Some people say: God is an all knowing God. Before I pray God already knows what I’m going to pray for. So why do I still need to pray?

Some people say: When I’m at peace, I have nothing to ask God for. So why do I need to pray?

1. Prayer is worship We pray not only because we have to ask things of God. We pray also for another important purpose. This is why even though God already knows what we want and even though we don’t need anything from Him, we still need to pray. Because prayer is a worship.

Isa 45:21-22 “Besides Me, there is no other God.” If we believe in God, we won’t acknowledge another god. If we do, that means god says wrongly by claiming to have no other God besides Him. Of course God doesn’t say anything wrong. Hence we have no voice but to acknowledge there’s only one true God which is Jesus Christ. We don’t need to go around saying other gods are false. But we do need to go around saying Jesus is the one true God. If you believe in this God, you MUST worship this God. This is the most important and basic thing a Christian should do. Just as the first commandment says: you shall have no others gods before Me

How do we worship this God? Some people say: I believe in this God and worship Him. What’s the use of kneeling down but not really acknowledging Him in our hearts? What’s the use of going to church when you fall asleep? What’s important is your heart. So if my heart is with God and I’m at home, that’s fine.

Hence many people have their own ways and methods of worshipping God. But God said if we believe in Him, “every knee shall bow and every tongue shall take an oath” (v23).

When we see the President coming, standing up and greeting him is showing respect. When God comes, kneeling and worshipping Him shows our submissiveness towards this God. The truest form of worship is that of kneeling before god in worship.

Rev 4:9-11 The 4 living creatures and 24 elders fall befall this God and worship. They represent the believers; the chosen people of God that have been saved. The 4 living creatures represents the behaviour/characteristics believers must have: like a lion, calf, man, eagle. The 24 elders represent the 12 tribes in the Old Testament and 12 It represents the Old Testament and New Testament believers. But some people say the apostles aren’t elders!

1 Pet 5:1 This verse shows that the apostles were called elders and Peter called himself an elder too.

The most important thing for the chosen people of the heavenly kingdom is to worship God. But to the people on earth, worshipping God is something most easily neglected. Because the things of the world easily entangle us. We have various troubles and anxieties of our own or others. We are busy over our own and others’ things. These prevent us from worshipping God. The speaker believes we all have the heart to worship God but we 有心无力. Our strength is drained by this world. We feel strengthless and helpless to come before the throne of God in worship. We are here before the throne but we are too tired. But the devout people overcame this and came before God in worship. They too had their own troubles and anxieties. But they were one step further in diligence; they came before God in diligence. How were they able to do this? Because they were willing to take down their own crowns to come before the throne.

Before the 24 elders came before God, they cast their golden crowns. This shows both their respect to God and also their wholeheartedness in worship. There’s nothing that will take the place of God in their hearts. Are we willing to take down our crowns? Our crowns represents our own authority, our freedom, things we reckon are very precious to us. All these we want to hold on tightly too and don’t want to cast down. If we hold tightly onto our crowns and don’t want to cast it down then we cannot worship God.

We feel our own crown is more important and precious than the Lord Jesus. So we want to pursue after and wear this crown. How will we have the heart to worship God?

So in worshiping God, important is not just kneeling down before Him but also to cast our crowns away. Only then will our worship be true.

1. Prayer is thanksgiving Psa 116:12, 17 The psalmist knew he had received a lot of benefits from the Lord. He couldn’t take anything to repay God. He could only offer up a thanksgiving as a sacrifice to God. So he comes to the temple of God to pray and make sacrifices to God. “Of course! Because he has received so much benefits from God! If he doesn’t give thanks that’s bad. But God hasn’t given ME much! I don’t have anything to give thanks! I only have murmurings. Once I compare with others I get angrier and angrier.” He feels that he worships God and sacrifices the same as others and yet they face much worse than others. Some people may not say this aloud but their hearts say this. If our hearts say this

Do we truly not have the grace of God? Actually we have received the greatest and most important grace. But we have forgotten about it. Psa 116:9-10 If we don’t read these two verses, we wouldn’t realise the psalmist that we thought received a lot of grace also met with GREAT afflictions. But God didn’t resolve these afflictions. But because of his belief and faith, he said this “what shall I render to the Lord? I shall offer my sacrifice of thanksgiving. Even though I have afflictions, God has given me the greatest grace of life so I can walk in the land of the living.” If you don’t have life, what does it matter what we have?

Eccl 9:4 “A living dog is better than a dead lion.” Similar to the idiom: a living beggar is better than a dead emperor. If both were living, it’s like comparing heaven and earth. An emperor lives a wonderful luxurious life while the beggar lives in destitute. But when the emperor is dead, even the living beggar is better. Living is such a great grace. The psalmist understood this.

An article said the war had ended after 3 years. The soldiers were returning home and You can imagine how moving that day would be. Many went into battlefield. But how many will return? Especially parents and wives will long to see if their sons and husbands will return home. The return of their loved one is the happiest thing. Perhaps they may be injured or even have lost a limb or two, but them being able to return living is the greatest joy! There was one soldier that had no one to receive him. Why? He told his family not to receive him. He said he wanted to do something first. His family members found it strange and were angry “whats more important than us after not seeing each other for 3 years?” They secretly followed him to see what was more important than them. He had gone to the church to pray to thank God for allowing him to return back alive. In war, he truly experienced how precious being able to live was. He had experienced friends that were alive that day and dead the next.

Do we have this realisation as well? To be able to live is the greatest grace. So no matter how difficult or unhappy our lives may be, we should give thanks to God for everyday we’re still able to walk in the land of the living. Because when we still live we can still change. When we’re dead, all change is no meaning. Hence we must like this psalmist we must give thanks to God for allowing us to live on everyday. Should we not pray to thank God everyday to allow us to live? Is prayer just to ask God for things? It’s also to thank Him for life. Our life is like the cloud. Today around, tomorrow gone. No one knows who will go first. Treasure when we are able to be together.

So it’s so good to live? Why don’t you kneel down to thank this God to give thanks for allowing you to live? Instead you fill yourself with unhappiness and discontentment with everything, everyone and God. We neglect the grace God has given us. At the end it may be too late. We ask ourselves why we were so calculative last time; why we were so angry and not forgiving last time. Before it is too late, let’s not have regrets at the end.

1. Prayer is a confession of sin Luke 11:2-4 Who is the one who says prayer is to confess sins? But if I haven’t committed any wrong why must I pray to ask for forgiveness? Because Jesus instructed it.

The Lord’s prayer as taught by Jesus is so that we know what our prayer content should consist of. “Forgive us our debt” The Lord’s prayer isn’t just something recited after the ending prayer. It is something that ought to be in our prayer everyday. If we feel we don’t know what to pray about, Jesus has already taught us what to pray about. If we neglect any parts, include it in the next time you pray as per Jesus’ instructions.

If we commit sins, of course we must pray for forgiveness. But if we haven’t, WHY must we pray for our sins to be forgiven? Suppose we haven’t committed any sin today, then do we skip over it because it’s superfluous?

1 John 1:8-9 Some disagree with what John said here. “I really didn’t commit sin. If I did, the police would catch me. Why is it you say me claiming to have no sin is deceiving myself?” Is John wrong? No. What John says includes your thoughts of sin. He’s not saying you acted out sin. You fear God and strive to keep the word of God. But no matter how much effort you put in, do you not have any sinful thought at all?

The commandment say we cannot kill. But if our anger is stirred against a brother, we ought to be judged. We don’t strike anyone, we’re just angry in our hearts! God sees the anger within you already. This is the thought of sin. If we don’t control ourselves, we’ll open our mouths to scold the person and even strike or kill the person!

The commandment say if we think sexual thoughts about a woman, that’s adultery in our hearts already. This of course doesn’t means the person has committed adultery. But if these lustful desires aren’t controlled within us, we may act it out one day.

Out of our hearts flows our deepest desires. Anger, greed, lust. These can cause us to sin. This is why we need to pray for our sins to be forgiven. Because God doesn’t just see our exterior but also our hearts. There’ll be times we have desires of sin and think nonsense. In our prayer we need to confess our sins to cleanse and purify our hearts.

A student asked his teacher “why do I keep training myself but fail to be successful?” Teacher “let us first boil tea” The teacher poured until the cup overflowed. “Teacher stop! It’s overflowing! It’s useless to keep putting! It’ll all go to waste!” “You uds this too” the teacher remarked “Your heart is filled with many desires. If you don’t remove it no matter how you nurture yourself externally, it’ll be of no use” Just like when Jesus rebuked the Pharisees. They wash their exterior but within is all dirty.

All of us dress up and clean up well. In the mirror, we see our external appearance but have we examined our heart? We must see our true self. Our exterior may be clean but is our interior clean? If our heart is filled with desires of sin (hatred, jealousy, greed), you’ll not be able to successfully nurture ourselves. Year by year it’ll still be the same. We must truly cleanse our hearts. Just like what Isaiah said “it’s not that the arm of the Lord is shortened, or His ears stopped that He can’t hear you. It’s your sin that’s separated you from God; that has made God nor hear your prayers”

We often examine God that He’s not loving or fair. Why doesn’t He help? Is He really kind? We blame Him but never blame ourselves. But the fact is the greatest problem lies with ourselves; our hearts. This is why we need to include praying for God to forgive our sins as part of the content of our prayer. To pray for God to get rid of all the lists and desires in our hearts. Then God’s grace can fill our hearts! If our inside is already full, anything poured inside is wasted. We must pray to God to cleanse our inner selves so God’s grace can cleanse us even more.

Do we not need to pray then? Prayer is not just help. There’re more important things to prayer as well.