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Teach Us to Pray
Text: Luke 11:1-13
What are you looking for? What should you be looking for? Who are you going to get it from? If you want groceries, where do you go? The grocery store. It’s very simple. You don’t go to a tire shop to buy groceries. Now, this is the principle at work.
The Father is the giver of all good things. He is a storehouse of life who has put all those spiritual blessings in Jesus Christ (Paul says this in Ephesians 1). Jesus taught that prayer is about asking the Father for these things that pertain to His will. His will is very defined by the fruit of the Spirit in the image of Jesus Christ. It’s like going to the grocery store to get groceries. It’s going to the Father to be filled with the fruit of His Spirit in the image of the Son. And the Father will dispense the things that pertain to His kingdom.
So when the LORD Jesus is asked how to pray, he uses forgiveness as an example of something that pertains to the Spirit of God. In Matthew 6:9-15 it’s clear. He uses forgiveness as an example of a prayer God will answer.
What do God’s children pray for? (vss 1-4)
- He is the heavenly Father. That is to say that God is higher than all things.
- His character is superior to all other qualities people possess. His power is beyond what can be examined naturally, and His understanding is infinite. The Father dwells in a superior place to the corrupted bodies we are bound to.
- You’ve used the word “stoop” or that’s “low” to mean something immoral or wrong. That’s the same idea with God except reversed. God is higher. In fact, God is the highest. His wisdom is superior to all ideas below Him.
- His kingdom is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance in the Holy Spirit. These are His will. LORD, let your kingdom dwell in me on earth as it is in heaven.
- The LORD Jesus uses forgiveness as an example of something to ask for.
- He could’ve said gentleness, he could’ve said temperance.
- Paul said if you’re a child of God your spirit bears witness with the Father.
- This is why Jesus ends this teaching on prayer with the statement in verse 13.
- Jesus uses “bread” here as a figure of speech. Similarly in:
- John 6:35 I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry… This passage clearly uses bread as a metaphor for spiritual nourishment as part of eternal life.
- Matthew 4:4 Bread is physical sustenance, while God’s word is spiritual sustenance for eternal life.
- 1 Corinthians 10:16 Paul ties these characteristics to Jesus Christ.
- Galatians 4:19
- Colossians 1:27
- Peter said it this way. 2 Peter 1:19-21
- Proverbs 9:5 Wisdom says come eat my bread and drink my wine. These are figures of speech. They’re not literal. Jesus Christ has become wisdom for God’s children.
- This reveals that most times people are asking God for things that don’t coincide with His will. The reason for that is people don’t want God’s will interrupting their lives.
- Not forgiveness; I want to hold a grudge. I want to hate them. I want to have a reason for my bad behavior.
- One thing is sure there. You’re not related to God because your spirit has no desire for the things of God.
- This is the temptation Jesus is talking about in verse 4.
The Father is a generous giver (vss 5-10)
- The Father does not treat requests for things in line with His will as nuisances.
- The neighbor answers the door because he’s annoyed. But the LORD isn’t like the neighbor.
- God the Father gives His gifts freely to those who ask, seek, and knock.
- James 1:17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
- Historically, the Son generously poured out the Spirit of God on all flesh, not just the Hebrew prophets
- John 15:26 But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me:
- This goes on in Acts. And the Spirit of God is given very generously to all nations, not just Jews.
- Then the Spirit of God is poured out upon men – Ephesians 4:8 Wherefore he saith, When he ascended up on high … and gave gifts unto men. (Ephesians 4:8, 12-13).
The Father desires to give the Spirit (vss 11-13)
- The Father gives the Spirit to people seeking the good fruit of the Spirit. He wants to be generous with His Spirit.
- What is the fruit of the Spirit? Galatians 5: These are the things the Father wants to give as they are connected with His own Spirit. Love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law.
- In answering the disciples’ original question, the LORD Jesus tells the disciples:
- God’s children are the ones looking for the things God offers.
- These gifts are fully manifested in Jesus Christ as the example and image of God
- There are things you must have because they are aspects of the Spirit of God. As Paul said the children of God are the ones who are led by the Spirit of God (Romans 8).
- The greatest problem people have is falling prey to the temptation b/c they’re not interested in any of these divine characteristics. Most come to Christ looking for a “get out of hell free” card, which you don’t get unless you have the Spirit of God.
