Finding the Confidence to Pray

00:00:00.000 | (music)

00:00:04.000 | Pastor John's new book is about the precious doctrine of God's providence

00:00:08.000 | and the title is simply "Providence." God sustains

00:00:12.000 | and governs over everything that he made, leading all things to their

00:00:16.000 | appointed end. And he reveals this remarkable truth

00:00:20.000 | to us in thousands of texts in the Bible. It's all over the place.

00:00:24.000 | By welcoming us into this incredible, revealed reality,

00:00:28.000 | God calls us to see and savor this for ourselves. He wants

00:00:32.000 | us to treasure his providence. He wants us to treasure his providence

00:00:36.000 | so much that it brings tangible changes to how we live

00:00:40.000 | and how we think and how we pray. On Wednesdays, we

00:00:44.000 | focus on these implications. We're looking at 10 of them. Last time, in episode 1592,

00:00:48.000 | we looked at how treasuring God's providence is a spiritual

00:00:52.000 | and theological vaccination against man-centered theology.

00:00:56.000 | That was implication number 7, episode 1592.

00:01:00.000 | Today, we turn to prayer. Here with implication number 8

00:01:04.000 | is Pastor John to explain. We're talking about

00:01:08.000 | the effects or the benefits

00:01:12.000 | or blessings of seeing and savoring the providence

00:01:16.000 | of God. Even though, in my experience, they are

00:01:20.000 | all wonderful, nevertheless, it

00:01:24.000 | feels to me that this one that I'm going to talk about

00:01:28.000 | right now is one of the most amazing and precious

00:01:32.000 | and wonderful effects of knowing and loving

00:01:36.000 | the all-pervading providence of God.

00:01:40.000 | It's this. It gives us

00:01:44.000 | the confidence that God has the right

00:01:48.000 | and the power to answer prayer,

00:01:52.000 | especially prayer that asks for people's hearts

00:01:56.000 | and minds to be changed.

00:02:00.000 | In his New Testament letter, James says, "You do not have

00:02:04.000 | because you do not ask. You ask and

00:02:08.000 | do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend

00:02:12.000 | it on your passions." That's James 4, verse 2.

00:02:16.000 | That means that things really do not

00:02:20.000 | happen that would have happened if we

00:02:24.000 | had prayed. In other words, God has ordained

00:02:28.000 | that we pray, that we ask, and he has

00:02:32.000 | ordained that things happen because

00:02:36.000 | we ask, precisely because we ask.

00:02:40.000 | Not coincidence, but cause. You don't

00:02:44.000 | have because you don't ask. Prayer is one of the great

00:02:48.000 | wonders of the world. That God would plan

00:02:52.000 | for his own sovereign hand to be moved by the

00:02:56.000 | prayers of his creatures is amazing.

00:03:00.000 | There are mysteries in it, but these mysteries have

00:03:04.000 | never stopped the simplest saint or the most highly

00:03:08.000 | educated Christian scholar from weaving the

00:03:12.000 | thread of prayer into the whole fabric

00:03:16.000 | of their lives. As Paul said, "Pray without ceasing."

00:03:20.000 | There have always been simple folk and highly

00:03:24.000 | educated folk who have done this without

00:03:28.000 | ceasing kind of weaving and praying in their lives.

00:03:32.000 | Maybe you can tell that I am taking

00:03:36.000 | one of the common objections to God's providence and

00:03:40.000 | turning it upside down into a wonderful blessing of

00:03:44.000 | providence. Maybe you noticed that. The objection says,

00:03:48.000 | "Well, there's no point in praying since, according

00:03:52.000 | to the doctrine of providence, God has all things

00:03:56.000 | planned anyway." But just a little thought

00:04:00.000 | would show you that God has planned

00:04:04.000 | millions of human acts every day

00:04:08.000 | that cause other acts to

00:04:12.000 | happen and without which those other acts would

00:04:16.000 | not happen. A carpenter's nail

00:04:20.000 | sinks into the board flush because

00:04:24.000 | God planned for a hammer to hit it

00:04:28.000 | soundly. A student makes an A on a test

00:04:32.000 | because God planned for the student to study.

00:04:36.000 | A jet flies from New York

00:04:40.000 | to Los Angeles because God planned for fuel to be

00:04:44.000 | available and wings to stay put and

00:04:48.000 | engines to thrust and a pilot to know what he's doing.

00:04:52.000 | In none of these cases do we say

00:04:56.000 | that the cause was pointless. The hammer,

00:05:00.000 | the studying, the fuel, the wing, the engine, the pilot,

00:05:04.000 | neither is prayer pointless.

00:05:08.000 | It's one of the God-ordained causes

00:05:12.000 | of things that God plans to do.

00:05:16.000 | Prayer is part of the plan for

00:05:20.000 | how God accomplishes his purposes in the world.

00:05:24.000 | In fact, the all-embracing, all-pervasive,

00:05:28.000 | unstoppable providence of God is the

00:05:32.000 | only hope for making our most

00:05:36.000 | heartfelt prayers effective. Let me say that again.

00:05:40.000 | It's our only hope. The providence of God is our only hope

00:05:44.000 | for making our most heartfelt prayers

00:05:48.000 | effective. If God doesn't have the

00:05:52.000 | power and the right and the authority to change

00:05:56.000 | things, like people's hearts, what's the point

00:06:00.000 | in praying about the things that matter

00:06:04.000 | most to us? It's precisely his providence

00:06:08.000 | that gives us hope that he has the right to do this.

00:06:12.000 | What's your greatest longing? What's your most heartfelt

00:06:16.000 | desire or prayer? My guess is

00:06:20.000 | that for almost all of us it involves

00:06:24.000 | somebody's change.

00:06:28.000 | Probably it is the salvation of someone you love.

00:06:32.000 | At least that's the case for many of us. Or it

00:06:36.000 | may be the liberation of your own soul from

00:06:40.000 | some sinful bondage. When you pray that

00:06:44.000 | God would save your loved one or liberate you

00:06:48.000 | from bondage to sin, what are you

00:06:52.000 | asking God to do? You are asking him

00:06:56.000 | to do what he promised to do in the new covenant,

00:07:00.000 | which Jesus, according to Luke 2220,

00:07:04.000 | bought, secured, guaranteed with his own

00:07:08.000 | blood. Which is, by the way, why we pray all of

00:07:12.000 | our prayers in Jesus' name. We pray, God,

00:07:16.000 | take out of their flesh the heart of stone and give them

00:07:20.000 | a heart of flesh, Ezekiel 1119. We pray

00:07:24.000 | Deuteronomy 30, verse 6, "Lord, circumcise

00:07:28.000 | their hearts." Circumcise my heart so

00:07:32.000 | that they will love you, so that I will love you.

00:07:36.000 | We pray Ezekiel 36, 27, "Father, put your

00:07:40.000 | spirit within them and cause them to walk in your statutes." We pray

00:07:44.000 | 2 Timothy 2, 25, "Lord, grant them repentance

00:07:48.000 | and the knowledge of the truth so that they may escape

00:07:52.000 | from the snare of the devil." We pray Acts 16, 14,

00:07:56.000 | "Father, open their hearts so that they

00:08:00.000 | may believe the gospel." The only people

00:08:04.000 | who can pray like that consistently

00:08:08.000 | are people who believe that saving faith,

00:08:12.000 | sanctifying faith, transforming faith,

00:08:16.000 | liberating faith, is a gift, a work

00:08:20.000 | of providence. Many people do not believe

00:08:24.000 | this. Millions of Americans have been taught

00:08:28.000 | not to believe this because they believe that

00:08:32.000 | human beings have the power of ultimate

00:08:36.000 | self-determination at the point of conversion.

00:08:40.000 | God doesn't have it; they have it. In other words,

00:08:44.000 | God can woo sinners like a man

00:08:48.000 | woos a fiancé. God can woo

00:08:52.000 | sinners, but he cannot create their faith, they say.

00:08:56.000 | Man must have the final, decisive

00:09:00.000 | say. They say at the point when

00:09:04.000 | faith comes into existence, man, not

00:09:08.000 | God, is decisive. I don't

00:09:12.000 | believe that. I don't believe that's what the Bible teaches. I believe in the providence

00:09:16.000 | of God at that very point and its decisive

00:09:20.000 | sovereign power. My point here

00:09:24.000 | is that people who believe that false

00:09:28.000 | teaching cannot consistently pray

00:09:32.000 | that God would convert unbelieving sinners.

00:09:36.000 | Why? Because if they pray for divine influence

00:09:40.000 | in a sinner's life, they are either praying

00:09:44.000 | for an effective influence, a successful

00:09:48.000 | influence, which takes away the sinner's

00:09:52.000 | ultimate self-determination—not their accountability,

00:09:56.000 | just their ultimate self-determination—or

00:10:00.000 | they are praying for a less-than-effective

00:10:04.000 | how should we say it, a non-successful

00:10:08.000 | influence, some kind of nudging, but don't take

00:10:12.000 | over, God. Don't be decisive. Don't be sovereign.

00:10:16.000 | Just do some wooing, but don't be

00:10:20.000 | effective, which of course is not

00:10:24.000 | praying for their conversion. So, they

00:10:28.000 | must either give up these prayers, these

00:10:32.000 | people who pray that way. They must give up praying that

00:10:36.000 | God would convert people or give up ultimate human

00:10:40.000 | self-determination or go on acting inconsistently,

00:10:44.000 | which millions do praise God. Many people pray

00:10:48.000 | way better than they believe. Prayer is a

00:10:52.000 | spectacular gift. No one believed more firmly

00:10:56.000 | than Paul that humans do not have the final say

00:11:00.000 | in their conversion. We don't. God does. It is

00:11:04.000 | all of grace, sovereign grace. He said in Romans 9:16,

00:11:08.000 | "It depends not on human will or exertion,

00:11:12.000 | but on God who has mercy." Nevertheless,

00:11:16.000 | probably no one prayed with

00:11:20.000 | more tears and more urgency than Paul

00:11:24.000 | for the conversion of sinners.

00:11:28.000 | "I have great sorrow and unceasing

00:11:32.000 | anguish in my heart," he said, "for the sake of my

00:11:36.000 | brothers, my kinsmen, according to the flesh. My heart's desire

00:11:40.000 | and prayer to God for them is that they may

00:11:44.000 | be saved." That was Romans 9,

00:11:48.000 | 2, and 10, 1.

00:11:52.000 | He prayed this way because he knew

00:11:56.000 | that the new birth is not a mere decision

00:12:00.000 | of humans, but a miracle from God.

00:12:04.000 | "With man this is impossible," Jesus

00:12:08.000 | said, "but with God all things are possible," Matthew 19,

00:12:12.000 | 26. So my conclusion is

00:12:16.000 | the all-embracing providence of God does not make

00:12:20.000 | prayer a problem. It makes prayer powerful.

00:12:24.000 | It makes prayer the wonderful gift

00:12:28.000 | that it is. Oh, let us be

00:12:32.000 | a praying people.

00:12:35.000 | Amen. What a great call. God's providence gives us the confidence that God

00:12:39.000 | has the right and the power to answer prayer.

00:12:43.000 | That is so, so relevant and so important. Thank you for listening to the podcast.

00:12:47.000 | On this podcast, we normally answer questions, and you can send us your own

00:12:51.000 | question, or you can search and browse all of our 1,600 past episodes,

00:12:55.000 | or you can subscribe to the podcast. You can do all that at DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.

00:13:01.000 | We are going to end the week with one of the most perplexing

00:13:05.000 | questions in all of the Bible. If he knew, if he knew that he

00:13:09.000 | would betray him in the end, why did Jesus choose

00:13:13.000 | Judas as a disciple to begin with?

00:13:17.000 | It's a great question. We get it all the time. We're finally going to address it. I'm your host, Tony

00:13:21.000 | Rehnke, and we'll see you back here on Friday for that.

00:13:25.000 | [end]

00:13:29.000 | [BLANK_AUDIO]

Finding the Confidence to Pray

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