Prevailing Prayer

Prevailing Prayer

By Pastor Matt Black

10 February 2008
Lord's Day morning
Luke 11:5-13; Luke 18:1

Introduction: Open your Bibles to Luke 11:5-13. This morning once again, we are going to be looking at the various approaches to God in prayer. Today we are looking at prevailing prayer, and the title of the message is: “Prevailing Prayer”.

Prayer is like a diamond. There are many different sides and angles to it. The light shines one way into it, and out of it comes a prism of colors that dazzle the eye. And so it is with prayer. All prayer is union and interaction and communion with God. But like that diamond there are various sides and approaches to prayer that shine through a Christian’s life. We’ve looked at public prayer, and private prayer, and also pardoning prayer. We wrestle with God and experience Him in prayer in these ways.

But this morning, we are going to begin by looking at a forth approach to prayer that I’m calling Prevailing Prayer. True prayer, guided by the Holy Spirit, is persistent, and it grabs hold of God until it secures an answer. It never gives up!

Remember Jacob in the Old Testament, it says he wrestled with God all night long. And the sun was starting to come up. And we read in Genesis 32:26, that the Angel of the Lord said to Jacob, “Let me go, for the day breaketh. And [Jacob] said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.” Jacob secured an answer! God blessed him, changed his name to Israel, and changed his nature! We are still talking about him and his descendants today. Jacob prevailed in prayer.

True prayer has never been about a show of religion for genuine Christians. We want an answer! True prayer keeps asking and knocking and seeking until the answer comes. With that in mind, would you stand with me as we look at Luke 11:5-13?

Let’s read beginning with Luke 11:5-13, “And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves; 6 For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him? 7 And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee. 8 I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth. 9 And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. 10 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. 11 If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? 12 Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? 13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?”

[Prayer for guidance]

In this story, Jesus teaches us that we should NEVER give up on God.

Illustration: I pulled into to the Annex driveway the other day to drop something off. Now I was barely in the driveway, just enough to get out of oncoming traffic, but I realized very quickly that I had made a big mistake. I went to pull out, and I realized my car had hydroplaned about six inches above the concrete suspended on the snow. I had a task ahead of me. Essentially, I had to take out all the snow from underneath my car. Every so often I would get into my car and put it in reverse to back out. Every time there was absolutely NO movement. NOTHING! So I would shovel some more. An hour into it, my wife called and offered to help. She grabbed a bucket of salt and headed out, while I pondered calling a tow truck! Finally, the entire car was dug out, except for the six-inches of snow directly under the tires that were acting as pegs to suspend my car in the air! About the time my wife arrived, there was a bit of movement and my car came off the snow pegs to the ground—finally! But though it looked like dry ground under my car—there was nothing but ice, and still I could not make it the four feet out of the driveway edge and into the street. I was glad Jill had arrived with the salt! After about an hour and a half, the salt went down and my car finally came out. I was so glad I had not given up. I wanted to about every ten minutes as the cold was seeping into my bones. But I didn’t give up until I secure the desired result!

My plea to you, is don’t give up on God! He’ll answer you! He says, “Call unto me, and I will answer thee, and shew thee great and mighty things, which thou knowest not” (Jeremiah 33:3).

I. First we need to see that we all have a great TEMPTATION for giving up on God! In my flesh Paul said “dwelleth no good thing”. Our spirit may be willing in prayer, but the flesh is weak. Jesus would never have told us to keep praying and to pray and not to faint, if there were not a constant temptation to give up on God. And some of you have given up. You wonder why God is not answering your prayers. If you were honest, you’d admit that you used to pray for certain things, but God didn’t answer, so you gave up.

A. Maybe you’re here this morning, and you’ve given up on your MARRIAGE. You know it’s not what God wants it to be. I want you to know that prayer will make the difference. Pray and persist and prevail in prayer, and your life will change.

B. Maybe you’re here today with a dead end JOB, and you are discouraged with your working conditions, with your boss, or that your paycheck is never enough. And you work 40 to 60 hours a week. And you’re discouraged. We work so much, but we pray about our work so little. And while God never promises to change your work situation, He does promise to change your attitude!! I believe if we prevailed in prayer, we’d be different people.

C. Maybe you’re CHILDREN have broken your heart, and you’ve given up praying for them. You’re believing the lie of Satan that you can’t do anything about it. That’s a lie, because my Bible says “the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much”. As one brother eloquently put it: “you’ve got to do war with the floor”!

Some of you here today are frustrated, joyless Christians because you’ve seen little answered prayer. You pray little because you don’t believe God will answer. I can promise that you will experience nothing but frustration if you are not seeing answers from God. Have you ever seen an unhappy child riding his new bicycle on his birthday? No way! The child asked. Jesus said, “ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full” (John 16:24). He says in our passage in Luke 11 and verse 9, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.”

We need to pray until we get an answer or until God clearly leads us to stop praying. We ought to pray and not to lose heart as Luke 8:1 says.

II. So now I want you to see that the Life of Jesus is the greatest TESTIMONY that you should never give up on God. He gave us the example of seeing answered prayer in His own life. Verse 1 of our text in Luke 11 says Jesus gave this parable (a parable is a story about everyday life that illustrates an eternal truth), and at that time, “he was praying in a certain place”. Even though He was the Son of God, Jesus prayed while He was on earth. He was constantly in prayer to His Father. He was praying when the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove (Luke 3:21). He began his ministry with forty days of prayer and fasting in the desert wilderness in Galilee (Luke 4:1-15). During many times in His life, Jesus withdrew from His disciples and the crowds to be alone to pray. He often went up on a mountainside or to solitary places to pray. Sometimes He even went to pray very early in the morning, while it was still dark (Matthew 14:23, Mark 1:35, 6:46, Luke 5:16). Sometimes Jesus spend whole nights on the mountainside or in the Garden of Gethsemane in prayer (Luke 6:12).

Jesus Himself during His life on earth was in constant prayer! These habits of Jesus teach us an important truth about prayer. This is amazing because it tells us of our deep need of prayer. If even the Son of God needed to pray, how much more do we stand in need of prayer! He prayed. If prayer was central in Jesus’ life, I want it to be central in my life. I want to be more like Jesus. I want to be a man of prayer more than I’ve ever been in my life.

III. And as far as giving up on God is concerned, I want you to thirdly catch the TEACHING of Jesus on this matter. We read in Luke 11:1, that when Jesus “was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray”. And so Jesus did! Now when the God of the universe gives you advice about prayer, you had better listen. And His advice is found in verse 9: keep asking, keep seeking, keep knocking!—until you get the answer!

In this passage, Jesus is teaching us about prayer. And everything Jesus prayed for He got. When Lazarus died, Martha said to Jesus, “I know, that … whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it thee” (John 11:22). And she was right. Jesus knew nothing of unanswered prayer.

He says in Luke 18:1, “that men ought always to pray, and not to faint”. We often give up on God. Jesus says—Don’t faint—don’t give up! Pray! The word here “to pray” means to persist in prayer until the answer comes. Jesus commands us to pray, not simply to waste air molecules, but to see God’s amazing will be done—that we would pray until we see an answer.

I want to mention four things in this text that Jesus teaches us about praying—four directions based on four promises.

A. First, Jesus teaches us that prayer that never gives up is focused on God’s Sovereignty. When the disciples ask Jesus to teach them to pray (11:1), he says (in verse 2), “When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed [TREASURED] be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth.”

1. Jesus first points us to the fact that God is in TOTAL control. We pray to our Father who is in Heaven. You can prevail in prayer because God’s hands are not tied. You can pray confidently, “Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth” because God’s arm is not too short to do anything! God can do anything anywhere anytime.

Jesus says our first desire, our first request, is that His kingdom advance and come. You must surrender your will and agenda for God’s agenda.

The greatest desire of prayer is that Christ would increase and that we would decrease! That Jesus Christ would shine through me and that His Kingdom and rule in our lives would take a greater hold on our lives and the lives of others.

Application: Let me bring it down to where we live. To your surprise, you are not in total control of the universe, God is. We pray not to change God, but for us to get in line with God’s sovereign will. We can change almost none of the circumstances in our lives, but we can react in a way that pleases God, and to pray for God’s will to be done. This breeds effectual fervent prayer. We don’t change God, but God sovereignly changes us into the image of Christ through our prayers.

2. Then Jesus says that you need to realize that God is to be TREASURED. “Hallowed by thy name” is our prayer. If you’ve come to know Christ, His name is sacred to you. You cannot bear to hear His name taken in vain. And you bear the Name of Christ in your life. You call yourself a Christian. And so you pray that God’s Name would be treasured and hallowed through your life. That you would give people to rejoice in the name of Jesus. That happens because God’s will is done in your life, on earth as it is in heaven. So you prevail in prayer because that is your desire.

B. Second, Jesus teaches us that prevailing prayer that never gives up is focused on God’s Love.

Jesus doesn't want us to feel insecure in our prayers. He shows this mainly by teaching us to call God Father when we pray to him. The prayer in verse 2 begins, simply, “Our Father”. As a Father he will provide all our needs. He will protect us from temptation. He will forgive us of our sins. And then in verses 11-13 he unpacks for us some of the security implied in this word, Father. God is your Father—of course He is going to answer you!!

Look at verses 11-13, “If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? 12 Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? 13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?”

The words “how much more” mean something utterly crucial for us. They mean that God is much more inclined to hear us and help us when we pray than earthly fathers are. You are accepted and loved by the Father! You are a joint heir with Jesus Christ. You ought never to feel unsure of your acceptance or that God would ever be unconcerned with anything you request. “He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things?” (Romans 8:32).

Is all well with your soul? If you don’t sense the love of God for you, then you’ll give up on God. You can't sustain a life of prayer if you believe God is stonewalling you or angry with you or even neutral to you. God is passionately for you! You were once His enemy, but now you are His child! Romans 8:31, “What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?” Prayer is sustained by the confidence that God is our Father and that he is more concerned about our life than we could ever be!! You need to understand that He is MORE inclined to give what we need than the very best human father is. How much do you love your son or your daughter? Would you do anything to meet their deepest needs? God is MUCH MORE INCLINED—a billion times more inclined to meet your needs!! That's the promise. And the direction is: prevail in prayer with this sense of deep security in your heavenly Father’s love.

C. Thirdly, Jesus teaches us that prevailing prayer that never gives up is focused on God’s Goodness.

Jesus tells the story in verses 5-8 that this guy has an unexpected guest show up, and he goes to his friend’s house because there isn’t enough food in the house to feed him.

He asks his friend for three loaves of bread. His friend says, Don’t bother me now! The door is locked, the children are asleep in my room!

But the guy keeps knocking and asking until the man gets up, not because of his friendship, but because of the man's prevailing, persisting, persevering knocking. We all feel that this is a very unattractive image of the transaction of prayer.

Now I know that the direction to prevail feels inconsistent with the love of our heavenly Father. We are prone to ask, ‘If God is more caring than the best earthly father, then why would He sometimes be slow to respond to our prayer?’

God is ready to answer you. He is willing to answer you. But part of prayer is waiting on God. And sometimes God says WAIT to our prayers. Why? It is not because He is not able to answer.

Immediately (in verse 9) Jesus says that there is a lesson to learn: “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. 10 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.” Three things here stress the importance of prevailing, not giving up in prayer.

Ø One is the tense of the verbs in Greek: present tense is continuous action; keep on asking, etc.

Ø The second is the fact that Jesus commands this continuous action three times (and repeats these three words in verse 10).

Ø The third thing that stresses prevailing is that the three words used get increasingly close to the answer and show a pressing in on God.

House Illustration: Asking (as it were, for the house); seeking (until we find it), then knocking (until the door is open). Asking is the simplest and requires no movement. Seeking turns asking into an activity of pursuit. Knocking on and on at the door again and again signifies utter earnestness and perhaps even desperation.

So Jesus clearly wants us to be like this friend who kept knocking. He want us to prevail in prayer. But then he makes a sudden turn in verse 11 and shifts from the image of a grumpy friend to the image of a caring Father.

Jesus qualifies his point in verses 11-13 by saying that God is NOT like that friend. He is like the most caring Father imaginable.

A good father will only give his children what is good for them. This is the only answer Jesus gives to our question in this text: when the Father in heaven gives us a slow answer -- when he wills that we prevail for a season -- it is because he is giving us a fish and not a serpent. He is giving us what is good for us. There is something in the prevailing -- the asking and seeking and knocking -- that we need, that is good for us. And he knows best.

The promise that will encourage us in prevailing prayer is simply verse 10: “For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened”. God is not unresponsive to prevailing prayer.

D. Fourthly, Jesus teaches us that prevailing prayer that never gives up is focused on God’s Presence.

Jesus teaches in verse 13 that our prevailing in prayer should be a prevailing for the Holy Spirit, “If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?”

It is no accident that Luke tells us in Luke 3:21 and following that while Jesus was praying the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove. Or that the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost came as the climax of a ten-day prayer vigil. Or (in Acts 4:31) that when the church had prayed, the place where they gathered was shaken and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit. Prevailing prayer is the pathway to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

Conclusion: Have you given up on God? Do you sense the outpouring of the Spirit directing you in your life? Are you fixated on your life and your desires, or are you focusing on His sovereignty, His love, His goodness, and His presence? God controls all things. He loves you. He is good. He is faithful to give you His presence and guide you every step of the way! Are you seeing answered prayer? Are you asking? Are you seeking? Are you knocking? James 4:2, “ye have not, because ye ask not.” Get your focus off of yourself and onto His majesty! Prevail in prayer for His kingdom, and it will come!