WEBVTT 1 00:00:03.080 --> 00:00:10.320 Like we mentioned last week, today we’re going to be talking about what it means to pray in Jesus’ name. 2 00:00:10.320 --> 00:00:15.900 What does it mean to come before the Lord in the name of Jesus? 3 00:00:15.900 --> 00:00:31.360 I’m going to read a couple of texts, but our primary text is John 14 verses 13 and 14. 4 00:00:31.360 --> 00:00:37.000 Jesus is in the upper room, just before his crucifixion. 5 00:00:37.000 --> 00:00:43.320 He is with his disciples and he’s giving instruction to his disciples. 6 00:00:43.320 --> 00:00:52.600 He’s telling them how things will be after he leaves and he’s making promises to them. 7 00:00:52.600 --> 00:01:09.000 And so in verse 13 of chapter 14, he says this: “Whatever you ask in my name, that will I do, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 8 00:01:09.000 --> 00:01:14.560 If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.” 9 00:01:14.560 --> 00:01:34.580 And then in chapter 16, verses 23 and 24: “In that day, you will not question me about anything. 10 00:01:34.580 --> 00:01:42.240 Truly, truly, I say to you, if you ask the Father for anything in my name, he will give it to you. 11 00:01:42.240 --> 00:01:45.580 Until now you’ve asked for nothing in my name. 12 00:01:45.580 --> 00:01:51.260 Ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be full.” 13 00:01:51.260 --> 00:01:59.280 The promise of the Lord to his disciples, to us through his disciples. 14 00:01:59.280 --> 00:02:06.400 Let’s ask God to bless his word. 15 00:02:06.400 --> 00:02:11.960 Father, we thank you so much for the preciousness of the words of Jesus. 16 00:02:11.960 --> 00:02:19.200 We thank you, Lord, for giving us our Savior and all that he means. 17 00:02:19.200 --> 00:02:32.460 We ask, Father, that as we reflect on what it means to pray in his name, what the name of Jesus means, please help us to understand this with clarity from your word. 18 00:02:32.460 --> 00:02:50.100 We ask for the special mercy and grace that comes to us through your Holy Spirit to illuminate our hearts and illuminate our minds so that we can understand the preciousness of what it means to be able to come to you in the name of Christ. 19 00:02:50.100 --> 00:02:57.140 Bless us today as we consider this, in the name of our Savior, for his glory, we pray. 20 00:02:57.140 --> 00:03:00.400 Amen. 21 00:03:00.400 --> 00:03:13.360 Well, this past Friday, Jess and Edmund came over, and my daughter Rachel brought her two kids over for breakfast on Friday morning. 22 00:03:13.360 --> 00:03:17.400 And so we were having breakfast. 23 00:03:17.400 --> 00:03:22.800 Before we started, I prayed as we always do, asking God’s blessing on the food. 24 00:03:22.800 --> 00:03:32.920 And when I finished, my three-year-old grandson, Titus, says, “You forgot to pray for the train park.” 25 00:03:32.920 --> 00:03:39.320 He’s been enamored with a particular park in Salem that has a train theme. 26 00:03:39.320 --> 00:03:43.800 And so, what do you do? 27 00:03:43.800 --> 00:03:48.200 Rachel, my daughter, says, “Do you want to pray for the train park, Titus?” 28 00:03:48.200 --> 00:03:50.380 He says yes. 29 00:03:50.380 --> 00:03:59.220 So he bows his head, we all bow our heads, and he prays: Thank you, Lord, for the train park. 30 00:03:59.220 --> 00:04:04.120 The end. 31 00:04:04.120 --> 00:04:09.540 I was thinking about that, his little prayer, and I was thinking about the way we pray. 32 00:04:09.540 --> 00:04:22.820 And I was thinking in particular because we are talking today about praying in the name of Jesus, what that phrase means to us when we use it. 33 00:04:22.820 --> 00:04:30.520 I wonder if it means any more than what Titus meant when he said, “The end.” 34 00:04:30.520 --> 00:04:45.640 When we finish our prayers and by rote we say, “in Jesus’ name, Amen,” that’s sort of like we’ve finished our text and we hit the little send button. 35 00:04:45.640 --> 00:05:05.960 And I wonder if we ever give thought to what that means, or more seriously, do we pray in his name, even if we tack that on, is the prayer that we are praying a prayer that is truly in the name of Jesus? 36 00:05:05.960 --> 00:05:23.080 I think that’s a very serious question to think about for us to consider, especially as we offer prayer and as we’re focusing right now on prayer and what it means to pray and where we find our confidence in bringing our requests to the Lord. 37 00:05:23.080 --> 00:05:30.020 So I want us to take just a minute and reflect about some of the things we talked about last week. 38 00:05:30.020 --> 00:05:45.300 And I want to bring this up again because I recognize if we stop where we stopped last week and we haven’t listened exactly carefully, it could lead us to a great error. 39 00:05:45.300 --> 00:05:59.120 Last week, we were talking about the fact that fellowship with God in Christ is necessary if we’re going to pray effectively. 40 00:05:59.120 --> 00:06:09.780 Our prayers depend in part on the relationship that we have with God. 41 00:06:09.780 --> 00:06:17.520 And so we looked at a number of verses last week that talked about that fact: “Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. 42 00:06:17.520 --> 00:06:21.700 Cleanse your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts, you double-minded.” 43 00:06:21.700 --> 00:06:29.620 We looked at 1 Timothy 2:8: “Therefore I want men in every place to pray, lifting up holy hands.” 44 00:06:29.620 --> 00:06:34.320 And we talked about what it means to abide in Christ. 45 00:06:34.320 --> 00:06:44.800 To abide in Christ, it tells us in John’s gospel, “He that abides in him should walk even as he walked.” 46 00:06:44.800 --> 00:06:48.280 Live your life the way Jesus lived his life. 47 00:06:48.280 --> 00:07:02.140 And we can look at verses like that and think about the relationship we have with Christ and whether our prayers will be answered or not, and that can lead us to a real problem. 48 00:07:02.140 --> 00:07:09.200 And I reinforced that last week by talking about people whose prayers are not answered. 49 00:07:09.200 --> 00:07:12.500 Let me give you a few of those again. 50 00:07:12.500 --> 00:07:20.200 Psalm 66:18: “If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.” 51 00:07:20.200 --> 00:07:31.980 Isaiah 59:2: “But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.” 52 00:07:31.980 --> 00:07:40.840 John 9:31: “We know that God does not hear sinners, but if anyone is God-fearing and does his will, he hears him.” 53 00:07:40.840 --> 00:07:51.660 And so these are true texts, they are describing a reality that is true, and yet it can lead us to a kind of thinking that is wrong. 54 00:07:51.660 --> 00:08:06.620 And the kind of thinking that is wrong is that we need to perform a certain way, and whether our prayers are heard or not depends on how well we behave before God. 55 00:08:06.620 --> 00:08:13.880 That’s the kind of thinking that it can lead to, and that is sinful thought. 56 00:08:13.880 --> 00:08:17.920 It’s wrong thinking. 57 00:08:17.920 --> 00:08:35.360 If we think that because of our behavior, we’ve behaved really well, then we’ve earned merit with God, we have earned God’s blessing in some way, then that’s wrong. 58 00:08:35.360 --> 00:08:38.100 It’s not the gospel of Jesus Christ. 59 00:08:38.100 --> 00:08:40.200 It’s not true. 60 00:08:40.200 --> 00:08:43.420 And so we have to rethink. 61 00:08:43.420 --> 00:09:02.220 And so what I was saying last week, and several weeks ago, is that what is true of the nature of a believer is that he abides in Christ. 62 00:09:02.220 --> 00:09:12.300 What’s true of a truly regenerate person is that the norm for that person is that they do seek to walk the way Jesus walked. 63 00:09:12.300 --> 00:09:15.860 That’s true of a saved person; that’s what they want. 64 00:09:15.860 --> 00:09:19.380 They’re not earning anything; it’s what they want. 65 00:09:19.380 --> 00:09:26.260 Their desire, their heart is the changed heart of a saved person. 66 00:09:26.260 --> 00:09:40.920 And when we sin, our sin creates doubt in us, and so we begin to not seek the Lord the way we should. 67 00:09:40.920 --> 00:09:45.620 That’s the dilemma that we were talking about last time. 68 00:09:45.620 --> 00:10:01.120 And so there’s a practical aspect of drawing near to God in relation to our prayer, but it’s not conditional on our behavior. 69 00:10:01.120 --> 00:10:20.420 We need to be careful that we make sure that we’re not caught up in this idea that if God answers our prayers, it’s something that we merit in any kind of a way, or we forfeit by a spiritual failure. 70 00:10:20.420 --> 00:10:22.440 We’re not to think that way. 71 00:10:22.440 --> 00:10:24.320 What happens if we do? 72 00:10:24.320 --> 00:10:33.740 Well, there’s an example in Luke’s gospel, in Luke chapter 18, that Jesus gives of two people who are praying. 73 00:10:33.740 --> 00:10:37.340 And the first one is a Pharisee. 74 00:10:37.340 --> 00:10:40.620 And you remember, I’m just going to paraphrase that little section. 75 00:10:40.620 --> 00:10:50.360 The Pharisee prays: Lord, I am so thankful that I’m not like other people, especially not like that tax collector over there. 76 00:10:50.360 --> 00:10:56.200 And then you remember the prayer of the tax collector: Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner. 77 00:10:56.200 --> 00:11:03.920 And Jesus says it was him, and not the first one, that went away justified. 78 00:11:03.920 --> 00:11:15.580 You see what happens when we think that we’ve earned something before God is that one of two things happens in our approach to God. 79 00:11:15.580 --> 00:11:28.200 First, we could, if we think we’ve done really well, then when we come before God, we think we’ve merited something and we come to God in our pride. 80 00:11:28.200 --> 00:11:32.020 And that’s sinful, just like the Pharisee. 81 00:11:32.020 --> 00:11:42.290 Or we think we haven’t measured up, and we might not come at all because we don’t think God’s going to hear our prayer because we haven’t merited anything. 82 00:11:42.290 --> 00:11:46.480 That’s the way we’re thinking at the moment, we have sinned. 83 00:11:46.480 --> 00:11:48.600 How should we come to God? 84 00:11:48.600 --> 00:11:53.980 Come to God like the publican, the tax collector. 85 00:11:53.980 --> 00:11:58.410 We come to God saying, “ God have mercy on me, the sinner. 86 00:11:58.410 --> 00:12:12.780 ” And the cure for this, what we have to do is recognize what it means to pray in the name of the Lord Jesus. 87 00:12:12.780 --> 00:12:27.140 And we’re going to look at a few things this morning, but prayer in the name of the Lord Jesus is how we come before the Lord. 88 00:12:27.140 --> 00:12:32.580 It’s how we are to come before the Lord with acceptance. 89 00:12:32.580 --> 00:12:42.460 We come in his name. 90 00:12:42.460 --> 00:12:45.980 Tacking the name onto your prayer doesn’t do it. 91 00:12:45.980 --> 00:12:52.800 It’s not like a magic formula and you say, “If I say in Jesus’ name, then he’ll hear this prayer.” 92 00:12:52.800 --> 00:12:57.980 You can say “in Jesus’ name” and it not mean anything at all. 93 00:12:57.980 --> 00:13:13.440 You can be a hypocrite, and by the way, hypocrites in the church, unsaved people who masquerade as Christians in Christian circles, they all use the name of Jesus. 94 00:13:13.440 --> 00:13:17.700 It doesn’t make you saved because you use the name of Jesus. 95 00:13:17.700 --> 00:13:21.920 It doesn’t make you real or true with the Lord. 96 00:13:21.920 --> 00:13:24.940 Hypocrites pray in the name of Jesus. 97 00:13:24.940 --> 00:13:28.280 Hypocrites do all kinds of things in the name of Jesus. 98 00:13:28.280 --> 00:13:39.760 An example of that is in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in chapter 7 of Matthew’s gospel when he talks about those who will come to him in that day of judgment. 99 00:13:39.760 --> 00:13:46.920 And they say to him: “Lord, Lord, have we not cast out demons in your name? 100 00:13:46.920 --> 00:13:53.520 Have we not done all these wonderful works in your name?” 101 00:13:53.520 --> 00:13:58.900 And he says: “Depart from me, you worker of iniquity, I never knew you.” 102 00:13:58.900 --> 00:14:04.420 You can use the name of Jesus and not be real with God. 103 00:14:04.420 --> 00:14:15.860 You can tack “in Jesus’ name” onto your prayer and that doesn’t make it acceptable. 104 00:14:15.860 --> 00:14:28.380 The people, when they said those things to Jesus, I want you to notice they don’t know what it means “in your name.” 105 00:14:28.380 --> 00:14:36.980 They wouldn’t be approaching the Lord saying, “look at all these wonderful things that I did in your name.” 106 00:14:36.980 --> 00:14:48.300 The problem is that they think that they’re acceptable before God because of the things that they have done for the name of Jesus. 107 00:14:48.300 --> 00:14:50.140 And so they’re wrong. 108 00:14:50.140 --> 00:15:02.880 They’re not praying in his name, they’re not doing these things in his name, they are doing those things for their own selfish ends, looking for their own glory. 109 00:15:02.880 --> 00:15:15.040 Now the better way is to come to God in prayer truly in the name of Jesus, and that means we come to God through Christ’s authority and through his merit. 110 00:15:15.040 --> 00:15:23.840 We come to the Father through the authority and merit of the Lord Jesus. 111 00:15:23.840 --> 00:15:27.240 Think about your record before God. 112 00:15:27.240 --> 00:15:35.060 How many days of your life have you lived perfectly, sinlessly? 113 00:15:35.060 --> 00:15:37.480 Do you have a good record? 114 00:15:37.480 --> 00:15:41.060 If you added them all up, how many would you get? 115 00:15:41.060 --> 00:15:48.320 Do you think you could fill up a hand? 116 00:15:48.320 --> 00:16:00.460 How often is it that someone might live an hour without thinking some type of sinful thought or twisting something in some prideful way? 117 00:16:00.460 --> 00:16:04.900 Do you live a life that is perfect? 118 00:16:04.900 --> 00:16:06.800 Well, we don’t, do we? 119 00:16:06.800 --> 00:16:08.220 We haven’t. 120 00:16:08.220 --> 00:16:10.260 Our record isn’t too good. 121 00:16:10.260 --> 00:16:15.600 All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, every one of us. 122 00:16:15.600 --> 00:16:20.460 If we’re going to come to God on our merits, what do we need to do? 123 00:16:20.460 --> 00:16:24.800 Well, Jesus said, > “Be perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect.” 124 00:16:24.800 --> 00:16:28.260 You want to earn the blessing of God? 125 00:16:28.260 --> 00:16:29.780 You want to earn it yourself? 126 00:16:29.780 --> 00:16:31.720 Then that’s the standard. 127 00:16:31.720 --> 00:16:33.480 The standard is perfection. 128 00:16:33.480 --> 00:16:40.180 When you fail to complete that, then you’re polluting the offering that you’re offering to God. 129 00:16:40.180 --> 00:16:49.340 If you mix it up with your sin, you do these good things, you have all this sin, and you offer that up to the Lord and expect that to be acceptable to God. 130 00:16:49.340 --> 00:16:50.800 God says no. 131 00:16:50.800 --> 00:16:53.720 It needs to be perfect. 132 00:16:53.720 --> 00:16:57.960 Think about Jesus’ record. 133 00:16:57.960 --> 00:17:02.280 His 33 years of perfect obedience to the Lord. 134 00:17:02.280 --> 00:17:05.680 Always doing the will of the Father. 135 00:17:05.680 --> 00:17:08.920 That’s a record. 136 00:17:08.920 --> 00:17:10.320 That’s incredible. 137 00:17:10.320 --> 00:17:14.820 That’s merit. 138 00:17:14.820 --> 00:17:24.960 So we need to appropriate Christ’s 33 years of perfect obedience through faith, which he offers to us. 139 00:17:24.960 --> 00:17:36.060 Not only did he pay for our sins through his suffering on the cross, but he lived perfectly and that perfect obedience that he has he offers to our credit. 140 00:17:36.060 --> 00:17:43.900 Through faith, God credits that to us as the sacrifice and gift of Christ. 141 00:17:43.900 --> 00:17:46.640 It’s the gift of Christ to us. 142 00:17:46.640 --> 00:17:58.480 And so Christ’s sacrifice provides a permanent access to the Father that our performance can’t come close to. 143 00:17:58.480 --> 00:18:06.120 So we need to avoid the Pharisee’s type of prayer, thinking about our own merit. 144 00:18:06.120 --> 00:18:10.520 We have to look to Christ and his authority. 145 00:18:10.520 --> 00:18:13.180 It’s his authority. 146 00:18:13.180 --> 00:18:25.760 In the ancient world, to speak in the name of the king is to be the representative of the king. 147 00:18:25.760 --> 00:18:29.680 To come with the authority of the king. 148 00:18:29.680 --> 00:18:38.500 If we come before God in the name of the Lord Jesus, we’re coming with his authority. 149 00:18:38.500 --> 00:18:47.020 A police officer walks out into the heavy traffic of a busy road. 150 00:18:47.020 --> 00:18:49.480 And he’s in uniform. 151 00:18:49.480 --> 00:18:57.280 He holds out his hand and all the traffic stops. 152 00:18:57.280 --> 00:19:03.900 It better stop, because he’s there with the authority of the state. 153 00:19:03.900 --> 00:19:06.960 He’s there with the authority of the Commonwealth. 154 00:19:06.960 --> 00:19:13.560 And when he holds out his hand, he essentially is saying, “stop in the name of the law.” 155 00:19:13.560 --> 00:19:18.480 You know, the traffic is far more powerful than that man is. 156 00:19:18.480 --> 00:19:21.520 They could keep going. 157 00:19:21.520 --> 00:19:27.480 They stop because of the authority of the law that is behind him. 158 00:19:27.480 --> 00:19:34.720 That’s a big difference between me walking out in the street and saying, “stop in the name of Steve.” 159 00:19:34.720 --> 00:19:43.220 When we come before the Lord, we come as the representative of Christ in that sense. 160 00:19:43.220 --> 00:19:48.860 We come with all the authority of Christ because we’re in him. 161 00:19:48.860 --> 00:19:54.240 And we have all the blessings of a relationship with Jesus Christ. 162 00:19:54.240 --> 00:20:03.900 And we come with the authority of the very name of Christ and all the glory of Christ, all the credentials of Christ, all his attributes and all that he is. 163 00:20:03.900 --> 00:20:10.340 So we come before the Lord in the name of the Lord Jesus. 164 00:20:10.340 --> 00:20:17.340 That’s part of what it means. 165 00:20:17.340 --> 00:20:22.540 We come by his authority, by the merit that he has earned. 166 00:20:22.540 --> 00:20:32.060 Every answer to prayer that you’ll ever receive, Jesus Christ paid for. 167 00:20:32.060 --> 00:20:34.360 He paid for it. 168 00:20:34.360 --> 00:20:42.180 We come to him bankrupt, but he gives us a check with his name on it. 169 00:20:42.180 --> 00:20:45.120 We come in his name. 170 00:20:45.120 --> 00:20:53.240 And so it’s through his perfections that these prayers are answered. 171 00:20:53.240 --> 00:20:57.780 Who gets the glory for it? 172 00:20:57.780 --> 00:21:01.800 Christ must get the glory for it. 173 00:21:01.800 --> 00:21:07.540 So we come in the name of Jesus, we come clothed in Jesus’ righteousness. 174 00:21:07.540 --> 00:21:19.480 And when we pray in the name of Jesus, it means—and this is important—it means that we’re praying consistent with the character of Jesus. 175 00:21:19.480 --> 00:21:24.120 The name represents all that Jesus is. 176 00:21:24.120 --> 00:21:27.720 It represents who he is with all of his attributes. 177 00:21:27.720 --> 00:21:47.900 In the Old Testament, when it talked about the name of the Lord and taking the name of the Lord in vain, using the name of the Lord in an empty way, when you talk about the name of the Lord, you’re talking about all the attributes of God, all that he is. 178 00:21:47.900 --> 00:21:56.400 When he shows himself to Moses, he declares all the things that are true of himself. 179 00:21:56.400 --> 00:22:02.120 His mercy, his righteousness, his perfections. 180 00:22:02.120 --> 00:22:06.520 So the name represents all of God’s attributes. 181 00:22:06.520 --> 00:22:11.600 The name of Jesus represents all that Jesus is in his person. 182 00:22:11.600 --> 00:22:17.420 The fact that he is infinite God and man at the same time. 183 00:22:17.420 --> 00:22:22.640 All of those things is what it means when we use the name of Jesus. 184 00:22:22.640 --> 00:22:31.540 And so we’re talking about the very character of Jesus when we mention this name. 185 00:22:31.540 --> 00:22:45.200 And so when we pray, when we pray in Jesus’ name, it means that what we are asking for should be in agreement with something that is true about him. 186 00:22:45.200 --> 00:22:57.780 If we’re praying for something that’s not in agreement with his nature, then we’re really not praying in his name. 187 00:22:57.780 --> 00:23:07.580 Our heart and our purpose in prayer needs to be aligned with the heart and purpose of our Lord Jesus Christ, with Jesus. 188 00:23:07.580 --> 00:23:15.020 And when our heart is aligned with Jesus’ heart, if we’re abiding in him in that way, then we ask what we want. 189 00:23:15.020 --> 00:23:17.540 Whatever we wish. 190 00:23:17.540 --> 00:23:22.980 And it’s in agreement with the Lord Jesus. 191 00:23:22.980 --> 00:23:29.800 So we are to come to him in that way. 192 00:23:29.800 --> 00:23:38.960 And we’re to come to him in that way because it’s the only way to come to the Father. 193 00:23:38.960 --> 00:23:43.460 We come through Jesus Christ’s mediation. 194 00:23:43.460 --> 00:23:48.880 Jesus is our high priest who takes our prayers to the Father. 195 00:23:48.880 --> 00:23:51.420 Jesus said: “I am the door. 196 00:23:51.420 --> 00:23:55.810 If anyone enters through me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.” 197 00:23:55.810 --> 00:24:01.840 In John 14:6, he said: “I am the way, the truth, and the life. 198 00:24:01.840 --> 00:24:06.660 No one comes to the Father but through me.” 199 00:24:06.660 --> 00:24:13.140 If you’re going to come to the Father, the only way you can come to the Father is through the Lord Jesus. 200 00:24:13.140 --> 00:24:19.660 The only way you can get access to the throne of God’s grace is through the Lord Jesus. 201 00:24:19.660 --> 00:24:25.760 There’s no other name in heaven and earth by which we must be saved. 202 00:24:25.760 --> 00:24:41.880 There’s no other name that gives us access to the Father or the benefits of what it means to have access to the throne of grace. 203 00:24:41.880 --> 00:24:49.520 Jesus, when he saves you, he reconciles you to the Father. 204 00:24:49.520 --> 00:25:18.680 In that group of passages as Jesus is talking to his disciples and instructing them to pray in his name, he basically says, “I’m not going to ask the Father on your behalf because the Father himself loves you.” 205 00:25:18.680 --> 00:25:21.620 Isn’t that a great statement, by the way? 206 00:25:21.620 --> 00:25:28.760 When you come to the Father, you can expect your prayer to be met because the Father himself loves you. 207 00:25:28.760 --> 00:25:30.520 Do you know why he loves you? 208 00:25:30.520 --> 00:25:33.500 Because you’re in Christ. 209 00:25:33.500 --> 00:25:36.020 Jesus has washed you from your sins. 210 00:25:36.020 --> 00:25:38.720 You stand pure before the Lord. 211 00:25:38.720 --> 00:25:44.680 You love the Lord with a mighty love because God has placed that love in your heart. 212 00:25:44.680 --> 00:25:46.380 You’re his child. 213 00:25:46.380 --> 00:25:56.260 He knows what you’re going to ask even before you ask it, just like a parent knows the needs of a child and wants to meet those needs. 214 00:25:56.260 --> 00:25:58.680 He loves you with a mighty love. 215 00:25:58.680 --> 00:26:00.080 Why is that? 216 00:26:00.080 --> 00:26:04.220 Because Jesus has already reconciled you with God. 217 00:26:04.220 --> 00:26:06.420 That’s his mediation. 218 00:26:06.420 --> 00:26:12.580 He’s made you right before God. 219 00:26:12.580 --> 00:26:18.140 And so that’s part of what it means to pray in the name of the Lord Jesus. 220 00:26:18.140 --> 00:26:20.400 We’re coming to him through Christ’s mediation. 221 00:26:20.400 --> 00:26:25.500 What does Jesus do if he’s not asking in our place? 222 00:26:25.500 --> 00:26:46.440 See, I have wrongly thought in the past that I pray my prayer and God the Father is sort of disgruntled, and Jesus comes and says, “well, you need to forgive him for my sake,” and so maybe he’ll grant the request. 223 00:26:46.440 --> 00:26:51.180 It’s not like that. 224 00:26:51.180 --> 00:26:55.160 Christ has made you right before the Father. 225 00:26:55.160 --> 00:26:58.580 And so the Father loves you. 226 00:26:58.580 --> 00:27:01.170 What does Jesus do as the high priest? 227 00:27:01.170 --> 00:27:14.380 Well, one of the things that he does is, because of his own nature as our high priest, he has experienced all the things we’ve experienced. 228 00:27:14.380 --> 00:27:17.400 He’s been tempted in the ways that we’ve been tempted. 229 00:27:17.400 --> 00:27:19.560 He knows the struggles of our heart. 230 00:27:19.560 --> 00:27:28.140 And he can represent us before the Father knowing our needs, and why we pray what we pray, and what we feel. 231 00:27:28.140 --> 00:27:32.940 And he expresses that to the Father. 232 00:27:32.940 --> 00:27:43.580 When we pray in Jesus’ name, we’re praying and recognizing that Jesus’ name is equivalent to Jehovah of the Old Testament. 233 00:27:43.580 --> 00:27:50.220 He is the Lord. 234 00:27:50.220 --> 00:28:03.140 If you have been reading through your Bible week by week, you would have read Acts chapter 4 this week. 235 00:28:03.140 --> 00:28:14.600 In Acts chapter 4, Peter and John are put on trial because they did a miracle and this man who had been lame all his life for more than 40 years is healed. 236 00:28:14.600 --> 00:28:18.240 And it was a big miracle. 237 00:28:18.240 --> 00:28:32.200 And so they’re brought before the Supreme Court of Israel, the high priest and the same people that put Jesus on trial and had him crucified. 238 00:28:32.200 --> 00:28:39.580 They’re brought before them and they’re asked, “By whose name did you do this?” 239 00:28:39.580 --> 00:29:03.260 There’s a passage in Deuteronomy that says, if someone comes and they do a miracle, and it happens, and they tell you worship this God instead of the true God, you’re to put them to death. 240 00:29:03.260 --> 00:29:12.400 The job of the high priest is to check this out and see, is this miracle a legitimate miracle, and by whose name are you doing this? 241 00:29:12.400 --> 00:29:19.980 Are you doing this in Jehovah’s name, are you doing this with the authority and the credentials that we give out? 242 00:29:19.980 --> 00:29:22.980 What is your authority in doing this? 243 00:29:22.980 --> 00:29:28.600 And they say, “In the name of the Lord Jesus.” 244 00:29:28.600 --> 00:29:41.580 They say it’s the only name on heaven and earth by which we can be saved. 245 00:29:41.580 --> 00:29:48.200 What they’re saying in essence is that this Jesus is Jehovah. 246 00:29:48.200 --> 00:29:53.200 This Jesus is God manifest in the flesh. 247 00:29:53.200 --> 00:30:02.100 And this miracle testifies to who he is. 248 00:30:02.100 --> 00:30:07.880 Jesus is to receive the glory for what he has done. 249 00:30:07.880 --> 00:30:34.920 One last thing, in writing about what it means to pray or do something in the name of the Lord Jesus, Jonathan Edwards gave us some really good insight into what it means to pray in his name when he recognized that the word “name” is essentially connected, it’s essentially the same thing as saying “the glory” of Christ. 250 00:30:34.920 --> 00:30:41.320 To say the name of Jesus is essentially the same as saying the glory of Jesus. 251 00:30:41.320 --> 00:30:48.340 And that’s related because the name represents all that the person is. 252 00:30:48.340 --> 00:30:56.080 And so when you’re praying in his name, one of the things that we are praying for is that he gets the credit for what he does. 253 00:30:56.080 --> 00:31:08.000 He is to get the credit for bringing about the answer to this prayer. 254 00:31:08.000 --> 00:31:15.400 And the very prayer that we pray should be for his glory. 255 00:31:15.400 --> 00:31:29.920 We talked about Muller and his prayers for all the orphans for all those years. 256 00:31:29.920 --> 00:31:33.120 He cared about the orphans, of course. 257 00:31:33.120 --> 00:31:51.380 But the reason he went exactly in the pattern that he did was because he would pray for these children’s needs to be met, he wouldn’t tell anyone about the need. 258 00:31:51.380 --> 00:31:54.780 He only told God and asked God about the need. 259 00:31:54.780 --> 00:32:01.080 When God answered, he told everyone about the answer, and who did it. 260 00:32:01.080 --> 00:32:04.140 It was to bring glory to the name of Christ. 261 00:32:04.140 --> 00:32:07.980 It was to show people the glory of Christ. 262 00:32:07.980 --> 00:32:17.340 Muller didn’t do anything. 263 00:32:17.340 --> 00:32:21.380 His whole purpose was to bring glory to the name of Christ. 264 00:32:21.380 --> 00:32:26.880 And he did it consistently throughout his life, and God used him in wonderful ways. 265 00:32:26.880 --> 00:32:33.040 It wasn’t just to meet the needs, though that’s good and wonderful. 266 00:32:33.040 --> 00:32:44.240 But Christ received glory through the prayers that the Lord answered. 267 00:32:44.240 --> 00:32:57.940 So if we’re to ask something that would not bring glory to the name of Jesus, a request that’s rooted in our selfishness, then we’re really not praying in his name. 268 00:32:57.940 --> 00:33:04.180 It’s to bring glory to the name of Christ that we pray in his name. 269 00:33:04.180 --> 00:33:12.440 Even if we tack those words to the end of our prayer, it’s not a prayer in the name of Jesus if we are praying a selfish prayer. 270 00:33:12.440 --> 00:33:16.120 How many of our prayers are selfish? 271 00:33:16.120 --> 00:33:36.660 There was a playwright, Henrik Ibsen, in the 19th century, and one of his characters in one of his plays, he describes in this way: He says he’s a “cask of self stopped with a bung of self.” 272 00:33:36.660 --> 00:33:39.420 It’s a pretty good description of someone, isn’t it? 273 00:33:39.420 --> 00:33:47.760 Kind of a pretty harsh insult in a way. 274 00:33:47.760 --> 00:33:49.420 A cask of self. 275 00:33:49.420 --> 00:33:56.090 Think of a barrel filled with something fermenting. 276 00:33:56.090 --> 00:34:05.310 A cask of self, stopped with a bung—a bung is the stopper—and the bung is of self. 277 00:34:05.310 --> 00:34:11.680 The whole thing is of self, all wrapped up in yourself. 278 00:34:11.680 --> 00:34:14.920 I was thinking about my own prayers. 279 00:34:14.920 --> 00:34:26.520 How many of our prayers could be described that way? 280 00:34:26.520 --> 00:34:35.200 If we’re praying that way, and there are a lot of preachers that teach you to pray that way, I’m sad to say. 281 00:34:35.200 --> 00:36:08.880 There are many preachers out there that encourage people to pray selfish prayers. 282 00:36:08.880 --> 00:36:19.200 James says: “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.” 283 00:36:19.200 --> 00:36:29.300 See, when we pray those prayers, that’s just like a cask plugged up with the bung of our self. 284 00:36:29.300 --> 00:36:30.760 We’re not to pray that way. 285 00:36:30.760 --> 00:36:32.900 Remember the text that I began with? 286 00:36:32.900 --> 00:36:41.760 “Whatever you ask in my name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son.” 287 00:36:41.760 --> 00:36:44.640 That’s the reason. 288 00:36:44.640 --> 00:36:47.900 That the Father may be glorified in the Son. 289 00:36:47.900 --> 00:36:52.920 Who gets the glory for the prayers that we pray? 290 00:36:52.920 --> 00:36:58.700 A few years ago for Christmas, Jared gave me a really special book. 291 00:36:58.700 --> 00:37:10.100 It was a special copy of David Brainerd’s diary that was edited by Jonathan Edwards. 292 00:37:10.100 --> 00:37:20.280 And it’s a powerful little book. 293 00:37:20.280 --> 00:37:28.800 He had a remarkable life that I don’t think many people would envy. 294 00:37:28.800 --> 00:37:36.140 He went to Yale and he was kicked out, which was an incredible disgrace. 295 00:37:36.140 --> 00:37:45.360 And so he goes out into the colonial wilderness and he preaches to the Native American tribes. 296 00:37:45.360 --> 00:37:47.800 He’s lonely. 297 00:37:47.800 --> 00:37:51.280 He’s in his twenties, he’s lonely, he’s battling depression. 298 00:37:51.280 --> 00:37:55.860 He has tuberculosis. 299 00:37:55.860 --> 00:38:05.500 And he’s literally coughing his life away in the cold, sleeping on straw, getting lost in the woods, spitting up blood. 300 00:38:05.500 --> 00:38:09.360 What would you pray for? 301 00:38:09.360 --> 00:38:22.290 In his journal, he writes about how he realized that most of his early prayers were a bundle of selfishness. 302 00:38:22.290 --> 00:38:25.800 He didn’t believe that they were really true prayers at all. 303 00:38:25.800 --> 00:38:30.240 And he starts praying for the glory of God. 304 00:38:30.240 --> 00:38:38.240 If you were in his situation, wouldn’t you pray, Lord, find me a better place to live? 305 00:38:38.240 --> 00:38:40.140 Fix my lungs. 306 00:38:40.140 --> 00:38:45.100 Can you fix my reputation, Lord? 307 00:38:45.100 --> 00:38:47.840 How did Brainerd pray? 308 00:38:47.840 --> 00:38:56.420 Here’s the prayer in his diary: Lord, set up thy kingdom for thine own glory. 309 00:38:56.420 --> 00:39:05.000 Glorify thyself, and I will rejoice. 310 00:39:05.000 --> 00:39:12.880 He’s saying, “I’m living for the joy of seeing your name magnified and glorified, and your kingdom built. 311 00:39:12.880 --> 00:39:18.840 If your kingdom is being built, if your name is being glorified, that’s where my joy is.” 312 00:39:18.840 --> 00:39:26.740 His joy shifted from himself and the things that he needs and wants to the glory of God. 313 00:39:26.740 --> 00:39:33.820 And so he’s praying a prayer that God would be glorified. 314 00:39:33.820 --> 00:39:38.020 And he goes on to say: Do with me just as thou wilt. 315 00:39:38.020 --> 00:39:41.380 Blessed be your name forever. 316 00:39:41.380 --> 00:39:52.460 That’s Brainerd’s prayer. 317 00:39:52.460 --> 00:40:03.720 Edwards called that attitude being a weaned child , from Psalm 131 that we read at the beginning. 318 00:40:03.720 --> 00:40:12.580 See, a nursing infant screams if it doesn’t get its milk right away. 319 00:40:12.580 --> 00:40:27.220 But a weaned child, a child that’s a little more mature, can sit on its mother’s lap and be content with the closeness of its mother. 320 00:40:27.220 --> 00:40:41.800 When our soul has gained a little maturity, and we’ve stopped focusing on ourselves, and think about the glory of God, then we can find joy in the nearness of God. 321 00:40:41.800 --> 00:40:44.340 And seek his glory. 322 00:40:44.340 --> 00:40:50.260 And take great joy when we see something of the work of God, when the work of God grows. 323 00:40:50.260 --> 00:40:58.460 When Jesus Christ gets more credit, when his name is glorified, then we can take great joy. 324 00:40:58.460 --> 00:41:04.060 Does that mean that we never pray anything practical? 325 00:41:04.060 --> 00:41:05.960 Not at all. 326 00:41:05.960 --> 00:41:12.720 We are to do everything in the name of the Lord. 327 00:41:12.720 --> 00:41:21.800 Colossians 3:17 says: “Whatever you do, in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father by him.” 328 00:41:21.800 --> 00:41:24.180 So what do we do? 329 00:41:24.180 --> 00:41:30.480 You do like I do sometimes, you go to the hospital, you’re going to visit somebody, and you’re driving around. 330 00:41:30.480 --> 00:41:35.700 I pray for a parking spot. 331 00:41:35.700 --> 00:41:46.970 I pray that God allows me to park here today so that I can go in and do what I need to do there, to his glory. 332 00:41:46.970 --> 00:41:53.860 Is what we’re doing for the glory of the Lord? 333 00:41:53.860 --> 00:41:57.920 And that’s true for the basic things that we need. 334 00:41:57.920 --> 00:42:09.060 When we ask for bread, we do that after we seek the name of the Father to be hallowed, to be glorified. 335 00:42:09.060 --> 00:42:11.880 And then we pray for our bread. 336 00:42:11.880 --> 00:42:18.560 And if we do so, we do that to the glory of Christ. 337 00:42:18.560 --> 00:42:23.660 Whatever you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. 338 00:42:23.660 --> 00:42:28.140 So we do these things for God’s glory. 339 00:42:28.140 --> 00:42:41.700 The prayer that seeks the glory of Christ, that’s the prayer that’s in the name of Jesus. 340 00:42:41.700 --> 00:42:50.380 Jesus, with all his perfect righteousness, has given us authority to come before the Heavenly Father to make our requests. 341 00:42:50.380 --> 00:42:53.200 We come in his very name. 342 00:42:53.200 --> 00:43:01.400 He’s already paid for our prayer requests to be answered. 343 00:43:01.400 --> 00:43:10.580 And by his grace, and his work, and his merit, we receive the things that we receive. 344 00:43:10.580 --> 00:43:12.980 We need to give him the glory for it. 345 00:43:12.980 --> 00:43:15.010 We need to praise him for it. 346 00:43:15.010 --> 00:43:25.720 And we need to make sure that when we come, we’re not just tacking on a line that basically means “the end.” 347 00:43:25.720 --> 00:43:31.840 We need to actually come in the name of Jesus. 348 00:43:31.840 --> 00:43:33.900 Let’s pray. 349 00:43:33.900 --> 00:43:44.640 Father, we are grateful to you for the abundant mercies you give us. 350 00:43:44.640 --> 00:43:51.480 Thank you for our Savior. 351 00:43:51.480 --> 00:44:21.210 Thank you that we can come to you, boldly to the throne of grace, to receive mercy and find grace to help in our time of need. 352 00:44:21.210 --> 00:44:30.880 We praise you for all the things you do for us, and we ask that you would glorify the name of your Son in our lives, in our church, and in this world. 353 00:44:30.880 --> 00:44:32.020 In his precious name we pray. 354 00:44:32.020 --> 00:44:34.020 Amen.