by Pastor Glenn Layne
January 19, 2003
(Acts 1:12-14)


Resolutions and Revolutions: Part 3
It's Gonna Take Prayer

A new church is starting in the area (and may God bless them!), and they came by and left a door hanger at our place. It's the Top Ten Reasons Why People Don't Go to Church (ala Letterman):

10. The pastor doesn't respond to my remote control
9. Three letters: NFL
8. I don't have kids yet.
7. I have kids.
6. People that happy just give me the creeps.
5. The last time I kneeled I had a hard time getting up again.
4. I'm a good person-and I want to avoid hearing otherwise.
3. I prefer Doritos to the little crackers they pass out.
2. When I want to feel guilty, I just call my mother.
1. Let's be honest…most people don't go to church because they think it's boring and it doesn't relate to their daily lives.

This relates I think to what I spoke to two weeks ago: the sense that the church is irrelevant, boring, detached from real life. The countdown to functional irrelevance ticks on. The church in America must come to grips with the fact that unless unchecked, the church in America will contact by two-thirds within 20 years.

People in the church now complain about the worldliness and godlessness of society today; can you imagine an America with only 10-15% of the population as believers? I find myself thinking-I must fight the trends for the sake not just of me-but even more so, for the sake of my kids and yet unborn grandchildren. In 20 years, I'll be 65, but they'll be 37 and 34, and in the thick of parenting. This gives me the urgency I need.

One place that has experienced that sense of urgency is Cali, Columbia. In the 80s and early 90s, Cali became the center of the most vicious drug cartel in the history of the world. The Cali cartel virtually controlled that country's government. The drug lords lived in high-walled mansions surrounded by armed guards. Violence became common; in a city of 200,000, 15 murders a day was commonplace.

The church in Cali realized that they were in an urgent, crisis situation. Gradually pastors began coming together to pray and soon their congregations followed. The churches began to cry out to God for deliverance from the demonic power they lay behind the drug cartel. An all-night rally on a Friday in a soccer stadium led to an amazing headline on Monday in the local newspaper: NO MURDERS ALL WEEKEND.

A few months later, in late 1995, Julio Ruibal, one of the key leaders of the prayer movement in Cali, was brutally murdered. This only increased the prayer momentum and hastened the fall of the cartel. The government declared war on the cartel and dozen or drug lords were arrested or killed by the government. Today, most of the mansions of the drug lords are either empty or being used for legitimate purposes. The cartel is broken. Cali is a safe place again.

And what about the church? Virtually every evangelical church in Cali is growing. The all-night, Friday night prayer and praise meetings at the soccer stadium still go on. Cali, as the mayor of the city has said, now belongs to Jesus Christ.

What is Prayer?

For that kind of transformation to take place, people have to be seized with a sense of urgency and immediacy. They must realize that they have come to then end of themselves and must rely upon God and God alone. For the kind of spiritual revolution that turned Cali around to come here, it's gonna take prayer.

A blueprint is given to us in God's word. Last week, we looked at what we called Jesus' "monkey marching orders" from Acts 1:8:

But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

Just a little father down in that chapter, we're told how the believers prepared for the coming of God's Spirit (1:12-14):

12Then they returned to Jerusalem from the hill called the Mount of Olives, a Sabbath day's walk from the city. 13When they arrived, they went upstairs to the room where they were staying. Those present were Peter, John, James and Andrew; Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew; James son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James. 14They all joined together constantly in prayer, along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers.

I think the key phrase is this: "they all joined together constantly in prayer." They as well had a sense of urgency-a sense that what they were involved in was of supreme importance. They also had a sense that they were in completely over their heads-that they had before them a situation that they could not possibly handle. So they prayed.

Listen: you don't feel the need to pray when everything's fine. You have no sense of urgency when you think that the church's mission is to serve coffee and cookies and make chicken dinners.

But just as we saw that that notion of the church's mission is a horrible distortion and a sure path to functional irrelevance, we have to see as well that for us, the people of God, to be engaged in things that matter, in things that matter for the sake of God's kingdom, in things that will impact people's lives and turn the corner on history in America in the 21st century, we as well must be like the people of Cali, like the disciples before Pentecost; we as well must bow the knee before God and cry out for His power, His deliverance, His guidance and his presence.

Those 1st century disciples did not come to God in a vacuum. They were raised as devout Jews, and had learned prayer from their childhood. Searching the Scriptures, they would have wonderful promises about prayer. We can add to the Old Testament promise the ones in the New Testament. We know that we can approach God…

Psalm 145:18-19:

18The LORD is near to all who call on him,
to all who call on him in truth.
19He fulfills the desires of those who fear him;
he hears their cry and saves them.

This is a general promise that becomes white hot when united with faith. God wants to hear from you-when-note this-you and I call on Him "in truth." It says He fulfills the desires of those who fear Him-those that have an awestruck reverence for Him.

God invites us to come with confidence-but on certain conditions. It has to be genuine. I find that there's no where to hide when I pray. It's not like I'm going to full a fast one on God.

Recall the story of Cali. When Julio Ruibal was murdered, that was a turning point. Until then, there was a genuine turning toward God, but from that point on that turning was intensified. People came to a clearer understanding that eternity was on the line. The games were over then.

1 John 5:14 makes this promise:

This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.

Come boldly. God rewards bold pray-ers. Come boldly-not because of us, but because of Him.

Those disciples in Acts 1 knew they were asking in God's will because Jesus had told them that the Spirit was coming. They had both that sense of urgency as weakness that's needed to pray effectively.

They also knew that they needed to be.

1 John 1:9

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

Psalm 50:15-16

"…call upon me in the day of trouble;
I will deliver you, and you will honor me."
16But to the wicked, God says:
"What right have you to recite my laws
or take my covenant on your lips?"

You can't show up on God's doorstep with blood on your hands and evil in your heart and expect God to bless you. Anyone here think that God would answer this prayer?

Dear God:

Me and the boys need to whack Jimmy the Bones causa he's muscling in on our territory. Just don let the boys get caught causa we don wan anybody have to do hard time. Amen.

OK, no Mafia prayers-right? Well, think on a smaller scale and you get a picture of what the Lord wants when we come before Him. You've got to come in to God's presence with clean hands-or at least with your hands on their way into the water.

One of the things I'm convinced that happened with the disciples in Jerusalem is that they got things right-with God and each other. Ten days is a long time to spend coming clean with God. One of the consistent marks of spiritual awakening in the Bible and in history is that there are nearly always preceded by a time of deep repentance on the part of the people of God. It's a time to put away idols. It's a time to turn from wrong, from lust, from greed, from petty jealousies. It's a time when husband and wife renew their love and when people freely say, "I'm sorry" knowing that that admission will not be used against them.

We come before God…

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.

When we pray, what do we ask God about? The short answer: "everything." "…in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." God invites us to tell it all. Nothing's trivial to Him if it's important to us.

And when we come, we come…

13And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. 14You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.

What does it mean, to pray, "in Jesus' name"? Many times we use this as a clue to God and the people listening that we're about to hang up. "Well, gotta go now, see ya 'round, in Jesus' name, Amen!"

But no! To pray in Jesus' name is to pray in the realization that our prayer, based on Jesus' own promise, is authorized by Him and carries His permission and authority. If a private goes to the base motor pool and asks for a jeep, he'll be denied. But if he has a requisition signed by the CO, you bet he'll get that jeep. "Give me a jeep-it's authorized by the General!"

Just like that private, we don't carry that authority. It's on loan from the Lord. It has to be asked for and "picked up" each time we use it. That's what it means to pray in Jesus' name. That brings me to some very important things about effective prayer.

Prayer and Grace

I want us to think for a moment about the connection between prayer and the grace of God. God's grace cannot be earned. It is His unmerited favor. But grace is also empowering. It is not simply a declaration of right standing with God-it is the power that enables to keep on with the doing of God's will. When Paul felt he had nothing left, God told him that His own grace would be enough to see him through.

His grace means a couple of crucial things when it comes to prayer.

First,

For no matter how many promises God has made, they are "Yes" in Christ. And so through him the "Amen" is spoken by us to the glory of God.

Promises are tangible tokens of His grace. And Paul says that all the promises of God are "Yes" in Christ. All the lights on the board are green. Then we cry out, "Yes Lord, so be it!" (That's what "amen" means.)

In prayer, we grasp what God has already graciously promised. In prayer, we simply load up what God has for us. Prayer does not produce or earn the promises; in prayer we simply "off load" the promises of God.

Let me expand on this from one other passage:

David says:

When I called, you answered me; you made me bold and stouthearted.

Knowing that our prayers doesn't produce the blessings, but just picks them up, we can be bold-and get boldness in our prayers. Hundreds of years ago, John Knox prayed, "Lord, give me Scotland or I die!" That's bold praying. The people in Cali prayed, "Lord, deliver our city!" The disciples before Pentecost prayed, "Lord send your Spirit!" God invites us to pray boldly, and then promises boldness as a gift that flows from prayer.

Frontline Prayer

This week, thousands of people left their southern California homes. Some went to Disneyland; others got orders to go to the Persian Gulf.

The ones going to Disneyland may stay at a hotel where they can call room service for most anything they need. The ones going to the war front will also engage in communication-but of a different sort.

The people of God are not called to a Disney hotel kind of existence, but more of a battle posture. We have not been given an intercom to call the butler; we have been handed a walkie-talkie to call headquarters in the midst of battle.

Prayer and the Work of the Spirit

But we must understand that the battle is the Lord's. In Acts 1, those early disciples were nobodies entrusted with the most important message in the world. That's what drove them to prayer-urgent, united, fervent prayer, in the days before Pentecost.

God has ordained that prayer be united with His work as a constant reminder and indicator that it is He who is at work. Only He can heal the sick, save the lost, and reach the nations with the gospel of His Son. We cannot do any of those things. His desire is that He alone receives the glory. Therefore, we cannot do any of those things. We can only pass along the message, and pray the prayer of hope. God must do the work.

God in a sense has locked His promises up, and prayer is the key that opens the lock.

John Hyde understood this. Hyde was a missionary to India in the late 19th century. Once E.G. Carre traveled to speak at a conference where Hyde was as well. He traveled all night and was tired, but Hyde brought him to a prayer room, where Hyde prayed for him from 8 in the morning to 3:30 in the afternoon-Carre was to speak at 4 PM. Hyde stayed behind, saying, "Go in and speak, that is your work. I shall go back to the prayer room, that is my work."

No wonder they called him "Praying Hyde." (Some people actually thought "Praying" was his first name!)

It would not be right to close this message on prayer without praying---

Lord, raise up a modern army of praying Hydes;
Lord, who delivered Cali, deliver this valley;
Lord, who gave Knox Scotland, give us the Southland;
Lord, who sent Your Spirit on Pentecost, send Your Spirit in power on us, Your people here in this church, and on the church in America.
So that You might receive the glory and the praise.
In the full authority of Jesus, we pray it-
Amen!

© Copyright 2003, Pastor Glenn Layne, www.templecitybaptist.org