AN ATTITUDE OF GIVING AND PRAYING
Matthew 6:1-13
DON'T GIVE TO BE SEEN
V:1-2. "Take heed that ye do not your alms before men,
to be seen of them: otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in
heaven.
2 Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a
trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets,
that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward."
A. The foundation of Christian living is giving,
1. God so loved
the world that He gave His only begotten Son-----
2. Our giving
includes our time and our money.
3. Some times a
person needs more than a donation.
4. Some time a
person may need our time.
B. Jesus healed all who came to Him.
1. His healing
was a drawing card to preach the Gospel.
2. People have
physical needs and spiritual need,
3. Money provides
food for a day, but the Gospel is food for life.
C. If you do something to be seen, your reward will come from
those
you are trying to
impress, which may amount to nothing.
1. It was the
custom of the Pharisees to make a great show of their
giving to the
poor to seem righteous before others.
2. It is God's
command to be humble in all situations.
3. To desire
someone to acknowledge what you do for the poor is an act
of pride.
REWARD FOR GIVING IN SECRET
V.3-4. " But when thou doest alms, let not thy left
hand know what thy right hand doeth:
4 That thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father which
seeth in secret himself shall reward thee openly."
A. God know what you going to do before you do it.
1. God's know
the heart that gives.
2. A pure heart
give without a need to be repaid.
3. A pure heart
give out of love and compassion,
B. A pure heart sees a need as his/her responsibility to
respond.
1. What goes around
comes around
2. A pure heart
knows but by the grace of God he or she could be
in a position of
need.
3. Those who have
been blessed dishonor God when they seek recognition
for what God has done for them.
4. Those who claim
a right to be seen while they are giving, dishonor
God with their
pride.
5. The ability to
give is a blessing from God to bless others and is best
done in
secret.
SECERT PRAYER
V:5 -6. "And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as
the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the
corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you,
They have their reward.
6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and
when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy
Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly."
A. Prayer is another part of Christian living.
1. It is our duty
to pray.
2. Prayer is our
basic way of communicating with God.
3. 1 Thessalonians
5:16-18
Rejoice
always; 17 pray without ceasing; 18 in everything give thanks; for this is
God's will for
you in Christ Jesus.
a. To be heard
by God is a privilege.
b. To have the
will to go to God in prayer is a blessing.
c. To rejoice
and give thanks is the attitude of prayer.
d, The
assurance of prayers being answered is the WILL of God In
Christ
Jesus.
e. The answer
to our prayer is bound up in our relationship with
Jesus.
B. There is power in individual proper prayer.
1. Psalms 34:17
The righteous
cry out, and the Lord hears them;
he delivers
them from all their troubles.
2. The power of prayer is in the hearing.
James 5:16
Confess your
faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed.
The effectual
fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.
3. A sinner only has
the prayer of repentance and confession.
Proverbs 15:29
The Lord is far from the wicked: but he
heareth the prayer of the righteous.
C. You don't pray to be seen, you pray to be heard by God.
1. There is
nothing gained by having someone witness
your private prayer.
2. Those who hear,
can't grant your prayer request.
3. You dishonor
God by seeking a witness to your private prayer.
D. There is a difference between private prayer and
corporate prayer.
1. James 5:15 speaks also to corporate prayer.
3. This verse is
focused on private prayer.
SIMPLE PRAYER
V:7-8. " But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as
the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much
speaking.
8 Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father
knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him."
A. Notice that there are two types of people who pray.
1. Those who pray
with a relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
2. There are
those who pray with no relationship with the Father.
B. You don't have to use a lot of words to pray to God.
1. He knows your
need before you ask.
2. You don't have
to repeat you prayer request more than one time
in a single
prayer.
3. God is not
hard of hearing, nor does He ever forget your prayer
request.
THE MODEL PRAYER
Verses 9-13 is the model prayer. Notice there are not a lot
of words
in this prayer.
There are only 65 words in 5 verses.
RECOGNIZING THE FATHER
V:9. " After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father
which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name."
A. The word "Our" suggest a corporate prayer.
1. It can also
serve as the model for our personal prayer.
2. In church. we
come together as a community in prayer to God.
B. The verse express the love and respect we have for the
holy Father.
1. Our prayer is
to Father and to the Father alone.
2. We express our
confidence in the Father to answer our prayer,
3. We come before
the throne of God which is in heaven.
a. By this,
our place of prayer becomes holy.
b. By this,
the time of prayer becomes holy.
4. We recognize
that the Father's is holy and above all names,
5. We recognize
that Father is pure and without sin.
6. We recognize
that the Father has the power, the resources and
authority to
grant our request.
7. By
"our" we claim God as our personal God.
a. Since we
claim possession of God, we also
claim He
has possession of us.
b. We claim
also that The Father has authority over us.
C. Since this a universal prayer from believers around the
world:
1. We claim that
God the Father is omnipresence.
2. Since every
believer around the world has difference needs, we
claim that He
is Omniscience.
3. Since there are
so many prayers going up all the time from
around the
world, we claim that He is Omnipotent.
D. Since we are praying to a holy God:
1. We make sure
our thought and request are without evil content.
2. Our prayer
request ought to be according to the will of God.
3. Since claim God
as "our", we must dedicate our families
in reverence,
respect and disciple to the Lord.
4. The end of our
request should be to the give the Father glory.
THE PLACE OF PRAYER
V:10. " Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as
it is in heaven. 14
A. Jesus said that "Kingdom of heaven is at hand".
1. The verse can
be both present tense and future tense at the same time.
2. Since Jesus lives
in us, His kingdom is in us.
3. Jesus said,
where I am you will be also.
4, We are joyfully
waiting the second coming of Jesus when we will
live eternally
with Him.
5. Everything in
heaven is good, therefore we are to expect God's good
for our lives.
B. What is God's will
for our lives?
1. It is peace,
joy, harmony, humility and righteousness.
2. God's will for us is that we have the desires
of our heart according to
Hid
righteousness.
3. Since heaven is
infinite good, wise and holy, that is what God expects form
us.
4. We are heaven's
representatives on earth.
5. We are the role
models kingdom of God
6. We maybe the
only representative of heaven that some see..
REQUEST FOR PROVISIONS
V:11. " Give us this day our daily bread."
A. Our concern should be for today and not tomorrow.
Matthew 6:34
Therefore do not
worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each
day has enough
trouble of its own.
1. In this life we
will have problems.
2. The key is make
it through the current day,
3. We cannot live
but one day at a time.
4. God has enough
favor for each day.
B. To look past today is to not give God complete
thanks for what
He is doing in the present.
1. We have no idea
of all that we will need to get through tomorrow.
2. When we are
thankful for what God does today we express
confidence in
what He can do tomorrow.
3. This day we
depend on God for help, strength, protection
and provision.
4. The God we serve is the same everyday.
5. Today's
activities gives us confidence that God will
continue to
be faithful to us.
FORGIVENESS, KEY TO FELLOWSHIP
V. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. 10
A. None of us is
without sin.
1. Therefore each
day we should ask for forgiveness.
2. Satan is
forever seeking to influence us to do evil.
3. There may be
some sins against God that we are not aware
that we are
committing.
4. Just in case we have overlooked some
sins we committed we
should
daily ask for forgiveness.
1 John
1:9-10
If we
confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse
us from all
unrighteousness.
5. Because God
is generous in His forgiveness of us, we ought to readily forgive
others.
B. Our Forgiving others works to this end; it frees us from
the past so we
move forward.
1. Jesus died on
the cross that we might be forgiven by the Father.
2. The blood of
Jesus on the cross was payment for our sin debt.
3. If we cannot forgive others, the Father will not
forgive us.
Matthew
18:28-32
Then his
master, after he had called him, said to him, 'You wicked servant! I
forgave you
all that debt because you begged me. 33
Should you not also have had
compassion
on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?' 34 And his master
was angry, and delivered him to the
torturers until he should pay all that was due
to him.
C. Our sins break fellowship with God.
1. Relationship
remains in tact doing our sins.
2. The Holy Spirit seals us to the day of redemption
3. In sin, we set
ourselves up for God's chastisement.
4. Sin blocks the
blessing of God.
5. Repent and ask
for forgiveness restores fellowship.
PROTECTION AGAINST THE DEVIL
V:13" And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us
from evil: For thine is the kingdom,
and the power,
and the glory, for ever." Amen.
25
A. We submit
ourselves to the power and authority of the Father.
1. The Lord has
the power to control the fiery darts that Satan cast toward us.
2. He
has the power to strengthen us to resist the devil's temptation .
3. The devil
came to steal, kill and destroy.
4. We request
the Lord through the power of the Holy Spirit, bring to
our
remembrance the Words of the Lord Jesus ,
to see clearly the
devils
deceptions and to resist them.
B. We request the protection of the Lord Jesus to shield us
from the evil of
the devil.
1. The devil
knows all our weaknesses.
2. Like a spider,
He draws a net to trap us in some area of weakness.
3. We request
divine insight to see and avoid the devils net.
POWER AND AUTHORITY OF THE FATHER
C. Heaven and earth and all that's in it belongs to the Lord
and
He has the power
to order thing to grant our petition.
1. We request that
God use every evil test of us to bring about Glory
to Himself.
2. We request the
Lord to use us in partnership with Him to be a light
in this
darken world.
THANK GOD FOR LISTENING
Rev. M. Mitchell
Asst Pastor Of Greater Macedonia
Baptist Church
For more lessons, follow me on facebook and vist
my blogs:
revmmitchell.com and goodnewsrevmitc.blogspot.com
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