This Sermon was Presented in May 2001:
Tonight, our devotional topic is prayer. Prayer is the most important aspect in the life of the church.
DL Moody says, “it is not recorded that Jesus taught the disciples to preach… it is not by eloquent sermons that perishing souls are going to be reached; we need the power of God in order that the blessing may come down.”
We must pray, we must not consider anything else more important than prayer. I’m often reminded of this.
It will be so easy for me to push the latest evangelistic program or Bible study. And those are important.
But there is nothing more important than prayer, because prayer is the fuel keep us going. Without it we are nothing. It is vital, if we are going to see growth in any area, to pray.
Dr. Thom Rainer, who is the dean of the Billy Graham School for evangelism at the southern seminary, and a friend of mine, recently did a study of the most effective southern Baptist churches. Of those he interviewed, 70% rated prayer as a major factor in their evangelistic success.
“Interestingly, he said, the strongest responses came to from the extremes of the smallest churches and the largest churches”.
Basically in his study he found that statistically this was a factor that affected all churches. Some of the comments from their interviews were:
“Prayer, corporate prayer, explains the evangelistic turnaround in our church”.
“I believe the primary reason that God has his hand on our church is our commitment to the foundation of prayer”.
Then, in a recent study about the formerly unchurched Rainer said that 83% of the affected churches had corporate prayer ministries.
“Billy Graham’s letter this month says that the secret to any crusade is the power of God’s Holy Spirit moving in the answer to the prayers of millions of his people around the world.” But we don’t need the statistics to prove to us that prayer is important we have the Bible.
And prayer is important. We see the early church spent much time in prayer. And we need to as well. So if you have your Bibles this evening please turn to Ephesians 6. 18
Let us pray.
Some have questioned if I am settling in Ok. Well today, I was able to run. I haven’t done that in about a year. But I was able to the day.
It’s nice to have a place to run where you don’t get run over. So I set out with my earphones, and ran 2 mi. And now I am feeling pretty good. But don’t ask me tomorrow.
It gave me a chance to think about some things, brush out some cob webs. I began running feeling good. I was loving it, I was actually happy that I could still do it.
So I was just jogging along, feeling the wind, and just loosening up. Then after about the first mile, I began to hurt. It always does that on the last half. I was getting tired. I was getting hotter. And I thought about quitting.
But I kept going. I came around the last lap, and didn’t feel good, but was proud. I was thankful the have a body that can still run and exercise. I was thankful that I finally had a place to run. I noticed how much energy I had. And I had greater confidence and a sense of freedom.
So, I’m settling in.
Last night, a church member and I had a good time of visitation. We went to two church members and one non-church member.
I was excited and called Monica, and we talked to later. So I went to bed later. And this morning, I woke up later. After I cleaned up and got my coffee, I read the Bible, and I prayed.
At first, it was a little slow, and I was loosening up. Then as always about halfway through I was getting tired. I wanted to get up and do something else. But I continued. When I finished, I felt good and I was ready for the day.
Your prayer life is an exercise of discipline. We can’t stop, we must keep going. And we as a church must pray.
Let’s look at Ephesians 6:18.
“praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints,” (Ephesians 6:18 ESV)
We must pray at all times. There’s nothing we do that should be absent of prayer.
Tomorrow is the national day of prayer. Dr. Adrian Rogers will be preaching at the White House. Dr. Rogers, is special to me, he took care of my family while my father was in Vietnam. And throughout his years at ministry, I have listened to many of his sermons. And Dr. Rogers is a man that I model my ministry after. So, if you have C-SPAN try to listen to his sermon.
But tomorrow he is preaching to the president, on the issue of prayer. Prayer is so important for our nation. It is interesting that students cannot pray in school but I have full access to pray with hospital patients.
Our nation was founded on prayer. The great document of the declaration of independence and the constitution were a result of prayer. We need to remember our nation.
As America goes through this time of spiritual identity, we need to pray. We need to pray on Election Day. We need to pray for our leaders. We need to pray as we pay our taxes. We need to pray for every area of the government. And we need to pray in school. We need to pray in every area of life– at all times.
We need to pray for church. As I get more involved, I’m excited about the ministries here. The activities of mission groups, choirs, Sunday school classes, and Sunday morning worship. There are many more, of course. But we need to pray for each one.
I am constantly aware of Satan’s opposition to what goes on here. We need to pray. And we need to pray in our personal lives. We need to take our needs before Christ. Actively, seeking out God’s will for our lives.
We’ve mentioned Sunday about a personal quiet time. This is a time when you read the Bible and pray. Each one here needs to make that a priority. Jesus did. We see him go into the hills to pray. Occasionally, it would be mentioned about Jesus praying. We need to pray in our lives.
Not only are we to pray all times, we must stay alert. The imagery I see here, is of the disciples falling asleep in the garden. Jesus was praying, disciples could not say awake—for even an hour.
Are we like that? We try to stay awake at all times praying for God’s guidance. The Bible says that we are to pray continually, that means we are to stay alert. Constantly communicating with God about the needs in our hearts, and the needs of those around us. We need to stay alert to what God has to say to us.
I believe prayer is two ways, God speaks us as we speak to him. He speaks to us through his word. We need to read and study and understand the principles of God. So we can understand what his will is.
We need to stay alert. How do we stay alert? We discipline ourselves. I mentioned earlier having a daily quiet time. This time keeps you alert. By spending the beginning of the day focused on what God wants you to do that day, and carrying that throughout the rest of the day—keeps you alert. By studying the word of God keeps you alert. This is not simple reading but serious study and application. I also recommend reading Christian books. There are many available today, and I recommend them to you—but as I said before be careful, and always measure with the yard stick of Scripture.
Then we must be persistent.
Continually means persistent. Being persistent is also being disciplined. Continually coming up to God asking, pleading, your case before him. More has been done by men and women in their persistency of prayer, than anything else in the world. Because when men and women are persistent in prayer, they understand where the strength comes from.
Do we what to see God move in this church? Of course we do. That will only come through prayer. Persistent, humble, continual prayer. And we must do that.
We must be like the story I read in Dr. Moody’s book , Prevailing Prayer,
“I heard something the other day that cheered me greatly. Prayer had been made for a man for about 40 years, but there was no sign of any answer. It seemed as though he was going down to his grave one of the most self-righteous men on the face of the earth. Conviction came in one night. In the morning he sent for the members of his family, and said to his daughter: “I want you to pray for me. Pray that God would forgive my sins; my whole life has been nothing but sin—sin.”
Do you know anyone like that? Someone that you are praying for, that needs to come to Christ? Then pray. Pray that day to will come to Christ, and pray persistently.
Let us pray.