Jesus' Sermon On Prayer

Read Luke 11:1-13

“Now the disciples had often heard Jesus teach, but they didn’t ask Him, ‘Lord, teach us to preach.’ They had often seen

Him heal the sick and perform miracles, but they didn’t say, “Lord, teach us to heal the sick or perform miracles.” It was the simplicity, the tenderness, the effectiveness and power of His praying that so impressed them that they approached Him, saying, “Lord, teach us to pray.”

In response we have this lovely little sermon with its three points.

THE PATTERN - vss. 2-4

Now, Jesus had previously composed this prayer and suggested it in a slightly longer version during His famous Sermon on the Mount. I suppose this is the prayer He frequently suggested whenever people approached Him with questions about prayer.

But I have a real problem in conveying to you the impact these words must have made, because most of us have herd them so many times that we do not hear them as the audiences heard them in our Lord's day. To us, this is a very traditional prayer. To us, this is historic liturgy. To us, this is a part of our historic Christian observance.

But to the people of His day, this was radical. It was revolutionary. It was irreverent. It was contemporary to the point of being offensive. The people were shocked when they heard Jesus praying in this way.

Look at it again: He said to them, "When you pray, say, Father..." Do you realize what a radical departure that was from the accepted and traditional form or Jewish praying?

Look At Gen. 15:1-2 After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward." But Abram said, Lord God, what will You give me, seeing I go childless,..."

Notice how he addressed God: O Sovereign Lord. The older translations put this: O, Lord God.

And notice how David prayed. We perhaps have more of David’s prayers recorded for us in the Scripture than anyone else’s. Not one time did he ever address God using the word Father. Not once that I can find. It was always, O Lord, O Jehovah, O God….”

I went through the Old Testament to see how many times God is referred to as Our Father, and I found only a sparse handful, and even then the word is used almost exclusively to convey His authority and discipline.

· Moses said in Deuteronomy 32.6: Is this the way you repay the Lord, O foolish and unwise people? Is He not your Father, your Creator, who made and formed you?

The saints and sages of the Old Testament were not comfortable with calling God their Father, for it was too familiar, too irreverent, too presumptuous, too disrespectful.

And then suddenly Jesus came, without shame, without hesitation, without restraint. In His opening sermon, the Sermon on the Mount, He referred to God in His role of a Father more times than we find in all the thirty-nine chapters of the Old Testament, and it was radical.

He called God His Father

· 42 times in Matthew

· 3 times in Mark

· 17 times in Luke

· and a whopping 110 times in John’s Gospel!

John 5:17-18 gives us an idea as to how upsetting this was for people:

17 But Jesus answered them, “My Father has been working until now, and I have been working.”

18 Therefore the Jews sought all the more to kill Him, because He not only broke the Sabbath, but also said that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God.

They wanted to stone Him over this. And now He was teaching His disciples to address God as "Father."

But He is our FAther, and there are vast implications of this, as Jesus points out in our text today, in Luke 11:11 ff: 11 If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? 13 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!”

Now, having given us permission to refer to God as our Father, what then does He suggest we pray about? We are to ask our Father very simply and humbly and intimately for five things. He gives us five basic prayer requests:

· May Your name be honored – Hallowed be Your name.

· May Your will be done – Your Kingdom come.

· May our needs be met – Give us this day our daily bread.

· May our sins be forgiven – Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive…

· May our lives be pure – And lead us not into temptation.

A PARABLE - vss. 5-8

Jesus said, “This man’s friendship was not a strong enough motivation to root this man out of bed, but the incessant knocking did the trick. It wasn’t love or loyalty that won the day; it was persistence.”

And Jesus was teaching us by this parable to keep on praying, to be persistent.

The New King James uses a better word: ...because of his persistence. And the old King James uses the word importunity… The Greek word that Luke actually used as he gave us this account is a word that denotes shamelessness. This man didn’t care how it looked, he didn’t care if he woke up the neighbors. He didn’t care if others thought he was crazy. He would not be denied.

And Jesus said—that’s the way we should pray.

A PROMISE - vss. 9-13

“So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.

Notice here that Jesus gives us a promise, and just to make sure we don’t miss it, He repeats it over and over and over. He gives us this promise six times:

· Ask and it will be given to you.

· Seek and you will find.

· Knock and the door will be opened to you.

· Everyone who asks receives.

· Everyone who seeks finds.

· To Him who knocks, the door will be opened.

Six times, and as if that weren’t enough, He gives it to us in another form: Luke 11.11-13: 11 If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? 13 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!”

James Montgomery, that strong-willed Moravian newspaper editor in England who wrote some of our greatest hymns including the Christmas carol, “Angels from the Realms of Glory,” wrote a wonderful old hymn, now seldom-sung, on this subject.

Prayer is the burden of a sigh,
The falling of a tear
The upward glancing of an eye,
When none but God is near.

Prayer is the simplest form of speech
That infant lips can try;
The upward glancing of an eye,
When none but God is near.

Prayer is the Christian’s vital breath,
The Christian’s native air,
His watchword at the gates of death;
He enters heaven with prayer.

Prayer is the contrite sinner’s voice,
Returning from his ways,
While angels in their songs rejoice
And cry, “Behold, he prays!”

The saints in prayer appear as one
In word, in deed, and mind,
While with the Father and the Son
Sweet fellowship they find.

No prayer is made by man alone
The Holy Spirit pleads,
And Jesus, on th’eternal throne,
For sinners intercedes.

O Thou by Whom we come to God,
The Life, the Truth, the Way,
The path of prayer Thyself hast trod:
Lord, teach us how to pray.