Are you thinking about forever? We’re all probably less focused on eternity than we should be.

Hi, welcome to today’s Little Lesson. Thanks for joining me. You know if you’ve been watching Little Lessons that we’re working our way through the Sermon on the Mount and we’re just finishing out the Lord’s prayer, which is a magnificent prayer. You can pray it verbatim or you can use it as kind of a pattern for prayer.

Either way, it’s great and there’s so much good spiritual truth that we can learn about. I want to point out in our Little Lesson today that this prayer that the Lord taught us to pray really focuses the prayers’ mind and heart on heavenly spiritual things. It starts off, “Our Father, Who art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy Name. Your Kingdom come, Your Will be done, On earth as it is in Heaven.” It’s so heavenly-minded to get our minds in heaven.

Paul wrote to the Christians, I think it’s in Colossi, “Set your affection on things above, and not on things upon this earth. For you are dead, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.” Jesus is going to talk about what we did here in the future, you know, lay up your treasure there in heaven because where your treasure is, that’s where your heart’s going to be. So God wants us focus more on heaven.

You know what? It’s not easy because all of our senses, our five senses are all part of this world and our daily lives are in this world, and it takes a concentrated effort to be thinking about heavenly things. I think this is why Jesus perhaps in this prayer tried to focus us right from the beginning. You know, “Think about heaven. Think about father in heaven, think about God’s will being done in heaven,” and it closes, bring us right back into that spiritual dimension and to the magnificence of God.

This is actually parenthetically stated in the new American Standard version so I don’t know what that means. Some people say it means it actually wasn’t part of the original manuscript, but anyways, it’s a great part of the prayer so I’m not going to toss it out. Here’s what we’re praying, “For yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory.” Here’s the last word, forever, and it almost needs to be whispered, doesn’t it?

Because of the … I don’t know, just the thought of forever and God having a kingdom forever and ever and him having the power and the glory forever puts life in perspective, doesn’t it? Puts a lot of little things in their perspective where they really aren’t all that important. What’s really important is forever. God wants our minds focused on the forever. That’s why Jesus talked about, don’t lay up treasure on earth, lay up in heaven.

Once your heart’s there, he wants us focus there because it’s forever, yet everything that we can see, everything we can touch, everything, everything in this material world one day will be gone, right? We marvel at those who are living in darkness how they love the darkness and they’re living their lives as if there is no tomorrow that when you die, you die. That’s it. You’re gone.

You know, and just to think, just to think about how preposterous that thought is when you just look at the human body and the complexity, just the chemical and the molecular complexity to our body and to think that that was created just to be good for 70 or 80 years and then poof, nothing. The richness of the human experience, the gaining of knowledge, the relationships, the joy of relationships with our families and friends and other people, the richness of life and to think that God designed all this and he says, “Okay, enough of that. You did your 70 or 80 years,” what? What?

Are you kidding me? You know, that doesn’t make sense. A God who can do that doesn’t just crumble up and throw it in the waste basket. No, no, no. There’s got to be something beyond. Just about every religion, whether it’s a divine origin or demonic origin for that matter, they often have some kind of a concept or a belief that there’s life after death because I believe that that also is something that’s built intuitively within every person. That everyone intuitively knows that there’s life after death. That intuitive concept has made its way into so many religions and also because of just the absurdity of thinking that this marvelous life, it was only intended to last for a few decades. It just doesn’t make sense.

All that is to say that we marvel at people who aren’t thinking about eternity, but yet we ourselves, myself too, are probably less focused on eternity than we could or should be. Again, I’m not pointing the finger of condemnation at anybody. I have no right to do that. I’m just trying to encourage us, right? Trying to encourage us to think like Jesus wants us to think, to get our perspective spiritual, heavenly and eternal.

The example I’ve used many times about laying up treasures the one about if somebody was to say to you, “Hey, here’s a million dollars and I want you to build two houses, it’s a free gift. Build two houses, one you’re going to live in for a day, and the other one you’ll live in the rest of your life.” Well, how much money would you spend on the one day house?

Well, if you’re smart, you’ll build a doghouse and crawl and do it and sleep there one night and the next day you go out and build your 999,000 whatever house because it only makes sense to invest in what is lasting. Something to think about for all of us. Okay. Thank you so much for joining me on today’s little lesson. Hope to see you next time. God bless you.

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Will God lead us into temptation if we don’t ask Him not to? Why does Jesus tell us to pray that God will not lead us into temptation?

Regular viewers know we’re working our way through the Sermon on the Mount asking common questions as we make our journey, and we’re kind of coming to the end of the Lord’s prayer in Matthew Chapter six, where one of the prayer requests that Jesus tells his disciples to pray is, this is Matthew six and verse number 13, “And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil.”

The question I posed at the beginning of this Little Lesson is, will God lead us into temptation unless we asked him not to? Well that’s a great question, and one that’s had me scratching my head for a long time.

Now, first and foremost, let’s not ever entertain the idea that God is tempting anyone. Okay? There’s a verse in the Epistle of James where James wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, “Let no one say who is tempted, I am being tempted by God because God doesn’t tempt anyone with evil and he himself cannot be tempted,” and so god is not putting any kind of enticement in front of anyone to do evil.

However, that’s not exactly what Jesus was talking about here. He didn’t say, pray, “God, don’t tempt me,” right? Rather, “God, don’t lead me into temptation.” The tempter is the devil and the tempter is the world, and the tempter is the flesh. Those are all evil influences. God is the leader.

He’s the guide and there’s a possibility apparently, otherwise, it would make no sense for Jesus to tell us to pray this prayer that God could lead us into a situation where he knows that we will be tempted. Now, the verse is very pertinent to that where if God does lead us into temptation, Paul wrote, “There is no temptation that you’ve suffered that is not common to man and God is faithful in this regard,” He’ll always provide a way of escape.

If God does lead us into a place where he knows that we’re going to face temptation from the devil, from the flesh, from whatever, then he’s also got an escape route. We can never say, never say, “I couldn’t resist. There was no escape. I had no way of avoiding this,” and no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. God promises a way of escape.

Now, back to the question. I have to believe that this is a legitimate prayer since Jesus himself gave it. I have to believe that it’s an effectual prayer that it could actually help in us not being led into situations where we’d be tempted if we pray this prayer. All right.

Now, why would you not want to be led into situations where you’d be tempted? Well, because you know, if you’re not tempted, you’re less likely to do evil. It’s when we’re tempted that we’re more likely to fall. One way to avoid sinning is to try to avoid the temptation to sin, not easy. You can be a monk and go live in a cave but you know even then you will not escape all temptation. It’s good to avoid temptation.

I believe, although I don’t fully understand all that’s going on here, it must be a good idea to pray this prayer every day because, “Give us this day our daily bread,” this is a daily prayer. This would be a great prayer to utter.

You don’t need two hours. You don’t need even 15 minutes. You don’t even need five minutes, you know, easy as you’re talking to Lord in the morning, “Lord, today, deliver. Don’t lead me into temptation, please. I don’t want to be tempted because you know, the Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak so I’d like to avoid temptation. Please don’t lead me into places where I will be tempted and deliver me from evil.” Those are obviously related things, deliver me from evil.

That also, I think is a great prayer that reminds us of our dependency upon God to be holy. You know? Right? You’re probably like me, you’ve probably tried that on your own. “Oh, I’m going to obey God,” and you know, not too long before you fall flat on your face. Here one secret anyways, I need the Lord’s help. “Oh Lord, don’t lead me into temptation because that will be a help on holding this path. Secondly, deliver me from evil. I need the power. I need the strength. You know, the inner fortitude to resist the flesh and the world, and the devil so help me Lord, help me Lord.” The Lord helps us. He knows our frame.

The Bible says, he knows our weaknesses. We have a High Priest who can sympathize with our weaknesses, right? Right. He also suffered temptation. Although Jesus never gave in, but He knows, man, He knows it’s tough. He did a great job. He hit it 100% of the time, never sinned, but He knows what it’s like to face temptation and it’s tough so we need His help. We need His help.

One way to get it is to look to Him for it and when you try to do things in your own strength, you know you’re missing out on a great blessing. “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me,” Paul said to the Philippians, and God is able to do exceedingly abundantly beyond all that we could ask or think according to the power that works in us. Okay?

You know, good reminders. We’ve got the powerhouse within us. We’ve got God in us. That’s why we can do all things through Christ. It’s no longer I who live but it’s Christ who lives in me and so put your mindset in a spiritual frame of reference where you’re not relying on yourself and your own willpower. Pulling yourself up by your own bootstraps. No, no, no. This is, I’m looking to the Lord and the Lord is the strength of my life, right?

That’s a good verse to end on today’s little lesson. Go out thinking about that, that the Lord is your strength. Praise God. Thanks for joining me. God bless.

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Is it okay to pray for your weekly bread? How about your monthly bread?

Hi, welcome to today’s little lesson. Regular viewers know we’re working our way through The Sermon on the Mount, we’re currently on Matthew chapter 6, and right in the heart of the Lord’s Prayer. My goodness, this is so packed full of good stuff, and we’re coming to this very simple utterance, this simple, simple request in Matthew Chapter 6 and verse number 11. “Give us this day our daily bread.” I’ve said on previous little lessons that this is indication that this is a daily prayer to pray. It’s good to pray every day, and it sounds like it’s a morning prayer doesn’t it, because you’re praying in advance of the day, “Give us this day our daily bread.”

So the question I ask in today’s little lesson, is it okay to prayer for more than just your daily bread? Is it okay to pray for weekly or monthly bread? Fundamentally what I’m asking is, is it okay to ask for more than just bread, or was Jesus literally talking about only praying, and it’s only appropriate, if you’re going to ask for anything, only ask for bread?

I think it’s obvious that it can’t be that what Jesus is trying to communicate is that it’s only okay to ask for bread, and even that’s limited to daily bread, right? First of all, Jesus himself said one time, quoting himself, I guess you could say it this way, or quoting the Father, “Man shall not live by bread alone.”

So it must be okay to pray for other kinds of food rather than just bread. God created all kind of good things to eat. Vegetables and fruits and animals, and animal products like milk and eggs and so forth. Paul wrote to Timothy, “God has given us all things to richly enjoy.”

We need to get hold of the fact that God is not trying to make us miserable. So many folks seem like they … you know, “God wants us to live a harsh, unenjoyable life. The more miserable you are, the happier God is.” I don’t buy into that at all. He has given us all things to enjoy, and obviously in the context of The Bible he’s talking about legitimate, non-sinful kind of enjoyments.

Well there’s nothing sinful about eating an apple, of course unless it’s the forbidden fruit and you happen to be in the Garden of Eden, and your name is Adam or Eve. For all the rest of us, you know God loves you when you eat a crispy, cold, sweet apple. You know God loves you when you eat all kind of other things and when you smell them. Life is just so good and full of so many blessings from God. Oh, my goodness, because he loves us and he’s trying to get our attention to say, “Hey, there’s somebody up here that really loves you. Remember me when you’re enjoying those cherries or that steak,” or whatever it is that you like or your favorite food or vegetable. God’s good, God’s good, God is good.

So when Jesus said, “Give us this day our daily bread,” he’s not limiting, obviously, to making prayer requests in the food realm over for bread, or in the realm of requests for your own needs, only for bread. That’s why I asked is it okay to pray for your weekly bread? Could we actually store some up? Well, I suppose so. I suppose do. But I think what this prayer indicates is that God is wanting us to say certain things that will remind us of how good he is. He’s the provider.

Also, think about it, bread, although the Manna fell from heaven. As it were, it appeared after the frost evaporated in the mornings when Israel was coming out of Egypt and into the Promise Land and so forth. But when you pray “Give us this day our daily bread,” you’re probably not expecting loaves of break to be falling from heaven, right? There’s a lot of work that goes into a load of bread.

From planting the seeds of the grain to making sure the grain is protected, or the plant rather is protected when it sprouts, making sure it survives, grows, produces the grain, harvesting it and so forth, extracting … separating the wheat from the chaff, all that stuff. Grinding the grain, making the flour. Oh my goodness, the process that goes into break, it’s a miracle that anyone ever discovered how to make bread, the complexity of it.

But in any case, if you’re going to get bread, you’re going to have to get the ingredients to make it or you’re going to have to buy it from somebody else who did. So this prayer is not a prayer that taken within the context of the whole Bible, would make us just think that God’s going to drop bread from heaven because we prayed for it. But it helps us to recognize that ultimately, even though there’s so much human activity and work that went into producing those loaves of bread, its source is from God. God provides the rain that grows the grain and so forth.

So that’s why we thank God before every meal, because we recognize his hand in it even though all the human activity was involved in getting it onto our plates, including a little bit of our activity as well in preparing a meal.

“Give us this day our daily bread.” A reminder, a reminder that God is our source, and that he is good.

All right, so I encourage you today to be thankful and to recognize all the blessings that we all enjoy all the time, every day. Millions of blessings that escape our consciousness unless we think about it, that are all from the hand of God. In every little message, God is trying to get attention our, saying, “I love you. Seek me, and life only gets better.” Amen.

All right, thanks for joining me. God bless you.

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Has God’s kingdom come or is it still coming? If you’re a regular viewer, you know that we’re working our way through the Sermon on the Mount.

We’re in Matthew chapter six, kind of getting towards the middle, talking about prayer, actually looking at the model prayer that Jesus gave his disciples to pray.

Every Christian and even a lot of non-Christians know how to repeat the Lord’s Prayer, but it’s absolutely packed with wonderful truths. It starts off, and this is what we talked about in our last Little Lesson, “Our Father,” identifies something marvelous about the one we’re praying to.

Boy, we’ve already got a lot going for us if God is our Father and our Father who art in heaven. That’s where he is. He’s in heaven. That reminds us that there’s another place. The scripture talks about this other place as a place that we can go to, as opposed to yet another place that we can go to, which Jesus emphatically couldn’t have made it more clear is a place of torment and a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth and a place of darkness. That’s not where our Father is at.

God is light and he dwells in unapproachable light. He’s shining with glory. He’s in heaven. I think that there’s evidence that heaven is illuminated by the glory of God. You start off the prayer thinking about how all our five sense are just geared to taking in information from the physical world. It’s just easy to be focused on what your five senses are always sending you and what your brain is reacting to and processing all that information.

When you pray, you got to get into the heavenly mode and jump up there in your thoughts to, “This is my Father. He’s on his throne. He’s in heaven,” and you can read some of those scenes out of the book of Revelation or something, think about those, or in the Old Testament, people that saw God in his glory and so forth.

Just think, “Here’s who I’m talking to right now. Oh my goodness. This is not earthly. This is heavenly.” The first thing that has to escape my lips is some bit of praise. If you’re in the right mode of prayer, “Hallowed be your name.”

God is great. God is awesome. God is resplendent in glory. God is good. God is awesome. God is all-powerful. He knows everything. He created the universe. He put the stars in their places. He knows every mystery. Oh my goodness. I get a chance to say something to this wonderful person. It sometimes makes me, you know, like I don’t want to say anything because I think, “Who am I to be talking to this person?” but Jesus is encouraging me because I have a relationship with him. He’s my Father. Oh my goodness.

We asked the question at the beginning of this Little Lesson: Has the kingdom come or is it coming? Well, it’s kind of a trick question, but the answer is pretty plain from the New Testament. Jesus told his disciples to pray, and this is Matthew six verse number 10, “Your kingdom come.” Obviously, something to be anticipated, but New Testament teaches that we are citizens right now of the heavenly kingdom and, you know, that Jesus is our Lord.

We’re in the kingdom spiritually and, in our prayers, it helps us to think about all that, the kingdom that we’re in. We’re in the kingdom spiritually and that kingdom does exist on the earth now spiritually, but the kingdom hasn’t come yet to this earth because it’s very clear that one day Jesus is going to literally reign from Jerusalem and rule over the entire world.

Of course, there’s debate on all these things, but I’m just telling you this is what I see in scripture. Jesus is coming back and he’s going to set up a kingdom, a physical kingdom. When we pray, “Thy kingdom come,” that’s a prayer, to go back to a previous question we asked in a Little Lesson, “Is it okay to pray the same prayer over and over again?” Well, Jesus didn’t mean for us to pray this prayer one time, obviously, “Give us this day our daily bread,” so we pray this every day. Well, praying every day, “Your kingdom come.” Of course, in the wider context of our understanding, we know that he’s not just talking about your kingdom coming physically, but your kingdom coming to a greater degree spiritually, that gospel will spread, that God will glorify his name through his servants and so forth.

There’s so much involved in God’s kingdom because it’s already here spiritually and it growing and spreading, praise God. In that sense, I suppose we could also be saying, “I’m praying for your kingdom to be established.” Paul told some of his disciples, “Pray for me, that the word of God would spread and spread rapidly and God would anoint me and give me the power to speak.” That’s a form of praying for God’s kingdom to come.

God, use the people that you’ve called. God, anoint them. God, protect them and so forth. Your kingdom come. Again, we started off this prayer thinking about heaven, thinking about our Father there in heaven. We just can’t be all wrapped up in the itsy-bitsy things of life that are really, when you come right down to it, rather minor and insignificant in the bigger picture. We so often have tunnel vision. I only see this little, tiny part of the picture and God’s trying to expand our minds to be thinking about the whole picture, the whole scenario.

We’re not really thinking about our daily bread as much we’re thinking about, “Your kingdom come and may your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” Your kingdom being established right now spiritually, that’s the second part of that prayer, and, the first part of the prayer, may your kingdom come physically. We want them both. That’s the biggest thing we want. Naturally, we want God’s kingdom to come to this earth.

Be kind of hypocritical to say, “Let it come for everybody else except me.” You start examining yourself, “How well am I doing as a subject and a servant of the King and a son of God? Does my life reflect that focus, that realization, or am I just earthy, living daily life, focused on all the nonessential stuff, living for the day, or am I focused on a greater purpose, the kingdom of God?” Then, I think after you get through with those weightier, bigger, majestic, awesome things that you can be including in your prayer, then you can get to the little stuff like, “I need some bread.” We’ll probably talk about that at our next Little Lesson. Thanks for joining me. God bless you.

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Does God only hear long winded prayers? We’re talking about prayer because we’re working our way through the Sermon on the Mount, and Jesus talked about prayer.

He talked about praying in secret. “Don’t be like those hypocrites out there praying on the street corners, in the synagogue to be seen by men. Go, shut your door and pray privately.” Of course, that’s not the only thing about prayer that we need to know and it’s not necessarily all wrong to pray publicly. We see examples of that in the book of Acts and so forth.

The question we’re going to ask today and answer hopefully is when you pray do you have to make sure you have a set amount of time. I think the devil uses that very thought to talk us out of praying. Now, I’ve never in my 39 years of being married to my wife ever thought to myself, “Well, if I’m going to talk to her, it can’t just be one sentence. It’s got to be at least a paragraph or I got to spend some quality time with her.”

Now again, we all want to spend quality time with our loved ones, but we’re not limiting our communication thinking something is wrong with one sentence and then you’re out the door.

I think the devil talks us out of praying a lot of times and communicating with your loving, wonderful heavenly Father, because we think, “Well if you’re going to pray, you got to every time get down on your knees. You got to be in your closet. It’s got to be early in the morning before the sun rises to really be effective. You’ve got to really put some bazonga in your prayer. It’d be an insult if you only spent five minutes with the Lord.” The devil says “Why waste your time, why insult the Lord? You can’t pray. You don’t have enough time to pray.”

Well, the next time the devil says that to you, I hope you can say, “Well, au contraire, Mr. Devil. Jesus himself gave his disciples a model prayer to pray that if you pray it slowly it only takes about 15 seconds.”

You know it’s the Lord’s Prayer. The Lord said this. “Pray then”, I’m reading from Matthew chapter six and verse number nine, “Pray then in this way.” Bingo, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Eight, eight. It likes about eight sentences, and you’re done. Who’s going to find fault with the prayer that Jesus said, “When you pray, pray in this way”?

I know. I know, I know someone is going to write a comment on this video and say, “yeah, but that’s, I’m not supposed to be repeating the Lord’s Prayer. The Lord said don’t use vain repetition.” Well, yeah. He didn’t say don’t repeat your prayers. He said don’t use meaningless, or in the King James vain repetition.

You’re just going through like some religious people. They have a prayer bead and they just keep saying the same things over and over again and repeating it. They just think the more merit I get from God, or gods, or whoever I’m praying to. Oh, what an insult that must be for anyone who is using that method to talk to God, the great wonderful God who sent Jesus Christ into the world to die for our sins, and who loves us like a Father.

If any of my kids came to me and started saying, “Hey, dad. How are you today? Hey dad, how are you today? Hey dad. How are you today? Hey, dad. How are you today? Hey, dad. How are you today?” That’s five. “Hey, dad. How are you today? Hey, dad.”

You know. I’d be saying, “Oh my goodness. We got a relationship problem here. My son or my daughter doesn’t understand how to communicate to me.” Really, because it’s got to be based on you don’t understand how much I love you that you think that you got to use some formula or some repetition to get my attention. My goodness. I love you dearly. I’m watching over you. I’ve got angels assigned just to you who report to me every day. You know? I got the hairs on your head numbered. You don’t have to work real hard to get my attention here and keep repeating something and then maybe I’ll glance over at you in between switching the TV stations or something. No, no, that’s not how God is at all.

You can pray a quick prayer. Now I’m not discounting, discrediting longer prayers, prayers in the closet, prayers on your knees, all that kind of stuff. I love my wife, I live with my wife. I talk with my wife throughout the day. When my kids were at home we interacted all the time. I just think we need to develop a flowing prayer life, there you go, that we’re always thinking about the Lord because he’s always thinking about us, and any time, every time we can whisper those prayers.

This prayer, the first thing that Jesus says that we are saying … Again, this could be prayed verbatim or some folks teach, and I agree with them limitedly, that this is a model for an expanded prayer, that you focus on certain things. Okay?

We never want to limit ourselves just to only praying this prayer because that’s the only prayer that Jesus put a stamp of approval on, so anything outside of this is out of the will of God. No, I think you’ve gone too far. I think you’ve misinterpreted when Jesus says, “Pray then in this way”. He didn’t mean only ever pray this prayer and no other prayers are acceptable. Right? Right. Okay.

Let’s just stay balanced here. “Pray then in this way. Our Father”, oh well let’s just stop right there. Our Father. Our Father. That’s where it all starts, knowing who you’re talking to. It’s a whole lot different talking to your father than talking to anybody else. Right? That word has significance. It has significance. He’s not my father. That’s not what he said.

He is my father, but that’s not what he said to pray. Our father. That reminds me also that he’s got a family. I’m a part of the family. I got brothers and sisters. It’s not all about me. There’s a little hint of a reminder once again. It’s not all about me. Our Father. That changes everything. Fathers love their kids. Fathers are gracious and merciful when their kids blow it.

One of our most popular videos is the video about if I repeat the same sin over and over again, will God forgive me. Another one, real popular one, is that I’ve committed the unpardonable sin. There are so many wonderful, sincere believers who are suffering under this load of bad belief, because fundamentally they haven’t realized enough yet that God is their father, and he’s a good, good father.

He’s merciful, long suffering, oh yeah, he disciplines. He disciplines everyone whom he loves, but he’s not out shooting lightning bolts down at you when you cross the line. He’s speaking to your heart. You don’t listen, he’ll get your attention one way or the other because he loves you. He wants you to get into heaven. People think, “Oh I can lose my salvation by committing one sin.” Oh my goodness, I feel so sorry for these people. They don’t have an understanding of the grace of God. Okay, well it’s not for today.

Thanks so much for joining me. I hope to see you at the next time we get together. Bye bye.

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Should you make the same prayer requests every day? What did Jesus teach?

Hi, welcome to today’s Little Lesson. Thank you so much for joining me. If you’re a regular viewer you know we’re working our way through Jesus’s most famous sermon, and many consider his most important sermon, the Sermon on The Mount, found in Matthew Chapter 5, 6 and 7. And we’re just at the beginning of Matthew Chapter 6, where Jesus is really getting into the heart of the matter of heart holiness.

And, when you think about it that’s really where holiness begins, if it doesn’t begin within our hearts. If we haven’t got our motives and our inward, inner most desires on the right path then any attempts at trying to be holy are- to do what God wants you to do are really … it’s going to be in vain. Because true holiness stems from the heart and God wants us to do what we do because we love Him and because we’re motivated by love.

It just seems so many in the church are focused on getting folks to outwardly conform to various rules and if they’re conforming then you know, we’ve done our job. But, I read something that Paul said in writing to Timothy, in the very first chapter of 1st Timothy Chapter 5, Paul said, “The goal of our instruction,” here’s the reason we’re teaching, here’s what we want, “The goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart.”

That’s what we’re trying to produce in people. We want them to be loving people and that’s stemming out of a pure heart not just to show, not just to put on, not just some religion practices. Love from a pure heart and a good conscience, see that’s an inward thing. Just like the pure heart. A good conscience and a sincere faith. Boy, what … so much truth packed into that one verse. That it’s worth our time to meditate upon that a little while, 1st Timothy, Chapter 1 verse number 5.

And that’s what Jesus was after, you know, he doesn’t want holy robots. He doesn’t want people pretending that they’re something they are not and so in three cases here in Chapter 6 of Matthew he talks about doing certain things you out to be doing but doing them secretly so that you can be certain your motives are right. That you’re not doing it to be seen by men. Namely, giving to the poor, secondly praying, and thirdly fasting.

These are things at all disciples of Christ out to be doing, you know, and, sadly those things are so low on many Christian totem poles and in many Christian churches.

We’re not focusing on the hard things, but the heart right then everything else just naturally falls in line because if your heart is right, and you love God and you love people, well then what you’re gonna do, it’s going to be right as well, if you make mistakes your heart can be right. And you can be wrong in your head and right in your heart.

Anyways, the question of today’s Little Lesson is, should I make the same, repeat the same requests because I’m hoping that you’re praying and I’m hoping that you realize that it’s a discipline, it doesn’t just happen. You have to make time for it. Usually the best time is in the morning, we’re about to read an example prayer that Jesus gave in the Sermon on The Mount we call the Lord’s Prayer and one of the requests is, “Give us this day, our daily bread.”

Well that sounds kind of like a morning prayer before you’ve eaten right? So, I think there’s a little hint there that if you’re going to pray, once a day, well shoot for the mornings. And when you get about as old as me you don’t have as much trouble getting up in the morning, you wake up actually earlier than you want to.

All right, so, should you pray the same request every day? Well, there’s a debate on that subject but we find some evidence right here, we haven’t read it yet, we will read it, the very clause of the Lord’s Prayer, that we’ve already mentioned, “Give us this day, our daily bred.” Well that sounds like an every day prayer that you’re praying and I don’t have it all figure out, you know, but one thing that I’m convinced about in that prayer request is it helps us.

Reminding us of our dependency upon the Lord. And also remind us to not be greedy. To be satisfied and content if all we have is just enough for the day because God will supply us. He goes on to say in this section of the Sermon on The Mount, look at the birds in air, they’re not worried about tomorrow because the Heavenly Father takes care of them. Don’t worry, you’re of much more value.

And these are lessons I just think that we just continently need to be reminded. I do. I’ve been a Christian here for well over 40 years and I’m still needing to remind myself of these things. I don’t have it perfected here yet. But, Jesus did warn against some kind of repetitious prayer right before he gave them a prayer that at least part of it could be repeated every day. And we read today in Matthew Chapter 6 Verse number 7, “When you are praying do not use meaningless repetition as the gentiles do for they suppose they’ll be heard for their many words.” And we’re told in another place that the Lord knows what we need even before we ask him so it’s not like we’re telling him something that he’s not aware of.

Again, I don’t have it all figured out. The mystery of prayer. But, I do know this, the Lord wants a relationship where his children and fathers, I’m a father, I’m a grandfather, always loved it when my children talked to me and communicate to me and look to me.

And we have a relationship, communication is part of it and my grandchildren the same way. I get a big kick out of when they want to talk to me. It makes me feel so good. And similarly, they rarely tell me things I don’t already know. And sometimes they tell me crazy things that are not true and but just interacting with them is so very precious and I just think we need to think about that as we think about your Father.

Here it is, I said it’s another place, it’s right in the very next verse, don’t be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. So, when my grandkids talk to me, I’m not learning a whole lot I didn’t already know but if they ask, they’re much more likely to receive and if they don’t ask there’s less likelihood that we’re just going to outright give it to them.

When my grandson, just the other day come up to me, he’s a little tyke, he doesn’t talk much yet, he’s just got a couple of words. And, when he wants something to eat he goes ah, ah, ah, ah. That’s his way of saying, can I have what you’re drinking, or can I have have what you’re eating. Well, I wouldn’t be giving it to him if he’s asking me he’s hard to resist. Okay, because I love the little guy and I think our Father’s the same way. A lot of parallels there, a lot of parallels.

Okay, well all right. Thanks for joining me. Good to be with you. And hope to see you in the next Little Lesson. God bless.

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