Introduction

James 1:5-8 ESV  If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him.  (6)  But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind.  (7)  For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord;  (8)  he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

James 1:6a  But let him ask in faith, with no doubting…

• Now last week we talked about the power of the prayer of faith.
  • We read verse after verse after verse that tells us that if we would pray in faith that God would answer those prayers…
    • Big prayers…
    • Mountain moving prayers…
    • Impossible prayers…
      • God will answer those prayers, God will move and act and do the miraculous… if we would just pray in faith.
  • We talked about the MANY miracles that have happened in this church over just the past year… healing miracles… miracles of provision… estranged families miraculously restored…
    • We talked about how the prayer of faith can really, literally, move mountains.
  • Then we talked about how to grow in faith… if you remember, here are three practical steps to grow in faith:

• See With Your Own Eyes: What does the Word Say. Who do I know that this kind of miracle has happened to? Who can I talk to to testify about this so I can have evidence of it?
  • Take Doubts Captive: Don’t allow doubt to dictate your thoughts and prayers… they have no place, take them captive and shut them down with evidence, substance, and reason.
  • Step Out in Faith: Allow God to do the miraculous in front of you and through you, ask for opportunities to pray in faith, to pray for miracles… then pray without doubting!
• So that was last weeks sermon, the power of the prayer of faith and how to grow in faith so you can be this kind of faith filled prayer-warrior…
• We also had this Ladder Example last week.
  • I explained that I am still to this day terrified of heights…
    • Yet I don’t let my unreasonable fear overcome my reasonable faith…
    • So, to prove it I had pastor Mike put up a ladder to the speaker and light bar up there and I climbed to the top.
      • I was terrified, but I had faith that the ladder would hold me safely.
      • I proved that faith by climbing the ladder.
    • Y’all I am really tall, but I am not tall enough to change out those lights up there…
      • With me that is impossible, but with a ladder tall things are possible!
  • But I actually have to climb the ladder, don’t I? I actually have to step out, or in that instance, step up in faith.
• And if you remember, I changed my shoes before climbing the ladder… I checked to make sure the ladder was square and set up right, and I asked pastor Mike to anchor the ladder for me…
  • Because you can’t use a ladder improperly and then blame the ladder when things don’t work out…
    • And that church, is what we are going to focus on today, the limits of the prayer of Faith.

• Ask in Faith (The Biblical Way to Receive From God) -Part Two, the Limits of the Prayer of Faith
  • You may think that you have all the faith in the world… but when you pray outside of the God ordained limits, the God given spiritual laws… you are going to find your prayers fall very, very short.
    • Or if we are sticking with the ladder example, your prayers are going to fall hard!

• There are at least 4 limits to the prayer of faith that I want to go over this morning… we are going to move quick, so follow with me here…

• The four limits, or at least four of the limits of the prayer of faith are:
  • Limit One – Selfishness
    • The prayer of faith cannot be selfish
  • Limit Two – Contradicting God’s Word
    • The prayer of faith cannot contradict God’s Word.
  • Limit Three – Breaking God’s Spiritual Laws
    • The Prayer of faith cannot break God’s Spiritual Laws.
  • Limit Four – Going Against God’s Will
    • The prayer of faith cannot go against God’s will.
• So let’s get into it with Limit One… Selfishness.

Limit One – Selfishness

• YOU CAN’T PRAY SELFISH PRAYERS AND EXPECT GOD TO ANSWER THEM.
  • You can have all the faith in the world, but if you are asking selfishly then your prayer of faith is worthless…
    • This is probably the number one reason why prayers of faith fall flat…
    • “But Pastor! I thought scripture says “You have not because you ask not… I AM ASKING THEREFORE I SHOULD BE HAVING”
  • Well dear word of faith friend, you are correct, scripture does say you have not because you ask not… but you have to keep reading…

James 4:2-3 ESV  You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask.  (3)  You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions.

• Asking God for things because you want them for you is WRONG.
  • That is what it says, you ask wrongly!
• I think this verse is just left out of some preachers Bibles…
  • I was studying for this sermon and I came across a sermon by a well known prosperity preacher… and this is what they said:
    • “I love James 4:2, one of my favorite scriptures in the Bible… simply says you have not because you ask not… Why can’t I have what other people have, I want things, I don’t have them, other people have them… why don’t I have them… If there is ANYTHING that you want the simple answer is “you have not because you ask not”
      • That is what this prosperity preacher said… made me sick really…
  • NO! You don’t get anything you want just because you ask in faith… because if you are asking for selfish reasons, you are asking wrongly!
• Maybe you are praying for 700 million dollars… but why are you praying for that? So you can buy a fancy new car, a fancy new home, a private jet…
  • And what, you think you are going to lie to God and tell Him it is all because you want to help people… Like God is going to be fooled?
    • “Well I just want a private Jet with leather seats, a full time pilot and stewardess so that I can preach the Gospel more places… I don’t want it for myself, I want it for God!”
      • THAT IS A LOAD OF BANANAS! Stinky rotten mushy banana’s..
        • And God Ain’t eating that mush!
  • You can fly like everyone else, save hundreds of millions, and still preach the Gospel globally… stop praying selfishly…
• On the contrary we can see the prayer of faith working, even in finances, when people don’t pray selfishly.
  • Billy Grahm’s ministries brought in over 750 million dollars the year that he died…
  • 750 MILLION dollars in just one year…
    • Yet he didn’t fly in a private jet, and he didn’t live on a mansion on a hill…
    • Here is how ol’ Billy Grahm, who is credited with leading millions of people to Jesus, here is how he lived… This is a picture of the house he lived in when he died.

• That’s a small house. A Nice house, for sure, very nice… but small.. just enough for his wife and him to live comfortably in retirement.
  • 750 million dollars a year, this man prayed in by faith… by his prayer of faith… and he lives like this… Humble and comfortable… why such a small house? Because Billy Grahm wasn’t praying for 750 million dollars so he could live in a mansion… he was praying for it to use it to lead people to Jesus.
    • Billy Grahm brought in Hundreds of Millions of dollars by faith, because he was not asking selfishly.
      • On the other hand… Some False pastors with mega influences bring in 100s of millions of dollars by fraud… because their faith is selfish and worthless..
• Limit one is selfishness… if you are praying selfishly, your faith is worthless to God.
  • That brings us to limit two: Contradicting God’s Word

Limit Two – Contradicting God’s Word

James 1:25 ESV But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.

• Live according to the perfect word of God. Persevere according to the perfect word of God. Live according to the perfect word of God. DO as the perfect word of God says to do…
  • Then, in faith, PRAY according to the perfect Word of God… the perfect Law of God.
• If you are praying contrary to God’s word… God won’t answer.
  • But if you are praying a prayer of faith, in accordance with God’s word, in it’s proper context… then your prayer has God’s attention…
  • Satan tells Jesus to pray to turn a stone into bread so Jesus, who was very hungry, could eat it.
    • Jesus responds with the Word of God… saying “I can’t go against what the Word of God says… because it is written “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God”
  • Satan then took him to a very high place, the peak of the temple, and said if you are Jesus, through yourself down… fall from here… and angels will catch you… Satan even quoted scripture…
    • But Jesus responds “THAT’S NOT THE PROPER CONTEXT… because it is written “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”
• Jesus’ faith was never in contradiction to God’s word… it always was in line with God’s word…
  • And of course it was… a name of Jesus is “The Word” who did Satan think he was going to fool?
  • But had Jesus given in, and said “OK” Satan and had Jesus thrown himself from the roof… he would have ended up not carried by angles… but would have ended up something like this:

• Now can we just take a minute to appreciate this picture… this was recorded from a security camera as a man fell from a ladder.
  • By the way… this man was knocked out cold, but was otherwise uninjured, praise God… but it was quite a fall, I posted the video on my Facebook page…
  • But let’s just take a moment to appreciate this picture… and all the things that are wrong…
• Notice first that the ladder is not perfectly square with the house… this is a big NO-NO when it comes to ladder safety.
  • Second, notice that the ladder is on top of a pile of leaves… in fact there is no leaves any where else but under the ladder… BRO MOVE THE LEAVES OR MOVE THE LADDER! LEAVES ARE SLIPPERY!
  • Next, notice that there is no one holding the ladder… in the video, the ladder slips because of the leaves and improper angle… if someone had held the ladder he would not have fallen.
  • Finally, notice his choice of foot wear… the man is wearing sandals! Not even closed back sandals… he is wearing FLIP FLOPS.
    • Worse yet, if you look at the bottom left of the picture, THERE JUST A FEW FEET AWAY FROM HIM IS A PAIR OF BLACK TENIS SHOES.
    • PUT ON THE SHOES BRO.
• This ladder in this video is a Werner Extension ladder…
  • With the ladder there is a Safety Training booklet called “Werner climbing pro ladder safety training”
    • And in that booklet it says to “Wear shoes that have non-slip soles, be sure the feet of the ladder are on firm ground, not obstructed or on slippery surfaces, make sure the ladder is set up properly at the right angle, and have another person hold the ladder.”
      • If the man climbing the ladder in this photo would have done HALF of those things he probably would be alright…
        • But I am guessing he never read the manual… or he never cared.
• On the contrary I climbed the same exact model of ladder… and I was fine… why? Because I obeyed the safety instructions written in the manual.
• So many Christians either don’t read their Bible or don’t care… and they pray contrary to the word of God… it’s not going to happen y’all.
  • Stop praying for world peace… the Bible says it won’t happen.
  • Stop praying for revival without first praying for repentance… because the Bible says revival follows repentance.
  • Stop praying selfishly, because the Bible says that won’t happen either.
  • Stop praying for sinful things… God knows your heart… God isn’t going to give you a new girlfriend for you to sleep with… God says fornication is SIN and God will not be mocked.
• Open your Bible, Read it, and do what it says… then pray in faith according to what it says!

Joshua 1:8 ESV  This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.

• So limit one, praying selfishly, limit two, contradiction God’s word… now on to limit three… contradicting God’s Spiritual Laws

Limit Three – Breaking God’s Spiritual Laws

• Now there are many physical laws that God has made, that you can find in a physics book…
  • But there are also many spiritual laws… found in a spiritual book, the Bible.
    • And while prayer can break the laws of physics… for example moving a mountain or walking on water… we never see prayers of faith breaking God’s spiritual laws…
  • So we should not expect our prayers to break spiritual laws…
  • Now there are MANY spiritual laws, and I don’t have time to cover them all… but let me cover three…

• You reap what you sow, If you are Faithful with little you will be given much but if you are unfaithful with little it will be taken from you, and, the penalty of sin is death.
• Let’s start with you reap what you sow.
  • This means that whatever you plant, you will harvest… if you plant corn you will get a harvest of corn… if you plant apples you will get an orchard of apples… you can’t plant lima beans and expect to harvest oranges!

Galatians 6:7 ESV  Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.

• Spiritually this means that your actions have consequences… if you bless others you will be blessed, if you curse others you will be cursed.
  • If you stab yourself in the stomach with a 6 inch blade, you are going to be in a lot of pain and need medical attention.
  • If you run from the cops you are going to go to prison…
    • These are all examples of you reap what you sow.
• But so many people pray against reaping what they have sown… so many people pray against harvesting what they have planted… God will not be mocked.
  • If you are obese and have diabetes… don’t think God is going to heal you if you continue to eat at taco bell and dairy queen.
    • It is a spiritual law you are facing, you ate poorly for life, now you have health problems you reap what you sow.
    • So stop praying for healing and start praying for conviction… conviction to eat right and work out… Conviction that you would sow health so you can reap health.
    • Then when you start loosing the weight, THEN start praying for health.
    • You reap what you sow.
  • If you are in prison because you are guilty of breaking the law, and you know your punishment is just… you reap what you sow… don’t pray that you would be set free… pray that God would forgive you and that you would use that time for His glory… you reap what you sow.
• Another spiritual law is that if you are faithful with little you will be given much, if you are unfaithful with little it will be taken from you.
  • This spiritual law comes from the parable of the Talent’s in Matthew 25. 3 Dudes were given a bunch of money… Two dudes invested and multiplied the money, the other did nothing with it.
    • The one who did nothing with it, his money was taken from it and given to the man who invested his original money the best.
  • It is the spiritual law of responsibility… if you are faithful with what God gives you He will give you more, if you are unfaithful he will take it away.
    • In otherwords… Don’t think you can pray a prayer of faith for provision when you don’t even tithe. God will not be mocked.
    • Don’t pray that God will grow your ministry when you have been unfaithful to serve in that ministry.
    • Don’t pray that God will fix your marriage while you are cheating on your spouse.
    • No matter how much faith you have, these prayers won’t be answered.
• The third spiritual law that I want to cover is this: The penalty of is death. The penalty of sin is hell.

Romans 6:23 ESV  For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Hebrews 9:27 ESV  And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment,

• If someone you love has died and they were not saved by Christ Jesus… no amount of prayer is going to change that… no amount of faith is going to pluck them from hell and put them into heaven.
  • It is so sad to see people pray this way… instead, pray for your loved ones NOW while they are still alive… before they die and are judged.
    • And listen if you are not saved, let’s fix that today. We will talk about that in just a few minutes.
• Now our finally, the last limit of the prayer of faith for today is this… praying against God’s will.

Limit Four – Going Against God’s Will

• You can’t pray against God’s will and expect for Him to answer… this really encapsulates all we have talked about thus far…
• “Now Pastor, this is all well and good… but the Bible says that God will give me the desires of my heart…”
  • YOU SKIPPED A PART AGAIN!
    • This is James 4 all over again!
  • You can’t just pick and choose parts of scriptures that you like you have to read the whole thing in context… yes God says He will give you the desires of your heart… but what is the rest of the verse?

Psalms 37:4 ESV  Delight yourself in the LORD, and he will give you the desires of your heart.

• FIRST: Delight yourself in the LORD, and THEN He will give you the desires of your heart…
  • First you delight yourself in God, then your will falls in line with His will… then you really mean it when you say “Your kingdom come your Will be done”.
    • And when that is your heart… when your will is his will… when the desires of your heart are in line with His will… then God grant’s you those desires…
• But the truth is, saints, we don’t always know the will of God…
  • I know some of you have prayed for dying loved ones… you have prayed prayers of faith, in line with the Word of God, unselfishly, and in line with God’s spiritual laws… yet still, after all that your loved one dies… why?

Job 14:5 ESV  Since his days are determined, and the number of his months is with you, and you have appointed his limits that he cannot pass,

• There are many verses like this… Jesus said our days are numbered and God controls when we live and day… Psalm 31:15 says our time is in God’s hand…
• God controls who lives and dies… not us… not even our prayers…
  • People are going to die  and you are not going to know why…
• But not just that, there are people who are sick who we pray for and they may not get better…
  • Not because we lack faith… though that could be A reason… but sometimes we don’t lack faith and they still don’t get better… why?
  • Because God has a different plan for that person.

John 9:1-3 ESV  As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth.  (2)  And his disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”  (3)  Jesus answered, “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him.

• You are going to pray for people and many will be healed… but there may be some that are not… at least not yet…
  • Maybe it is because you lack faith… but maybe it is because God’s ways are higher than our ways and we don’t always know or understand His will…
• So what are we to do in these situations? The same thing we do in all situations… pray in faith non-the-less.
  • No where in scripture do we see God telling us to limit our faith… to temper our prayers…
  • We are told to pray bold prayers, prayers of faith, prayers of power…
    • And so that is what we do, and we leave the rest up to God.
      • Sometimes it doesn’t turn out the way we think it should… that should not effect our faith… if that shakes your faith, your faith probably wasn’t that strong to begin with.
      • Instead we continue praying in faith and trusting God.
• David cried out in faith that his son would not die. But his son died… and what did David do? He went on living a great life of faith.
  • I pray that we as a church can do the same when we don’t understand or know the will of God… that we can trust Him when He answers our prayer, but that answer is “No”.

Conclusion

• Gospel Call – Fast
• Now in conclusion, saints, it is supper important that if you did not listen to last weeks sermon, that you go and listen to it…
  • And if you listened to last weeks sermon then you definitely need to hear this weeks sermon.
  • An understanding of both the power and the limits of the prayer of faith is important to stay in line with Biblical teaching and to walk in faith and power according to the Word.
    • To many people Just hear the messages about the power of the prayer of faith…
      • And they turn into name it and claim it, blab it and grab it, confess it and posses it heretics…
        • They believe they can speak private airplanes and new wives into existence if they just have enough faith…
        • Then they end up stealing millions of dollars from God’s people in the name of faith… before falling into sexual or financial sin…
        • It happens over and over and over again…
          • Such preachers, such people, need to know and teach the limits of the prayer of faith…
    • But on the other hand… there are far to many Christians who err the other way, they know the limits of the prayer of faith but ignore the power of the prayer of faith…
      • They become the frozen chosen… just waiting around for Christ to return…
      • Not believing in the power of the Holy Spirit…
      • Not believing in the power of the prayer of faith…
      • Not believing Jesus when Jesus said WE WOULD DO GREATER WORKS THEN HIM.
    • And so, for the most part, Christianity get’s divided into two groups of whackos…
      • Whacko’s who think that faith is some kind of magic that can get them whatever they want…
      • And whacko’s that are so faithless they barely have the faith to get out of bed and get to church.
    • Don’t be a wacko! Understand the power of the prayer of faith, Use the power of the prayer of faith for God’s Glory and His Kingdom Come… but understand the God ordained limits of the prayer of faith as well!

Aaronic Blessing