The Purpose of Prayer

CONVERSATIONS WITH GOD
THE PURPOSE OF PRAYER
DR. JIM DIXON
JANUARY 14, 2007
MATTHEW 6:5-13

Right here in the city of Denver on 3340 Quitman Street, there’s a school called Thomas Edison. And this should not surprise us, because virtually every major city in the United States of America has one or more schools called Thomas Edison—elementary schools, middle schools, high schools, all called Thomas Edison. And this is because Thomas Edison was a famous American. He was not famous for his love of family. He had six children through two marriages, and he spent very little time with any of them. He was not famous for his love of friends. I mean, he had a few friends. Henry Ford was one of his friends. Harvey Goodyear was one of his friends. He had John Burrows as a friend, but he spent very little time with his friends as well.

Thomas Edison is famous today because of his mind. It is because of the mind that he had. And how unusual that mind was. He was perhaps the greatest inventor in the history of the world. The people of America referred to Thomas Edison as the wizard. They sometimes called him the Wizard of West Orange, referring to his laboratory in New Jersey. They referred him as the wizard because all of his inventions kind of seemed like wizardry to the average American. I mean, from, the light bulb to the phonograph, the inventions of Thomas Edison seemed almost supernatural to people who lived in his time. Now, Thomas Edison dealt with the natural world and with the world of physics, but he did have, I think many of you know, an interest in the supernatural. And in 1920, in an interview with Scientific American Magazine, Thomas Edison said he was trying to invent a machine that would enable him to communicate with the dead.

That’s what he told Scientific American in 1920. He was trying to invent a machine that would enable him and others to communicate with the dead. He wanted to communicate with the spirits of the dead, and particularly Edison said he wanted to communicate with his wife who had passed away. He had loved her, he missed her, and he really wanted to talk with her. But the strange thing about Thomas Edison is that though he believed in the supernatural and though he believed in the existence of God, Edison had little desire to talk with God. He had little interest in prayer. And in fact, many historians believe that Edison was actually afraid of God. He would rather talk to the spirits of the dead than talk to God. And so, he wanted to communicate beyond this world, beyond the grave, but not with God.

And as you sit there this morning, I mean, who is it that you would love to talk to that is beyond the grave or beyond this life, or what we call beyond the pale? I mean, do you have a loved one who’s passed away? Is that who you would most like to talk to? Or, how about God? I mean, we have an incredible privilege called prayer. And do you really have a desire to talk with God? Do you want to converse with Jesus? Do you want to have a conversation? Of course, that’s what we’re going to be talking about in these next eight weeks: conversing with God, talking with God. We’re going to be talking about prayer.

Of course, there are many Greek words in the Bible for prayer, and most of them connote this concept of conversation. Prayer is conversation. It’s talking with God. Now, today, we look at the purpose of prayer, and I have two teachings. The first teaching is this: prayer is about intimacy with God. That’s what prayer is supremely about: intimacy with God, friendship with God, intimacy with Christ, friendship with Christ.

So we look back in the Old Testament in the Book of Ezekiel, and we see the prophet of God having a vision. And Ezekiel, in his vision, looks into the future, through the portals of time, and he sees the new Jerusalem. He sees a millennial Jerusalem. In many chapters of the Book of Ezekiel, the prophet of God describes this glorious city that is to come, the millennial Jerusalem. And at the end of the book, Ezekiel tells us that heavenly city, that new Jerusalem, will be called Jehovah Shammah. And in Hebrew, Jehovah Shammah means “God is present,” or, “the Lord who is there. “And for the Jewish people, this became their hope, that one day they would live in a city in which God dwelt. Jehovah Shammah, that God would be there and present with them.

This was the dream of the Jewish people. Of course, through Jewish history God showed up from time to time with the Jewish world. There was the glory cloud and the pillar of fire during the time of the Exodus. There was the Angel of the Lord, and every visitation of the Angel of the Lord was a divine manifestation. There was the Shekinah, the glory of God, that kind of attended the Ark of the Covenant, hovering over the Mercy Seat. You recall that when the Ark of the Covenant was stolen by the Philistines, the people shouted, “Ichadbod!” from “kavod,” which means glory. “The glory has departed; God’s presence has left us.” And the Ark of the Covenant was kept in the tabernacle and then later in the temple. The Ark of the Covenant was kept in the Holy of Holies, and the Holy of Holies was meant for that Ark of the Covenant and for the presence of God, as the Shekinah hovered over the mercy seat of the Holy of Holies.

But then there came a time when the temple was destroyed. Solomon’s temple was destroyed by the Babylonians, and the temple of Herod was destroyed by the Romans and the temple was no more. And so now, for centuries and millennia, the Jewish people have looked forward to Jehovah Shamamh, to the new Jerusalem, when God would be even in a greater sense present with them again. And so today, most of the Jews have become like other people in the world, people who sometimes feel like God is distant. They just can’t quite sense or feel the presence of God.

Maybe you feel like that today. Maybe you feel like God is distant, and when you pray you don’t sense His presence and you don’t feel His person. He doesn’t seem to be with you. And you know, this series is particularly for you. In Acts, chapter 17, the Bible tells us that in the course of time, the Apostle Paul went to the city of Athens. And there in the city of Athens, Paul stood before the Greek people, and he stood up on the hill of the Areopagus across from the Acropolis. And as he looked out on the crowds, there were basically two primary groups of philosophers: the Epicureans and the Stoics. The Epicureans believed that God was very distant—that God kind of created the world and then stepped back—and that God has departed from the lives of mankind. And then the stoics were kind of the opposite. The Stoics were almost pantheists, and they believed that God was in everything and God was in everyone, and you just couldn’t get away from God.

So Paul stood before the Greeks and he kind of told them that in a sense they were all wrong. I mean, he told the Epicureans that God is not distant—that our creator is still with us, that He is not far from any of us, and in Him we live and move and have our being. And then Paul said to the Stoics that God is not in everything. God is not in everyone. God stands distinct from His creation, but God does desire relationship. And so Paul then began to tell the Greeks about Jesus Christ, who came into the world that we might have relationship with God. Jesus said, “No one comes to the Father but by Me.” And you know, Jesus told His disciples that, “If you had known Me, you would’ve known My Father also. He who has seen Me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father?’” So Jesus came to show us the Father, and to bring us into relationship with God.

When Jesus died on the cross at His crucifixion, the gospels tell us a number of things happened. The Bible tells us that when Jesus died on Calvary’s cross the earth shook and at the moment of Christ’s death the sun would not give its light and darkness covered the land. The Bible tells us that in the moment of Christ’s death tombs in and about Jerusalem were opened and there were many resurrections. And the Bible tells us that in the moment of Christ’s death, the Temple veil was split in two. And what was the temple veil? I mean, as Christ breathed His last and as He paid for the sin of the world, in that moment, the Bible says, the veil and the temple on the Mountain of Moriah, the Temple Mount, that veil was split in two.

And what did that represent? Well, the veil was the veil that separated the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies. In the Holy of Holies was the Shekinah, with the presence of God. And you know that no one was allowed to go into the Holy of Holies except for the high priest. And you know that he could only go into the Holy of Holies but one time a year, and that was on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. He would go in to sprinkle the blood of animals upon the Mercy Seat in the Holy of Holies. And so, when Jesus died on the cross, the veil was split asunder, and the way opened up into the presence of God. And the symbolism is beautiful because it illustrates that Christ enables us to come into the presence of God.

And so, the Bible tells us that when we respond to the gospel, and when we receive Christ as our Lord and as our Savior, that we actually join the family of God; that what Jesus has by nature, we receive by adoption. Jesus is the only begotten Son of God, but through adoption we become children of God, sons and daughters of God. And the Bible says that this is what the gospel offers, that we come into the family of God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ becomes our Father. And so, Jesus taught His followers to pray. And that prayer begins with, “Our Father,” “Pater hemon,” in Greek. But Jesus never gave the prayer in Greek. It’s been translated into Greek and so we have “Pater hemon,” but the prayer was originally given by Jesus in Aramaic, and Jesus didn’t say Pater. Jesus said, “Abba.” And we know this from Mark chapter 14. We know this even by Paul’s remembrance in Romans eight and in Galatians chapter four, that Jesus always said “Abba” when addressing God the Father. And Jesus taught His followers, who had been brought into His family, to do the same thing.

So we call God Abba, and scholars and theologians for centuries have examined this Aramaic word Abba. There has been lots of discussion. But on this they all agree: this was what little children call their fathers at home. This was many times the first word from a child’s mouth. And it’s what little children called their dads Abba. Daddy. Jesus taught His followers, members of the family, to view prayer intimately, to view prayer relationally and to begin your prayer by saying, “Our daddy, who art in heaven.” It’s an amazing thing. And you can look through all the literature of the Jews. You won’t find any prayer prior to Christ which begins with “Abba.” You won’t find it in any of the literature. This was unique to Jesus, and He gave it to us because He’s brought us into a special relationship.

His father has become our Father. As Jesus ministered in the world, the big question He asked everybody was, “Who’s your daddy?” That was the question that He asked. Many of the Jews said their father was Abraham. Jesus said no, your father is the devil. Who’s your daddy? And Jesus made it very clear that we’re not all children of God. I mean, there’s a sense in which obviously we could say that since God is our creator, but Jesus made it very clear that we become children of God through rebirth as we’re born into the family of God through faith and we receive Him a Savior and Lord and we become brothers and sisters of Jesus and the Father of Jesus becomes our daddy. So he taught us to pray.

Now, I know that many of you have heard of Brennan Manning. Brennan Manning is a Catholic priest, and for the last three or four decades Brennan Manning has ministered in the Christian world and to the broader evangelical community. And Brennan Manning has from time to time come here to the city of Denver and spoken at the Downing House. He’s come here to our church. We’ve had Brennan Manning here, and he’s addressed our staff up on some staff retreats in the mountains. Brennan Manning is a man of some controversy. He’s a man of deep faith, a man with a needed message. He tells many stories. One of his stories is a story he tells of a friend of his, a woman whose father was dying, and she came to Brennan Manning as her friend and as her priest.

She said, “I wish you could go and visit my dad. He’s dying. He’s in the hospital.” And so Brennan Manning went, and he showed up in the hospital room. He saw this dying man, and right next to the bed was an empty chair. Brennan Manning smiled and said, “I see you’re expecting me.” And the man smiled at Brennan Manning and said, “No, not really. I didn’t know you were coming.” He said, “I’ll tell you why I have that empty chair there. I’ve really never told anyone this, not even my daughter, but I’ll tell you. Four years ago, I was having a hard time praying. I had a hard time sensing the presence of God. I never felt like God was with me and present, and I couldn’t sense closeness to Jesus. And so I had a friend who I told this to, and the friend said, well, why don’t you do what I do? I used to be like you, but I always sat an empty chair next to me. Now when I pray, I just imagine that Jesus is sitting in that chair. Somehow that’s helped me feel closer.

So this man told Brennan Manning he’d been doing this for four years, and it worked for him. And he really, as he prayed, kind of just felt the presence of Christ and closeness to Him that He’d never experienced before. Brennan Manning understood. Brennan Manning anointed him with oil and prayed over him. Brennan Manning left. Three days later, Brennan Manning got a call from this guy’s daughter, and she said, “My dad has just died. I feel kind of bad because I wasn’t able to be with him at the moment of his death, and nobody was with him when he died. I hope that when he died he wasn’t all alone. It is a strange thing… when I got there and we saw him, he somehow in the moment of his death had managed to lift himself up in the bed and had reached over and his head was resting on the chair that was by the bed.”

Well, Brennan Manning immediately understood that his friend’s dad had wanted to die with his head in the lap of Jesus. I remember Brennan Manning said to us as a staff, “Do you have any desire to be closer to Jesus? I mean, do you long for friendship with Him? Do you long for a sense of His presence, a greater sense of His presence? And when you come to prayer, do you seek that? Do you seek intimacy with Christ?” Because that’s primarily what prayer is about. Prayer’s not about getting stuff. I mean, I think for most of us kind of view prayer as about getting stuff. And so, when we need stuff, we pray. Or maybe we’re a little bit altruistic and we want stuff for somebody else, so we pray for them. But it’s still about stuff, and that’s really not primarily what prayer is about. Prayer is primarily about intimacy and friendship with God and with His Son Jesus Christ.

Some of you have seen the movie Meet the Parents with Ben Stiller. In the movie, Ben Stiller is asked to say grace at dinner, and he doesn’t know what to say and is kind of uncomfortable, but says something like this: “Oh, dear God, thank you. You are such a good God to us, a kind and gentle and accommodating God. And we thank you oh, sweet, sweet Lord of hosts for the smorgasbord. You have so aptly laid out our table this day, and each day… by day—day by day by day—oh, dear Lord, three things we pray: to love thee more dearly, to see thee more clearly, to follow thee more nearly, day by day by day. Amen.”

You know, sometimes I think it’s true that a lot of people are not comfortable praying, maybe in public particularly. I think sometimes when people pray corporately or in in public they almost are more conscious of the people around them and what they’re thinking than they are of the Lord Himself. Of course, in that prayer that Ben Stiller gives, he quotes an old song, and he prays that they might love God more dearly and see God more clearly and follow God more nearly. And the amazing thing about that comedic prayer is it kind of hit the nail on the head. I mean, that’s really what prayer is about: to love God more dearly, to see Him more clearly, and to follow Him more nearly. And so, what God would like to know from us today is, do we want that? Do we want to love Him more dearly? Do we want to see Him more clearly? And do we want to follow Him more nearly? And if we do, understand that this is in the primary sense what prayer is about.

Now, this last weekend, Barb and I took care of our granddaughter, Abigail. Our daughter Heather and her husband Chris are having a weekend just to themselves. Heather’s very, very pregnant—two weeks away from their second child—and her birthday’s coming up. So they just kind of wanted a weekend to kind of be together and have some fun. And so, Barb and I took Abigail for the weekend. On Friday night (Abigail’s almost four and a half) Barb and I were sitting in my study and Abigail came in and she said, “Papa,” (she calls me Papa and Barb Mimi), “I love you.” And I smiled, and she said, “But not as much as mommy and daddy.” I said, “You know, that’s great. That’s exactly how it should be. You should love your mommy and daddy the most.”

Well, the next day, Abigail brought further clarification as Barb and I were in the car with her and we were driving somewhere. She told us she loved us, but then she said, “But not as much as mommy and daddy and the dog.” And so that needed clarification. Abigail has a dog named Maddie, who’s a boxer. And you know, obviously she loves Maddie very much, but we come just right after that. So I said to Abigail, “Well, you might rethink the dog deal a little bit.” And she wanted to know why. And I said, “Well I mean, your mom and daddy take care of you and, and Mimi and Papa take care of you, but the dog really can’t take care of you.” And she said, “Yeah, but the dog kisses me and licks me.”

We had to admit that dogs are pretty special. But is it not true that no matter what your age is, you love people to varying degrees? You don’t love everybody the same, right? I mean, there are some people you love more than other people. This is human nature. And who do you love most of all? I mean, as you sit there this morning, who do you love most of all, and is there any chance that it’s Jesus? Is there any chance that you love Jesus most of all? Is there any chance that you love God most of all? This is the Shema, Deuteronomy six: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind.”

We’re supposed to love God supremely. But that’s not always true with us. And so, what would you honestly say? I mean, maybe as you look at yourself honestly, you might say, well, I don’t. You might say, “I love Jesus, I love God, but maybe not most of all.” But would you be willing to work on that? Do you want to love Him most of all? Do you have any desire in you to love God most of all? In these next eight weeks, as we learn about prayer, understand that that’s part of the purpose of prayer. It is that we might grow in our love of God, that we might love Him more dearly, that this intimacy with Him would increase, and that we might begin to experience also His special love for us and more of that love.

Some of you love hymns. I know I love hymns. At the first service every Sunday, now in the chapel at 7:30, we always have a hymn, and we have a lot of people at that 7:30 service who like hymns. We also have a lot of people who like to get up early, which I don’t like to do. But you know, there are a lot of hymn lovers (and maybe some of you love hymns too), and one of the old hymns is called In The Garden. I’ve sung that hymn thousands of times through the years, and so has my wife. And maybe you’ve sung it too. I think a lot of people when they sing In the Garden think of the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus prayed. But that’s really not what the hymn is about.

The hymn was written in March of 1912 by C. Austin Miles, and C. Austin Miles was a photographer who loved Jesus Christ. And when he studied scripture, he would always picture it as a photographer. He would just picture whatever he read, and he would try to imagine the scene. And so he was reading John chapter 20, and John chapter 20 is not about the Garden of Gethsemane. John chapter 20 is about the garden tomb. And so it was that C. Austin Miles was reading John 20 and the story of Mary Magdalene who went to the tomb, and in the midst of her sorrow found joy who went to the tomb and found Christ resurrected. Jesus called her by name saying, “Mary,” and she fell down before Him. She called Him Rabboni, which means “My teacher.” It actually is more intimate than that. It means “My very own teacher, my personal teacher.” And she had the joy of that experience.

C. Austin Miles wrote, “In the Garden, I come to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses. And the voice I hear falling on my ear, the Son of God discloses. And He walks with me and He talks with me, and He tells me I am his own. And the joy we share as we carry there, none other has ever known.” Now, I hope you understand that you can go to the garden; you can do that through prayer. It’s prayer that takes us to the garden. It’s prayer through which we walk with Him. We talk with Him through prayer. He tells us that we are His own through prayer, and we share His joy in prayer. And understand that this is what prayer is about. I mean, if it’s all about petition for you or even intercession, you’re never going to spend enough time in prayer because God just isn’t into blessing our stuff that much.

And you’re soon going to notice that. If prayer for you is all about getting stuff—either for yourself or for those you love—pretty soon you’re going to be disappointed. Because even though God does answer prayers of petition and intercession (and we’re going to deal with that in the weeks to come) and even though that’s important, that’s not the primary purpose of prayer. A lot of times God just doesn’t give us what we want. The reinforcement of prayer is very intermittent in terms of getting what you want. But prayer is primarily about falling in love and having Jesus as your best friend. So that’s the first teaching.

The second teaching, more shortly, is transformation. Prayer is about intimacy, and it’s about transformation. Prayer is not about God’s transformation. It’s not about changing God; it’s about our transformation and changing us.

I think a lot of people go to prayer and they want to change God. They want to change God’s mind. They want to make God do stuff. But prayer is not about changing God. Prayer is about changing us. When you understand this, you know why we need to be in prayer every day. I mean, it’s about that intimacy, and it’s about that transformation. So in the Old Testament, in the Book of Exodus, we see Moses—Exodus chapter 34, beginning with verse 29—go up on Mount Sinai, which was also called Mount Horeb. Moses encounters God; he encounters the divine presence. He comes into the presence of God, and he would never be the same. The Bible tells us Moses comes down from the mountain changed. He comes down from the mountain transformed, and he’s radiating light. His face shines like the sun, so much so that people cannot look at him. He’s been in the presence of God and he’s changed.

Have you ever known anyone that just basks in prayer? I mean, you can tell they’ve been in the presence of God, and there’s a transformation there. It’s not like radiant light, but it’s a spiritual light. You see it in folks who have been with God and who tarry with God in prayer. It’s powerful and it changes us.

Now, during the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln had one of his officials come up to him. It was a very tough time for our nation. We were a nation divided. Our sons and daughters were dying. Certainly young men were dying. And you know, nobody knew what the outcome of the war was going to be. And so, this official of Abraham Lincoln came up to him and said, “I sure hope God is on our side.” And Abraham Lincoln’s response has been recorded by many historians. Lincoln said, “Throughout my life, my concern has never been that God be on my side.” And this official was just stunned when Lincoln said that. But then Lincoln added, “My only concern throughout my life has been that I was on God’s side.”

It’s a not-so-subtle distinction. I mean, it’s a pretty important distinction. It’s not about God being on my side or God being on your side, but it’s about us being on His side. It’s not about God blessing our stuff. What Christ wants from us is that we would seek to know His heart; that we would seek to know His mind; that we would seek to know His goals, His purposes, what He’s trying to do in Denver; what He’s trying to do in this church; what He’s trying to do in our community; what He’s trying to do in the world, and that we get on board, because it’s not about Him blessing our stuff and Him getting on our side. It’s prayer that brings us into this new mind where we are changed and we’re transformed and we begin to seek Him and His purposes.

I know many of you have read Golding’s Lord of the Flies, and it’s a classic of English literature. Many of you who took English Literature courses surely read the book. And if you’ve read Golding’s book you know that Golding was a Calvinist, and he viewed the human race as born into sin. He views human beings as born with a sin nature. He didn’t view a human life as just a beautiful garden. He knew there were weeds to pull. And if you’ve raised kids or even grandkids there’s some weeds to pull. And Golding really believed that the human race has fallen and there’s sin there, even from the beginning. He viewed civilization itself as an effort by humanity to control the sin nature. And this was the primary purpose of civilization: to control the sin nature in human beings.

In Lord of the Flies a bunch of kids are left without civilization. You see the sin nature go amuck. Now, Golding also knew that God alone has power to change us. God has power to forgive us. God has power to change us, transform us, and to make us in the image of His Son. And so this is what prayer is about. It is to change us in that way, and you have to long for it. You really heave to want that. I mean, what is your goal in life? What are you aiming for? You know, there’s that old Chinese proverb, “He that aim at nothing verily hits it every time.” It’s been attributed to Confucius, but that’s bogus. Confucius never spoke those words, but the words are true.

The words are true, and we all need goals. We need some supreme purpose in life, and it should be righteousness. Jesus said, “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness.” Jesus said, “Seek first My kingdom and its righteousness.” So if this is your passion, prayer will transform you. If this is my passion, prayer will transform me. It will bring us friendship and intimacy with God, and it’ll begin to change us and to move us towards righteousness.

Many of you have gone up to the mountains here in Colorado, and of course some of you have gone on many occasions to Summit County. In 1830 in Summit County, there was a little town established called Three Rivers. And Three Rivers was where the Blue, and the Snake, and the 10 Mile rivers came together. That is why it was called Three Rivers. Really in the beginning, in 1830, it was kind of just a trading post. But 30 years later, in 1860, Three Rivers had grown, and a young man just out of his teens left three Rivers to go in search of gold. He never came back. No one to this day knows what happened to him. Maybe he fell from a precipice, maybe he was killed by animals, but he never came back. The people of Three Rivers loved this young man, whose name was Tom Dillon. And so, they changed the name of the town, and instead of Three Rivers they begin to call it Dillon—Dillon Colorado.

Now, Dillon Colorado has been moved three different times. And Lake Dillon now sits over the top of the old Dillon, the old Three Rivers. But when you go up there, think of Tom Dillon. Remember that during that era, almost everyone had a passion for gold. This was true in California, here in Colorado, and really across the country. It’s what spawned all the gold rushes. It was a passion for gold. And I think we all realized times haven’t changed much, because people still wake up in the morning (though we’re more sophisticated and we go to corporate settings) and there’s still this passion for gold. Everybody’s out there in pursuit of gold.

What is your passion? I mean, is that what drives you? Jesus said, “Do not lay up treasures on earth, where rust and moths consume. Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven.” So what is your passion? Now, what God wants us to understand is our passion needs to be intimacy with Him and transformation. Our passion, therefore, needs to be prayer, because that’s what prayer is all about.

Well, as we conclude I want to tell you a story of a man who in the year 1976 came into a small African village. He just staggered into that village. This man was named Kim Fumu, and he was very sick when he came into this primitive African village in 1976. He had a horribly high fever, and he went into a hospital tent, and there were five different people who ministered to him, seeking to save his life. And as his fever rose, he began to bleed. The blood came from his mouth. Blood came from his ears and blood oozed from his eyes.

And ultimately, the administrations of these five people failed and Kim Fumu died. And after only a few days, each of the five who worked on him began to be feverish and they grew horribly ill. They began to rupture and to bleed from the mouth and the ears and the eyes, and all five of them died. It was the beginning of the Ebola virus in 1976. Today, we can look at the continent of Africa, and we’ve seen more than four outbreaks of the Ebola virus. And even today, doctors do not know how to solve this horrible disease. They have no cure. I saw recently a CNN special on the subject of the Ebola virus. And there was a scene that I saw that I’ll never forget. It was a young woman, a thin young woman clothed in a white garb.