{"id":21811,"date":"2023-01-05T15:41:07","date_gmt":"2023-01-05T15:41:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=21811"},"modified":"2023-01-05T15:42:46","modified_gmt":"2023-01-05T15:42:46","slug":"new-testament-worship-worshiping-god-in-prayer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=21811","title":{"rendered":"New Testament Worship\u2014Worshiping God in Prayer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Views: 1<\/p><p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 14pt;\">[<strong>Note: <\/strong>This MS is available in larger font on our <strong>Brief Articles-1<\/strong> page.]<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/strong><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">Anyone who knows anything about the New Testament understands that the church of the New Testament was often found in prayer. While the importance of personal, individual prayer is emphasized as a regular part of the Christian\u2019s life (1 The. 5:17), the church is also depicted as praying when it assembles to worship God (Acts 2:42; 1 Cor. 14:15\u201317 etc.). God has communicated His Will to us through the Bible, His inspired Word. He has graciously provided a way for His children to verbally communicate with Him\u2014through prayer.\u00a0 Several principles must be respected if our prayers are to be acceptable:<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">We must pray in Jesus\u2019 name, that is, by His authority or on His merit (John 14:13). On our own, we are unworthy to address God, but through Christ we can boldly approach Him (Heb. 4:15\u201316). The practice of praying to Mary or in the name of Mary or to some so-called \u201csaint\u201d is a direct contradiction of God\u2019s Word. There is one and only one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ (1Tim. 2:5).<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">We must pray according to God\u2019s will, asking and thanking God for those things that are in agreement with His revealed Will in the Bible (1 John 5:14). We must seek God\u2019s pleasure, not our own, as we pray (Jam 4:3).<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">We must pray in faith, believing that God will hear and answer us (Mat. 21:22; Jam.1:6\u20137). If we don\u2019t believe God hears and will answer, we are hypocrites to even pray. Prayer is preeminently an exercise of faith. Atheists don\u2019t pray.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">We must do our best to live righteously if we want God to hear our prayers. God does not hearsinners (John 9:31), and when we turn our ear from God\u2019s law, our prayer is an abomination (Pro. 28:9). We must \u201clift up holy hands as we pray\u201d (1 Tim. 2:8).<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">We must pray to be heard of God, not to impress men with our piety (Mat. 6:5).<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-family: 'book antiqua', palatino, serif; font-size: 12pt;\">Prayer is a glorious blessing God has given to His children by which we may express praise and thanksgivings and bring our supplications to God (Phi. 4:6; 1 Tim. 2:1). What a glorious privilege it is to worship God, especially as His children assemble! Why anyone who claims to be a Christian would intentionally be absent is incomprehensible. Likewise, why any professing Christian would even consider tampering with God\u2019s revealed will concerning how He wants us to worship is beyond our understanding. We plead with all men to cast aside all human opinions, traditions, and preferences and be governed only by the New Testament in worship as well as in all other matters.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\">[<strong>Note:<\/strong>\u00a0I wrote this article for, and it was published in the \u201cBible Thoughts\u201d Column for the <em>Hood County News<\/em>, Granbury, Texas, September 11, 1977.]<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 10pt;\"><strong>Attribution:<\/strong> From <em>thescripturecache.com<\/em>; Dub McClish, owner and administrator.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Views: 1[Note: This MS is available in larger font on our Brief Articles-1 page.] \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Anyone who knows anything about the New Testament understands that the church of the New Testament was often found in prayer. While the importance of personal, individual prayer is emphasized&#8230;<\/p>\n<div class=\"easywp-readmore\"><a class=\"read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/?p=21811\">Continue Reading&#8230;<span class=\"easywp-sr-only\">  New Testament Worship\u2014Worshiping God in Prayer<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21811","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","wpcat-1-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21811"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21811\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21812,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21811\/revisions\/21812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thescripturecache.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}