596. Gospel of Luke - Chapter #11 (#1) - The Lord's Prayer - July 15, 2024

[00:00:06] Welcome to Wisdom Today. My name is Bill Kelley and I'll be your host. In this podcast we will be exploring the book of Proverbs. In prayer, Father God, I thank you for anyone listening to this podcast today. As we begin a new week,

[00:00:29] I pray that you would reveal to everyone listening how much you truly love each and every one of them. In addition, I pray that everyone listening today would have favor with both God and Man.

[00:00:43] I ask this in Jesus' name, Amen. This is Proverbs 15, beginning in verse 1. A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. The tongue of the wise uses knowledge rightly

[00:01:02] that the mouth of fools pours forth foolishness. The eyes of the Lord are in every place, keeping watch on the evil and the good. A wholesome tongue is a tree of life, but perverseness in it

[00:01:18] breaks the spirit. A fool despises His Father's instruction, but He who receives correction is proven. In the house of the righteous there is much treasure, but in the revenue of the wicked is trouble.

[00:01:35] The lips of the wise disperse knowledge, but the heart of the fool does not do so. The sacrifice of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord, but the prayer of the upright is His delight.

[00:01:50] The way of the wicked is an abomination to the Lord, but He loves Him who follows righteousness. Harsh discipline is for Him who forsakes the way and He who hates correction will die.

[00:02:07] Hell and destruction are before the Lord. So how much more the hearts of the sons of Man? A scoffer does not love one who corrects him. Nor will he go to the wise. A very heart makes a cheerful

[00:02:24] countenance, but by sorrow of the heart the spirit is broken. The heart of Him who has understanding six knowledge, but the mouth of fools feeds on foolishness. All the days of the

[00:02:40] afflicted are evil, but He who is of a merry heart has a continual feast. Better is a little with the fear of the Lord than great treasure with trouble. Better is a dinner of herbs where love

[00:02:55] is than a fatted calf with hatred. A wrathful man stirs up strife, but He who is slow to anger a laize contention. The way of the laize man is like a hedge of forans, but the way of the upright

[00:03:14] is a highway. A wise son makes a father glad, but a foolish man despises his mother. Folly is joy to him who is destitute of discernment, but a man of understanding walks uprightly. Without counsel plans go a rye, but in the multitude of counselors they are established.

[00:03:42] A man has joy by the answer of his mouth and a word spoken in due season, how good it is. The way of life winds upward for the wise that He may turn away from hell below.

[00:04:00] The Lord will destroy the house of the proud, but He will establish the boundary of the widow. The thoughts of the wicked are an abomination to the Lord, but the words of the pure are pleasant.

[00:04:16] He who is greedy for gain troubles his own house, but He who hates brides will live. The heart of the righteous studies have an answer, but the mouth of the wicked pours forth evil. The Lord is far from the wicked, but He hears the prayer of the righteous.

[00:04:39] The light of the eyes rejoices the heart, and a good report makes the bones healthy. The ear that hears the rebukes of life will abide among the wise. He who distains instruction despises his own soul, but he who heds rebukes gets understanding. The fear of the Lord

[00:05:06] is the instruction of wisdom and before honor is humility. Friends, today I'd like to take a closer look at verse 1 and proper 15 verse 1 says this, a soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh

[00:05:28] word stirs up anger. Friends, we will take a closer look at that verse prior to closing today, but what I'd like to do is continue in our study of the gospel according to Luke. Now we spent the last two weeks on chapter 10 and today we will begin chapter 11,

[00:05:51] and today we will be going over Luke's account of the model prayer. We know this as our father in heaven. So let's begin chapter 11 we will be going over the first four verses today.

[00:06:09] Now I came to pass as he was praying in a certain place when he ceased that one of his disciples said to him, Lord teach us to pray as John also taught his disciples. So here

[00:06:29] the disciples are asking Jesus. They were aware of John the Baptist. They knew that John the Baptist was a relative of Jesus and they knew that John had many disciples and they wanted to

[00:06:46] know how to pray. So Jesus often made a point of going out on his own to pray and they were aware of that and they would watch him from afar, they would see him pray and ordinarily Jesus would pray

[00:07:04] whenever he had a major assignment or a major decision that he had to make. Sometimes he would pray all night. So what that tells us as Jesus understood the value of having a relationship with his

[00:07:26] heavenly father. Now if Jesus thought that prayer was so important, we should do likewise and that is what this model prayer is all about. Let's continue to verse two. So he said to them and these are

[00:07:46] the words of Jesus. When you pray, say our Father in heaven, howlode thee your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So friends my first point of the day today is we should

[00:08:11] begin each prayer by acknowledging God. Now friends, I am reading out of the Nelson study Bible and what I'd like to do is go over the commentary for verse one. This is before Jesus is speaking,

[00:08:31] but we're talking about the Lord's prayer. The disciples had gone to Jesus. They wanted to know what was the key to prayer and having your prayers answered. Listen to this commentary. The Lord's

[00:08:47] prayer illustrates the variety of requests that one can and should make to God as well as displaying the humble attitude that should accompany prayer. The use of the plural noun us throughout the

[00:09:09] prayer shows that it is not just the prayer of one person for his or her own personal needs, but a community prayer. And what I'd like to do before reading the commentary for verse two is to read

[00:09:28] this prayer again. We are all so familiar with it, listen to the words of Jesus. Our Father in heaven hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us

[00:09:50] day by day our daily bread and forgive us our sins for we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us and do not lead us in to temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. Now let's go to the commentary

[00:10:14] for verse two. Father, God is approached confidently as a caring figure and friends, many time on this podcast I say if your earthly father is no longer here on earth or if he is here but you

[00:10:33] don't have a good relationship with him or are estranged from him then you can go to God and God will serve as a God, as a father here to you on earth. Hallowed in the context of intimacy with God.

[00:10:56] There also is respect and recognition of his uniqueness. Hallowed means that God is holy set apart unique in his character and attributes. Your kingdom come. The reference here is to God's program and promise this is more affirmation than request highlighting the petitioner's submission

[00:11:30] to God's will and the desire to see God's work come to pass. Now what that reminds me of is Psalm 374 and Psalm 374 says delight yourself there for in the Lord and he will give you the desires

[00:11:53] of your heart. But friends in context of the Lord's prayer, as we draw closer to God and as we seek him and ask him in prayer on a daily basis our desires will become his desires for us.

[00:12:14] God has certain things that he wants each and every one of us to do. We all should be aware of and if you do not know at this particular juncture of your life, if you don't know what God has planned

[00:12:30] for you simply ask him and he will make it clear to you and just continue asking until it is revealed to you what are you supposed to do for him? Let's go to verse 3, give us day by day our daily

[00:12:50] bread and friends my second thought for the day is we should ask God to meet our needs. Now we shouldn't ask him in appropriate things we only need to have our needs met many people go to

[00:13:10] God with their wants but what we need to do is simply ask God to meet our actual needs such as housing and food and clothing and that's basically it. Now electricity and bills and stuff like

[00:13:31] that are also something that we can ask for but the main things we should be really asking God for are the bare minimum and things that we actually need and now I'm going to go to James chapter

[00:13:45] 4 and James chapter 4 it says we have not because we ask not or we ask a miss so this kind of has to go with what I was just talking about. A lot of times we ask a miss and will ask God

[00:14:02] for things that are inappropriate. We'll ask him to for somebody else's spouse when you're married just because you think that person is prettier or more handsome than your spouse. God isn't going to answer that prayer. Those prayers are out of lust. We need to understand what God's will

[00:14:25] is for our life and we need to tune in and try to filter our life so that it matches up with what God's desire for us is and as we do that and as we draw closer to Him will get a better

[00:14:43] clue. Let's go to verse 4 and forgive us our sins for we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us. Now friends we know that when Jesus died on the cross all of our sins have been forgiven

[00:15:01] and yet we also know and I know that even though we are the righteousness of God that we still will all fall short of the glory of God. Paul is very clear in his letter to the Romans that that

[00:15:17] is the case. We will never be perfect so we will always have sins that we should ask God to forgive us even though Jesus has already forgiven us of our sins. He is white our slate clean and yet we still

[00:15:34] will sin so should we ask for forgiveness of those sins absolutely you should because you want to make yourself feel good about it. We don't want to have sin on our conscience. We don't want

[00:15:50] to do that so if we acknowledge that we have sin and say God please forgive me for what I just did. I didn't mean to do that. I want to ask for your forgiveness and if we have harmed someone

[00:16:04] whether it's a spouse or a neighbor or a coworker or a good friend of ours we need to ask them to forgive us as well. So let's go and finish verse 4 out and it says, and do not lead us in

[00:16:20] to temptation but deliver us from the evil one. And friends Satan is real. He is out there. The Gospel of John tells us that in John chapter 10 verse 10 we talks about the thief but the

[00:16:40] thief comeeth but to steal and kill and to destroy. That is Satan's entire that's his will that each of us die or we have our dreams die and he's going to do everything he can in his power

[00:17:02] to get us to not fulfill the purpose that God has given us but the second part of that verse is so rich. But I mean in Jesus have come that they may have life and that they may have it more

[00:17:22] abundantly and a different translation says to the fool. So Jesus and God their desire is for us to have a rich, impactful life and it starts with having a genuine true relationship with the living

[00:17:40] God and we know him as Jesus who is the Son of God. It's also important that we have a relationship with the Holy Spirit whom Jesus sent to us because the Holy Spirit is the teacher and whenever

[00:17:57] we have a need now we pray to the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit will reveal what it is what we have to do. Friends we will pick up here on Wednesday's podcast but before we close today I'd like to review

[00:18:15] our verse of the day found in proper 15 and verse 1 says this a soft answer turns away wrath but a harsh word stirs up anger and friends I often try to make a correlation between the

[00:18:34] verse I select each day and my lesson for the day so my lesson for the day was talking about the Lord's prayer and friends if we make a habit of praying to the Lord on a regular basis

[00:18:51] and if we go over our steps of today we should begin each prayer by acknowledging God talk about the goodness of God and the majesty of God and revealing to him our knowledge that he is

[00:19:09] holy and that we are described to be like him we should ask God to meet our needs it is perfectly fine to ask God to meet our needs he wants to meet our needs and we should ask God

[00:19:24] to forgive us of our sins and I forgot to mention also to keep us away from the evil one now the second part of that verse a harsh word stirs up anger friends if we make a habit of seeking God

[00:19:45] and praying to him it will soften the way that we are with other people let's look at the commentary for verse 1 often it is not so much what we say but the way we say it that prompts such varied responses

[00:20:05] as acceptance and wrath friends our words are important the words that we say are important when I was a classroom teacher for many years I would often tell my students that it's not what you say

[00:20:22] but it's how you say the words what is the mood on your face when you have words come out of your mouth are you smiling are you happy or do you have a frown on your face the delivery of words is

[00:20:41] often much more important than the words that actually come out friends my call to action today is very simple but I'd like for you to do is to ask yourself that question when you deliver words to people

[00:21:00] are you mindful of the attitude that you have when you are dispensing those words are you aware of it try to have a smile on your face a cheerful countenance as opposed to an angry tone of voice

[00:21:22] something to think about something to really meditate on if that is an issue for you friends I will never end a podcast without giving anyone an opportunity to receive Jesus as their Lord and Savior if there is anyone listening today to this podcast and you've never taken that

[00:21:45] step today is your day of salvation simply repeat this prayer Father God I recognize and acknowledge that I am a sinner and in need of a Savior I ask that you come into my heart I ask that you

[00:22:01] lead me and guide me from this point forward you are the Son of God and I know that you have forgiven me of my sins and yet I still need your help lead me and guide me I pray from this moment on

[00:22:19] in Jesus name amen friends if you said that prayer you are now a member of the family of God welcome to the family now may the Lord bless you and keep you the Lord make us face shine upon you

[00:22:37] and be gracious to you the Lord lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace friends tomorrow is testimony day please join me and a special guest as we further explore wisdom today