I have grown up in the church – I was born going to church – my parents were founding members of Faith Missionary Church – the church that Grace came from. I have been around church and church people my entire life. So, I’ve been around prayer and people that pray my whole life.
There was prayer in my home – before meals, before bed – when something bad was happening – there was prayer in my church – before meals, at the beginning and ending of meetings, in the services, Wednesday night prayer meeting (my parents never missed it) – there was prayer all around me. And remember feeling like some of those prayers that I heard out loud didn’t feel like prayers at all – it felt at times that people would use their spoken prayers as a means to prove how much they knew or gossip in prayer request form or discipline me or someone around me thru their words. At times it didn’t feel much like prayer. But what I remember most – what I recall vividly was the time I spent in “prayer” alone at night in my room while I was trying to go to sleep. I don’t think I realized it was prayer at the time – but now I know. From a very young age I remember laying in my bed and having the feeling of God all around me. I could sense him right there in the room with me. I felt comforted and secure in His presence. I knew he was with me. In that space – in that – what I now know to be – sacred space.
Prayer is one of the most important – if not the most important disciplines we can take part in as Christ followers – it is an essential aspect of our discipleship and our transformation
And for this very reason today we are beginning a 4-week series focused on the practice of prayer – simply called How to pray. And to learn what prayer is, what it isn’t, who it’s for, how to do it – we are going to spend the series looking at what Jesus has to say about prayer in the Sermon on the Mount that is found in the book of Matthew. But before we dive in let me start by praying.
Pray
We’re going to be looking at Matthew 6:5-6 today but I want to first give you a little background on what is happening in and around this scripture. The sermon on the mount is found in the gospel of Matthew in chapters 5-7. In these chapters and verses you will find some of the most quoted phrases of the gospels – including the beatitudes and the Lord’s prayer. The sermon on the mount gets its name from the first verses in Matthew 5:
5 One day as he saw the crowds gathering, Jesus went up on the mountainside and sat down. His disciples gathered around him, 2 and he began to teach them.
It is believed that this famous sermon took place on hill overlooking the sea of galilee – which is now called the Mount of Beatitudes in Northern Israel. It is here where Jesus will deliver a message about what it means to be his disciple – what it means to truly pattern your life after his – what it means to live a life of humility, grace and love and not a life of self-centeredness, self-righteousness and hypocrisy.
The section that we will be looking at focuses on his thoughts and teachings about prayer. Look with me at Matthew chapter 6 starting in verse 5 thru 13 – and I’m going to read the whole part about prayer that we will be studying for the next 4 weeks and then we will look at 2 specific verses for today:
5 “When you pray, don’t be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth, that is all the reward they will ever get. 6 But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father, who sees everything, will reward you.
7 “When you pray, don’t babble on and on as the Gentiles do. They think their prayers are answered merely by repeating their words again and again. 8 Don’t be like them, for your Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask him! 9 Pray like this:
Our Father in heaven,
may your name be kept holy.
10 May your Kingdom come soon.
May your will be done on earth,
as it is in heaven.
11 Give us today the food we need,[a]
12 and forgive us our sins,
as we have forgiven those who sin against us.
13 And don’t let us yield to temptation,[b]
but rescue us from the evil one.[c]
14 “If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. 15 But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.
This is the passage that we will be in for the next few weeks – but for today we are going to focus on verses 5 and 6
5 “When you pray, don’t be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth, that is all the reward they will ever get. 6 But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father, who sees everything, will reward you.
Don’t be a hypocrite – don’t do or say things for the people around you to see and hear – but your audience is an audience of one – your father in heaven
Jesus is making this statement about 3 different practices in this passage – he knows that his disciples will give so he says earlier in the passage:
Watch out! Don’t do your good deeds publicly, to be admired by others,… Give your gifts in private, and your Father, who sees everything, will reward you.
He knows they will fast, so he says later in the passage:
“And when you fast, don’t make it obvious, as the hypocrites do,
He is making sure they know that in all practices and disciplines – you should not do it for an earthly reward – you do it for a spiritual reward. All of these things – the giving, the fasting, the praying – you do for me and my kingdom – not for the kingdom of man.
Speaking specifically about prayer he says in verse 5:
5 “When you pray, don’t be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them.
There were two main places where a Jew in Jesus’ day might pray in a hypocritical manner. They might pray at the synagogue at the time of public prayer, or on the street at the appointed times of prayer (9 a.m., noon, and 3 p.m.).
Prayer was not normally practiced at the street corners, but…one who strictly observed the afternoon hour of prayer could deliberately time his movements to bring him to the most public place at the appropriate time.”
Don’t make a spectacle of your prayers – don’t go looking for opportunities where you can make sure everyone gets to hear you pray
Where everyone can see you
This is a common fault in public prayer today, when people pray to impress or teach others instead of genuinely pouring out their hearts before God.
We’ve all been there before – maybe we’ve even done this
“dear lord – I just want to lift up Karen/Kevin – lord you know she is a mess (sitting right next to you) – lord – oh Jesus she just needs a good counselor lord – if she could just lord – find someone to tell her how wrong she is in this situation lord – to help her see lord that she just needs to keep her mouth shut lord
You know it happens and if you just sprinkle in enough lords, you sound legit and holy – but you’re just trying to teach Karen/Kevin a lesson
There is no reward for that – maybe someone might think you’re smart for the moment – but there is no heavenly reward – you are using God as a tool for your recognition – you are using God as a means to your end
That is not prayer – that is self-promotion and self-recognition, and it is an insult to God
Prayer is – verse 6
6 But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father, who sees everything, will reward you.
Rather, we should meet with God in our room (or “closet”). The idea is of a private place where we can impress no one except God.
I. The specific ancient Greek word “room” was used for a storeroom where treasures were kept. This reminds us that there are treasures waiting for us in our prayer closet
But to truly understand why Jesus is saying all of this about prayer – I think we need to fully understand what prayer is. And to do that I want to go to a passage in the OT in Genesis – chapter 28 – verses 12-17
In this passage Jacob has deceived his father and Esau, his brother, and he is fleeing from them, and he gets tired and stops to rest and has this dream:
12 As he slept, he dreamed of a stairway that reached from the earth up to heaven. And he saw the angels of God going up and down the stairway.
13 At the top of the stairway stood the LORD, and he said, “I am the LORD, the God of your grandfather Abraham, and the God of your father, Isaac. The ground you are lying on belongs to you. I am giving it to you and your descendants. 14 Your descendants will be as numerous as the dust of the earth! They will spread out in all directions—to the west and the east, to the north and the south. And all the families of the earth will be blessed through you and your descendants. 15 What’s more, I am with you, and I will protect you wherever you go. One day I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have finished giving you everything I have promised you.”
16 Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely the LORD is in this place, and I wasn’t even aware of it!” 17 But he was also afraid and said, “What an awesome place this is! It is none other than the house of God, the very gateway to heaven!”
In this passage thru his dream I believe Jacob entered into the true space of prayer – the staircase/ladder that it is commonly referred to – Jacob’s ladder - that he dreamed of is a symbol of how we can enter into true prayer with God – as we leave the world behind and ascend the staircase/ladder and God descends the ladder and enters into our presence – that is where true prayer or communion with God can be experienced.
In that dream Jacob entered into the presence of God – he experienced him – God spoke to him - that’s why when he awoke, he said:
“Surely the LORD is in this place, and I wasn’t even aware of it!”… 17 “What an awesome place this is! It is none other than the house of God, the very gateway to heaven!”
He had entered the sacred space and had been changed by God.
Prayer is not something you do – it is something you experience.
In the book Going Higher with God in Prayer – A.W. Tozer says this about prayer:
“Prayer is not a ritual or the mumbling of phrases; rather, it is experiencing the awesome presence of God.”
“…prayer is not merely a process or program, but a sacred and holy activity.”
“Prayer is discovering the presence of God in a way we did not know before.”
This is what Jacob discovered. We ascend the staircase and leave the world behind – because we cannot bring the world into that sacred space – and then God descends at his discretion and meets us in that beautiful place that is prayer.
Tozer also said:
“Prayer is not something we add to our life. Rather, it is something we ascend to.”
This takes intentionality and determination and time and space. You can’t casually move into it – and this grows as we mature in our faith – there are steps on the staircase and rungs on the ladder – as we continue to pursue God and mature in our faith, we move up a step or up a rung and move closer to him. We leave the world further and further behind as we move into that prayer space – step up a stair or rung
The ladder (or staircase) is symbolic of the connection between HEAVEN and EARTH. Jacob's ladder established contact between man and God.
And then Jesus fulfills that ladder/stairway image for us – as he tells us in John 1:51
“Then he said, “I tell you the truth, you will all see heaven open and the angels of God going up and down on the Son of Man, the one who is the stairway between heaven and earth.”
Prayer is first – access to God – and Jesus makes that access fully possible for us.
Prayer is that sacred space between heaven and earth where, because we have full access to him, we ascend to him, and he descends to us, and true transformation can occur.
Again Tozer:
“I need to get to the point where I am coming up into His presence and allowing Him to come down into my presence at His discretion. And when that happens, I will begin to see things like I never saw them before. I see them from God’s perspective.”
That is special
That is powerful
That is beautiful
That is the prayer that Jesus talks about it
And you can experience it
Just you and God – the world left behind – while you experience intimate time with God
And that is why Jesus says in the sermon on that mount
But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private.
To boast about it – to exploit it is offensive – it’s wrong – and you get no reward for that
But when you intentionally choose to enter that sacred space – you will be rewarded – you will see things from God’s perspective – you will be transformed
I realize now that when I was a little girl going to sleep at night – and I felt the Jesus all around me – that was my sacred space – I was experiencing him – childlike faith – we can tend to trivialize that deep personal set apart prayer time – as not needed or takes too much time or what does it really do – but that is the space where we encounter and experience God in the deepest sense
I spend most of my days in constant and continual conversation with God – it is how I survive – but entering into that intentional set apart sacred space makes it possible for me to live in and practice the presence of God on a daily, hourly, minute by minute basis.
In the book, the practice of the presence of God by Brother Lawrence it says this:
“This brother has become so accustomed to God’s divine presence that he relies on it for help on all sorts of occasions. His soul has been filled with constant inner joy that is sometimes so overwhelming,…Experiencing these things makes this brother certain beyond all doubt that God is always in the depth of his soul, no matter what he does or what happens to him.”
When we ascend that stairway and meet with God in private – in secret – He then fills us so full of the Holy Spirit that we feel and experience his presence all day every day.
And Jesus led by example – in Matthew 14:23 it says:
23 After sending them home, he went up into the hills by himself to pray. Night fell while he was there alone.
Even Jesus knew he needed that sacred space. And he knows we need it too. Life is hard
Of course, we have times of corporate prayer – prayer with others – times where we share that sacred space with a friend – times where we as a community enter that sacred space together. But as followers of Jesus – our private individual encounter and experience with God is the most important and the place where true transformation takes place.
Tozer says:
“Every Christian is defined by their prayer life, and if we are not living in prayer, we are not experiencing the life God has for us.”
You have to make room for this sacred space to occur.
Morning
Evening/bedtime
When the spirit prompts
When you feel weak or distraught
When you feel tempted
Practices to accompany:
Fasting
Scripture
Journaling
Music
Movement
Can you find an hour once a month – once a week – once a day to try this?
Your reward will be great.