Monday 1/28/13 When We Pray

Good Monday Afternoon, my dear brothers and sisters.  I pray all of you are well and solidly in love with our Lord Jesus.  Please pray today for our leaders in Washington, also in our State Houses, our local governments and the leaders of our schools.  Also today please pray for our military veterans and our current military, also all those police and firefighters.  Also all others who work to keep you safe and healthy.  Have you noticed that the grass and flowers, etc., look much better near our Capitol Builders?  More fertilizer, folks.  (I just made that one up.)

I have been praying today as I was in the truck plowing about a subject or subjects for this weeks' messages.  As I was praying and talking to God, He just opened up my little brain and said why not write about prayer, about talking to Me?  So again, and yes, I have done it before, I am going to tackle the subject of prayer.  So let's get started.

1/28/13 Prayer Day One:

Matthew 6:9 - "After this manner therefore pray ye:  Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy name.  10 Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.  11 Give us this day our daily bread.  12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.  13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, For Thine is the kingdom and the power, and the glory, forever.  Amen."  (KJV)

It is time again to take a good look at the prayer our Lord Jesus taught us to pray.  We refer to it as the Lord's Prayer, but it is indeed our prayer.  Do you attend a church that uses The Lord's Prayer weekly or maybe on just special occasions?  Maybe your church does not use it much at all.  Folks, it is a wonderful prayer, but years ago I had to really take a look at it and at me, for I found out that I was really not praying but just saying it.  Where do you fit in on this?  If at church and you were all praying this The Prayer our Master, our Lord Jesus taught us, and your leader dropped out, would the rest go on or just drop the ball? Folks, it happened to me as I was leading a service a lot of years ago at Hope United Methodist Church on the Carlisle Pike, and I did not have the Prayer in the bulletin, sadly I lost my place, and everyone stopped.  EVERYBODY!  Then "Miss Kim", Kim Murphy, who was the choir director, picked up on it, knowing I was in trouble, and started praying it.  Others joined in and this old man was bailed out.  So this got me thinking, do I say the prayer or am I praying the prayer?  So I looked into it and looked at the meaning of it and what all was in it and preached on it.  I also wrote on it several times each time asking God to give it to me fresh and again starting tomorrow I am going to write on it, we are going to study the prayer this week.  So please by all means use it this week.  What does it mean to you?  Say it and pray it, study it with me.  What does it mean?  We will dig into it starting tomorrow.  Right now, let's go to prayer, and yes, you just know the prayer already.

But before we PRAY the Lord's prayer, let's look at a couple of prayers our parents taught us to pray when we were kids.  I am going to write down a couple.  Would you please take time to share one of two of yours with me?

Before our meals, before I ate, I was taught to say this prayer.

"God is great, God is good, let us thank Him for our food.  By His hands we all are fed, give us, Lord, our daily bread."

Now my daddy had another prayer He always prayed before eating but He went so fast to this day I don't know what He really said.  But back then, I loved it because he went fast and we got to eat sooner.  Now I pray different each time I pray and I never write down notes.  One time I was praying before a sports dinner where I was invited by our son Keith.  As I walked to the front, Keith said to me, "Hey, dad, don't pray so long that the food gets cold."  My mamma taught me to pray and here is the one I prayed before I went to sleep.

"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.  If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.  Lord forgive me of my sins and bless my family and my friends."  And then I prayed for our dogs and cats and would fall asleep holding my dog.  (I still am holding onto a dog as I sleep.  Martin Martin has been in my bed at night for 15 years.  Don't laugh, brothers and sisters, I bet half of you sleep with either a dog or cat or maybe both.

"Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy name.  Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread.  And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.  And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever.  Amen."

Tomorrow we will go deep into prayer.  Please remember that when you pray, do it in faith!  Now go forth sharing your blessings and that also in faith.

Love ya, Pastor Dan.