23 min
What Can I Ask for? // Unlocking the Power of Prayer, Part 4 Christianityworks Official Podcast
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- Christianity
Way too many Christians are way too timid in their prayer lives. Now, I’m not saying be belligerent and demanding, but let me tell you, if your faith is in Jesus … you have a lot more power in your prayer than you realised.
OUR FAITH IN CHRIST Well, welcome to this last program in the four part series that I’ve called, “The Power of Prayer”. Over the last few weeks we’ve been looking at this whole prayer thing – “Bridging the Communication Gap”. You know sometimes we’re so busy, we’re running around we’re running around doing things. We just don’t take the time to spend with God. Then we saw how Jesus taught us to pray, just a humble, simple communication. Not trying to impress God or trying to impress anyone else, just spending time humbly before Him.
And then last week we saw what it meant to pray with power. This is so important. Last week on the program we saw time and time again God’s Word teaches us to pray with boldness, not with arrogance, but with a confidence in who God is and who we are in Christ Jesus.
When we talk about prayer one of the questions that comes up is, “Well, what can I ask God for? I mean, can I go to God and ask Him for anything? What if I want a flash new car, can I ask Him for that? Or a pay rise, or healing? How come sometimes He answers some peoples prayers for things like that and not others?” We’re going to take a look at that on the program today, because you know something, it’s an important question.
On the one hand, absolutely, we should pray with boldness because that’s what God’s word tells us to do. But on the other, in our me-centric world, and we’re all a product of that somehow aren’t we, it’s easy to get things the wrong way around.
We put ‘me’ at the centre and then we expect God to dance around to our tune. On the other hand, didn’t Jesus say, “Ask for whatever you wish and it will be given to you. And you haven’t received yet because you haven’t asked. See the dilemma.
On the one hand God is God. He’s Sovereign, He’s almighty. His thoughts aren’t our thoughts, His ways aren’t our ways. And yet He teaches over and over again to pray with a faith and a boldness and a perseverance and belief, as Paul puts it in Ephesians Chapter 1, “In the Power that we have”, with a capital ‘P’. Now how do we resolve this dilemma? How do we get it right? What are we missing here in our understanding about this apparent conflict? For me it starts and ends with a deep faith in Jesus.
I was just reading this morning in my own devotion time the Gospel of Luke Chapter 6. Grab a Bible if you have one and open it up with me. Chapter 6 verse 17:
Jesus went down with the people and stood on a level place. There was a large crowd of His disciples and a great number of people from Judea, from Jerusalem and from the coast of Tyre and Sidon and they had come to hear Him and to be healed of their diseases. Those troubled by evil spirits were cured and the people all tried to touch Him because power was coming from Him and healing them.”
See, power was coming from Him. The Greek word for power is ‘dunamis’ we get the word dynamite. We are talking serious power was coming from Jesus and people were getting healed.
We have to look at what it says before then. You see it says that they had come to hear him and be healed from all their diseases. That’s verse 18 of chapter 6 of Luke’s gospel. And there’s the key. We need to be open to who Jesus is and what He has to say. Jesus said some outrageous things. Love your enemy for starters. Forgive people. Call God “Dad” which is very radical. He ushered in a power, radical love.
He hung around sinners and lepers and prostitutes and healed the lame, the blind on the Sabbath when he shouldn’t have. And criticised the religious establishment for its hypocrisy. This Jesus, this unconventional saviour, that you just can’t easily put it in a box somewhere.
Way too many Christians are way too timid in their prayer lives. Now, I’m not saying be belligerent and demanding, but let me tell you, if your faith is in Jesus … you have a lot more power in your prayer than you realised.
OUR FAITH IN CHRIST Well, welcome to this last program in the four part series that I’ve called, “The Power of Prayer”. Over the last few weeks we’ve been looking at this whole prayer thing – “Bridging the Communication Gap”. You know sometimes we’re so busy, we’re running around we’re running around doing things. We just don’t take the time to spend with God. Then we saw how Jesus taught us to pray, just a humble, simple communication. Not trying to impress God or trying to impress anyone else, just spending time humbly before Him.
And then last week we saw what it meant to pray with power. This is so important. Last week on the program we saw time and time again God’s Word teaches us to pray with boldness, not with arrogance, but with a confidence in who God is and who we are in Christ Jesus.
When we talk about prayer one of the questions that comes up is, “Well, what can I ask God for? I mean, can I go to God and ask Him for anything? What if I want a flash new car, can I ask Him for that? Or a pay rise, or healing? How come sometimes He answers some peoples prayers for things like that and not others?” We’re going to take a look at that on the program today, because you know something, it’s an important question.
On the one hand, absolutely, we should pray with boldness because that’s what God’s word tells us to do. But on the other, in our me-centric world, and we’re all a product of that somehow aren’t we, it’s easy to get things the wrong way around.
We put ‘me’ at the centre and then we expect God to dance around to our tune. On the other hand, didn’t Jesus say, “Ask for whatever you wish and it will be given to you. And you haven’t received yet because you haven’t asked. See the dilemma.
On the one hand God is God. He’s Sovereign, He’s almighty. His thoughts aren’t our thoughts, His ways aren’t our ways. And yet He teaches over and over again to pray with a faith and a boldness and a perseverance and belief, as Paul puts it in Ephesians Chapter 1, “In the Power that we have”, with a capital ‘P’. Now how do we resolve this dilemma? How do we get it right? What are we missing here in our understanding about this apparent conflict? For me it starts and ends with a deep faith in Jesus.
I was just reading this morning in my own devotion time the Gospel of Luke Chapter 6. Grab a Bible if you have one and open it up with me. Chapter 6 verse 17:
Jesus went down with the people and stood on a level place. There was a large crowd of His disciples and a great number of people from Judea, from Jerusalem and from the coast of Tyre and Sidon and they had come to hear Him and to be healed of their diseases. Those troubled by evil spirits were cured and the people all tried to touch Him because power was coming from Him and healing them.”
See, power was coming from Him. The Greek word for power is ‘dunamis’ we get the word dynamite. We are talking serious power was coming from Jesus and people were getting healed.
We have to look at what it says before then. You see it says that they had come to hear him and be healed from all their diseases. That’s verse 18 of chapter 6 of Luke’s gospel. And there’s the key. We need to be open to who Jesus is and what He has to say. Jesus said some outrageous things. Love your enemy for starters. Forgive people. Call God “Dad” which is very radical. He ushered in a power, radical love.
He hung around sinners and lepers and prostitutes and healed the lame, the blind on the Sabbath when he shouldn’t have. And criticised the religious establishment for its hypocrisy. This Jesus, this unconventional saviour, that you just can’t easily put it in a box somewhere.
23 min