The Prayer of Enlightenment [Part 1]

Pastor, author, and Bible teacher, Alan Wright. Our prayers matter so much. He could do whatever he wants. He's God in the same way that he doesn't really, he didn't have to have us to share the Gospel. He could just save people. He could have it such that there's no need for us to lay hands on the sick and pray for them, but he's ordained it. He's ordained that we be integrally involved, and it's an exciting thing when you see and your prayer. That's Pastor Alan Wright.

Welcome to another message of good news that will help you see your life in a whole new light. I'm Daniel Britt, excited for you to hear the teaching today in the series called Pray, as presented at Rinaldo Church in North Carolina. If you're not able to stay with us throughout the entire program, I want to make sure you know how to get our special resource right now. It's an audio album of Pastor Alan's teaching series, The Body You've Always Wanted.

It's available to you in physical CD album or a digital download, your choice. And it can be yours for your donation this month to Alan Wright Ministries. As you listen to today's message, go deeper as we send you today's special offer. Contact us at PastorAlan.org. That's PastorAlan.org. Or call 877-544-4860.

That's 877-544-4860. More on this later in the program. But right now, let's get started with today's teaching.

Here is Alan Wright. Okay, you ready for some good news? You don't just have the privilege of having intellectual knowledge and intellectual assent to the gospel. You can know the good news. You can know what the hope is to which you've been called. You can know what is the glorious inheritance that's yours amongst the saints.

You can know what is the immeasurable greatness of God's power. We're going to look today at one of the most important and beautiful prayers in the Scripture, one that Paul prayed. It's in Ephesians Chapter 1 as we're learning about five great prayers from the Bible, prayers that you can memorize and you can personalize and you can make part of your prayer life. And if you pray God's Word, then you know you're praying in the Spirit because all Scriptures God breathed.

You can know that you're praying God's will because these are the very prayers that God Himself has put into His Word. And Paul prayed this over you and me. He prayed it over the Ephesians. And so what an important, important important prayer it is, one that I really encourage you to memorize and to make part of your prayer life. In Ephesians Chapter 1 Verse 16, Paul writes, I do not cease to give thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of Glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, having the eyes of your hearts enlightened, that you may know what is the hope to which He has called you, what are the riches of His glorious inheritance in the saints, and what is the immeasurable greatness of His power toward us who believe, according to the working of His great might, that He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And He put all things under His feet and gave Him as head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all. What a beautiful prayer. It is intriguing the whole matter of prayer and how God uses us and has ordained it that our prayers matter so much.

He could do whatever He wants. He's God in the same way that He doesn't really have to have us to share the gospel. He could just save people. He could have it such that there's no need for us to lay hands on the sick and pray for them, but He's ordained it. He's ordained that we be integrally involved, and it's an exciting thing when you see answered prayer.

This week we had a prayer gathering amongst many that were happening around the nation as part of the National Prayer Week, but on Tuesday morning we filled up the Benton Convention Center for early breakfast, and Pete Gregg, a pastor from London and author and one who's known as the founder of the 24-7 prayer movement was our guest speaker, gave one of the best talks on prayer I think I've ever heard, and in the midst of it he shared how at his church outside of London they started praying around the clock, 24 hours a day, just set aside a room, and people began praying, and they started seeing miracles. He said, you know, a boy was healed of leukemia, and they saw some other extraordinary type miracles, and Pastor Gregg was so excited about it. He came to some of his parishioners. He was so excited to say, do you believe what God is doing? He said, do you know what this means? They said, well, this means that Christianity is true, and I laugh so hard as a pastor. They said, Pastor, you're the pastor.

You're supposed to already believe that it's true. He said, yeah, yeah, I do, but you know, I mean, it's even all the more important that I really do believe that it's true, and I thought it was so funny because what is he really referring to? Is there's a way in which you know something is true because you believe it, and your mind, you know, a sense to it, but there's another way that you know something's true, and that is that you've experienced it, and when you really, really know it, it's sort of the difference in knowing about a person or knowing a person, and so what Paul is praying here is a prayer really about knowing because the fact is that God has already a great hope to which he's called you, and there already is a tremendous inheritance spiritually for everyone who's in Christ, and God has and always has had on display incomparably great power, immeasurably great power, so what Paul is praying is not that there would be hope or that there would be an inheritance or there'd be the power of God, but that you know it. It's a prayer about knowing. It's a prayer that starts with praying that we'd have a spirit. He's talking about the human spirit here, not God's spirit, the human spirit of wisdom and revelation so that you would have knowledge of these things.

That's what it is. It's a prayer that you would know these things, so we're going to talk today about what this hope is to which we've been called, what that means, what the prayer is for knowing the glorious inheritance and the saints and what this prayer is all about the incomparably great power of God, but all throughout it we want to talk about what it means to really know these things and why therefore this is such an important prayer. Well, let's start with the whole idea of knowing because it is essential that we really recognize the Scriptures promise to us is that we can know. We can know God and we can know our salvation. We can know the presence of the Holy Spirit. You can really truly know and the reason that I highlight this is because there actually is a great divergence of thought throughout the history of Christendom about this and the way not only that people proclaim the gospel but the way that they interact with one another about the gospel and in our everyday lives. There is a school of thought that says that we can't absolutely know for sure about our salvation because it is in part dependent on us remaining in a state of a certain type of condition of relationship with God and there's another school of thought that says no once you're a child of God you're God's child and there is on the one hand the notion that we mustn't tell people with too much confidence that they are thoroughly loved and accepted by God because if you do then people will not strive as hard to live a holy life. If you tell people that they're already pleasing to God through Christ and that no matter what they're accepted in Christ then the fear is when people will quit trying to live a godly life.

But there's a whole other thought which most certainly is the perspective of the true gospel and that is that when you accept Christ God wants you to know that you're a child of God that the Holy Spirit bears witness to your spirit that you're a child of God and that you're an heir therefore with Christ himself so that you know that you know that you know you're in the family of God and that you could never be separated from the love of God in Christ Jesus. That's Alan Wright and we'll have more teaching in a moment from today's important series. If you think heaven is a misty place where you float around on clouds and pluck angelic harps you're in for the surprise of your life. Our special product this month is all about the hope of heaven.

It's our gift to you when you support this month. Alan's CD album invites you to discover the body you've always wanted. A spiritual resurrected body. Be assured that God isn't going to scrap you or the world. He'll make all things new. Overcome the gnawing anxiety about the end of your life.

You can have peace now. Pastor Alan Wright's hope filled messages will lead you into more than a joyous revelation of heaven according to the scriptures. They'll lead you into a bounding hope. So please help us stay on the radio in your area by making a generous gift today and we'll be happy to send you the body you've always wanted.

The CD album that is. When you make your gift to Alan Wright Ministries today we'll send you Pastor Alan's messages in an attractive CD album or through digital download as our way of saying thanks for your partnership. We are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Alan Wright Ministries. Call us at 877-544-4860. That's 877-544-4860. Or come to our website pastoralan.org.

Today's teaching now continues. Here once again is Alan Wright. There's absolutely nothing even including your own failures folly and sin that from that point on could ever separate you from God. You might live your life in rebellion and miss out on so much of what it means to be a child of God and it's true that we reap what we sow so everything we do matters. But what the scriptures want to assure you of is that you are perfectly accepted in the beloved so you will not be rejected by God. And the conviction of this position which I think is most certainly the position of the gospel and the scriptures is that when you are relieved of this great fear of rejection by God when you know that you're reconciled to God when you know that because you are so utterly loved by God that you can come into His presence with boldness when you know that you're much more likely to live a holy and godly life. That the life of fear and of condemnation under any degree of law doesn't lead to godly living it leads simply to shame-based and fear-based living. But this divergence of thought and most of the time that you hear it it will be so similar sounding that you have to tune your ears to even know what you're listening to.

I always like to think of it this way it's like at a point of a watershed if you think of a continental divide up near the watershed but the top elevation everything looks fairly similar but you have to see where does this go if it runs all the way one to the Pacific and one to the Atlantic because that's where it's going and you have to look at it that way. There is an example from the first century of a Jewish rabbi who was very well known beloved he was called variously the mighty hammer and the light of Israel he was known respectively of Rabban Yochan Ben Zechai and he fell ill and we have this written testimony of what happened at his deathbed. His disciples came to visit him and when he saw them he began to weep. His disciples said to him quote light of Israel right hand pillar mighty hammer why do you weep and he said to them were I being led before a mortal king I would weep now that I'm being led before the king of kings the Holy One more so and they continued saying and moreover two paths are before me one to Eden and the other to Gehenim which was a reference for the pit of darkness it was the valley outside of Jerusalem I do not know he said to which one I am led shall I not weep so here was the it was the greatest known rabbi and what he was saying was I come to the point of my death and I can't know with certainty where I'm where I'm going in the theological dictionary of the New Testament this massive work by Kittel he says there is perhaps no more striking proof of this thesis that there is no certainty or hope under any system of the law than in the fact that the schools of Hillel and Shammai these two rabbinical schools disputed for more than two years whether it were better for man not to have been created or whether it's good for him to have been created and that they finally agreed that it were better for him not to have been created and Kittel says no other view is really possible under the law I'm just saying if you take it all the way to its extreme one ocean or the other that if you were just simply under law you don't know for sure you're saved and if you don't know and you have to live with the terror that you can't know for sure whether you'd be separated from God what the schools of Hillel said well they've been better that you've not even been born and what happens in our lives is that people adopt this in the way they interact with others there are two ways of parenting there's a way of parenting in which you withhold a little bit of your love and acceptance because you think this is the way you're going to get your children to try harder because if they just absolutely know how loved and accepted they are well they'll just take everything for granted or you'll praise them it'll just go to their head but there's an entirely different school of thought that says no the way that you raise children is you build an environment of such security and of such love that they just live loved they live as ones who are absolutely confident that their life matters and what happens in that environment is a child gains an identity an identity as a as a beloved person who must matter and if you matter then you have hope and if you have hope then you chart your course accordingly the student that gets an identity as an a student is going to try hard to live like an a student there are two different ways that people look at this and what paul is saying here is that his principal prayer is that you would know these things about God and about who you are in Christ these things already exist there is a great hope there is a great inheritance and there's a great power he's not he's not praying that these things would come to pass he's saying that you would know it oh that you could know this paul is saying there is a vast difference difference in knowing something just intellectually versus just really knowing it some years ago abby my daughter and i we had an opportunity to go on a mission trip to papua new guinea and on route we spent several days in australia and had a delightful time we rented a car and that was an adventure because i'd never driven on the left-hand side of the road i literally got the rental car and we started at the counter while i asked the attendant are you allowed to turn left on red because we turn right on red and he looked at me and he said might he said when it's red you stop red you stop i got into the rental car and i drove it around the parking lot for a long time trying to drive on the left-hand side of just in and out of the road of the parking i was so nervous because i knew that you're supposed to drive on the left-hand side of the road but i didn't know it and so i said abby your job she was she wasn't even of driving age yet i said your job you sit here and you say stay left daddy stay left daddy i started out going on the wrong lane coming out of the airport and i swerved back over and got to the left-hand side and i realized in australia they love roundabouts roundabouts are confusing even when i'm driving here but they had two lane roundabouts almost every intersection and so uh you come up to the roundabout and the first thing you have to do is remember go left around the roundabout but the hard thing is when you came out of the roundabout remembering to go left and abby sat there left daddy left daddy and i would get so concerned that i was going to stray to the right that i'm just hugging the left-hand side and she said daddy you're about to run off the road on the left-hand side you can come back over this a little way i said abby we're going to be here three days we can't turn on the radio we can't talk to each other all i have to do is just sit here and go left left stay left stay left stay left stay left that's somebody who knows that you drive on the left-hand side of the road in australia but i didn't know it but when i came home and i got into my car to drive home from the airport i was like cut on the radio what do you want to talk about i don't even have to think about it to really know something means you don't even have to think about it right my children don't have to sit around every day and go my father loves me i'm sure my father loves me i'm going to claim the fact that my father loves me oh he does love me i know my father no i'm going to operate like he loves me i mean that's not the way they do they just know i'm loved i'm loved i guess that's why abby can be so snorky with me sometimes she's not going to get rejected she does you know that's why she can walk and say daddy are you really going to wear that um when you're secure in love you're not thinking about it any more than i'm thinking about driving on the right-hand side of the road oh that you would know Alan Wright and you look good today alan thank you hey we've got more on this uh this teaching it's praying pure word and the teaching is the prayer of enlightenment today and uh alan's going to be back here in a moment with additional insight on this for your life and today's final word if you think heaven is a misty place where you float around on clouds and pluck angelic harps you're in for the surprise of your life our special product this month is all about the hope of heaven it's our gift to you when you support this month it's our gift to you when you support this month alan's cd album invites you to discover the body you've always wanted a spiritual resurrected body be assured that god isn't going to scrap you or the world he'll make all things new overcome the gnawing anxiety about the end of your life you can have peace now pastor alan writes hope-filled messages will lead you into more than a joyous revelation of heaven according to the scriptures they'll lead you into a bounding hope so please help us stay on the radio in your area by making a generous gift today and we'll be happy to send you the body you've always wanted the cd album that is when you make your gift to Alan Wright Ministries today we'll send you pastor alan's messages in an attractive cd album or through digital download as our way of saying thanks for your partnership we are happy to send this to you as our thanks from Alan Wright Ministries call us at 877-544-4860 that's 877-544-4860 or come to our website pastor alan.org so alan would you connect the the last two teachings here together or the last teaching the prayer of agreement with the prayer of enlightenment and say once you understand what scripture says what the word of god says and you can agree with it then that becomes second nature and now you're enlightened are those going hand in hand well i think i think it's so so much it does i mean if to say that you may know the hope to what you're called that you know what your glorious inheritance is in the saints he's saying that something that you might read in the scripture and you might see it it becomes enlightened to your heart so you know there's a way in which you're in the word and you're just reading lines on a page and there's another way in which the holy spirit is enlightening your heart where you go wait a minute this is god speaking to me this is about me yeah this is about my hope it's about the calling god has in my life this is about real spiritual riches that i have in in a real spiritual inheritance from the lord and the revelation of that and paul is saying i want you to know that down in the deepest part of your heart so may the eyes of your heart be enlightened so all these things that god has said this is such a great prayer to pray to the lord you know let my heart be enlightened so i can really know these things today's good news message is a listener supported production of allen wright 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