Jesus Tells It Like It Is

Before you start todays devotional, ask the Lord to use it to grow you up in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

“Lord, teach us to pray” (11:1)—that’s the only thing we know the disciples asked Jesus to teach them. They didn’t ask for a technique or ritual to follow, they wanted to pray like Him.

So the Lord gives them a model for spontaneous, personal prayer, like a son talking to his father. God the Father knows you; He wants you to talk like yourself when you talk to Him.

“The Lord’s Prayer” begins with worship and must be offered with a whole heart. Don’t pray this prayer without wanting God’s will in your life.

Only those who know Jesus as Savior can pray this as the Lord intended. The only prayer God hears from the unsaved is, “God be merciful to me a sinner.” He will save you if you will come to Him.

To further teach us about prayer, Jesus tells a parable only Luke records. Prayer is like knocking on your friend’s door at midnight, asking for help. When your neighbor says, “I’ll get back to you in the morning,” you keep knocking.

Jesus contrasts that scene with the confidence you can have that God will help you right when you ask. You don’t have to knock down heaven’s door to get His attention. He’s not reluctant to answer you. But sometimes we must accept His “no” answer when what we ask is not His best for us.

As Jesus continues to teach, He also kept healing and kicking demons out of people. The religious leaders couldn’t deny Jesus worked miracles, but they explained it as the devil’s work. Jesus showed them the absurdity of their reasoning: A house divided against itself falls. “Would Satan be against himself?”

Once again, in order to find something to entrap Him, a Pharisee invited Jesus to dinner. Jesus surprised them all by calling them frauds. “You look shiny clean on the outside,” He told them, “but inside you’re filled with maggots. You make the Law more difficult to follow but don’t even try to follow it yourself. You can’t hide behind your religious masks forever!” True religion is not about externalities, but a matter of the heart.

Rather than object to what Jesus was saying, the Pharisees egged Him on, hoping He’d say something they could use against Him.

To those whose hearts were God’s, Jesus assured them the Holy Spirit will be coming to help them. “Don’t resist His convicting work in your heart. He’ll teach you how to respond to everything that challenges your faith.” And to His disciples He promised the Holy Spirit would give them courage and wisdom to faithfully witness for Him.

Search your heart and ask yourself, Am I living only for this life?

“Don’t forget you are an eternal soul,” Jesus said. We will each stand before God, stripped of the things that filled up our lives on earth. The only treasure we’ll have is what we send ahead. If you lived without God, you will die without God.

He then told parables that illustrate our expectation of Jesus’ return—not only in the waiting, but also the working. We should live like Jesus is coming any minute but work as though we had another thousand years. Work hard so you have more to lay at His feet in worship.

When He returns, we will stand before Him as our judge and He’ll review what we’ve done for Him. Our works will not determine if we are saved, but rather the rewards we receive. There will be degrees of rewards for those who believe in God just as there will be degrees of punishment for those who refuse to believe.

Only one question separates people then and now—do you believe in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ?

1. Prayer can be difficult for many of us. What lesson can we learn from the disciples, who struggled with prayer even when in the physical presence of Jesus?

2. Jesus taught the disciples to pray by teaching them what is commonly called today, “The Lord’s Prayer.” When you read this prayer, what is one thing you can improve when you pray?

3. What does it tell us about God that the picture He gives us of our relationship with Him is one of a loving Father and His children?

Additional Resources

Listen to Dr. J. Vernon McGee’s complete teachings on Luke 11 and Luke 12.