1. Let’s Review… Prayer is… A working partnership with God
Established by God as a law of the universe
Essential for faithfulness

2. This week… Prayer is… Essential to our purpose
Essential to our mission

3. Matthew 9:35-38 Jesus was going through all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness.

4. Seeing the people, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd.

5. Then He said to His disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.”
New American Standard Bible : 1995 Update. LaHabra, CA : The Lockman Foundation, 1995

6. What’s the prayer? Prayer for workers Laborers Field hands Grunt labor
Blue-collar types
Ordinary people with a mind and heart to work

7. What’s the prayer? Not prayer for… Just workers who will work Leaders
The gifted
The called
The elite
Just workers who will work

8. What’s the prayer? Workers for the harvest Two-fold harvest
Matthew 13:24-30
Isaiah 17:10-11
Joel 3:11-14
Revelation 14:14-20

9. Why the prayer? Jesus saw people Jesus saw their condition Distressed
Dispirited
Sheep with no shepherd

10. “Sheep without a shepherd points to people who are in great danger and without the resources to escape from it.” (Morris, pg. 239)

11. Why the prayer? Jesus saw their condition (vss. 18-32)
9:18 – spiritually dead
9:20 – unclean
9:27 – spiritually blind
9:32 – enslaved
Physical was a picture

12. Why the prayer? Jesus came to… Bring the dead to life
Restore the unclean
Give sight to the blind
Free the slaves
His came to rescue sinners

13. Why the prayer? Jesus had compassion Compassion… A gut level emotion
To be powerfully moved internally
To be moved emotionally by a need

14. Let’s Pray… For our own hearts To see people To see their condition
To have compassion

15. Let’s Pray… For workers in children’s ministry
To give vision for shepherding children
People to invest in children
To serve in the Good News Club

16. Let’s Pray… For workers in youth ministry Worker’s in women’s ministry
At Lighthouse
At the Compass
Worker’s in women’s ministry
Vision for community

17. The truth is… Prayer is partially answered… Believers need to follow
Great Commission
Holy Spirit indwells
Holy Spirit has gifted
Believers need to follow