Blue Lake Presbyterian Church | 7-24-2016
A grandpa was walking by his young granddaughter’s room one night, when he saw her kneeling beside her bed, with head bowed and hands folded, then he noticed something peculiar, she kept repeating the alphabet.
“What are you doing?” he asked her.
She explained, “I’m saying my prayers, but I couldn’t think of what to say. So I’m just saying all the letters of the alphabet and let God put it together, he has heard them all.
Good morning, welcome to Blue Lake on this great Sunday morning.
The last time we were here, was just two weeks ago. After the service, two of the elders urged me to come again today. My first inclination was, sorry but no.
Running a business keeps you plenty busy. Sermon preparation takes a decent amount of time, and two weeks apart is just a little close. But they persisted and I promised to at least think about it.
That night I received an email, from a listener in Jacksonville Florida, and she proceeded to share her testimony, which was absolutely amazing and heartwarming, a witness about Faith in God, a story we will share in a bit. It moved me to accept and to be here today.
The message the morning is “Strength in Faith”.
The turmoil of today with police killings, terror attacks, violent demonstrations and a society filled with hatred, we repeatedly hear calls for prayer, prayer for the slain police officers, for the victims in Nice, San Bernardino, Munich, Istanbul. With the RNC last week and DNC next week, we badly need prayers for our next President whoever it may be.
When do we pray? Do we pray just before a meal, only in church, do pray at a set time each day, OR do we pray when things are so bad around us that we cry out for help.
How do we pray, what should we say or ask, like that granddaughter who didn’t know what to say. What should do or not do? This is essentially, what the disciples asked Jesus and it brings us to today’s scripture reading which can be found on page………………………………..
Luke 11:1-13
11He was praying in a certain place, and after he had finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.” 2He said to them, “When you pray, say: Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. 3Give us each day our daily bread. 4And forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone indebted to us. And do not bring us to the time of trial.”
5And he said to them, “Suppose one of you has a friend, and you go to him at midnight, and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread; 6for a friend of mine has arrived, and I have nothing to set before him.’
7And he answers from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been locked, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.’ 8I tell you, even though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, at least because of his persistence he will get up and give him whatever he needs. 9“So I say to you, Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 10For everyone who asks, receives, and everyone who searches, finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. 11Is there anyone among you, who if your child asks for a fish, will give a snake, instead of a fish? 12Or if the child asks for an egg, will give a scorpion? 13If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
Jesus was asked: how do we pray. And after he recites what we today call the “Lord’s Prayer” he underscores it with a parable: Suppose you have a friend and you go to him at the most unlikely hour, at midnight, looking for some bread.
The man says: are you nuts, it is midnight, the house is locked, kids are in bed, go away. But the next sentence is the essence of this parable.
Because his persistence, the man gets up and will give him whatever he needs. In other words: Persistence breaks resistance. The Lord will listen, when we persist in asking.
Earlier we listened to some very moving testimonies from Teen Challenge students. What a blessing, to see these men who went through many difficulties, witnessed the pits of the darkness of life, persisted in their journeys and prayers, and have turned their lives to Christ and now walk, in the shining light of Jesus. What a blessing.
Years ago I listened to an audio book of Napoleon Hill called: “The keys to success”, 17 principles of personal achievement. In one chapter, Hill tells the story of his son Blair, being born without ears, a condition called: bilateral microtia.
He describes, that the doctors diagnosed that his son would be deaf for the rest of his life. Through prayer and sheer determination and desire and the power of Faith his son ultimately was able to hear and function as any other member of society.
His son in turn, was determined that his lifelong mission would be to serve others, and to bring hope, and practical relief to thousands of deafened people who, without his help, would have been doomed forever to deafness”
When we pray, do we just follow a routine, do we pray and the Father, the man in the house, just ignores us? Or at least is that what it feels like? How strong is our faith when we pray? Do we pray a halfhearted prayer? Or do we cry out, to our Heavenly Father in desperation, over and over again.
Scripture says: Then the Lord promises, I will listen, Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 10For everyone who asks, receives, and everyone who searches, find, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.
Here is a story about the hand of God, in the life of that listener in Jacksonville Florida: She had been a singer all her life….But over the past ten years, had THREE throat surgeries. Before each surgery, the doctors told her, she would likely regain her speaking voice, but quite possibly never be able to sing again.
Vocal cords are like rubber bands and in the surgeries they need to be separated by forceps and will likely never regain the elasticity required to sing.
Although never part of a formal singing group, she just loved to sing at home, and prayed to God that her singing voice be protected, and sing His praises for many years to come.
After the first surgery, she was asked to audition for lead singer in a contemporary Christian group in Jacksonville.
She was shocked and afraid to audition, at first not trusting that God indeed preserved her singing voice. She found out the next day, “You’re IN!”
After the second surgery, she was asked to audition for Don Thompson Chorale…among highly-trained musicians. Again, fearful…but God was asking her to GO! She made the group’s first cut!
Then, after the THIRD surgery, the Symphony vocal conductor of River City Chorus called, and asked her to audition for THE most premier chorus in Northern Florida. Even though God had blessed her twice…the bar was raised once again…. Would she be good enough?
She wrote” On the morning of this audition, I became doubtful and had decided NOT to go, when a voice came to me and told me to read John 18, which was Peters three time denial of Christ.
It was clear. These three events were orchestrated by God…not only as a gift…but as a test of faith. I saw clearly that God gives us MORE than we can explain in human terms. But the blessings we receive help us grow in faith, AND provide a path toward a closer relationship with Him.
After reading John 18, I quickly jumped into my car and drove to audition among hundreds of other talented hopefuls. My voice wasn’t damaged…..it was restored even greater and stronger than before….I hit notes that I had never reached, even BEFORE the surgery.
My voice flowed with musical clarity, that didn’t even feel like it was coming from my own body! …..a voice flowed from my vocal cords that can only be explained as a miracle from God…….
Faith is where it all starts; the writer in Hebrews 11 lists 20 specific examples of acts of faith going back to the first days. Hebrews11is referred to as “The Faith Hall of Fame”.
Prayer without faith is meaningless babble. It is like standing at the door at midnight, looking for bread and not really believing, the man will get out of bed, anyhow. It all starts with faith and the deeper the faith, the more powerful the prayers.
Speaking of faith and prayer last Sunday driving to church, I heard a story about George Mueller, who lived in England during the 1800’s and is widely considered a man of prayer and great faith.
According to the George Mueller.org website, Mueller took in orphans, fed them, clothed them, and educated them. Through his orphanage in Bristol, Mueller cared for as many as two thousand orphans at a time, more than ten thousand in his lifetime.
Yet, he never made the needs of his ministries known to anyone, except to God, in prayer. Only through his annual reports, did people learn, after the fact, what the needs had been, during the previous year, and how God had provided.
In his journals Mueller recorded over fifty thousand specific answers to prayers, the majority were answered, the same day or the same hour that he prayed them. During a span of 60 years, God provided over half a billion in today’s dollars through his hands, in answer to prayer.
Alan Brehm of the Presbyterian Church of Dickinson TX wrote that the prayer Jesus taught us, suggests that the desires of our hearts, ought to be shaped not by the values of our culture, and our own selfish interests, but by the principles of the kingdom, compassion, peace, justice, freedom, and new life. As we pray in that way, we can pray with the confidence that “everyone who asks, receives.” As this certainly was the case, for George Mueller.
Last week my wife and I watched the movie “Unbroken”, the amazing life story of Louis Zamperini, as runner in 1936 Olympics in Berlin, he ran the final lap in just 56 seconds, beating the previous Olympic record of 69.2 seconds, “a monumental achievement.
Zamperini enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Forces in 1941. In May 1943, his plane went down into the Pacific several hundred miles from Oahu Hawaii. Zamperini and two others survived and managed to take refuge in two inflatable life rafts.
Zamperini once said: they say there’s no such thing as an atheist in a foxhole,”. “Well you can multiply that a few times on a raft.
After about two weeks, Zamperini began praying aloud. “He had no idea how to speak to God, so he recited snippets of prayers that he’d heard in movies,” Zamperini prayed, “promising that if God would save them, he would serve Heaven forever.”
They would go for days without food, until they could kill a bird that landed on their boat and use it as fish bait. They survived, despite being shot at, by a Japanese warplane sending thousands of bullets directed at them, while sharks circled the raft for weeks.
They also survived a monster Typhoon. On the 47th day, they were captured by a Japanese boat. Then they were taken to a series of POW camps and were subjected to cruel, viscous and sadistic treatment by their captors.
The movie concludes with Zamperini returning home late in 1945. But his faith journey continues in the book written by Laura Hillenbrand. He marries and starts a family, but the atrocities of the war are haunting Zamperini every night.
He turns to alcohol and develops a severe drinking problem, in an attempt to assuage the deep emotional wounds that the war had inflicted on him, drinking heavily every night before going to bed in hopes of masking the pain of the PTSD.
Every night his captors return in his nightmares. One night he is struggling in a fight with his captor and tries the strangle him.
When he wakes up, it is his wife he is strangling. She ultimately can’t take it anymore, and files for divorce.
And then comes a remarkable turn of events, a young preacher called Billy Graham comes to LA in 1949 using a rented circus tent, preaching 65 sermons in 8 weeks to 350,000 people.
One night on October 23, Zamperini heard Graham say “If you suffer, I‘ll give you the grace to go forward.
Zamperini tells how he recalled all the miraculous moments, when his body might have broken and yet, did not.
But on that night, Zamperini’s broken soul was touched. He walked down the sawdust aisle towards Graham.
Louis Zamperini gave his life to Christ that night; put away the bottle forever.
In an interview for CBN he said that from that moment forward, he did not have another nightmare ever again.
The divorce never materialized, as they were married for 55 years. Louis Zamperini devoted the rest of his life to Christian testimony and good works………..
| The Teen challenge students, Napoleon Hill, the listener in Jacksonville, George Mueller and Louis Zamperini, all found Strength in Faith.
Bobby Schuller of the Hour of Power, describes faith as equaling trust and being synonymous with clinging on to God, instead of clinging to clarity. Ladies and gentlemen, in a moment we will sing Seek ye first the kingdom of God Ask, and it shall be given to you; |
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| George Mueller said: expect great things from God, and great things you will have.
The bible says in Jeremiah 33:3 call to me and I will answer and tell you great and hidden things you have not known. The writer of Hebrews reminds us in Hebrews12:1 Let us run the race marked out for us fixing our eyes on Jesus. Christ will lead us and guide us, and keep us from falling down into the abyss, from that dark deep ocean. Put your trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, accept him as your Lord and Savior and he will nourish your soul and lead us on the path to eternal life Amen |
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