I had a wonderful time preaching on Sunday.  It is always a pleasure to share God’s word that he has laid on my heart.  We are coming to the conclusion on the Lord’s prayer and how it answers some of the reasons why our prayers go unanswered.  And even though this week we saw that sin is one of the reasons why our prayers go unanswered, I want again to emphasize that sin (whether in our life, in our world, or in our prayer itself) is only one of the many reasons why God does not answer our prayers.  And if you have missed any of the previous sermons, click on the Media menu and then the Sermon link and you can listen to them. 

   Also, I must confess that yesterday’s sermon was not recorded.  So this morning, I preached the sermon a second time (this time to an empty auditorium), so it could be recorded and added to the other 5 sermons in this series.  It might not be exactly what was heard on Sunday, but I tried to make it as close as possible.  I hope that all the messages have impacted your life of prayer.  I know as I have worked through the Lord’s Prayer and seeing it’s connection to unanswered prayer, it has made a personal impact on my life.  I have read and heard many sermons on the Lord’s prayer in my life and saw many benefits that this prayer Jesus gave.  But until I started thinking about this series several months ago, I never connected it to unanswered prayers.  And while I admit, I had to twist one or two of the phrases very slightly to fit the “theme of the week”, most clearly applied themselves to the unanswered prayer theme I spoke on.

   There is one quote from John MacArthur’s book Alone with God that I would like to add before I close this devotion about the Pharisee Jesus condemns in Matt 6:5, “On the surface, Jesus’ condemnation of their practice of prayer seems unwarranted. Certainly there was nothing wrong with standing and praying in the synagogues. Standing was the most common position for prayer in New Testament times, and the synagogues were the most appropriate and logical places for public prayers to be offered. As long as the prayer was sincere, it was suitable. Even the practice of praying at the “street corners” was not wrong in itself—that was actually a normal place for prayer. At the appointed hour for prayer, devout Jews would stop wherever they were, even if they were walking along the street.  The real evil of these hypocritical worshipers, however, was not the location of their prayers, but their desire to display themselves “in order to be seen by men.” The Greek word for “street” refers to a wide, major street and street corner. The scribes and Pharisees made a point of praying where a crowd was most likely to gather. Whatever place might afford the largest audience, that’s where you would find these hypocrites.”   MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (1995). Alone with God (p. 36). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books.