Bearing Fruit in Prayer

OK, so a number of years ago, When I was single, a number of years ago, I recall praying together with a very good friend of mine. we were in his home in the living room and spending a considerable time in prayer. At the time, he had a roommate whom we concluded was struggling with a serious addiction. It was an addiction that was harming his spiritual life and so as my friend and I were praying, we began to pray for his roommate to overcome his addiction.

Immediately with eyes closed, we saw a bright flash accompanied by a thunderous noise as the ground beneath our knees quaked. We opened our eyes and we looked at each other and we said, whoa. Within seconds, my friend's roommate ran from out of his room. He was observably shaken and the following is a modified G rated quote of what he said.

Dang it, my TV stopped working. I can't watch my show. To this, my friend and I rose to our feet and we, we began screaming and shouting as we danced around the coffee table. We were so excited about how the Lord issued a bolt of lightning as an answer to our prayer that his roommate stopped watching too much TV.

Well, my purpose in sharing this is not to impress you with how our prayer was answered, but that you be impressed and you with a God who delights in hearing. And answering our prayers. He is a God who delights in hearing and answering our prayers. He delights, he delights.

Our message this morning is entitled Being Fruitful in prayer, and we will be reading from Mark chapter 11 verses 20 to 25. Mark 11:20-25, if you have your Bibles, please turn there to Mark chapter 11, and as you are turning there, I want to give a little bit of background information. As we examine this passage, we must consider context. It is Passion Week, the week leading to the death and resurrection of Jesus.

The slide behind me provides a basic layout of the week, and both John MacArthur and William Lane Craig agree that Monday would have been the triumphal entry. We can call it a false coronation of the true king. You recall the mass celebration as Jesus first entered Jerusalem. Everyone, nearly everyone anticipated Jesus overthrowing the government and establishing his earthly reign.

They were crying out, Hosanna in the highest, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, blessed is the coming kingdom of our Father David, Hosanna in the highest as they were anticipating the Lord Jesus establishing his earthly reign and setting himself up as king. That evening proved to be anticlimactic as Jesus enters the temple. He looks around. There is no indication that he even spoke a word.

And then he leaves. The next morning, Tuesday morning, Jesus heads back to Jerusalem, and along the way, Jesus is hungry. He spots a fig tree that is full of leaves. A fig tree with leaves is a sure sign of fruit, and so Jesus approaches the fig tree looking for the expected fruit under the leaves, but he finds nothing.

He curses the fig tree, saying to the fig tree, May no one ever eat fruit from you again. Jesus proceeds to enter Jerusalem and he goes directly into the temple. As he enters the temple, the anger that he felt from the night before is expressed as he overturns the money tables and he shouts, it is written, my house shall be called a house of prayer for the nations, but you have made it a robber's den. Hear the word of the Lord again, my house shall be called a house of prayer for the nations, but you have made it a robber's den.

Without question, Jesus has prayer at the forefront of his thinking. He envisions people from every nation, tribe, and tongue coming together in prayer to the one and only true God. Jesus will then exit the temple, and he makes his way out of Jerusalem. The next morning is Wednesday of Passion Week, and as Jesus and his disciples are heading back into Jerusalem, they spot the fig tree along the way.

It is the same fig tree from the day before and the text says it was withered from the roots up. Peter, as was his custom, is first to speak. Listen to what Peter says, Rabbi, behold, the fig tree which you cursed has withered. Implied in Peter's statement is a question which Matthew's Gospel records.

When we look at the parallel passage in Matthew, we see that Jesus is here responding to the disciples' question, how did the fig tree wither at once? They were blown away by what they had seen. How in the world could this have happened? How could the fig tree wither at once?

You see, the disciples failed to put the pieces together. The fact is that just the day before Jesus cursed the fig tree, he had by the power of his words pronounced judgment, and his word is now seen as having come into fruition. The withering of the fig tree is merely the result of having been cursed by Jesus. You see, there is power in the word of the Lord.

What the Lord determines will come to pass. Jesus' response. is not at all. What anyone would expect.

One would think that Jesus would reveal the meaning of the withered fig tree, that Jesus would explain how the fig tree represents fruitless Israel, but Jesus launches immediately into the topic of prayer. Where does this come from? What does prayer have to do with the withered fig tree? As we examine the passage, we will see that prayer proves to be the perfect topic for Jesus to address.

Think about it. Praying to the true God for miracles such as salvation with the right attitude of faith and forgiveness is the very thing that the nation of Israel. which the withered fig tree represents failed to do. Again, The fig tree represents Israel, and Israel was a fruitless nation.

Israel was a nation who prayed, but they did not pray aright. Israel was a people who did not in their heart have an attitude of compassion and mercy and grace and forgiveness, and Jesus is having an issue with Israel. And the fig tree that he curses is representative of the nation of Israel. But let's go ahead and then read Mark 11:20.

Mark 11:20. And as they were passing by in the morning, they saw the fig tree withered from the roots up and being reminded, Peter said to him, Rabbi, behold, the fig tree which you cursed has withered, and Jesus answered, saying to them, Have faith in God. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, be taken up and cast into the sea and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says is going to happen, it shall be granted him. Therefore, I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them, and they shall be granted you.

And whenever you stand praying, forgive. If you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your transgressions. But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your transgressions. Our message this morning is entitled Bearing fruit in prayer.

bearing fruit and prayer, and we will consider 4 ingredients of a fruitful prayer life, 4 ingredients of a fruitful prayer life. Ingredient number 1, praying to the true God, praying to the true God. Notice again in verse 22, and Jesus answered, saying to them, have faith in God. The subject here is implied you, Jesus is speaking directly to Peter and his disciples.

They are being commanded to have faith. The imperative is present tense, active voice, meaning right now in the immediate present, they are to be deliberately choosing to have faith. Furthermore, they are to continue to have faith in God. The word for faith is pistis and it carries the idea of belief and trust.

They are to believe in and trust in the Lord and notice that the object of their faith is not faith. They are being commanded. Not, they are not being commanded to believe in their belief. No, the object of their faith is God Himself.

Implied in this passage is the absolute necessity of having and maintaining a right view of God. What, what you believe about God and how you relate to him defines you as a person. It is the most important thing about you. Jesus begins his discourse on prayer with the most important command to have faith in God, have faith in God.

This is the very thing that the disciples so often failed to do. We see them in Mark's Gospel struggling to believe. They did not always have faith. Their belief was infected by the poison of so much unbelief.

Throughout Mark's Gospel, we see Jesus giving them every reason to believe. They had every reason to trust in Jesus. Jesus had performed countless miracles designed to buttress the faith of his followers, and here is a chronology from Mark's Gospel of the things Jesus does. These are just a number of the things that Jesus does on the way to the withered fig tree.

Chapter one. In the synagogue, Jesus delivers a man from demon possession. Jesus heals Peter's mother-in-law who was sick with perhaps a life-threatening fever. When the Sabbath ended, it says that Jesus healed many who were ill, with various diseases, and he cast out many demons, and then it goes on to say how Jesus healed a leper.

In chapter two, Jesus heals a paralytic. Jesus begins by forgiving him of his sins. Then he empowers him to walk, and this is both spiritual and physical healing. Chapter 3 in the synagogue on the Sabbath, Jesus heals a man with a withered hand.

Chapter 4, Jesus demonstrates his power over nature by calming the raging sea, and you recall how Jesus was asleep and the panicked disciples awoke him crying saying, do you not care that we are perishing? It was then that Jesus arose and rebuked the wind, and he said to the sea, hush. Be still. Matthew's gospel says it became perfectly calm.

And Jesus follows up with a penetrating question. Where is your faith? In chapter 5, Jesus cast demons into a herd of swine, a hemorrhaging woman is healed, Jairus' daughter dies and Jesus says, do not be afraid any longer, only believe. Jesus then follows up by going to the corpse of the little girl and he raised her from the dead.

In chapter 6, Jesus enters his own hometown and he performs a small number of miracles. Matthew's gospel says he did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief. You see, the folks there did not have faith and therefore they failed to come to Jesus for healing. The result, Jesus chose not to do many miracles there.

Jesus sends out the 12, and he empowers them to cast out demons, heal diseases, and every sickness, and Jesus feeds the 5000. Jesus walks on water, Jesus heals at Gennesaret. Everyone who touched his cloak was healed. And it goes on and on.

Chapter 7, Jesus comes into the city of Tire and he delivers a Serro Phoenician girl from a demon. In the city of Sidon, he healed a deaf and a mute man. Chapter 8, he feeds the 4000. He heals a blind man in Bethsaida.

Chapter 9, Peter, James, and John witness the transfiguration and coming down from the mountain, Jesus observes that his His disciples had failed to do what he had empowered them to do. Jesus declares, Listen to what Jesus says to his disciples who had failed to cast out, the demon possessed boy. He says, oh, unbelieving generation, Faithless generation, you who do not trust, oh unbelieving generation, how long shall I be with you? How long shall I put up with you?

Bring the boy to me. And Jesus proceeds to deliver the demon possessed boy. In chapter 10, a blind beggar named Barhemaeus is healed, and now, now we come to this passage where we see yet another miracle. The day before Jesus had cursed the fig tree.

Now Peter and the others observed that it is withered. They present their observation to Jesus and Jesus responds with this declaration, Have faith in God. Jesus does not say have faith in prayer. The object of our faith is not our own prayer.

No, we are commanded to have faith in God. Implied in this command is that we are having faith in the one and only true God. There are many who have faith in the false God. Many of the religious leaders, the scribes, and the Pharisees believed in the God of their own understanding, but their understanding of God was deficient and therefore rendered them fruitless.

In our day, there are many who pray, Muslims pray, Jews pray, Hindus pray, Buddhists pray, Mormons pray, Jehovah's Witnesses pray. These are just a few examples of folks who pray. They have faith in God, but their faith is misdirected, it is deficient. They do not have faith in the one and only true God of the scripture.

Brothers and sisters, fruitful prayer always begins with faith in the true God. We must wrap our hearts and our minds around the reality of God. He is the one God eternally existing in three persons. We worship God the Father, God the Son, and God the Spirit.

Our God is powerful, having spoken all things into existence through the word of his power, and in just a few days, he will die on the cross and he will be raised bodily from the dead. That is power. The Trinity. And the resurrection of God the Son are truths that distinguish the Christian faith from all other religions.

We cannot have faith in God while denying the Trinity and the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. This is the God whom we are to have faith in. He is a God who is holy, infinite, powerful, everywhere present, all knowing, loving, merciful and kind. And because of our sin, he is stirred up in his anger.

Apart from faith in this God, his wrath abides on us. We are destined to hell, but God sent his son to earth to die on the cross and to rise from the dead, so that through faith in this one and only true God, we would be saved and we would have an audience with him in prayer. The disciples had sufficient reason to trust in God. And yet they struggled.

And Jesus is here commanding them. This is not an option. This is a command. Have faith in God.

That is a critical component. Fruitfulness and prayer begins with having faith in the true God, but there is another important ingredient for a fruitful prayer life. A fruitful prayer life since it is directed to the one and only true God is accompanied by the ingredient of praying for miracles, praying for miracles. In Mark 11:23, Jesus says, after saying, have faith in God.

Truly I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, be taken up and cast into the sea and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he is saying is going to happen, it shall be granted him. Truly I say to you, indicates that Jesus is about to deliver an important truth that should be taken to heart. Our God invites us to pray for the miraculous. The example of a miracle that Jesus presents is the miracle of a moved mountain.

Jesus gives conditions for such a prayer to be answered. First, as we have already learned, we must have faith in God. He is the powerful one who is able to pull through whenever we are in a situation where we need a miracle, but second, we must not doubt that what we ask for will be given. Positively speaking, we must believe that God has heard and will exercise his power in answer to our prayer.

Now, Jesus is not here expecting that Peter and the apostles would pray for mountains to jump into the sea. In fact, there is no recorded account of the apostles ever praying for such a thing, but there are accounts of the apostles performing miracles. Consider a parallel passage in James chapter 15 to 8. I'll read it to you.

James here says, if any of you lacks wisdom, let a mask of God, who gives to all men generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith without any doubting. Let him ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea driven and tossed by the wind, for let not that man expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being a double-minded man unstable in all of his ways. You see, whenever we are in a desperate situation requiring a wisdom that we do not possess, we must go to God in faith and we must ask for wisdom, and God is pleased to grant to us the wisdom that we need.

Likewise. Whenever we are in a situation that calls for a miracle, we are to go to God in prayer. He is here inviting us to pray for those miracles. If we need a mountain to be moved, God can move that mountain, and I can think of at least 3 miracles that are worthy of our prayers.

First, the miracle of salvation. I want to go backwards a little bit into Mark 10:17 to 27. And in that section of Mark, we learned that salvation is nothing less than a miraculous work of God. Now, Jordan talked about this miracle and we did not plan it out together, and I believe that this is a point that God wants for us to hear this morning that we understand that salvation is nothing less than the miraculous work of God, and this is the type of miracle that we should be praying for, and you remember the story in Mark chapter 10, a rich young religious man comes to Jesus seeking salvation.

He comes bowing, praying, he comes with the right question, but Jesus puts up a roadblock. Jesus says, keep the commands, and the man wrongly thought that he had kept the law perfectly, and so Jesus goes, goes for the jugular, and he addresses this man's idol and he says, sell all that you possess and give it all to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven and come follow me. And the Bible tells us that this man went away sad, for he owned much property. Then Jesus.

squares his disciples up. And he begins to talk to his disciples, and from the perspective of the disciples, what they had just observed was confusing. This is a rich, young, religious man. He was blessed of God, he had everything going for him, and the man walks away sadly, and it looks as if what has just happened is contrary to what we would expect.

We would expect that of all people, this is a man who is saved. This is a man who is right with God, but he goes away sadly. So Jesus goes on to declare to his disciples that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God, and that greatly astonished the disciples like whoa. Boy, if the wealthy religious man who certainly was blessed of the Lord is not in, then who is?

They literally ask. Then who can be saved? Then who can be saved? You detect a little bit of self-concern here, a legitimate self-concern.

What about me? If he's not in, what about me? And Jesus responds by declaring, with men, it is impossible. But not with God, for with God all things are possible.

You see, salvation is nothing less than a miraculous work of God, and in this passage, we are being invited to pray for the miraculous. We are being invited to pray for the miracle of salvation. Are there people in your spheres of influence in need of the miracle of salvation? Pray for them.

Do you have family? Friends, neighbors, coworkers, and enemies who are in need of salvation, God says to you this morning to pray for them, pray for the miracle. Perhaps there is someone whom you love deeply and you have been praying for years and even decades for that person. You might even feel at times like giving up hope that that person will ever be saved.

I want you today to be renewed afresh to pray for the salvation of folks near and dear to you. Sure, you cannot save them, but you have a God who can pray for the miracle of salvation. I would love this time next year to look around and to see 50+ miracles in this church. That is 1 saved person for every 10 who are here.

And that sounds like a pretty, legitimate thing for us to pray for, oh God, I pray that there would be 50 people in this church, this time next year, who would be born again between now and then. Allow people to get saved, allow us, Lord, to be successful in our attempts to reach out to the unsaved. A second miracle worthy of prayer is the miracle of sanctification, the miracle of sanctification, that is your own personal growth and the spiritual growth of people in your lives.

Perhaps you are struggling with a life dominating sin.

There are mountains in your life that need to be lifted up and cast into the sea. Those mountains come in the form of materialism. Laziness, lust, gluttony, bitterness, anger, prayerlessness, jealousy, gossip, slander, pride, or arrogance, and the list can go on and on. You are struggling with sin in one form or another, and God in His word here today says to you to have faith in God, and you can pray for the miracle of sanctification.

The very God who moves mountains can deliver you from the sins that so easily entangle you. A third miracle worthy of prayer is the miracle of healing, the miracle of healing. I am not saying that we have folks running around today with the gift of healing. My understanding of scripture leads me to believe that certain sign gifts gradually ceased as the apostolic era came to an end, but we must never lose our confidence in a God who Is able to heal as believers we should boldly pray for physical healing.

We are commanded to present our request to God. We are commanded to approach God's throne of grace with boldness for help in our time of need and so we should pray amongst other things for physical healing. A few months ago, the Lord challenged me in this area. I had just finished reading an article by a well respected theologian named Daniel Wallace.

In the article, he writes as a cessationist who offers a balanced perspective of ways in which we can learn from our charismatic brothers and sisters in Christ. One of the 11 points that he makes is that God is still a God of healing and miracles. God is still a God of healing and miracles. I read that section of the article at the same time that my mom had asked me to pray for my auntie Wendy.

My auntie Wendy was diagnosed with a terminal illness and her time was very limited. Auntie Wendy's loved ones had flown in from out of the country in order to be with her in her passing, and she was within hours of her departure, and I felt especially challenged by God to pray. I pleaded with the Lord for her healing. And you will never guess what happened.

God actually healed her. In fact, the doctor declared that it was a medical miracle. Suffice it to say that God invites us to pray for the miraculous. Let us now move to the 3rd ingredient for ministry success.

The 3rd ingredient, praying with confidence that you will receive those things God wants you to ask for. Praying with confidence that you will receive those things that God wants you to ask for. The Lord has just invited his followers to pray for the miraculous. He does this through his reference to the mountain being taken up and cast into the sea.

He tells us that when we pray for such a miracle, we must believe, and then the Lord sums it up in verse 24, he says, therefore, therefore I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you have received them and they shall be granted to you. Now, this is not to say that Jesus is our genie in which our wish is his command. We do not preach a name it, claim it, blab it, grab it gospel. Rather, we must pray in accord with God's will.

We understand this, Jesus, for example, will later model this in Mark 14:36 when in the garden, sweating as it were great drops of blood in anticipation of his own crucifixion, Jesus cries out, Abba, Father, all things are possible for you, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me, yet not what I will. But what you will. You see, even Jesus himself would come before his mighty Father in heaven and pray.

And there are times in which his mighty Father in heaven gave him a response, and the response in this situation is, I'm not gonna remove the cup of my wrath from you, but I am gonna pour out my wrath upon you, and I am gonna cause you to suffer excruciating pain so that lost sinners can be saved. You see, God on this occasion, he answered, And his answer to Jesus was, you will die on the cross for the salvation of sinners. That was the Father's will. In 1 John 5:14, we read this, this is the confidence which we have before him, that if we ask anything according to his will, take note of that clause, according to his will, if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.

And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have to request which we have asked from Him. You see, it is critical that as we pray to the Lord, we pray to the Lord in accord with His will and that's part of what must happen in prayer, that in prayer we're so connected to the heart of Almighty God that the things that he desires are the very things that we desire, and so we are praying in accord with the very will of God Himself. Another qualification here is that we need to pray with proper motives.

In James 4:2, James says he's the half-brother of Jesus, and he writes this, you do not have because you do not ask.

But then he goes on to say, you ask and you do not receive. Why? Because you ask with the wrong motives. You see, our hearts must be motivated aright when we come before the Lord in prayer.

We must be motivated with a concern, a consuming concern for the glory of of God and the advancement of the church, and I believe that as long as if we are motivated or right, that we can come to the Lord with these requests, praying for these miracles, and we can look anticipating that the Lord is more than happy to want to bless us by answering those prayers in the affirmative. With this being said, we should with confidence, pray for the miracles of the salvation of lost people, the sanctification of saved people, as well as the physical healing of both lost and saved folks.

We ought to pray as well with humble submission to a good and sovereign God who has the right to do as he wills. At the end of the day, God is God and he has the right to answer our prayers however he sees fit.

He has the right to do as he pleases. Sometimes God's purpose in our life is accomplished when we don't get what we ask for. We have already considered the example of the Lord Jesus Christ. If you don't always get what you ask for, you are in good company.

We might desire healing, but the Lord allows us to suffer physically for His glory and our good. Over 20 years ago, I had fallen asleep in the passenger seat of my friend's car, and I remember waking up to my friend Kevin, praying that the Lord would heal my right ear. For those who don't know, I was born with a severely deformed ear, and in fact, I cannot even hear out of the right side of my head because I do not have an ear canal, and Kevin is a good friend and he really wanted the Lord to fix my ear.

But guess what?

It wasn't the Lord's will to heal my ear. I could give you a number of reasons why it is God's blessing to me to have a deformed ear. To be honest, I would not trade my ear for one that is perfectly formed. God has used my deformity to shape me in some positive ways as a person.

I never used to think this way. As a kid, I hated having one ear. I wore long hair. In order to hide my ear.

I would not go swimming for fear that someone might see my ear through my wet hair. But God over the years as I have grown in my sanctification, has helped me to see the good that he has accomplished in my life as a result of something as small as being born with one ear. And so you see, I no longer feel the need to cover my ear with long hair, not that I could. When Kevin prayed for me to have an ear some 20 years ago, it was not God's will to perform that miracle.

Nevertheless, we should pray to the one true God to move the mountains with confidence that he is able and often chooses to perform miracles. Let us now move to the 4th ingredient of a fruitful prayer life. Ingredient number 4, praying with an attitude of forgiveness. Listen to what Jesus says in Mark 11:25, and whenever you stand praying, forgive.

If you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your transgressions. But if you do not forgive, neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive your transgressions. You see, fruitfulness in prayer requires an attitude of forgiveness. Notice that we are to forgive anything against anyone.

It does not matter how we have been sinned against, it does not matter who has sinned against us, we must embrace an attitude of forgiveness. We're not saying we must trust those people, but we must forgive those people. This can be very difficult to do, but Jesus does not waffle with his command. We must forgive anything that we have against anyone.

The person who has been sinned against severely must forgive. We must forgive when slandered. Slandered against, gossiped about, stolen from, cussed at, lied to, assaulted, abused, mocked at, threatened, spat upon, tortured, whether emotionally or physically, and the list can go on and on. We must forgive whatever offense that anyone has committed against us.

This is an imperative. It is non-negotiable. The measure of our spirituality is our ability to walk in the steps of Jesus and forgive those who sin against us. Jesus modeled the attitude of forgiveness when from the cross he prayed, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.

And the Bible in Ephesians tells us to be kind, tender-hearted, forgiving, just as God in Christ Jesus has forgiven you. Understand from that passage that the basis for our forgiveness is the fact that our many sins, our many sins have been forgiven. A great debt has been taken care of, and God tells us to forgive just as God in Christ Jesus has forgiven you. And as we look at this passage, in particular, the passage before us issues For the sobering reason as to why we must forgive when it says, so that, this is the reason, this is the purpose, so that your Father who is in heaven may forgive you your transgressions.

Taken at face value, this passage warns that failure to forgive results in our not being forgiven by God. This passage is not teaching that we need to forgive in order to be forgiven. We understand that salvation is not based on works. There are several passages that make it clear that we are saved, not as a result of our works, but we are saved on two good works, and forgiving someone may be one of those good works that we are saved on too.

And so how are we to understand the connection between salvation and the necessity that we forgive? I think the best way to look at it is by understanding that forgiven sinners forgive. Forgiven, sinners forgive. That's the bottom line.

OK. Forgiven, sinners forgive. When we experience God's forgiveness for our own sins, we in turn extend that forgiveness to others who sin against us. I have a video that I've watched a number of times of an actual, an actual real-life counseling session in which a woman who is in her 50s was struggling with severe anger, just very angry lady.

And as the counseling session unfolds, she opens up about how she had been sexually molested by her own father. As the counselor led her in prayer, she was encouraged to share for the first time her pain with the Lord. Her raw emotion before the Lord brought me to tears as she wept bitterly over the pain of having been violated as a little girl by her own father. But while praying, an obvious peace came over her.

Her tone changed as she transitioned from tears of hurt, pain, brokenness, and anger to tears of relief as she was able to behold her Lord through the eyes of faith. She felt the embrace of her Lord, she understood that the Lord shared her pain, she realized that the Lord had not abandoned her, and tears of relief began pouring. From this lady's eyes. In a follow-up session some 6 months later, she shared with the counselor how her heart had so softened as a result of her encounter with the Lord on that day.

Her family members noticed a change in her countenance. She was no longer angry and then she said the most interesting thing, she talked about her father's rough upbringing and how God only knows what he went through when he was a child. The words she used in describing her father were marked by kindness and compassion, care and concern. In fact, she asked her counselor if it was OK for her to feel compassion for her father who had violated her.

I would like to ask you her question. Is it OK for our hearts to feel compassion for those who sin against us? Is it OK for us to cry out to the Father on their behalf, Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Our passage tells us that when we pray, we must forgive anything that we have against anyone.

And what I love about this is that we are invited in the midst of our pain to pray. We are commanded to forgive within the context of prayer. When you stand praying, forgive. It's in the midst of our prayer that we are invited to come to the Lord and to ask Him to help us to forgive.

And I would submit to you today that such a need to forgive may in fact be the very mountain in your life that must be cast into the sea. Do not let bitterness take hold of your heart. Do not allow anger to interfere with God's goodness in your life, but when you stand, when you pray standing, forgive. Some of you are struggling.

And you need to forgive. Perhaps you need to forgive your spouse. Perhaps you need to forgive a parent. An in-law You need to forgive a child.

You have an extended family member that you must forgive, a grandparent, aunt, uncle, niece, or nephew. Perhaps you need to forgive a friend. Or a fellow brother or sister in Christ, a neighbor, a co-worker. An enemy.

I am not saying that you must go to that person and say to that person, I forgive you. The fact is they may not even be aware of how they have hurt you or they may not care, and it is not appropriate until they ask you for forgiveness to say, I forgive you. But you must have an attitude of forgiveness even before they come to you asking for forgiveness, even as the father had the attitude with his prodigal son of forgiveness long before he saw his son at a distance coming to him.

So you must go to God in prayer and while praying, you must forgive, you must do for another, the very thing that the Lord has done for you.

He bled his blood on the cross for you so that your many sins, including the sin of unforgiveness, would be forgiven. He voluntarily took upon himself the punishment that you deserved. All of your sins were nailed to the cross, and you can stand before a holy God in prayer. As one who has been fully forgiven.

And if you are struggling to forgive, you are invited. Through this passage to come before God's mighty throne of grace, seeking a miracle. Our Savior, he can move the mountains. Our God is mighty to save.

If you want to be fruitful in prayer, then you must forgive anything that you have against anyone. I would like to conclude with the following action points as we just bring things together. And the first one is a no-brainer, right? Pray.

It's just that simple. Pray. And as you pray, remember, pray to the true God. Pray for miracles, the miracles of salvation, sanctification, healing, and you can throw other miracles in there as well, but you can pray for those things.

Pray with confidence that, that you will receive those things that God wants you to ask for. If it is in accord with the will of God, he will answer those prayers and so get close to God and understand what is the heart of God and begin to pray in the spirit and according to truth and cry out to the Lord to do mighty things and to move the mountains and I can guarantee you based upon his words that if it is his will, he will do those things. Our savior He can move the mountains, our God, He is mighty to save.

And we should pray with an attitude of forgiveness.

Pray together as a family. Understand that the devil does not want you to do this. He will use anything and anyone in the family to thwart a family coming together for prayer. He will use your sin, your laziness, your indifference, he will use your iPhone, video game, television show to distract you from coming together to pray.

Make prayer a priority. When you gather together in your care group, brothers and sisters, take prayer seriously. Prayer ought to be seen as a highlight that when we gather together and we spend 15 minutes, 30 minutes, a full hour, maybe even the whole 2 hours as a prayer group together in prayer, we ought to see that as a blessing, as an, as an opportunity, as a privilege and our hearts should be stirred with a desire to pray in such settings. Share your prayer request with the staff through the connection card, and that you drop those connection cards off in the offering basket, and every Tuesday as Pastor Mike tells you so often, we pray for you guys, we pray for those prayer requests.

Give us the things that you want us to pray for, and it is our privilege as a staff to pray for you. When needed, call for the elders to anoint you with oil and to pray over you according to James chapter 5 verse 14. We have people in our church who have come to us over the years and you have asked for us to pray for them and we have anointed them with oil and we have prayed over them for healing, sometimes for healing in regard to life dominating sins, sometimes for physical healings, but we as elders are more than happy to come together and as of late, our wives have actually joined.

And we're praying for people in our church.

And so feel the invitation, if you're at the end of your rope, if you feel that there is no way of moving forward, if there is a mountain in your way and it's not moving, and you just feel that you yourself don't have the faith to even pray to move the mountain, then come to the elders of the church and we would be more than happy to anoint you with oil and pray over you and James tells us that the effect, the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much, and it's not to say that we are righteous men as much to say that we are in Christ and we are clothed in his righteousness and with every confidence in him, we will pray for you and we will pray that God would move the mountains in your life.

In anticipation of a new year, many of us are making resolutions. I hope to grow my hair back. That is the miracle that I am praying for.

People in my family keep telling me that I am not bald. They say I have outgrown my hair. I promised my son that I would not tell you who said this. I don't want Caleb to get mad at me.

Seriously though, That is not my resolution. But whatever your resolutions might be, I suggest that we root our resolutions in prayer. And perhaps for some, The need to bear fruit in prayer is the resolution that you need to make. Would you join with me in prayer and as you are preparing your offering and as you are getting ready to give unto the Lord out of the overflow of what God has given to you, join with me in prayer, please, as the ushers come forward.

Our gracious Heavenly Father, We are challenged. By your word this morning, To trust in you To have faith in you. To have faith in God. And Lord, we confess to you that so often we struggle in our faith.

Lord, we believe. Help thou our unbelief. And Lord, we pray. that you would move the mountains.

We pray, Father God, for the salvation of lost loved ones, for the salvation of co-workers and neighbors and friends and family. And Lord God, we pray for the salvation of even our enemies. We pray, Father, that You would move the mountains of unbelief and that you would by your Spirit draw men to Yourself and we pray, Father, that you would use us as instruments of your, of your grace in the lives of people around us to bring them to faith in Jesus. Oh, Father, we pray that You would move the mountains and that you would save people in our spheres of influence.

We pray, Father, that you would sanctify us, that this time next year, Lord, we could look back and we can say that there are sins in our lives that we are not struggling with like we were before. We pray, Father, that this time next year we can look back and say that we have gained ground in our holiness, oh God. Father God, I pray that if there is anyone in here who has struggled to forgive another person who has sinned against them, no matter how big, no matter how small, no matter who the person, Lord, I pray for that person who is here, that you would help them, Lord, to forgive those who have sinned against them, help them, Lord, even now to stand before your throne of grace and to cry out to you and to say, oh God, help me.

To be a forgiving person.

It is so hard. It is so hard. But Lord, you can move the mountains. Our God is mighty to save, and Lord, you tell us in your word that if we pray in accord to your will and believe that you will answer that prayer, and so I pray, Father, that we would stand as a cornerstone people, a forgiven and forgiving people.

Give us grace, oh God. And we give praise to you. When you died on the cross, Lord, before you died. Father, forgive.

Hm. They know not what they do. Lord, we affirm this morning that you are good. That you are beautiful beyond description.

Lord, we give ourselves to you, not as a bunch of individuals, but as one people. We offer our bodies before you as living sacrifices, and we pray that you would have your way with us, that you would sanctify us, and I pray, Father, for those in our body who are dealing with illnesses and diseases. I pray with those who are struggling with health issues, I pray, God, if it be your will, That you would heal. I pray that as we anticipate the next year, Lord, that we would gain ground in being fruitful in prayer.

And we ask these things in Jesus' name. Amen.