Sermon Cloud

I started this sermon looking for fellowship. Fellowship in prayer.

I couldn’t find it.

I keep coming back to this prayer in Acts

Acts 4:29 (NIV) Now, Lord, consider their threats and enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness.

Because this is the one prayer we have, recorded, of Christians praying together.

Many times it says they prayed together, but only here is the prayer written!

Then I looked up HOW they prayed together. They were insistent!

Acts 4:29 (NIV) Now, Lord, YOU MUST consider their threats and YOU MUST enable your servants to speak your word with great boldness.

When I first read that, I thought “That doesn’t sound like asking, that sounds like demanding!”

There’s only one other group prayer written in the Bible: the prayer Jesus taught us to pray.

OUR Father

Group prayer!

Matthew 6:9-13 (ESV) ⁹ Pray then like this: "Our Father in heaven, hallowed MUST be your name.

¹⁰ Your kingdom MUST come, your will MUST be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

¹¹ YOU MUST Give us this day our daily bread, ¹² and YOU MUST forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

¹³ And YOU SHOULD lead us not into temptation, but YOU MUST deliver us from evil.

It all sounds so demanding. In Greek, grammar, it’s called “imperative”. And this is where it makes sense.

God, it is IMPERATIVE that your name be sacred, because no one else’s name can be!

Your kingdom HAS TO come, your will MUST be done, because no one else’s kingdom or will should be!

You must give us our daily bread, or we won’t get it. You must forgive us our debts, because no one else can! You must deliver us from evil, because…no one else can!

It is IMPERATIVE that God do these things because no one on earth CAN!

Look at the cover of the bulletin.

¹⁹ "Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. ²⁰ For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them." Matthew 18:19-20 (NIV)

What do you suppose Jesus meant by that?

Matthew 7:7-8 (NIV) ⁷ "Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. ⁸ For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.

Notice Jesus said “whatever you ask for”. This sounds a lot like some other quotes from Jesus:

²¹ Jesus replied, "I tell you the truth, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to the fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, 'Go, throw yourself into the sea,' and it will be done. ²² If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer." Matthew 21:21-22 (NIV)

[parallel in Mark 11]

John 14 (page 749)

¹¹ Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves. ¹² I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

¹³ And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. ¹⁴ You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.

¹⁵ "If you love me, you will obey what I command. ¹⁶ And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor to be with you forever-- ¹⁷ the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you.