Tuesday, July 10, 2018 - Ephesians 6:18
The Proper Attitude & Motivation in Prayer
Demonstrated by Jesus Christ, Pt. 2 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zavtegYWkE8

Grace Fellowship Church

Pastor/Teacher, Jim Rickard

www.GraceDoctrine.org

Stand in Warfare – Eph 6:10-20.

4. The Energy, vs. 18-20, God’s Appeal for Prayer in the Church.

Vs. 18, Prayer Makes the Armor of God Effective for Victory!

Principles on Prayer.

Luke 11:1, “It came about that while He was praying in a certain place, after He had finished, one of His disciples said to Him, “Lord, teach us to pray just as John also taught his disciples.”

Jesus’ manner and attitude in prayer saturated His total being and living. His every step and action manifested the intimacy of His relationship with and dependence on the Father.

Prayer for our Lord proceeded out of a basic attitude of deep dependence that resulted in a very intimate fellowship that He always had with the Father.

Out of His conscious and constant sense of need, there arose a continuing attitude of prayer: a continual expectation that if anything was to be done, the Father must do it by way of initiative, wisdom, and power. It was a prayer life which demonstrated a dependency upon and intimacy with the Father.

“Teach us to pray” was not just how to pray, the “mechanics,” but how in the sense of the “attitude and motivation,” Luke 11:2-13.

Prayer is communication between those who have become His children in Christ and God the Father.

It is conversing, discussing every circumstance, tackling every problem, celebrating every victory, and growing in love with Him.

We are to approach prayer this way, rather than seeing it as some kind of magical incantation or even out of a sense of duty.

When we fail to tap into this pipeline, we guarantee our failure. The secret of all failure is our failure to pursue communion with our Father above all things.

Therefore, prayer is communication between those who have become His children in Christ and God the Father. It is conversing with our Father in Christ, discussing every circumstance, tackling every problem, celebrating every victory, and growing in love with Him. Prayer is one means of communion with God.

We are to approach prayer this way, rather than seeing it as some kind of magical incantation or even out of a sense of duty. When we do it is the key to victory and fruitfulness in the Holy Spirit. It is the pipeline through which the power of God is delivered to the child of God. When we fail to tap into this pipeline, we guarantee our failure. Indeed, “the secret of all failure is our failure in secret prayer.” The secret of all failure is our failure to pursue communion with our Father above all things.

Therefore, we have the following principles:

1. Prayer should demonstrate a total consciousness of our need, a sense of our complete inadequacy along with a sense of God’s complete adequacy and willingness, 2 Cor 3:5.

2 Cor 3:5, “Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God.”

2. Prayer is not overcoming God’s reluctance, but laying hold of God’s ever present willingness.

3. Prayer is not for emergency use only, when we get in a pinch and need someone to bail us out.

4. Prayer is not an “Aladdin’s Lamp” or a trip to the wishing well for our wants.

5. By contrast, prayer is a means of intimate communion, fellowship, and dependence upon God the Father who has promised to work in and through us through His Son, just as God worked through Him.

6. Prayer is for everyday living, moment by moment.

7. Prayer is a means of claiming God’s promises and knowing and becoming abandoned to God’s will.

In John 14:10-14, note the relationship to prayer mentioned in vs. 13-14, and the works we, as disciples, are to do in vs. 12.

John 14:10-14 “Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in Me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on My own initiative, but the Father abiding in Me does His works. ¹¹Believe Me that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me; otherwise believe on account of the works themselves. ¹²Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go to the Father. ¹³And whatever you ask in My name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. ¹⁴If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it.”

There is no activity in your life that does not require a prayerful attitude; a prayerful dependence on and an expectation that God is at work and will work according to His purposes and leading.

In ourselves we can do nothing. Yet, Christianity is living by faith in the Creator God who dwells in us, and prayer is God’s means for us to draw upon Christ’s miraculous life. Christianity is as Paul expressed it in Gal 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and delivered Himself up for me.”

Faith for a committed believer is expressed in intimate, prayerful living.

Unfortunately, we usually recognize our need of God’s enablement in things like witnessing or major disasters in our lives. Yet, we tend to take God for granted and operate in our own abilities in other areas of our lives, because we think something does not seem too difficult or it is within our area of expertise. That is a mistake!

Biblical Christianity is never a matter of living by who and what we are; our insight, background, experience, training, giftedness, etc. Rather, it is a matter of living prayerfully by faith in God’s Word, having Biblical insight, and by faith in Jesus Christ, the Creator God, and His availability to work through us as we are available and submissive to Him. But, this only happens when we live by intimate prayerful dependence upon the Father through a life of prayer, praying without ceasing, and devoting special times of prayer alone with the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit.