Prayer Meeting 22/3/2022
My House Shall Be Called A House Of Prayer
Tonight we want to establish our prayer meeting. We want to give you some reasons and give you help as we have these meetings. Also, to let you all know from the offset, no one is going to be asked to stand up and pray. We are not here to make you uncomfortable but we are here to pray as one.
Our flesh knows prayer is it’s enemy. When we went through the High Priestly prayer in John 17 we truly got a grasp of the holiness of God, the holiness in Jesus’ prayers. Christ doesn’t need to pray for forgiveness, or confess, He is perfect, He and the Father are one. I wrote this during the sermons on the High Priestly prayer:
Christ’s prayer is not first confessional, nor does He come with His own need for forgiveness. Old testament priests all first had to first confess their own sinfulness before they prayed for others.
This prayer, the High Priestly prayer, the perfect Mediator, (note that word: mediator), He can intercede completely and in utter purity for us because He is perfect. This is why again, when we pray, we do so in His name, it’s Christ that purifies our prayers. Anthony Burgess says:
If a Godly man’s prayers avail much it’s because Christ’s prayers avail much… …our prayers live and move in His… …if Christ’s prayer had no more dignity and worth in it than mine has, I would be undone forever.
Why do I say that? Because when we pray, and when we have prayer meetings Christ joins us, He is with us, He is interceding for us.
Hebrews 7:26-28
26 For such a High Priest was fitting for us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and has become higher than the heavens; 27 who does not need daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifices, first for His own sins and then for the people’s, for this He did once for all when He offered up Himself. 28 For the law appoints as high priests men who have weakness, but the word of the oath, which came after the law, appoints the Son who has been perfected forever.
Hebrews 8:1-2
1 Now this is the main point of the things we are saying: We have such a High Priest, who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, 2 a Minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle which the Lord erected, and not man.
This is who we lift our prayers to, He is our high priest, who is seated at the right hand of the Father, yet is with us. As we pray together Christ joins us and unites us to Him. This is why prayer meetings are vital, they collectively join us to Christ in a heavenly realm. He propels us towards that. It’s not that He comes and dwells in the world with us, it’s that prayer leads us upwards. Jesus, when He prayed, He lifted His eyes to the heavens, now He is seated there.
Scripture tells us that the very first church started as a prayer meeting, in fact, it was a prayer meeting before it was a church. Acts 1:12-14, directly after Jesus ascended in front of their very eyes, the disciples went to the upper room to pray:
Acts 1:12-14
12 Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day’s journey. 13 And when they had entered, they went up into the upper room where they were staying: Peter, James, John, and Andrew; Philip and Thomas; Bartholomew and Matthew; James the son of Alphaeus and Simon the Zealot; and Judas the son of James. 14 These all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication, with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with His brothers.
They continued ‘with one accord’, in Greek: ὁμοθυμαδόν – Homothymadon
- With one spirit, one heart, one purpose
That unity of prayer is vital and brings us closer as brothers and sisters. It unites us in love, when we pray together we grow together in love for one another.
Romans 12:15-16
15 Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. 16 Be of the same mind toward one another. Do not set your mind on high things, but associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own opinion.
Praying together brings a deeper compassion, its where we hear the cries of people’s hearts and we can support and stand with one another. As we continue to do this we will see this happen.
Fraser mentioned to me today that he was reading Spurgeon on prayer, and he said
“when we lift one another up in prayer, when we lift our voices through prayer requests, it’s like kindling that lights the fire of a congregation.”
Galatians 6:2 tells us to ‘bear one another’s burdens’. It is said that the prayers of the puritans pierced heaven because they were always so heartfelt. Why? Well, because they lived such a hard life. Rarely did they live beyond 40, certainly few beyond 50. They faced extreme poverty, extreme hardship, extreme grieving. John Owen lost I think 11 children, 10 died before they were 3 years old. Calvin’s only son died in infancy. Many spent years in jail and squaller, and abuse. Their prayers were so heartfelt because their lives were so dependent on God. They brought every single aspect of their lives to God. In Robert Elmer’s book on puritan prayers he writes:
Ultimately the people who prayed these prayers were serious disciples, dedicated to their faith, their families and their work, their prayers reflected their all in commitment. The puritans were people on their knees.
It’s said that John Bunyan, who spent many years in jail, had knees like leather. Bunyan wrote:
The truths that I know best I have learned on my knees. I never know a thing well, till it is burned into my heart by prayer.
Prayer burns conviction into our hearts, fervent (ἐνεργέω - energeō) genuine prayer pierces the heart. I love the valley of vision book that we will most certainly be making available. Here is one prayer from it called ‘The Christian Prayer’ (Page 108):
Bless God, ten thousand snares are mine without and within. Defend Thou me, when sloth and indolence seize me give me views of heaven. When sinners entice me give me disrelish of their ways. When sensual pleasures tempt me, purify and refine me. When I desire worldly possessions help me to be rich towards Thee. When the vanities of the world ensnare me, let me not plunge in to new guilt and ruin. May I remember the dignity of my spiritual release, never to be too busy to attend my soul, never to be engrossed with time that I neglect the things of eternity. Thus may I not only love but grow towards Thee. Form my mind to right notions of religion, that I may not judge of grace by wrong conceptions, or measure my spiritual advances by the efforts of my natural being. May I seek after an increase of divine love to Thee. After unreserved resignation to Thy will, after extensive benevolence to my fellow creatures, after patience and fortitude of the soul, after a heavenly disposition, after a concern that I may please Thee in public and private, draw on my soul the alignments of Christ in every trace and feature of which Thou will take delight, for I am Thy workmanship, created in Christ Jesus; Thy letter written with the Holy Spirit’s pen, Thy tilled soil ready for the sowing, then harvest.
Amen
We want these meetings to open us all up to bring every aspect to God in prayer. We want it to move us. I will conclude with this in Matthew 21:12-14; a house of prayer. Above all the church is a house of prayer. Here Jesus enters the temple:
Matthew 21:12-13
12 Then Jesus went into the temple of God and drove out all those who bought and sold in the temple, and overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves. 13 And He said to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a ‘den of thieves.’ ”
I love verse 14…
Matthew 21:14
14 Then the blind and the lame came to Him in the temple, and He healed them.
Prayer opens the door to the broken, prayer opens the door to allow Jesus to heal them, to restore them, to save them. Thank goodness we are building a holy house. Let’s pray for the hurting in the community. Pray we don’t allow our own desires to stop that; our own inward looking, our own issues. Let us not be creating any stumbling blocks for anyone to come to the Lord. Let them know the church is the hope of the world, because it’s where they will meet Jesus.
Let’s pray.
Amen.
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