Reading the Sermon on the Mount with John Stott by John Stott Douglas Connelly

Author:John Stott,Douglas Connelly [Stott, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780830893348
Publisher: Inter-Varsity Press
Published: 2016-07-20T00:00:00+00:00

Christian Prayer

Matthew 6:5-8

5And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 6But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. 7And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. 8Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

In his second example of religious righteousness, Jesus depicts two individuals at prayer. The hypocrite sounds fine at first: “They love to pray.” But unfortunately it is not prayer they love, nor the God they claim to be praying to. Instead they love the opportunity that public praying gives them to parade themselves before others. Behind their piety lurks their pride. What they really want is applause—and they get it. “They have received their reward in full” (v. 5).

The accusation of hypocrisy has often been leveled at us churchgoers. We can go to church for the same wrongheaded reason that took the Pharisee to the synagogue: not to worship God but to gain a reputation for piety. We can boast of our private devotions in the same way. Giving praise to God, like giving to the poor, is an authentic act in its own right. An ulterior motive destroys both. It turns our service to God and others into a mean kind of self-service. Religion and charity become an exhibitionist display. How can we pretend to be praising God, when in reality we are looking for others to praise us?

How, then, should Christians pray? Jesus said, “Go into your room [and] close the door” (v. 6). We are to close the door against disturbance and distraction, but also to shut out the prying eyes of others and to shut ourselves in with God. Only with the door closed can we obey Jesus’ next command: “Pray to your Father, who is unseen.” Our Father is in that closed room, waiting to welcome us. Just as nothing destroys prayer like glances at who is watching us, nothing enriches prayer like a sense of the presence of God. He sees not the outward appearance only but the heart, not the one who is praying but the true motive for the prayer. The essence of Christian prayer is to seek God.

Hypocrisy is not the only sin to avoid in prayer; “babbling” or meaningless, mechanical repetition is another. The first is the problem of the Pharisee, the second is the problem of the pagan. Endless repetition degrades prayer from a real and personal approach to God to the mere recitation of empty words. Jesus is describing any and every prayer that is all words and no meaning, all lips and no mind or heart.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.