Matthew chapter 6. I want to begin this morning by reading you a quote. I read it to you three weeks ago. I want to read it again because I think it is a powerful reminder as we study the first 18 verses of Matthew 6. This is from D.A. Carson. It reads like this. We human beings are a strange lot. We hear high moral injunctions, commands, and glimpse just the little of the genuine beauty of perfect holiness, and then prostitute the vision by dreaming about the way others would hold us in high esteem if we were like that. The demand for genuine perfection loses itself in the lesser goal of external piety. The goal of pleasing the Father is traded for its pygmy cousin, the goal of pleasing men. It almost seems as if the greater the demand for holiness, the greater the opportunity for hypocrisy. That is why I suspect that the danger is potentially most serious among religious leaders. That is exactly what Jesus is getting at in Matthew 6 1. I want you to go back And I want us to read again verse one of chapter six. Jesus says beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them. For then you will have no reward from your father who is in heaven. Every true believers wants to do the right thing before God. But he says watch out. Don't do good things with the motive of getting people to see you and be pleased with you. And why is there a problem with that. We just read it because if you do you will have no reward from your father who is in heaven now understand let me remind you he is not saying do not do any righteous deeds. That other people will see go back to five sixteen remember let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your father who is in heaven so that's not it it's deeper than that don't do these righteous deeds in such a way that you want people to see them and praise you for it. Don't try to garner the praise of men. That must not be your motive. So ultimately the contrast is between do I want to please God or do I want to please self. Now it would seem on the surface do I want to please God or do I want to please men. But why do we want to please men our own pleasure so they will think well of me and I get something out of that I take glory in that. So do I want to please God or do I want to please sell now. In verses two through eighteen Jesus applies verse one with three examples giving to the needy prayer and fasting. Those three things they're all what we would probably call in secular terms anyway. These are religious things. One person has written these were the three pillars of piety for a devout Jew and that's exactly why Jesus uses them. So today we come to the second of these and that is prayer. Jesus focuses on prayer and we're going to look particularly this morning at verses five through eight. So let me begin in verse one and read down through verse eight. Matthew six one through eight. Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you give to the needy do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing so that your giving may be in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. Verse five and when you pray you must not be like the hypocrites for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners that they may be seen by others. Truly I say to you they have received their reward. But when you pray go into your room and shut the door and pray to your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. And when you pray do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them for your father knows what you need before you ask him. Let's pray. Father this morning. We're asking that these words of Jesus might penetrate deeply into our hearts. Prayer is something that we could say, well, we're familiar with that on a certain level. But, oh, God, I confess to you. Prayer is difficult. I find that it gets crowded out so easily, it gets corrupted. So Lord, this morning, give us a diligence, a desire to pray in a way that would honor you and praise your name. That when Jesus walked the earth. He instructed us and these words are as much for us as people of that day. Let us hear this morning for your glory in Jesus name. Amen If you want a title for this message, it would simply be when you pray two points Number one when you pray don't be preoccupied with others and with self When you pray, don't be preoccupied with others and with self. Now you'll notice that when Jesus begins this section in verse five, he begins exactly like he did when he was talking about giving to the needy. He gives a warning. Do not be like the hypocrites. Now he doesn't. Again, he doesn't identify the hypocrites. But everything we know from the New Testament The primary ones were most likely the Pharisees if you go over to Matthew twenty three when he talks to the hypocrites he identifies them as the Pharisees. They were the ones that though they were scrupulous keepers of the law. Their primary motive was to gather the praise of men. We see it in this passage we see it in other places. Their audience was people now before we get started much I want to give us a caution all of us. We can read this whole section one through eighteen and we can really get down on those hypocrites the way they were and like giving to the needy they blew their own horn they found ways to let people know they were doing a good thing for God so that people would praise them. and then we come to prayer and he talks about them praying in the streets and in the synagogues and we say well I'd never be tempted to do that I sure don't want to go up front and pray and you won't catch me praying on the street corner. Understand that's the way those hypocrites did it but we can do it and we can do it in very subtle ways If you think, well, this doesn't apply to me, you missed the point. My part of my purpose this morning is to convince us that we desperately need these teachings of Jesus about prayer. So stay tuned. Don't tune out because you say, I'm not like that. So why did the hypocrites pray in the synagogue? Well it was customary in the synagogue service for a man to come up to the front of the synagogue and lead in prayer. Now think about that. Could there be any temptation there. You know there could be a temptation there. I don't want to use the kind of language that people will think I'm ignorant. I don't want to use this tone of voice that people will think I'm indifferent. And you know I'm thinking about that man that prayed last week at the synagogue service. And there's that subtle temptation. I want to do a little better than he did. And you say oh no. Be honest. The problem is when we pray and others are around. It's very easy to become more conscious of the people around us than we are of the God to whom we're praying. That is what Jesus is warning us about. And then why did they pray in the streets. Well we don't know all the history of that. I don't get the idea that a Pharisee comes along and he's just walking down the street and he comes to the corner and he starts praying. These guys wanted the praise of men but they weren't stupid. They didn't want it to look like they wanted the praise of men. They wanted to look like they were spiritual men of God. So sometimes they did blow trumpets at special fast that they had or maybe the evening offering and the trumpet would blow and they were supposed to come to the temple to pray. But it's likely that these hypocrites They didn't wait to go to the temple as if they were saying, Oh, I can't wait to get to the temple to pray. I must pray right here here and now whether they prayed out loud. I don't know. It doesn't matter whether they lifted their eyes to heaven or whether they bowed on their knees. Here's the point. They had ways of letting people know I am spiritual. I pray and they wanted people to know that they pray. So get this in mind. The point is they wanted people to recognize them as being spiritual and say that man really wants to be in God's presence so he prays all these times. Now the temptation the battle for us is how do we come into God's presence especially when other people are around and not be preoccupied with other people and with self. That's the battle. And if you don't think you have any struggle here you're blind. I want to read you a quote. This is from Martin Lloyd Jones. And it goes like this. I have a little trouble finding what I want to find this morning. Here it is. He says this. We tend to think of sin as we see it in its rags and in the gutters of life. We look at a drunkard poor fellow and we say there is sin that is sin but that is not the essence of sin to have a real picture and a true understanding of it. You must look at some great saint some unusually devout and devoted person. Look at him there upon his knees in the very presence of God. Even there, self is intruding itself, and the temptation is for him to think about himself, to think pleasantly and pleasurably about himself, and really to be worshiping himself rather than God. That, not the other, is the true picture of sin. Or to put it in another form, if you really want to understand something about the nature of Satan and his activities, the thing to do is not to go to the dregs of the gutters of life. If you really want to know something about Satan, go away to that wilderness where our Lord spent 40 days and 40 nights. That is the true picture of Satan, where you see him tempting the very Son of God. All of that comes out in this statement. Sin is something that follows us even into the very presence of God. The point is this. Sin is subtle. And it is very comfortable with religion. Satan likes religion. So don't think just because I come to a place and I pray that we are safe from self-deception and self-absorption because we are not. Again, sin seeks to follow us even into the very presence of God. So here's a question. If it's a great danger that we come to God in prayer but we're thinking more about self or others than about God, what do we do about it? How do we avoid it? Did Jesus give us any advice? He did. Verse 6. But when you pray go into your room and shut the door and pray to your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. So do you see the contrast between verse five and six. The hypocrites pray in a very public way and they get their reward but they get no reward from the father. But you when you pray you go into your own room shut the door and there you pray to the father in secret and he will reward you. Now. The King James and maybe the new King James I don't remember says he will reward you openly. The difference is because of a difference in Greek text and probably the best text don't have that you can say well you find that in other places yes you do he certainly will reward us openly but understand don't get this picture. Well I do these good deeds and I pray in secret to my father and someday he will reward me in a way that everyone will see And then my motive inside is I want to be praised by other people. That's not it. That's the very thing he is condemning. The father will reward us when we pray in secret. But the point is the hypocrites have already received what they want. What did they want. What was the result of this praying like they prayed. Jesus put it like this. Truly I say to you they have received the reward. What did they want. They wanted the praise of man. What did they get. They got the praise of man. But that's all they will ever get. They will get no reward whatsoever from the father will not happen now. I remember when I was in high school. For five maybe half a dozen of us sometimes we would meet before school started in the morning. We would find us a place and we would have a small prayer meeting. And it wasn't for show. It was not a popular thing to follow Jesus in my high school and we needed to pray for one another so we would do this on a daily basis. And one day a classmate came up to me and and she was polite but she says. Why do you do that? Don't you know what Jesus said? Jesus said, go into your room and shut the door and pray in secret. Why do you pray like this where people can see you? So that's an honest question. Does Jesus forbid public prayer? Does he forbid us from praying so that others might see us? Now you think about that a minute. So let me let me give you two cautions. The first one is we must look at the larger context of Scripture. If Jesus was forbidding public prayer then his disciples didn't understand what he was teaching because when you go to the book of Acts we find prayer meetings in Chapter one in Chapter three in Chapter four if you want to turn to Acts four the one I remember best is in Acts four. You remember that Peter and John are called before the council and the council lets them go but they tell them do not speak anymore in the name of Jesus. Now pick it up in chapter four verse twenty three. four twenty three and when they were released they went to their friends and reported what the chief priest in the elders had said to them and when they heard it they lifted their voices together to God and said Sovereign Lord who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them who through the mouth of our father David your servant said by the Holy Spirit I don't need to read the rest of the prayer but you get that you get the idea this was not a private thing they came back to the brothers and sisters and together They had a prayer meeting. Jesus did not forbid public prayer meetings. The other thing we have to do is we have to look at the more immediate context in Matthew six. Jesus was not concerned about the outward the external he was concerned about the motive The warning was not to pray with other people or where other people could see you. The warning was not to do it in such a way that they desire that you desire that they see you and lift you up and praise you and you get pleasure out of that. The older translations say that King James says enter into your closet. The modern was a room. It doesn't matter. The idea is enter into your secret place. You remember for Susanna Wesley with the seventeen children. Her secret place was she would sit down at the table and throw her apron over her head and that was her tent of meeting where she met with the Lord. You could pray in secret while walking down a busy street in New York City. The idea is to shut everything else out so that you can be with the Lord. He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. A great way to escape worrying about thinking about what other people are thinking about your praying is spend much time in private prayer. That's what Jesus did. Did Jesus pray more in public or in private. We have a few of his public prayers for instance in John seventeen it's long. Because we're told. That's a good question. He didn't make a show of it. But he did it enough that his followers knew when they wrote the gospel accounts you read the gospel accounts there are some public prayers particularly John seventeen where we have a long prayer of Jesus in the presence of the apostles. But you remember what it says in Mark one thirty five rising very early a great while before day he went out to a solitary place and there he prayed on one occasion he prayed all night Now I don't know this from Scripture but I find it hard to believe that that was the only time Jesus did that Jesus had a secret prayer life if you will with his father he spent much time with him. We need to do the same. So when you pray. Don't be preoccupied with others and so. And then secondly when you pray don't rely on religious formulas. When you pray don't rely on religious formulas. Now in all three of the examples that Jesus gives in verses one through eighteen giving to the needy prayer and fasting. His emphasis is just what we said don't do your righteous deeds in such a way that you want the praise of men. But then we get to verse seven and eight in Matthew six and he departs a bit from that. It's kind of like Jesus is teaching them about prayer and how they shouldn't do that so that others will see them and praise them. But then he has something else he wants to tell them about prayer. He sees another danger. And so he addresses that in verse seven and eight. Let's read it. And when you pray. Notice he begins it exactly like it did in first five. And when you pray. Do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them for your father knows what you need before you ask him. And then he goes on to give us the model prayer. Now. Jesus tells them that they are not to be like the hypocrites but now he tells them not to be like the Gentiles or we would probably say the pagans he's been talking to hypocritical Jews but now he says the pagans the Gentiles They also have a practice that you should avoid says they heap up empty phrases the King James says they use vain repetitions the N.I.V. reads when you pray do not keep on babbling like pagans. The point is they go through certain rituals and they think that will give them an audience with God and you saw these Gentile pagans they didn't even believe in the true God. Oh but they had plenty of gods and some of those pagans believe that if they address all their gods they say the name of their gods and then they say a prayer to each one and they use repetitious phrases they thought that would give them a better chance of getting an answer from their God. This is not directly related to the seeking of praise of men but I suspect there's still something of speaking to the hypocrites here because I suspect that they also got this into their practice and it's easy to do. You know it's always a good thing when we pray. to shut up. We don't have anything else to say. But sometimes we can just babble on even though we don't really have anything to say we're just heaping up empty phrases. Just don't do that. That's what the pagans do. Don't be guilty of that. I suspect if the hypocrites they did that because that too made them appear before people that they were godly and spiritual. The goal of prayer is not to soften God's heart. God is not hard of hearing. He hears well. He knows. As a matter of fact, we don't have to because notice what he says. Verse eight do not be like them for your father knows what you need before you ask him. Remember some some of us heard the reading of some one thirty nine Wednesday night out at White Sands. You remember what that song says. God knows us inside and out. He knows the words I'm going to speak before they come out of my mouth. He knows me far deeper than I know myself that God knows my needs. So we say well why pray to him if he knows our needs because he is a loving heavenly father. Think of it. John you're a dad and you've got a young Lucas now Lucas isn't able to ask much yet but let's go down the road a couple years and Lucas is three or four years old and when he comes to his dad to ask him for something. Most of the time, his dad already knows what he needs. Now can't you just see John saying, you don't need to talk to me boy, I know what you need. Look at that. Look at the smile on his face. He's going to be delighted that his son is coming to his father and asking him that. How much more will our heavenly father be delighted when we come to him to genuinely ask that he meet our needs. That's the picture here. Don't lose this. We talked a lot about it last week. This relationship with God as our father. So can we be guilty. Of using religious formulas. In our praying. Yes we can. You know sometime we can get the idea that if we pray a longer prayer God's going to be more satisfied with our longer prayer. No. You don't find that in Scripture you certainly don't find it here. So turn over for a minute to Luke 18. We read that earlier this morning and I feel like we need to deal with this just a minute because you might read this and think well boy sounds like there's a contradiction here. Let me just read through it again quickly. Luke 18 one and he that is Jesus told them a parable to the effect that they are always to pray and not lose heart. Now that's that's what he tells them then he's going to tell the parable. But the purpose of the parable is so that they are they would know they are always to pray and not lose heart. Verse two he said in a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man. There was a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying give me justice against my adversary. For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, Though I neither fear God nor respect man yet because this widow keeps bothering me. I will give her justice so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming. And the Lord said here what the unrighteous judge says and will not God give justice to his elect who cry to him day and night. Will he delay long over them. Now you might say well this sounds like we're to keep on praying we're to keep on praying that prayer. This quote explains it much better than I like the way he puts this so listen with me if you will. In the particular example before us these two scriptures if we make Matthew six seven through eight the absolute the logical conclusion is that followers of Jesus must never pray at length and seldom if ever ask for anything since God knows their needs anyway. If instead we make Luke eighteen one through eight the absolute we will reason that if we are serious with God we will not only pray at length but we may expect the blessings we receive to be pre proportionate to our much speaking. However if we listen to both passages with a little sensitivity we discover that Matthew six is really not concerned with the length of prayers but with the attitude of heart which thinks it is heard for its many words. Likewise we find that Luke eighteen one through eight is less concerned with mere length of prayers than with overcoming the quitting tendency among certain of Christ followers. These Christians finding themselves under pressure are often in danger of throwing in the towel but they must not give up and see it helps if we go back after you read this parable and you read verse one again. Verse eight eighteen one Luke and he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart. Always look at the context. These are different contexts different situations that Jesus is speaking to. So the great danger in this second danger is that we will use religious formulas to try to manipulate God. Sometimes prayer can be seen and God can be seen kind of as kind of like a slot machine. You put in the right tokens and outcomes the proper prize. God is not. Like this this is a relationship with our father and it with you it may not be heaping up phrases it may be another way you know sometimes people say if you will pray like this God will answer. Always be aware of that religious formulas that is not the key to prayer. So if there's a great danger. In the way we pray in the temptations we face. What do we do. The great principle in both these cases when you pray do not be preoccupied with others and self when you pray do not rely on religious formulas. The great key to both is when we pray we must remember that God and God alone is our audience. It is to God that we are praying. almighty God who is our father. Now I just I want to say and I'll say a little more in a minute. Understand that I'm talking to those of us whom God is truly our father that's not true for everyone. But if God is your father because you have come into a relationship with him through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. then remember to whom you are praying too often we we yield to certain temptations when we pray with others we gather on Wednesday night or some other gathering and you're praying with others I confess I can become more concerned with the people around me that are praying with me than with the God to whom I'm praying. And I have to be reminded that even though we're together and we're one body still I am praying to God not to my brothers and my sisters. Some of us have heard a preacher say he says something like this I've heard him say in a sermon he says I want you to know right now God is more real to me than you people who are sitting right here. That's the way it always should be being in his presence and recognizing that he is our audience again. Remember sin seeks to follow us into the very presence of God. I'll tell you something that disturbs me. Let me put it this way. It's not enough to go into your secret place, your room, your closet, and shut the door. That's not enough. Because you can still be in the secret place and thinking about self. This disturbs me about me but I have to confess it sometimes it happens. I can pretend with God even when nobody else is around. I can't explain that very well but I know it's true. Not often but I feel like there have been a few times when I've cried crocodile tears in God's presence but it wasn't genuine. I was pretending I was trying to fool him. Makes no sense but sin never makes sense when we come into God's presence how we need to cry out Oh God preserve us from that kind of self consciousness. This is one of the great curses we bear. We are so self conscious. We tend to relate everything to me. Oh, that we would God would so occupy our minds and our hearts with his glory that we could get past this preoccupation with self. We desperately, desperately need that. Another way to put it. Don't underestimate the power of the flesh the ability of self to put itself forward and congratulate itself as long as we live in this life sin will seek the spotlight in the most subtle ways even in times of prayer. Now I need to say one other thing this morning and that is this. The instructions that Jesus is giving us about prayer. These are for true believers we've talked about that with this with the whole sermon on the Mount. Jesus was not speaking to the world. He was speaking to his followers. Sometimes people ask well can non Christians pray and. I don't know we can debate all that stuff. But not in the sense of praying to God. As father. Not with confidence. If you grew up with a loving father. You could come to your dad. With confidence. How much more so. Our heavenly father. So I want to say to you this morning. If God is not your father. And again I'm not talking about. Whether you go to church, whether you read the Bible, whether you pray, I'm not talking about that. If God is not your father, because you've never come to the place where he has given you the new life in Jesus Christ, I cry out to you this morning, turn to him because of what Christ did. Jesus said, repent and believe the gospel. Come to the point where you're willing to admit openly to God. There is nothing good in me because you say there is nothing good in me. But I know that Jesus offered himself in my place on the cross that I might have real life. Jesus said that when you come to him like that he will not turn you away. I urge you run to Jesus today. Let's pray. Father, this morning, even though we've talked about prayer this whole time, we're not here to glorify prayer. It's the one to whom we pray. Prayer is just the vessel. But, oh God, You are the reality. Guard us from self-deception. what could be more subtle than a man or woman thinking he is worshiping and praying to you when he's really worshiping himself or herself Oh God deliver us from all of that may it be our desire to come into your presence often even continually and then Lord when we gather together as a church to pray O Father, remind us that we pray to you, our Father. As a church, show us how to pray together like they did in Acts 4, with the focus on you, but with hearts that are knit together. Thank you that you are faithful. You have promised that when we come to you in secret, you will reward us. Praise your holy name. And Lord the greatest reward that we want is just to continually be in your presence. One thing if I desired that while I seek after that I may dwell. In his temple all the days of my life to behold the beauty of the Lord. That's our desire father and where we're weak and that gets crowded out renew it in us again. Thank you especially that the Jesus who taught us to pray is the one who made it possible by going to the cross and rising from the dead. Make your gospel clearer and clearer to all of us. For we ask it in Jesus name. Amen.