Amen, you're in Daniel chapter 2 and this is a long chapter of the Bible and there's
quite a lot in there obviously and I just want to look from verse 17 in Daniel 2.
We're just going to look at three verses for now.
From verse 17, Daniel 2, 17, where we see this, and Daniel went to his house and made
the thing known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions, that they would desire
mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret that Daniel and his fellows should
not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in the night vision, then Daniel blessed the
God of heaven.
And the title of my sermon this morning is Lessons from Daniel About Prayer, Lessons
from Daniel About Prayer.
I'd like to pray and then we'll get started.
Father, thank you for your word, thank you for this passage, Lord, thank you for Daniel
and the lessons we can learn from him and Lord, help me to just preach this message
that I've been thinking about for a little while now.
Just in a clear way, in a way that everyone will be able to apply it to their lives, Lord,
will go away and think about these things and just ultimately improve their prayer life.
Lord, help me to preach this accurately, clearly, boldly, full of your spirit.
Just let me pray.
Amen.
Okay, so I keep a finger here in Daniel chapter 2, we're going to turn to Mark 11 for now.
Daniel 2 is going to be our main text, so I put something in there and turn to Mark
11.
So you might have heard it being said, I've heard it many times said that if you ask most
Christians whether they're happy with their prayer life, the majority will say no.
They're not completely content with their prayer life.
They feel like they're not, you know, it's not where they'd like it to be.
I saw some survey and you can take it for what you like.
It was kind of Protestant pastors leaders or something and although a lot of them would
have been false prophets, I'm sure, still I think the overriding, you know, opinion
was that it was like a very small percentage of them were actually happy and felt like
their prayer life was where they wanted it to be.
So most people feel like their prayer life isn't where they'd like it to be, right?
Which if you think about it, it's seemingly strange considering how it's one of the,
it is one of the easiest parts of our spiritual life, so it should be, shouldn't it?
So praying is pretty easy, it doesn't take much, it's a pretty easy thing to do.
Being in church, for example, and many people say, well I'm in church, that's a good thing,
right?
So they're lacking in their prayer life but they're making it to church and coming to
church can be difficult for some, can't it?
And there's travel disruptions, there's effort involved, there's time involved, there's keeping
that day free, there's, you know, many issues for many with getting to church, but being
in church can be, can mean sacrifices for some soul winning.
Many people here might say, no, I'm pretty happy with my soul winning, I go X amount
of times, you know, a week, a month, whatever you think, you know, it works for you and
you're happy with it.
And some people might say, no, I'm happy with the amount of soul winning I'm doing.
But soul winning can be quite difficult, can't it, sometimes?
So especially as we're looking out there now and especially as it's starting to get a bit
colder, it's starting to get a bit wetter, well I don't know, it's wet all the time,
not all the time.
Okay, but, you know, you look out there and look, soul winning can be tough.
Soul winning can be a bit more of a struggle, but a lot of people are pretty content with
their soul winning, I'd imagine.
Bible reading.
And Bible reading, again, you know, many people might say that Bible reading lacks a bit.
Many will say it doesn't, though.
Many might say, look, no, I've got a routine, I read in the morning, I read in the evening.
But for many, it should be maybe tough sometimes, because sometimes there are some tougher chapters.
Sometimes having that routine, having that discipline can be tough for some.
You know, sometimes when you're going through chapters that maybe you're not feeling necessarily
applying to you right now and, you know, you're going through maybe like the building of the
ark or something, I don't know, you know, you might find those things, you know, a bit
tougher when, you know, I'm talking about the ark of God there.
And look, there are many, many, there can be some tough parts about that.
Tithing.
Many people say, no, I'm on point with tithing, but tithing for many can be a tough part to
get their head around, to get it right, especially for people on lower incomes.
It can be difficult, it can be a struggle.
Avoiding the sins that tempt you most in life can be tough, can't it?
OK, and sometimes for many people out there, that's a struggle, but they might still feel
like, no, I'm on top of that, I'm doing well with that.
But there's something about prayer, there's something about prayer where it's something
that could be done anywhere.
It could be done at any time.
It can immediately benefit us and those around us.
It's easy to do.
It doesn't require any training, like, for example, maybe soul winning does, and, you
know, getting into church and being a part of a church, it's safe.
You generally don't get in any danger when you're praying unless you're praying in some
pretty hairy spots.
You know, usually, you know, it is safe and it's free.
It doesn't cost you a penny.
And of course, it is commanded as well.
You know, 1 Timothy 2 says, I will, therefore, that men pray everywhere, lifting up holy
hands without wrath and doubting.
So what's the problem then?
What is the problem?
Why does it lack in many people's lives?
We've got the ability to speak directly to God, and so many of us make little use of
it.
So many make at least less use than they could of it.
Why?
And I think that a big part of the problem is faith, OK?
I do think that's a big part.
Not the only part, but a big problem is faith.
Often people doubt that God will actually answer their prayers.
They doubt that they will get answered, and therefore, they then pray less, and then it
becomes a sort of vicious circle where they're praying less.
They don't feel like their prayers are getting answered when they do.
But there's a problem, OK?
Because if you're doubting, your prayers definitely won't get answered.
So there is a vicious circle there.
In Mark 11, OK, where you are, Jesus, he's earlier cursed his fig tree, and then later
they see it again.
So Mark 11, verse 20, Mark 11, 20 says, And in the morning, as they passed by, they saw
the fig tree dried up from the roots.
And Peter, calling to remembrance, saith unto him, Master, behold, the fig tree which
thou cursed is withered away.
And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God.
For verily I say unto you that whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and
be thou cast into the sea, and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those
things which he saith shall come to pass, he shall have whatsoever he saith.
Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive
them, and ye shall have them.
And before everyone starts praying for carnal things, OK, convince themselves they're going
to receive the newest sports car, if only I just believed it, I'm going to get the newest
yacht, I'm going to get whatever, you know, it is, you know, that some people might think
they want to get, right.
Guess when you're really not doubting.
Do you know when you're really not doubting?
When you're praying for something that you know is God's will.
So you're going to doubt when you pray for something that isn't God's will.
And then you're going to doubt and you're not going to get what you prayed for.
But when you know it's God's will, well, then you're hopefully not going to doubt when you
do pray.
1 John 5 14, you don't have to turn there, it says, And this is the confidence that we
have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he heareth us.
He hears you.
So that's a key caveat to prayer, OK?
If it's not his will, he won't hear you.
If it's not asked in faith, he won't hear you.
How do you know what's his will, so you can ask him full faith for reading and hearing
his word, right?
Always comes back to the word of God, doesn't it?
If you're reading the word, if you're in the word, if you're hearing it preached, if you're
living the life, you're doing the things of God, if you're walking in the spirit, if you're
not fulfilling the lusts of the flesh, when you're doing that, you can be more confident
that what you're asking is his will.
And if it's his will, he's going to answer that prayer, isn't he?
So if it's his will, the Bible says he's going to answer it if you're asking it in faith.
But if it's his will, you should have full faith, therefore, that he's going to answer
the prayer.
And that's key when praying, OK?
Have that faith that it will be answered, OK?
This is a really key part of prayer.
You've got to have that faith in your heart.
This is going to get answered.
I know you're going to answer it.
Sometimes you can even petition God and say, look, you said you would answer.
You said that you would do this.
You said that you would do that.
You said you would give me this.
You said you'd etc, etc.
And there's nothing wrong with that in prayer.
We see examples of that in prayer where people are praying, just saying, God, you know, you
said this.
And that's how we can pray.
And this is a key to praying.
So like Daniel did, back in Daniel 2, OK, when Nebuchadnezzar had had this vivid dream
that he wanted interpreting, the problem was that he couldn't remember the dream, OK?
So he had this really vivid dream.
It was so vivid, he couldn't even remember it.
He just knew that he had an important dream, right?
Sometimes you get that.
You get like a really vivid dream.
You wake up, you think, wow, what a dream.
And then you go to tell someone about it, you can't even remember any of it, can you?
Well, he just can't remember it.
So his wise men in inverted commas said it's impossible to interpret a dream that you can't
even tell us of.
And you can understand their reasoning, OK?
They're like, how do we interpret the dream?
We don't even know what dream you had, right?
So they're in a bit of a fix here.
He's got angry, like a bit of a spoiled king, you know, he's just like, well, how dare you
not be able to interpret the dream I can't tell you about?
And he's decided to kill all of these wise men, OK?
So the problem was that Daniel and his three friends, who are also known by the Chaldean
names they gave them, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, were counted as wise men.
So they're basically going to get the chop, too.
And then after that, just to top things off, have their houses made into a dung hill, which
I don't know, you know, maybe what's going to happen after is going to bother you as
well.
Maybe he's talking about the people of their houses as well.
Now, verse 13 said this, said in verse 13, And a decree went forth that the wise men
should be slain, and they sought Daniel and his fellows to be slain.
So they're going to kill them.
And Daniel answered with counsel and wisdom to Arioch, the captain of the king's guard,
which was gone forth to slay the wise men of Babylon.
He answered and said to Arioch, the king's captain, Why is the decree so hasty from the
king?
Then Arioch made the king the thing known to Daniel.
Then Daniel went in and desired of the king that he would give him time and that he would
show the king the interpretation.
Now there's that faith right there, isn't it?
That's that faith that we've just been looking at.
He had faith that if he gave him time, knowing that he was going to go and pray to God, that
he would show the king the interpretation.
Now you say, how did Daniel know then that it was God's will?
Because he knew that God is a revealer of secrets, that it would glorify God above all
others, that it would save his servants, Daniel and his three friends.
He was he was confident.
Maybe he was walking that walk.
He just knew.
He knew.
Okay, he knew this is God's will.
And he was confident.
He had faith.
He said, he said in verse 16, he said he desired of the king that he would give him time and
that he would show the king the interpretation.
What was the result?
Well, look at verse 17.
And Daniel went to his house and made the thing known to Hanani, Mishael and Azariah,
his companions, that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret
that Daniel and his fellow should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
Then was a secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision.
Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.
Now that was some successful prayer time, wasn't it?
And aside for it being prayer of faith, I think there's some other lessons that we can
get from Daniel about prayer here.
Okay.
So we're looking at lessons for Daniel about prayer and lesson number one that we can get
from this passage.
There's a few I think in this passage that we could take for this.
Lesson number one is to pray at home.
Pray at home.
Said then Daniel went in and desired of the king that he would give him time and that
he would show the king the interpretation.
Now, he could have dropped to his knees there and then, couldn't he?
He could have made a public spectacle, could have got out the prayer mat and aimed for
Mecca, Jerusalem maybe instead.
He could have done what the Moors do, couldn't he?
He could have said, right, everyone, look at me.
Hey, look at me.
I'm going to start praying to my God, everyone, blah, blah, blah, you know, I'm about to do
a prayer.
Can everyone, everyone come round?
It's time to do a prayer.
You know, I'm going to do it public in the street or something else.
But verse 17 says, then Daniel went to his house and made the thing known to Hananiah,
Mishael, and Azariah, his companions.
So he could have sent for his friends, okay?
Remember, he's counted one of the wise men.
I'm sure he had resources to be able to just say, right, go and get those guys, you know,
he could have said to that captain of the guard, he could have said, can you go and
get my friends?
But instead, he went to his house.
Why?
Because there's no replacement for private prayer time.
For being one on one with God with no distractions, okay, there really isn't.
There's no replacement for that as part of your prayer life, okay?
Now turn to Daniel 6, because Daniel chapter 6, it's not to say that we should only pray
in private, okay?
We should be praying often throughout the day.
So that should be something you should be striving to do is regularly pray in the day.
Pray in many situations, many times you need to pray, Colossians 4, 2 says to continue
in prayer and watch in the same with thanksgiving.
So he's saying just continue in prayer.
You could say, well, he means continue your prayer life, yeah, but you know what?
Pray without ceasing.
I believe that you could look at that in two ways.
You could say, yeah, we should be continuing to pray, not give up on our prayer life.
But secondly, I think you should be regularly praying in the day.
It doesn't have to be a set prayer every time you pray.
Pray in your car.
Pray when you're walking around.
Pray when you're doing things.
Pray in awkward conversations.
Pray when hard situations.
Pray when things come into your mind.
We should be regularly seeking God in prayer.
However, however, private prayer is more intimate, isn't it?
It's more considered.
It's also respectful because it's taking that time out to pray to God Almighty, isn't it?
So you're taking that time out of your day.
It's not like, oh, well, while I'm doing this, I'll quickly sneak in a quick prayer.
It's actually take a time out and say, no, at this point in the day, this is when I'm
going to pray to God.
And in Daniel 6, Daniel, he's got some haters, okay, and they're trying to find something
to get him in trouble for.
Look at Daniel 6-5, Daniel 6-5 said, Then said these men, We shall not find any occasion
against this Daniel, except we find it against him concerning the law of his God.
Then these presidents and princes assembled together to the king and said thus unto him,
King Darius live forever.
All the presidents of the kingdom, the governors and the princes, the counselors and the captains
have consulted together to establish a royal statute and to make a firm decree that whosoever
shall ask a petition of any god or man for 30 days, save of thee, O king, he shall be
cast into the den of lions.
Now O king, establish the decree and sign the writing that it be not changed, according
to the law of the Medes and Persians, which altereth not.
Wherefore King Darius signed the writing and the decree.
So basically, they've just made it illegal to pray.
That's what's happened here.
This is now the Medi-Persian Empire, it's still, Daniel's still, you know, high up there
in the court.
It's been made illegal to pray.
Verse 10 says now, or in fact, he's raised to high up in the court, more to the point.
Verse 10 says now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went into his house
and his windows being open in his chamber toward Jerusalem.
He kneeled upon his knees three times a day and prayed and gave thanks before his God
as he did a full time.
So Daniel went to his bed bedroom, kneeled on his knees, prayed, gave thanks as he did
a full time, basically as he did beforehand, as he was used to do what he was already doing,
just like he did previously, like he probably did back in chapter two where we're reading
where he got on his knees and he prayed to God as he did a full time.
That was his routine.
That's what he did.
And he didn't matter.
They made a law.
You're not praying.
He still went to it.
So even a law saying you're going to be put to death for praying didn't stop Daniel with
his prayer life.
Yet, sadly, social and exciting social media video will stop many here with their prayer
lives.
Right.
Sadly, you know, some, you know, a little bit of extra sleep in the morning, an extra
five, 10 minutes, snuggled up under that warm duvet might stop many with their prayer life.
Right.
Sadly, so many other things will stop someone praying.
But Daniel couldn't even be stopped by the threat of death.
He could have made some other excuse, couldn't he?
But he said he just went home and it's prayer time.
I'm praying.
Why on his knees?
Why did he get on his knees?
Well, for me, getting on your knees shows respect.
It shows a respect that we and I think we need to remind ourselves of as well, because
there is that sort of Christianity out there that many people have maybe at least been
exposed to to some degree where it's like talking about God is like the big guy or something.
And it's like, you know, like and don't get me wrong, like Jesus considers his disciples
friends, but it doesn't mean we have to then disrespect him.
We should still show a reverence, a fear for the Lord, shouldn't we?
And people can go too far the other way, can't they, where it becomes so sort of informal,
so like just sort of buddy, buddy.
And then people try and act like, well, we're this sort of church.
They take out all the like the freedom and the great.
No, we just believe in respecting God.
Like we see the examples in the Bible and like God actually commands us to as well.
OK, we should we should serve him with godly reverence, shouldn't we, with a fear of God.
Well, getting on your knees helps to do that.
And I think as well, getting on your knees humbles you, doesn't it?
Because it does when you're regularly getting on your knees, getting your knees down to
God, you're bowing down.
It helps humble you, which many people need a bit of regular humility sometimes because
we can all get a bit puffed up sometimes or think with something special or when you're
on your knees with your head bowed to the floor, praying to God.
It's a good reminder of what you are in comparison.
Yeah.
So, Daniel here, he's on his knees.
Turn over to Matthew six, Matthew chapter six, where the Lord gives us a lesson on private
prayer.
So he's having this private prayer, or at least he thought he was private.
He was getting spied on.
Now, in Matthew six, it's a sermon on the mountain.
He says this in Matthew six and verse five.
Matthew six, five says, When thou pray'st, Matthew six, five, thou shalt not be as the
hypocrites are, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the
streets that they may be seen of men.
Verily, I say unto you, they have their reward.
So their reward is the approval of men in that that's what ultimately they're looking
for.
They're claiming they're praying, they're claiming they're holy, they're claiming they're
praying to God, but really their reward is what really they want, and that's people to
think they look holy.
And yeah, there's a lot of people out there that think that's holy.
Well, they'll get what they want.
People think they're holy, but what really have they achieved?
Their reward is the approval of men.
And this is something that you see across a lot of religions, really, don't you?
This public prayer.
I mean, Muslims are the, you know, that's the kind of very something we see a lot, don't
we?
And we're aware of a lot is the holy Muslim prayer time that, you know, the call out.
I think when we were in Malawi, there was because there was a prison behind us and there
were a lot of Muslims in prison and they did a call out, didn't they, in the morning.
And it was some sort of Muslim call to prayer time.
And it's like, you know, if you're that holy, do you really need an alarm to go off when
it's time to just pray?
But it's all for show, isn't it?
It's that public show, that public public prayer.
And the Jews, though, they do the same thing, don't they?
There's a lot of public praying and they do that sort of stuff.
But there's there's other types that as well that we need to be aware of as well.
There's, of course, those those sort of, you know, the classic open doors church, the Catholic
church, some of the bigger churches where people make a point of going to the church
to pray.
But really, let's be honest, a lot of those you can imagine the ulterior motive is to
be seen going into the church to pray.
And hopefully the vicar or the priest or whoever it is is going to see you come in and maybe
whoever else is in there, the wardens or whatever stuff they have.
And you get a little bit extra holy and they're going to go, oh, yeah, well, they do come
in regularly to pray.
So there is that.
But think about this as well.
What about all those clowns you see who put their so-called and sometimes they just use
it as a weapon, but they'll be on like social media and stuff saying, well, don't worry,
I'll pray for you.
Things like that.
My prayer is this and it's like, why is your prayer and it's usually like used as a sort
of like there's some guile and it's not even hidden guile within these sort of things.
Why is your prayer put out across the Internet?
My prayer for the whatever, for this situation, for these people, for this might decide, well,
thanks for that.
You know, well, verily, you've had your reward.
You know, if you wanted to pray, you could have gone in your closet and prayed like we
see here.
Right.
Well, here he says, but now when thou prayest, enter into thy closet and when thou has shut
thy door, pray to thy father, which is in secret and my father, which seeth in secret,
shall reward thee openly.
Now, just to make it clear, OK, the closet is not a cupboard.
It's basically just like a small private room.
So in case anyone's been reading this and they've been like amongst the clothes in the
cupboard and the moths and is that only my cupboard?
OK, you know, amongst, you know, whatever it is in the cupboard, the smelly shoes at
the bottom and they're trying to squeeze in there and shut the door.
No, the closet is just like a small room.
It's a private room.
And he's basically saying to go somewhere private, OK, go somewhere private where it's
just you, you and God alone, OK?
He said, but when thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet and when thou has shut
thy door, pray to thy father, which is in secret and my father, which seeth in secret,
shall reward thee openly.
So the big point is to have that private one-on-one prayer time with God.
Go back to Daniel, chapter two, Daniel, chapter two.
So verse 17 said, then Daniel went to his house.
OK, this is after he had kind of said, yeah, I'm going to get the answer to this.
Then he went to his house and made the thing known to Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, his
companions, that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning the secret
that Daniel and his fellow should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
When was the secret revealed unto Daniel in the night vision and Daniel blessed the God
of heaven?
So we're looking at lessons for Daniel about prayer.
Lesson number one is pray at home, OK?
So, yeah, like I said, pray throughout the day.
You should be constantly praying to God, but there should be some set prayer time.
And a good example just with that was what Daniel did was three times a day, wasn't it?
If you like, that's a good benchmark, isn't it?
You just find three times in the day, morning, evening and sometime in a day to just have
set prayer to God.
That's a good time to be praying.
That's a that's a great that's a great set, formal prayer where you can you know, maybe
you could think of and it's up to you how you want to do it.
You don't have to just repeat, repeat the same place.
You can maybe if you if there is a time issue with that, you can maybe write morning prayers.
I'm going to pray for these people or, you know, these people of the church.
I'm going to pray for this situation.
In the afternoon, I'm going to pray for maybe, you know, family, whatever.
You know, this evening, I'm going to pray for these situations in my life or this sort
of thing.
So it's it's it's taking that time out and it's having some set prayer time, some time
when you're just alone with God praying, OK?
Lesson number one was pray at home.
Now, lesson number two is pray for each other.
Pray for each other.
Look at verse 17.
It said that Daniel went to his house and made the thing known to Hananiah, Mishael and
Azariah, his companions, that they, so they would desire mercies of the God of heaven
concerning the secret that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of
the wise men of Babylon.
So Daniel was a was a great young man of God, wasn't he?
He had great mysteries revealed to him by the Lord.
Daniel 117, for example, said, as for as for these four children, God gave them knowledge
and skill in all learning and wisdom.
And Daniel had understanding in all visions and dreams.
But he didn't just go alone.
He made the thing known to his believing friends that they would desire God to be merciful
and reveal it.
OK, so he made those things known so that they would then also pray to God.
So as much as we instruct our private prayer time, OK, and we should have private prayer
time, it's also good to get others to pray for you for certain things as well, isn't
it?
It's good to get others involved in the prayer time, important things, big things, big deals.
Get other people involved in the prayers.
Yeah, get people to pray.
Turn to James, Chapter five, one of the reasons, James five, one of the reasons that we as
a church pray for things the Wednesday night, one of the reasons that we have a prayer and
chat group as well is because there's power in numbers, isn't there?
You can think of it this way, maybe some here at least have some strong faith when that
prayer is made.
So you might be thinking, I've got a bit of weak faith, I don't know if those prayers
are going to be.
Well, if you get everyone to pray, there might be a couple of people that have a strong enough
faith that the prayers answered, right?
One way of looking at it, right?
James five says in verse 13, James five, 13 says, Is any among you afflicted?
Let him pray.
Is any Mary?
Let him sing songs.
And yes, Mary had nothing to do with alcohol.
He wasn't like, right, OK, guys, let's have a boozy sing song to the local to the latest
songs.
Obviously not.
OK, verse 14.
Is any sick among you?
Let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him
with oil in the name of the Lord.
So this is the leadership of the church praying over someone sick, praying over them, praying
for them to be, to recover.
And in fact, it's also anointing him with oil.
And you go, well, this sounds a bit weird.
I've done this before with people.
You know what?
We've had some great results with that as well.
And you know, anointing with oil, praying over, praying over someone who has a sickness,
has an illness, has like, you know, a problem.
Well, we're told to do that here.
He said, if any sick among you, let him call for the elders of the church, let them pray
over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.
And the prayer of faith shall save the sick and the Lord shall raise him up.
And if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him.
So that's an if, because it's not necessarily chastisement.
It can be, though, can't it?
OK, it's not necessarily.
But if it is, then great.
OK, he's bringing it to God.
And here as well, he said the elders of the church in the verse 14, and I suppose by default,
they should be strong in faith, shouldn't they?
And I'll tell you why.
We were talking about this the other night.
Why should someone, especially a pastor, someone who's leading a church, preaching from behind
a pole, why should they be strong in the faith?
I'll tell you why.
Because they're just in the Word so much.
So we're saying when, you know, anyone here who's written, you know, even 10 minutes,
multiply that by six or written our sermons, you know that you're in the Word a lot.
There's a lot of study and time and effort that goes into it.
So with that time, if you're preaching regularly each week, your faith should be strengthened
because ultimately it comes from the Word of God, doesn't it?
And with that, you know, that's why he's saying that.
However, it's not just about the elders of the church and it's not that they're suddenly
better people.
They should, by default, have strong faith.
But people in the church should have a strong faith, OK?
And he said in verse 16, confess your faults one to another and pray one for another that
ye may be healed.
The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.
So this isn't confession booth time, OK?
Just to make it clear.
I think maybe some some Catholic leaning types like to kind of go with that through this.
He said one to another.
OK, so talking to each other, confessing your faults one to another.
And it can be for some sin, OK, but also, you know, and he said because he said confessing
your faults, but also making, you know, maybe asking for help with the situation that you
got yourself in.
Maybe it's not like an obvious sin.
It's maybe some fault, some issue you've got it.
Maybe it's a weakness.
Maybe it's a bad choice.
Maybe it's, you know, something along those lines.
Maybe isn't it?
Maybe there's some sin that you just like, look, I need some help with this, guys.
And maybe, you know, if people aren't going to be all weird about it and get all kind
of overly judgmental, if someone's come to you going, I've got a problem with this, I
need some prayers, hopefully you understand, yeah, these guys are just going to pray for
me for this.
Right.
That's what it should be.
Right.
OK, I've noticed someone put a message for this on the prayer group.
I wonder what they've been up to, hmm?
Hopefully not.
OK.
Why one to another?
Because the more the merrier.
Because our prayers avail much.
They succeed.
They can help many things.
Because if the unrighteous judge helped the widow for her much asking, if you remember
from, you don't have to tell me, Luke 18 7, it says, and shall not God avenge his own
elect when compared to that unrighteous judge, which cry day and night unto him, though he
bear long with them.
So just the sheer amount of people praying will make that prayer surely more likely to
be answered.
Yeah.
Just the amount of people praying about that prayer should make that prayer more likely
to be answered.
Turn to Ephesians 6.
And lastly, on this point, Ephesians chapter 6.
Whether someone asks for specific prayer or not, we can all do with praying for each other,
can't we?
We can all do with it.
Every single person here could do with other people.
If you're saved and you're in the battle, you're in the fight, you're going to need
some prayers.
Because it can be tough, can't it?
And there are many different angles, many battles, many issues, many ways and means
that the devil is trying to attack you, trying to pull you out of church, trying to stop
you doing the work that he wants being done.
Well, we all need each other's prayers.
So in Ephesians 6, it's at the end of the armour of God, Paul says in Ephesians 6, 18,
he said, praying always, always, with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit and
watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints.
So he said to do this with all perseverance, to basically put effort in, you know, and
don't give up and supplication or earnest prayer for all saints and who are the saints?
That's all believers.
So we're told to, so regardless of whether someone puts a prayer request in, what would
be great is if everyone in this church, just in their own prayer time, just prayed for
individual people in the church, prayed for individual church members.
Maybe you just, sometimes you just notice something, don't you, as well?
Sometimes you just notice someone may be a bit upset, a bit, you know, some issue, some
problem.
Maybe more than, and other days you might, but pray for those people.
Go away and think, yeah, actually, because we're a team here, aren't we?
We're a team here which needs to thrive as a team.
We need to think about each other, pray for each other, help each other for us to be able
to keep doing what is a team job, isn't it?
So he said here, thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints, and that
is a big part of being a part of a church and obviously a part of this church, is being
able to pray for each other, is being able to pray for other like-minded, God-fearing
believers.
It's also getting people to pray for you, you know, that is part of being in church
and, you know, part of the reason we have that prayer night on a Wednesday and part
of having a group where you can send in prayer requests is so that people pray for you.
But also just, you know, the other reason is, and another big part of it, is to be able
to pray for other people and to be able to pray for like-minded believers, soul-winning
believers, or people maybe that one day will be soul-winning, soul-winning Christians.
To be able to pray for them and pray because the ultimate goal, the end result, as I always
say, is eventually is more people saved.
And if you're praying for each other, praying for all those different issues and problems
and things that can pull people out of the race, you're praying for them and praying
for their, you know, their health, praying for them to be steadfast, praying for them
to be strong, praying for them not to be demoralized, praying for all those things and all the
different issues that many people need praying for, then the ultimate result will be more
people saved.
And I appreciate, okay, there might be maybe a lot of people, like if you think about it,
if you maybe went, I don't know, like a three-month period, because you have people that kind
of come from afar and don't come maybe every week, maybe not even every couple of weeks
or every month.
Maybe if you added everyone together with kids, maybe we're maybe close to like a hundred
people, right?
And maybe you think this is quite a long prayer, okay?
But you can maybe break that up or maybe you could, maybe on different days you could even
get structured with a prayer.
You could even, you know, something I'd do is I'd go through our group chat and I know
there's a couple that aren't on it, so don't worry, you know, I have them in the back of
my mind as well, and I'll just go through and pray for what I think maybe those people
need praying for sometimes and just go through it and think about those and think about maybe
things that they might be praying for.
That's a good way of doing it, right?
Just a bit more structured, you're thinking about people, you're thinking about those
people in the church.
And it's not just my job to do that, we should all be doing that, shouldn't we?
He said one for another.
I didn't just say just the pastor for the people in the church.
Go back to Daniel 2, Daniel 2 and verse 17, Daniel 2, 17 says,
Then Daniel went to his house, and made a thing known to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah
his companions, that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret,
that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in the night vision, then Daniel blessed the
God of heaven.
So we're looking at lessons from Daniel about prayer.
Lesson number one is to pray at home.
Lesson number two is to pray for each other.
Lesson number three is to pray for understanding, pray for understanding.
Verse 18 said that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning this secret.
So it was a secret that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise
men of Babylon.
So there are many things that we don't know in life, okay?
Many decisions to make that we're unsure of, aren't there?
Okay?
And there's a lot of kind of unsure times in life, you know, if anyone tries to pretend,
oh, they've just got such strong faith, they're just so guided by God, they never
have a time.
That's nonsense, okay?
Often we're kind of wondering, often we come to a sort of fork in the road, we come
to sort of where it's a hard decision to make, hard to know what the next course of
action should be.
And sometimes it can even be truths of God that we just don't understand, can't it?
Sometimes it can be when you're reading through the Bible, maybe you're studying
through the Bible, maybe there's just something that you've heard in the Word of God, and
you don't really get it, and you don't really understand, and you're not sure
what God wants you to think about that or believe about that.
What's the answer?
Ask God to help you.
And although it sounds obvious, okay, it does sound obvious, so many don't do this.
So many people come to these hard decisions, come to these problems, come to these passages,
come to these, you know, crossroads in life, and instead of asking God, or turn to James
1, James chapter 1, instead of asking God, it's the last thing they do.
They ask the world.
They ask people in the world, maybe they even go to Google, you know, and what do I do this,
or how do I do this, what does someone do in this situation, or maybe they go to like
the guru, the world's guru.
They ask a family or friend, you know, instead, and look, sure, look, there are some people
that have some wisdom and stuff, but a lot of the time, people just go to an unsaved
family and friends to ask for sort of spiritual decisions often, and they forget to ask God.
And like I said, this does apply to truths out of the Word of God as well.
How many, how many people will Google a question about Christianity?
I bet, I bet there's even, sadly, people in this room that have done that probably on
multiple occasions.
I don't understand this passage, let's see what Google's got to say.
You failed.
Ask God.
You go, oh, wait a second, how's God going to tell me?
He does tell you.
He does help you.
And sometimes you just start, you start looking and the answer is to be found in the Word
of God, isn't it?
And the Word of God helps explain the Word of God.
It's line upon line, precept upon precept, here a little, there a little.
And the more you're reading and the more you learn, the more you're looking and the more
you're trying, maybe there's a term, you look for that term somewhere else, you look for
maybe that word somewhere else, and then it starts to make sense.
You start to get understanding, but how many, sadly, will just go, and not just, and it's
not just Google, how many will just go for a ripe sermon?
Now, don't get me wrong, there's some great preachers out there, there's some men of God
that understand the Word of God, but that's not what God tells you to do.
If you don't know something, he wants you to go to him.
He wants you to ask him, and he wants you to go to his Word.
And when you start to do that and you stop relying on someone to tell you, and you start
relying on the Word of God to tell you, and reading the Word of God and learning from
the Word of God, your wisdom will go up here, compared with when it's just like, let's find
like my favourite pastor, let's see if he preached, oh, this one said this, this one
said that, so it must be true.
You won't really have that real strength of conviction in that, will you?
And then when, you know, when things down the line, when maybe they're not your favourite
pastor or preacher anymore, then you start to question half the things you ever believed,
when you should have known it was in the Word of God.
James chapter 1, it says it like this, if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God
that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him.
So he's saying that if you lack wisdom about something, okay, ask God who will dole it
out generously.
And you know what he's not going to do either, he's not going to reproach or scold you for
asking.
He's not going to mock you, he's not going to make out like you're an idiot, because
you ask something and, you know, and like might happen sadly if you ask other people
and people go, you don't even know that or something else, God won't do any of that.
He won't upbraid you.
And he will give it to you.
But let him ask in faith, like that faith bit again, verse 6, let him ask in faith nothing
wavering, for he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.
For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord.
So if you're not asking in faith, if you're not really believing God's going to give you
the answer, you're thinking, yeah, I mean, I'll ask him, I'll have a quick read, but
I'm sure I can Google this, I'm sure I can find it here, I'm sure I can find someone
else to tell me, I'm sure I can go to this person to tell me, yeah, you won't, you won't
receive it.
A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.
So there's no point asking for God to help you understand something.
If number one, you don't believe that he will answer the prayer.
But number two, you don't really have faith also in what God then tells you to do.
There's no point going, God, please help me to understand this, help me to find the right
course of action, help me to do this, if really, whatever he tells you, you're not really going
to have faith in anyway.
Oh, yeah, tell me God, you really, don't fancy that, let's go back to, you know, Andrew Tate
will tell me something better.
It's got to be the solution, isn't it?
He's a queer, isn't he?
Yeah, amen.
My opinion.
Anyway, let's keep going, but, okay, so, if you want to understand the right way, okay,
you want that wisdom, you want that knowledge, you want to know what to do in many situations,
you want to know what the word of God is saying, ask the Lord, okay, ask the Lord.
Be like Solomon, who when asked what he wanted from the Lord, instead of riches, power, health,
joy, popularity, whatever it is people want, 1 Kings 3, 9 shows what he answered.
1 Kings 3, 9, you have to turn and it says, give therefore thy servant an understanding
heart.
That's what he asked for, to judge thy people that I may discern between good and bad.
For who is able to judge this size so great a people?
So when you want to discern between good or bad, you want an understanding heart, go to
the Lord in prayer and go to his word, yeah?
Go back to Daniel 2, Daniel 2 and verse 17 said, Daniel 2, 17, then Daniel went to his
house and made the thing known to Hanani, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions, that
they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning the secret, that Daniel and his
fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in the night vision, then Daniel blessed the
God of heaven.
So we're looking at lessons from Daniel about prayer, and lesson number one was to pray
at home, lesson number two was to pray for each other, lesson number three was to pray
for understanding, and lesson number four is to pray for protection, okay?
Pray for protection.
Verse 18 said that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning the secret
that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
So that's what Daniel and his fellows were ultimately praying for.
They were praying for their safety, weren't they?
That's what they were praying for.
They were praying to not die, to not die like everyone else.
That's what they were, that was the main goal, that was the momentum behind their praying,
behind them going to him and saying to him, look, we're going to find the truth of this
for you, but at least Daniel's saying that, going back then praying so they don't die.
Is that a bad thing?
Is that unholy?
Of course not, okay?
God wants us to do that.
God wants us to pray for it, but we don't just go, well, whatever we'll be, we'll be.
God wants you to pray to him.
God wants you to pray for his protection, for his help.
He wants you to call out to him.
He wants you to reach out to him.
There's nothing wrong with that.
There's nothing wrong with praying for things for yourself.
Praying for help, praying for him to come and help you.
There's nothing, oh, well, you've got, no, only pray for other people, nonsense.
He tells you to call on his name, to call upon the name of the Lord, not just for salvation
in your daily lives as well.
Turn to 2 Samuel 22.
2 Samuel 22, whilst I read Psalm 46.1, Psalm 46.1 is to the chief musician for the sons
of Korah.
It's a song upon Alamoth.
It says, God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
He is a very present help.
That means he's there.
He's willing and ready to help you.
He's there.
He's there waiting.
You only have to ask him.
You just have to ask him.
He's right there waiting to help you.
But it's the same criteria.
It's in faith, and it's according to his will.
Okay, so it's the same thing.
It's in faith.
You've got to ask him in faith.
You've got to be saying, look, I know you're going to help me.
I know you said, you said to call on your name.
You said here that you're a very present help in trouble.
And when you do that, you should have the faith to know that he will help you.
And if you ask him in faith, he will help you.
Sometimes we need to get shook up a bit, okay, sometimes, sometimes we bring it upon ourselves.
But he is there.
He's still there.
You just have to ask him.
And you've got to remember that.
Remember, he's there.
He's right there.
Just ask him and ask him with faith.
Now this is, 2 Samuel 22 is actually Psalm 18 being sung.
Okay, we're going to look at it in 2 Samuel 22, though.
But they're singing Psalm 18, which is after David's return to his kingdom.
He's dealt with the next uprising after returning after what happened with his son, with Absalom.
And then he's had this kind of other, he's dealt with that.
So it's just kind of at the end of all, like what's been a horrendous time for David, and
he's just dealt with it all.
And then we get to 2 Samuel 22, it says in verse 1,
And David spake unto the LORD the words of this song in the day, that the LORD, it was
the LORD, had delivered him out of the hand of all his enemies, and out of the hand of
Saul.
And he said, The LORD is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer.
So it's God that delivers you.
The God of my rock, in him will I trust, he is my shield, and the horn of my salvation,
my high tower, and my refuge, my saviour, thou savest me from violence.
So he shields us.
He said here, he calls help even when needed.
A God could call out, like the horn of your salvation, he could call out to others for
you.
He's a high tower, somewhere safe.
He's a refuge.
He's a saviour.
He will save you from physical harm as well.
He saves you from violence, he said here.
And I've said this many times, you know, really, what we do and, you know, how unpopular really
we are, and what we're up against, really, and the sort of absolute nutters out there
that completely hate our guts.
It's pretty amazing, really, that no one here has really ended up being beaten up and killed.
And it's not really.
Do you know why?
Because it's the LORD.
Because you can't do it on your own.
You wouldn't have a chance on your own, really.
I mean, we're this tiny remnant of people, not only saved, but going out and actually
doing something, preaching the Gospel, trying to do the job that God wants us to do.
And we would be stuffed without him.
But he does save us from violence.
And I think, like, maybe you could get, like, I don't know, it wouldn't need to be a highlight
reel, because you could just kind of do the full length when you're up there, because
you've got eternity up there, where maybe he's going to show you, maybe you could go,
look, this is a fake.
You just show me what happened over this period.
And maybe you'll see all sorts of, like, crazy lunatics on their way here, and suddenly
they turned off the other way, suddenly just like, I don't know.
But like, you know, he does save you from violence.
And if it wasn't for God, really, if the devil, if there was no restriction, we would all
be dead already.
That's the reality of it.
But it's God that saves us.
How do you get all of that, though?
How do you get all of that help?
How do you get it all?
Well, verse four said, I will call on the Lord who is worthy to be praised.
So shall I be saved from mine enemies.
So you just got to call on him.
You've got to pray to him.
You've got to ask him for help.
He is there to help you.
That's what he said.
He said, I will call on the Lord who is worthy to be praised.
So shall I be saved from mine enemies.
That's an assurance there, isn't it?
God will save you.
Yeah, you might go through some rough times.
David went through some rough times, didn't he?
David had some hard battles.
But at the end of it, God did save him.
God did save him from his enemies.
So you've got to ask him faith, nothing wavering.
And he does come through.
And you know, I'm not trying to say I'm this holy guy who's just always praying in faith
and everything else.
But I think many people here, including myself, who've been saved, trying to do this and call
on the name of the Lord and have that faith that he's going to help you, could look back
at many, many situations where God's come through for you.
I'm sure many, I'm not going to ask for a raise of hands, but I'm sure most people here
can think of times when, yeah, I prayed to God when this was, it was rough.
I mean, we had something recently where we were like, what on earth?
It was rough.
You know, we were thinking like, this is big trouble for something, you know, that we dealt
with a couple of days ago and then just suddenly out of nowhere, just God just solved it.
And we didn't even know how he was going to, he just suddenly just solved it.
And everyone else is probably, probably dealt with similar things and many times, but often
what happens is we kind of put them out of our mind, don't we?
And we kind of forget about it or we start to, what do we do?
We start to put it back into a sort of worldly explanations.
Yeah, I know I prayed to God, I know it was seemingly a miraculous change, but however,
it might have just been this, it might have just been circumstance, it might have just
been that.
We forget it, don't we?
It could be as futile, there could be a problem in your life that seems as futile trying to
get out of it as having to guess someone's dream and then explain it.
I mean, that would sound like a pretty tall order, wouldn't it?
If I said to you guys now, right, okay, suddenly like the ushers, suddenly they're armed up,
you're like, you ain't getting out of here unless you guess what dream I had last night.
Why didn't you explain it to me?
I think most people would think this isn't going to work, you know, but that's what they
were told they had to do.
So with that in mind, next time you're in a scary situation, and we all get in scary
situations sometimes, don't we, situations where you're thinking, what's going to happen?
I don't know how I'm going to get out of this, I don't know what's going to happen next.
This is scary, you know, you're in danger, you're in physical danger, physical harm,
or to your family, to whatever else.
Maybe next time you're just concerned about someone, something, some situation, something
you've got to deal with, something else.
Next time you need God's protection, call on the Lord, who is worthy to be praised,
so shall you be saved from your enemies.
Something we need to take away from this, right, and people need to remember that.
And it needs to be the first point of call, because how often as well do you have a situation,
have a problem, have a fear, have a danger, have something going on?
And instead of going to God, you're trying to solve it in a hundred different ways, and
then you're like, oh yeah, I've got to pray, and then you pray, and it's like, oh, it's
been solved.
Well, you could have not gone through all of that if you prayed at the beginning.
Go back to Daniel 2 and verse 17.
Daniel 2, 17, you're going to remember this passage by the end of this, said, Then Daniel
went to his house and made a thing known to Hanani, Mishael, and Azariah, his companions,
that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning the secret, that Daniel
and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men of Babylon.
When was the secret revealed unto Daniel in the night vision?
Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.
So we're looking at lessons from Daniel about prayer.
Lesson number one, pray at home.
Lesson number two, pray for each other.
Lesson number three, pray for understanding.
Lesson number four, pray for protection.
And lesson number five, pray thanks and praise to God.
Pray thanks and praise to God.
Look at verse 19.
It said, Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in the night vision.
Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.
Daniel answered and said, Blessed be the name of God forever and ever, for wisdom and
might are his.
And he changeth the times and the seasons.
He removeth kings and setteth up kings.
He giveth wisdom unto the wise, and knowledge to them that know understanding.
He revealeth the deep and secret things.
He knoweth what is in the darkness, and the light dwelleth with him.
I thank thee and praise thee, O thou God of my fathers, who has given me wisdom and might,
and has made known unto me now what we desired of thee, for thou has now made known unto
us the king's matters.
So first off, okay, Daniel's first response for the answered prayers wasn't to run off
and wake the guys up, because I'm guessing he went to his home and then he spoke to them.
Maybe they live in the same house, or maybe they were local, but he didn't do that.
It wasn't to go and get Arioch, you know, before the king changes his mind about giving
him time to interpret the dream.
It's like, quick, I better run off and leg it and tell him.
I've just found out.
First thing he did was praise God and thank him.
It's the first thing he did.
He said, Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven in verse 19.
And he continued to do that in the following verses, okay, like I just read to you.
And that's something to remember when your prayers are answered, isn't it?
Give God the glory.
Give God the glory when your prayers are answered.
And I say that because a lot of people don't.
A lot of people, and I'm talking about myself here, many times I've had prayers answered
and then I've almost just kind of just got on with things afterwards, instead of giving
God the glory.
And sometimes we even try and take the glory ourselves.
I've had the prayer answered, and then we're suddenly trying to take some sort of glory
as if, oh, well, I solved that myself, really.
It was really my skill in this situation.
It was the way I did that.
And it's, no, give God the glory.
Give him the appreciation.
And that's for our own good as well.
Because again, like with getting on your knees, it stops you getting prideful.
It really does.
If you, straight away, whenever something good like that happens, whether it's an answer
to prayer or not, and you're just giving it to God, giving God the glory, giving him
the praise, praising him for things, it will stop you getting puffed up.
It will stop you getting prideful.
And we need that help with that.
But there's another side to it, too, okay?
The more we praise and thank God for answered prayers, the more we're reminding ourselves
of those answered prayers, and the stronger our faith then gets in our prayers.
So you want a successful prayer life, thank God and praise God when you answer your prayers,
because it's going to give you stronger faith, and the prayers are more likely to be answered.
Because you're reminding yourself regularly and giving the glory to him and reminding
yourself of those prayers that are getting answered.
When the more prayers are answered, well, look at verse 23, he said, I thank thee and
praise thee, O thou God of my fathers, because I worked it out for myself, because I'm so
clever and I can—no, he didn't say that.
He said, who has given me?
He said, O thou God of my fathers, who has given me wisdom and might, and has made known
unto me now what we desired of thee, for thou has now made known unto us the king's matter.
He's giving it all to God, isn't he?
And that's the right response to answered prayer.
Okay, turn to 1 Thessalonians 5, 1 Thessalonians chapter 5, because it's not just answered
prayer that we're to give thanks for.
So obviously, look, you're seeing prayers answered by God, give him the thanks, give
him the credit, give him the appreciation.
But in 1 Thessalonians 5, in verse 17, verse 17 is a great memory verse, okay?
If you can't do the six verses, right, and you just find it really hard, at least memorize
1 Thessalonians 5, 17, okay?
Pray without ceasing.
There you go, okay?
Surely you can memorize that.
Okay, pray without ceasing, okay?
Your prayer life, like I said, should be in ever constant, okay?
Your prayer life should be ever constant, and I think you should be just trying to regularly
pray throughout the day as well, but ultimately you should just be regularly praying.
Don't stop your prayer life.
He said, in everything, he didn't say in some things, he said, in everything give thanks,
for this is a will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.
So it wasn't in some things, it's his will.
His will for us is that we give thanks in everything.
That's God's will for your life.
Something about, what's God's will for my life?
Well here's one, give thanks for everything.
There's a good will for your life from God, and the more that we do that, okay, the more
we're then giving him the credit for the things, like I said.
So if you're giving thanks in everything, the more you're giving credit to God for those
things in your life.
And you know what, then the more carnal things and the things you start to realize, actually,
how am I thanking God because this wasn't a good thing, might even help you to avoid
some of those things as well, when you're giving thanks to God for those things and
you're realizing what therefore then is your bad choices or not.
But turn to 1 Timothy 4, 1 Timothy 4, because if this is new to you, if you're like, I don't
even know where to start, right?
Let me give you a really good start, because a good start to help you with a routine of
this is meal times.
That's a really good start for giving thanks to God and getting used to just giving thanks
to God for things, is to start with meal times.
So once you get in the habit of that, I think you then start to think more about thanking
him for other things as well.
So if you can get in the habit of meal times, and most people will eat maybe some females,
maybe some it's a few more a day, okay, if you're doing that, then you've got a good
habit then of thanking God, that's a good time to pray to God as well, okay, and it's
a good habit of thanking God.
So you get in that habit, and then you start to think about it other times, then snack
times, you know, then like, it's not just breakfast, lunch, dinner, then it's second
breakfast as well.
Then it's 11s's.
Then it's tea.
Yeah, then it's supper and it's dinner.
Is that just me, or was I going to be in black?
But seriously, if you're praying for your meals, you start to pray for other things,
then you're like, you eat, you start to get in a habit, you're thinking, I'm eating something,
I'm not giving, I'm not praying, I'm drinking something, then it starts to be other things
as well, then you just start to get in a habit of praying God for things that you're being
given in life.
He says in 1 Timothy 4, verse 1, 1 Timothy 4, 1, Now the Spirit speaketh expressly that
in the latter time some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits
and doctrines of devils, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their conscience seared
with a hot iron.
And this one never ceases to amaze me, the lies in hypocrisy.
Let's keep going, verse 3, Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats
which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which believe and know
the truth.
For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it be received with thanksgiving.
For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.
So the reason our food is clean is that the word of God says it is now, okay, if it's
received with thanksgiving and prayer.
So all these, I mean, if, let's put it this way, all these people that try and harp on
about not eating pork and stuff like that, it's like, just read your Bible, yeah, this
is such a clear passage on this, isn't it?
He said, For every creature of God is good, and nothing to be refused if it be received
with thanksgiving.
For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.
Now it's up to you, if you don't want to eat it, that's up to you, but if you start trying
to say that it's like some sort of unbiblical thing, then you're out to lunch, you just
don't read the Bible.
Okay, it's pretty clear in the Bible here.
But the reason, like I said, is because of the word of God and because it's received
with thanksgiving and prayer.
So that is a good incentive to give thanks for your food, isn't it?
You're cleaning your food.
You're cleaning it.
You make it, and when you say being clean, well, ultimately, yeah, you could say that
in God's eyes, he's looking down and going, yeah, you know, that's some blessed food.
So maybe you could think that you maybe probably do a bit better with that food.
Maybe you won't be burping it up or maybe it's just going to be that bit better for
you because it's sanctified, it's clean, it's washed in the eyes of God by you giving thanks
for it, by you praying for that food, which should then, like I said, get you in a habit
of thanking God for other things too.
And you don't have to turn it, but in Hebrews 13, 15, it says that this is a sacrifice that
he wants from us regularly.
It says in Hebrews 13, 15, by him, therefore, let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God
continually.
So that's the sacrifice he wants from us, his regular praise.
That is the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name.
That's what he wants from us.
He wants you to regularly thank him.
That's a sacrifice that God requires of you.
No, you don't have to bring the animal to the altar, but he does want you to thank him.
And it's not really the worst sacrifice, is it?
I mean, when you think about sacrifices, you think about things that are, this is going
to be hard.
Thanking God is a thing that's so good for you.
It helps you in so many different areas, not just by sanctifying your food, not just because
it helps you to appreciate him, but it humbles you, it helps you then with your prayer life,
it helps you to have more faith in what you're praying for because you're recognising and
appreciating when those prayers are answered, and with a knock-on effect as well with that,
helping you to be more positive as well.
Something that I sometimes say to people, people that maybe find life a bit more negative
in life sometimes, and there are people that are unsaved that come out with this as well.
You might have heard it from people who do rehab stuff, they're like, oh, I've just got
to give thanks more.
But there is an element of truth in that.
So if you're someone who is sometimes, maybe you look at a lot of negatives, maybe you're
like a glass half empty type, and that could be at periods in your life as well, a good
cure for that is to give thanks, because if you start to think about all the things
you should be giving God thanks for, you might start to appreciate much more in life, because
a lot of the time it's just perspective, isn't it?
Because sometimes if you just appreciate what you do have in life, you're less likely to
be as down in the dumps about the bad, the worst stuff in life.
So giving thanks, there's so much that benefits us from that.
And then with that as well, as well as that, now on top of your three, hopefully your structured
prayer, look, if you're like that, I don't even know how to start, start with once, start
within the morning, you know, but on top of that, now suddenly, you're drawing nigh unto
God, you're talking to him regularly throughout the day, because there's a lot of things to
thank him for.
And if you have someone who eats a lot of stuff throughout the day, well, at least you're
drawing nigh unto God a lot with that, right?
You're drawing nigh unto God and do it with everything and it's constant dialogue.
And because there is a lot to thank for really, there really is.
Everything like, you know, just, just when you walk out, just walking outside, walking
out there and just, and we're not in the middle of a war-torn nation.
You're not walking out there wondering when the next bomb's going off.
I mean, sometimes South End gets a bit hairy apparently at night, but it's not, you know,
and there's so much you could walk out there and say, I can walk out here without someone
checking my ID card and checking that I can go across the road to the next section or
something.
Just really, if you really boil it down, that we can be thankful for, because it could be
so much different, couldn't it?
And instead we so often focus on all the negatives and there are people all over the world that
would look at what we have here and think, you are so blessed.
And the more you thank God and start to think about all these things and thank God, the
easier life gets, I believe.
James 4-8 says, draw nigh to God and he will draw nigh to you.
Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
And back at Daniel 2, okay?
That is exactly what Daniel did, okay?
He drew nigh to God and he thanked God.
Verse 17 said, then Daniel went to his house and made the thing known to Hanani, Mishael,
and Azariah, his companions, that they would desire mercies of the God of heaven concerning
this secret, that Daniel and his fellows should not perish with the rest of the wise men of
Babylon.
Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision, then Daniel blessed the God
of heaven.
So the title was Lessons from Daniel About Prayer.
Lesson number one was pray at home.
Lesson number two was pray for each other.
Lesson number three was pray for understanding.
Lesson number four was pray for protection.
Lesson number five was to pray thanks and praise to God.
And hopefully the idea with that is to help everyone just with their prayer life, things
to think about as you go home and go on with your day, go on with your week, month, year,
and just think about, you know, what a blessing we have, right?
We're able to come to the Lord God Almighty in prayer and we want to make use of that,
right?
But there's ways to make maximum use of that and to get the blessings that come with that.
We're going to finish off therefore in a word of prayer.
Heavenly Father, thank you, Lord, for, well, for prayer, Lord, thank you that we're able
to come to you.
I'm able to come to that phone of grace and we're able to call upon you, Lord, in times
of trouble where we're able to get understanding from you, Lord.
We're able to pray for one another, pray to you and know that if we pray in faith, if
we pray according to your will, you will answer those prayers, Lord.
Help us to just do that more, Lord, help us to go away and, you know, dwell upon this
message and the truth from your word in this, Lord.
Help us please with that, therefore, to then go out this afternoon and pray while we're
out, pray before, pray, you know, even during, while we're trying to get people saved, Lord,
to call on your help with it and help us get people saved, Lord.
Help us to then also be able to return for this evening's service, Lord, and in Jesus'
name, pray with us.
Amen.