384: Unlearning Independence | Dave Sloop

Introduction

Good morning, everyone. How are you? So glad that you've chosen to join us today. We, here at Church of the Holy Spirit, are embarking on a new sermon series on prayer, and to kind of gauge where we are as a congregation, I'm going to flash up in just a moment a series of famous quotes on prayer. And here is the exercise I would like you to walk through with me. I want you, as you hear these quotes, I want you to be honest with yourself about what happens in your mind and what happens in your heart. What is your emotional response to these words? Okay?

Let's look at the first one. Prayer is beyond any question, the highest activity of the human soul. Man, at his greatest and highest—he's at his greatest and highest—when upon his knees, he comes face to face with God.

See the next one. What the church needs today is not more machinery or better, not new organizations or more and novel methods, but men whom the Holy Spirit can use, men mighty in prayer. The Holy Spirit does not flow through methods but through men of prayer.

How about this one? Mister Wesley, this is referring to John Wesley, spent two hours daily in prayer. He began at four in the morning. Of him, one who knew him well wrote this: he thought prayer to be more his business than anything else. And I have seen him come out of his closet with the serenity of face next to shining.

Last one. Martin Luther said this: if I fail to spend two hours in prayer each morning, the devil gets the victory through the day. I have so much business I cannot get on without spending three hours daily in prayer.

Reflection on the Quotes

Let me ask you some questions. How many of us saw these words and thought, finally. Finally, someone has put words to what I experience on a daily basis. It's nervous laughter. Okay? I make jest because I suspect that's not where most of us live. But I do want to acknowledge the fact that I wouldn't be surprised if there are some among us who do live there. Prayer warriors. That what those men spoke about is something that some of us here experience in a very real way.

Let me ask another question. How many of you read those quotes, and in your mind and in your heart, something was stirred? It was a longing. There's something in you that thinks, I recognize that that's not me, but I wish that it was. In fact, maybe it simultaneously is longing and a little bit of shame. Longing for something that you aren't yet, and a little bit of shame because maybe you feel like, I've been following Christ for twenty or thirty years now, and I should have figured that out.

How about this? Maybe some of us here might have thought this: I have zero expectation or aspiration to become what those men talked about. That's unrealistic, unattainable. That is a kind of prayer that is reserved for a select few spiritual giants. They're kind of on a different plane, otherworldly. That's not what most of us are meant to experience.

Be honest with yourself. Which one of those categories do you find yourself in? Over the next four weeks, here at Church of the Holy Spirit, we're going to be asking a question together. And here's what that question is: Why don't we pray? That is to say, why don't we pray like those guys do? I mean, if we believe that what they said is true and that kind of experience in prayer is available, then why don't I do it?

We're going to be looking at what we have kind of determined are four of the most common enemies to our prayer life. But before I suggest to you what those are, I want to ask you a more basic, more foundational question, and it's this: Why don't we change in general?

Over the next four weeks, we're going to be talking specifically about prayer, but that question could be asked about any number of areas of our life for which we long for transformation, but we don't experience it. Why don't we change? Have you ever wondered that?

Let me ask you a true or false question. Do my choices and decisions affect and impact the outcomes of my life? True or false? It is true. The decisions and the choices that we make influence the outcomes of our life. That sounds like common sense, right?

So what if we want better outcomes? What do we need to do better? We need to what? We need to make better decisions and choices, and it will lead to better outcomes in our life. This is the simple formula for transformation, is it not? If I make better choices, it will lead to a better life. And therefore, every year, especially around January, a lot of us in this room are like, this year is going to be different. I'm going to eat healthy. I'm not going to go to Bojangles twice a day. Cut back to once. I'm going to go to the gym five times a week instead of zero times in the last year, which is an honest statistic for this guy. I'm not going to waste so much time. I'm not going to scroll on my phone. Or how about this in our spiritual life? I'm going to read through the Bible in a year, every single day this year. I'm not going to miss. Or I'm going to set aside dedicated time for prayer. What are we saying? I'm going to make better choices, and you know what's going to happen? Better outcomes.

Let me ask you something. How does that go? Does it work? It does not. Statistically, it does not. Do you know why? Because behavior, which is the sum of our choices and decisions, it does not happen in a vacuum. The mere exertion of my will upon my choices will rarely, if ever, move the needle. It will not lead to lasting change. And if it does, it will do so, not because of my willpower, but in spite of it.

What is the missing ingredient to this? Don't flip the slide yet. Here's the deal. Behavior is a byproduct of something else. We can't just will ourselves to change. It doesn't work. You've experienced it, and so have I. What is the missing ingredient?

In Romans 12, chapter 2, Paul says it this way. He says, do not be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world. Do not be conformed. That word conformed means to be pressed into a mold, like a cookie cutter. Imagine every single one of us is a lump of dough, and there is a pressure being applied on every single one of us if you are a human being and you live in this world. It's called the pressure of the world, and you are being forced into a mold. If you aren't careful, if you're not actively fighting against that pressure, you know what happens? You start thinking like the world, and talking like the world, and longing for what the world wants, and valuing what the world values. We become like the world.

Paul says, don't do that. Don't conform. Then he says this, but be transformed. You know what that word means in the Greek? It is metamorpho. And it is the same word that we get the word metamorphosis, which is the process whereby caterpillar transforms into butterfly. Completely different thing. It is a massive transformation. Paul is saying there is a transformation that is available to every single one of us. We can be transformed, and here's how he says that we do it: By the renewing of your mind.

That word renew, in the Greek, what it means is to renovate. What do you do when you renovate something? You tear out the old stuff. We just did this in our kitchen. We tore out the old cabinets that were ugly. The paint was chipping off. The doors were hanging by the hinges. We ripped those out. We demoed the kitchen. It was a blank slate. You know what we did then? We put back in new and pretty stuff, and the doors have a soft close. I've arrived. I feel like a king.

See, what happens when you renovate something is you take out the old stuff and you put in the new stuff. Do you know what happens? The end result is a more valuable home, a more valuable kitchen. A kitchen not just that you like more, but it's worth more.

Paul says, you can renovate and transform your life by taking something out of here and putting something back in. You have to take out some lies, and you have to put back in what is true. And that is the key to transformation.

Here's the completion of this formula. Belief leads to behavior, which leads to better outcomes. See, our behavior is not a byproduct of our will and our effort; it is a byproduct of what we believe. Every single decision that you make can be traced back to something that you believe, and we have to start there.

So I'll ask you again. Why don't we pray? Are you here today, and you would say, those quotes could not be further from the truth about my own personal prayer life. Why not? I'll tell you why. Because we have fallen prey to some belief, either about God or ourselves or about the nature of prayer, and it's a lie. And therefore, it has influenced our behavior. And we may say over and over again, I'm going to change, I'm going to pray more, I'm going to pray more. We never will until we change the core belief that leads to the behavior.

The Four Enemies of Prayer

So what are the four things that we've come up with? I'm not suggesting that these four enemies or lies that we believe are the top four. This is certainly not an exhaustive list. But as the pastoral staff got together and talked about why we personally struggle to pray, these are the four top ones that kind of came to mind pretty quickly. Here they are.

Number one, I don't need it. This is a posture of arrogance. It's a posture that says, there are better things to do.

Number two, it doesn't work. It doesn't work. Maybe we perceive some need that we can't solve ourselves, but we don't think prayer is a viable solution to accomplishing the problem, to fixing the problem.

Number three, I don't know how to do it. I don't know how. Now this doesn't sound like a lie that we believe, but if we think we don't know how to pray, what we have convinced ourselves of is that prayer is something that it is not. It is not something for the sophisticated, and the learned, and the trained. If you know how to have a conversation with a friend, you know how to pray. And you're stuck with some belief that it's difficult to figure out.

Number four, it's boring. And one way to guarantee that you will never do something is to convince yourself that it isn't fun. Because we're not gluttons for punishment, and we're not going to spend our time doing boring things.

So this week, we are going to jump into number one. But before I do, I want to just stop here, and I want to pray. This is going to be part two. The part one is kind of setting up the sermon series, and part two, we're going to jump into the first lie that we believe. But I just want to pray that God would open our hearts to hear it. Would you pray with me?

Father, we need you. Lord, we want to experience you in the way that you've invited us to, and we are aware of so many things that we believe that are not true. And those things keep us trapped from experiencing you. Would you help us? And would you help me to speak your truth and your words plainly? In Christ's name, amen.

Why Don't We Pray?

Number one, we don't think we need it. Now if I was to ask you, do you think you need to pray? If you are a believing, self-professed Christian, you would say, of course. And what you think you might think that I mean by that question is, do I think you should pray? In other words, is prayer something we are supposed to do? But that is not what I mean. I mean, do you need to pray? Like you need to breathe? Like you need food? Like you need water?

And for many of us, the answer is no. And I say us on purpose. In fact, here's how you can know whether or not you're believing this lie. I'll give you a story from my own life. I wish I could say this was five or six years ago. It was two weeks ago. And I was in one of those times in my life where I was just overwhelmed. A bunch of different things collided at once. I was frustrated. I was anxious. I was—I felt there was just all kinds of emotions. I was a victim.

And when I'm in that place, Melissa gets her ear, and this had none of what I was feeling had anything to do with her, but I was venting to Melissa. And my sweet wife listens, and she smiles, and she says, we should pray. Do you know what happened to me emotionally when she said that? I thought, seriously, Melissa? You think that's what I need? Right?

What I need from you is to agree with how unjust whatever this or that is. Or I need you to help me come up with a solution to whatever problem I'm complaining about. Or to just comfort me. But what I don't need is to pray. You know what I actually said to Melissa? I'm ashamed of this, but I said, I can't. I'm—I have too much to do.

Now, what I revealed to myself and to you just now is that in that moment, what I believed was that prayer was some ceremonial box to check, but it wasn't a strategy for accomplishing my most difficult struggles in life. I just didn't believe it.

See, if your first instinct is to do rather than to pray, then you probably don't think you need to. It is not a lifeline for you. It is not a proven strategy. It is something you're supposed to do, but it's not what you need to do. Maybe, for some of us, that resonates with you. The lie that I was believing is the oldest lie in the book, quite literally, about the nature of humanity. It's a lie called self-sufficiency. And it started in the garden.

The moment that Eve reached for the fruit that God forbade her to eat, what she was saying to herself, and to Adam, and to God was this: I can do better. I can do better than you. There is a different strategy that will be more productive, more effective, more strategic, that will more fully satisfy whatever it is that I'm longing for. And in that moment, they ate of the fruit. You know what happened? They instantly became aware of self. It was the first time in Genesis that they were aware of a self apart from their creator. They were self-sufficient, and we have been trying to solve our own problems ever since. It is the greatest lie. It is at the core of every sin. I will be like God. I can do it myself. I don't need prayer, which is another way to say, I don't need God.

Have you ever been there? Now the question becomes, how do we battle against that lie that is keeping us trapped from a life with Christ and a life of prayer that is fulfilling, effective, and satisfying?

Jesus is going to give us, in John chapter 15, a metaphor for what life is supposed to be like. If you turn there, we're going to briefly walk through this. And I want you to notice that Jesus is going to say in John 15, there is something that I want you to believe. And out of that belief will come a behavior. And from both of those things will be a byproduct or an outcome. I want you to listen for what it is.

Starting in verse five, Jesus says this:

I am the vine. You are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit. Apart from me, you can do nothing.

If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers. Such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given to you. This is to my father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

What is it that Jesus wanted us to believe in John chapter 15? You hear it in verse five. Here it is.

I am the vine. In fact, he's building on something he started in verse one. He says, I am the true vine. That is to say, I am the source of all life. I am the place that you come to get every need supplied, and he qualifies it. He says, I'm the true vine. Meaning, there are some other places that you can go that are phonies and fakes and substitutes, and they will not work. I'm the true vine.

And the second thing he wants you to know and me to know is this, you are a branch. What is a branch? A branch is something that passively receives. That, what it is connected to. It doesn't do anything on its own. It just is a channel for something else to flow through.

He says, I'm a vine. You are a branch. That is what you need to believe. What is he asking us to believe? He's asking us to understand the true nature of our humanity, which is this: we are utterly helpless and dependent and needy.

See, branches are clingy, and they are needy. And that is when they are at their best. When they are clingy and needy, all that they need flows in. It is when they're separated from the vine that they start to wither and die, thrown into the fire because they're worthless.

Jesus says, you stay connected to me. Once we begin to believe that, once that becomes a belief, a core belief, there's a command that follows that can actually become a reality because if that belief is in place, this next thing is possible.

Jesus says, abide in me. Remain in me. That word means stay put, stay where you are, don't go anywhere else, don't go to one of these false, phony, substitute places to try to find life. You stay right where you are. You remain. You abide.

That word literally means to make your home with. You stay needy, he says. That's what it means to remain. You stay helpless. Don't try to figure it out.

You know who's really good at staying helpless? Our children. There's no pretense. They're not pretending that they know better. And you know who's the best at it? You know who moves my heart the fastest in my family? It is my youngest child.

I'm going to show you a picture. This is Claire. She used to have teeth. But when that face asks her daddy for something, do you think I'm good at saying no? No. See, Claire is unfiltered. She tells me all the things that she needs. Claire will shout from the sunroom where she's watching TV, Daddy! I'll be working on something, and she'll just say, I'm hungry. Of course, I'd better bring her whatever she needs because she's my baby.

Claire will shout out, Daddy! From the bathroom upstairs. I'll run up. She'll be in the bath. She'll say, can you stay in here with me? Yes. I can. Because Claire is my little girl. And the messier and the more honest and the least amount of pretense I mean, I just—I just it just stirs my heart. I can't help but respond to my baby's needs. He says, remaining is staying needy. It's staying dependent. You know what you know what else it is? It's staying honest.

Yeah, I think for so much of my life when I thought about what it meant to abide, I think I turned that into something far more spiritual. Like, it meant that I needed to go off into the woods with my Bible and a journal, turn off my phone, and just connect.

I'm not saying this is a bad thing to do. In fact, Saint Augustine said something to this effect, which I think it's true but it's misleading. He says, ask God for nothing, save God himself. And what he means by that is that God is our chief treasure. There's no thing we should desire more than God, and that is true.

But the danger of that statement is this: what do I do with all the other stuff that I desire? And what about my relationship with my wife or my kids or my finances? Where do I take those desires? Where do I take those problems? And if we're not careful, we can begin to live bifurcated lives.

We have our spiritual life over here, and we, you know, come to God and we pray to him about spiritual things. And then for the rest of the day, we have our real life. And what happens when a problem rises up over here in our real life? Well, this isn't spiritual, and so I try to fix it myself.

This is why I love in verse seven that Jesus says, ask whatever you wish. He says, if you're remaining in me, here's what it's going to look like. Ask whatever you wish. Don't hold back. Be honest. It's not just being needy. It is being honest and unfiltered with all of your desires.

Do you know why? Because if you're going to experience the real God, who is a person, you need to bring your real self to the table. And you cannot abide in him so long as you're trying to be some spiritual version of yourself that isn't the real you.

See, Paul Miller in his book says that the key to abiding in Christ is asking whatever we wish. That's what we have to do. We come and we beg. We ask. We ask. We ask. You know, one of my dear friends, Alan Janney, has actually been a great picture of this in my life lately, of just coming honest.

He said that he started a prayer card for himself, and it's the first card that he sees every day. And here's what the card says: I don't think this is going to work. And you know what that has done for him? It has opened up a world of honest prayer, and God is doing some crazy things answering prayers in his life.

See, here's the deal. Our helplessness, it is the doorway to authentic prayer. As long as we think we can do it on our own, we will never pray, or it won't be the kind of prayer that actually achieves anything. It'll be ceremonial. It'll be a spiritual box that we check.

You come needy. You come honest. And here's the fruit. Jesus says there's a byproduct to that kind of behavior, and here's what it is. You will bear much fruit, showing yourself to be my disciple.

Do you know what the fruit is? You start to become like Jesus himself. And that's what the fruit of the Spirit is. It is the Spirit of Christ showing up in your life. You become like him. And can I tell you something about Jesus? He was the most dependent person of us all. When he was inviting us to abide and to remain and to be helpless, he was inviting us into the kind of life that he lived while he was here on earth.

That's all that he did. In John 5 and in John 12, you go read this. Jesus said, I only do what the Father gives me to do. I see what he's doing and I do that. In John 5, he says, I only say what he tells me to say, and I say it exactly how he tells me to say it. Jesus, I'm helpless. The creator, the Son of God, was needy, he was helpless. And he's inviting us in to that kind of life.

Listen to my favorite quote from this book, page 144. Paul Miller says this:

Self-will and prayer are both ways of getting things done. At the center of self-will is me carving a world in my image. But at the center of prayer is God carving me in his Son's image. Either we are trusting in our resources or we are clinging to him. Those are the two choices.

Do you know that when the disciples came to Jesus, they said, teach us to pray? Do you know the first word he said? Father, our Father. And the word he used, there was Abba. It was like papa. Jesus modeled for his disciples: be a little kid. In fact, he said, you can't get into the kingdom unless you become like one of these little kids who are needy and dependent and honest.

Jesus' first words on the cross? Father, Abba, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing. Was Jesus honest on the cross? God, why have you forsaken me? You know what his last words were on the cross? Abba, into your hands, commit my spirit.

Why? So that you could become a branch connected to a vine, so that you could begin to experience life how it was meant to be lived. Prayer is just not something we do. It is a way that we live.

See, when we begin to see how helpless and needy we are, all of life becomes prayer. Let's pray.

Lord, we need you. God, I pray that you would help us to lay down our pretense and to just acknowledge how needy we are. Lord, show us what it looks like to walk in this kind of life of prayer.

If you're here today and you find yourself in need and yet you can't find the words, we have a prayer team. We'd love to pray with you with these straight rails. Don't hesitate to come and experience the freedom that God might have for you. And maybe you're here and you just want to connect on your own, and these curved rails will be for you.

For the rest of us, if you would join me in standing as we worship together. Amen.