my prayer for you is this is that your communication, that your communion with God will only get better from here on out, that you will have a persistent life of prayer.

Speaker 1: 3:29

And throughout the teachings of Jesus, he uses these illustrations about persistent prayers. He even uses the illustration that we have to ask and seek, and not as a means to prayer. And there's this theme that he's communicating that prayer is persistent. And why is that? Why is that? Does God need to start using his Google Calendar better? Like God, I'm going to ping you. I need you to show up for me on this time.

Speaker 1: 3:56

Or does persistent prayer develop something in us? Does it develop character in us? Now, today? I want to be very practical today, because my heart for you as a pastor is that you will develop a relationship with Jesus. Here's the truth. Let me shoot it straight to you. We can pack out this place with people and that would be cool. But if we weren't teaching everyday people how to follow Jesus, we're missing the point. We're missing the point. Here you go. We do want to pack out this place with people, not just for a number of sake, but because we actually believe if an everyday person can learn how to follow Jesus, can cultivate a relationship with God outside of just coming to a church service, but in their daily life. Man, it changes everything. It changes future generations, it changes your legacy, it changes the world around us. So I get a little excited sometimes when we talk about this because it's so important. Okay, here you go, I'm going to get practical, I'm going to get personal.

Speaker 1: 4:51

Today, let's look at the apostle Paul. This is what he tells us Ephesians 6. He says In praying the spirit on all occasions, with all kinds of prayers and requests. This is what I talked about in part two of this message when I went over how to pray. How to pray, we pause, rejoice, ask, yield, and we know that. But during our 21 days of prayer, during our morning calls, we'd use the Lord's prayer as a model of prayer. We just didn't sit there and say Our Father in heaven, hallelujah. We use every step as a means of prayer, as a model of prayer, a way to connect to God. But here I want you to check out this last part of this verse. Okay, paul says this With this in mind.

Speaker 1: 5:31

Be alert, meaning be on the lookout. Be on the lookout because there is an enemy who wants to steal your joy, rob your perspective and leave you done and dusted. But check this out. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying, just keep on praying, keep it up. Last week, I talked about how to be a Jesus follower. We have to keep digging that we have to build our lives on a solid foundation because when the flood waters of life come not if not, maybe not, they might know when the flood waters of life come, we're built on a solid foundation and we can withstand it. So see, I love 21 Days of Prayer and Fasting, but the real fruit can I be honest the real fruit of 21 Days of Prayer and Fasting comes on day 22.

Speaker 1: 6:27

I was almost going to title this message Day 22, because it's exciting as a churchman, we get together and we pray, but what are we going to do on Day 22? See, we don't want 21 days of prayer just to be an event that we go to and then we move on to Jersey Sunday. That's happened in a couple of weeks. It's not just another church event. Our hope is that you will keep on praying. Now you may wonder why we do 21 days. Now there's two reasons. One in the book of Daniel, he gives us an example of a 21 day fast. He did so. It was a biblical example, but we also know that it takes roughly 21 days to develop a new habit, and so we want us to have a new habit. Our hope is that you will develop a new habit, a spiritual habit that will form you into the likeness of Jesus. But you got to keep on praying. Here you go, and the spirit is celebrating four years as a church. I guess I should share why you are here today, like why you are literally here today. What happened to get you here today? Because none of this just happened. I don't think any of us woke up this morning and say, hey, let's have church at Melothian Middle School today.

Speaker 1: 7:30

Now there's a lot of things that happen. When I was in my early 20s it's the personal part when I was in my early 20s, I was struggling a lot. I was struggling with my purpose. I made some really bad decisions that almost derailed my life. Can you even relate to being in your early 20s and making bad decisions? So I was making some bad decisions and I was struggling with an addiction that, no matter how many times I prayed Lord, help me from this, it wouldn't happen. I was still struggling with it. I couldn't stop.

Speaker 1: 7:57

Now I remember being in my room one afternoon and praying and I felt this nudge of the Holy Spirit to go outside and pray. Now a couple things. I don't normally get feelings like that. Okay, so that's not like a normal thing that happens to me. And second, it was raining outside. So I'm definitely not doing that, you know, I'm definitely doing it. So I just kind of kept praying, reading my Bible and and, but I kept this feeling, this nudge to do it, to go outside and worship God. I'm like what the heck? I am going delusional. That's what I'm thinking right now. I'm going crazy. So I finally give in. I finally give in.

Speaker 1: 8:28

I walked to the deck out, to the deck of our house, and I kind of stand and hunched over a little bit because the rain's falling on me. It was uncomfortable, it was cold. And then I felt, very gently, a nudge from the Holy Spirit and God speak to me. Now I'm not out loud, but it's in my heart. God speak to me. And I looked forward and from my deck there was this long field, this neighborhood field, and it's not a big field, but the way my deck is positioned you can't really see the end of it. You can't really see where the field ends. And then I felt the Lord nudge me and say the influence I want to give you will be larger than the field you see, and the people that I want you to impact will be more numerous than the drops of rain in front of you. And then I felt him had called me. He says be pure, pursue purity.

Speaker 1: 9:11

And from there, in that moment, I went on a journey to find healing from an addiction. And that was the moment I knew I wanted to be a church planter. That was the moment I knew I wanted to be a church planter. And here's the thing I want you to get, though I didn't go like the next day say, oh, I'm going to start a church at 20 years old. No, that didn't happen. That promise didn't even begin to happen until eight years later, until eight years later. And then sometimes God may put something on our hearts, god may promise us something, but that doesn't mean it's going to happen the next day. That doesn't mean that all you're going to do is sometimes God would drop something on your heart to get you ready to head in that direction. Because so, from that moment to when we planted the church, I got married. That's a good thing, I got married and that was a big part of my life.

Speaker 1: 9:58

I remember when my pastors, andy and Sharon, met, you know, met Erin, got to know her. They told her they said, hey, you know he wants a church plan. Do you want to do that? And she said, yeah, they're like OK, good, because if you don't, you probably don't want to get married to him. And so we end up doing that, and then we got married and it was great.

Speaker 1: 10:14

Then, when we were getting ready to leave to church plant originally, erin's dad gets sick, he gets sick, and then, not too long after that, he passes away, he passes away. And so Erin and I especially more so Erin than me have this deep sadness we're dealing with. We're dealing with all this grief, you know, and we had this life change. We ended up having a baby right before her dad passes away. Then her dad passed away and then her granddad passed away. There was just a lot of emotions going on. There was a lot of different things.

Speaker 1: 10:42

So some months down the road goes and we're kind of dealing with this and we're trying to figure this out. And I had this moment one night. We're laying in bed and I look at her and I say and I kind of don't want to say it because I know she's just dealing with a lot and I look at her and say I know there's a lot happening in our lives, but I still feel like God is calling us to plant this church. Still, and to my surprise, she looked at me and said I feel the same way. We have to do it. We have to do it and that came with a lot of prayer. It came with a lot of prayer.

Speaker 1: 11:12

We then talked to our pastors and we set the date to move to Richmond. And the very next day, the very next day after our pastors gave us the date to move to Richmond and we were going to go, I got a job offer to pastor a church of a thousand people in Myrtle Beach I ain't in Myrtle Beach right now, as you can tell I was like what the heck, what the heck? And then we end up saying no to that. You want to know why we said no to that? Because not only do we just say no to bad things, but we should say no to good things so God can prepare us for the great things he has. Okay, and so we said no to it.

Speaker 1: 11:53

And then, when COVID happened, I was like why did I say no to that? But we said no to it and God called us to Richmond and we got here and it was nuts and I'd never worked so hard in my life and each step of the way I am more depressed. Like I'm telling you guys, I'm more depressed. Brandy, thank you for sharing that story, because in my heart I was like this thing ain't never going to work out, but it was great to have that. Yeah, we met Brandy there in that time and all the different people, but all I could do is pray. And we launched, and we launched big 260 people in our open and day service. You know, it was amazing and just when we fight, things are going to go great. Covid happens right, covid happens six weeks later. And now I'm not going to tell that whole story. That's a whole long story.

Speaker 1: 12:37

But let's fast forward to why we're here today. You are here today because God called us to this city. God has called us to the city but, most importantly, through the process God has formed us and shaped us into the people he's called us to be. I see I am more confident about the direction of LVC and what God is calling us to do, more now than when we started, than when we started, and I am more confident that God wants us to influence the land and the people farther than we can see, more numerous in the range of drops and then we can see.

Speaker 1: 13:11

So, from 20 years old to 33 years old, there's been 13 years of prayer before promise. There's been 13 years of prayer before promise. And I'm saying this because it's easy to want the promise without the process, but it isn't the process that we can progress with persistent prayer, with persistent prayers in order to see the promise fulfilled. And the biggest promise oh, I love this. I love this, and the biggest promise that God wants to reward isn't church growth, it isn't just making things bigger and better and grander, but in your life, the biggest promise that God wants to give you and your persistence is more of him. It's more of him. It's that you can learn how to do this life, following him in direction of what he's called you to do. To be formed into the likeness of Christ, as the Apostle Paul tells us to do. To follow him, to allow the Holy Spirit to guide us, step by step. Say, I'm going to tell you this our reward, through persistent prayer, isn't the thing we're praying for, but our reward is Jesus and learning how to become more like him, how to be with him, to become like him and do the stuff he has called us to do. And the life built on prayer you'll discover that's your biggest reward is Jesus. So let me get practical. That was my personal. Let me get practical today. Okay, let's get practical.

Speaker 1: 14:40

If you aren't a note taker, if you are a note taker, I want you to write down these five phrases. Okay, it'll be good for you. First one is this continue to make prayer a priority. Continue to make prayer a priority. See, in theory, there's nothing magical about the time of day you pray. There's nothing like. It's not like oh, god is awake at 6am, so that's when you should pray. You know that's not how it works, but there is something important about first things. There is something important about first things and we talked about that week, one of the series, and the main reason why prayer is my first thing I do in the morning and not checking my phone or the news or the sports even though the Lakers and the Warriors went like triple overtime last night, I was like yo, that was crazy. But anyways, there's something that changes the entire day when God is my first, when I put God first. Check this out.

Speaker 1: 15:34

Psalm five says this in the morning, lord, you hear my voice, and the morning I lay my request before you and wait expectantly. So mornings are a great time and it is like a pacemaker for your day. But then the apostle Paul comes along and says, yeah, mornings are great, but I want you to what? Pray, continuously Pray without season, just always pray. And that seems impossible. Like how long was it always pray? It's only impossible unless prayer takes on a different form than most of us have.

Speaker 1: 16:07

See, prayer isn't just us, isn't just like an event. That we do is not just our alone time, or saying some creeds, or anointing our heads or oil or whatever it's actually. You may say, jacob, come on, for real, prayer is actually more like texting God. It's actually more like that than an event. It's more like it's more like texting throughout the day, like like my wife, my wife Erin. I texted throughout the day, especially when we both work from home, especially when we're kind of out and about in different spots, and I just want to send this text messages hey, running out of time, can you pick up the kids? Or blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 1: 16:40

You know there's one and we're always constantly texting throughout the day and I want to give you the thought that you can talk to God like that. You can talk to God like that, like that, and this is what I want you to try to do. You know, if my kids are fighting and I'm about to walk into the room and they're like arguing, you know, before I walk into the room, I just say God, help me, parent, not based on my emotions, but we'll help, but we'll help the situation, and because I want to go in there and be like, what's your God yelling at me, you know? But it's just a simple prayer. It helps me realign and I'm telling you, before you go to a work meeting, just say God, help me with this one. This person is difficult After the work meeting. If things don't go the way you hope, you say God, that was a lot rougher than I hoped, but thank you for that letting me react the way I want it to, and you're just talking and connecting God throughout the day. And the question I want to ask you is this what would I have to rearrange to make prayer the priority? What would I have to rearrange in my life to make prayer the priority?

Speaker 1: 17:37

And chances are some of us might need to change some things up in order to make prayer a priority. For example, my wife Erin. She was always wanting to wake up early with me and pray. I'm an early person, I love waking up early. It's great. She was wanting to do that, but she was having a hard time doing it and getting in the habit of doing it. She's actually gotten pretty good in the habit now, but before she did, she knew one thing that she consistently did every night, and that was take a shower, and so she decided to do this. So she grabbed an expo marker and when she went to take a shower, she would write her memory verse in the shower and spend some time praying in the shower, because she knew she consistently did that. Here's the crazy part about that. Here's the crazy part about that. After she would get out the shower and I would go in the shower, the water felt like holy water. Was that one too corny? Was that two? Okay, all right, but for real some of you you need to rearrange some things and make it a priority. Instead of listening to your hype music workout playlist at the gym, put on some worship music. That five minute drive home after kid drop off that's your time, right then. And there to pray. You got to make. You got to rearrange things to continue to pray.

Speaker 1: 18:49

Everyone is this find a dedicated place to pray, find a dedicated place to pray. Now, this doesn't have to be the only place you pray, but there is something special about having a dedicated place that you go to. Maybe you have a chair or a room For me. During the warm seasons, I wake up early and I sit on my deck. I love it. It's so awesome. I'm already in my sunroom. It's great, and it helps me to focus on God. I like nature. So I was like, okay, this is great, but so check this out.

Speaker 1: 19:16

Jesus says this In Mark one. It says this very early in the morning, while it was still dark. Jesus got up, left the house, went off to a solitary place where he prayed. Where he prayed Now, chances are a lot of scholars believe that where he would pray regularly was the garden of Gethsemane Was where they believed he would pray, and what we know for a fact was that that's where he prayed the night before his crucifixion and where he prayed a prayer that was pretty intense. He prayed. He said God, take this cup away from me. You know, jesus was at, was right before the cross. Jesus was having an honest conversation with God. He said God, take this cup away from me. But then he says not your will, not my will be done, but your will be done. It was a dangerous prayer, but Jesus had that at his prayer time and this is a powerful example of prayer. But that spot was his spot and it was very accessible. There you go.

Speaker 1: 20:12

A few months ago I made this map of Richmond and the surrounding counties of it. I believe we have a picture of it and you see Chesterfield, richmond City, henrico, palatine, new Kent. You can even go down towards Williamsburg. And then you got handover and you can even go up to Fairfax, up to Berryville, and I wrote on this map and it's our mission of our church to help everyday people learn how to become Jesus followers. And then you can see our vision as a church to help people be with Jesus, become like Jesus and do the stuff that Jesus did. And I put the Bible verse there, luke 14, and that's the parable of the great feast, where everyone gets invited to God's table. And here you go and I pray over that visual of the mission that God has given our church.

Speaker 1: 20:57

Here you go, I'm going to be honest with you. I'm going to speak a little vision. Today it's our birthday. I feel like we should speak a little vision. My prayer is that, in the course of time, that we will have a vineyard church in every single county in this area, from all the way down to Williamsburg, all the way up to Fairfax. Because I'm going to get it.

Speaker 1: 21:16

The reason why is not because we just want to start new churches or plant new campuses and do stuff like that, just because. No, because I actually believe that if everyday people can learn how to become Jesus followers, it changes the world around us, it changes everything. And I'll tell you this it's a vision worth going all out for. It's a vision what? Why not? Why not go after? Why not believe that future generations can be changed? Why not believe that single moms can learn how it is to raise their kids in a way that honors God and points their kids to a future they want? Why not believe that the divorced person can know that they're not a mess up or wash away or throw away, but they can have a new life in Christ? Why not believe, starting to share hope with everybody? So, guys, this is a visual I pray for. Every day.

Speaker 1: 22:07

You may be looking around and say, jacob, there's only about 60 people in here, here you go. I have a vision that our church would be a church of a million people. You're like Jacob, we're going to be one of those churches. No, no, no, no, no. When I say that, I mean I'm believing that through our church, god will give us church planters, campus leaders, college leaders, international missions, leaders that will go out and change the world. And I'm believing. I'm believing this small church in Melody in Virginia. I can shake the world for Jesus. That's what I'm believing. And call me crazy, but hey, other people believe they can do stuff and start making them float and be on Facebook all day. I can believe in this and I'm telling you. I'm telling you, it changes, because I'm convinced that if moms and dads and contractors and doctors and entrepreneurs and teachers can learn how to have an authentic relationship with Jesus, it changes the world around us. So I pray over that. I pray over that every day because I can't do it, but with God, all things are possible and it's a God-sized dream.

Speaker 1: 23:21

So let me ask you this what place would be the most conductive for me to pray effectively? Ask yourself this you know if for some of you, it's getting into a quiet place you've got too many kids in your house. They just laugh. But maybe find in one spot where you can pray, where you can get into quiet. Some of you is finding a prayer partner. That's what we've got small groups happen in next week. It's a place that you can find accountability with someone and they can pray with you. You can text them and hang with them, and it's the way that works, okay.

Speaker 1: 23:51

Third thing is this have a plan for prayer. I'm going to keep this one simple. I'm going to keep this one simple. I'm going to keep this one simple. If you wanted to run a marathon, you want to just wake up, slip on your slippers, put on your bathrobe, grab your cup of coffee, go outside and say I'm going to run a marathon today. You wouldn't do it, would you? You weren't just show up to the Richmond marathon and your slippers and run. You may make it a mile before you fall over. No, if you want to run a marathon, what are you going to do? You're going to come up with a plan. You're going to find a trainer, you're going to get on a training plan, you're going to get you some nice shoes, you're going to get some running gear and then you're going to be able to. Then, first, you're going to start with a walk, then a jog, then a mile, then tune and three, and so on and so forth, until you get to a place where you can become a marathon runner.

Speaker 1: 24:52

Your approach to prayer life should be the same. You need a plan with it, and on our website, we created this Google doc with this QR code. We love some QR codes around here. We created this Google doc. I think we have the slide for it. Oh, it got all out of shape. There you go, there you go. There's the QR code up there.

Speaker 1: 25:09

And these are the two Bible apps I recommend for you to use If you are looking for a plan for prayer the YouVersion Bible app and the Pray First app. They will give you practical tools for you to learn how to pray. Okay, and because you got to come up with a plan, you got to be strategic about it. Luke 11 said let me just say something real fast. There is no other relationship in our lives that we would just wing it. Oh, I might. Just. I'm just gonna wing my marriage. I'm just gonna wing my relationship with my kids. I'm gonna wing it. No, no, no Same with your relationship with God. You have to be strategic about it in order to see the results you want.

Speaker 1: 25:44

Luke 11 says this once, jesus was in a certain place praying. As he finished, one of His disciples came to Him and said Lord, teach us to pray Just as John taught His disciples. Jesus says this is how you should pray and this is where he taught Him the Lord's prayer as a prayer model. I'll make it plain for you. Today, there's the two apps I encourage you to do, because what plan makes prayer easy, interesting and effective.

Speaker 1: 26:11

You got to find what works for you. Some people they're head smart so they love oh, I'm gonna read over the Bible and I want to search the original Greek and Hebrew and the Arabic and want to know that. Some people yeah man, I can't give a rip about that, but you connect to God and worship, and so you got to find what works for you. And here's the good thing about God he is so personal that he can personally connect to you and he can personally connect to you. Okay, here you go.

Speaker 1: 26:40

For me, the last thing I'll say for me I love my iPad. I try to do hardcover Bibles and notepads. I got the nice ones that look like I'm writing a book in the Lord of the Rings or something like that. You know, with the leather I can't do it, I lose them all, I can't do it. But for me, I have everything on my iPad. My wife, for example she tried to use her phone to do her devotional and then all of a sudden, she would be reading the Bible app and then all of a sudden, she was reading Target 316 and work for her and work for her. So she has a hardcover Bible and a notepad and she thrives, okay.

Speaker 1: 27:12

Fourth one is this pray with energy and power. Pray with energy and power. Hey, george, real fast, can you pass me my water man? I'm thirsty up here and this is that high quality H2O. You like the water boy Bobby Flay over here? Wait, not Bobby Flay, that's the chef. There you go, there you go, okay, but pray with energy and power.

Speaker 1: 27:37

Now, if you've been coming to LBC for a while, you know I love talking about some silence and solitude. You know I love talking about because the world is so noisy, we've got so many notifications on our phone, there's so much noise, but it is important for us to get into quiet. It's important for us to get into quiet, but there's also something powerful about what I would call that Ray Lewis style of prayer. If you don't know who Ray Lewis is, ray Lewis was the linebacker of the Baltimore Ravens, who are playing today and there are pregame huddles. He will get so loud, he will bring so much energy, he'll start dancing and chanting and he'll get his whole team hyped up for the game that's about to happen. I mean, he will go nuts, but and here's the thing, because some of us we go in prayer and we're just kind of like Lord. Just, you know, just blush my day today and you know, help me do good. You know I just wanna try my best.

Speaker 1: 28:35

Lord, you know it's okay to pray like that, but sometimes you just gotta get hyped about it. Sometimes you gotta get yourself a little excited about it. Sometimes you gotta be like God. I'm believing for you to move. Today. I don't know about you, but sometimes I wake up and I don't feel like things are gonna move. Sometimes I wake up and I do feel a little depressed. Sometimes I wake up and I do feel a little anxious. Sometimes I wake up and I'm like man, what is my purpose? What is my plan? Sometimes you gotta hype yourself up and sometimes you gotta get.

Speaker 1: 29:05

James five says this the effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. And the Greek to get a little deep the Greek word there is for effective and fervent is where we get the word energy. So what it's saying is sometimes we gotta they have an effective prayer, we gotta get a little energetic about it. And I'm gonna tell you this if this dude at the Buffalo Bills game can get hype at this minus seven degree weather, we can get hype when we talk to Jesus. I'm trying to be like this dude when I pray in the morning, but not really, because he got something going on with that red. Okay, nevermind, let's get him off the screen. But I'm telling you this that's why we can get a little excited there in worship. That's why we can sing a little louder, because sometimes we gotta get to our place. We gotta get to a place.

Speaker 1: 30:00

That God, I am gonna go after you, no matter what here, I'm gonna ask you this what hurt or what have to overcome to make prayer a powerful experience? Maybe for some of us we just been in a church background where it's just kind of we just kind of sit and look and the man of God teaches and we just say, mm-hmm, not here at LVC. I'm telling you there's something powerful when we worship God, when we go after it, when you sing to the Lord. Today, man, my heart was so blessed. I heard the young people from the back singing louder than the people on the stage and I was like dang of our young people can lift up a noise to Jesus, so can we. And I'm gonna tell you this it's powerful about that.

Speaker 1: 30:38

And the fifth one is this and Bethany, you can come on up and play something spiritual and get me out of here, because we all want some brunch, okay. Fifth one is this relate to the persons of prayer. Relate to the persons of prayer. What do you mean by that? See, god is not a faceless, mean ogre in heaven. He's not shrek in heaven.

Speaker 1: 31:00

According to scripture, god is very relational and we see this through the Holy Trinity. We see this through the Holy Trinity. God, the Father, god the Son, god, the Holy Spirit, god in his very nature is communal and relational. In 2 Corinthians here I want you to check this out In 2 Corinthians, it says this.

Speaker 1: 31:19

It says this the amazing grace of the master, jesus Christ, the extravagant love of God and the intimate friendship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you. I love that and this is the model of how we can approach God. See, we can focus on the cross of Jesus. We can focus on the cross. We can when we pray, we can focus on his amazing love for us, through the cross that he lived the life we couldn't, died of death we deserved and, for the joy set before Him, endured the cross. And what is that joy? What was that joy? It was you and me, it was us, it was our city, and he said for that I went to the cross.

Speaker 1: 32:08

And this is amazing grace. This is grace upon grace, morning by morning, day after day, so we can focus on the cross, and when we pray, we just simply say Jesus, I love you, jesus, I love you, and then we can focus on submission to the Father, and I know that word submission people like. Well, I don't like that word. I'm free, I'm a free bird. Are you, though? Are you really though? Because the truth is this if you're not Jesus, Father, that's cool, but you are being discipled by someone or something. You are being formed by someone, as I'm not. You know, I'm an original thought. No, you're not. The fact that you said I'm an original thought was something that you got from someone else that said that I'm just telling you this a life lived for Jesus is the best life possible. So we're going to focus our submission to the Father, and my hope for you, my hope for you, my prayer for you, is that your relationship with God will be a confident relationship, that you know not just know in your head, but know in your heart that you know that he loves you and that he is for you and that he is with you, and with that deep knowing, you willingly say to God here's my life. So we're going to focus on the cross, we're going to focus on following God, and then, third, we're going to focus on communion with the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is nudging you, guiding you, comforting you throughout the day, and the Bible says that we can walk and step with the Holy Spirit. We can have an authentic communion relationship, and those are the five Ps of prayer. Those are the five Ps of prayer that we go after, those things, but here you go.

Speaker 1: 33:55

Here's the thing, though there's four groups of people that I pray for every day. Four groups of people I pray for every day. I pray for my family. I pray for my extended family. I pray for people I know who do not believe in God. Yet you want to know who else I pray for every single day. I pray for you guys, every single day.

Speaker 1: 34:18

If you ever wonder if someone's praying for you yeah, your pastor's praying for you. I pray for you every day you may be wondering well, what do you pray about for? And some of you I pray specific things that you've asked me to pray for, and I've lift those things up. I pray those things, but there is a common thing I pray for you every single day and this is what it is. I want to show you this.

Speaker 1: 34:38

Ephesians one says this I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you and my prayers. I keep asking that God, the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may check this out, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation. Do you know what that means? That God just wants you to get it? God wants you to experience him. That, and for what purposes? Why does God want you to know them? So why does God want you to experience him? It says so that you may know him better. God wants you to experience him. And in the Greek, in the Greek, there's that word again. I'm taking it to the deep end. The Greek is the word that means intimacy. It means intimacy. In fact, it's the same word that a man would say when he knew his wife and had children. And now it's not a sexual word, but it's closeness, it's intimacy.

Speaker 1: 35:34

In my prayer for you, church, and what I pray for you every day, is that you will be with Jesus, is that you will be with Jesus, you will begin to experience him and have moments that you're close to him. So if you're wondering, what am I praying for? I'm praying that. Yes, I'm praying for the prayer request that you give me, but, more importantly, I'm praying that you will be close to Jesus. And then he says then he says this and I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened. Now, what does that mean? That means that that you're not looking through these eyes, but you're looking through your heart. And did you know your heart has eyes? And did you know that your that there is a relentless pursuit against your heart? Did you know that, before you make most mistakes, begin to think about this, before you begin to make most mistakes or most decisions? As you know, you shouldn't do that. There's something that made your heart hurt, and typically our bad decisions are a response from a broken heart, and so and so and so.

Speaker 1: 36:32

So the, the Bible verse says I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened, that we hear negative words all the time. We have terrible experiences, we have hard, we have hard day, and my prayer is that your heart will be enlightened, that you will find freedom for your lives by becoming like Jesus, so that you will be with Jesus and that you will become like Jesus, in order that you may know that, you may know the hope to which he has called you to. And what I want for you, my hope for you, is that when I talk to you, you know why you are here, not in this building, but why you are here on this earth, why God has designed you and the reason why he's he designed us is for the riches of his glorious inheritance and his holy people. And God left you in an inheritance. You may be wondering what did they say? Oh God, where is it? Give it to me. You want to know what it is. It's people. It's people You're like.

Speaker 1: 37:37

What does that mean? It means your inheritance is that your life come on. I want you to get this that your life can impact someone else's life for the better. That your life that you're not here just like an accident and you're not just breathing air, and then one day you just leave the earth, then your life that you can leave in legacy with your life that outlives your life, that changes the next generation. And I'm telling you, god has placed eternity on our hearts. God has placed something in your heart for your life to do the stuff that Jesus did, so that your life can make a difference. So he wants you to be with him. My prayer for you is that you will be with Jesus, become like Jesus and start doing the stuff that Jesus did.

Speaker 1: 38:22

And so, friends, I end this message today, I end this series, with this thought Prayer is simply talking to God and, just in case you didn't know, he is desperate to hear your voice and he can't wait to speak to you. So, god, jesus, holy Spirit, we thank you for your love. We thank you for your goodness and your favor. We ask for more of you, lord, in less of us. God, with this confidence that we have, we know that, even the heartaches in the trials and the downs and the seasons that aren't going the way we want, we know that you take those very things and you can use them to form us and shape us, that nothing is wasted with you, god. So, jesus, we focus on the cross, that you went there for us, but you didn't stay on the cross and you didn't stay in that grave, but you got back up again and because of that, we can get back up again and Father, we love you and we thank you for your extravagant love and we trust you. We say you are powerful and trustworthy and Holy Spirit, guide us, help us to walk in step with you.

Speaker 1: 40:00

If you're in here today and you're like Jacob, that sounds good, but I don't know this Jesus you're talking about. Or maybe you have prayed that prayer once in your life or so, but you kind of walked away and you want to say, man, I want to recommit my life back to Jesus. I just want to lead you in a prayer. I'm not going to call you out how you come up front, nothing like that. Just write where you are. If you want to make a decision to trust Jesus with your life, just simply talk to God. Say this prayer out loud or in your heart, just say Jesus, forgive me for my mistakes, make me new Today. I follow you. Today. I trust in you In Jesus name, amen, amen. Let's give God some praise in here today.