Are you praying? Are you seeing God? Are you wrestling in prayer?

Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself. I could be assuming that you know how to pray and honestly, you are thinking, "I don't have a clue how to pray!"

Well guess what? You are in good company! I find it so encouraging that the disciples came to Jesus and they asked him, "Teach us to pray."

If you would go back and read that request in Luke 11, and then go back and look at all the things the disciples had seen, it is quite astounding to me that they asked the question. Prior to them asking Jesus to pray, they had seen Jesus:

·        Cast out demons (three times)

·        Catch a miracle mess of fish!

·        Heal a man with leprosy

·        Heal a paralyzed man

·        Forgive sins

·        Heal a man with a deformed hand

·        Heal by proxy the roman officer's daughter

·        Calm the story sea

·        Heal a woman who just touched the hem of his garment

·        Feed the 5000

In addition to this they had heard him teach the parables of the Good Samaritan, the parable of the lamp, the parable of the sower, the sermon on the mount, and on and on.

But they didn't ask Jesus to teach them to heal. They didn't ask Jesus to teach them to teach/preach like he did. They didn't ask Jesus to give them the authority to control the storms of life or anything else like that ...

They asked him to teach them to pray. And he did. And the first thing he taught them about prayer was this: the focus of prayer is the Father.

You begin by praying, "Our Father..." Or ask the (NLT) puts it in Luke 11:2, "This is how you should pray: 'Father, may your name be kept Holy'..."

That's where it all begins ... this Sunday we'll be talking about Holiness.

Seeing it. Recognizing it. Keeping it.

Begin praying by recognizing who it is that you are talking to. As you pray, tell God who you see Him to be. It might be just the thing to open your eyes to holiness.