Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction: What are you confident about?

Things that seem impossible: tight rope walking between skyscrapers, acrobatics, climbing a mountain without a rope.

What can we confidently ask in prayer?

What is possible in prayer?

What can I ask and expect to receive it.

What is our intent?

1.

We want to be confident in our prayers.

We want God to answer our prayers.

We want to experience Jesus’ promise, “whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours” Mark 11:24.

There seems to be an elite level of prayer that we aren’t at and want to be at.

We want to pray effectively, to know what we can and can’t pray for.

We want to know we aren’t wasting our time but are actually accomplishing something with our prayers.

It bothers us to think we have to pray according to God’s will.

Why does our prayer have to be according to His will?

God’s will is right, true and always best.

If we have to pray “according to His will” does that really mean “whatever you ask” will be done?

Is this a bait and switch?

Of course not!

We don’t know God hears us.

We don’t know that we have what we asked of Him.

Why not?

We don’t know His will.

What’s the obstacle?

We don’t know what “whatever you ask” means.

We know what it doesn’t mean.

We don’t have confidence in our prayers.

So we don’t ask.

We aren’t confident in our prayers.

We have confidence in our status before God as His children.

Confidence in prayer is like or should be like the confidence we have in our salvation.

1 John 5:13

We are confident in going into God’s presence.

Hebrews 4:16

We are confident when we are walking with God, when our heart doesn’t condemn us.

We keep his commandments and please Him. 1 John 3:21-22

Our prayers don’t seem to work.

We have all prayed for things we haven’t received.

We don’t know God’s will so we don’t know what to pray!

It isn’t a sin to pray if it isn’t God’s will, we just won’t receive it.

Yet do we just throw prayers up against the wall and hope some stick?

That isn’t what is being said either.

We don’t ask.

We ask with the wrong motives.

We don’t ask according to His will.

We aren’t being obedient.

We aren’t abiding in Jesus or Him in us.

We don’t have faith when we ask.

What is the plan?

How do we pray so that we get what we ask for?

Here is how Jesus teaches us to pray so that we get whatever we ask.

Jesus’s statements about prayer have the following prerequisites.

2. Ask how Jesus would ask.

Ask in Jesus name John 14:13-14

With right motives Matthew 7:11; James 4:3

Asking some for God’s good.

According to His will 1 John 5:14-15

This includes having forgiven others Mark 11:25

It happens when we pray while agreeing with others it is good.

Matthew 18:19

3. Ask while doing what Jesus would do.

This is abiding in Jesus John 15:7

Obeying his command John 15:14, 1 John 3:22

Stop being anxious while we commit all our burdens to God Philippians 4:6-7

Confessing our sins and seeking forgiveness 1 John 1:9, Psalm 66:18, Proverbs 28:9 ESV

Being filled with the Spirit Galatians 5:16, Ephesians 5:18

Loving each other John 15:10, 17

While living in a right relationship with others 1 Peter 3:7

Producing fruit John 15:8-16, Ephesians 2:10

In faith Mark 11:24, not doubting Matthew 21:21

Having success by trusting Jesus while our work Luke 5:1-11, James 4:13-17

There are some things we get by praying and doing.

4. Ask what Jesus wants us to ask.

This where we have issues, when we pray something Jesus wouldn’t want us to pray.

It won’t be . . .

selfish Matthew 26:39; James 4:3

Like winning the lottery.

mean Genesis 50:17-21

Like punishing someone who was mean to us.

imposing Genesis 2:16-17

Like making someone choose to honor God.

like getting the winning lottery ticket or that God would punish someone because they were mean to us or if we ask God to force someone to do something.

Ask for things we know God wants.

His declared will and what God promises.

Prayer flows out of our relationship with the Father, Son and Spirit.

It isn’t just asking a random stranger for things.

Prayer is how we align our will to the Father’s.

The New American Commentary: 1, 2, 3 John (2) Be Confident in Prayer (5:14–17)

Prayer is not a convenient device for imposing our will upon God, or for bending his will to ours, but the prescribed way of subordinating our will to his.

It is by prayer that we seek God’s will, embrace it and align ourselves with it.

Every true prayer is a variation of the theme “your will be done.”

(Letters of John Stott, 188 ).

Similarly, Dodd comments: “For prayer rightly considered is not a device for employing the resources of omnipotence to fulfill our own desires, but a means by which our desires may be redirected according to the will of God, and made into channels for the forces of His will” (Johannine Epistles, 134).

It will be . . .

good Psalm 84:11, Luke 11:13,

mercy and grace Hebrews 4:16

needs Philippians 4:19

guidance Proverbs 3:5-6

wisdom James 1:5

blessing Psalm 128:1

salvation Romans 10:9-12