Message Theme & Verses: How to pray: Matthew 6
Jesus continued His ministry of traveling from place to place, healing people, but more importantly, teaching. Jesus wanted the people to be prepared for His death, resurrection, ascension into heaven and eventual return to earth. Jesus’ ministry was one of grace, telling people to repent of their sins, have faith, and follow Jesus, living lives pleasing to God. He knew that when He returned it would be for justice. When Jesus comes back, He will rescue the righteous and punish the wicked. Jesus told many stories and gave many sermons teaching people what it meant to be righteous. Often, He would use examples of the people and practices around Him to show His followers what not to do and how to live right. Of course, the first step is to believe in Jesus. Without the Spirit of Jesus in our hearts, we cannot love God and we cannot love others. God gives us new hearts by His grace, through faith in Jesus.
Today, we are going to look at some important parts of life. The first one is about relating to other people and the second one is about relating to God. Both involve a key word. Kuya Roque recognized this in Jesus last week. He said that Jesus is not like politicians because they are boastful and Jesus is humble. Try and think about the word humble as we read today.
Let’s turn to Matthew 6. We will read the whole thing, but we will concentrate on verses 5 – 15 for our questions and for Happy Family tomorrow.
Where did you see humility in this chapter?
Why is humility important to God? (Those who prayed long and fancy prayers were trying to show other people how smart and holy they were. Humble people are not worried about what other people think. They are just telling God who they really are and how much they need His help. In Luke (18:9-14), Jesus sees two men praying. One man thought he was really holy and was praying “God thank you for making me so great and so much better than other men. I do lots of good things.” The other man prayed “God, have mercy on me a sinner.” The first man thought that He did not need God and that his good works made him good. The second man knew that he was a sinner and could never do enough good works to earn God’s love. He knew that he needed God’s salvation. God shames those who are proud and honors those who are humble and know that they need God.)
Why do you think many people do good works? (Maybe they want attention. Maybe they want people to think that they are good. Maybe they think they can earn their way into heaven. Maybe they have done lots of bad things and are trying to make up for it. The prophet Isaac (64:6) is so sad about how God’s people have forgotten Him. He says that all of people’s good works are like filthy rags to God. They are nothing but garbage because they have the wrong motivation. The true motivation to do good works is because God has made us new and we want to honor Him and show love to those around us. It is only because God was good to us that we can be truly good to others.)
What is prayer? (Prayer is sending a message to God. God wants a relationship with us. To have a relationship, we must be together and learn about each other. God gives us messages through His Word. He reveals truth about Himself and about us through the Bible. He tells us how to live and how to best honor Him. We send messages to God in prayer. We can send the message, “God you are great and we praise you. We honor you.’ We can send the message, “God, we need you. We need help in our lives.” We can send the message, “God, we are thankful to you and for what you do for us.” We can send the message, “God, we confess that we have sin and we are sorry. We need your forgiveness.” Finally, we can send the message, “God, I have a complaint. I need to cry out to you because life is difficult.” We should not have a complaining heart, but sometimes we do and when we do, it is best to direct our complaints to God. God says that we should pray always and for everything. We should pray by ourselves, when it is just us and God. We should pray with our families. We should pray in small gatherings and in larger worship services.)
Why do we pray?
God tells us to pray. James 5:16, 1 Thessalonians 5:17, Luke 22:40, Luke 6:28
To increase our joy. John 16:24
Because we have the privilege of talking to the ruler of the universe. Romans 11:34-36
Because it glorifies God. John 14:13, Psalm 50:15
What six requests do you see in the Lord’s Prayer:
Hallowed be your name
Your kingdom come
Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven
Give us this day our daily bread
Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil
Do you see any difference between the first three requests and the last three requests? (The first three are about God and His glory and greatness. The last three are about regular things we need every day. So we see requests for God’s name, kingdom, and will and then we see requests for our food, our forgiveness, our holiness. We want God to be glorified on earth and in our lives and we need certain things from Him. My bread, my forgiveness, my holiness are all for the purpose of being part of God’s great purpose to glorify His name, exalt His rule, and complete His will.)
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