Greetings MOL Family!
Often we forfeit God’s peace and the privilege to take everything to Him in prayer…
Jesus Hears
And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. – Luke 11:1
Now, let’s notice something else in this verse, very practical. It’s by inference in this first verse. It’s by inference in the second verse. What was Jesus doing when the disciples came upon Him there? — Praying. What did He do, by and by? He stopped praying. He ceased. And then they said what? Tell me, did they know when He had stopped? Yes, there was a moment when He was praying and there was a moment when he ceased, and those men there recognized it. Notice, they came upon Him in private prayer. Tell me this: do you gather that He was just thinking a prayer, or was He speaking? He was speaking. Was He using His brain? Was He using His lips? Yes, now, verse 2. I want you to see the same thought as He begins to teach them.
And he said unto them, When ye pray, say… – Luke 11:2
Now, let me put something in that isn’t there, so you see what I mean. “When ye pray, think.” “When ye, pray, meditate.” Is that what it says? When ye pray do what? Say. What do you think with? Of course, you have to use your brain and think in order to say anything, if the saying is worthwhile. But my point is, is it possible to think and never say anything? Oh yes, and some people have a hard time with this in prayer. Maybe you do.
I want to give you a little quotation that will help you. You should copy this down.
Learn to pray aloud where only God can hear you. – Our High Calling, pg. 130
Again:
Learn to pray aloud where only God can hear you. – Ibid
Dear friends, if to you, secret pray has been silent prayer, you have a great discovery ahead of you; the power and blessing that comes through opening your lips, using your mouth, talking to God.
When you pray, say, Our Father… – Luke 11:2
Don’t just think, “Our Father.” Say it. Now, it’s all right to meditate. And there are times, of course, for silent prayer. When we’re in the midst of a business engagement, we don’t pray out loud with the busy world all around us. But oh, when we’re alone with God, then we are to pray aloud where only God can hear us.
“Ah, but,” somebody says, “What’s the use of praying out loud? He can read my thoughts just as easy as He can my lips.”
Why, sure He can. But as we said in the beginning of this lesson (part 1), prayer is not to change God. It’s to get us in shape to fit in with His providence. And watch this and don’t miss it! The more real our communion with God is, the more will be accomplished. And it becomes far more real to us that we’re talking to God if we talk.
What is communion? To talk while He listens, and to listen while He talks. This is communion. Now, this can get to be a habit:
It is not always necessary to bow upon your knees in order to pray. Cultivate the habit of [What?] talking, [not just thinking] with the Saviour [When?] when you are alone [And then?] when you are walking [And then?] when you are busy with your daily labor. – Ministry of Healing, pg. 510-511 {WGP, pg. 169, column 1, par. 2}
Then it goes on that, there are situations where your heart can be continually uplifted in silent petition for help, that is, people around you are not hearing you pray. “Oh Lord, help me with this problem.” The patient in the sanitarium that you’re burdened for won’t hear you say as you go into the room, “Oh Lord, help me to help this patient.” But Jesus hears. The student in the elementary school doesn’t hear you say as you’re teaching, “Oh, Lord, help me to help this boy, this girl.” But Jesus hears.
The reality of it is more because when you have been alone with God, you have spoken, not just thought. Do you see? This is the thing. The more we actually talk to God every chance we get, the more our silent petitions will be real when we’re around other people.
Cultivate the habit… – Ibid
How do you cultivate a habit? — By doing the same thing over and over. And the way you cultivate the habit of talking with the Saviour, when you are alone, is to talk with Him when you are alone.
Somebody says, “Well, I don’t think about it.” Just do it when you do think about. Try it these next 24 hours. Every time that Jesus brings it to your mind, say something to Him. If you are walking along the road and He brings it to your mind, say something to Him. Whatever you would say, were He there in the flesh, by your side.
Cultivate the habit of talking with the Saviour when you are alone. – Ibid
Now turn to Psalm 5:3. There’s a special time for God to hear our voice. Isaac Watts studied this Psalm and wrote the matchless hymn:
Lord, in the morning Thou shall hear
My voice ascending high;
To Thee will I direct my prayer,
To Thee lift up mine eye.
Now, let’s read the verse he got it from:
My voice shall thou hear in the morning, O LORD; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto Thee, and will look up. – Psalm 5:3
Notice it isn’t just “My thought You’ll read in the morning, O Lord.”
My voice shall thou hear… – Psalm 5:3
We are speaking to Him.
My voice shall thou hear in the morning, O LORD; in the morning will I direct my prayer unto Thee, and will look up. – Psalm 5:3
Again, I say, I want to be very practical. If you’ve not been in the habit of doing this and even if you have, you may find that as you try to pray to God audibly your mind wanders, and you wake up and find you’re not saying anything. You’re just thinking about something, maybe a thousand miles away. Incidentally, that’s one of the reasons for speaking to God, you will at least know when you quit, and you will know pretty soon. If you’re like me, you probably say, “Oh, my, why can’t I keep my mind on this.” Don’t worry about it. Just start again, just like a child learning to walk.
If the mind wanders we must bring it back, by persevering effort, habit will finally make it easy. – Messages to Young People, pg. 114
I’ve been working on it for quite a while. I haven’t mastered it yet, but friends, I know enough about it to know this is what I want. I want more and more of it, to just talk to God.
Everything To God In Prayer
We’ve been learning about the importance of sleep and rest. But some of you may have the problem that I have at times. That is, I may go to bed all right and go to sleep, but I wake up long before it’s time to get up. Then what? Well, I’ll tell you, friends. You can do two things that are just wonderful. This is a great blessing to learn in how to live. You can repeat Scripture, and you can talk to God. And God will listen to you at 2:00 in the morning.
And by the way, you don’t have to turn on the light to see what time it is, either. Don’t worry about that at all. You’re not keeping a diary of what time you woke up. No. Just lie there. It doesn’t make any difference whether it is two minutes or five minutes or thirty minutes, just improve the time, not laboriously, not restlessly, but restfully. You may never know just what minute you went to sleep. That isn’t important. Fill your mind with the Word of God. Let Him speak and you listen while He talks, and you talk while He listens. David had this experience. He says:
I [commune with] Thee in the night watches. – Psalm 63:6
There is something wonderful to do every minute of the 24 hours. We can live 24 hours a day. Nobody can give you anything more than that. Don’t settle for anything less. If Jesus gives you sleep, thank Him for it in the morning. If He gives you sweet communion in the night watches in prayer and listening to His word as it rolls over in your mind from memory, thank Him for that. Prayer and faith are the great problem solvers.
Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. – Luke 11:1
What a Friend we have in Jesus,
All our sins and griefs to bear;
What a privilege to carry
Everything to God in prayer!
Oh what peace we often forfeit,
Oh what needless pain we bear,
All because we do not carry
Everything to God in prayer.
Our Father, our hearts rejoice that we have such a loving Master who chooses to teach us to pray today, as He did His disciples when here on earth. And today our hearts go out in longing to Thee. Lord, teach us to pray. Thou hast told us that if we call unto Thee, Thou wilt answer us. Thou hast told us, “ask and it shall be given you.” We plead these promises not because we’re worthy, but because of our great need and Jesus’ great righteousness. And we thank Thee that Thou hast made the truth simply beautiful and beautifully simple. Write these precious words in our hearts.
And as we see the lovely flowers and hear the sweet songs of the birds, see the beautiful green leaves on the trees and the lofty mountains, may we audibly say, Thank Thee dear Jesus. Oh, we know it will make Thy heart glad when we talk to Thee and then be still and listen for Thy voice to speak to us.
Lord, help us to talk less and pray more. Help us to talk less and pray more. We need Thy help. We plead for Thy Holy Spirit to bring deep conviction on our hearts and our minds that we’ll spend less time in common talk and more time in communion and talking with Thee. Oh, help us.
We thank Thee that Thou art leading us. And teach each one of us to pray and we know and are thankful that Thou art doing this, and that soon we will be walking with Thee as Enoch did of old and we choose that today. And we thank Thee in Jesus’ wonderful name we pray. Amen.
Until next week – Invite a friend, and we’ll see you then…
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Jesus took everything to His Father in prayer, and through this intimate connection, He pleased the Lord. In order to desire the Father’s will over our own, pleasing God in all that we do, we too must develop a close, intimate, and personal relationship with Him. >> Enter In
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* This study has been adapted from classes taken by Elder W.D. Frazee.