Our Heavenly Father Who Wants to Give Us Good Gifts

Luke 11:1-13

Sermon Notes:

1) The Pattern: Pray like this, vv. 1-4

2) The Reason: Because your father loves to hear the voice of prayer, vv. 5-8

3) The Plea: Ask, Seek and Knock, vv. 9-10

4) The Reason: Because your father loves to give good gifts, vv. 11-13

Reflection questions: 

1.       Do you ever use the Lord’s Prayer to guide your prayer time? Why or why not? Do you think it’s too hard to pray like this? If so, google “Martin Luther, A Simple Way to Pray,” a prayer guide that includes the Lord’s Prayer, which Luther wrote when his barber asked him for advice on prayer. (If you get lucky, you might find a free copy online)

2.       Do you “play” at prayer, or are you persistent? Is there anything in your life that you’ve stopped praying for, because you think God is not going to answer the way you want? Do you (or anyone you know) have a story about a long-time prayer request that God finally answered? 

3.       How you approach your Father when you pray? Like a miser, who might give you something good once in a while if he really feels like? Or like a Prodigal Father (Luke 15:20ff) who runs to meet his runaway son while he is still far off, like a father “who is able and ready to help us?” (Westminster Shorter Catechism, Q100)