I Want To Pray More… Like Jesus // Reset Sunday // Pastor Charles Metcalf

What is up? Hey, have you ever felt like you went to pray and had no idea what to pray, or how to pray, or that you weren't like fancy enough to pray, or does God hear my prayers? All of those questions are things that I feel embarrassingly more often than not, trying to figure out, am I doing this right? Am I saying the right things? And you're about to hear a sermon called, I Want to Pray More Like Jesus. And this sermon is really about the Lord's prayer. And this is a beautifully simple template. As a matter of fact, Jesus said, hey, listen, all the other prayers, this is how you do it. And he gives us a template on how to pray. And in this sermon, I pull out three truths on how we can practically pray like Jesus. And I know for a fact, no matter where you are, what you're going through, what weight you may be carrying, that this sermon is going to be an encouragement to your soul and help you live a transformed life. I love you so much. And I pray this message is a blessing to you. All right, turn to your Bibles, Matthew chapter 6. Matthew chapter 6, Matthew chapter 6 is where we're going to be. Context of the scripture, Jesus has been preaching for hours. Legit, that's what the Bible talks about. It's his first sermon, Sermon on the Mount. And the story, the way this one closes out is it says, when the day began to wear away, the disciples are like, hey, oh, Jesus, so people are tired and they're hungry. And really what they meant was we are tired and we are hungry. But I'll jump up a little bit earlier. We're going to start in verse number 5, Matthew chapter 6, verse number 5, it says this. When you pray, don't be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on the street corner in the synagogue where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth, that is all the reward they will ever get. But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father who sees everything will reward you. I got to, this isn't even my message, just a little sidebar. Jesus isn't talking against public prayer right here. He's talking against prayer that needs attention. There's a difference. Okay. Verse number 7, when you pray, don't babble on and on like the Gentiles do. They think their prayers are answered merely by repeating their words again and again. Don't be like them. For your Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask it. Now, the next portion of scripture right here is very popular. It's the Lord's Prayer. I'm going to put it up on the back LED so you can see it together. You don't have to read it together because I apparently can't do that. Y'all nailed it. We didn't even address this. This happened. I preach a series. I was like, we're going to read the Bible together out loud.

And we were terrible. Then Pastor Mike comes back and you're like, let's read it together. And y'all were like, one, two, three, four, five. It's fine. I won't take it personal. I'll just read the Lord's Prayer. By myself, in this manner, therefore 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 this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. Titled my sermon today for taking notes. Write this down at the top of your notes. I want to pray more. I want to pray more. I want to pray more. Would you pray with me? Lord, I'm trying to pray more. So help me do it. In Jesus name I pray. Everybody said, amen. Amen. Have you done your New Year's resolutions yet? No. Me neither. No, I'm joking. Uh, I got a couple. But I was thinking about New Year's resolutions. I was having a conversation with my little brother and we were talking about what do you want to do for the new year? And we were sitting down with my family, talking through all our New Year's resolutions. And I was curious on what are the top five most common New Year's resolutions? Like what? No, I'm about to tell you. You ain't gotta tell me. I'm about to, I'm about to actually put it up on the screen. That's a rhetorical question. I got the microphone. So just wait a second. This is my intro. So just wait. But I appreciate you. Uh, top five New Year's resolutions. Okay, now this is where you participate. Can anybody guess what number one is? Number one. Lose weight. There it is. Number one. Put it up there. Lose weight. Come on. How many of y'all you like? Come on. That's not probably in there for me. Come on. Raise your hand. No. Oh, nobody don't want to admit they want to lose weight. Okay, cool. That's fine. Number two. What y'all think number two is? Save money. Okay. Save money. What's number two? Go ahead, throw it up there for us. Make more money. Come on. We ain't worried about saving money. We just need to make more of it. That's a bad, don't do that. That's a bad idea. But that's number two. People want to make more money. Um, number three. What do we got for number three, top five New Year's resolutions? Number three is be happier. Come on, people just like, man, I'm just sad. It's kind of depressing once you look at it. Like, oh, God.

Really what people are wishing for. Okay. Be happy. Number four, what do y'all think number four is? What'd you say? There, I put it up there. Okay, great. Read more. Read more books. Anybody want to read more books? Anybody? Come on. They're like, yeah. Come on, y'all went to Barnes & Noble and went crazy. Ain't going to make it through that first book. I already know. I went to Barnes & Noble on New Year's Eve, and it was cracking up there. It was like, all these people really think they're buying like ten books. You're lying to yourself, man. Number five. What's number five? I already forgot number five. What's number five? Be more present. That's a good one. That's a good one. I was going through my New Year's resolutions, and one of my New Year's resolutions was just to not yell as much. Don't be laughing.

Hey. Just not yell as much. I'm not going to yell. Just not as much. One of them was get buff. You know what I'm saying? Just pure vanity. Just for my wife. Not even like healthy. I'm just trying to get ripped for my wife specifically. Another one of mine was it would save more money than we did last year. So that's one of ours. And my last one, I was going through my list, was I want to pray more. I want to pray more. Now here's the thing about New Year's resolutions. I looked up some statistics on these, and it's tough. The statistics are tough. Because statistics say 25% of people will be done with their New Year's resolutions, meaning they quit, by the end of this week. No lie. Don't be laughing. Because 25% of us, it might 1, 2, 3, 4, will is not going to be doing any of his New Year's resolutions by Wednesday. 25%. 56% of people are going to quit by January, the end of January. As a matter of fact, it said in the thing, it says people who study this time of year, they call February 2nd quitter's day.

So if you was planning to quit, why don't you make that one of your New Year's resolutions? I'm going to quit on quitter's day. And it said only 8% to 9% of people will actually make it the whole year doing their New Year's resolutions. So I'm thinking about this, and I'm like, dang, this is tough. This is because I said New Year's resolutions. I'm excited about them. I feel hopeful about them. I feel like I can do it. One of them is I want to pray more, and I'm trying to figure out which percentage I'm going to be in. Am I going to be done by the end of the week? Hopefully, I'll make it through 21 days of prayer and fasting, so maybe I'll be in the quitter's day group. But I'm thinking about it, and no lie, because I'm getting all this data and going back and forth on ChatGBT. So I'm asking deep questions. And here's my hot take on ChatGBT. ChatGBT can either make you dumber or smarter. It just depends on you. So ChatGBT is neutral. Some people use it, and you are getting dumber as you use it, because you're not learning nothing. Me, I'll be up in the thing just freaking finding out all the information. I'm like, give me everything that's ever been known at all.

I'm going back and forth, and I'm like, OK. What I say, literally, back to the ChatGBT thing, I'm like, OK, so based upon these statistics, it seems like people's goals are too high, people are too weak, or both. Could you please tell me what's the combination, what's happening here based upon these statistics? And ChatGBT hit me back and said, neither one of those are true. I'm like, oh, OK. What you got to say, robot? I said, based upon statistics, this is what you can get from this information, and here's where people go wrong. The first thing that goes wrong is people set goals for outcomes, not systems and strategies. The second thing that goes wrong is people overestimate how much motivation they have, and they underestimate how much opposition they're going to face. I mean, ChatGBT was preaching. I was like, eh, OK, chat. And the last one, let me make sure I say it right, because I don't want to miss it. The last thing it said that people go wrong, it says, people, this one was good, it said, people try to change behaviors without addressing identity. It's ChatGBT, really. So I started looking at this. OK, people try to go for an outcome. So they just say, I'm going to lose 20 pounds.

And you can do that a lot of ways. 2026, you can go get a shot. You lose 40 pounds in a. Day. We don't know how you should do it, but that's an outcome. It's not a system or a strategy, though, to keep the weight off, live a healthy life and get fit and get strong. It's just an outcome. So when you shoot for the outcome, you can either achieve it or not, but you don't have a strategy behind it to continue to live that way. That's people overestimate their motivation. Meaning January 1, you're like, absolutely, I'm about to do it, this is going to be incredible. And you underestimate how much life does not want you to do it. You underestimate your ability of how difficult this is going to be and what it's going to take to actually do this. You just set the outcome, you have no strategy for it, or if you do, you have a really bad strategy. Can I tell you, this is, I'm literally just thinking about this, this is hilarious. It's kind of bad, but it's hilarious. When I was like 16 or 17, I'll never forget, and this is a real thing, I was trying to quit watching pornography. My strategy was, no lie, this is a real strategy, I came up with my mind, I put two rubber bands on my wrist, and when I went to go think about looking at pornography, I would snap the rubber band and just be like, bam, don't do that. It didn't work, just let me tell you that. But I needed much more than snapping my wrist with rubber bands. But the last thing is behavior. You try to change your behavior, but you don't address your identity. Now this got me thinking, where can you go to achieve all of these things? Where do you go to get wisdom and a strategy and a system that goes beyond a fleeting moment?

Where do you go to get clear motivation and to face opposition? Where do you go to find your real identity, not just something you want to do? This brings us to prayer. I am submitting to you today that all of your New Year's resolutions, all the goals you have for this year, they are all summed up and can be found and achieved through the place of prayer. Now prayer, we have to talk about it for a second, because we have to first address as Christians, prayer is not unique to us. Somebody's like, what? Yes, everybody prays. Certain religions, they pray five times a day with a rug on the ground facing a certain direction. Someone's like, dang, five times a day, really? Yes. Certain people pray, they write on pieces of paper and put it in the wailing wall. Certain people pray and they sit there and they silence themselves, trying to empty themselves to achieve a certain disposition. Prayer is not unique to believers. What is unique to believers is who we pray to, what we believe happens when we pray, and the fact that he hears us when we pray. What's unique to me and you is I don't have to pray a certain number of times before he turns his ear to me. I don't have to face a certain direction for him to hear me. I don't have to have a certain tone of voice for him to answer my prayer. I don't have to be a good person for him to hear my prayer. What's different about our prayer is everybody else is praying to people who are dead and gone. The person we are praying to is alive, standing up, interceding for us in heaven. Prayer is not unique to us, but who we pray to and how we pray is different and what we believe happens when we pray.

Something happens when you pray. You need to know this. Don't let anybody downplay your prayer. I get that we say this all the time and I get it and I be feeling that way sometimes. We'll be like, man, all he can do now is pray. Yes, okay, what you're trying to say is you've exhausted all your options, you went through all your plans, and you have no idea what you're going to do. Yes, and please do not downplay talking to the person who created the galaxies and put the fish in the sea and is causing all our hearts to beat at the same time. Please do not downplay that to like, okay, well, I guess we can just ask him. Prayer, it matters, it's important, and here's the thing about prayer. We all pray differently. We all, we have different types of prayer and the way you pray, and I'm not even going to get into all of that. All I'm just submitting this morning to you is in 2026, what if this was one of the best years of your life because you discovered something new and beautiful about prayer? Now, Jesus is talking about prayer. He's actually talking about a lot of things in Matthew chapter six. He talks about, he starts off early in the chapter and he says, when you give, don't do it this way and do it this way and do it this way, and he says, when you pray, and he uses these two kind of ideals to compare and contrast. He says, first, don't pray like the hypocrites, and what he's saying is, these are the Pharisees at the time who don't pray like these people who, they're not really praying to God. They're praying for the people who are hearing them pray. They're not even really, they don't even really know what they're saying. They're praying so that when you hear me pray. And you think, dang, they can really pray. They be praying really good. And they're thinking about this in the moment. He said, don't be like those people.

And also don't be like the Gentiles or the people who think that because they pray over and over and over and over again that it's gonna do something. I wanna read it to you in the message version because it's so powerful. Listen to what it says. It says, here's what I want you to do. Find a quiet, secluded place so you won't be tempted to role play before God. This is an interesting thing we do with God. God knows us, created us, all knowing, everywhere at the same time, yet we get into the place of prayer and then we start thinking like, okay, what should I say? What should I, hey, hey, hey, hey, God. So everything's fine. You know, nothing's going wrong. Meanwhile, like your life is falling apart and you're like, so just wondering, maybe you could. This happens all the time. And there's no, I want you to hear the tone of my voice. There is no shame or pressure. I'm just trying to acknowledge some things that we do that maybe aren't serving us the best way. We have prayer at the end of every single one of our services and there'll be times where people will come up and they'll be like, hey, what can I pray with you about? And they're like, yo, just pray.

You know, I just got some stuff going on. I'm like, okay, yeah, what type of stuff? A lot of stuff. Okay, like what specifically is the stuff? Just some things, some relational things. Okay, relational things. And here's the thing. I have gotten to a point, you don't want to come ask me for prayer because I'll be like, what relate, tell me what is happening. I'll sit there at the altar. I'm interrogating people. What is actually, what's really going on? Here's why. Because sometimes for some reason, we feel like we can't be honest, not even to another person, but to God who already knows. For some reason, we feel like God doesn't know. And I'll do this, we'll be eight minutes up here. Haven't prayed once for him. I'm still asking. And what they mean is I cheated on my spouse. They left me. I'm going to court for this. I got, okay, let's talk about that. But let's not go over here with the general, just I got an unspoken and you know, some general money things. Oh, you mean you've been stealing from your company

for 30 years? Okay, let's talk, let's pray about that. Wow. I'm just saying, why do you feel? And just, let's just take that question and go home with it. Why do I feel the need to role play before God? What is it about what I learned from prayer, what I observed from other people? And here's what happens. This is how they impact other people. Many people feel this way because they heard someone pray who was not praying to God, but praying for your impression and how you would feel about them. And you heard them pray so eloquently and so fancy and they use big words. And so you get into prayer and you're broken and you don't know what to say and you're just hopeless and you feel like I can't pray like that so I might as well not pray at all. Scripture says, get by yourself so you don't feel this pressure. Look what it goes on to say. It says, just be there as simply and as honest as you can manage. Says the focus will slowly shift from you to God and you will begin to sense his grace. Now this part is dangerous right here. The world is full of so-called prayer warriors

who are prayer ignorant. The Bible said it. They are full of formulas and programs and advice and peddling techniques for getting you what you want from God. Oh, yes sir. Come on now. Some of us we go to pray and really we think if I pray this many times, do this many things, speak this loud, scream at this point in the song, then God will give me what I want. And what you don't realize is, is you have turned God into a slot machine. And you have lowered God apparently in your world where you can control him. And if you can control your God, I don't wanna serve that God because he's been submitted to you and what you think and what you know. And you and I both know, you don't know that much. It says you do these things and you think if I do it this way and I say it this way, then God will give me what I want. You're saying that's not how it works. Now here's what I'm not saying. I'm not saying you can't pray loud if you loud. Because people pray loud, I'm loud. So when I start praying at some point, it's gonna get loud. I repeat myself because I repeat myself up here. I'm not saying you can't be natural to your personality,

but if you think the way you are praying is. changing God and maneuvering him around and now he's gonna do something that he wasn't gonna do before because you prayed a certain way what you have done is canceled out the cross and you've brought back religion and you are peddling religion to people saying do these certain rituals and you get this I'm not mad at you for that but that makes us the same as Buddha the same as Islam the same as Confucianism we can go back to that if that's what we want to do but what separates us is the grace of God so if you go back to this side where you got to pray a certain way in a certain amount of times and it's a certain things and you can't say certain things in your prayer then you're just bringing us back to and that's fine but now you got to take the whole law oh see this is where you want some parts of it but not all and no play that out if you gonna go back to you pray a certain way God does certain things let's bring back the whole thing start raising your goats I need three sacrifices a day and we can get this thing popping Charles that's ridiculous no you're ridiculous you got if you gonna commit to it you got to go all the way no God hears your prayer no matter how you pray no matter if it's God help me he says absolutely because he's wise enough to know what they really are saying is they are beyond their jurisdiction as a parent and they have no idea how to raise these kids specifically this one because they have specific issues and they don't know how to relate to him and they're different than them and they since the divorce they can't really do it and they're trying to co-parent again so I know what they're asking for is wisdom in this situation they're also asking me to mend the relationship as they co-parent because they don't want to scar this kid more than has already happened outside of their control so Holy Spirit I thank you you would send peace to them right now give them wisdom mender he knows all of that and if you have to wear with all to pray that all in your prayer great you don't have to do certain things to get God's attention it's just I can just talk to him and here's what I've learned about my own relationship with God it's kind of kind of funny I was thinking about me and Abby have been together for

how long together 20s 13 years 12 13 years and I remember when I met Abby and early on in dating I remember I would I would before I would we would go on a date or do something I'll be thinking about like all right what we gonna talk about you know I got a couple just cued up questions some good jokes just I was ready I would think and the truth is when we were earlier in our relationship we didn't do well and somebody I relate this you don't do well with awkward silence because you feel the need to fill the space is weird and so we got to talk and when you early in a relationship you talk all the time non-stop that's the stage when you got the phone on you going to sleep with no you hang up no you hang up I was like you hang up like a boop okay but here's what I found the more your relationship matures with somebody you're actually really good with the awkward silence it's actually an indicator of a mature relationship that you ain't got to say all that stuff at the same time Abby Rose Metcalf could walk around that corner and I she could come around that corner and walk and sit in a seat and I could tell you exactly how her morning morning went no words spoken not yelling not interviewing her because the time spent creates a a place of communication that words just can't feel that space what am I trying to say to you there's a place you can get to your relationship with God where your prayer doesn't feel like awkward silence anymore you know you're just sitting there with God and he knows everything that's going on and you say God I'm going through so much I don't have the words to say it right now but I need your peace I need your clarity I need you I want to pray more now this was my original submission on my New Year's resolutions I want to pray more but the truth is it's a dangerous it's a dangerous one because I want to pray more okay more more how much this is what this is what we do we do this in church sometimes you just need to pray more and you read your Bible more and you go to church more my question is okay how much more I need pray more okay like like an hour more a day well that feels good why well because you made it up because an hour feels like no ten hours a day whoo okay now we're really talking that's I mean where does the

where is more you need to read your Bible more okay how much would you have to read your Bible for us to know it was enough and it was substantial and good here's what I really meant when I wrote that down is I don't want to just pray more I want to pray more like Jesus I just I don't this here, I don't want to just be yelling into the air. I don't want to just be screaming, trying to get God to do something for me, or trying to control a situation, or trying to take over something, or trying to change somebody else through my prayer, or trying to control an outcome through my prayer. No, I don't want to pray more. I want to pray more like Jesus prayed. I want to pray how he prayed. I want to do what he did. I want to go in his way. This is why, as a church, we do prayer and fasting, because Jesus does not do a miracle on the earth before this moment. He goes into the desert, and he is fasting. He's not eating. You can see it in Matthew four, before he gets baptized, and then the Bible says, the spirit led him into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil, which is a quick little thing. I always throw this out there, which means that everything is not the enemy and the devil. Sometimes God's using stuff to show you you're stronger than you think.

But this model, we get this from Jesus. I want to pray more like Jesus. So today, I want to give you three simple ideas. There's a million, but three simple ideas from the Lord's Prayer of how can we pray more like Jesus. All right, here we go. Number one, how do I pray more like Jesus? First thing you got to realize is prayer starts with God, not us. Our Father, who art in heaven. This is important. This is the context of this again. Jesus does this also in the book of Luke. They ask him, Jesus, how should I pray? And he gives them this same teaching. First off, you start off, our Father, who art in heaven. Hallowed be thy name. What he's saying is, is when you go to pray, the first position you're trying to get into is realizing God is bigger than you are and he's the thing you should be focusing on. Our Father, prayer starts with God, not us. What does that mean? We start coming in, acknowledging who he is, not what we want. It's like going in a conversation, you pick up the phone and they're like, yeah, could you just go to the store and get me this? And also, I need that. And can I get 50 bucks?

And also, could I get, all right, appreciate you, bye. Hey God, how you doing? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was wondering, could you change my husband because he is crazy, literally crazy, and I'm about to hit him in the face. Actually, I did hit him in the face, so I just want to apologize for that. So if you could change him, that'd be great. And also, kids, if you get to him, appreciate it, bye. This is how our prayers be. God, this year, 2026, if you could just do everything that I want you to do last year, this year, that'd be great, thanks. And if you could just stop for a moment and think, let me take two seconds to forget about myself. And when I come into the place of prayer, it's just, first off, God, I just want to say thank you. Man, I, last year was really difficult and you brought me through. And there were times I didn't think I was gonna make it. And I just want to say you're good and I appreciate you continue to being patient with me. I see, I am not patient with my kids, but you're still patient with me. And that's inspiring, it helps me and it reminds me that you're a good father and inspires me to be a better father. And thank you, God, for my friend, getting to work with my friends.

God, thank you for my friends. God, thank you for this church, man, what an honor. And you just spend the first however long focusing on him. And what I found is sometimes, this has been the most beautiful times of prayer in my life, is I forget what I went in there praying about. Cause you get in there for a second and you realize, oh dang, when I start to remember all the stuff he's already done and how big he is and how great he is and how kind he is, it kind of helps me remember like, man, I was mad about that person at my job. They ain't getting none of my prayer time. I ain't bringing them up in here. It's a beautiful thing. Prayer starts with God, not us. Next one, number two, prayer changes us, not God. So we going into prayer, not to change God. And I'll add this, not to change other people. Come on, man, we got to start doing this. We go in there like bringing other people, God, if you could just help them see what I see. That's not none of your business. I'm going to prayer to change me. If I get in an argument with my wife, it's probably cause I didn't see something I needed to see. I'm going into prayer. If I'm frustrated with somebody, I'm going to prayer to change me. This is what it says,

your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. What it says. The thing is, God, change my will to your will. Change what I want to what you want. And this is why prayer can be so frustrating for so many people, is because you're in there wrestling wills. You're in there trying to force God's hand to do something he said he never was gonna do. And I'm not mad at you, I'm not saying you can't have desires, I'm just saying it's gonna be really frustrating in there if you're fighting him. And let me just tell you, spoiler alert, he gonna win. There's a story in the Old Testament, a guy's wrestling God in prayer, and he keeps going, and he's like, man, he couldn't get away, he couldn't get away. Then it says the guy just touched his hip, and it's like, bam, his hip was out of socket. He was wrestling God, that brother limped for the rest of his life. They're like, what happened? He's like, oh, I was talking to God, and that's how we know. Sometimes I'll be wishing they could bring back some of them Old Testament stories. If you walk in with a limp, we all like, yeah, you was wrestling with God. Very, very funny.

Prayer changes us, not God. It's important to address this, and really, what I'm trying to get at today, and listen, this is a very simple message. I got one more point, and we about to be out of here. But here's the thing, what I've really, I was talking to a friend one time. We were watching a sermon, and I told him, you can tell how God's voice sounds to people when they pray. I can hear, I hear people's theology when they pray. It's easy money, because you start praying, and the way you kind of sequence your prayer is, God, I know I haven't done this, but if you could just help me with this, and God, I'll do this if you do that, and what I can say, oh, you think God is mad at you, and so you have to do certain things to, oh, you think God, you hear God as a yelling, angry God. That's why you yell and you're angry when you pray, because that's how God sounds to you when you pray. Oh, goodness, now y'all looking at me crazy. Just think about it, when you hear somebody pray, that's why one of the most things I love so much about my friend Bre Davis, when you hear Bre Davis pray, you feel like, she know him, that is her, she known him since she was two years old. That is her friend, and I want to know that guy, because you can hear the intimacy in her prayer. You can hear that he is a friend that is stuck by her

through times that nobody was there. You can hear that there's been shared tears and pain, but he's also restored. You can hear something in the prayer, and all I'm trying to help you with is maybe there's a thread in your prayer theology that doesn't line up, and all I'm saying is, there's some stuff you might be doing in prayer that you ain't gotta do. You ain't gotta do that. You can just talk to him. Hey, God, I am mad. As a matter of fact, I am so mad, I am so, I'm about to, woo, God, I am about to, God, I will, I promise you, if they walk over here one more time, I will hit them so hard, they will wake up at the Last Supper, and they will have to ask you for help when they come back on this side. That's a real prayer. But some of us, for some reason, we think we can't say that to God. God, if you could just help me. No, the truth is, you are angry. You are living, you are irate. You are in rage right now, and all I'm trying to help you is to connect whatever extreme emotion you find yourself in. From that emotion, you can immediately talk to God.

Some of you feel like you gotta calm down before you talk to God. You gotta calm down before you talk to your wife, but not before you talk to God. Some of y'all feel like, some of y'all are like, oh, I can't, and here's another thing that'll happen. This is a part of our bad theology. We'll make a mistake, and then you punish yourself and don't talk to God for a week. Why? Because that's what happened to you when you were a kid. When you got in trouble, parents kind of shaded you for a week, and then you kind of slowly, you know, you mope around the corner, you're like, hey, Mom, I cleaned the kitchen. Hey, Mom, I cleaned my room. Hey, God, I gave you some money, and I read my Bible. I did 21 days of prayer and fasting. You think I could come back in now? Hey, God, you think I could maybe, if you could kind of, no, that's not how this works. The moment you make a mistake, you can be in the middle of that mistake and turn and say, God, I'm so sorry. I don't know why I did that. I don't know who I am. Could you remind me who I am? I'm ordering this Uber to leave this person's house, but just help me, God, right in this moment.

That is when we need to pray. Not when you clean yourself up and not when you get it all together. Right in the middle of that mistake, you can call out. to a holy and sovereign God and he will shut down holy holy holy in heaven and say hey y'all quit praising me for just one second my child needs me i don't know where you heard that God is not ready to listen to you but it's a lie no matter what you've done no matter how dark it feels no matter the pain you're in you can talk to God in that place with frustration with tears in your eyes with cuss words in your mouth whatever it is you can talk to God because where else you're going to go who else has the words of life who else can give you the wisdom who else can guide your life who else knows the identity of who you actually are this prayer this is the answer i am convinced that half the stuff we are frustrated about is because we haven't figured out how to pray hey let me tell you a real conversation i had with my friend how much time is left i can't see these tvs what's this what the thing say oh we've 15 minutes okay perfect i got an hour uh 15 minutes to me i can do a lot 15 minutes okay so here's the thing i was talking to my friend and i was like yo this is weird and i don't even know if you can say this but thank God this friend is like the safest place in the world and i was like i feel like ever since i got like my mental like clarity in structure like i've got some routines some things i do every single morning some check-ins i do some stuff that's just got me really really sharp that's helped with just a bad attitude and just being dumb ever since i got that order i my prayer has changed a lot and i was like what i really want to say is i feel like i'm not praying as much as i should be and my friend's like oh no this is incredible this is perfect and what i learned is i had spent so much time praying about stuff that was really just the result of bad habits but when i got good habits it freed out a lot of my prayer time to pray about stuff that only God can do i'm trying to help you some of y'all spend a lot of time on prayer on stuff you could do you're just in a bad mood because you just went to sleep late and you'll be eating bad food late at night so you wake up in a bad mood that's just that's just you need to stop eating pizza at midnight you wake up and you ain't got to say that morning prayer instead of God oh help me Lord with this headache you can say God give me wisdom for the day i'm telling you y'all ain't as excited about that as i am but call me you know

that is crazy what could happen in your prayer time with God if you didn't feel a need to perform you didn't feel a need to say certain things and you were honest with him some of you i'm gonna tell you to pray a prayer that maybe seemed a little crazy but some of you need to tell God how frustrated you really are at how things have gone and maybe even at him he can handle that if you're in a healthy relationship i can say to my wife i'm mad at you i'm not going nowhere but i'm mad at you i'm frustrated just give me a second some of you you need to say that to God i prayed and you did not save them and i'm mad at you for it and i'm frustrated and i'm not going anywhere but i am frustrated and i need i need you to help me see what you are trying to do because i do not see it right now i trust you i know you say you got a plan i know we just sang the song on time God you never make a mistake or whatever the song said i don't know but i frustrated sorry that's i'm not a worship leader but you gotta be honest with God all right i'm gonna go to point three here we go i lost y'all on the the lyrics songs just be funny sometimes to me it's like on top God you i don't even know what's the next lyric you love the impossible he loves impossible man what does that even mean okay sorry he loves impossible i don't know what that means okay i this is what happens to me on the front row i'm like in it and i'm like God what does that lyric even mean you love impossible it's like an object you can't love an inanimate okay anyways you love impossible what okay it's true though so y'all believe it keep singing the song Christian all right no shade on the song the problem is with me just to be clear number three everybody be serious come on we're in church prayer is daily dependence Give us this day our daily bread. Something I love, I love studying history and it's great because I created another human to do that with, which is my son. And we will sit and listen, literally any time me and Arlo are in the car together by ourselves, we just listen to history podcasts. And it's just ridiculous stuff, but it's like our favorite thing.

And one of the things I was studying one time was about monks and the monastic way. And some of you are like, oh my gosh, monks, shabba-dabba-shabba, no, calm down, be quiet, just give me a second. And they're Christian monks and all that means is they're just more secluded and they, prayer is a lot of silence and solitude and they still love Jesus, so they're just different. But one of the things that, I read about this monk and when you become like a, I don't know what the actual term is, I'm gonna butcher this, but like a head monk, whatever that would be. On their desk, they would keep a skull, like a human head skull. And that sounds super, they would keep that. And then there was a pathway in between two buildings and pretty much where they would go to have church and then where they would go to sleep, eat, all this stuff. And on that pathway, right next to it was a massive dugout grave. And a part of their belief system was, it is healthy for me to be reminded, I'm not gonna live forever. The imagery of like skulls and like all that stuff, I know we make it like all witchcraft, but there's an early part, something called martyrs, where people were actively dying because they believed in Jesus. The Colosseum, that was us in there getting eaten

by them lions in that movie Gladiator, Christians. And there was something about the early church that related to, I'm not gonna be here forever and life is not eternal and tomorrow is not promised. And so give me this day what I need for today. Give me my daily bread. This isn't a morbid thought, it's a sobering thought to realize I don't have until tomorrow to forgive them, so I'm gonna go ahead and forgive them today. I am not promised tomorrow to do the thing God asked me to do, I'm not doing that out of fear, but I am very aware, I need wisdom for today because tomorrow is not promised. Prayer is daily dependence. It's every day I come before God, I say, hey, it's another day, thank you for waking me up, I need you to give me wisdom for today. I just need to raise it. And this has changed specifically how, and I'm very, very early on. Some of y'all has raised full kids who love Jesus, which is like the ultimate feat of a lifetime now that I have kids. I'm like, to raise a full human to full size and they still love God? Brother, you know something we all need to know. Mine are still in the small stage, you know, but every day I wake up, I'm thinking, okay, I have no idea what these kids are gonna do tomorrow or how I'm gonna deal with them tomorrow,

but God, just help me be patient and present today. That's my prayer every single day with my kids. God, help me be patient and present today. I wanna encourage you. If you are, maybe you feel overwhelmed by 2026. How's everything gonna go? What's gonna happen in the summer? Oh, I got that thing coming up, oh, my job. The Lord's prayer is beautiful because it brings you back to, hey, just daily bread. Don't worry, Jesus said, don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow has enough worries by itself. Give us our daily bread. The scripture is that our father who art in heaven, help us control when our kids go to college. God, our father who art in heaven, help us when we get to, no, our father who art in heaven, today. I just need, I need wisdom for today, I need peace for today, and what you will realize is if you get peace every single day, days turned into months, months turned into years. We're gonna close out. I wanna give you this, this is a bonus extra credit point. Prayer is not getting God's attention. You already have it. If you feel like you go into prayer, trying to do some dance to get him to see you, let me tell you something, friend, he already sees you. He's ready to listen to you, and he's ready to hear you. We're gonna close out this service,

and tomorrow, we start 21 days of prayer and fasting, and I spent the majority of my sermon talking about prayer and fasting. Short and short is abstaining from food for spiritual purposes. Now, the way I would break down fasting. is there is a difference between definition and principles. And I'm trying to bring clarity and education, not any pressure or anything wonky. But definition specifically in biblical times when they would fast, it was I'm not eating certain foods or any food so that I can get closer to God. And what happens through that, there is a connection that you cannot deny between actually not eating food and what it does to your body. There's just, you can't argue with it. My point I always throw out is if food wasn't that big of a deal, then explain to me why the thing that wrecked God's plan was man's inability to not eat an apple. We could not eat an apple. So food clearly has something to do with us on the inside. I can't explain all of it. What I am saying is there is something. There's also a deeply powerful principle behind fasting, which is giving up something you love for something you love even more. So there's a definition of fasting, which is, okay, this is about food and fasting and I do food,

but I want to take this beyond that too. For some of you, it's both ways. Either the food thing, some people, they do intermittent fasting every single day. It's their life. They just, that's how they live. So it's like, oh, this isn't maybe the same thing. But there's a principle behind that. There's maybe some other stuff you need to do that you love, that you haven't given up, that you feel like you can't give up for some reason. You can't, that's a powerful thing to dig into. The Bible's clear. This combination of prayer and fasting, it changes things. It sharpens you. It clears out the noise. It gets us to, it's not that God's not speaking. God is speaking. We just have a lot of stuff in the way. Prayer and fasting, it clears that pathway. If you've never done it before, if you have, I want to encourage everybody. Tomorrow is a fresh start, a new day, beautiful opportunity to start a new habit with God. And even enter into a new place of prayer. Would everybody stay in with me? I want to read to you the end. I read the end of this scripture, but it says this. It says, this is your father you are dealing with. And he knows better than you what you need.

With a God like this loving you, you can pray very simply. My hope and prayer for everybody is that 2026 will be a year where you could pray simple and honest prayers. Simple and honest prayers. You don't have to be complicated. You ain't got to impress God. You ain't got to say nothing fancy. Simple and honest prayers. Would you pray with me? Everybody bow your head and close your eyes. Lord God, we love you. We need you. And right now, God, we're asking that you would help us to pray more like you. Honest, simple, clear. Not trying to impress, not trying to prove, not trying to control, but simply to be with you. Pray for every person in this room who wants to pray more from an honest place, from a genuine place. God, would you allow us, Lord Jesus, to find ourselves in your presence talking to you more honestly, more than we ever have this year. For people who are on the fence of 21 days of prayer and fasting, I pray you would give them the courage and the boldness to try something new with a real dedication and an expectation of you wanting to speak to them. Every head bowed, every eye closed.

The truth is, if you're in this room, you can pray, you can fast, but the power of those things is held in who you're praying to and who you're fasting for. The truth is, the gospel of Jesus is that humans are sinful. All that means is we're broken. We make mistakes and those mistakes lead to other mistakes and those mistakes lead to pain and hurt and heartache and it leaves us broken. And if you're honest with yourself, you can look around in the world and see that there is something clearly wrong. And Jesus is the person who came to set everything right. And the way that that happens through the gospel of Jesus is he lived a perfect and sinless life. And the Bible says he died on a cross for you and for me so that the sin that rips us apart, that he could cover that sin and that we could live a life, the Bible says we could only dream of. All you gotta do is you gotta say, I surrender and I give my life to him. You don't have to perform, you don't have to stop doing a bunch of stuff. All that is religion and it's not the gospel. The gospel is right where you are, as broken as you are, as hurt as you are, as confused as you are. You can throw up both of your hands and say.

God, I don't know what to do, but I need your help. If you're in this room or watching online, and you wanna accept Jesus as your savior, you wanna say, I give up control of my life and I lay my life down to Jesus, I want a fresh start. I'm gonna count to three, and on the count of three, you're gonna raise your hand boldly. You're not gonna apologize, you're not gonna worry about nobody else besides you. This is about you, God, and eternity. And today is the day of salvation. One, he loves you. Two, this is your moment. Three, lift your hand right now, all over this room and online. I see your hand, brother, right here on the front row. I got you, sister, so many hands. Come on, y'all, people making the decision on the first of the year, I got you, brother. Proud of you, sister, I see you, ma'am. Oh, come on, y'all, keep celebrating, the whole crew of people up here. I see you, dog, so many people online. Hey, listen, together as a family, let's all pray this prayer out loud. Everybody say, dear God, I admit I've made mistakes. I need you. Save me, change me, make me new. In Jesus' name, I pray, amen. Come on, can we celebrate those who just made that decision?

Hey, listen, if you just made that choice, we're so proud of you, and we would love to know about it so we could help you and kind of help guide you so you can figure out what's next. If you text the word saved to 828282, our team would love to give you some resources to pray with you, to help you, and man, we're just so grateful. Hey, listen, tomorrow we start 21 days of prayer and fasting, 6 a.m. online, join us, 6.30 p.m. online and here locally in Tulsa. We love y'all so much. Hey, listen, if you need prayer for anything, we're gonna have prayer up here at the front, prayer people at the back, and they have been instructed to interrogate you on what you actually, no, they haven't been, but they might do that. Well, we love you so much, I wanna pray for you. God, bless these people. I thank you that 2026 is gonna be the best year as we continue to surrender our life to you. Lord, we love you. It's in the beautiful name of Jesus we pray. And everybody said, amen. We love you, friends.