APR 15 2014 | Praying For Your Elephant Passion Week S1E3 | Day 3

Sea Change Church · Praying For Your Elephant Passion Week S1E3 · "Day 3" · Adam Stadtmiller · April 15, 2014
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

Today I was reading an article on NPR called Prayer May Reshape Your Brain and it was interviewing neuroscientist Richard Davidson who believes that through his studies that prayer can actually reshape your brain. That as you learn things, as you learn different ways of doing things, that your complete way of thinking, the way the neurotransmitters connect, the dendrites, everything connects and works.

It's sculpted, that's the word he used, it was sculpted, that prayer sculpts your brain. I think it's interesting when you think about us having the mind of Christ. If you were able to take your brain and sculpt it in a way that most reflected God, I would say, or the way that God thinks, prayer and the word of God are probably two of the key ways to make that happen.

That when we pray, we sculpt our mind to be like Christ and when we read the word of God, we do the same. And this is why these two disciplines are so important. Because no other two disciplines change us in a way that actually changes our biology and our chemistry, like prayer and reading the word of God. It is day three of the Praying for Your Elephant Passion Week prayer podcast.

And it's great to have you alongside of us today in the herd and part of this migration into the heart of prayer for these eight days. I hope you had a good day. I hope your day was filled with prayer and you had some time to sit and pull away from your normal frenetic existence, to put the phone away, to put the computer away, and to just sit and rest in God's presence.

And that's why the elephant is here. It's here to help you do that, to remind you when you see that little ping come up on your Facebook page, your Twitter account, or whatever it is, or your podcast. Listen to remember that, hey, you know, we can actually rewire our souls. We can rewire our minds and rewire this entire world through prayer and believing that.

You know, here at the Elephant, it's a group of people. It's a herd that believes that asking prayer changes things. And that when we go to God in prayer, He is attentive, He wants to listen, and He wants to respond. And so hopefully that is your mindset as we move forward into that today. And hopefully you're able to start organizing your prayers into specific and strategic requests.

And that's one thing, as many of you already know, and I'm being redundant, for many of you that are new, because we have picked up a lot of new people along the journey. I think we had a couple hundred close to that on the first day and maybe a hundred or so on the second day. I'm not sure. I haven't checked the stats yet. But it's not about stats.

It's about prayers. It's about Jesus. And I am excited to think about all the prayers that that represents, that if all of us are beginning to pray, that if, you know, 200 people or 300 or whatever listen to this podcast are beginning to pray, beginning to ask, beginning to seek God, then there's a stirring in heaven, and God turns His attention.

I would say in the same way that He turns His attention to us at Passion Week, I think when believers unite together in unity, there's an anointing. There's something special that happens, like Psalm 133 talks about, when the brothers dwell together in unity, when we do things in a unified way as Christians, that it puts us into the superhighway of God's intention and His power.

And whenever we get in alignment with God, especially in the personal discipline of prayer, God begins to move, and we step into those streams. And so I really believe the more people that are involved as part of this, the more power we're going to see God release. I don't think it's magic. I don't think it's witchcraft. I don't think it's, you know, any kind of weird thing.

I just think that God respects His own order or His own way of doing things. And believing that when believers pray, unified, that it makes a difference. And so that's what we're doing. We're gathering here, and it's good to have you today. We're going to jump right into John 17. And in John 17, yesterday we looked at Jesus, the idea that Jesus, whenever we pray, we're ethereal.

We're leaving this world. It said Jesus looked to heaven, representing that He looked to a different place. And prayer does that. Prayer is looking to a different place. And I would ask you the question is, you know, when you're not praying, where are you looking to? Where are your eyes focused on? When you're trying to force something through. When you have an agenda you're trying to make happen.

And when you're going back to maybe your own controlling, maybe manipulative ways to get things done. Even in a relationship. You know, you're trying to control the other person. And you go to those easy standbys before you go to prayer. And in the beginning of the podcast, I talked about that, you know, neuroscientist who's saying that we can actually sculpt our brains by prayer.

This first instinct. And what is your first instinct when you come to a problem? When you come to an issue, when there is time to pray. Or something to pray over. And, you know, Jesus would immediately go to prayer. And we saw that in John 17. And the reason He prayed in John 17, and we talked about this yesterday, was that God would be glorified.

I really want to embed that into your thinking. Whenever you're praying, for whatever you're praying for, the key is God's glory. And the more we can take our prayers, no matter what it's for, whether it's, like I said, the end of world hunger or to find your keys. And we ask God, even though we don't know how He would do it, how could your glory be found in me finding my keys?

If we attune our prayers, like tuning in a radio, to God's glory. Once again, this is another superhighway, another current of God that is full of His power, benevolence, grace, love. I mean, all that is God are in these channels. Holiness is another channel. It's a superhighway in our prayer life. And so we see Jesus walking in all these channels.

And the more you get your life in tune with these different channels, whether it's holiness, whether it's purity in your physical life, whether it's honesty, every one of these things that we get ourselves in line with creates more inertia in our lives and gives us a more kingdom-filled life. Prayer is one of those things, and Jesus knew it.

So after Jesus looks to heaven, He prays, He prays that His Father would be glorified in all things, He begins to turn His attention to the thing that matters most to Him outside of His own Father's love for His Father and the glory of His Father. And it was this. It's people. Jesus cares about people. In the end, everything that Jesus is about comes back to people.

And I would ask you if you had a temperature gauge to show your own thinking about other people, you know, how high is it reading at the moment, especially when it comes to your prayers. How much of our time is spent praying for others? And Jesus, this whole John 17, it's so much about other people. It's so much about the unity of the church.

It's so much about people not falling away. Prayer is a form of love. You know, we say we love people. One of the best ways to love people is to pray for people. And so we see this. So let's turn our attention. If you have your Bibles, open it up to John 17. If you have your computers, open it up and we will jump right in. I'm going to start with John 17, 1 and then read John 17, 2 and 3.

And then kind of pick it apart a little bit. After Jesus said this, He looked towards heaven and prayed, Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son that your Son may glorify you. And there's that glory bit again. Verse 2, For you granted Him authority over all people that He might give eternal life to all those you have given Him. Now this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

I want to quickly juxtapose this passage with something that Jesus said in John chapter 4 to the woman at the well. When He spoke to her, He said that if she drank from the water that gave eternal life, the living water, that it would become within her a well of itself, welling up to eternal life. And this is what's really, really interesting.

Jesus tells this woman that she can become the source of eternal life. Not the source, because He's the primary source. But if she drinks from His well, then it says within her will become a well that will well up to eternal life. Where actually, she becomes the well. Jesus is still the water. Jesus is the one who, the word is slake, is a way to say it.

Or to quench. That quenches our thirst. That gives us eternal life. But you can be used as that well that is the place where people can come to. And prayer is like a bucket. Prayer goes down into that well. It brings up the water that is God to a point where actually the well will begin to overflow. And people won't even have to come and drop a bucket into that well.

There will begin to be a change around you with those that are surrounded by you. And we see that with prayer. And as Jesus prays, He prays for people. And prays for eternal life. And this is, you know, the reason He went to the cross. The reason that He had this passion, weak, was that people would get saved. And I want to bring your attention to the lost today.

I want to bring your attention to people who don't know Jesus. People who will spend an eternity separated from Him. And really challenge you in your list of people. Who are you praying for their salvation? Who are you praying that they might for? That they might come to know Jesus in a salvific way where they'll spend eternity with Him. You know, is it family members?

Is it the, you know, your next door neighbors? Is it the person down the street? And as you pray, how are you praying into that? Because prayer is like a bucket that will source the water that is God in your life. And then as you live your life in the manner of which, like a well, you become a well when you meet these people. You encourage them.

The things that you say, they begin to realize that they're being nourished by you. You know, I'll tell you what. People will never be nourished by you in the way that they could. Or perhaps should, to use the word should, if you're not immersed in prayer. And the more you pray for someone, the more when you're with them, you're going to have the ability to affect their lives.

The deeper you pray into their lives and for that. And so that's where we are today. We're landing there. We're praying for people like Jesus did. We're praying for the souls of people. So on your list, I want to encourage you to begin to pray. And if you want to put this on the prayer page, you can put a person's first name. And just, if you want to add this to any of the Praying for Your Elephant group page where we pray, you can just add a first name there or two initials if you want to keep their, you know, identity kind of a secret.

Or not a secret, but just, you know, protect their dignity if they don't know the Lord. But if you want to put some initials of these are the people I'm praying for, that would be amazing. And then we can begin to pray with you for those people. So this is your prescription for prayer today. Once again, it's to detoxify. Take 10 minutes and detoxify.

Just sit before the Lord. Put some worship music on. Clear your mind. Clear your soul of all the stuff. Confess anything you need to. Then spend 10 minutes just thinking through people in your life. The geography of your life. Begin to put their names down on a list of paper. And then spend 10 minutes just praying over those names. Just ask God to reveal things to you.

Pray for their salvation. Pray for the next time you're in at their shop that you can share. Stop by tomorrow. Just stop by and just talk. See how they're doing. Catch up with people. But become the well. Because Jesus is the water, but you are the well. And I want to say that live like a well. And prayer is the bucket. And so live that way. And I pray that people would be saved.

Invite them to church. Hey, Easter is right around the corner. Invite someone to church. So with that said, let me close in some prayer. Lord Jesus, bless this group. I pray that many souls would be saved. As we begin to pray, we begin to journey with you into this prayer that you prayed before you hung on the cross. God, help us reorganize, reinvent, reimagine, and re-inspire our prayer lives, God, with you.

We love you and we thank you in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.