This document summarizes key points from a teaching on prayer based on Ephesians 1:15-19. It discusses three main ideas: 1. The supremacy of prayer - Paul's most important prayer was that people would know God better by taking Him into their hearts and minds. Knowing about God is less important than knowing God Himself. 2. The integrity of prayer - Giving priority to outer life over inner life leads to feeling uncomfortable with self-reflection and lacking integrity. Cultivating an inner prayer life is important. 3. The hardness of prayer - Prayer is difficult work that requires searching for God, even when feeling His absence. Persisting through dryness and discomfort can lead to a flour

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Lesson 1. The Greatness of Prayer
John R. Wible, Editor
I. Fellowship Time – recording of prayer requests.
II. Teaching Time – From Keller, Prayer. Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God.1
Ephesians 1:15-19
15 Therefore, I, too, hearing of your faith in the Lord Jesus and of your love[j] for all the
holy ones, 16 do not cease giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers, 17 that
the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and
revelation resulting in knowledge of him. 18 May the eyes of [your] hearts be
enlightened, that you may know what is the hope that belongs to his call, what are the
riches of glory in his inheritance among the holy ones, 19 and what is the surpassing
greatness of his power for us who believe, in accord with the exercise of his great might.
. .”
1. The Supremacy of Prayer. Comparing Paul’s prayers in Philippians, Colossians, and
Ephesians, we see the typical Pauline prayer: “that you might have more of God.” He doesn’t
pray that they have a better time of it, merely that they may have more of God and know Him
better. Isn’t that what we’d pray for? Does that mean it’s wrong to pray for those things such as
protection, safety, health, provision and the like? No, Jesus asks to give us our “daily bread” and
to “deliver us from the Evil One.”
Likewise, Paul directs his readers to pray for peace in the world, good government and the
needs of the world. Paul is not, like Jesus, giving us a universal model for prayer, but merely
expressing what he believes to be the most important things. He prays that we would “know
Him better.”
In Ephesians 1:18, he prays that “the eyes of their hearts might be more enlightened.” The
heart is the center of the self and the eyes are the portals to taking in information. Thus, he
prays that they might take in only God and having taken Him in, He might become more of the
fabric of their “self.”
There is a contrast here between taking God into the heart and into the mind. It’s a good thing
to know “about” God, but it is a far better thing to “know God Himself.” And, that’s Paul’s most
important thing.
1 Here throughout, most material is quoted from or suggested by Keller.For the sakeof brevity, I have not set off
many thoughts in quote marks.That is notto claimoriginal ownership in the thought. There are original insertions,
however and they will probably beobvious.

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In Eph. 3:18, he asks for “power to grasp” all their past, present and future benefits. “Grasp”
means with the heart, not merely the mind. The more we “grasp” what God has and can do, the
more we “grasp” Him and His immensity and the more we understand our relative position
with Him. That He then would stoop to our level is an awe-filling thing.
Paul sees grasping God as more critical than grasping circumstances because circumstances
change, God does not. If we have good times, we get the big head and don’t need God, if we
feel overwhelmed, we think too lowly of God. Either way gives us a skewed impression of God
and thus of life itself. Knowing God better keeps us on an even keel when both the good and
bad come – and they both will.
The Greeks had a concept of “the good.” The philosophers debated what it was. For Paul, the
highest good was public and private communion with God – living with Him, not merely coming
to Him in bad times for good stuff. We can never know the richness that God wants to give us,
the Person of Himself that He wants to give us if we don’t live in communion with Him.
Paul speaks of “taking hold” of God or “striving” with Him in prayer. See Isa. 64:7. This pictures
grabbing someone’s coat-tails when you want his attention. It’s not that the more we strive,
the more God will give us the good stuff, the secret is the more we strive with God, and the
more we learn to live in Him. It’s not unlike a child holding onto you skirt. It’s not so much that
the child wants something from you, though he probably does, it’s that he wants your attention
– for you to notice Him. God wants us to as Paul says, to behave exactly that way – child-like in
our relationship with God. Remember Jesus taught the same thing – the greatest in the
Kingdom of Heaven is the child-like person who is “guileless” before God.
This shows us that Paul places the emphasis on the “inner person.” Obviously, today, the world
teaches us to place emphasis on the outward person. But that person is transient – the inner
man remains. The two things that are eternal we are taught are the “Word of God and the souls
of men.” If we learn through to contemplate the inner person, we are not “whiplashed” by life’s
ups and downs.
2. The Integrity of Prayer. If we give priority to the outer life, we will face a scary world.
Further, we will be increasingly uncomfortable with and have a short attention span for self-
flection. We will become “double-minded” and lack integrity. Outside, we feel the need to
project an image of “everything’s OK” when that is not the truth of our inner self.
2[Like most if not sin, that sin has its own imbedded virus of self-destruction. We will struggle
with the conflict between inner and outer until we either give up or give in to the world- we
compromise, or we go crazy. Eventually, we cope with the conflict until our sense of right and
wrong – real and not real becomes dulled. We then become like robots going through life just
getting by.]
2 Editor’s comment.

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The 17th Century Minister, John Owen says that a preacher may fill the church, have great
collections and have many walk the aisles for Jesus, but it is the man that he is before God on
his knees that is the measure of who he really is. In other words, it’s not what we do that
defines us, but who we are. The more our inner-life is dedicated to God, the more we realize
this and practice it – and the greater person we become. Caveat: this is only achieved by being
with God in prayer.
Test who you are. Think about what you think about when you are not pressed or when no one
is looking. You may want to be seen as a truly spiritual person, but if you don’t habitually spend
time before God examining sin and asking Himto root it out, you are not the person you
thought you were. Ultimately, this lack of proper “being” will play out into lack of proper
“doing.” Are you joyful and humble before God or is the relation a bit “strained?”
In Matt. 6:5-6, when Jesus was preparing to give his disciples the Lord’s Prayer, He gave them
some preliminary things. “Don’t be like the hypocrites, praying great prayers in public, but go
into private. The true test of spirituality is in the prayer life. When you pray only because you
are called onto by people or circumstances, or when you are anxious about what’s happening,
or when you don’t really want to pray habitually, your spirit-person is weak and you are a “reed
shaking in the wind.”
3[We need to cultivate the desire to want to pray – to approach God as we would a good friend
– as we would post on Facebook®, both the good and the bad. The point is, that we should be
drawn to prayer not forced into it.]
Keller tells us that this is not to advocate the solitary person of prayer. Christians thrive best in
community – “iron sharpens iron.” Truly knowing God for yourself cannot be achieved by
yourself – it requires living in community. Silent devotion, public worship and listening to the
prayers of others. At the heart of knowing God is public and private prayer. If you listen
carefully to other people’s prayers, you will not only learn to know them and what they value,
but you will be uplifted by the good ones.
3. The hardness of prayer. Prayer is not easy. If it were, everyone would do it. In prayer,
we must search for God. It’s not that He doesn’t want to be found, but that He wants us to
search. [This pictures a young woman hoping her young man will court her. She is a bit hard to
get because it’s important that he demonstrate that he is willing to do the hard work to get her.
That struggle makes the relationship more stable in the long run.]
Job prays in 23:3, “O that I knew where I might find him.” Austin Phelps, the 19th Century writer
says that the knowledge of the absence of God is an indicator of the spiritual life. It’s not that
God is not in your thoughts that reveals you a non-spiritual person, it’s when you don’t miss
Him. Phelps points out that at first there is “dryness” in prayer, a sense that God’s not there.
The first thing we have to feel is to recognize this dryness. The natural man is used to the
3 Id.

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absence of God. He doesn’t feel dry when God is not there. He doesn’t miss. Him. When we
become aware that God is missing from our inner life, we are on our way to spirituality. But as
we pray and read the Bible, we see all the promises and wonderful things God has done and we
recognize that such has not happened to us. Then we learn to feel the dryness. This, if
persisted, leads us to want to get the dryness lubricated. Phelps says this can be a disorienting
thing. [I suggest this is true because when we reach that realization, we begin to get
uncomfortable as we step out of the comfort zone of the spiritual desert with which we have
always learned to cope.]
However, if you persist, eventually, you will become accustomed to the new reality. Your prayer
life will start to flourish. The pettiness will become apparent and will fall away and God will
replace selfishness with Himself. That’s when you become a spiritual person.
4[The lesson here is that it all achieved by God through your inner self. There is nothing outer in
it, though who you are inside will be apparent on the outside. And, when you think about it,
that’s the way it’s supposed to be – the inner person drives the outer person not vice versa.]
However, J.I. Packer tells us that it is not without work. Prayer begins as a duty. If you want it to
be, it can stay there. But, if you push on through duty to delight, 5it takes flight. All this happens
to your inner self because you have begun to know the presence of God – that’s a thrilling
thing!
These seasons of dryness can and will return. But we must persist on through them. Everyone
we overcome through God’s power makes us the more powerful in prayer and draws us closer
to God – which is why we are powerful in prayer anyway.
The pursuit of God in prayer will eventually bear fruit because John 4:23 tells us that God seeks
for us to worship him. That’s what prayer is – worship. It’s giving to God the honor He deserves
by giving Him our time in prayer. He rewards his true worshippers.
4. The Centrality of Prayer. The Bible is about God and that’s why prayer is so pervasive
throughout it. Every OT patriarch prayed with familiarity and directness.
 Abraham for Sodom in Gen. 18:23, et seq.
 Moses for liberation in Exodus. Exodus 5:22.
 Moses for the greatness of Israel in Deut. 4:7.
 1 Sam. 12:23 says that Samuel puts it far from him to fail to pray for the people even
though he was very disappointed in them. To fail to pray is a sin.
 David fills the Psalms with prayer which itself is inspired in prayer. Ps. 65:2.
 Solomon dedicates the temple with prayer. 1 Ki. 8:42.
4 Id.
5 I’d add desire.

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 Job is basically about Job praying to God trying to understand his suffering. God who is
angry with the three comforters” says they will only be forgiven if Job prays for them.
Job 42:8.
 The OT prophets basically received their prophesies through prayer.
 The Jews are preserved in exile through prayer beginning with Daniel’s prayer for the
well-being of the City of Babylon.
 Jerusalem is rebuilt through prayer
In the NT, Jesus taught his disciples how to pray, healed with prayer, cast out demons with
prayer and declared the temple to be “a house of prayer.” He prayed often and fervently. The
Holy Spirit comes to Him in prayer in Lk. 3:21-22, He is transfigured in prayer. Lk. 9:29. He prays
fervently for the disciples in John 17:1-26 and He prays for Himself in the Garden of
Gethsemane. Matt. 26:36-46; Mk. 14:32. He even dies in prayer. Mk. 15:37
After Jesus’ death, the disciples were “constantly in prayer. ACTS 1:14. All church gatherings
were basically prayer meetings. Acts 2:42, 11:5, 12:5, 12. [Not until the 2nd Century with John
Chrysostom does Greek style preaching and oratory reach prominence.] The Holy Spirit
inaugurates the Church in prayer in Acts 2. The Spirit gives power in prayer.
All the early church leaders were chosen only with prayer. The main sign of the coming of the
Spirit is in prayer.
The Spirit gives us confidence and desire to pray even when we don’t want to. We are taught
that prayer should pervade our whole life and we should “pray without ceasing.” 1 Thess. 5:17.
5. The Richness of prayer. George Herbert’s poem on prayer (1593-1633.)
Prayer the church's banquet, angel's age,
God's breath in man returning to his birth,
The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav'n and earth.
Engine against th' Almighty, sinner's tow'r,
Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
The six-days world transposing in an hour,
A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;
Softness, and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,
Exalted manna, gladness of the best,
Heaven in ordinary, man well drest,
The milky way, the bird of Paradise,
Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the soul's blood,
The land of spices;
. . . something understood.

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Herbert describes prayers as “breath returning to birth. The Hebrew for “Breath” and “Spirit”
are the same word, ruach. There is something that God has placed in us telling us we are not
alone. To communicate with this “something” is natural.
Prayer can be both soft and peaceful yet very powerful. The power to trust Jesus is in prayer
just as the calming of the soul is in prayer. He describes prayer as a “feast.” These were signs of
not merely eating but fellowship and acceptance. Thus, prayer nourishes friendship and
fellowship.
Prayer can be like tune, a beautiful melody that makes us forget ourselves and our troubles.
Likewise, if we are people of prayer, others will notice. It’s as evident as if we went around
singing or whistling a song – though not as annoying. Prayer can fill our senses with spices and
tastes, marvels and wonders.
Like “Angels’ ages,” prayer is timeless because it allows us to escape the earthly confines of
time and space and reach the infinite.[ Unlike J.M. Barrie’s 1902 Peter Pan, in prayer, we are
not pursued by time as Captain Hook is pursued by the crocodile, “Tock” who represents time
chasing us, eventually to catch us.]6
Herbert notices that prayer is a pilgrimage. In olden days, pilgrimages were long and arduous
and were demonstrative of great faith. Evidence Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.
In spiritually lean times, it is manna, a provision of Heaven, filling but not too flavorful.
Prayer is arduous because it I s the “soul in paraphrase.” God doesn’t require our words, He
requires our selves. When we learn to truly pray, it is not our words that pray, not our minds,
but the inner being of us that prays.
Herbert says that prayer is not all “peace and light.” Sometimes it is an engine of destruction of
evil. That’s a mighty thing. Though it is our forgiveness and God’s mercy. It is our refuge, it is
also a piece of artillery aimed at the very heart of Hell.
Prayer has the power to “transpose” our attitude and understanding of the world and its events
just as composer transposes music from a key to another. It can be a measuring line to tell us
the depth of circumstances of Earth and the depths of God’s love.
Finally, Herbert says it is “something understood.” In prayer, we can “understand” things – that
is, we can see them through God’s perspective. All this makes us realize how great God is and
small we are. In turn, this shows us how much God has sacrificed and given to save “a wretch
like me.”
6 Editor’s comments.

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III. From With Christ in the School of Prayer by Andrew Murray7
I say to you,whoeverbelievesinme will dothe worksthatI do,and will dogreateronesthan
these,because Iamgoingto the Father. 13
Andwhateveryouaskinmy name,I will do,sothat
the Fathermay be glorifiedinthe Son. 14
If youaskanythingof me in myname,I will doit.John
14:12-14.
1. Jesus opened His ministry in the Sermon on the Mount with the same subject as this,
but this address was to neophytes. In this final address, He tells the disciples that they are to
take His place in the Work. He gives to them the care of the world. Now, they must accept that
role. But, they do not go it alone, they do it in His strength. Prayer is the channel, through which
that strength flows. In fact, they are to do greater works that He has done.
 They will receive power from the Holy Spirit
 They can now ask for that power “in His Name.”
 “Whatsoever ye ask, I will do.
Jesus first mention of prayer in this address teaches two lessons.
 Whoever wants to do the works must pray in His Name.
 Whoever prays in His Name must do the works in His Name.
Jesus did all His powerful works in prayer. The disciples, now His Body must work directly as
Jesus works indirectly. Since Jesus has risen from the grave, He has conquered Death and in so
doing, He has unleashed Heaven’s power on Earth, IE. The Kingdom of Heaven has come to
man. As we believe and ask in His Name, that power takes possession of us. And empowers us
to do great works – but works in His name
2. Prayer in the Name of Jesus is the only way to share in the mighty power. It is through
Jesus’ mighty [power alone that works are done. This power is accessible to every believer.
They complaint that, “I can’t do it,” is both right and wrong. Alone, I can’t do it. It is not in any
believer to do mighty spiritual works. But, in the power of Christ, any believer can do mighty
works, - not just the ones who are gifted or talented – all.
3. The second lesson is this: Whoever prays must work. Don’t ask for the power if you’re
not going to use it. God’s grace will not be wasted. Jesus is emphatic that anything is possible to
any believer! In John 14, 15 and 16, Jesus repeats the “whosoevers” no less than six times.
“Whosoever” means exactly what it says.
The grant of power through is given solely for the doing of Christ’s works. This is why when you
pray for selfish things you are disappointed. If it is God’s will and you ask for it, you will receive
it, but, it must be in His name and in God’s will. How do you know whether it is or not?
Sometimes you don’t, but pray any way and leave the results to God.
7 This is a summary of Murray’s work. No claimis madeby the Editor to original work.

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4. Prayer strengthens and teaches one for work, work teaches and strengthens one for
prayer. [8It’s a cycle that moves up like a tornado. Who has not seen the vast and immeasurable
power of a tornado? Do you want to have the power of tornado spiritually? Then, pray in Jesus
Name and regularly and vigorously. Don’t worry if it’s not His will. He will show you that and
eventually, you’ll learn to sense it. The point is – just start.]
5. When Moses was called on to lead the Israelites, He prayed for God’s power in God’s
Name and in His will – and he received it. We’ve all seen the mighty works Moses did through
this power. If you give yourself entirely to God for His work and for no other, you will feel that
these great promises are exactly what you need to do the work to which He has called you. You
may count on it, you may expect it, and you may rely on it and count it as done ab initio.
IV. Murray’s Prayer for the Day (Listen)
V. Prayer Time.
VI. Next Weeks’s Assignment
Read Murray Chapters 1 and 7 (pages 9 and 31.)
8 Editor’s comment.