We started off by looking at who the adversary was. What is the devil? Who is the devil? What is he like? What is his intent? We looked at the schemes of the devil. We also looked at the fact that he is an attacker of the mind. He masquerades that he is a deceiver. And then we looked at the idea of taking up the armor but primarily standing in Christ, making sure that your hope and your sense of who you are has to do with Jesus and what he's done for you and what he's doing for you, his intercession for you and so on. The devil attacks us to try to get us to disbelieve or to doubt what it is that the word of God tells us about God and our salvation and so on. And the first part of all the epistles, especially like in Ephesians here, we have all this information about what it means to be a Christian. You're adopted, you're forgiven, you are now a part of the family, you are indwell by the Spirit of God, you're heading for glory. These are truths that the devil wants to get you in doubt. And then he wants you to sin. He wants you to not obey the kinds of commands that you have in the epistles and all throughout the Bible in reference to how you should act and behave in reference to what you believe. As a result of believing in this great truth about who Christ is and who you are now in Christ, so he's trying to get you to sin. He's a tempter. Disobey the commands. The battle itself Changes, though, every day. That's his general operation. That's what he's trying to do. But the way he attacks us each day, it changes as different things develop as we go through our lives. So when you are in a situation where an accident happens, I think about this thing in Miami, the collapse of this building. These souls who are taken out of life with no warning. with no sense of it being, if you will, in a dangerous place, they went to sleep. And at 1.30 a.m. or so, the building collapsed, one part of it, and 90 seconds later, the other part of it. And the people living there were quite wealthy, diverse, from all over the, especially South America, there were 20 Israelis there, there were other people, you know, wealthy. I mean, each apartment was like 750, to 2.8 million dollars. People now have to deal with this. Think of all the relatives who are waiting in those rooms trying to hear word. Think of their battle today, how it changed from, you know, a week ago. Think of the officials who have to make decisions. Think of those who are going to eventually have to grieve over the loss of these people, and so on. Every day brings different kinds of battles for all of us. We didn't know that Ron was going to fall out of a tree a couple of weeks ago. We just don't know what's coming around the corner for all of us. But in each of these, there is a battle going on of the mind to keep trusting God, to keep depending on Him. Every time you interact with somebody at work or at your neighbor, or anybody, a doctor, you are called on to do it well for Jesus, to reflect Him well in that situation. You need to pray. You need to be calling on God to assist you in that particular battle. Every single day there is something that comes, and every battle is slightly different. We are told to be strong, stand firm, put on the armor, but also to pray. This is the big thing today. We want to focus on why this thing of prayer. Why connect it to the armor? Look at what he says, 618. And pray in the spirit on all occasions, all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints. Pray also for me. Whenever I open my mouth, words be given me. Fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel. which I am a bastard in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly as I should. Prayer. Pray. Six times in this short little paragraph. Obviously this is important when it comes to doing the battle. You may have all the rest of the armor, but not pray. And it'll be ineffectual if you don't pray. You see, this is sort of a part of your equipment as you go into this warfare. As soon as you pray, you are connecting to Jesus, the great warrior, the one who was able to defeat the devil and has defeated the devil. So when you pray, you're communicating and putting yourself at his disposal. You're calling out to him, the great God of power. And you know that this Christ has shown himself strong against the devil over and over. Resurrection is the final statement of the devil's defeat. God's chief gift to those who seek Him is Himself. So as soon as you start praying, you're connecting your heart to the Lord, to Him and His power. You're submitting to Him. You're depending upon Him. You see how important prayer is? You're calling out to this God to come to your aid in this situation. It's also a calling out to God to bring His power to bear on this particular spot where the battle is the strongest or the hottest. What is it that you're burdened about? What is it that's bothering you today? What has come to your mind? What person and their need has come to your mind? That's who you need to focus. And when you pray, you're calling down the power of God to deal with this particular situation. I like the illustration of the combat controller. In a major conflict, there's people that are dropped behind the lines, and these people have tremendous training. They're people who know how to communicate with all the planes and all the other commanders and everything else, and they are right there watching the battle, and they know exactly what they need to bring to bear to defeat the enemy. They're embedded. They're called combat controllers. They call in power. They have the planes. They know where all the planes are. They know everything. They have it all there. This is sort of like prayer people. This is us calling in power. You know, in any battle, there needs to be communication with the captain, or with the general, or with the powers that be, the higher command. And, you know, in the Roman army, when Paul was writing this, they had trumpets that would say what to do, whether it's retreat or go forward, go left, go right. They would use banners. Later on, it was flags. Sometimes it was smoke signals. Now it's all electronic. It's very high tech. But this is command and control. It's absolutely essential for the battle to be won. So what we have here in prayer is sort of like that command and control. You get to call out particularly and bring in the power of God to deal with this particular situation, this particular person, everything that is in front of you, you can bring His power to bear. I think about the event with Moses and Joshua. They're fighting the Amalekites. Joshua's in battle. And we're told in Exodus 17, 11, as long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning. But whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning. Now this, I think, is an illustration. By the way, Aaron and Hur were called alongside because you can't only hold your arms up so long. I mean, it's a whole day long battle. So here you have this picture of the battle being won as one continues to pray. So you can see the connection between winning the battle and prayer. These missions of these combat controllers, they're absolutely essential in these battles. Are you losing battles? You know, battles with temptation? Battles with frustration and anger? Battles with discouragement? Sadness? Are you losing these battles consistently? Well, maybe it's because you're neglecting prayer. You've got to connect prayer to this. You've got to read the scriptures with prayerful attitude. You've got to have prayer connected to deal with the devil. There's no other way. The one concern of the devil, someone has written, is to keep Christians from praying. He doesn't fear prayerless Bible study, prayerless service, or prayerless religious duties, but he fears when we pray. That's the power of God. William Cowper, the hymn writer, put it this way, forgetting prayer, we cease to fight. Prayer makes the Christians' armor bright, and Satan trembles when he sees the weakest saint upon his knees. The weakest saint. You don't have to be powerful. You've got the powerful God that you can call on. These air controllers, just one little man down there, but he's bringing in the power of the blue angels, or whatever those things are. And he can call in tremendous power just with his voice. See, that's what we need to do. Now, secondly, the effectiveness of prayer. Ask, Jesus says, and it will be given to you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you. Over 70 times in the New Testament, we have admonitions to pray. So, apparently, Christians should be people who pray. We should be noted. is the slender nerve that moves the muscle of omnipotence. We need to be in prayer. James 5.13 is interesting. Is anyone of you in trouble? He should pray. The prayer of a righteous man or woman is powerful and effective. Now why would he say that? Why would he say that? Because we tend to think it's not powerful. and not effective. We say, what's the use? You know, I've already prayed about this, how many times? Or, if you will, maybe God isn't hearing me because I'm such a schmuck. Or until I get myself all cleaned up, then maybe he'll hear me. I mean, on and on, excuses come to our minds as to why we just don't bother to pray. No, he says, it's Affectual and powerful. Now a righteous man, that doesn't mean a perfect man. That means a man who's righteous in Christ. Somebody who has confidence that his sins are forgiven because of Jesus. That Jesus is interceding in his behalf. That he's beloved because of Christ. A righteous man that's powerful. God is sovereign. People know this. And sometimes they ask the question, well if God is sovereign, isn't he going to do what he's going to do? without me praying. You know, if God is not with me, why pray? I mean, whatever's going to happen with this person or this situation, God has a plan to accomplish it and He's going to do it. Well, the answer to that is God's plan includes your praying. Your praying for this situation is a part of Him bringing you in to His creative power, His providential power, through Prayer. This is his plan. He seems to do this. Like, for instance, Daniel. Daniel 9.2, he says, I, Daniel, understood from the scriptures according to the word of the Lord, given to Jeremiah the prophet, that the desolation of Jerusalem would last 70 years. Now, he's in Babylon. He's reading the scriptures. He understands it's been 70 years since the captivity started. He sees that God promised to deliver his people after 70 years. But he goes to prayer. This is so interesting. So I turned to the Lord and pleaded with him in prayer. In petition and fasting and sackcloth and ashes. Not a quick little simple prayer, but a real intense prayer. So what we have here is sort of a picture of how God has a plan, but part of his plan is us praying. So he puts the burden on us. and he makes us pray, gets us to pray. So we participate in God's activity in the world. I wonder if Hannah would have conceived Samuel, little Samuel, if she wasn't praying, seriously praying. Remember how Eli came and thought that she was drunk? She was just praying her heart out. I wonder if Peter would have been released from prison when Herod Agrippa I put him in prison if the Christians weren't fervently praying for him, as it says in Acts. Would those angels have come and rescued him? You see what I'm saying? There's this connection between our prayers and God's activity. Our prayers and His activity. So never think, oh, God is sovereign. He's going to do what He wants. No, if He's put a burden on your heart, put something in your mind. Pray. Pray. Include that with the activity of God. He's planned this. And while I am not sure He can certainly do all of this without us, but he's brought us in. He's made us his children. We're co-creators, as it were. We are in his image. We're people who can actually participate with God in the activity of this ongoing thing called his kingdom. The high kingdom come. See what I'm saying? So, don't ever think that his sovereignty prevents us or should stop us from praying. What about unanswered prayer? Well, just remember this. Sometimes the answer is not what you asked. It's not my will, but thine be done. You know, God isn't some sort of cosmic vending machine. You press in the right buttons and you get the dollar, and you get exactly what you asked. We are asking a being who sees the future, knows the past, knows us, knows the person we're praying for, knows all things. He is so infinite in his mind, You need to just ask. He understands when you ask for silly things, as it were. Just like a little child will ask for something. I would like to have a car that I could drive to, you know, or something. And we don't necessarily give the five-year-old a car or an ATV. We essentially filter those things, understand the heart cry, comfort the little one, but don't always give him exactly what he has. This is our Father as well. There are other things God is up to. God's answers are wiser than our prayers. God's answers are wiser than our prayers. Another person, Joseph Hall. I am sure I shall receive either what I ask or what I should have asked. Here's something else from J.R. Miller. We saw it the other day. This has to do with after Paul had prayed and removed the thorn three times, but instead he heard God say, my grace is sufficient for thee. Many prayers which seem to be unanswered are really answered. The blessing comes, but in a form we do not recognize. Instead of the very thing we sought, something better is given. The burden is not lifted away, but we are sustained beneath it. We are not spared the suffering. But in the suffering we are brought nearer to God and receive more of His grace. The sorrow is not taken away, but it is changed to joy." There's reasons God doesn't answer prayer, but He answers it in His way. You pray. This changes the heart. You know, prayer changes things, as they say, but primarily the thing that it changes is you, internally. you are putting yourself under the sunshine of God. Prayer is not a convenient device for imposing our will upon God or bending His will to ours, but the prescribed way of subordinating our will to His. John's done it. So when we pray, we are emboldened by God to accept what He gives. And that changes us. So prayer changes things. Prayer changes us. Don't let Satan prevent you from praying. Just pray. You may not understand it. It may not make sense to you. You may think that it's empty or without any power. That doesn't matter. Just pray. You don't have to understand this. You just need to do it. I mean, how many of us have cell phones that we completely understand? I mean, give me a break. We have no clue. There's a whole little computer thing going on in here. And there's other machines all over there, GPS devices, blah blah blah. It's way beyond us. But we still use them. You don't have to understand it. You just need to do it. So don't let the devil keep you from praying because he gives you some kind of argument against it. Just keep praying. Number three, pray in the spirit. This is an interesting term. It's only used twice. Jude 20, build yourselves up in the most holy faith, pray in the Holy Spirit. So thinking about what does this mean, praying in the Spirit? Is it a different kind of prayer? Does it mean that you lose your thinking? You go into some sort of ecstatic state and speak something that comes to your mind that's not even language that you can understand? Is that it? What is it? Well, I think it has to do with praying with his aid. We already read Romans 8.26. The Spirit helps us in our weakness. We don't know what to pray for as we walk, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will. He's interpreting our prayers. He's assisting our prayers. He's making them effectual before God. He's bringing them into the core of heaven. He's assisting us in the whole process. So that certainly must be something of what this means. It's sort of like a mother who understands her little four-year-old whose language isn't quite clear to everybody, but she's heard it all these days and knows what to say and interprets it to you. The Holy Spirit does this. Also I think it has to do with being absolutely sure that you're accepted in Christ when you pray. Now when you're praying, The answer is not going to come on the grounds of your own goodness, or your own worth, or your own work for God. You know, sometimes we think, well, I've done all this, and this happens? Wait a minute, that has nothing to do with the effectualness of your prayer. It always has to do with Christ. His intercession, His goodness, His death for us. We are accepted in the blood, in Romans 8, 15. For you did not receive the spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the spirit of sonship. And by Him we cry, Abba Father! The Holy Spirit causes us inside to say, Abba Father, I'm a son, I'm a daughter, I belong to God. That's praying in the Spirit. You have this absolute confidence that you have access to the living God. The Spirit Himself testifies with our spirit, we are God's children. So we pray to the Father, through the Son, with the aid of the Holy Spirit. But through the Son. It's always through the Son. It's not through you. It's without praying in the name of Christ. It's like a check unsigned. You pray in Jesus' name. It has power. Because it's not in your name. You're praying in His name. I think the other thing would be that prayer should be not a rote duty, just a couple of words that are said, a recitation of prayer. Some people recite prayers. I mean, Catholics are taught to do this, you know, with the whole rosary thing. And you're saying these things, and it's a duty. It's actually considered a punishment. It's a part of your penance. You know what? This is not godly. There are Zoroastrians, my relatives, We pray these prayers in a language they don't know. Islamists do this too. Whenever they go to prayer, many of them don't understand Arabic. But they have to pray in Arabic. They're not even sure what these words mean. And they pray them. They pray them over and over. Jesus says, when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. No, we pray as we worship in spirit. and in truth, in spirit and in truth. When you pray, pray with a sense of fervency and reality that you are really connecting to God, that your burden needs to be mentioned to Him in such a way that you bring it to Him. It's not just some broke prayer, some written out prayer by somebody else. Now those are sometimes good, but essentially it has to have heart with it, fire, fervent and effectual prayer. The righteous man fails much. If you don't have it on fire, Your prayers will not make it to heaven. Lifeless prayer is no more prayer than the picture of a man is a man. Thomas Watson. That's so good. Cold prayers do always freeze before they reach to heaven. Cold prayers freeze before they reach to heaven. Saying prayers without praying is blasphemy. Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to be healed. I wonder if anybody in that building heard that prayer? I don't know. Is it just a rote prayer? Does it really mean something? I mean, are we just saying things that we've been taught? Or are we expressing our hearts? Really calling out for this particular situation? See, that's real prayer. Number four, pray on all occasions. That means at all times. in every season, always. That's the way other translations have it. Colossians 4.2, devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 1 Thessalonians 5.17, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances, all circumstances. 6.18, be alert and always keep on praying. Jesus said to his disciples, be always on watch and pray. In other words, like, Everyday duties will require your praying. Husbands, love your wives. Is it always just easy to love your wife? Wives, submit to your husbands. Is that easy, women? Children, obey your parents and Lord. These are all commands, by the way, that just came, you know, just mentioned in the epistle. No, it's not easy to do any of these things. Is it easy to love your neighbor as yourself? Is it easy to be humble, as it says in chapter 4? In chapter 5, is it easy to avoid sexual immorality? Are any of these things just come natural, or are they battles? They're battles, let's be real. And so what he's saying is on all these occasions, and all these things that you face every single day, pray. You're going to need prayer. You're going to need to be praying or you will lose the battle. This is an interesting prayer. Dear God, so far today, I haven't lost my temper, wasted my time, used harsh, nasty words, been unkind or too selfish or overindulgent. But in a few minutes, I think I'm going to really need your help when I finally get out of bed. As soon as you start moving around, As soon as you get up and you think of your day, you're going to start, have to start praying. Because you're going to need His help to have your mind right, just to be in the right spirit, even if nobody's around. But then when things start happening, you know, you find something, some accident, something doesn't work, oh, each day brings so many things that you have to pray for. You live your life in an attitude of prayer, continually saying, God, give me grace, give me grace. Even now, you're sitting here listening to me graciously. Let me pray, Lord, look, you've brought me here for a reason. There's something here that you're expecting me to get. Lord, open my heart and my mind to receive the seed of the word. Let me grow from this. That's a prayer. that you need right now. Then he says, all kinds of prayer are last of all. 1 Timothy 2.1, I urge then, first of all, that requests, and would be petitions, prayers, intercession, thanksgiving, be made for everyone. Kings and all those in authority, he goes on. And I was like, there's always people to pray for who are lost, who are outside of God's immediate loving favor in the sense that they are right with God and have accepted Christ as their savior. These people are lost. They died. Think about all these folks who died in this terrible collapse. Souls are daily moving on to face the God of the universe and their only hope is the Lord Jesus Christ. Do you talk to people about the Lord? You talk to your children, your grandchildren, your neighbors. Others do. You tell them about the only escape there is, which is Christ. We're all going to face death one way or the other. Whether it's a natural disaster like this tower, or whether it's the Twin Towers by some evil persons. Either way, we're going to die. We need to have a heart that is right with God. I thought, I think about what Jesus said. Luke 13, 4, those 18 who died when the Tower of Siloam fell on them, do you think they were more guilty than all the others living in Jerusalem? I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you too will all perish. What is he saying? He's saying, look, these things happen, but let's not think that that's because they're worse than you. We're all in need of repentance and faith in Christ. So let's start thinking in those terms in reference to these dear ones that have lost their lives, those who are left, if you will, that God might use even this terrible event to work in them, that the gospel would get through to them. And then pray about your own troubles. Psalm 86.6. Hear my prayer, O Lord, listen to my cry for mercy. The day of my trouble I will call to you. Look, God never gets tired of you coming to Him. Never. You may say, well, I bothered him about this over and over again. Well, keep bothering him. He's not bothering him. You're trying to fix something that doesn't work. Or you're not getting there. Something isn't working that you had thought should work. A plan isn't working out. Whatever. Pray. Pray. Just keep praying. You're not bothering him. Ask for his assistance. Can't find your keys. Can't find your wallet. Can't find whatever. Pray. Just keep praying. He's not going to say, oh, it's you again. Oh, great. No, he's an infinite being. You can hear your prayers all day long, no problem. Just keep praying. And then, finally, intercession for others. He says here, Colossians 4.12, Epaphras is always wrestling in prayer for you, that you may stand firm in all the will of God, mature and fully assured. Every true prayer, Stott says, is a variation on the theme, thy will be done. We are looking for God's will to be done in our lives. We want to be something that beams that glorify God. And we want it in other lives. Are you caring about your grandkids? Do you think about them even though they're far away? Maybe it's somebody else that you are concerned about that's close to you in your life. Are you concerned for them? Well then pray for them. Bring God's power there on them. And it may be a long way off. William Carey who was the missionary to India who lived in the 1700s and the 1800s. I forget the exact dates, but he was considered the father of modern missions. And he went to India and he lived there for 40 years and was a teacher. He started several schools. He translated the Bible into 44 different dialects. This guy was incredible. And what he ended up doing was great, if you will. But did you know that his sister was paralyzed, was bedridden for 50 years, and encouraged him with letters continually from England, but also prayed for him for at least two hours every day. So the work of Carrie, and the success, if you will, of Carrie, is in some way attributed to her You can pray for people at a distance and God will do things. You've got to believe this. This is a part of our calling. What is a prayer warrior? A prayer warrior is somebody who prays as he goes through his daily life. He's just a regular average soldier who is constantly in prayer. You don't have to pray for two hours a day in some formal way, laying on your face You could be praying all the time, all through your day. Pray without ceasing, we've been told. Live in the attitude of prayer. That's a prayer order. So it's a warrior who prays. So, we're all in daily battles. We battle with grief, we battle with doubt, fear, discouragement, pain, sin, temptation. Stand in Christ, put on the truth, and pray. Communicate with the high command. Call in his power, and you will have more victory. You know, these people, these combat control training, combat control people, their training is so intense that 90 to 95% of the people that try to get into that program fail. They fail out. These people are so well trained. And it's interesting that out of the seven Air Force crosses that are awarded since the global war on terror started in 2001, five have been awarded to combat controllers for extraordinary heroism in combat. So you can be, we can be, combat controllers, controlling the power, focusing that power with laser beam accuracy. on the things that really are going on in our lives. Are you doing that? Are you being the combat control? That's what it is to pray. Let's pray. Father, please challenge us all to be more in prayer on a regular daily basis in every situation. Let us not be people who just mechanically go through life without calling on you and looking to you. May every frustration be a call to prayer for us. in every annoyance, in every situation that is difficult for you. Call for prayer. Call the prayer for patience, for kindness, for compassion. Everyone around us is suffering. Help us, Lord, to be in prayer for them and assist them the best we can, even by our prayers, even as we see people that we sense are hurting. oh lord give us hearts that are constantly in touch with you through prayer please lord let this be the habit of our lives because you've called us to be prayer warriors we pray in jesus name amen take time to be holy six five six They tried to keep away, to keep off with my Lord. Abide in Him always, have feed on His Word. Make friends with God's children. Those who are weak or can't even know me, it's a blessing to see. Take time to keep going. Love of the world rushes on. Spend much time inside. I am looking to Jesus, I am looking and I shall be. I have friends and I know God, His likeness shall see. Your benediction is taken from Ephesians 6. At the end of the epistle, peace and love and faith and hope. God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to all who love our Lord Jesus with an undying love. We'll sing the fourth and the last. It's time to be holy, be calm in thy soul. Be sure to be troubled with peace and joy. Take time to pray. And pray as you go through doing everything you do. Amen.