2 Samuel 7:18-29
Promises of God Encourage Us to Pray
Pastor Martin expounds on the promises of God as a powerful encouragement to prayer, drawing primarily from 2 Samuel 7 and various Psalms and New Testament passages. He argues that God's promises should allure believers to pray with boldness and that these promises must mold the very contours of their petitions. Martin critiques spiritual laziness and unbelief that prevent believers from 'cashing in' on God's promises, urging them to actively search for and plead God's word in prayer, much like a hungry man is drawn by the smell of a meal.
Primary Texts
Topics
Outline 9 sections · 68 min
- Introduction: The Power of God's Word and Prayer for its Impact 0:03
- The Church's Mandate: Making and Teaching Disciples 3:01
- Trinity Baptist Church's Manifesto: Core Affirmations 10:50
- A Balanced Perspective on the Christian Life: No Master Key, No Escape from Tension, No Suspension of Faculties, No Post-Conversion Crisis 19:51
- No Substitutes for Divinely Appointed Means of Grace: The Privilege of Prayer 21:38
- The Promises of God Allure and Encourage Prayer 26:10
- God's Promises Must Mold the Contours of Our Prayers: David's Example 37:30
- Pleading Promises: Faith's Checkbook and 'Yea and Amen' in Christ 43:18
- The Tragedy of Uncashed Promises and Misguided Prayers 56:57
Key Quotes
“If God himself likens his word to fire that burns, fire that one cannot touch without feeling it, to a powerful sixteen-pound sledgehammer that sends shivers through solid rock and smashes it into little piles of dust at one's feet, then surely it is not wrong for us to pray that God will cause his word, as it is preached this morning, to burn like fire.”
“This is the task of the church, not to entertain disciples, not to make disciples necessarily feel good, not to pack their head full of all kinds of abstract knowledge, but Jesus said, teaching them to observe whatsoever I have commanded you.”
“It's a wonderful thing when our duties and our privileges are parallel.”
“The smell of God's promises ought to allure us and encourage us to come with liberty and boldness, and I say it reverently, with spiritual salivating to the throne of grace, believing that God waits to hear and to answer the cries of his neediest children, to receive the efforts to praise his holy name and to magnify his glorious grace.”
“And never is God more delighted, and I say it reverently, never is he more placed under obligation to hear and answer our prayers when their contours are molded by his own promises.”
“The sacred promises, though in themselves most sure and precious, are of no avail for the comfort and sustenance of the soul unless you grasp them by faith, plead them in prayer, expect them by hope, and receive them with gratitude.”
“Dear people of God, what a tragedy for us to be spiritually like we've occasionally read in the newspaper about some people physically. A neighbor has discovered that someone three doors down in an apartment complex was dead for a week or two and the police and the proper authorities have come and forcefully entered and there they have found someone who died in filth and squalor and poverty only to discover when they began to dispose of the goods that they had dozens of uncashed checks, bonds, were in poverty in the midst of wealth.”
“God in heaven doesn't sit on his throne to be a bellhop to your own lusts he says you ask and receive not because you ask amiss to consume it upon your own lusts in the tomb of Christ we are too lazy to go to the scriptures and let the promises shape our prayers and therefore we may ask and ask and receive little because our prayers are molded by our remaining sin and by our remaining corruption”
Applications
The unconverted
- For the unconverted, take a promise of mercy from God's word (e.g., 'Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved') and plead it before God, laying hold of Christ through His promises.
All listeners
- Pray that God will cause His word, as it is preached, to burn like fire in every heart and for none to sit without feeling its hammer blows.
- Pray that God's word would be a fire and a hammer, attacking dark and murky corners of hearts and breaking rock-like resistance.
- Recognize and engage with the divinely instituted means of grace as essential for spiritual growth, rather than ignoring them or devising human substitutes.
- Allow the promises of God to mold the very contours of your prayers, making them specific and aligned with His word.
- Consciously, personally endorse God's promises by faith and prayer, 'cashing them in' at the bank of heaven.
- Confess the sin of abusing God's promises through ignorance and neglect, and begin searching for promises to plead in prayer.
- Confess the sin of unbelief and dishonoring God by framing prayers out of remaining corruptions rather than His promises.
- Pray for the unconverted to be drawn to Christ by His promises of mercy and to find acceptance with God through His word.
- Pray for believers to learn the art and habit of turning promises into 'faith's checks,' consciously and deliberately looking for words of promise to plead.
A full transcript is available on the tab. 96 paragraphs, roughly 68 minutes.
Introduction: The Power of God's Word and Prayer for its Impact
The following message was delivered on Sunday morning, January 31, 1993, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey. God speaks to the prophet Jeremiah and asks the question,
Is not my word like unto fire, and like unto a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces? If God himself likens his word to fire that burns, fire that one cannot touch without feeling it, to a powerful sixteen-pound sledgehammer that sends shivers through solid rock and smashes it into little piles of dust at one's feet, then surely it is not wrong for us to pray that God will cause his word, as it is preached this morning, to burn like fire. Fire in every heart, and that none will sit here without feeling the hammer blows of the word of the living God. Let us pray and ask him to make that true in our experience.
Our Father, we bow before the pronouncements of your own mouth through the prophet Jeremiah, and we do believe that your word is like unto fire and unto a hammer. Is not my word like unto fire, and like unto a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces? And many of us bowed in your presence have known its searing, scorching, burning influence upon our own hearts. And we thank you that we have known its devastating, pulverizing influence upon reigning sin, and upon the love of self, and upon indifference to our never-dying souls.
We thank you that you have... ...smashed the rock of our own self-destructive indifference.
And oh, how we pray this morning, blessed living God, make your word to be a fire and a hammer in every heart this day. Lord, attack with holy ruthlessness all of those dark and murky and germ-laden corners of our hearts ...with the purest of hearts.
Oh Lord, let loose the hammer upon those pockets of rock-like resistance to you and to your will. Speak to us this day, we plead, for the good of our souls and for the glory of your own holy name. We ask through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.
The Church's Mandate: Making and Teaching Disciples
Now as we come to this time in our service of worship in which the scriptures, will be opened up, and their truths preached and applied, I realize that this morning we have, I think, more than an ordinary number of visitors among us, some of whom may not be acquainted with precisely what a servant of God is doing when he stands to open up the scriptures, and especially what we are doing here in this place this morning on the 31st of... January, 1993.
And for the sake of those who fit into that category in particular, I shall take the first part of our meditation this morning to explain precisely what we are doing, and where we are in the process of doing it. When our Lord Jesus Christ gave his marching orders to the church, in terms of what has been designated the great, according to Matthew, Matthew chapter 28 and verse 19, he charged his disciples as follows, Go ye therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them into the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I commanded you. Now in this set of marching orders, it is clear that the great end of the ministry of the servants of God in that day and down to this present day is not simply to give out information to cause organized visible religion to flourish, but that the great end of every true and biblical ministry is to make disciples,
that is, to see men come into an acquaintance with those truths that by the blessing of the Holy Spirit will show them that they have no hope of life and salvation in themselves, that all that God will ever do for hell-deserving sinners he has purpose to do in the person and work of his Son, and that if we would know the benefits of the work, of Christ for sinners, we must be brought to an intelligent, believing, submissive, obedient relationship to Jesus Christ. That is what is bound up in the language of the commission, make disciples of all the nations. Furthermore, our Lord went on to say that when people profess that they have entered into that relationship of discipleship to the Lord Jesus, when they acknowledge what they are in themselves as sinners and what Christ is in his person and work as the only Savior of sinners, and that by the Spirit of God they have come to find Christ to be to them in the language of his own parables, the pearl of great price and the hidden treasure,
and they are prepared to give him supreme place of religious confidence, of affection, and allegiance. Such people are then to be openly marked out, not by a tattoo in their forehead, not by wearing strange clothes, but by being baptized, by undergoing a watery ritual which declares on the one hand the truth of the gospel that Christ has washed them in his own precious blood. In virtue of being united to him, they have died to sin and risen to newness of life, and on the other hand that they are now committed to living as those who are alive from the dead, living no longer unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again. But our Lord did not stop there. Not only is the end of a biblical ministry to be that of making disciples and then identifying and gathering those disciples, into visible communities by baptism, but then our Lord said they are then to be taught to observe all things whatsoever he has commanded. These disciples are then to be instructed
in the observation of all that Christ has revealed as his will for his people, not only in the recorded words, that he himself spoke, but those words which he spoke through the prophets and the psalmists and the poets of the Old Testament, and those words that he would yet speak through his inspired apostles and penmen who would complete the writing of the New Testament. This is the task of the church, not to entertain disciples, not to make disciples necessarily feel good, not to pack their head full of all kinds of abstract knowledge, but Jesus said, teaching them to observe whatsoever I have commanded you. Now it is in pursuit of this third aspect of the marching orders of Jesus Christ that in the public preaching and teaching of the scriptures in this place, we are generally engaged in various experiments, extended series of studies, as opposed to a haphazard, what I like to call lucky dip, kind of approach to the scriptures, where from Sunday to Sunday as an ordinary course,
people have no idea what the preacher is going to address, what passage of scripture or theme will be addressed, and everything is a kind of unpredictable buckshot type of ministry. We are convinced that if we are to fulfill the mandate of Christ, and to obey the marching orders of our commander-in-chief, there must be a commitment to a systematic opening up of the word of God. And therefore in this place, as a general rule, we will be found studying a given book of the Bible in a verse-by-verse consecutive manner, as we did in going through the gospel of Mark, as we are presently doing with a brief interlude in our Sunday school class, in the study of the book of 1st, John, or that consecutive systematic teaching may take the form of tracing out various themes through the Bible. The doctrine of sin, or the doctrine of repentance, or the doctrine of justification, the doctrine of sanctification, or it may take the form of studying major characters as they come to us in the scriptures. That's the study we're engaged in, Lord's Day evenings, taking the, the major Old Testament characters as they are brought before us in the book of Genesis in our present area of study. Now,
Trinity Baptist Church's Manifesto: Core Affirmations
one of the other ways this can be done is the way in which we are presently committing ourselves to a consecutive series of studies, and that is a series entitled A Manifesto of Trinity Baptist Church. This church was established, established in 1967 and as we approached our 25th anniversary in 1992 and now as that milestone fades into history, we have been engaged in this declaration of those truths which have formed the very heart and lungs and spiritual breath of our 25 years together. So a manifesto, which is a public, declaration of the vital central principles of a group or organization has been an attempt to set forth in a public forum in a systematic way what it is that we believe, what it is that we have sought to embrace as our directives for our individual and corporate life over these 25 years together.
And each of the tenets or affirmations, or affirmations, or affirmations of the manifesto have been stated in terms of a determination. And in checking back through my notes, I found the last that it was way back in January 26th of 1992 that I last gave you a run through just stating those tenets. And because we have a number of visitors and this periodic bringing of the whole together, many, not many, some of you have said you have found helpful. I want to take, just a few minutes now to just mention what those tenets or affirmations have been and then move on in our development of the ninth of those affirmations. The first was this. We are determined, and we have been from our very beginning, we are determined that Jesus Christ shall have his rightful place in the totality of our life and ministry. This is not pastor anybody's church.
It is Christ's church. And he alone has crown rights to call the shots in every facet of our life. Secondly, we are determined that all of our life and doctrine shall be molded by the scriptures. In setting out the rationale for what we were doing, I took you to the word of God and to the marching orders, and I took you to the word of God and to the marching orders, and I took you to the word of God and to the marching orders, and I took you to the word of God and to the marching orders, of the Son of God.
And we are determined that all of our life and doctrine shall be molded by the scriptures. Thirdly, we are determined that we shall maintain a God-centered climate in the totality of our life and ministry. The purpose of the church is not to stroke men or promote men. It is to exalt and magnify the triune God, in all the inherent glory of his being, and in all the wonder of his works, both in nature and in grace.
And we are determined to maintain a God-centered climate in the totality of our life and ministry. Fourthly, we are determined that our life and ministry will unquestionably confirm the unique place assigned to the church in the purpose of God. Fourthly, we are determined that our life and ministry will unquestionably confirm the unique place assigned to the church in the purpose of God. Fourthly, we are determined that our life and ministry will unquestionably confirm the unique place assigned to the church in the purpose of God.
Fourthly, we are determined that our life and ministry will unquestionably confirm the unique place assigned to the church in the purpose of God. Fourthly, we are determined that our life and ministry will unquestionably confirm the unique place assigned to the church in the purpose of God. God. God has said that the church is the pillar and ground of the truth. 1 Timothy 3.15. We are determined that our life and ministry will unquestionably confirm that unique place which God has assigned to His church in His own purpose. The fifth affirmation was this. We are determined to strive for a membership composed only of truly regenerate and genuinely converted men and women. I did not say our membership is composed only. I said we are determined to strive for a membership composed only of truly regenerated and genuinely converted men and women. For such people alone have the right of admission. And retention in the church of Jesus Christ. There is no bloodline birthright to membership in the church of Christ. There is no social association right of entrance into the church. None should be
in the visible church of Christ who have not come to a true experience of regenerating grace and a genuine conversion. From sin to righteousness. In the sixth place, we are determined to pursue a biblically established standard for church officers. The word of God is not mute on the standards for deacons and elders.
We do not recognize as office bearers men of influence necessarily in the world. The vice president of the local business establishment or someone who is in a place of influence, in his worldly occupation, God has set the standards for leadership in his church. A deacon must be, an elder must be. And we are determined by the grace of God. We are determined to maintain a biblically established standard for church officers. Seventh, we are determined to validate in our corporate life the life out of death, Principle essential to real Christianity. And basically that's just attempting to say in human words what Jesus meant when he said, whoever would save his life shall lose it. But whoever will lose his life for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it.
The life out of death principle is at the heart of all vital Christianity. And we are determined to validate in our corporate experience that principle. That the way of blessing is not the way of seeking to serve ourselves. But losing our lives for Christ's sake and the gospel's.
And in so doing we find our life. The eighth affirmation. We are determined to maintain the presence of an ungrieved Holy Spirit in every facet of our life. And ministry.
The scripture says, Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God. He is a person. He alone can make our worship living and vital and spiritually real. For true worshipers worship the Father in spirit and in truth.
And Paul said, We are the circumcision who worship by the Spirit of God. Who glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh. The Spirit alone can make the presence of Christ a reality. The Spirit alone can.
Take of the things of Christ and make them real to us. He alone can form Christ in our character. He alone can give unction and power to our worship and to the ministry of the word. And therefore without his living presence.
We are nothing, nothing, nothing but a shell of empty religious form. As orthodox as we may remain. Therefore we are determined to maintain the presence. Of an ungrieved Holy Spirit.
In every facet of our life. And ministry. And that brings us then to the ninth affirmation. The one that we've been wrestling with for a number of months now.
And I have stated it this way. We are determined to maintain a balanced New Testament perspective. In our teaching and expectations concerning conversion.
The Christian life and the mission of the church. The present focus of our attention is upon that middle issue. The determination to maintain a balanced New Testament perspective. In our teaching and expectations concerning the Christian life.
A Balanced Perspective on the Christian Life: No Master Key, No Escape from Tension, No Suspension of Faculties, No Post-Conversion Crisis
And as we have focused upon the issue of the Christian life. We've done so in terms of these great principles. That become as it were the watershed of major categories of biblical teaching. We have seen that there is a great need.
We have seen that there is a great need. We have seen that there is a great need. There is no one master key to living the Christian life. Man does not live by bread alone.
But by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Secondly that there is no escape from tension and conflict in living the Christian life. Galatians 5.17 The flesh musteth against the spirit.
And the spirit against the flesh. And these two are contrary. The one to the other. So that you may not do the things that you would.
Thirdly there is no cancellation of any of the things that you would. Actually we are not suspended in any of our faculties in living the Christian life. We are not suspended in the use of our minds, our judgments, our wills. Our faculty of reflection and thought.
God addresses every faculty inward and outward. In the engagement of the believers. Total redeemed humanity. In living the Christian life.
We are to work out our own salvation with fear and trembling. Then we saw. Fourthly, on this matter of a balanced doctrine of the Christian life, that there is no post-conversion crisis experience, either promised or commanded, in connection with living the Christian life. All the claims of Pentecostalism, deeper life, higher life teaching, notwithstanding, nowhere in the New Testament is a post-conversion crisis experience promised or commanded as normative in living the Christian life.
No Substitutes for Divinely Appointed Means of Grace: The Privilege of Prayer
Rather, the teaching is Colossians 2, 6, as you have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in Him. And now, that brings us precisely to where we are today. It took a 20-minute trip to get there. I haven't done that for a whole year.
And I hope it has not been tedious, but helped all of you to get things into perspective, as well as assist those visiting with us. We are considering this fifth principle now of a balanced teaching on the Christian life, that there are no effective substitutes for the divinely appointed means of grace in living the Christian life. No effective substitutes for the divinely appointed means of grace in living the Christian life. In consideration of that principle, we define the means of grace as those divinely designated activities, disciplines, and relationships by which God nourishes and strengthens us in our spiritual lives. And by asserting there are no effective substitutes, we were stating that if, through the grace of God, we canternize our spiritual lives and strengthen our spiritual life in other ways which are value 1000 percent, theと思います which God drop-off us in every aspect of spiritual life won-to-mel denn Ivan. through willful ignorance take no weeping or wake которой desire to offer our Ukraine. know effective substitutes for the divinely appointed means of grace in living the Christian life. In consideration of laboratory diesex-ana prophets we define the means of grace as those divinely designated activities, disciplines and relationships by which God nourishes and strengthens us in our spiritual lives and we certain there are no effective substitutes we shared
we ignore these means, or in our arrogance devise our own means, we can no more be nourished in our ignorance or in our arrogance than our bodies can be nourished by the deprivation of all food or the substitution of flavored sawdust for real nourishing food. No effective substitutes. What then are those divinely instituted means of grace? Which, if we would grow, must be part and parcel of our experience.
For we have focused our attention upon the primary means in the category of the individual or private means of grace in distinction from the corporate or public means of grace, and that is the habit and the disposition of personal prayer. The habit and the disposition of prayer. Personal prayer. And we saw from our study in the scriptures that according to the word of God, personal prayer is a duty laid upon every child of God.
Christ and his apostles commanded us to pray. Luke 18.1 Christ and his inspired penman expect us to pray. Matthew 6 When he prays, said Jesus, and Christ in his example mandates that we pray.
1 John. 2.6 Now last Lord's Day we began to consider personal prayer as habit and disposition, not as a duty, but as an unspeakable privilege. It's a wonderful thing when our duties and our privileges are parallel.
And it is not only our duty to pray, but it is our great privilege to pray. And as we sought to address this privilege, we saw from the scriptures that, the work of Christ, past and present, secures for us the privilege of prayer. We looked at the scriptures that speak of the new and living way that Christ has made for us, and the invitation to draw near with boldness because of what Christ did when he died upon the cross, and because of what Christ is doing as he intercedes at the right hand of the Father for all of his own. Then we saw, secondly, that the gift of the Spirit both inclines us to and assists us in the privilege of prayer. Galatians 4.6 in Romans 8.15 The Spirit of God is the Spirit of adoption, inclines us to cry, Abba, Father.
And in Romans 8.26, where Paul says we know not how to pray as we ought, the Spirit assists us in our felt impotence in prayer. Now then, I want us to proceed to consider at least the third and hopefully the fourth Bible category of encouragement to view personal prayer not only as a duty, but an unspeakable privilege. The work of Christ secures the privilege.
The Promises of God Allure and Encourage Prayer
The gift of the Spirit inclines us unto and assists us in the privilege. Thirdly, the promises of God allure and assist us in the privilege. And encourage us to avail ourselves of the privilege of prayer. The promises of God allure and encourage us to avail ourselves of the privilege of prayer.
I originally had chosen the word entice. I looked it up in my synonym finder and all of its synonyms showed it was a good word, but because of its connotation so often with respect to a negative entice, the enticement of an immoral man or woman of another human being, I've used the word allure and I hope it does not carry that connotation, but I cannot be robbed of a word that's in that ballpark of nuance. The promises of God allure, entice, and encourage us to avail ourselves of the privilege of prayer. The promises of God should be to ourselves, not to our own souls, what the smells of a hearty meal are to a hungry man. There's a man who's been out all day doing hard physical labor, expended hundreds of calories. He hasn't snacked between lunchtime and suppertime. His stomach is growling.
And on the way home he's imagining, what may my wife be preparing for me? And he no sooner opens the front door when his nostrils are attacked by the intense of the various foods that are being prepared on the kitchen stove. And as his olfactory nerves are attacked by those scents, they register in his brain, ah, she's fixing my favorite kind of stewed beef and my favorite kind of baked potatoes with such and such a topping, etc. And as his brain receives signals from the olfactory nerves which are being attacked by those smells drifting out of the kitchen, he begins to salivate.
And he begins to fantasize how it will taste to sink his choppers into that favorite piece of meat and into that baked potato. And what happens? He is being powerfully allured and encouraged to come very quickly when his wife says, Honey, dinner's ready. He needs no one to persuade him to put down his paper.
He needs no one to argue with him and give him ten reasons. He regards it an unspeakable privilege to bring his empty growling stomach and his salivating mouth and his bug eyes to that table. Why? He's been allured and encouraged by the smells that have drifted out of the kitchen and attacked his nose.
Now, dear people, that's exactly what the promises of God ought to do for us with respect to prayer. The smell of God's promises ought to allure us and encourage us to come with liberty and boldness, and I say it reverently, with spiritual salivating to the throne of grace, believing that God waits to hear and to answer the cries of his neediest children, to receive the efforts to praise his holy name and to magnify his glorious grace. What more simple but compelling encouragement could be given to us to pray than that which is found in the broad range of the promises attached to the activity of prayer? From the words of Psalm 37, and I'm just arbitrarily selecting a few places in the Old and New Testaments, from the words of Psalm 37, for delight thyself also in Jehovah, and he will give thee the desires of thy heart. My friends, if that doesn't waft its way out of the kitchen of God to your nostrils
and make you long to come to the table of prayer, it's because you're spiritually dead. Hold the smells of the most delightful meal under the nose of a dead man, and there won't be a drop of saliva coming from his mouth. What a promise! Delight thyself in the Lord.
He will give to thee Jehovah, infinite, exalted, all-glorious, eternal God, Son and Spirit, the Great I Am. He, Jehovah, will give to me worm of the dust the desires of my heart, insofar as those desires are framed by delighting in Him, finding my greatest joy in His glory, the advancement of His cause, the promotion of His name, and His faith. As I delight myself in Him, the desires that come out of such a heart are a reflection of the very purposes of God for such a creature. And He says, I'll give you the desires of your heart. Or over to Psalm 50 and verse 15, simple, straightforward promise of God. Verse 15 of Psalm 50, Call upon me in the day of trouble.
I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glory, thou shalt glorify me. The God who could so order our lives that we were never brought into the jaws of trouble would rather bring us into the jaws of trouble that by our crying in the day of trouble and God coming to our aid and delivering us, more glory will be brought to God by delivering us out of the jaws of trouble than by hedging us up from trouble itself. The promise, call upon me in the day of trouble, whatever that day of trouble may be, the day of trouble brought by intense temptation to a given sin, the day of trouble brought by the permissive will of God that allows me to be ensnared and enmeshed in a complex web of false accusation, of the deprivation of some of my material needs, of the accusation of the devil himself. Whatever my day of trouble may be, I am to call upon him in the day of trouble and I have his pledge. I will deliver thee. And the great end in view is that by that deliverance I will receive more glory to myself.
Thou shalt glorify me. And we can go right on through the Old Testament scriptures. Isaiah 40, 31, They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings as eagles.
They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. There's the promise of God to all who wait upon him in felt weariness. For he says in the preceding verse that even the youth shall falter and the young men shall fail.
Those marked by their strength natively, they'll come to the end of their tether. But all who wait upon him, young and crotchety old ones as well, rickety old ones as well, the measure of their strength is not what nature has left them with but which God imparts to them in grace. That's his promise. The promise of Jeremiah 33, 3 Call upon me and I will answer thee and show thee great and hidden things which thou knowest not.
That's God's word of promise. Call upon me and I will show thee. My answers will not be all of them in the realm of the subjective, difficult to discern and precisely to identify motions of my spirit within your own heart. I will do things in answer to prayer that can be seen where you can raise an Ebenezer and say, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us.
You can raise an Ebenezer and say, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us. Or on into the New Testament the words of our Lord Jesus in Luke, 11 and verse 13, If you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give? The account in Matthew, good gifts, Luke says the greatest of all gifts, give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him. He had just said ask and it shall be given you.
Seek and ye shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you. And then as if to counteract our dumbness, he says, now look, I'm not just holding up promises that exceed the reality of my commitment to do what I've said. You who are evil, if your child asks for fish, would you give him a scorpion?
If he asks for bread, would you give him a stone? No. Well, how much more then will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him, not those who are the most obedient of his children, those who can bring the most brownie points? No.
Those who ask, those who ask, Mark 11, 24, when ye stand, pray, believe, ask what ye will, and believe that you have received it, and ye shall have it. John 15, 7, If my words abide in you, ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. 1 John 1, 9, If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us. To forgive us, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Dear people, on and on we could go with the promises. What are they there for? The promises of God are there to allure us and to encourage us to avail us of the privilege of prayer. They are to be to our souls what the smells of that favorite dinner are to the hungry working man when he comes to the front door and his nose is attacked by the smells of that meal.
God's Promises Must Mold the Contours of Our Prayers: David's Example
You see, it is the promises of God that are to mold the very contours of our prayers. Now I want you to turn with me. I've quoted a number of verses, but I want you to turn to this passage with me to demonstrate that great principle. For if we get nothing else this morning, if we can grasp this with a new measure of understanding and an increased degree of faith, it will be well worth all of our labors.
The promises of God are to mold the very contours of our prayers. 2 Samuel chapter 7. Here's the record of a prayer that David was moved to pray. He was moved to pray it at a very significant and strategic period in his own life and ministry.
2 Samuel chapter 7. David desires to build a temple God sends a message to him that he is not to build the temple, but that God also has purpose through his seed. Solomon, of course, is the man in reference that through his seed God would indeed raise up one who would build him a magnificent temple. And after this word has been brought to God through the prophet Nathan, David responds in verse 18 in prayer.
Then David the king, 2 Samuel 7, 18. Then David the king went in and sat before Jehovah. Notice, this time he did not kneel, he did not prostrate himself or stand. All of those are postures in which David is found at prayer in other instances.
But here the Spirit of God records that he sat before the Lord. And he said, and now he begins his prayer, Who am I, O Lord, and what is my house that thou hast brought me thus far? He begins his prayer with the language of humility, with the language acknowledging that whatever God has promised he does not deserve, not a bit of it. And then he is overwhelmed, verse 20, And what can David say more unto thee?
For you know your servant, O Lord Jehovah, for your word's sake, and according to your own heart, you have wrought all this greatness. Then he goes on to worship God for who he is, and then the greatness of his grace to the nation of Israel, verse 23. Now look at verse 25. Here's the heart of the passage, And now, O Lord God, the word that you have spoken concerning your servant and concerning this house, confirm thou it forever, and do as thou didst.
For thou hast spoken. Let thy name be magnified forever, saying, Jehovah of hosts is God over Israel, and the house of thy servant David shall be established before thee. For thou, O Jehovah of hosts, the God of Israel, hast revealed to thy servant, saying, and now he quotes back to God the word that came through the prophet Nathan, I will build thee a house, therefore hath thy servant found in his heart to pray this prayer unto thee. And now, O Lord Jehovah, thou art God, and thy words are truth, and thou hast promised this good thing unto thy servant. Now therefore let it please thee to bless the house of thy servant, that it may continue forever before thee. For thou, O Lord Jehovah, hast spoken it, and with thy blessing let the house of thy servant be blessed forever. Do you see the constant recurring theme?
He says, God, I have had it in my heart to pray this prayer, not because I have grandiose notions about who David is, not because I have unmortified ambitions for my offspring, for generations to come, but, O God, I pray what I pray because you said what you said. I plead what I plead because you promised what you promised. And the contours of David's prayer were shaped and molded by God's word of promise. And never is God more delighted, and I say it reverently, never is he more placed under obligation to hear and answer our prayers when their contours are molded by his own promises. David was not out on some self-imposed, carnally infused, evil trip when he's asking great things of God, and he's very conscious of that. He said, Who am I? What is my house?
I think my house is nothing. But you sent a prophet, and the prophet made a declaration, and the prophet made a promise. Verse 25, Now, O Lord, this is the word that you have spoken. Verse 28, You are God, and your words are truth that are missed.
Pleading Promises: Faith's Checkbook and 'Yea and Amen' in Christ
I marvel at how, of the exceeding great and precious promises of God, I plead before the Lord. I'm grieved when I can go through prayer meetings with you, my brethren, and sometimes barely hear a specific promise pleaded before God. Holding God to his words is what you have said. In a lovely book that the bookstore is carrying, a reprint of an old work by Thomas Watson and Samuel Lee called The Bible and the Closet.
The first half of the book is about private, secret prayer. The last half is about the family altar. Beautiful, rich stuff in this book. But listen to the counsel of Watson regarding this very point.
Apply special promises to special cases in prayer. For God hath and will magnify his word of promise above all his name. When we are under the word of a command for a duty, we must seek for a word of promise and unite them in prayer. When we are under a command for a duty, we must seek for a word of promise and unite them in prayer.
When a promise of aid suits the precept, it renders the prayer victorious and obedience pleasant. When we come with God's own words into his own presence, when we take his words with us that he would take away all iniquity and receive us graciously , then he gives scriptural examples from Jacob to Jehoshaphat to Solomon. He goes on to say, first search the Bible and look for a promise. And when found, open it before the Lord.
Paul teaches us to take the promise given to Joshua and then to say boldly that the Lord is our helper. Hebrews 13, 5 and 6, a promise originally made to Joshua. The writer to Hebrews says, he has said to us, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee, therefore with boldness we may say, the Lord is my helper. I will not be afraid what man can do to me.
And he says there's the principle. We are warranted to dig into the promises of God and to extract them and to apply them to our situation. And then this beautiful statement, Simeon, remember the old man who lived in the temple? Recorded in Luke chapter 2.
Simeon lived upon a promise. God had given him a promise. It said it had been revealed to him by the Lord that he should not see death till he had seen the Lord's anointed. Remember when he held the baby Jesus in his arms, he says, now Lord, let us thy servant depart in peace according to thy word.
Watson writes, Simeon lived upon a promise and died sweetly in the arms of a promise in the breathings of a prayer. He lived upon a promise, died sweetly in the arms of a promise, in the breathings of a prayer. Let thy servant depart in peace according to thy word. You see, Watson is simply stating in quaint, old, fascinating Puritan literary form what I'm trying to say in contemporary Americanese by talking about the man's favorite beef stew and potatoes.
Promises of God, dear people, ought to allure and encourage us to avail ourselves of the privilege of prayer, and those very promises ought to shape and to mold the prayers that we bring unto God. Charles Spurgeon, among his many, many written works, has a choice little book that has helped thousands over the years called Faith's Checkbook. And it's a book of promises, and he calls it Faith's Checkbook because this was Spurgeon's thinking about the promises of God. I quote, and I quote him from another place, The sacred promises, though in themselves most sure and precious, are of no avail for the comfort and sustenance of the soul unless you grasp them by faith, plead them in prayer, expect them by hope, and receive them with gratitude. As you read them over one after another, you say to yourselves, This is my checkbook. I can take out the promises as I need them, sign them by faith, present them at the great bank of grace, and come away enriched with present health in time of need. That is the way to use God's promises.
Dear child of God, let me ask you, what checks have you consciously, personally endorsed by faith and by prayer cashed them in at the bank of heaven since we met last Lord's Day? Over what promise have you placed the signature of your faith and turned it in at the bank of heaven? Any? Can you think of any specific word of promise that you have, by the signature of your own faith, endorsed at the bank of heaven and have either received in exchange that immediate answer or in the expectation of faith you yet wait for the return of that prayer? Any? If not, why not? That's what the promises are given to you for.
Not to pass by you as an object of admiration, not to be there as the occasion for poets to give thanks to their aesthetic desire to magnify the wonder of promises. Second Corinthians 1.20 contains a word that is crucial for every child of God with respect to the promises of God. Look at it.
Verse 19, The Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, even by me and Silvanus and Timothy, was not yea and nay. When we preached Christ, we didn't preach a Christ who was uncertain in his mission, uncertain in his willingness to receive sinners and do for sinners all that he promised to do for sinners. No, there was no yea and nay Christ preached by us. Verse 20, But how many soever be the promises of God.
Do you want to name them? How many? In the scriptures, in him is the yea, wherefore also through him is the amen unto the glory of God through us. Now I realize there is an irresponsible lifting out of promises and making a one to one equation in their fulfillment which is a twisting of the scriptures.
God promised to the ancient nation of Israel that was in a unique way his nation, what we call the theocracy, that when they went into the land of promise if they would obey him, there would be the early and the latter rains, there would be no miscarrying wounds in their animals, no miscarrying wounds in their wives, there would be abundance of physical and material provision and some have lifted out those promises and sought to apply them one for one. I'm not talking about that irresponsible use of the promises. It says in Christ they are yea and amen. That is in terms of their divine intention now that Christ has come in whom all of the promises and towards whom all of them is his point when they are right has secured under the new covenant every one of those promises is yea and amen in Christ in terms of the purposes of God in Christ we must not bleed the text of its full vision so ever be the promises of God him is the yea wherefore through him is the amen. Dear people of God, what a tragedy for us to be spiritually like we've occasionally read in the newspaper about some people physically. A neighbor has discovered that
someone three doors down in an apartment complex was dead for a week or two and the police and the proper authorities have come and forcefully entered and there they have found someone who died in filth and squalor and poverty only to discover when they began to dispose of the goods that they had dozens of uncashed checks, bonds, were in poverty in the midst of wealth. But you see the wealth that was potentially the for one reason or another they never endorsed those various media by which all that they could have needed would have been brought into their hands put upon their backs put in their belly put over their heads a picture of many a child of God who lives a relatively impoverished dark life. Why? of God said I can do all things through Christ
who strengthens me was that just something peculiar to Paul or was he simply endorsing the generic promise with respect to the fact that my God shall supply all your needs. He was endorsing the generic promise again and again and again and again in the bank of do all through Christ who strengthens me even when I had an affliction that I thought was going to be an insuperable barrier to my usefulness 2 Corinthians 12 for this thing I sought the Lord three times apparently gave himself to intense seasons of prayer if not it's not explicit but if not prayer drawing to fasting and he said God you've got to remove this thorn in the flesh whatever it is it makes me so weak I can't fulfill my mission and after the third season of prayer the Lord said unto him remember the words in 2 Corinthians 12 he said unto me my grace is sufficient for thee verse 9 my power is made perfect notice not by replacing weakness but in the midst of weakness now what's a greater demonstration of the power of God
for God once for all to come and zap the apostle and remove the thorn in the flesh and make him visibly demonstrably strong in every area or to have him go around like a walking corpse and yet through him God is shaking the very cage of Satan's empire throughout the whole Roman world which is a greater display of God's power a visibly evident weak instrument yet the instrument through which God is shaking kingdoms or a man made an evident superman which is a greater display of God's power God tells us in this passage my grace is sufficient my power is made perfect weakness not replacing weakness but in the midst of weakness and if that's not the right meaning then why does Paul go on to say most gladly therefore will I glory in my weaknesses that the power of Christ may literally tent itself about me you look at me and say what are you Paul mass of weakness but when you look at what I do you have to say power of strength he said the strength is not mine it is the strength of Christ that has tented itself over me overlaid is divine strength and power wherefore I take pleasure in weaknesses
The Tragedy of Uncashed Promises and Misguided Prayers
injuries necessities persecutions in distresses for Christ's sake for when I am weak not when I was when I am weak then am I strong you see his weakness and strength were not exclusive they were coordinates in his spiritual experience but see the difference between Paul and us is he cashed in the promises you and I leave them lying around potentially wealthy living in squalor and filth and poverty dear people of God how can God make his heart more plain than he's done in his promises ask it shall be given you seek ye shall find knock it shall be opened unto you sin shall not be shall not have dominion over you you are not under the law but under grace my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus dear people of God I ask you because I don't want this to be theory that floats by what promise have you personally endorsed and taken to the bank of heaven this week what promise are you pressing before the teller of heaven in your own I go back to the text
with which I closed last week James 4 and verse 2 ye have not because ye ask not ye ask and receive not because ye ask amiss that you may consume it upon your lust on the one hand he says you don't have because there's no personal endorsing you have not because you ask not you're not endorsing the check of Thomas and bringing it to the bank of heaven on the other hand he says you may be coming with a slip of paper but it's not one of God's checks you have framed your petition not by the word of God it has taken its contours in shape not by the word of God but you're trying to make God the celestial bellhop for your own lusts he says you won't ever get your prayers answered that way God in heaven doesn't sit on his throne to be a bellhop to your own lusts he says you ask and receive not because you ask amiss to consume it upon your own lusts in the tomb of Christ we are too lazy to go to the scriptures and let the promises shape our prayers and therefore we may ask and ask and receive little because our prayers are molded by our remaining sin and by our remaining corruption
and I say it reverently such prayers even the intercession of Christ can't make acceptable to God they've got to be trashed and reconstructed or we're impoverished simply because through mock humility or spiritual laziness we simply don't search out the checks that are strewn throughout the book of Paul and every time we catch sight of a promise say oh God is this one of those words that in Christ is yea and amen help me to see its application to my need personally to my family to the life of the church to the work of the gospel to the work of evangelism and the spread of the knowledge of Christ oh Lord help me to see how this promise in Christ is another blank check waiting for faith to endorse it and to have it brought into the bank of heaven to plead its fulfillment I say as surely as the work of Christ encourages us to the privilege of prayer as surely as the gift of the Spirit both inclines us unto and assists us in the privilege of prayer so the promises of God allure entice draw us to avail ourselves of the privilege of prayer
I ask you sitting there this morning are your spiritual nostrils sensitive to the promises every time you smell one does it make you salivate and long to come to the table of God's faith and the faithfulness and feed upon it if not child of God confess the sin of abusing through ignorance and neglect one of God's greatest gifts to us as the people of God His promises and start this very Lord's day searching for a promise to plead to say with David therefore hath thy servant found it in his heart to pray this prayer unto thee for thou has spoken this word of prayer and my unconverted friend who doesn't know what it is to pray that's how you get into the kingdom you go with a promise into the presence of the very God who could damn you if he willed to and whose damnation you and I deserve and take his own word of promise this word of promise whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved this word of promise him that comes to me I'll in no wise cast out this word of promise come unto me all ye that lay me burn her heavy laden I will give you rest this word of promise look unto me all ye ends of the earth
and be ye saved for I am Jehovah and beside me there is no Savior take that word of promise and go to the God who could rightfully damn you and say O God in myself I have nothing to plead but this is your promise and that's what Newton captured in that beautiful hymn we often sing at prayer meetings thy promise is my only plea that's it for you unconverted man woman boy or girl take a promise that has come from the lips of God and embodied in the word of God and go into the presence of that God lay hold of Christ in the only way any one of us can lay hold of him he's not here to be seen with these eyes to be touched with these hands but he's here by his spirit I say the Christ who's here by his spirit takes the shape and form of his promises of mercy to sinners who repent and believe take hold of him in the promise there's no other way to take hold of him and if you try to take hold of him in any other way you'll grasp in vain but take him as he comes couched in the promises you don't take just the promise apart from him
but you can't have him apart from the promises how many so ever be the promises of God in him is the yea and through him the amen in the promises take hold of the promises as they are held out in the hands of Christ and find him to be all that he said he would be to needy sinners let us pray oh our father we bow in your presence this morning and we feel on the one hand very keenly the wretchedness of unbelief that horrible sin that would strike out your very words words which have added nothing to you but which as it were are the very banquet house of all of your good gifts and graces and good will to sinful men oh Lord forgive us for the wretched sin of unbelief forgive us forgive us that so often we've dishonored you framing prayers out of the stuff of our own remaining corruptions rather than framing prayers by your promises we pray for the unconverted who are among us
oh God may they be indeed a lord may they be drawn enticed to Christ by his promises of mercy to the vilest of sinners may they find his word that upon which they may rest and find acceptance with you we pray for your people who have not learned the art and the habit of turning the promises into faith's checks and endorsing them and bringing them into the bank of heaven may this mark a new day in many lives when consciously and deliberately the eye shall constantly look for those words of promise sealed and given over to us in the blood of the everlasting covenant oh God make us in a new way a company of Jacobs who will plead that we will not let you go unless you bless us and who plead for blessing only according to the contours of your promise that we may say with David because you have spoken this word we have found it in our hearts to pray thus and thus unto you oh God seal your word we plead for our good and for your glory
through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen
This transcript was generated by automated speech recognition and may contain errors. It is provided for study and reference only; the audio recording is the authoritative source.
Passages Expounded
This passage is expounded to illustrate how David's prayer was directly molded and shaped by God's prior promises to him, serving as a model for believers.
This verse is presented as crucial for understanding that all of God's promises are 'Yea and Amen' in Christ, securing their fulfillment and encouraging their use in prayer.
This passage is used to diagnose why prayers are often unanswered, highlighting the need to ask according to God's will and promises rather than selfish desires.
Texts Expounded
Also Referenced
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