Here We Stand Conference 2025 Session 2 - If God Is Sovereign, Why Pray?

But whenever I think about prayer and the

sovereignty of God as Marcus so wonderfully

shared with us tonight, all things in this

world are ordained by God. Nothing happens

outside of

the sovereignty of God. And it's wonderful to

express gratitude and thanksgiving to God when

things go well. And my heart was filled with

such appreciation that we were all around the

dinner

table for Christmas that year and the previous

years and for all that God continues to do in

and

through our lives. But there is this sense in

which we wrestle with, I think, with the

sovereignty

of God in prayer. If God is sovereign and he

is sovereign, why pray? And that's a question

that

arises. And tonight I want to give you the

essence of a theology that I think is so

important that

has been impactful in my life. And I want to

begin here in Matthew chapter seven, but I

want to look

at the Sermon on the Mount a couple of

different texts with you. And I was joking a

minute ago

that I usually go to sleep about this time in

the sense that my alarms fiction to ring. And

I go

to bed between 8.30 and 9. And so, you know,

that is a reality. But by the Lord's grace, I

do want

to preach to you the essence of the message

because there are some truths here that I hope

that will

be impactful for you and that will really stir

your soul to pray. And to see the reality, the

only

reason we should pray is because God is

sovereign. Whenever you think about prayer, if

God's not

sovereign, there's no need to pray to him. We

pray to him because not only is he far greater

than we

are, he is indeed the only one that is great

and that he rules and reigns over every aspect

of our

lives. For after all, the very hairs upon our

head are numbered. Psalm 139 tells us that our

days are

written in his book and thus we come here to

Holy Scripture tonight for God to instruct us

and to

compel us about the importance of prayer and

how indeed we should be a praying people,

especially

those that believe in the sovereignty of God.

So, look with me in Matthew chapter 7, verse 7

,

and let's read this text together. "Ask and it

will be given to you. Seek and you will find.

Knock and it will be opened to you. For

everyone who ask receives, and he who ask

finds. And to him

who knocks, it will be opened. Or what man is

there among you, who, when his son asks for a

loaf,

will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a

fish, he will not give him a snake will he? If

you,

then, being evil, know how to give good gifts

to your children, how much more will your

father who

is in heaven give what is good to those who

ask of him? And everything, therefore, treat

people

the same way that you want them to treat you,

for this is the law and the prophets. Enter

through

the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the

way is broad that leads to destruction. And

there are

many who enter through it. For the gate is

small and the way is narrow that leads to life

. And there

are few who find it. So as Jesus is instruct

ing his disciples about prayer, and he's

already

instructed them about what we call the Lord's

Prayer in chapter six, that prayer is an

essential

part of the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And if we're going to emulate him, then we

must

indeed be people of prayer. For as he imbounds

said, what we are upon our knees before God,

that's all that we are in nothing else. It is

to say that our prayer lives define us. It

reveals to

us the true nature of our lives. How much time

we spend in solitude and silence with God

really

does say a great deal about what we believe

about God. And not only those times of silence

and solitude

individually, but how much time we spend

praying with our spouse, how much time we

spend praying

with our families, how much time we spend

praying with the church. And so tonight as we

look at these

things, I want to encourage you to understand

what it is that God would have us to pray for

and how

this is interwoven with the sovereignty of God

. And as you look at the Sermon on the Mount,

one of

the things you're confronted with is indeed

the Kingdom of God. Look at a couple of texts

with

me and put this in your heart and mind, for

this is extraordinarily important. Look with

me in Matthew

chapter five and look at the Beatitudes. I

want to show you a couple of things here about

the Beatitudes.

I think this is a description of what happens

to a human being whenever they become born

from above.

For whenever Jesus said to Nicodemus that you

must be born from above, that first you become

born

again and then you see the Kingdom of God.

What happens to a human being whenever that

transpires

to them? And I think the Beatitudes is indeed

a perfect reality of what has indeed transp

ired

to each believer. But notice the emphasis here

upon the Kingdom of God. Here in verse three,

the Bible says, "Blessed are the poor in

spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of heaven."

Don't you

find that intriguing as Jesus begins the

greatest sermon ever preached, that he begins

by talking

about the depravity of human beings, that we

are spiritually bankrupt before a holy and

righteous

God, and that whenever we come to the

awareness of our great need for a Savior,

because there is

nothing good within us, because depravity is a

reality for every single one of us, that for

these,

theirs is the Kingdom of heaven. But go on to

verse four there, "The next Beatitude is,

'Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall

be comforted.' Thus your mourning over your

sinfulness,

because the Spirit has bought conviction about

sin, judgment, and righteousness; thus you are

indeed

mourning, and thus you will be comforted." And

so this brings great gentleness of humility.

There's

this brokenness of sin. There's contrition and

there's an awareness that there's true

humility

in the life of the brother or sister that has

indeed been saved. So it's this kind of thing

that we deal with with the Christian Gospel.

We are confronted with the great need of a

Savior,

but we understand that our Savior has

transferred us from the Kingdom of darkness

into the Kingdom

of God's beloved Son. But then he says

something else there in verse six, "Blessed

are those who

hunger and thirst for righteousness." Now this

is Old Testament background because really the

imagery

here is that of famine. That the true disciple

of Jesus Christ is going to hunger and thirst,

not for food or for water, but for

righteousness. For you see, dear brethren,

whenever Christ comes

and saves you, and he gives you this new heart

, that heart that Jeremiah and Ezekiel spoke of

,

then he gives you a heart that longs for

righteousness. You are now a new creation,

and those old things of worldliness and desire

of the flesh has indeed been transformed

because

now you're going to choose towards love of God

. You're going to choose towards righteousness

and

holiness, and this is going to satisfy you.

Dear friend, are you satisfied in your heart

of hearts

tonight? Is Jesus really all that you need in

this journey of life? And do you hunger and

thirst

as a man that is in the desert, not looking

for food or for water, but for righteousness?

And because God has been so merciful to you,

you're going to be merciful to those around

you.

Why? How is this possible? It's because you

have this new heart. Notice there,

"Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall

see God." As Louis says, it's only those that

are

pure in heart that want to see God. Isn't that

true of you, Christian? Aren't you longing to

see

the Lord Jesus Christ? Yes, the kingdom has

come to your soul. The kingdom is indeed a

present

reality because Jesus said, "The kingdom is in

your midst, but yet we are all longing for

what?

For the second coming of Jesus Christ, for the

departing of those eastern skies,

and we will behold Him face to face." Now, I

'll leave the details to Brian and Rusty and

everybody

else about how all that unfolds, but I am

longing for the second coming of God. It is

this kind of

truth. And then he says that we're going to be

peacemakers. We're at peace with God,

and thus we're going to be at peace with

brothers. And we're going to long to be at one

with one

another, but notice that many people will not

want to be at peace with us, for there's going

to be

persecution for the sake of righteousness. And

then notice there in verse 10, he mentions

again,

"The kingdom of heaven." Now, it seems to me

that a good exegete would understand that the

kingdom

of God plays a major role here in the Sermon

on the Mount, for whenever Jesus teaches his

disciples

to pray, he says, "Pray that the kingdom of

God would come on earth as it is in heaven."

So,

as you come to understand what God has done in

our individual lives, that Jesus is saying

unto us

that because God has done this incredible work

, that your works are going to be put upon a

hill,

and people are going to see your works like a

light shining in the darkness, and you're

going

to be the salt of the earth, because for you

or his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for

good

works, and that God has indeed not only

transformed you into this new creation, but he

is displaying

to entire creation that what God has done for

you, he will do for anyone that is willing to

repent

and believe, for the general call of salvation

goes to all of humanity, and thus we rejoice,

because God has done this incredible work in

our lives. So, noticing this passage of

scripture here

in chapter 7, verses 7 through 14, that Jesus

comes back and he reiterates prayer again. Now

,

some have thought that this passage of

scripture is just a general call for prayer,

that Jesus has

already taught us how to pray, and then he

comes back again, and he reiterates this again

at the

end of the sermon, but I think that there's a

special purpose here. I draw up on John Brodas

and Chuck Coral's here, and then we're going

to look a little bit of Jonathan Edwards. Now,

for

those of you at Riverside, I found this

wonderful program, AI, that can take Jonathan

Edwards

complexities and make him understandable. Aren

't you glad that we have AI today?

But what is it that Jesus is saying here? Well

, notice as he speaks of these three words,

ask, seek, and knock. It has a rhythm to it,

and Jesus presents these things in such a way

that

these three gory words are implying an ongoing

action. This is not a one-time event, and

whenever

the apostle Paul says that we pray without ce

asing, it's kind of that imagery here that we

should be

asking and seeking and knocking, that we are

to continue this action, whatever this action

is,

for this was given to us by our Lord, and thus

if we're going to emulate him, if we're going

to

walk in his footsteps, then we're going to

have to pray as he prays, and he is teaching

us to be

able to carry these things forth. So what is

this issue here about prayers? This is just a

blanket

promise concerning prayer in general, and that

you could ask God anything that you want to

ask

him, or you can seek from God anything that

you want to seek, or you could knock and you

will

receive anything that you so request of God. I

don't think that's it. I think the whole

sermon

is emphasizing the kingdom, and the

righteousness required to enter into the

kingdom. We see as

Jesus begins ending the sermon, as it goes to

the conclusion, he is going to make some very

profound statements for everyone there, and

that he's saying to us that you need to be

asking,

you need to be seeking, you need to be

knocking about the kingdom of God, for it was

there in

Matthew chapter 6 verse 33, where he says, "Se

ek ye first the kingdom of God and his

righteousness,

and all these other things will be added unto

you. Seek means to seek the kingdom of God and

the

righteousness required to enter into it. Dear

church, that whenever one becomes born from

above,

and you have this new heart that desires

holiness and righteousness, then you're going

to be longing

for the coming of the kingdom of God, because

the kingdom has already come to your soul,

and you're going to desire righteousness, you

're going to desire to be living the life that

is

honoring unto God. You do not want to discour

age your witness, and if you're running down a

driveway

and you're facing despair, then the

righteousness within you will call out, God,

let me not dishonor

you." For you see, we're all going to be

facing within the providence of God enormous

challenges

in life. For it's one thing to be up on the

mountaintop and talk about God's sovereignty

and

quote R.C. Sproul as I have, that there's no

maverick molecules acting contrary to the

sovereignty of

God. That's all fine and good, but whenever

life has turned inside out, and everything

that you

stood for and all that you hope for is

standing there and it's in ashes, how do you

respond then?

Do you still believe in the sovereignty of God

? For you see, it is God that grants us

righteousness,

and remember the five soul is. Indeed, we are

saved by grace alone through faith alone and

Christ alone, right? There's nothing of works

that we can do for anything for salvation.

We are nothing more than filthy rags. We're

depraved sinners. There's nothing that we can

do to alter

salvation because our best of works are

nothing more than things that are nothing more

than filthy

rags before a holy and righteous God. But it's

Christ that comes to us in our sinful

condition

and in our brave condition, and He comes and

He closed us in His righteousness. And

whenever He

comes and closed us in His righteousness, then

He puts this desire in our soul to seek He

first,

the Kingdom of God and His righteousness

because all of these things are commanded. And

thus what

Mark reminded us a few moments ago is that we

have this free will, but that free will as

Luther

reminds us is indeed in bondage. But whenever

Christ saves us, that we've been redeemed by

the blood

of the Lamb. Thus, we have this desire now to

be able to carry forth this thing called

prayer

because we're going to emulate our Savior and

you ask yourself the question, well,

if I'm going to be a person that is praying,

but why do I pray if I believe in the

sovereignty of

God because you're following in the footsteps

of Jesus? Jesus was the sovereign God and is

the

sovereign God of the entire universe and He

prayed. If He prayed, and I think that Jesus

understood

sovereignty a lot better than any of us, that

He is one that prays. That's intriguing. As

you ask,

as you seek, but also as you knock, the

command knock is also important in the Sermon

on the Mount.

Matthew here in chapter seven, verse 13 to 14,

refers to a narrow gate through which one

enters

through an eschatological life. The contrast

is with a wide gate and one who enters into

eternal destruction. In first century

Palestine, a person normally approached the

gate and he

would knock upon it to announce the arrival

and request entrance. And yet the gate would

be

unlocked and opened from within. Very

important. Whenever you knew where the gate

was as a citizen

of the kingdom, you went and you knocked on

that gate, but you could not open it from the

outside,

it had to be opened from the inside. And when

you knock on the door, it's quite a great

imagery.

For in Acts chapter 12, verse 13, the

scripture says when he knocked at the door of

the gate,

the servant girl named Rhonda came to answer.

So you remember whenever Peter was in prison,

they were praying and I might say not with so

much faith because they were shocked that he

was left

free. Thus the word knock on the narrow gate

is one that leads to lying. I think what Jesus

is

saying here that in our prayer lines that we

need to continue to be aware, constantly

praying and

saying true, living God, take and apply Christ

to me because you have changed me and

transformed me

from this creature that was living in open

rebellion before you, this depraved wicked

creature. Now

that I have been saved by the blood of the

Lamb and I have been redeemed and I have been

sent free

from the bondage of sin, I have this

compelling desire in my soul to ask, seek and

knock for what?

A new house, a new car, do I want some kind of

material possession or am I concerned about

some other frivolous matter of this world? No,

I'm prayed that the Kingdom of God would be

fully realized and manifested in my life

because I want to be like Jesus. It is here

that Jesus

contrast our understanding of who God is with

an earthly father and he says, and I love it,

you being evil, you know, that if you're

willing to take care of your children in

essence, even

though that you're not righteous people, you

're not holy people, how much more does your

father

in heaven want you to cry out unto him and say

, Lord, I want to be changed and transformed,

I want the gospel of Jesus Christ to govern me

, Lord, I want to grow in grace and knowledge,

I want to grow in Christian maturity, I want

to become what you've called me to be.

If you see the calling of God, isn't this fr

ivolous idea that it's out there somewhere,

but whenever God has called me, whenever he

has transformed me, then I have this

compelling

desire in my soul to get before God and say,

Lord, cleanse me and purify me, search me and

see if

there's any harmful way in me because private

prayer is at time that I find myself on my

face

before God crying out and saying, Lord God,

would you please come and examine me because I

want to

confess my sin and I want to repent for you

see, friend, repentance is not a one-time

event at

conversion, but repentance is the ongoing

activity in the life of the Christian because

I'm asking,

I'm seeking and I'm knocking and say, Lord,

check me and examine me because I don't want

to do anything

that's going to dishonor your sacred name.

Dear church, can I say to you today that one

of the

greatest fears in my life is for me to do

something where I'll be disqualified from the

ministry of

the Lord Jesus Christ. I want to honor my

Savior. I want to honor Him in prayers, the

very mortar

that holds me close unto my Savior. So let us

come and behold this great and glorious truth,

how it is that we serve this God that wants to

hear our prayers more than we want to pray

them.

So this is relational. When we think of the

sovereignty of God, it is not some impersonal

dictator who makes all the plans of the world

and that somehow some way that we have prayer,

some human mechanism to change the things we

don't like in life. Friend, prayer is not some

mechanism

that you and I can come before God and say,

God, I want you to change my circumstances.

Don't you remember what Jesus taught us in

Matthew chapter six verse eight?

"So do not be like them, for your father knows

what you need before you ask him."

We are participating with God in eternal

fellowship because God's eternal decrees

have been incorporated into our lives and that

as we common ponder what God has ordained,

both by the ends and the means like prayer,

then we are carrying forth the very thing that

God has

called us to do and we're praying as Christ

instructed us to because a prayerless life

is a life that indicts the person that is the

confessor. It was Spurgeon that said to people

,

"Friend, you have enough dust on your Bibles

to write damnation."

Could I say to you today that if your prayer

closet has so much dust up on it that you can

write damnation, friend, you got a serious

problem? It is Jesus that comes to tell us

these things are so quite critical. Now, when

you understand there in verse 12,

when he speaks of the golden rule, as we call

it, and everything therefore treat people the

same way, that you want them to treat you for

this is the law and the prophets, it's

intriguing to me

that as you come and contemplate the general

gracious love of God to us and that every good

gift comes from God, that this should impact

our lives. Why is this connected to the prayer

of asking, seeking, and knocking? Because as

we come before God and we thank him with

gratitude

and appreciation for all that he has done for

us, then that's going to affect our

relationship with

other human beings. Because if we truly have

this heart that is filled with gratitude and

appreciation and that we're overwhelmed by the

grace of God that's in Jesus Christ, then we

are

going to love people unconditionally. For as

Jonathan Edwards says, "The foundation of our

relationship with God is not self-love or self

-interest, and I don't look at other human

beings as a means

to be able to get out of them what I want, but

I am to love them as Jesus loved them,

whether it's reciprocated back to me or not."

So you come to see what he describes here.

This narrow gate, notice what the scripture

says, "Enter through the narrow gate, for the

gate is

wide in the way as broad that leads to

destruction, and there are many who enter

throughout. For the

gate is small in the way as narrow that leads

to life, and there are few who find it." Now

intriguing,

that whenever you consider these two paths of

life, one leads to destruction, it is a broad

path in

many Aronia, but there are few that are on the

narrow path, and that narrow path is the ones

that are the true confessors of Christ. Now be

reminded, dear friend, that whenever Jesus is

preaching the Sermon on the Mount, he's

addressing this to his professed disciples.

And he is saying

to these professed disciples, "Many of you are

going to go down the wide path. You're going

to go

down the broad path. You're going to go down

the path that leads to destruction, but there

is a small

way, a narrow way that leads to life, and

there are few who find it. It is penetrating

words for us

to examine ourselves." Now I'm so grateful for

Revelation, for the Bible says in the end, at

the

great day of judgment, that we're going to see

the multitudes of people that are born again

believers,

and they're going to be from every kind of

people group, and from every nation, and all

these various

individuals will be there. And so there will

be many of us, and yet Jesus gives us some

sobering

words to do some self-examination. Indeed,

dear friend, prayer, asking, seeking, knocking

is the

very essence of choosing and staying on the

narrow path. So it is here that we come and

behold

these glorious things. I had all this stuff

written down for the freedom of the wheel and

all

this sort of thing, but Mark did such a great

job. I'm going to move forward right here. Let

me give

you a couple of other things to ponder and

think of this evening. Since God is sovereign,

why pray

we ask this evening? Well, by illustrating

prayer is not an addendum to our lives, but it

's the

essential practice of obedience that builds a

life that is resilient against the storms of

life.

Go to the end of the Sermon on the Mount,

because I just want to make a few observations

for you

here tonight, and some things for you to be

able to ponder and to think upon this evening.

So when you come here to the end of the Sermon

on the Mount, Jesus says there's two kinds of

hears. He says, "Therefore, everyone who hears

these words of mine and acts on them may be

compared

to a wise man who has built his house on the

rock. And the rain fell and the floods came

and the

winds blew and slammed against the house, and

yet it did not fall, for it had been founded

on the

rock. Everyone who hears these words of mine

and does not act on them will be like a

foolish man

who built his house on the sand. The rain fell

and the floods came and the winds blew and

slammed

against the house, and it fell, and great was

its fall." And so both are hears of the Word

of God,

but there's one that hears the Word of God,

and this is the one that has built his life

upon the

rock. What is the rock? The rock is the living

Word of God. It is Christ. It is the written

Word of

God. It is being infused in your life. It's

the imagery of Ezekiel eating the scroll. It's

the

imagery of those that have the Word of God as

their foundation that whenever the storms come

,

then you're going to endure whatever may come.

As I shared with you a moment ago,

whenever the wreck happened almost two years

ago, as I was running down that driveway and

not knowing

what I was going to open up, so thankful that

my wife and my daughter are here today.

But I've often wondered to myself, "What if I

opened that door, and if neither one of them

would have

been alive?" I think about that every day, and

I imagine left unto myself I would have fallen

,

and I think I would have just died right there

.

I don't think I could have gone forward unless

God, in his gracious sovereignty,

granted grace for me to stand because the rock

would have been beneath my feet.

It is a powerful imagery because, friend, I

want to say to all of us that we're all going

to

suffer in this life. There's not one of us

that is immune to true heartache and broken

ness.

All of us have some suffering ahead of us, and

we're going to live in the refiner's fire,

and we're going to endure some really

difficult things. But it's here where holiness

takes over.

It's here where we come to understand that our

faith is not merely intellectual accent,

but it is a holy practice that evidences true

faith. Why pray if God is a sovereign ruler

because we pray because we're putting into

practice Christ's words? That's what he's

describing here.

As Edwards reflects upon divine providence in

his works, he describes that God orders all

events

for the good of his people. But this is good

because we realize that only through obedience

,

least we build on sin and continual ruin. I

say to you tonight, for every born-again

believer

in this building, and anyone that will ever

hear these words, I'm talking about for anyone

that

has ever been born again, God has his

sovereign hand around you. You will not keep

yourself

because you can't sanctify your life no more

than you can justify it,

and God is going to uphold you in the midst of

life's greatest storms. And whenever you

believe

that you cannot go on one further step, you're

right. You cannot, but God can, and Christ

will

sustain you and keep you because he is the one

that is able to provide everything. This

sermon

tonight is a statement against self-reliance

in the Christian life. Self-reliance will make

you

crumble under the pressure of providence's

weight, for we come to live in a world where

God continues

to live and abide within us. And this isn't

some kind of sphere of mental ascent, but this

is a

present reality that the Kingdom of God has

come and that we are going to be sustained and

we are

going to be contempt continuously in our lives

because God has kept us. Tonight, we ask the

question why pray if God is sovereign? We pray

, dear friend, because he is sovereign. Would

you pray

with me tonight? Father, there's a lot that we

didn't get to, but I think that we have shared

what you would have us to look at this evening

. Lord, we acknowledge before you that you

alone

are God. There's no one like you in heaven or

upon the earth, and I love what the psalmist

says.

Lord, that you're in heaven and you do

whatever you so please. God, you are not

beholding to any of

us, and none of us has any idea what tomorrow

will bring. There are many of us in this

congregation

tonight that one day will be diagnosed with

cancer, have already been diagnosed with

cancer.

Lord, we will all face moments where we will

either bury loved ones or they will bury us.

Father, as churches, we're never going to live

in ease and comfort. We're always going to be

facing tremendous difficulties because that's

church life. This is living in a fallen world.

We are light and we're seeking to be able to

proclaim the gospel, and thus the world is

going

to hate us, and because the world hates us, we

are going to face persecution. That's the

reality

of where we find ourselves today. May these

things not embitter us, but Lord, may we

indeed

flee unto you and to seek you even more

seriously all the time. For it is in the

sacred name of Jesus

do we ask these things. Amen. I want to leave

you this one thought tonight. Roger Dell, just

let me

mention this to you. I've pondered whether I

should say this or not. I don't know if all of

you know,

but here at Riverside Baptist Church, we have

had some real challenges in 20 years.

The first, after the first three and a half,

four years I was here, we had 80 people

depart from the church. They said it was over

Calvinism and election. I was preaching

through

John's gospel. I was just preaching the Bible,

you know, but it was very painful. It was very

hard

because not only did I go through that, my

family went through that, all the families,

and some of

them are here tonight. It was miserable. Last

year we had something similar happen where we

had

people we knew for some of us 20 years. It was

heartbreaking, but I have to know all of that

's

within God's sovereignty. Amen. And we pray

for all those folks. I see a lot of them

around

town all the time, you know, but how do we

move forward? All I know to do is keep

preaching,

keep praying, keep being faithful, and keep

growing, keep repenting, keep looking to

Christ.

Thank you for hearing me tonight. I greatly

appreciate it, brother.