When You Pray

Good to see you in the house of the Lord today on this first Sunday of 2026. If you came with a praise in your heart, can you lift it up to Jesus right here? God, you are so good. We thank you for your goodness towards us. We thank you for this brand new year, for this brand new day, for brand new mercies. Come on, let's sing together. Goodbye yesterday, I'm living in the light of a new day. I won't waste another minute in my old ways. Praise the Lord, I've been born again. Goodbye yesterday, I'm living in the light of a new day. I won't waste another minute in my old ways. Praise the Lord, I've been born again. I've been born again. Thank you, Lord. Let's sing again and again. Again and again and again and again. You rescued me out of the mess I was in. Traded my sorrow for something to sing. Now I'm dancing on the grave that I once lived in. Goodbye yesterday, I'm living in the light of a new day. I won't waste another minute in my old ways. Praise the Lord, I've been born again. Goodbye yesterday, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me. I've got a resurrection in my veins. Praise the Lord, I've been born again and again and again and again. You rescued me out of the mess I was in. You traded my sorrow for something to sing. Now I'm dancing on the grave that I once lived in. Again and again and again and again. You rescued me out of the mess I was in.

You traded my sorrow for something to sing. Now I'm dancing on the grave that I once lived in. If you've made your choice, won't you declare it here? We say, I have decided to follow Jesus. The world behind the cross before and I won't turn back. I have. I have decided to follow Jesus. The world behind the cross before and I won't turn back. I have. I have decided to follow Jesus. The world behind the cross before and I won't turn back. I have decided to follow Jesus. The world behind the cross before and I won't turn back. No, I won't turn back. No, no, no. The world behind the cross before and I won't turn back. I won't turn back. I won't turn back. No, no, no. I won't turn back. I won't turn back. The world behind the cross before and I won't turn back. Again and again and again and again. You rescued me out of the mess I was in. You traded my soul for something to sing. Now I'm dancing on the grave and I want to sing. Again and again and again and again. You rescued me out of the mess I was in. You traded my sorrow for something to sing. Now I'm dancing on the grave and I want to sing.

We sing praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. I've been born again. Oh, praise the Lord. Praise the Lord. Yes, I've been born again. If you've been born again, can you lift up a shout right here? Oh, we've got great reason to rejoice. Yes, it's a new year, but I'm thankful that I just got to see a new day. I'm thankful to have a new life in Jesus Christ and I'm thankful to be able to say that I'm no longer who I used to be because of what he's done in my life. I can do this. I can sing. Dancing on the grave that I once lived in. Somebody lift up a mighty praise! Hands together, continue to praise the Lord as we sing. ♪ I won't waste a day with worry ♪ ♪ Cause nothing in my past can stop your plans for me ♪ ♪ Though my future is a mystery ♪ ♪ Lord I know that you're preparing me ♪ ♪ Cause I've been a beggar, been a leper, been a lost for goodness sinner ♪ ♪ Even at my worst you turn my pain into glory ♪ ♪ Since I met you, life is better, living in your friend forever ♪ ♪ Even at my best you turn my praise into glory ♪ We sing. ♪ God I thank you, Lord I thank you ♪ ♪ You always go before you make a way for me ♪ ♪ God I thank you, Lord I thank you ♪ ♪ No matter what I'm gonna give my praise to you ♪ Come on, is that you today? No matter what, we're gonna praise the Lord.

Hallelujah. ♪ For all you've done, Lord ♪ Sing, I remember all you've brought me through. Sing it to Him. ♪ I remember all you've brought me through ♪ ♪ Every sorrow turned to joy because of you ♪ ♪ Though there's pain within my suffering ♪ ♪ Lord I know that you're preparing me ♪ ♪ Cause I've been a beggar, been a lover, been a lost and a failure sinner ♪ ♪ Even at my worst you turn my pain into glory ♪ ♪ Since I met you, life is better, living in your friend forever ♪ ♪ Even at my best you turn my praise into glory ♪ ♪ God I thank you, oh I thank you ♪ ♪ You always know before it makes a way for me ♪ ♪ God I thank you, oh I thank you ♪ ♪ No matter what I'm gonna give my praise to you ♪ Put your hands together. ♪ No matter what, no matter what I'm gonna give my praise to you ♪ ♪ Cause he's worthy of all the glory ♪ Come on, so we declare the new thing he's doing. ♪ I see that you are doing a new thing for me ♪ ♪ You are making a way for me ♪ ♪ I see that you are doing a new thing for me ♪ ♪ I see that you are working it all for me ♪ ♪ I see that you are doing a new thing for me ♪ He makes a way. ♪ I see that you are doing a new thing for me ♪ ♪ Believe that you are working it all for me ♪ ♪ God I thank you, oh I thank you ♪ ♪ You always go before it makes a way for me ♪

Come on church sing. ♪ God I thank you, oh I thank you ♪ ♪ No matter what I'm gonna give my praise to you ♪ Hallelujah. ♪ No matter what I'm gonna give my praise to you ♪ Oh come on if you need that church sing it one more time. ♪ No matter what I'm gonna give my praise to you ♪ Come on praise the Lord with me. Hallelujah who is happy to be in the house of God this Sunday? Amen me too. If I wanna invite you church, feel free to take the next minute, step out of your seats and greet the people around you. Say hello to your friends, say hello to some new faces. God bless you church family. Hallelujah. Well good afternoon church, how are we feeling this afternoon? Happy New Year. Well welcome to faith, we are so excited you are joining us today. How you feeling Pastor Kaimana? I'm feeling great because I'm speaking for some of the parents in the room. break is over and these kids are going back to school. Yes, thank you for your support. So, I'm feeling good. Yeah. We're feeling great. We're feeling great. Well, we want to take a moment and just welcome those who are joining us here in the room or joining us online. We're so excited you're joining us for the very first service of the year. Come on.

And it might be your first service of the year if you're in this room, but it also might be the first time you've ever been to Faith. And we want to recognize you and say thank you for joining us. So, if you go ahead and wave for me and our church family is going to go crazy, would you wave at me and let me see if you're here? Oh, I see some people in the middle. Hello. So glad you guys are here. Some people in the risers. Go ahead and keep those hands up so our ushers can put a little booklet of info in them. We're so glad that you're here. And if you are here with us for the very first time, we want to invite you to do something. If you haven't encountered one of our connection points or people with the yellow t-shirts in the lobby, we want to invite you, if you're new with us, pull out your phone and tap the touch tap right in front of you in the seat. We have a connect card. We'd love for you to fill that out just so we could be in touch with you and know that you're visiting with us today. And before you leave today, we do have a reception for you just outside right after the service in the atrium behind the grand staircase. We have our connection hub. Stop by there before you leave today. We'd love to answer any questions that you have. Meet you and meet your family. Once again, we're so excited that you're here visiting us for the very first time. One more time, church. Can we just thank those for being here today for the first time? Yes. And you guys know here at faith, we're never not doing something. And so we have so many cool things going on this month, including on a lot of our Fridays. So next Friday is our ministry teams conference. And that is for anyone that volunteers or serves. We see some of our ushers in the back helping seat people. Maybe you've seen people with the yellow shirts on. All of our volunteers are invited to this. It's an equipping and an encouraging event. But also I see some faces in here that maybe need to start joining a serve team or get involved in some kind of leading and serving way. And so if you've ever just wondered what it might be like to do that, you can also come to ministry teams conference. Make sure that you scan the QR code or tap the back of your seat. So good. And we're in our 21 days of prayer and fasting. So we're going to be praying a little bit more. And we want to invite you this Wednesday. We're having a night of prayer. We're also having another night of prayer this Friday. So make plans this Wednesday, this Friday, bring the family out. We're going to pray. We're going to seek the Lord together. So I wanted to let you know about that. Those are going to be happening all throughout the month. Some amazing nights of prayer. But this Wednesday, this Friday, make plans to come on out and pray with us. Yeah. And like he said, we're doing the 21 days of fasting. We started on the first. It's

not too late to join, but we have a podcast going on this month that's kind of supposed to supplement your praying and your fasting. There's going to be different staff members and pastors on there talking about fasting and different testimonies, hopefully to just encourage you, equip you, walk alongside of you. You can basically find that anywhere that there's a podcast available, including on the faith app. So good. So many great things are happening here around the church. And one of the things that we want to continue to do in our service today is we want to continue by giving to the Lord with our tithes and our kingdom builders offerings. And we like to celebrate that here, giving back to the Lord and the ways they give are going to be on the screen. You can get digitally. The buckets will pass if you have a physical offering. But I want to read a scripture from Matthew chapter six. And it says this for where your treasure is there, your heart will be also. I was really thinking about this scripture because I think everybody in this room, we would agree that we would want the Lord to be the number one priority in our life this year. I think we would all agree on that. And one of the ways that we can keep the Lord a priority is by putting him first in our finances. Then here at the church, we believe in the two kind of ways of giving that are outlined in scripture. The first is this this way of obedience of returning the tithe, the first 10 percent of our increase back to the Lord. That's what we call the tithe. And then the second way of giving is anything above that. That would be considered generosity. As we look at scripture, anything above that would be something we call kingdom builders here. And that goes to all of our global and local projects all around the world. There's thousands of missionaries and projects that we are a part of, that you are a part of because of your generosity. So as we get ready to give, the ways to give will be on the screen. I'm going to pray and then we're going to give to the Lord and put him first. And something something cool is going to happen in our hearts as we do that. So let's pray and then we'll get together. Lord, as we begin this year, we honor you and we look to you and we put you first in every single area of our life. And God, as we tithe, as we give above the tithe, as we build your kingdom, it's a privilege for us to be a part of what you're doing. So, Lord, we give all of this to you. We honor you and we pray all these things in Jesus name. God bless you as you give. ♪ ♪ ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ If the bucket has already passed your row, if you wouldn't mind go ahead and standing up with me. ♪ ♪ Psalm 42 verse 1 says this, As the deer pants for the water, so my soul longs after you. As the deer pants for the water, so my soul longs after you. Each and every one of us has a God-shaped hole in our heart. Something, it's a hole that only, only God can fill. But if we're honest, so often because we live in this world, we hunger for the things of this world. Success, stuff, things that are temporary. If we're honest with ourselves, sometimes we thirst for the ways of this world. Control, anything to cope, anything to deal. But the bottom line is, only God can satisfy. Only God can fix. Only God can make us whole. Psalms 121 verse 1 and 2 says this,

Where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, maker of heaven and earth. And that's the truth. So can we seek him right now? Can we just raise our hands up to heaven and seek God first Sunday of the year? Let's not think about stuff. Let's not think about our agenda. Let's not think about all the unanswered things that we have, what we have to do later today. Can we just seek God? Because he is God and only he can satisfy, not his stuff, him, his presence. Let me just challenge you in this place. Let me invite you to just come up to the altar right now. Come up to the altar and just raise your hands up and just seek him. Seek him together as a family. Maybe you're in this place and it's been hard to press in, hard to just hear his voice. Let me invite you to come down so that we can pray with you and agree with you and seek God as a family. No need to be shy or ashamed. We're family here. And if you're in this place and you're a believer, go ahead and start worshiping him in your seats. We don't have to wait for the band to start, for the music to start. The word of God says he inhabits the praises of his people.

So come on, believers. Start calling down heaven right now. Start worshiping him. Worshiping him in spirit and in truth so that he could show up in this place in a new way. My God, we seek you. My God, we want you. My God, you are king of kings and you are lord of lords. My God, only you can satisfy. Forgive us, my God, for seeking other things. Forgive us, my God, for doing things the way the world does it. My God, we want you, Jesus. We want you, your truth, your way. Come on, church. Come on, church. Press in. There is nothing like your praise. There is nothing like your worship. There is nothing like your song. Come on. Come on, come on, come on. Maybe this is the first time you've been in an atmosphere like this. Just tell him that you love him. Tell him that you need him. Invite him into your heart. Invite him into this place. Come on. Just surrender it all. Surrender it all right now. Holy Spirit, we seek you.

Holy God, we seek you like never before. Come on, Holy Spirit. Come on, guys. Press in. Press in. Press in. How we need you, Lord. Praise after you, Lord, as we sing. My soul longs for you. As the deer pants for the waters. Oh, my soul longs for you. My soul thirsts for you. For a fount that won't run dry. And so my soul thirsts for you. When I seek you. I know I'll find you when I seek you with my whole heart. Yes, when I seek you, I know I'll find you, because we know that nothing else can satisfy me. This is our prayer today, church. I don't want to go one day without you, but I don't want to miss one thing you say. I just want to know you more than I did the day before. Lord, I'm desperate for you. My heart clings, my heart clings to you, because without you, I am nothing. Oh, my heart clings to you. My heart yearns for you. When I'm with you, we are face to face. My heart yearns for you, Lord. He said, when I seek you.

When I seek you, I know I'll find you. When I seek you with my whole heart, the word tells us, God, that when I seek you, I know I'll find you, because nothing else will satisfy me. And I don't want to go. I don't want to go one day without you. I don't want to even try to make it without you, Lord. And I don't want to miss one thing you say. But I just want to know you more than I did the day before. Lord, I'm desperate for you. Come on, if you want to grow in your relationship with the Lord, won't you tell him today, I don't. I don't want to go one day without him. I want to be closer, Lord. And I don't want to miss one thing you say. But I just want to know you more than I did the day before. Lord, I'm desperate for you. Oh, Lord, I'm desperate. Lord, I'm desperate for you. Oh, God, hear the cries of your people, your people who are prioritizing your presence over everything else today. God, we declare, Lord, I'm desperate. Lord, I'm desperate for you. If you're being intentional this year about the presence of God in your life, in your household, I invite you to lift your hands to heaven. And let's declare who he is today. Sing. You're the bread of life.

You're my heart's desire. Oh, I'm hungry for more of you. And you're the spring of life, the well that won't run dry. Oh, I'm thirsty for more of you. You are. You're the bread of life. Oh, you're my heart's desire. Oh, I'm hungry for more, more of your presence every day. You're the spring of life, the well that won't run dry. Oh, I'm thirsty for more of you. One more time, you're the bread. You're the bread of life. You're my heart's desire. Oh, I'm hungry for more. According to the thirsty soul, you're the spring of life, the well that won't run dry. Oh, I'm thirsty for more of you. We want more of you, Lord. Yes, we do. We need you, Lord. Lord, we draw in close to you because we sense you're doing the same thing to us, Lord. We sing to you, Lord. When I feel distant, you close the gap. Nothing can come between us. No hide, no dare. Can't separate. There is no life apart from you. In the morning and evening. You're reminding my soul. That you're closer than ever. Never far cause I know. There's no where I could hide but you won't be. There's no where I could hide, but you won't find me. Even at my worst, you'll never leave. Everywhere I go, you're right beside me. There's no where I could hide but you won't be. There's no where I could hide, but you won't find me. My worst, you'll never leave. Oh everywhere I go, you're right beside me. Come on, aren't you grateful for that truth today? As I draw near, you're drawing closer.

This is my confidence in you. And you won't relent, you have my heart, Lord. All that I am, I give to you. We sing in the morning and evening. You're reminding my soul that you're closer than ever. I'll never fall because I know. There's no where I could run, but you won't be. There's no where I could hide, but you won't find me. Even at my worst, you'll never leave. Everywhere I go, you're right beside me. There's no where I could run, but you won't be. There's no where I could hide, but you won't find me. Even at my worst, you'll never leave. Everywhere I go, you're right beside me. Come on, would you draw near to Him right now with your hands lifted to heaven and surrender to His presence? Let this be your cry today as we sing. I want to be near. Close to your heart, wrapped in your arms clear. Tune into your voice through all of the noise here. Your presence is where I know who I am. I never want to leave your side knowing you changed my life. I want to be near. Close to your heart, wrapped in your arms clear. So I can hear you speak. Tune into your voice through all of the noise here. Your presence. Your presence is where I know who I am. I never want to leave your side knowing you changed my life. I want to be near.

So close. Close to your heart, wrapped in your arms clear. Yes, I need you, Lord. Tune into your voice through all of the noise here. Your presence is where I know who I am. I never want to leave your side knowing you changed my life. I want to be near. Yes, we do. Close to your heart, wrapped in your arms clear. Oh, Jesus. Tune into your voice through all of the noise here. Your presence is where I know who I am. Sing. I never want to leave your side knowing you changed my life. I want to be near. I want to be close. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord. Church. Church, can I remind you of one of the most amazing promises in God's word? And it's in James chapter 4. God tells us that when we draw near to God, God draws near to us. What an incredible promise that when we decide, I'm going to get closer to you, God says, okay, I'm coming closer to you. I guess you could say it this way. We're as close to God as we want to be. You're as close to God right now as you want to be. Does anybody want to find a greater desire for more intimacy with God? To know God more? And if you'll join me in that, come on.

Why don't you lift up a hand to heaven and just, let's do that. Let's draw closer. Let's draw close to him knowing that he's going to draw close to us. Father, thank you. your presence and we do we hunger and thirst for you we do draw near to you we want to be close so god and i pray god that anything that would separate us anything god that would create a distance lord god anything going on in our life that would that would be a hindrance to us being close to you and knowing you will oh god we just pray get it out of the way take it away and move it out of our heart move it out of our life give us a heart that seeks after you and i thank you for your presence and we pray even now god may we encounter the fullness of who you are in our life and we want you we need you in jesus name come on if you believe that would you give god praise in this place amen amen god bless you you can be seated today and i am so glad that you're here on this first sunday of 2026 uh how's 2026 treating you so far okay i'm gonna pray it gets better then all right if it hasn't gotten off to a good start it's coming all right uh good things are coming in jesus name it's gonna be a great year just speaking that out over your life right now in jesus name and so uh we are in a season of 21 days of fasting and prayer and we're gonna i'm gonna share a little bit on that in a moment and uh but before we jump into the word today and if you want you can go to matthew chapter 6 but before we jump into the word today i'm gonna ask for two families to come and join me here on the stage and you can give them a hand as they come and uh this is the morales and the montalvas and here's what is uh here's what's kind of special about why they're up here you maybe heard and remembered back in october we launched our vision to have the faith 100 which would be 100 missionaries who are in full-time uh missionary work overseas and um these are two of our couples and two of our families that are getting ready to leave actually and we're taking that toy with us when we go uh but we're getting ready to leave in on wednesday right wednesday this week and uh southern asia morale says you guys are going southern asia and then malawi on the continent of africa uh for karen michael and so we're just going to pray for them and pray god's hand of protection over their life that god would anoint them in a special way and we're so excited to get to be a part of this journey with you and to be um we want to send you in a in a very uh you know spiritual way here as well and pray over uh your your life and your family so if you would would

you stretch your hands towards uh them as we pray for them father in jesus name we just come to you and i thank you god for the call of god on their life i thank you god for the way that you're going to use um these families in jesus name lord for jodi and we just pray god just anointing on her life an angel lord i just pray god a fresh anointing god even on on wednesday may they just sense got a a new level got a double portion and i just thank you father in jesus name for karen michael and we just pray god protection upon their their families god and lord that you would just use them lord we thank you that people will encounter jesus because they said yes to the call of god on their life to go and so god we pray that you'd surround them and meet every need and uh give them great joy as they serve you in jesus name and everybody said amen give it up for the kids come on come on great job guys we're excited for you and we will be praying continue to be praying for them if you would and uh let me do one other thing if you would indulge me before i get into the word today but today is also my mom is here in this service and today is her birthday so uh right here it's today's her birthday and uh so we're excited to have you with us in service and today's what is it 39th is that what it is yeah her 39th birthday is today so praise god for that so i'm thankful for a good mom and happy birthday to you all right matthew chapter 6 matthew chapter 6 as i said we are in this season of fasting and prayer and i want to mention this is if you if you did not uh if you weren't able to attend last week's service and i know we say this from time to time but i always mean it when i say this one's especially true uh if you did not get to be at last week's service or have not seen it yet i'm going to encourage you please go on and watch last sunday's message it was really a pivotal moment for our church we kind of announced our word of the year for 2026 our our word as a church for 2026 is seek we're gonna be seekers we're gonna be seekers after God's face seekers after God's will and seekers after God's call in our life to seek and save that which is lost and so we talked all through that last week and talked about what it looks like to start this year with the 21 days of fasting and prayer it's kind of like we're tithing the year it's like the first part man we are super seeking after God and it's not that we stop seeking this is gonna set the trajectory of our years gonna give us momentum in our is anybody with me today it's gonna give us momentum in our year and see God do some amazing things and so today at the end of service if

you did not if you weren't here last week and you didn't get one of these it's a little bag tag or a keychain however you want to use it put it somewhere that you'll see it a lot just as a reminder of what we're doing this year we are we are seekers this year and so he didn't grab one get one today on your way out you'll see them us just don't have them on the way out if you got one last week don't take one this week don't be like that all right ain't nobody being like that all right and it's one per person please we just want to make sure everybody gets one who wants one but so anyway yeah we are starting we're three to four days into the fast and man y'all look I could tell y'all look spiritual when I came in today it was awesome and so thank you for seeking God with us so let's we shared a couple different verses last week that kind of were pillar verses for our year but I'd say maybe the one key verse if I was gonna narrow it down to one that would be our key verse for the year it would be Matthew 6 verse 33 Matthew 6 verse 33 says but seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things Jesus is kind of summing up Matthew chapter 6 really summing up Christianity isn't he that we're gonna seek first the kingdom of God and all his righteousness so that's why we're starting this year off at this season of fasting and prayer and I was thinking about the fast and what we're doing this year as we start the year and I was remembering back to another season of fasting and prayer that we were doing this probably would have been 18 or 19 years ago and we were doing a 21 day fast and during that 21 day fast I was doing all food for all 21 days so I wasn't doing any anything other than liquids and so whatever I could you know water and juice mostly is what I had during that 21 days and I don't know we were probably maybe 10 to 14 days into it okay so it'd been oh it'd been a minute that we've been fasting and it was a Sunday night it was after church I was playing basketball and was with some guys and I brought my kids with me they used to come and watch play and so there I was playing basketball as I remember it correctly I was on fire I was making

all my baskets and everybody was really impressed with my skills that's how I choose to remember my story amen and I do remember this part that that the ball goes out of bounds and so I went over to get the ball and I was coming back in to the court now when I went to go get the ball one of my kids was right there where the ball was and it was right in the middle of the game but they had a bag of Skittles and my son one of my sons had a bag of Skittles he goes dad do you want some and I was like yeah and he put him in my hand and I put him in my mouth and I started chewing and man I tasted the rainbow it was just like my brain and my body kind of came to life and they're like oh we're doing this again we're chewing again this is awesome and I was like wait no we're not chewing again like oh no I blew it and so I lost all the reward that God had for me during that fast that one night and since it was already ruined I went ahead and after I got done playing basketball went got a cheeseburger and just gave up totally on the fest no that's not true okay and the reason why I share that is because a time of fasting is not a time of legalism it's not a time of like oh no because some of you started on January 1st and you were like going strong and then you had some Skittles on January 2nd all right you already and so now you're like well I might as well wait till next year no jump back in if you've never fasted before fast for maybe seven days and just try some different things and again that's what last week was about and we talked about some different types of fast and wait how to get started in fasting and there's also a lot of information on the app and on that podcast we talked about and so prayer service is also this Wednesday night this Friday night prayer services so come out to those and pray with us and and let's start the year off right somebody say amen and one more thing is the following Friday night so that's the not this Friday night next Friday night the 16th we mentioned that ministry teams conference and I want to encourage you to come out be be at that ministry teams conference especially If you serve, of course we'll see you there. But if you don't serve anywhere,

or if you just wanna come to church on that Friday night, come out, and it's gonna be an awesome service. Ministry Teams Conference, Friday night, January 16th. Okay, so let's get into this. Jesus in Matthew chapter six, he actually gives three duties of every Christian, okay? He says it this way. He says, when you give, give this way. He says, when you fast, fast this way. And he says, when you pray, don't pray this way, pray this way. Did you know that there is a wrong way to pray? Did you know you can pray incorrectly? I mean, this is a whole thing. Like, I can pray ineffective prayers, and maybe because I haven't even looked at the warnings that Jesus gives, Jesus actually gives some warnings on the wrong way to pray, and then he follows that up with some right things and some positive things, and then he gives a model in prayer. And so, and I want you to know that on all of those, these duties that he lays out for Christians, when he says, when you give, when you fast, when you pray, none of those does he say if. So Jesus expected that you were gonna be a person who prays. Jesus didn't say, if you pray, pray this way. Jesus didn't say, if you find the time and nothing else is going on, then pray this way. No, he said, when you pray, this is how you pray.

When you give, give this way. When you fast, fast this way. So Jesus thought these disciplines were gonna be a part of your life, but he also gave some warnings as we pursue prayer. And so, I'm gonna talk about when we pray today, and let's look at Matthew chapter six, the section that Jesus teaches here on prayer. Matthew six, five through 13, and here we go. The words of Jesus, and Jesus said, and when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners. They love 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. Look at this, then your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. Verse seven, and when you pray, don't keep babbling on like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Don't be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. This, then, is how you should pray. And then Jesus gives this model prayer that we're familiar with. 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 also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. So here's Jesus' teaching on prayer that begins with when you pray, not if you pray. So he totally expects you to pray. And listen, this is our response to Jesus' expectation on us that we're gonna pray. We don't see prayer as an obligation because of that. No, we see prayer as an invitation. We see prayer as an opportunity to know God. That's good news, somebody in this house. Listen, we don't see it as something that we have to do, oh, and they're making us start the year this way. No, this is gonna be an incredible journey of intimacy with God. We're gonna be seekers after God in 2026. Somebody say amen, amen. But let's see, when you pray, and let's see what Jesus taught in these warnings that he gave. So first thing I would say would be this as I summarize it. When you pray, your prayers should be sincere. That's one of the warnings that Jesus gives is a lack of sincerity in prayer. So look what Jesus said, verse five. When you pray, don't be like the hypocrites. What made them hypocrites?

They love to pray standing in the synagogues. They love to pray on the street corners to be seen by everybody else. He said, truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But he says in verse six, when you pray, go into your room, close the door, pray to your father who's unseen, and your father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. All right, let's talk about this insincere prayer, this prayer that is to be seen by other people. He talked about these hypocrites that would stand in the synagogue and they would pray to be seen by everybody. Is Jesus forbidding public prayer? I mean, I hope he's not, because I just did it. I just led a prayer for our missionaries, and I did it publicly, and you guys heard me, and so hopefully Jesus wasn't condemning that kind of behavior, and he wasn't. What Jesus was condemning is if that's the only kind of prayer that I have in my life is the prayer. It would be a problem if I, as your pastor, come up here before I preach a message and I pray my one prayer of the week. Lord, bless this message in Jesus' name. That's the problem. I guess we could say it this way.

It's not a problem for you to pray in a gathering like this. We start to hint towards a problem if this is the only gathering, if this is the only place that you ever pray. Say, Pastor, I can pray in this service. I'm not praying to be seen by people. You can pray in here without being, but boy, I am getting close to the line of it's just about a public thing and it's never a private thing. That's what Jesus was saying. Jesus is saying, listen, when you pray, go into your room. Have some times where you shut the door. Have some times when maybe nobody else is there and you are just praying to your Father in heaven. And then Jesus says something that is so much more incredible than we give it credit for. Jesus said, your Father, who sees what is done in secret when you're praying, will reward you. Are you kidding me? You mean that God is gonna reward me if I learn how to pray, if I learn how to have sincere, like if sincere, rightly motivated prayer is promised to be rewarded by our heavenly Father, then why don't we pray? Like what would keep us from praying? Why would we rather dry up than pray

when we have been promised by God that he's gonna reward us when we pray? When I was in college, I was talking about playing basketball a minute ago. And when I was in college, I played basketball in college, in a small college. And we used to go through our basketball practices and I would just be thirsty all the way through practice. And it wasn't a thing where you could just run off the court real quick and grab a drink. The practices were scheduled and the drink breaks were scheduled as well. You didn't even think about going and getting a drink until they told you you could go get a drink. And they would schedule those drink breaks right before everybody passed out. That was about the time that you got to go get a drink is when everybody was about ready to pass out. And so I would be so thirsty, it kind of scarred me. Like I hate being thirsty. We used to have to go on two-mile runs being on that team. And they had this road that just went out in the country. We had to run a mile out in the middle of the country and there was a line that was painted on the road. And then we turned around and we ran back. And on that whole route, there was no water fountains, there was no convenience stores, there was nobody out there holding cups like at a marathon for me to grab on my way through.

I would come back so thirsty. And they say that the human body can go about maybe three to four days without any water and without any liquid. Now can you imagine if I had been to basketball practice and I'd ran my two miles and I hadn't drank or any kind of liquid or any water for three or four days. And I get done with practice and I get done with my run and I stumble in to my dorm room and I sit down and I lean back and I pass out from dehydration. And they come and look at me, dehydrated, passed out, near death. And they go, look, there's a sink right there. Why did he never just turn on the water? Like why did he go through this dehydration? Why is he passed out? Why is he near death when all he had to do was turn on the faucet? Why is it, do we dry up spiritually when the God of the universe says, I'll be your sustenance, I'll be your spiritual life, I'll be your support. And yet we don't open up, we don't open up the faucet of prayer and say, God, yes, I need you, I'm dry. We never get to the point of David was in Psalm 63, when he said, oh God, you are my God and earnestly I seek you. My soul thirsts for you, my flesh faints for you

in a dry and weary land where there is no water. Why do we dry up instead of just praying when God our Father said, I'll reward you if you will? To be honest, just like, I don't know, week and a half, two weeks ago, I went through a couple days where I wasn't in my normal prayer times and honestly, I felt, I don't know, I just felt off. Felt like I was a million miles from God and I started thinking about it and I just, man, I need to pray. And so I put in headphones and put on some worship music and you don't have to have worship music on when you pray, but I did this time and I just decided I'm just gonna go on a walk and pray. Church, I'm gonna tell you, I mean, those first couple steps. that walk I just felt like God just goes oh I've been waiting he just came it was just like it's like it's like a faucet was turned on and I was in his presence and he was so and I just started thinking why why don't we do that when Jesus promised that when he shows up it it's it's going to make a difference in our life our prayers should be sincere when you pray your prayers should be simple and to be honest this keeps some of us from praying the very warning that Jesus gives here Jesus said that when you pray don't keep babbling on like pagans what's he talking about here there were there were uh gentiles who um just said like part of their there was these incantations they would just say these words over and over and over again these phrases over and over and over again to try to invoke some false god and so they would just they would just mindlessly chant these words and this is what Jesus is calling out here he says don't don't keep babbling on like the pagans they think they'll be heard because of their many words but he said don't be like them for your father knows what you

need before you ask him your father already knows what you need before you ask him and for being honest the same thing that Jesus warns about here is keeping some of us from praying because we don't think we have the vocabulary of prayer in our in our in our life we don't think we have the right words and so we hear somebody that might pray on a microphone from time to time and it's all eloquent and it's all spiritual and it's all biblical and we go well i can't do that so i guess i don't know how to pray no Jesus is warning against that very thought when he says it's not about these bunch of words it's just about the sincerity of your heart and you approaching your father knowing that he knows what you need even before you get there author Francis Chan said i think many of us don't experience the power of prayer because we are too busy telling God what to do rather than asking him who he is our prayers should be simple and there's not some complicated thing that you have to do you just have to pray and thirdly our prayers when you pray your prayers should be scriptural your prayers should be scriptural so Jesus gives these two warnings followed by two positives and then he gives this model prayer this scriptural prayer and this is what it says in verse nine this thing 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 that's the model prayer the lord's prayer a lot of people call it it's important for us to realize and note this that Jesus did not say pray this prayer he didn't say when you pray pray this he said when you pray pray like this he didn't say when you pray pray this no he said when you pray pray prayers like this when you this is how he said this is how you should pray not what you should pray and so it's important that we understand that there's nothing wrong with memorizing this model prayer but Jesus was trying to get more out of you than just to recite some paragraph uh over and over again matter of fact he was discouraging that kind of behavior in this very text so no he's saying this is a model of prayer to kind of use some of these same principles and so as i was pulling these principles out of the lord's prayer i found a uh an acronym that will help us to be better at praying to be more scriptural in our in our prayer life and i want to i just want to show this to you and it comes with the word acronym with the word pray so we got pray there p stands for praise and r would stand for repent a stands for ask and y stands for yield so this could be these four components could be a part of of your of your prayer life and we've been doing as part of the fast seek at seven and so 7 a.m

and 7 p.m and i don't know if you've done uh your 7 a.m this morning 12 o'clock service maybe not all right let's be honest all right maybe you weren't up at seven this morning uh i was and i did my seek at seven with the pastors and we were seeking after god at 7 a.m here at the church but maybe you've not done seek at seven yet so 7 p.m tonight would be the time to do this and and you can practice that uh this using this uh using this guide uh for prayer we're also this is going to be really awesome at the end of the service we're also going to do something very very special all together and i'm i'm reserving time in the service we'll get out a normal time but i'm reserving time at the end of the service for us to pray practice this together, and I want you to hold in and do this with us, it's gonna be incredible. We're gonna do our own kind of seek moment here altogether. But let's walk through these. So we got P, in the word pray, P stands for praise. We think about like worship and praise and what a great way that is to enter into prayer. Can I tell you what's kind of making prayer difficult for some of you? Some of you enter into prayer with just your list of things that you want God to do. It's like, you start by going, okay, God, I need this, I need this, I need you to do this, and we need this to happen and that to happen. Good prayer time, thank you, God. And you're like, why don't I feel anything? I wanna encourage you, start your time of prayer with worship and praise. Start your time of prayer with our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. That's how Jesus started his model prayer. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.

And I know what somebody's thinking in this place, that they go, well, I don't know if I'm worthy to worship because I've met pastor, you don't understand, man, what I did even this last weekend, and I got some stuff going on, and there's compromise in my life, and there's sin in my life, and there's secret things going on, and I don't feel like I'm worthy to worship a holy God. And listen to me, that is the wrong question to ask. The question is not, are you worthy to worship God? The question is, is God worthy of your worship? And I'm telling you, the answer is yes to that. Of course he is. And so we begin our worship, we begin our prayer times with worship, and it's worshiping a Father. Jesus actually uses the word Father 10 times in 18 verses in Matthew chapter six. He uses, he's trying to, that repetition is speaking something to us, that God is our Father, and God wants intimacy, and worship brings that intimacy with our Father. When my kids were all little and growing up, I don't really ever hardly remember them ever coming up to me, needing me for something, and me saying, not right now, get away. Like, I don't remember it, and I know that sometimes we're busy, and things happen, I'm not saying I never did,

I don't remember ever doing it. I can tell you this, the things I remember, I remember being in youth service on a Wednesday night as a youth pastor, and I remember still being on those altars, praying for students, and just seeing God radically change people, and I can remember seeing some of my kids come running down the aisle. It was on a Wednesday night, they hadn't seen me much that day because of youth service, and they were excited to see their dad. You know what, and as they ran towards me, even if I was praying for somebody, I never said, hey, get away, not right now. You know what I would do? I'd pick up whatever son or daughter that was, and I'd just keep on praying. I'd say, how's your day? Oh, good, all right, Lord, help this student right now, and I would just, you know why? Because that's just the heart of a father, and there's a reason why Jesus refers to the Father 10 times in this passage when he's trying to get you to pray, okay? He's saying, I don't want you to see prayer as this thing where you're bringing your, don't think about prayer like I gotta bring my list to God, and I gotta bring my needs to God. Think about prayer like this, the fact of the creator of the universe

is listening to you as a father. That's how you should be thinking about prayer. What an incredible privilege this is that the God of the universe listens to us, welcomes us like a good, good father would. So pray, acronym starts with praise. We're gonna start our prayer time with praise. R stands for repent, but what's repent mean? Repent means to turn. Repent means to find forgiveness, and no matter how spiritual you think you are, no matter how long you've been saved, no matter how long you come to church, don't ever get to the place that you don't think God can't convict you. No, you need to be in a place where daily you're saying, God, convict me. Daily, you are asking God, God, what doesn't sit right in my life? God, what attitude doesn't belong? What behavior doesn't belong? What words did I speak that were misspoken? God, what relationships do I need to bring reconciliation in? You're asking God to bring conviction on your life and saying, God, I am willing to turn away from anything that would, what we're doing in that we're clearing the air. We're clearing our soul, what for? For that intimacy, that intimacy with God. So part of that intimacy with God

is God, anything that keeps that intimacy from being absolutely vibrant in my life, Lord, show it to me, and I'll leave it here. Repent is a regular part of your prayer, daily repentance. A stands for ask in this, and Jesus' teaching on prayer, that's where he says, give us today our daily bread. We're asking him to meet our needs and there's nothing wrong with that. Okay, there's there's no There's no problem with us bringing our maybe it's not the only thing we're gonna do in prayer, but that's a part of prayer Yes, God wants to help you. God wants to give you direction. God wants to give you provision God wants to give you help. God wants to encourage you. God wants to heal you So yes pray and ask for these things from God This should be a part of our prayer life and I know what maybe somebody's thinking Well, I I prayed one time and God didn't answer my prayers I don't think God answers my prayers and so people get overly concerned about unanswered prayers Let me tell you what you should be concerned about more than unanswered prayer be concerned about unasked prayers That's what we should be concerned about is prayers that are not offered prayer Times that we are not coming to God and saying God I need your help Times when we are sending a message to God saying God I got this on my own Oh, I don't want to live that way. I want to ask for God's help So daily asking for God's help A for ask and then Y would stand for yield This is the part of the Lord's Prayer where Jesus says your kingdom come Your will be done I'm yielding to you I think we said it last week that a season of fasting and prayer is not about getting God to do what we want him to do It's about us Yielding our will And saying it's not about what I want. I want I got I want to be doing what you're doing I want to be headed where you're headed. I want to be moved by where you're moving God

It's that yielding and this should be a regular part of our life where we say God anything any direction Any calling anything in your word that I'm not yielded to any any area of pride or arrogance or Selfishness Lord, I yield this and surrender this to you So that's using the Lord's Prayer P starting with praise R Repentance A We ask and Y we yield and we're gonna practice this together and I love what Oswald Chambers said Oswald Chambers said prayer does not fit us for the greater work Prayer is the greater work. I Say that one more time prayer does not we think about it fitting us for this Well, I'll pray so that I can do something great and no prayer is the greater work That's why I'm asking you to be a part of this closing moment where we're gonna pray and seek Together and we're gonna walk through this this model of prayer that we've but we pulled from Jesus's model prayer this this Standard that we can use. So why don't if you would just do this with me if you would stand to your feet And let's pray together. Let's seek together. We got time in this service And so the first P is Praise We're have the worship team come and help and lead us in a moment of worship and praise and and I know we go Yeah, but that's the problem pastors. I don't have the worship team at my house on Monday night So, how am I supposed to worship without them? First of all, you can't have them via stream okay, they will show up on iTunes for you, but Even if you don't have it, it's we're not gonna worship because they're leading us. We're gonna worship because he's worthy So it we're not leaning on this. Yeah, we'll use it now together But you can do this at any place on your own let's worship God together. Come on. Let's begin this this PRA Why let's begin it with praise. Let's begin it with worship right now. Come on Maybe lift up a hand to heaven just begin to worship him even now give him praise even now Lord

You are high and you are lifted up. We exalt you Jesus. Oh, come on I know somebody's going I don't know how to pray. Come on. We're we're learning. Let's learn together right now. Let's do this We worship you Jesus we worship you Jesus we worship you Jesus come on no matter where you're at in God Worship him. He's worthy Your name stands above them all We worship you God be exalted Oh God That's it, come on give him praise give him praise Something you need to learn To touch the heart of the Father again Let's go We need you Jesus. We need you Lord Your name is the highest The highest Lord is the greatest Is the highest Is the greatest You're a great God All thrones Come on, for 30 more seconds, will you lift him up on high? Come on, will you lift him up? We worship you. We bless you, Lord. Come on, in your own words, in your own words, take a moment, just continue to exalt him, continue to praise him. Lord, before we ask for anything, Lord, we just declare, you are great. You are good. You have been good to us, God. You are merciful. You are powerful. You are worthy of all praise. You are great, and you are greatly to be praised.

We bless you. We honor you. Lord, we lift your name up in Jesus. Jesus, be worshiped. Jesus, be praised. Jesus, be praised. Peace stood for praise. Now let's move to repent. So I want you, everybody in this room, to have a moment of repentance. Let's all, let's all get clean today. Let's all get pure in our heart today. And maybe you're here today and you've never surrendered your life to God during this prayer time. You can make your way to this front. We'll have some people here to pray with you. But come on, can we all do that? Can we all repent? Can we ask God, God, forgive us? Come on, you begin to do that. Just talk to him, just like you talk to anybody else. God, forgive me. Cleanse me, God. Wash me, God. Oh, I thank you, Lord, a river of cleansing stream of just move through this place in Jesus' name. I thank you, God, that sin is defeated in Jesus' name. I thank you, God. Come on, just pray this. God, defeat sin in my life. I don't want it. I don't want the things that separate me from you, God, the wrong attitudes, the wrong mindsets. Lord, purify me.

I turn away from it. Oh, God, the wrong words, I pray. Cleanse me of them and I turn away from it, God. Lord, wrong actions. Lord, secret sin, sexual sin. Lord, cleanse us of it, we pray in Jesus' name. We turn to you in Jesus' name. Lord, wash us clean. Come on, will you take another few seconds and just ask God, Lord, cleanse my heart. Cleanse my heart. I receive your forgiveness. If you're here today and you've never prayed a prayer like that today, what an incredible day to do this. Come on, just say, Jesus, forgive me. Cleanse me. R stood for repent. The A stands for ask. And I want us to ask God, our Father, the one who already knows your needs. I want you to ask him. Jesus didn't say that God already knows your needs so you wouldn't ask. Jesus said he already knows your needs so that it gives you confidence when you ask, okay? And so we're going to ask God to bring, to meet our needs. So whatever your needs are, we're going to ask God's help. It's a shame that some of you have been struggling through a season and you've not yet asked God for help. You're struggling with a decision and you've not yet asked God for help. Why would we do that? Why would we continue with the faucet off when the faucet's right there through prayer? So here's what we're going to do. Matter of fact, let's do this. If you need healing in your body today, physical healing, I want you to hold up your hand and just hold it up for a second. I need healing in my body.

Hold it up. We're going to pray for you first. We're going to ask God to heal you. And all of us in this room are going to ask with together. And so you see somebody around you with their hand up, you can stretch your hands towards them. Come on. Let's link our faith together and let's ask the healing power of Almighty God to just fill each and every life that needs healing right now. Father, in Jesus' name, come on, pray with me. This is not a performance. You pray with me. You ask the Lord. You see somebody around you who needs healing. Come on, ask God. Say, God, will you heal him? Will you heal my brother? Will you heal my sister? God, you know exactly the infirmity that's going on. And so I pray, God, that you would heal them in Jesus' name. We come against infection in Jesus' name. I just pray it would be gone. We come against cancer in Jesus' name. I pray it would be gone. I come against injury and pain, and I pray for healing to come in every single heart and life. Lord, I pray for freedom, God, for those that feel in bondage. Lord, we ask you to bring healing. We ask you to bring freedom, God. Lord, for those that are heavy hearted and maybe heavy on their mind, things on their mind. Lord, I pray that you just, we ask you to bring freedom. We ask you to bring peace to those who feel a lack of peace right now. Lord, I ask you to bring power to those that feel weak.

Lord, we ask you to. Lord, for our sons and daughters that are running from you. Lord, for lost family members, and lost friends, and lost co-workers, and lost moms and dads. Lord, we just pray you would go to them now. We ask you to go by your Spirit. We ask you to send laborers into their lives, Lord. We ask you, God, now to reach those that are lost, and that are broken, and that are hurting. God, we thank you, and we ask you for provision. Come on, let's ask God for that. God, we ask you for provision. We pray, God, that you would provide, that you'd give direction, God. Lord, as we make decisions, Lord, we ask you for help on every decision that we have to make. In Jesus' mighty name. And the last one is why. Yield. And it's yielding to His will, not our will. And so what happens sometimes during prayers, is sometimes God will impress us. Hey, maybe get rid of this. Maybe stop with this. Maybe start to pursue this. Hey, maybe I could use you if you would have that conversation with this person. Maybe bring reconciliation in this relationship. Maybe start being used in ministry in this way, and join this team. And what happens is sometimes we've said, well, wait. God, I will, but wait. That's not yielding. You know what yielding is? Yielding is saying yes to God's timing, yes to God's will. So come on, let's do that. Kind of a cool symbol of yielding to Him is just hands lifted up. So maybe you just want to join me in that. Just say, God, it's Your will. Your will be done. Lord, anything in my life that needs to change, any direction, any pursuit I'm going after, any poor use of my time, Lord, speak to me. Bring conviction, and God, I yield to Your will.

Anything that I'm doing that's about my will, my desire, what I think I need, Lord, I submit that, and I surrender that to You. You have permission, God, to change my life. You have permission to change my situation, because I yield to Your will being done in Jesus' name. Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Now, everybody look me in the eye, because some of you in this room, you've never prayed for 10 minutes straight in your life, and you just did it. And, I might add, you did it with ease. You did it, because you just had some time of praise, you had some time of repentance, you had some time of asking, and you had some time of yielding. And so you can do that. You can do that on your own. And so tonight at 7, come on, P-R-A-Y, let's be people who pray. Let's be seekers after God in 2026. This first part of the year is just setting our momentum for the whole year. God bless you. We love you. Pastor Carmona is coming to close out in prayer. God bless you. How many of you guys are happy you came to church today? That was maybe the best decision that you have made all year so far. So congratulations. Two things on your way out. We do have these tags, Seekers. That is our word and our theme for this year, so grab one. And then if you gave your life to Jesus today,

that's the greatest decision you actually did make this year. Whether you're online or in person, we have a QR code that we want you to scan, and that has resources that are going to help you get started in this journey. Thank you guys so much for coming out this afternoon, and we will see you Wednesday for our Night of Prayer.