Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to the Pray and See podcast. I'm Brian Brooks, your host. I'm glad to connect with you to share how God moves through prayer in our Youth for Christ ministries and some things I've seen in my own life.
Speaker: Are you feeling empty, like you're performing a role rather than sharing a life? Today on the podcast, we're looking at why Jesus says that the secret place is the only place to find the reward that actually lasts. Let's pray and see what God does and who he is.
Speaker: Pray along with me. God, you hold the whole universe together by your word, and you also call us to yourself, to be in a relationship with you. So much of our lives are spent being on, playing a role, and we can bring that into our relationship with you, but you actually want our hearts, not the performance.
Speaker: God, I pray that you would show each listener where their heart is with you today and help them to reset and come to know you. Amen. Life in God's kingdom and in his family is way different than religion.
Speaker: Religion focuses on outward behavior, the show, the performance, on doing the right things to belong, to earn acceptance or standing with God or in a community, and even to earn forgiveness from God.
Speaker: It's not that way with Jesus. Jesus cares about the heart. your attitude, what you really think about. Coming to know Jesus in the first place is deciding to surrender to Him, to admit that we're messed up, we're broken, we need His forgiveness.
Speaker: That's a heart transaction, a heart interaction with God. Religion wants to impress, but Jesus wants us to love and serve and grow close to Him.
Speaker: When I was thinking about this content, I was struck by the example of two of my friends, Phil Sluss and Dan Slane. First, when I got to teach a college house church Bible study years ago, i was excited, the crowd was older than me, and I wanted to impress.
Speaker: I slaved over studying this chapter in the Bible. I wanted to squeeze something really profound and deep out of the Bible teaching. Not really so people could grow, but I think because I hoped they would just be impressed and they wouldn't put me in the box of a shallow 18-year-old college freshman.
Speaker: I connected with Dan Slane, who was the leader of our Bible study group at the time. Afterwards, he gave me feedback on the teaching, and we prayed together.
Speaker: I listened to Dan pray. He prayed with emotion, with real words, like he actually believed he was talking to God. Another time later, we prayed together, and he said, you know, before we start, I want to tell you, Brian, you can actually pray with emotion.
Speaker: If you're angry, tell God and get angry in prayer. Prayer is not a performance. Be yourself. Years later, a couple house church groups were combining to form a new group in the larger church that I'm a part of.
Speaker: We had three other couples in our living room talking, people that we really didn't know that well. Well, we prayed together at the end out loud. And I remember thinking, i just prayed kind of a scripted thing in my head.
Speaker: And I fell into the trap of wanting to impress people because I don't know these guys. I don't know what they think. Yikes. But I was struck by Phil Sluss. He prayed in a real heartfelt way that was authentic. I was refreshed by it.
Speaker: And I immediately decided, no matter what happens with this group, I want to be around this guy. I want to hang out with him and become his friend. Prayer is not a performance.
Speaker: Be yourself. This many episodes in, I realize there's a danger of doing a podcast on prayer. The main danger for me is that you might think I'm a prayer expert.
Speaker: I'm not. Or that I pray for hours a day. Nope. Or that I never struggle with wanting to pray. Not true. On top of that, every single one of us can distort prayer into an opportunity to impress people.
Speaker: You change your voice. You use certain words. Your tone changes. You pray for a super long time. All that is under the umbrella of thinking that more must be better.
Speaker: That's not what it's about. Listen to what Jesus says in Matthew 5.
Speaker: Listen to what Jesus says in Matthew 6, 5 and 6. five and six When you pray, don't be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them.
Speaker: I tell you the truth, that is all the reward they will ever get. Prayer wasn't practiced at street corners busy intersections.
Speaker: then your father who sees everything will reward you prayer normally wasn't practiced at street corners and busy intersections But certain religious leaders during Jesus' time would pray publicly for show.
Speaker: This could lead someone to posture, to pray to impress people, or as a performance. Why does Jesus say that people who do this are hypocrites? Well, it's because they're motivated by pride, the desire to be above other people.
Speaker: They're appearing to serve God, but really they're just serving themselves. What's the answer? Jesus says, get alone by yourself and pay attention to God.
Speaker: What is prayer about? What is it? It's that you, follower of God, you're connecting with him. Jesus isn't saying the idea of praying publicly or out loud with a group of other people is bad, but he is saying that praying to perform or to impress others is bad.
Speaker: Jesus even prayed out loud with his own followers. Jesus says, if you go away by yourself and you shut the door and you pray in secret to your father who sees, he will reward you.
Speaker: What's the reward? The reward is closeness with God. Prayer, when you're by yourself or with other people, should be prayer to God. It should be authentic and personal.
Speaker: This is what my friend Phil did. He still does it when I get to pray with him. God is far more pleased with a stammering, awkward prayer that expresses your real thoughts and emotions than he is with a polished performance that's offered in place of you just being yourself.
Speaker: Prayer is not a performance. Just be yourself. For those of you serving young people, you cannot give what you do not have.
Speaker: Serve and lead teenagers out of the overflow of your private walk with God. When we value the secret reward over public praise, we can become the non-anxious, authentic leaders that middle and high school students need.
Speaker: Prayer is not a performance. Be yourself. Now I want to talk to the person who feels like you're running on fumes or constantly being on. Maybe you're on stage, you're in front of students, you're at their sports games.
Speaker: You're on social media. You're on. It's easy to start living for public reward and praise. Jesus invites you and me to stop performing.
Speaker: God isn't grading your Bible teaching. He's not grading your online engagement. He wants to spend time with you. Don't just pray either to see results in your ministry.
Speaker: Pray so you can see God. Here's your challenge for this week. Find your closet. Find your inner room. Spend five minutes of honest, authentic, shut the door prayer to God and see what happens.
Speaker: Thanks for listening. Share this podcast with friends, family, and students who are interested in connecting with God or you think could be encouraged. Go ahead and share it if you found it helpful.
Speaker: And we realized there was an issue with the email address pray at COYFC.org, but we fixed it. So if there's something you'd like to hear more about with prayer, send me an email at pray at COYFC.org.
Speaker: Pray and See is a ministry of Central Ohio Youth for Christ. Look us up on social media and we'll see you next time.
