David Diga Hernandez - How to Pray with Perfect Faith

I want to help you understand how to approach God when you go to pray. Far too many believers approach God with timidity, with reservations, and with doubt. They wonder if God is listening to them; they question if their last mistake disqualified them from having an audience with God. So, I want to read a portion of Scripture to you here in Luke chapter 10, verses 38-42: As Jesus and the disciples continued on their way to Jerusalem, they came to a certain village where a woman named Martha welcomed Him into her home. Her sister Mary sat at the Lord’s feet, listening to what He taught. But Martha was distracted by the big dinner she was preparing. She came to Jesus and said, «Lord, doesn’t it seem unfair to you that my sister just sits here while I do all the work? Tell her to come and help me.» But the Lord said to her, «Dear Martha, you are worried and upset over all these details. There is only one thing worth being concerned about. Mary has discovered it, and it will not be taken away from her.» Now, both Martha and Mary saw the same thing; both Martha and Mary understood who Jesus was; both Martha and Mary desired to have the same thing. They went about it in different ways. They both desired to please the Lord; they both desired an audience with God Himself. However, they tried to obtain that audience; they tried to obtain that connection through different means. Martha chose the strain of work. She chose to perform; she chose to cook and to clean. Now, there is nothing wrong with working for the Lord, and there is nothing wrong with what Martha did in and of itself. Her working for the Lord, her desire to prepare a meal for Him, came from a good place, only it was a misplaced desire. She thought that by preparing that meal, she could gain an audience with Him through hard work. Mary, however, chose the confidence of friendship with Jesus. Martha tried to work for it; Mary understood it was right in front of her. Prayer is not an attempt to get God’s attention; you already have it. I imagine the conversation goes like this when we approach God: «God, please hear me.» The Father answers, «I hear you.» We say, «God, please, I beg of You, please listen to me.» He responds, «I’m listening.» Then we ask, «God, do you see me? God, do you hear me? God, I need You.» God says, «Yes, I see you. Yes, I hear you, and yes, I’m here for you.» We continue to berate Him with all of these requests, with the begging, with the pleading, with the tension, with the desperation; all the while, He is standing there, ready to listen to our prayers. Our pleadings are sometimes too loud. Our desire to pray can sometimes itself become a distraction to prayer. Our desire to have an encounter with God can sometimes become a distraction to having an encounter with God. We work, we strain, we toil; we exhaust ourselves with emotion trying to establish a connection that’s already there. 1 John chapter 5, verse 15 says, «And since we know He hears us…» I love this! I’m going to read it again: «And since we know He hears us when we make our requests,» that is a knowing. We also know that He will give us what we ask for. Since we know He hears us, that’s the posture of prayer—that’s the posture of confident faith. We should have confidence when we pray. Sadly, some believers don’t. Our approach to the Lord’s presence should be one of confidence. So much time is wasted in prayer by wondering and begging, pleading with God for His attentive ear. Now, this partially comes about as a result of a church culture of desperation. You’ve heard it said at the worship events, the powerful conferences, and the revival services: «Come on, lift up a shout of desperation!» Or they’ll say, «Come on, let’s get desperate in this place!» Oh, if you really want a move of God, you’ll do this. If you’re really serious about encountering God, you’ll dance around, you’ll jump up and down, you’ll shout really loud and motion like we all motion. Sadly, for the most part, these types of attempts at crowd control come from a good place, yes, but more often than not, they’re just attempts at hyping a crowd and creating a moment. I find that the people who try to get others to react in such ways are often upset when the crowd doesn’t respond because they take it personally. This is a sad approach because desperation, while it has its place, is not the way to approach God. Now, I know I’m going to come against some common mindsets here, so I want to really take my time with this point. At best, such pleadings are a genuine attempt to get God’s attention; at worst, they’re someone’s attempt at creating hype or momentum. They want to be able to say, «Look at how well the crowd responded when I preached,» or «When we did worship,» or «When we did our thing.» That right there really is the flesh. They program a culture of desperation because they like the way it looks when the crowd responds to how they preach, or how they worship, or how they teach. Now, I’m not saying this is everyone who does such things, but many times, that’s the case. In other instances, it’s just ignorance—it’s trying to produce in the flesh what could only be produced in the Spirit. Now, desperation has its place. It can be used by God to get you going in the right direction. In fact, if you’ve heard my testimony, you know…