The Shepherd Who Prays

The following message is made available by Truth for Life. For more information, visit us online at truthfolife dot org. There are a number of unique characteristics about the Apostle Paul's writings, and there are a number of these unique characteristics that really draw us to him. Some of that has to do with the patterns that he uses in his writing and in his teaching, and one of those patterns that we find are these short pastoral prayers at the beginning of many of his letters. In fact, nine of the thirteen of his letters have these brief snippets of pastoral prayers. The only places where we don't find them, of course, is in relations where his attitude is rather foul and rightly so, and also in first the Titus and in Second Corinthians. However, in his other letters we do have this pattern of him introducing himself as the author, introducing the recipient, and then a greeting and a prayer of thanksgiving, a brief picture of pastoral prayer. But not only do we have that pattern of him setting up or laying out the introduction to his epistles, but even in those pastoral prayers we find a pattern. Look with me briefly, if you will. Romans chapter one, verses eight through ten. We find one of those pastoral prayers, and note the pattern here. First, I thank my God. There's the first thing you need to knowe the thanks of God through Jesus Christ. The second for all of you. And then here's the third, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world. For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the Gospel of His son. That and here's the fourth. Without ceasing, I mention you always in my prayers, asking that somehow, by God's will, I may now at last succeed at coming to you. These four things are prevalent in these pastoral prayers. First of all the idea that he gives thanks to God. Secondly that he mentions Jesus Christ. Thirdly that he says it's because of this great faith that they have or the reputation that they have. And then finally this idea that he prays consistently and without ceasing. First Corinthians, chapter one, beginning in verse four, listen to the pattern again, he writes, I give thanks to my God. There's the first always for you. There's the continual prayer. Why because of the grace of God that was given you. And then here in Christ Jesus Ephesians chapter one, beginning of verse fifteen. For this reason, he'll shuffle up the pattern. But the same elements are there. For this reason. Why, because I have heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love toward all the saints, I do not cease to give thanks to you. There's the thanks remembering you in my prayers. There's the remembrance that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of Glory, may give you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him. Again Philippians chapter one, beginning at verse three, I thank my God. There's that. Secondly, in all my remembrances of you, always in every prayer of mine for you, and making my prayer with joy. Why here's the third part of the pattern, because of your partnership in the Gospel from the first day until now. And I am sure of this that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of And there it is Christ Jesus Colossians chapter one, beginning verse three. We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, there's a second. Here's the third when we pray for you, and here's the fourth, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love that you have for all the saints. First Thessalonians, Chapter one, beginning verse two, we give thanks to God always for all of you. Second part of the pattern, consistently mentioning you in our prayers, remembering before our God and Father what your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. There is another instance that we find in Second Thessalonians, But for now let us move to the final one in filehmen, and then we'll come to our particular text for this morning. In two Timothy Philemon, verse four, I thank my God always when I remember you in my prayers. There's the thanks and the mention of his regular remembrance, because I hear of your love and of the faith that you have towards the Lord Jesus and for all the saints. And I pray that the sharing of your faith may become effective for the full knowledge of every good thing that is in us for the sake of Christ. So again we see these similar elements again and again and again in Paul's prayer, not always in the same order, not formulaic, but I believe it says something about his ministry of prayer, if you will. But there is one such pastoral prayer that stands out from the rest because it is the one that occurs in a letter that's not written to a church, not written to a region, but actually written to an individual. And here we see a picture and get a glimpse of the shepherd who prays not just to Paul the apostle, who's shepherding many churches, establishing many churches as an apostle, and writing to these churches as an apostle, but here as Paul the Shepherd, Paul the discipler, Paul who's pouring his life into another individual by the name of Timothy. And as we look here in the book of two Timothy, another thing I want you to know is how this meshes with what we did on last night, because if you remember the idea of the proclamation that we make, they're entitled. Paul wanted to make sure that we understood that this gospel bore fruit, and in the minister's life, that first area where it bore fruit was that area that was closest to him, that area of his home with his wife and with his children. Why is that significant? I don't know about you, but nothing has taught me how to pray like two things, one being a father, two being a pastor. And they are incredibly similar. Again, not because a pastor is necessarily the same kind of fatherly authority figure in the lives of every individual in the church, but because of that shepherding duty and responsibility and the theological underpinnings thereof. So join me if you will here in second to and read with me, beginning in verse one, Paul an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the Word of God according to the promise of the life that is in Christ Jesus to Timothy, my beloved child, wrote the word that he uses, my beloved child, grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. I thank God whom I serve as did my ancestors, with a clear conscience. As I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day, as I remember your tears, I long to see you that I may be filled with joy. I am reminded of your sincere faith a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice, and now I am sure dwells in you as well. For this reason, I remind you to fan and to flame the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power and love and self control. We learn a great deal from this particular prayer about the shepherd who prays about what it looks like to be a shepherd who prays, and make no mistake about it. This is related to the shepherd who preaches. Listen to this from Timothy Keller in an article whose title is worth the entire thing. Preachers only aren't good preachers? Amen, Hallelujah, Praise the Lord. He writes, If you put in too much time in your study on your sermon, you put into little time being out with people as a shepherd and a leader. Ironically, this will make you a poorer preacher. It is only through doing people work that you become the preacher. You need to be someone who knows sin, how the heart works, what people's struggles are, and so on. Pastoral care and leadership along with private prayer are to a great degree sermon preparation. More accurately, it is preparing the preacher, not just the sermon. Through pastoral care and leadership, you grow from being a Bible commentator into a flesh and blood preacher. There is an inexorable link between our preaching and our praying, and the effectiveness of our preaching and our praying, and our ability to apply our preaching to the needs of those whom we shepherd, and our praying, and the connection goes both ways. The first thing we see here with the apostle Paul is the importance of acknowledging our dependence. That's what leads us to pray. By the way, how is he acknowledging his dependence here? In two Timothy, Well, turn with me to the back of the book, if you will. Paul is in prison again. He is what you call a repeat offender. However, he recognizes that this is more than likely his last time. And he's right. Knowing that it's his last time, he writes one of the most memorable phrases in all of the New Testament in chapter four, beginning at verse six, he writes, for I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the Righteous Judge, will award to me on that day, and not only to me, but also to all who have loved his appearing, he is at the end of his life. He longs to see young Timothy, but he realizes that he may not get to see him again. Young Timothy is a protegee, a preacher of the Gospel who has been so under the tutelage of the apostle Paul that Paul refers to him as my beloved child. And yet, like a father with a son, Paul realizes that there is going to come a moment when he can no longer give continued instruction to his son and the faith. There is going to come a moment when he is no more, And unlike most of us, Paul had a pretty good idea when his last moment would be. The fact of the matter is, all of us are precisely like Paul in this sense. There will come a moment when our teaching will cease. There will come a moment when our lives will cease. But yet, because of whose we are, that does not mean that our influence has to cease, nor does it mean that the work has to cease. Why because of the one to whom the work belongs. See, this is the dependence that leads us to prayer. But brothers, don't allow yourself to have to come to the end of your life before you realize that your people need God and not you. Amen, somebody, this was always true with Paul. He's dying now so he thinks about it, but it's always been true of him, and it's his dependence. It is our dependence upon God and our recognition of our people's dependence upon God that dries us to pray. Only when we think about prayer. Really, here's the great irony. If you have a warped theology of prayer, you actually move away from dependence upon God. If you have a warped theology of prayer and do not comprehend the sovereignty of God, then actually what you do is you make God dependent upon you and not you dependent upon God. And there are some of us who pray precisely like that God. I am coming before you today to inform you of things of which you know not. There are decisions that you need to make, and I am here to give you the proper information so that you can make the right decision. And oh, by the way, there is a way that I would like for you to carry this out. Thank you very much, so, if you will just take a seat on your throne, I will inform you for a few moments here. That is not biblical prayer. Think of prayer like a mighty ship being moored to a shore. When you pull on the rope, you do not move the shore. You move the ship. Gentleman, God is not the ship, He is the shore. Listen to this from John Risinger. He gives us these three rules to keep in mind when thinking about the sovereignty of God in prayer. One true prayer is a frank admission that God is sovereign. When we really pray, we admit that the thing is in God's hands alone. We are saying that tomorrow and all it brings is not under our control, but under His control. It is in His hands and not ours. That's what prayer is. It is an acknowledgement of our dependence upon God. Secondly, he says, prayer is a joyful surrender to God's sovereign purposes. We are acknowledging that God has the right and power to do whatever seems good to him. We are saying that regardless of what God does tomorrow, we know it is part of the all things in Romans eight twenty eight, isn't that good? Whatever he does tomorrow, that's part of the all things. You don't know what he's gonna do. I don't have to know what he's gonna do to know that it's part of the all things. Thirdly, prayer is earnest pleading with God for grace to glorify him regardless of what he does. We are really saying, Father, give me grace to trust you and act like your child. Whether you say yes or no. That posture of prayer is a posture of dependence. If I can just be honest for a moment, when I believe that those whom I shepherd, either as a father or as a pastor, really need more of me, I am not at all prone to pray. But when I recognize my own wickedness, my own inadequacies, and recognize that in spite of my wickedness and my inadequacies. God has placed me in this position. It drives me to my needs. Six of our eight children come into our home by way of adoption. The last six. We've experienced six adoptions in the last seven and a half years. During that process, I've run into more than one individual who has said things to me that at least implied, and sometimes more than implied, that we really need to be careful with this adoption business because we're not too sure about the generational curses that are coming into our home with these children, to which I always respond, if I believe that, then my wife and I, knowing what we come from, wouldn't have had children in the first place. Think about the arrogance of that statement. You need to worry about what those children are bringing. I need to worry about what my children kept from me. You need to worry about what's happening out there in the world. No, you need to worry about what's happening in here in you that leads you to dependence upon God. Secondly, there is an expression of intimacy from the shepherd who prays notice this that you can't miss it. I thank God, whom I serve as my ancestors did with a clear conscience. As I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. That constantly wasn't enough here constantly in my prayers night and day, he continues, As I remember your tears, I long to see you that I may be filled with joy. See that as I remember your tears, this is intimacy. They have shared tears. They have been together on those days when all things were not the things that you want or actually pray for, but the things that you actually pray against, but God graces you with in order to conform you to the very image of Christ. There were some of those days that these individuals shared. Paul was not praying for someone whom he did not know. The shepherd who prays is a shepherd who values intimacy with the sheep. He's not a man who thinks himself above the sheep, but recognizes that he is a sheep himself. Notice also, the intimacy continues. He says, I'm reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and now I am sure dwells in you as well. He didn't just know him from personal experience, but he also knows his story where he's coming from. Is that important to you, shepherd? Is it important to you to know your sheep? Is it important to you to know who they are, where they come from, what their background is, what they struggle with. Is it important to you to know what kind of theological baggage they bring? Is it important for you to know what they struggle with? Because if it's not important for you to know those things, then you don't think it's important for you to pray for them about those things. All of your prayers will skim the surface. Lord, bless Lord, keep Lord, guide, Lord, direct, and they will never get to the point that Paul's prayer gets to notice something. As we continue, he says, here and it almost seems out of place. For this reason, I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power and love and self control. What would does that have to do with Paul's intimacy with young Timothy. Bear with me for a moment, and I'll explain. If you remember from the end of the book. Paul is now in a place where he is about to die. He is about to pass the baton. He is passing the baton to many individuals, but perhaps most significantly to young Timothy. So as he is about to breathe his last he takes pen and writes letter to young Timothy. In this letter that he writes to young Timothy, there is a theme that you find in every chapter of the letter, and that theme is this. It's a too prottoned theme. On the one hand, preserve and proclaim the Gospel. On the other hand, endure the suffering that will inevitably follow. Look with me, if you will here in chapter one, begin with me. In verse eight, first we see suffering. Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord or of me his prisoner. But share in suffering for the Gospel by the power of God. I love that, share in suffering for the Gospel by the power of God. Again, counterintuitive, share in suffering. Here's the way we would say it, Share in suffering with me, brother, knowing that the power of God is available to deliver you from No, that's not what he says. Share in suffering by the power of God. Not that suffering is foreign to us. Not that suffering means that God has forgotten us, But suffering comes to us from the hand of God. Notice then, what he says in verse thirteen. We have the suffering. Now there's the preserve and proclaim. Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me. In the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. Now in chapter two, the order is reversed. We start with teaching and then go to suffering. Look in verse one, you, then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me, and the presence of many witnesses. Entrust the faithful men who will be able to teach others. Also very next verse, share in suffering as a good soldier in Christ Jesus. Chapter three, the order is reversed again. First we go to the suffering in verse eleven. My persecutions and suffering that happen to me at Antioch and Iconium, and listra which persecutions I endure verse twelve. Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil men and impostors go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. Right after that, we ought to find what preserve and proclaim verse fourteen. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing that no excuse me, knowing from whom you have learned it, and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. Chapter four, the order is reversed again. We start with preserve and proclaim. I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom, preach the word. Be ready in season, out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with complete patience and teaching, and then of course ask for you verse five. Always be so reminded in dure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. What does this have to do with his intimacy with Timothy and his prayer? The apostle Paul says, this, I am about to die for the Gospel. And when I do preach the gospel. He says it to a young man who happens to number one lack a father figure in his life and number two struggle with timidity. He knows Timothy, he knows exactly where he's afraid, and he looks him in the eye through a letter and says, they're about to kill me for preaching the gospel. And when they do, I want you to preach the gospel. What they are going to cut off my head for preaching the gospel. And when they cut off my head for preaching the gospel, what I want you to do is the very thing for which they are cutting off my head. Yeah, but you know I'm not the bravest guy in the world. No I don't. But I know the faith that was in Lois, that was in Eunice, and that was in you. I know that I laid my hands on you, acknowledging that gift that was in you, and I'm calling upon you to fan it into flame. And I'm saying to you, man to man, that that fear you have does not come from Christ. You don't pray for people like that unless you're intimately involved with him, characterized by Christ's centeredness. You notice in all those prayers how many times he mentions Christ. Here's the interesting thing about Christ's centered prayers for us. When we think about christ center's prayers, what we usually mean is that you pray whatever you want to pray, but at the end of it, you say in Jesus's name, and that makes it all right. As though the phrase in Jesus' name is the stamp that you have to put on the letter in order for it to be delivered. Notice a few things and listen carefully to what I'm saying here. First of all, there's no New Testament prayer, to my knowledge, that ends with the phrase in Jesus name, not one. The model prayer that Jesus teaches his disciples to pray doesn't end with in Jesus's name. Yet we know that we are to pray to the Father in the name of the Son and by the power of the Spirit. Now, I am not saying that it's wrong to end our prayers by saying in Jesus's name. What I am saying is that it's wrong to pray a prayer that is inconsistent with what it means to pray in Jesus's name and then put in Jesus's name on the end of it. Praying in Jesus's name means praying in accordance with his will, in accordance with his nature, and in accordance with his authority. So if I'm asking something that is absolutely not in accordance with the will and nature and authority of Jesus Christ, but put on the end of it in Jesus's name, i am actually not praying in Jesus name. Christ's centered praying is about praying the heart of Christ. You see, the shepherd who prays doesn't just pray that his people will live better, but that they will live Christ. That's my prayer for you. Now, if you have a problem in your body and you've been diagnosed with cancer, or you know you're going into surgery, you have lost a loved one, or whatever, I am going to pray for you. But a Christ's centered prayer is different than a man's centered prayer. The man centered prayer says, brother Bob has cancer. We want brother Bob to live a longer life. Lord, would you heal him so that he'll live a longer life. That is not a Christ's centered prayer. What does a Christ's centered prayer for Bob sound like? Lord God, it is our desire that you would heal our dear brother, and we trust that you are able to do that. In fact, you're the only one who's able to do that. But we recognize that death comes to us all, and so we pray for our dear brother. That shouldn't you determine not to heal him of this, that you would grant him grace to die? Well, that's Christ's centered prayer. It's not about Bob. It's about Jesus. We want Bob to live if Bob's gonna continue to live and be used by Jesus. But we also recognize that sometimes God is glorified when six saints to get well. Other times he's glorified when six stengths die. Well, when's the last time you prayed for a good death? And I'm not talking William Wallace Brave Heart. Yes, that's you know, and nobody loves William Wallace ray Hart more than I. But that's not the point. That's not the point. Although there is that line at the end of Brave Heart and he's about to go and face the executioner, and he does offer up a prayer, and his prayer is, Lord, help me to die. Well, can you pray that? Can you pray that for yourself, for the people whom you shepherd. That's a christ centered prayer, not a mansion of prayer. And again I'm not saying that we don't pray for people to be healed. Did you hear what I pray for Bob? Make him well? Lord? But again he's the shore on the ship. These prayers also go public, and if I can, for just a moment, I want to encourage you, perhaps even admonish you, to engage in public pastoral prayer. It is absolutely lost in our worship today, completely and utterly lost. So much so, you know, we engage in this at our church. And I don't say this to too our horn. You'll understand why I share this with you. We engage in public pastoral prayer, and sometimes, you know, it's at the beginning of our worship service, and we pray for one another, and we pray for kings and those authority, pray that the Lord of the Harvest will send for labors. We go through this prayer. Sometimes it can be ten fifteen minutes, not at our midweek prayer meeting on Sunday morning, Lord's Day. Do you know we've had people decide not to come back to our church because we pray too long. We heard earlier about the two hour singing service. Here's what people are saying. You know, I'm coming to church and I want to meet with God, and you' all are getting in my way. You act like this is a house of prayer or something. But there are those who would argue that we should not do that publicly. Let me share a couple of things with you. Number One, these pastoral prayers that I read for you from the Apostle Paul, they were all in letters that were read publicly in the assembly. Secondly, when Jesus cleanses the temples, and that's my Jesus, y'all that you lowly Jesus, meek and mild. You know, the guy with hair like of you know, female hair model and pretty and all this stuff. The European guy looked like he ain't been Jewish a day in his life. That is not my Jesus. Okay, that guy would not have chased anyone out of the temple with a whip that's my Jesus y'all walking around with a lamb on his shoulder. He was wrecking stuff that day. And what does he say on that day? In his father's house? Becau a house of prayer? And I say this with every bit of love that I can muster, not that I have arrived. But brothers, I ask you, how many of us in this room have lords? They services where there is no prayer. Listen to this from John Calvin, as God, in his word enjoins common prayer. So public temples are the places destined for the performance of them. Hence, those who refuse to join with the people of God in this observance have no ground for the pretext that they enter their chamber in order that they may obey the command of the Lord. For he who promises to grant whatsoever two or three assembled in his name shall ask, declares that he by no means despises the prayers that are publicly offered up. I don't pray enough. We don't pray enough, and I believe it's because we do not see our dependence on God, because we lack intimacy with God and intimacy with God's people. And I believe that's reflected in the fact that when we think about how it is that we will worship God for many of us, prayer is at best a side note. The shepherd who preaches must be a shepherd who prays, and a shepherd who prays will always be a shepherd who preaches. Why do we preach because our people need God and God has spoken? Why do we pray? Because our people need God and we're dependent upon him? So we go to God on behalf of the people, because God knows and loves the people more than we ever will we go to God that He might turn our hearts toward Him and toward his. And then when we come from going to God, we stand before those people whom we have taken to our God, before the throne of Grace, and we preach to them passionately, as a shepherd who cares for their very souls, not as one who merely desires to entertain them with our words. Who preaches must be a shepherd who prays, because the shepherd who prays will always be the shepherd who preaches. Preach. Brothers, pray, Brothers, Father, we acknowledge our dependence upon you, our great need of you, and our people's great need of you, grant by your grace that we would preach and pray like we know these things to be true. We ask this because we believe it to be in accordance with the will and the nature and the authority of Jesus and whose name we pray. 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