Sermon Central
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Breath Prayer
Contributed by Stephen Belokur on Sep 9, 2021 (message contributor)
Summary: Breath prayer is a form of prayer that is invading the progressive church. Is it Biblical? Is it what God desires? Where did it come from? Should we make it a part of our devotional practices? May the Lord give us discernment.
Breath Prayer
Please stand with me as we go over our current memory Scripture:
“Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me.
“Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for they persecuted the prophets who were before you in the same way.”
And our memory Scripture “refresher” verse(s) is(are):
1 Corinthians 10:13 (ISV)
“The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. But when you are tempted, He will show you a way out so that you can endure.”
Today we will be reading from Matthew 6:5-13
Before we get into anything I wanted to explain something.
Last week we had a visitor who came to church with Phyllis and the first thing she asked her when she got into the car was, “Who is Yahweh?”
And as hopefully you all understand by now, Yahweh or Jehovah is the proper name of the God of Israel. It was replaced in the Jewish Scriptures with the word LORD all in capital letters. This was done a few hundred years before the birth of Jesus and the and the reason was because they believed the name of Yahweh to be too holy to be spoken out loud.
But I have often wondered what to do with
Genesis 3:15 where it says,
“God also said to Moses, ‘Say to the Israelites, “Yahweh, the God of your fathers - the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob - has sent me (Moses) to you.” This is My name forever, THE NAME YOU SHALL CALL ME FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION.’”
And what do we do with Malachi 1:11 where it literally says,
“‘MY NAME WILL BE GREAT AMONG THE NATIONS, from where the sun rises to where it sets. In every place incense and pure offerings will be brought to Me, BECAUSE MY NAME WILL BE GREAT AMONG THE NATIONS,’ says Yahweh Almighty.”
So, when Yahweh says, “This is My name forever, THE NAME YOU SHALL CALL ME FROM GENERATION TO GENERATION.” And when Yahweh says, “My name will be great among the nations” … then it only seems proper and with great reverence that we should do as Yahweh requests!
Praise the name of Yahweh forever! And that is why I read the name that has been hidden in the Bible when I read it at home and in church.
I will try to explain this whenever we have guests in order to not confuse people.
OK. What are we going to talk about today? Let’s read a few Scriptures and see.
“Isaac prayed to the LORD on behalf of his wife, because she was childless.”
“David built an altar to the LORD there and sacrificed burnt offerings and fellowship offerings. Then the LORD answered his prayer in behalf of the land, and the plague on Israel was stopped.”
“So we fasted and petitioned our God about this, and He answered our prayer.”
“I call on You, my God, for You will answer me; turn Your ear to me and hear my prayer.”
“For this reason, ever since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all God’s people, I have not stopped giving thanks for you, remembering you in my prayers.”
So, what are we going to talk about today?
Prayer and the perversion of prayer in the progressive church.
Please join me in your Bibles as we read: Matthew 6:5-13
(Prayer for help)
In Sunday School we have been going over some of the beliefs that are coming out of what is called “progressive Christianity”.
Please look at this picture and it will give you an idea of the dismantling of Biblical Christianity as it happened in the early 1900’s and it is very similar to what is taking place in the progressive church today.
(picture can be found at: https://www.quenotelacuenten.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Descent_of_the_Modernists_E._J._Pace_Christian_Cartoons_1922-1024x1004.jpg )
These are the steps of descent (deconstructing Christianity)
- Biblical Christianity
- Bible NOT infallible
- Man NOT made in God’s image
- No miracles
- No virgin birth
- Jesus not Divine (Not God)
- No Atonement
- No resurrection
- Agnosticism
o The belief that the existence or nonexistence of a god or gods cannot be known with certainty
o The doctrine that the ultimate cause and the essential nature of things are unknowable, or at least, unknown
- Atheism
o An absence of belief in the existence of a god or gods
