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DEVOTED TO PRAYER
I want you to try something. Have a conversation with the person sitting next to you. EXCEPT…you can’t talk to them. Ok, go… Ok, we know that’s impossible. You we need to communicate with each other. How about this…Who in here thinks you can have a healthy relationship with your boyfriend or girlfriend and never talk to them? Communication is necessary in relationships. What is our greatest, most important relationship? Our relationship with God. How is your communication with him?
Tonight we’re going to finish our “Devoted” series where we see three specific things the early church was devoted to and how we need to be devoted to them as well. We have seen they were devoted to God’s Word and fellowship. Tonight we’re going to see that we need to be devoted to prayer. And hopefully you’ll walk away with some practical tools to start communicating with God on a regular basis, and even constantly.
Acts 2:42
Prayer should be primary. From the very beginning of the church, prayer has been primary. It was the driving force behind everything they did. We don’t just see it in our passage for tonight, but it goes even earlier. As soon as Jesus ascends into heaven, what do the eleven disciples do? Well, after they are urged to go to Jerusalem and stop staring at the sky, they go and…pray.
Acts 1:14 – “All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.”
Our first response should be to pray. Immediately after Jesus ascends into heaven, they go and pray. Immediately after Peter’s powerful sermon at Pentecost and 3,000 people coming to faith in Christ, they devote themselves to prayer.
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 – “16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
What’s the first thing you do when you are in trouble? (MOM! HELP! You call out for someone.) What’s the first thing you do when something good happens to you because of someone else? (Thank you!) What do you do when you don’t know what to do? (MOM! You ask someone who can bring wisdom.)
It’s the same with prayer. Prayer should be our first response to everything. I think that’s part of how we can “pray without ceasing.” Need help? Pray. Happy? Pray. Confused? Pray. Thankful? Pray. Fearful or worried? Pray. Whatever the circumstance, our first response should be to pray.
Prayer isn’t just asking for things. It’s talking to God. To a God we can talk to, which is a miracle in itself. And a God who cares and who listens.
Adoration
Confession
Thanksgiving
Supplication
We’ll come back to this acronym later, but let’s see some more from Acts of why we should be devoted to prayer.
Prayer precedes powerful works. Throughout Acts, God uses prayer as his means to do miraculous works.
Hear what one person says about this:
Throughout the book of Acts, God uses prayer as a means to achieve His ends. In almost every case, prayer precedes powerful works. First, prayer precedes the filling of the Holy Spirit. The coming of the Holy Spirit in Acts 2:3 is directly tied to the devoted prayer of the disciples in Acts 1:14. Luke intends his reader to make this connection. To make this even more clear, in Acts 8:15, Peter and John pray that the Samaritans would receive the Holy Spirit. Luke records, “Then they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit” (Acts 8:17).
After the first recorded incident of persecution from the council of the high priest, Peter reports to his friends everything that has taken place. Together they pray to God, and “when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness” (Acts 4:31). Therefore, on three separate occasions, the Holy Spirit responds to the prayers of the early disciples.[1]
God uses prayer to lead people
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By Grace Baptist Church
5
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I want you to try something. Have a conversation with the person sitting next to you. EXCEPT…you can’t talk to them. Ok, go… Ok, we know that’s impossible. You we need to communicate with each other. How about this…Who in here thinks you can have a healthy relationship with your boyfriend or girlfriend and never talk to them? Communication is necessary in relationships. What is our greatest, most important relationship? Our relationship with God. How is your communication with him?
Tonight we’re going to finish our “Devoted” series where we see three specific things the early church was devoted to and how we need to be devoted to them as well. We have seen they were devoted to God’s Word and fellowship. Tonight we’re going to see that we need to be devoted to prayer. And hopefully you’ll walk away with some practical tools to start communicating with God on a regular basis, and even constantly.
Acts 2:42
Prayer should be primary. From the very beginning of the church, prayer has been primary. It was the driving force behind everything they did. We don’t just see it in our passage for tonight, but it goes even earlier. As soon as Jesus ascends into heaven, what do the eleven disciples do? Well, after they are urged to go to Jerusalem and stop staring at the sky, they go and…pray.
Acts 1:14 – “All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.”
Our first response should be to pray. Immediately after Jesus ascends into heaven, they go and pray. Immediately after Peter’s powerful sermon at Pentecost and 3,000 people coming to faith in Christ, they devote themselves to prayer.
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 – “16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
What’s the first thing you do when you are in trouble? (MOM! HELP! You call out for someone.) What’s the first thing you do when something good happens to you because of someone else? (Thank you!) What do you do when you don’t know what to do? (MOM! You ask someone who can bring wisdom.)
It’s the same with prayer. Prayer should be our first response to everything. I think that’s part of how we can “pray without ceasing.” Need help? Pray. Happy? Pray. Confused? Pray. Thankful? Pray. Fearful or worried? Pray. Whatever the circumstance, our first response should be to pray.
Prayer isn’t just asking for things. It’s talking to God. To a God we can talk to, which is a miracle in itself. And a God who cares and who listens.
Adoration
Confession
Thanksgiving
Supplication
We’ll come back to this acronym later, but let’s see some more from Acts of why we should be devoted to prayer.
Prayer precedes powerful works. Throughout Acts, God uses prayer as his means to do miraculous works.
Hear what one person says about this:
Throughout the book of Acts, God uses prayer as a means to achieve His ends. In almost every case, prayer precedes powerful works. First, prayer precedes the filling of the Holy Spirit. The coming of the Holy Spirit in Acts 2:3 is directly tied to the devoted prayer of the disciples in Acts 1:14. Luke intends his reader to make this connection. To make this even more clear, in Acts 8:15, Peter and John pray that the Samaritans would receive the Holy Spirit. Luke records, “Then they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit” (Acts 8:17).
After the first recorded incident of persecution from the council of the high priest, Peter reports to his friends everything that has taken place. Together they pray to God, and “when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness” (Acts 4:31). Therefore, on three separate occasions, the Holy Spirit responds to the prayers of the early disciples.[1]
God uses prayer to lead people