Morgan Teruel: Hey. Thanks so much for listening to Sandals Church. Our vision as a church is to be real with ourselves, God, and others. We hope you enjoy this message.
Pastor Fredo Ramos: As an 18 year old and a senior in high school, there's a handful of memories that I can, conjure up from time to time. And one of them was, this trip we all took as seniors called senior retreat. Now you gotta remember, I went to a private school, I went to a Christian school, I was one of those kids. And, every year on the calendar, they had us go away for 3 days out of the classroom and into the mountains. And the goal of this trip for all of the seniors was to connect with God, to grow our relationship with Jesus, and to bond as a class.
And you can imagine for me as someone who didn't identify as a Christian nor were any parts of my life remotely modeling someone who follows Jesus, I had all kinds of thoughts and attitudes about senior retreat. And one day in particular, I remember they gave us an assignment to go out into the wilderness and to pray for an hour by ourselves with nothing to do but just be in the wilderness. And I remember going out there, and I had a Bible and a journal, and that was it. I didn't bring snacks, which was, like, the first thing I thought about. Like, dang it.
And I had no idea what I was doing out there. I didn't know what to say. I didn't know how to think. I was looking for a rock to get comfortable on. We had to go back to, like, tell, you know, about our spiritual experience.
I literally had nothing to offer that entire time. I didn't know what to do. I didn't know where to begin. But here's what I did remember. Though I couldn't really stand at all this hour of silence and solitude, there was a part of me that knew I needed it, but I didn't know what to do with that.
And I would imagine many of us, when it comes to the topic of prayer, would agree with that. You you're not sure where to begin. You don't know how to do it. You don't know what to say, but you know at some level you need it. And it's true today that there are Catholics everywhere around the world who already early this morning have recited poetic prayers that have been prayed for 1000 of years.
Muslims this morning have spread their rugs out and and prayed to Allah. Buddhist have, around the world, prayed and meditated in in looking for this kind of enlightened state of self forgetfulness. Jews have even wrote in prayers on small pieces of paper and wedged them into the cracks of the Wailing Wall in the old city of Jerusalem. People everywhere have prayed already before you and I even gathered today. That includes people who are sitting in a hospital room and probably well meaning, tax paying, very nice person who doesn't know what to think about God has probably prayed to God for help as he watches his wife give birth to their first child.
Or even someone in a waiting room who's desperately not wanting to hear bad news about the life of their loved one. Right. People everywhere pray. It's even said that 25% of the globe prayed this last Easter the Lord's Prayer. Gallup research here in America says that more people pray than drive, exercise, have sex or go to work.
Now I would imagine some of us are praying for some of those things this week. Right? We'll just leave it at that. Right? And in in this modern world, it it is the case that church attendance is declining everywhere but it is the case that prayer isn't going anywhere at the same time.
People pray. But we also know the problem with prayer. We know what it's like to, at some level, be in a moment of desperation and wonder, is this even working? Because as modern people we love and idolize and worship efficiency. We do things that are efficient.
We only spend time with things that are efficient, that will make our day go by faster, get our work done quicker, cost us less money or energy. We love efficiency and so at some level we ask ourselves, is prayer even efficient right now? Does it actually work? Add to that this current cultural moment in which oftentimes in the face of real tragedy, we constantly hear these two phrases, our thoughts and prayers go out to the people. Thoughts and prayers from churches, celebrities, people.
It's it's a natural response. As one author put it, prayer is the language of the soul. To pray is to be human. And so what do we do in the face of evil and tragedy? We we pray.
But it's led so many today, in our cynical moment to be like, what's the point of praying? Actually do something. I think of even a prolific hip hop artist and, one of my favorites, probably the best rapper right now, Kendrick Lamar, in his recent song said these words, I pray to God you actually pray when somebody dies. Thoughts and prayers way better off timelines. False claiming not cute.
I'm mortified. He's making a point. Keep your thoughts and prayers off the timeline and actually do something. Now I feel that at a gut level. I really do.
Even as a pastor, it should move us to something. Right? People will say stop praying and actually do something about the problems in the world. And I get that. I feel that.
Even as a Jesus follower, there's a part of me that knows, man, is there anything beyond prayer that we should be doing? But then I'm left to assume, well, it's probably not safe to imagine that all of the healthy change we have seen in the world hasn't come as a result of somebody praying for that change. The the laws that we've seen that have brought an improvement to a life, we gotta imagine at some level we're bathed and soaked in and motivated by prayer. Right? One of the greatest civil rights leaders that our nation has produced was a man of prayer.
Because before he marched, he prayed on Sundays. Right? But still I circle this question, does prayer actually change anything about our lives? Does it actually matter? Is there anything happening because I prayed that wouldn't have happened if I didn't pray at all?
Or are things happening regardless of prayers that I pray or don't pray? Right? See what I'm really circling is this, do my prayers matter? Do yours prayers matter? Do they matter to God?
Do they matter in the world? And what I can't seem to get away from at some level on any given day of the week is either a confident yes, like yes prayer matters, or a cautious one, like yes, I think prayer matters. And here's why that's the case, because the most important person that I know that ever lived and walked this earth was a man of prayer. Jesus prayed. Jesus was a man of prayer.
Before he began his public life and work, he spent 40 days in the desert fasting, praying. Before he chose his his 12 friends and followers, he prayed. At the news of his own cousin, John the Baptist, being beheaded by a power hungry political ruler, the gospel writer says that he went away onto a boat to seek solitude and to pray. Even after a long day of teaching, he's with people crowded in in the middle of nowhere where there's nothing to eat, he decides he's gonna miraculously feed 5,000 plus of them with food. Even after a long day of doing all that, he makes a decision that he's gonna climb a mountain and then pray through the night.
Jesus prayed. Before his impending death and suffering, he prayed in the garden. Even hanging on a cross, we're told in Matthew's gospel that he's praying to the God who had forsaken him. Jesus prayed and then he prayed and then he prayed some more. So you and I, as we approach this series, can't possibly imagine that our lives don't need more prayer.
We need prayer. And at the risk of sounding overdramatic, you need prayer more than you can possibly imagine. You do. And so this summer, as a church, we're going to patiently walk through the Lord's Prayer. This famous prayer that is prayed by athletes before they go out and play a game or priests before they conduct a service.
The Lord's prayer is one of the most well known prayers. It's a profound and simple prayer. It's profound because it can take a lifetime to pray it and it's also simple because you can pray it in just a minute of time. Right? Imagine that.
Something that just takes you 60 seconds to say can lead you to live for an entire lifetime praying this. And so with that in mind, let's stand for the reading of God's word and hear this exchange between Jesus and his disciples as he teaches them to pray. First from Luke's gospel, Luke records this, Lord, teach us to pray. Let me say it again. Lord, teach us to pray.
And when you pray, Jesus said, do not be like the hypocrites. For they love to pray standing in synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father who is unseen. Then your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.
And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. This then is how you should pray. Our father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come.
Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. This is the word of the Lord. Let's pray together.
Heavenly father, as we have gathered here in this moment, we want to take a moment to realize you are present to us as well. And so in this time together, God, would you teach us to pray? Give us ears to hear. Give us eyes to see so that we might become people of prayer. We pray these things in Jesus' name.
Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you. You may be seated.
You know, out of all the things that his disciples could have asked him, this is probably one of the most important requests they ever made to Jesus. Lord, teach us to pray. And what I just appreciate and and allows me just to breathe in this moment is Jesus' response to them. Because it's not met with, well, you should know this. It's not met with, oh, you don't remember how to do this from Jewish school?
It's met with kindness, it's met with patience, and it's met with teaching. He shows them how to pray. And I wanna tell us, are they also at Sandals Church, that same attitude that Jesus had for his disciples then, he has for us now. And so when we think about the question, how can I begin to pray? Know that we are met with the grace of God and the patience of Jesus.
And so this is how we should think about it. How I can begin to pray? Number 1, write this down. Prayer begins by imperfectly showing up for it. Imperfectly showing up for it.
Take note of that phrase, imperfect, because one of the things and one of the main barriers that it keeps that I think keeps so many of us from prayer is the question, am I doing this right? I don't know what to say. And I love the words of Roberta Bondi. She's a church historian who, writes and talks about Christian practices through the ages around the world. And she says this, if you're praying, you are already doing it right.
I love that. So prayer begins by imperfectly showing up to do it anyways. But let let's press further though. And let me do so by going to Philippians 4, which is, again, one of the most common recited verses on prayer. Listen to Paul's words.
Do not be anxious about anything, but pray, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Man, what a set of verses. Now oftentimes when I read through scripture, I'm a little bit bothered that it's not always so clear. Like, I don't get the point.
Right? The stories in the Bible don't often go like Star Wars stories where it's, like, so clear and there's just there's courage, there's evil, and then, man, we're done. We're good. We're set. They don't go like that.
Oftentimes the Bible doesn't read like a set of IKEA instructions, which would be really helpful for us. But maybe for some of us, maybe not for all of us. But here though in Philippians 4, I think it does. It reads like a set of instructions. Number 1, step 1, do not be anxious about anything.
Okay. Alright. Maybe. Step 2, by prayer and petition, present your request to God. Step 3, here's a transaction.
This transcendent peace will guard your heart. Man, what a plan. What a plan. But here's the problem, I don't think we buy it. We believe that this should be true and we know it to maybe be true but I don't think it actually plays itself out as true in our lives.
And here's why I think that's the case. In my own experience and as a pastor, I have more conversations with people not about their peace but about their anxiety. I don't think we're praying. Right? But I don't want you just to come to church and feel like, oh, I was told today I'm not praying.
That's not helpful. So let's press a little bit further. I think at the root of why we don't pray is because we're just busy. We are busy trying to live a normal, generally successful life and we just don't have time to pray. But more than that, when you hear the phrase, don't be anxious about anything, the truth is prayer at times just brings to the surface a whole new set of anxieties, like the fear of, am I doing this right?
And so not only are you faced at any given moment by being overwhelmed by the world, then you get overwhelmed by prayer because you don't know if you're doing it right and so you don't know where to go. Add to that, it it's hard for us, I think, as people and as human beings to remain committed to things that we don't always see progress in. And that's the problem with prayer. We can't master it. It masters us.
You and I, when you look back at your life, if you've been a Christian for some time, and ask yourself, am I better at prayer? Some of us are just like, I think so? I don't know. It's hard for us to stay committed to something that we don't feel like we can make progress in. And so though Paul says don't be anxious, I don't even know if he lived an anxious day of his life, honestly, to say that so boldly.
He's he's trying to communicate something profound, and that's that at some level, other anxieties come up as we pray. And that first one is this, I don't know if I'm doing it right. I don't know what to say. The other fear is this though, the fear of silence. We can't stand to be alone in the quiet for very long.
In fact, I showed you a stat this week that said most of us don't know what to do after 20 seconds of unplanned silence. So let's try. I'm gonna stop talking and just stare at some of you guys or the wall. After 20 seconds, we start to squirm. We get uncomfortable.
We don't know what to do. We don't know what to say. And that's a fear that I think comes up for a lot of us in prayer. What happens when God doesn't talk back? Did I do it wrong?
Does he not wanna hear from me? Does he not like me? Do I have too much sin in my life? Did I not read enough? I mustn't have the Holy Spirit.
So many overwhelming thoughts flood our mind that it's almost more of an anxious experience to try to pray than to not pray, which is why I think a lot of us just struggle. Which is why, again, I'm offering to you with enough love to keep me calm right now to begin by imperfectly showing up. Just show up. You see, we get prayer wrong when we spend so much time trying to get it right. Let me say that again for some of us who are slow right now.
We get prayer wrong when we spend so much time trying to get it right. On any given day when I'm trying to pray, I'll spend more time figuring out if I did it right than I actually did praying. So I'll end prayer and I'm like, alright, God, well, think that was good? You liked it? I liked it?
I mean, I said what I needed to say. I didn't feel much. You were quiet again. Let's keep it moving. We'll go along.
We spend more time overanalyzing the effectiveness of the prayer than we actually do just in prayer because we are so caught up in is this being done right? And perfectly pray. And perfectly pray, you guys. Begin by just doing it. Begin because you're overwhelmed, man.
All all of us are so consumed with our thing. In this post Christian, post truth world, we are more comfortable being suspicious of everyone and everything, so we just trust ourselves. And so regardless of what you're doing in life, whether you're raising kids, working to to build your business, making spreadsheets, you know, being a social media influencer, creating art, working somewhere, doing retail. Whatever it is, we are so consumed with our own thing. For me, that's reason enough just to start to pray imperfectly.
Because the truth is at some level right now, you are more overwhelmed by something or someone than you are about prayer. So just imperfectly start to speak to God. Show up and say something. And in the process of saying something, secondly now, prayer begins with honesty. Honesty.
Notice the conversation with Jesus to his disciples. And when you pray, this is from verse 5, do not be like the hypocrites, Strong phrase. Do not be like those who do one thing but completely do another thing or say one thing. For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. They have received their reward, Jesus says.
And then he gives a second caution, and when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans. What a great phrase. That word babbling means someone who's repeatedly with intensity saying the same thing over and over, thinking, trying to convince themselves that because of their intensity, their emotion, their passion, their repetition, that God actually will hear them. No. Jesus is saying your father is a God who hears prayers.
He just is. That's his character. It doesn't depend on you. God is a God who hears prayers. So your prayers and my prayers aren't going up and being heard because we're convinced they're going up being heard.
They're being heard because they're being heard because God is a God who hears prayers. So be done with the babbling. This strong caution, 3 times he says don't be liked, don't be liked, don't keep on doing this, reminds us that there is a kind of prayer that can sound religiously correct and even intense and passionate and not be honest at all. Pray honestly. In other words, think of it like this.
If you really wanna know what you believe about God, listen to the way you talk to him when no one else is around. What are the words you use? What's the vision you have of God's face towards you? What you ultimately believe in your relationship about God is the way you sound when you talk to him when you're in your own room privately in the secret place, Jesus says. That's what your real life looks like with God.
That's what it sounds like to speak to him. And I say honesty because, man, so so many of our moments in prayer are mixed bags of everything. We got mixed feelings about how we're doing that day. We have mixed thoughts about how we should do this. We have, mixed motives.
Am I praying because I need this or I'm praying because God wants this? Right? Kingdom come, your will be done. That's a hard one to swallow. We have a mixed bag of everything when it comes to prayer and I realize that even in my own journey of prayer, the person most in my way is myself when it comes to prayer.
It's not my wife, it's not my kids, it's not my work as a pastor, it's not my social life, it's me. I am unable to regularly, faithfully, and perfectly show up and just be honest and just be honest. And with that, I want I want us to hear some of the honest words in scripture. Listen to these phrases. May burning coals fall on them.
May they be thrown into the fire, into my repits, never to rise. That's a prayer? How about this one? I am worn out for calling for help. My throat is parched, my eyes fail looking for my God.
Another one from Psalm 142, I pour out before him my complaints. But then Paul said, do everything without complaining. So are we complaining about prayer or am I complaining in prayer? Which one is okay to do, God? I pour out before him my complaint, before him I tell him all my troubles.
This sounds like a person who's angry, depressed, entitled, judgmental, and probably should, you know, see a professional, with all due respect. But this is King David. This is the man after God's own heart. This is the man who the promised Messiah would come from. The king of kings comes from this king, the greatest king that ever lived in Israel.
He prayed like that. He talked like that. Do you talk honestly to God? Because listen to these words. The Lord is my shepherd.
I lack nothing. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside quiet waters. He refreshes my soul. Psalm 103, praise the Lord my soul, all my inmost being.
Praise his holy name. Praise the Lord my soul and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's wings. Man, David's on one. He's lifted up. He's excited.
How is it possible that he can say that phrase, may burning coals fall on their head, and then another day, the Lord is my shepherd. He's praying honestly. He's praying honestly. Because truth be told, there are feelings and experiences and words recorded in the Psalms that go directly against the teachings of Jesus and they sound borderline heretical. But we ask, why are they even in the Bible?
The truth is because they are honest prayers. That's why they're in the Bible. They're honest prayers. Prayer begins with honesty, and I think prayer is is laying laying before God what is actually in us and not what should be in us. And so just pray.
Speak honestly. You don't know what to say, just start to say something. Prayer is a conversation between a father and his children. It's not a professor grading research papers. Prayer is a conversation.
It's not a speech, so offer to God the rough draft. Give to him the things that you don't know if they even make sense. You don't even know they're accurate. Just begin to speak honestly. That's what Jesus invites.
That's what he's calling for. And I think as this begins to happen, thirdly now we also see that prayer is something that begins with discovery and not just teaching. Prayer begins with discovery, not just teaching. What I love so much about this conversation between Jesus and his disciples is when he's asked, Lord, teach us to pray, he starts by praying. I never realized that until this week.
He models for them what they should be doing. In other words, in that moment, he's inviting them to experience it for themselves. You see, it's one thing to be taught about prayer, to read about prayer through the ages. It's another thing to actually just start doing it. Prayer begins by you just discovering it for yourself.
Prayer is a place where we not just are taught that God loves us, but where we actually experience it in a moment when we say, our father in heaven. And you are reminded once again that you are a child. You're his child. Speaking of children, I I think of my son Eli. Hopefully, he doesn't hear this.
This is a nice one. But anytime my wife and I are, trying to get him to to try something that he's he's, you know, hesitant to try, he'll he'll take what we give him, and then he'll do, like, this shrug. When he likes it, he'll go like this. And, really, what what he's doing in that moment is he's saying to us he liked it, but he's unwilling to admit that he was wrong about what he did. And this happened recently when he tried sushi for the first time.
He's like, cold fish, dad? Rice, avocado, mayonnaise that's spicy. I'm like, son, just just try it. Just try it. And he had a roll.
He went, okay. He liked it. He tried it. It it was one thing for him to be told all the facts about sushi. It was another thing for him to actually just try it for himself, to discover that, yes, this little weird looking roll is pretty dang delicious.
And as an 8 year old, he can enjoy it beyond nuggets and fries and burgers. Sushi is good. We gotta learn it. We gotta learn it through discovery. If you know anything about me, I I'm a sucker for romcoms.
My wife and I, we love romantic comedies, even the cheesy ones, man. I will watch every romantic comedy that's out there. I just like watching them. And I think it's true, man, that you can you can watch all the romcoms you want. You can go to every wedding possible, and watch people make vows before each other.
You can eavesdrop, on couples on their first dates at a restaurant. You can interview couples who've been married for 50 years about love. But until you take that step to discover it for yourself, you will never know the power of what's there in intimacy. You gotta try it. You gotta discover it for yourself.
And so I wanna encourage us in this moment as we close to be thinking, man, how can you make a commitment to pray this week? And and here's the basic commitment I want all of us to make, make a commitment to pray about whatever you can, whenever you can, and however you can. Pray about whatever, whenever, and however you possibly can. Here's what I mean by that. Pray about whatever.
Man, if you don't know how to pray the hope in God, pray your disappointment in God. If if you can't pray faith and trust in Jesus, pray about your doubts in Jesus. If you can't pray about your joy, pray about your struggles. If you can't pray for your yourself, pray for other people. Pray about whatever comes to mind.
And whenever, if you can't pray in the morning, pray in the afternoon. You can't pray at night because you fall asleep, pray in the morning. And for some of you who feel like, man, I fall asleep when I pray, that's okay. That probably just means you need more sleep. It's alright.
God's good with you. It's a great thing to fall asleep on God. It's a beautiful gift. You probably just need to sleep more. That's it.
Whenever you can, just pray. If you can't pray for an hour like me at 18 on the mountain, pray for a minute. Pray whenever you can. And lastly, pray however you can. If if you cannot pray out loud, then write your prayers down.
If you get distracted in the house, then go for a walk or a drive. If you need to be hearing something, then be talking out loud to God by yourself even if it sounds strange. Pray however you can. And if you've never prayed ever in your entire life, just be reminded that one man who was a criminal thief crucified next to Jesus prayed, Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom. And you know what?
That one single prayer was answered. It was answered. Today you will be with me in paradise. It just takes one prayer. One prayer.
But at the same time, it takes a lot. It takes a lot. And I wanna encourage all of us to to enter into this journey of, Lord, teach me how to pray. I I think back to when I was 18 on that mountain not knowing what to say or what to do. Again, I'm hungry because I'm like a hobbit and I'm on a journey.
Gotta have a snack. I have no idea what happened up on that mountain, but I do know something happened. The Lord was near. Even though in my own life God felt further away from me than the pleasures of my life, The things that I enjoyed doing seemed more real to me than God did at that moment. The Lord was still near.
When we read Philippians 4, that first verse I read as we started, we generally start at don't be anxious about anything. But we so quickly overlook the 4 little words that come right before that, the Lord is near. The Lord is near. Prayer begins not with us needing something, but with God promising his presence. His presence.
He's here. He's here. It's amazing when Jesus is asked, teach us to pray, he doesn't take his disciples anywhere. He starts to pray right there because God is there. He was right there in front of them.
What a gift it is for us to, as we begin this journey all through the summer, to know that the Lord is near. And the reason why I know the Lord was near to me on that mountain, and even though I can't qualify what happened, I'm standing right here today. I'm here today. I couldn't possibly begin to imagine the future that God had for me as I imperfectly said and did nothing but complain on that mountain for 30 minutes as an 18 year old, far, or at least feeling far, from God, not knowing he was so close to me, patient with me, doing something deep within my soul that would lead me at this point to be talking to you about prayer with a microphone at your church. Prayer will do something transformative in our lives beyond what we can imagine.
And so as we go to God and pray, I wanna invite some of you guys for the first time to cry out to God and perfectly and perfectly show up and say something honestly and discover it for yourself. Let's do that now. Jesus, would you teach us to pray? Teach us, God, what it means to show up to you in the busyness of our lives, in the failures of our lives, in the sin in our lives. God, teach us to imperfectly show up to you and speak.
God, would you help us to open our mouths, our minds, and our hearts to share with you, to pour out to you what is going on in our lives. We pray that as a church, god, you would transform us through this summer as we learn how to pray. Would you lead us to do so with hope and love because you are our father who hears prayers. And, Jesus, you have provided a way for us. You respond to our question with kindness and grace.
Teach us to pray, and you say, follow me. And so we do that now. We pray these things in your name. Amen.