Prayer -
 It’s been the focus of our morning messages here the last few weeks and will continue to be so for a while to come.  Beginning a new year and new millennium by pausing with one of the most crucial building blocks of a Christian’s life – their contact space, their together time with God;
 verbal or quiet contact
 in times of terror or joy
 specific requests and pleadings; or quiet appreciation
 while on the run, or in extended meditation moments
  Prayer - when the heart of a believer is focussed on and connected to the heart of God.

Quick review:   (Remember where we’ve gone so far?)
 The series began where a solid life of prayer begins - when a person surrenders the control of their life to Jesus Christ; invites Jesus through the open door of their mind and heart and says, “Jesus, please - you be in charge.” Dependence on Jesus - that’s the foundation of all living, growing, vibrant prayer.

 Second thing we said was that prayer doesn’t depend completely on how good we’re feeling, how pious and close to God our spirit is at the moment, how fluent we are with words, or how together the circumstances of our lives are.
 The Holy Spirit of Jesus provides us with thoughts, ideas and words that can form our prayers.  He sends us others to pray for us, and with us.  And -
  the Holy Spirit, together with Jesus himself: the two of them pray for us to God the Father.  They’re like a holy prayer team at work on our behalf in the most perfect of ways.

Last week we asked some questions about how to figure God’s leading in prayer.  What if we or someone else believes that God is directing in a certain way, or answering such and such?
 How do we deal with that?
  Simply accept it?
  Remain sceptical unless proven otherwise?
  Or what?
 The topic was Christian discernment, and the Word of God gave us some solid direction on how to test for truth and godly direction in our response to prayer.  We learned the difference between discernment and judgementalism.

 Today I want to talk about fences, prayer fences - a protocol for prayer, if you will.  Protocol is something we encounter in many quarters of life.
 There is the protocol of title – when speaking of or to the Prime Minister or a judge or the mayor we use phrases like “The Right Honorable”, “Your Honour”, “Your Worship”.  Your teacher is “Sir” or “Miss Smith” – not “Hey you” or “Sally”.
 There is the protocol of topic - if you are so fortunate as to be chosen to meet the queen in a receiving line it would be strongly encouraged that you don’t slap her on the back and ask for her opinion on John Manley’s announcement this week to support NHL hockey with tax dollars.  A big mouth to the judge will land you time in the klink for contempt.  In class you raise your hand before speaking, and don’t interrupt when someone else is talking.

Prayer -
 A human being in contact with Holy God.
 Does everything go, no holds barred?
 Or, are there limits placed on what is acceptable to God:
  - in the way we address Him?
  - in our choice of words?
  - in the sorts of things we choose to bring to His attention?

Prayer - what’s “In” and what’s “Out”?
Understand, please, that there are such things as “in” and “out of bounds” when it comes to prayer.  It is not so that anything goes, any which way, when we come before God in prayer.

Earlier in the service we read together words from Psalm 62.
I’m not going to read it again, but you may want to have a look - p.652.

Look at the very first words:
 “My soul finds rest...... in God alone.”
And then down to verse 2: “He alone is my rock and my salvation.....”
 Verse 5: “My hope comes.... from Him.... He alone is my rock and my salvation......”

God centred, God alone.
Any hope, any peace, any security – in God, through God, God’s way.
 No other way.

1 John 5:14 says, “This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.....”
 When Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane on the night before His execution, He poured out His broken heart to the Heavenly Father.  And right in the deepest, most painful part He says, “Your will, not mine, be done.”

 John Calvin reflects on this and says, “We can never pray in faith unless we attend, in the first place, to what God commands.......our prayers are faulty, so far as they are not founded on His Holy Word.... what is to hold first place in our prayers is consent with the will of the Lord”
    [Commentary on Genesis 19:18; Psalm 7:6; Rom 8:26]

One group calls this adopting a “Whatever, Lord” approach to prayer.
Coming to prayer ready to receive whatever the Lord is prepared to give.
As the old hymn puts it, “Have thine own way, Lord. Have thine own way.  Thou art the potter, I am the clay.”
 God is God.  We’re not.  Period.
 Something worth remembering when approaching prayer.
  Surrender.

Second thing that arises out of this Psalm:
 God-centred.  God-alone.
 That’s the attitude of the Psalmist in looking for life aid.
 It’s also to be the attitude in our praying.

I want to draw your attention to another passage of scripture.  It’s part of a longer sermon preached by Jesus, a sermon about attitudes towards different parts of life.  One part He touches on is prayer.  Jesus presents us with an attitude NOT to have, and an attitude we SHOULD have in prayer:

Matthew 6:5-15 p.1093

First - two attitudes, two approaches to prayer that Jesus DOESN'T want us to have; personified by those who stand on street corners, and those who babble a mile a minute.
 Problem with the first group is that they pray with one eye to heaven and one eye on those around them.  Their attention is divided - sending a message to God, yes; but also worried about what others think of them and their praying.
 Perhaps a desire to look good, perhaps embarrassed because they fear their word choice won’t be up to par, or fear of stumbling, or praying too long or short, or bad topic choice.
 That sort of cross-eyed praying, one eye turned in one direction and the other eye in a different direction ---- one eye to heaven and one to earth ---- can be an attitude of the one praying
  OR
 those who are gathered round.  "How could that person possibly pray like that? Horrible, they slurred their words, spoke too fast, talked about trite matters."
   No way, says Jesus.
   Prayer's not about talking to people. It's talking to God!

Neither is prayer a sort of shotgun, where the more pellets you blast out the end, the greater the chance of hitting the target – the more words you mouth, the greater the chance of something getting through to and hitting the target of heaven.
 Basically it’s the attitude that tries to control contact with God and the response of God by the method of prayer.  The more words I speak, or the kind of words I use will dictate the outcome, rather than the Lord's grace and wisdom dictating the outcome.
 God becomes just some sort of machine, and prayer is reduced to some sort of secret code -- punch in the right sequence, use the proper syntax and things will get processed with the right product punched out at the end.
  NOT!!

 Prayer is not a humanity-centred activity!
 Instead - look at Jesus’ teaching.  There is a key word here that He uses six times.  Can you see it?

It's this -- FATHER.
Jesus sets the whole business of prayer within the context of a relationship - a relationship between a believer and his or her Father in heaven.
Prayer is communicating with your Father, your heavenly Father.
  Can you get that?

It is not an unwelcome intrusion into the inner sanctum of a fearsome and destructive being, some tyrant who will crush all that dare face him.
 Jesus died for you, Christian.
 He won you adoption into the family of God.
 He earned for you the -- hear it!! -- the right to enter the presence of the most Holy God, creator of heaven and earth.
 His presence is our home. That is where we belong. That is where we are welcome, and loved and cared for.
   Almost unbelievable..... but true!
    We belong to God - we belong with him!

 Belonging.... Nothing expresses it better than the testimony of one who wrote "You ask me what is my only comfort in life and death? It is this - that I am not my own, but belong - body and soul, in life and death - to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ. He has fully paid for all my sins with his blood, and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil.

Listen to Psalm 100:
 Know that the LORD is God.
 It is he who made us, and we are his;

It is the security of Jeremiah 31.33:
 I will be your God. You shall be my people.

It is the assurance of the powerful words from Romans 8:
 I am convinced that there is nothing... that can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

My prayer life, your prayer life are built on the indisputable, unchangeable fact that through Jesus Christ we belong to God! --- WE ARE HIS!!

 I am never isolated.
 His face is constantly turned towards me.
 He is my Father. I am his child.  And let me tell you, as a deep inner awareness of that begins to grow, it can change one's perspective on prayer entirely. It gives rich, three-dimensional colour to what otherwise is merely some bland academic statement:
 "Prayer is communing with God."
 Prayer is being with my Father to whom I belong!!

 FATHER - he is the centre of our attention in prayer. Being with him, relating with him, communing with him - be that through talking or listening, crying or laughing; desperate pleading or jubilant thank-you; adoring praise or painful questioning; through much noise or extended silence.

 Communing with Father.
 “Pour out your hearts to him,” says Psalm 62. “For God is our refuge.”

 Come to Father.
 Focused on Him.
 Never mind what others may think.
 Come - bringing all the stuff and issues of life.  Don’t hold anything back.

Pour out your hearts to Him.  Please don’t hold back.
Calvin says -
 “What the Psalmist advises is all the more necessary, considering the mischievous tendency which we naturally to keep our troubles pent up inside till they drive us to despair.  Usually, indeed, people show much anxiety and ingenuity in seeking to escape from the troubles which may happen to press upon them; but so long as they shun coming into the presence of God, they only involve themselves in a labyrinth of difficulties.” [Calvin commentary on Psalm 62:8]
  He’s so right.

Where do we get this maddening tendancy that leads us to hide our griefs and ruminate upon them, instead of relieving ourselves at once by pouring out our prayers and complaints before God? [Calvin]

And where do we get this idea that, well, maybe your major concern is good to bring up in prayer.  Maybe that’s big enough to go and see the prayer partners here at the front after service, or to call the Saturday morning prayer team about.  But my concern — oh now.  That’s so small.
 No.  Not fit for prayer.  Out of bounds.

Are there matter too trivial for the Lord’s time and attention?
No more than there are people too trivial - something we may consider possible - and indeed do.  The disciples thought children and their childish whims and issues were too small.  They chased them away.  Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me.  Do not hinder them.  For the Kingdom of God belongs to such as these.”  (Mt 19:13-15).  The crowds thought that blind beggars were too trivial.  Jesus said, “bring him to me.” (Mk 10:49).

Hey, from the mighty vantage point of heaven, the very angels who serve God may well have said, “Why bother with that trivial planet called earth?”
But God so loved the world that He sent His one and only son that whoever believes in Him would not perish but have everlasting life (Jn 3:16).

 My friends, the very people and items that we consider to be trivial are precious and treasured in the eyes of the Lord.

So bring your concerns to Father, and leave them there.
Don’t worry that He may forget, or not be bothered.
He remembers, He cares, He loves more than we could ever think or hope possible.
 Let that blood-stained cross be His holy pledge that he’ll listen to you.
 And let the wonder of an empty grave – the grave out of which Jesus rose as the victor over death – let that stand as the pledge of power that God has the strength to accomplish all that He deems best and right for your life.