We all know we should pray, but for many of us praying is hard. It is like picking up a telephone and talking to someone who is silent.
JOHN 14:13 & 15:7-8: WHAT GOD PROMISES ABOUT PRAYER
INTRODUCTION
Sometimes I come to you because I think I have the answers. This time I come mostly with questions.
I am going to talk to you about prayer—something I’m not very good at.
The Bible tells us that prayer is powerful in its effects.
Jesus told us that if we pray with faith, we will receive.
St. Paul tells us to pray without ceasing.
But for me prayer is hard.
It is hard to keep up a one-sided conversation—because I don’t hear God’s voice answering me.
A lot of my praying is more from a sense of duty than a joy.
I suspect that when I get to heaven and find out what my prayers have accomplished, I will wish I had prayed more.
So this message is as much for myself as much as it is for you.
I. Here are two promises from John’s Gospel: John 14:13 and John 15:7-8.
John 14:13:
“Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it,
that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”
John 15:7-8:
“If you abide in me, and my words abide in you,
ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you.
By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit,
and so prove to be my disciples.”
A. First we will consider John 14:13: “Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.”
We learn from this saying that when we ask, we are to ask in Jesus’s name.
To ask in Jesus’s name is to ask as his representative.
It is to ask, not for my sake, but for Jesus’s sake.
It is to ask only for things that I have reason to believe Jesus wants.
When I went to college my father put his name on a check.
When I got to the registrar, I filled out the check and put in the amount and handed it to the clerk.
She accepted it—even though I didn’t have a checking account—because my father’s name was on it.
My father trusted me to make it out to the University of Kansas and for the proper amount.
This is kind of like how prayer works.
God gives us a book of checks with Jesus’s name on the signature line, for us to fill out and cash.
But it is very important that what we write on that check is according to God’s will.
Another thing we learn from this verse is that the purpose of prayer is to glorify the Father.
This isn’t because God is vain and proud and craves our admiration.
It’s because only when the Father is honored in my life, can I be in right relationship to God.
And my happiness depends on my being in close fellowship with God our Father and his Son Jesus Christ.
When we want something very much, it is easy to fool ourselves by thinking that what we want so much must be what God wants us to have.
So we have to be open to the idea that sometimes—often—we will pray for things that we will not receive.
Could it be that we might pray for healing—or for the pain to go away—but God intends that we prove our faith by the way we handle our adversity?
Peter writes of our rejoicing in our hope of resurrection but adds: “…though now you may have to suffer various trials, so that the genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold which though perishable is tested by fire, may redound to praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.”
How we handle suffering proves to us and to others that our faith is genuine.
Sometimes pain can make us cling closer to God.
Sometimes affliction can help us understand the afflictions of others, so that we can comfort them.
Sometimes troubles can make us long for heaven, and suffering can prepare us for our homecoming.
These are some ways God uses suffering in our lives.
B. The second saying I want us to consider is John 15:7-8: “If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be my disciples.”
Here again we are invited to ask “whatever we will.” But here again, there are conditions.
The first condition: “If you abide in me…”
Jesus has compared his Father to the gardener, himself to a grapevine, and his people to the branches in the vine.
Only as the branches remain attached to the vine can they make fruit.
He expresses the union of the branches and the vine by saying that the branches “abide in the vine.”
He says, “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”
The idea is that we are made to live our lives in union with Jesus, our Savior.
I pray that whatever it Christ wants will be what I want.
When people are very much in love with one another, they have one will because they both desire the same things.
Jesus knows best and he always has my good at heart, so my aim is to have his mind in me.
The Bible speaks of having “the mind of Christ.” That is our aim.
When our mind is one with the mind of Christ we are ready to pray with confidence.
The second condition: “…and my words abide in you…”
It is by having Jesus’s words constantly in mind that we truly “abide in Christ.”
His commandments are constantly in our minds—especially the commandments to trust and to love.
We go to the Bible to find Christ’s words to us.
To live in union with Jesus we need constantly to be meditating on the words of Christ and the words of the holy writers of our Bible.
It’s not just the words we remember. It’s the words that we do—the words that live with us.
Again in this saying, Jesus tells us that our purpose is that the Father may be glorified: “By this the Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples.”
II. So much for the promises. But it is the problems that sometimes make us lose heart when we pray.
A. What about faith? The Bible says we have to have faith. But how can we have faith when we’ve been disappointed so many times?
I don’t know the entire answer to that question.
I know that it’s impossible to make ourselves have faith.
I know also that sometimes we have faith and pray and are still disappointed.
But there’s one kind of faith we can all have.
We can all have faith that when we pray, God hears us.
And if you don’t have faith, pray anyway. Faith will come.
One of my favorite prayers in the Bible is the prayer of the father of the epileptic boy in Mark 9. Jesus tells him that if he has faith all things are possible. The poor man cries out, “I believe; help my unbelief!”
Think of it this way. Just tell God what’s on your mind and let him sort it out.
Keep praying, keep talking to God, keep crying out to him—and leave the results to him.
The important thing is to be in communication.
We don’t have to be always talking. Sometimes I just like to rest in Jesus.
I read about an old woman who lived alone.
Someone asked her what she did with her time.
She said, “I take my Bible and I let God talk to me. Then I pray and talk to God. And when I’ve talked to God and let God talk to me, I just sit still and let God love me.”
I heard about an old peasant in France. His priest noticed that he would often come to church and just sit—seemingly doing nothing.
His priest asked him: “What are you doing here, day after day?”
“Well,” he said, “I look at God and God looks at me—and we’re happy together.” This man had learned to pray without words.
B. Another problem: Sometimes I am quite sure that the thing I am praying for is God’s will, but God does not grant my request.
Suppose a friend is suffering dreadfully, and her suffering is destroying her faith. You beg God to deliver her from her affliction, but she continues to suffer.
These are things that I can’t understand, but we have to accept that we don’t always know what’s best.
Sometimes God’s ways are dark. Some of God’s children walk in darkness. The psalm calls it “the Valley of the Shadow of Death.”
Sometimes we pray for a loved one that he will come to God, but he keeps wandering far away.
Let us remember that God can draw a soul to himself, but a person has to make a choice.
God wants lovers not slaves. He forces nobody. He respects our free will.
So keep praying for that one, that God will bring into his life good influences and draw him to himself. But remember, each of us must choose God for himself.
C. There are many things that we know God wants for us. These we can ask for without any doubts.
One of my most frequent prayers is for stronger faith.
Another is that God will make me useful.
God wants us to overcome the sins that stumble us up and hurt the people around us.
We can pray against our sins—anger, pride, selfishness, envy, complaining, superiority.
And we can pray for the character traits that should replace our sins—kindness, courtesy, humility, gentleness, thoughtfulness, thankfulness.
We need not doubt that these prayers are God’s will for us.
So let’s pray that God will make us holy, useful, fruitful Christians—a blessing to those around us and worthy of our Lord Jesus.
CONCLUSION
The story is told of a man who ordered something from a catalog.
On the order form were the words: “If we haven’t the article you order in stock, may we substitute?”
He wrote “yes.”
When the order came, found that what had ordered was not in stock, so they had sent something worth double what he had paid.
Ever after that, he would always answer the question at the bottom of the form—“If we haven’t the article you order, may we substitute?”—with a big “YES” so bold that they couldn’t miss it.
As I look back over my life I can remember many times when I didn’t receive what I asked for in prayer.
But as I look back I also see that things worked out.
Even though I didn’t get what I asked for, something good happened—sometimes better than what I asked for.
So let us pray, confident that God hears us, that he loves us, and that he will work through all the circumstances of our lives for our good and for our happiness.
After all, he has all eternity to make it up to us for the disappointments and afflictions of our life on earth.
So keep praying and don’t be discouraged.
And if you are discouraged, tell God about your discouragement.
But, above all, keep taking to God.
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