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How Can I Glorify God as I Pray for Myself? · Pastor John Piper's answers

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  This week in the Navigator's Bibble Reading plan, we read together Psalm seventy nine,
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  So this question from Kimberly in Houston, Texas is timely for us.
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  She writes in and ask this, Hello, Pastor John, thank you for
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  this podcast and Psalm seventy nine to nine. The Psalmist praise like this quote
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  help us owe God of our salvation for the glory of your name, Deliver
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  us and atone for our sins for your Name's sake end quote. I want
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  to pray like this, but how how do I pray for things that would
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  benefit me and the people I know in love and would also glorify God at
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  the same time In answer to those prayers? It seems very Christian hedonistic.
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  We get the help, He gets the glory. Except I just don't know
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  how to frame my praying like this. I thought it would be easy until
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  I tried to do it. It's actually very hard and limiting because I'm finding
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  that most of my prayers have no conscious relife to God's glory. Can you
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  teach me to pray the Psalm seventy nine way? Well, Kimberly has one
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  problem already solved which many people stumble over, and the problem is expressed in
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  the question, Yeah, how do I pray for things that would benefit me
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  and glorify God at the same time? And many people stumble over that tension
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  as though it were attention, like for me for God? Which is it?
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  But Kimberly knows there doesn't have to be attention, because she says,
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  we get the help, he gets the glory. So she's got that one
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  wonderfully biblically figured out, which is exactly what Psalm fifty, verse fifteen says,
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  call on me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you,
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  and you will glorify me. We get the deliverance, he gets the glory.
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  That's what it says. If we keep in mind the giver gets the
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  glory, then there doesn't have to be a tension between our asking for what
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  we need and are asking that God be glorified. But Kimberly says that she
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  does not have an answer to the question or the problem. Namely, I
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  just don't know how to frame my praying like this. I thought this would
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  be easy until I tried it. It's actually hard and limiting because I'm finding
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  that most of my prayers have no conscious relation to the glory of God.
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  So let me see if I can make a few biblical observations. I think
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  I have five that might reorient Kimberly's and all of our thinking so that it
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  feels natural that every request we make in prayer relates to the glory of God.
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  So here's number one. Never forget that God does everything for his own
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  namesake, that is, for his glory. He does everything for his glory.
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  He delivers us for his namesake Psalm seventy nine to nine. He blots
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  out our transgressions for his own sake Isaiah forty three twenty five. He leads
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  us in passive righteousness for his namesake Psalm twenty three three. He does not
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  forsake his people for his great namesake for Samuel twelve twenty two. He saves
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  us for his namesake Palm one oh six eight. It helps to see our
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  prayers as fitting in to this overarching global historical purpose of God. In everything
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  that he does, he does all that he does for his name's sake,
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  that is, to display and communicate his beauty, his worth, his greatness,
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  his glory. So if we have just an overarching, pervasive mindset that
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  God does all he does for his glory, then our prayers assume a new
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  fitness. As we think that way, as we dream that way, in
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  as we ask that way. Number two, this unwavering commitment of God to
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  uphold the glory of his name is at the heart of what is his righteousness.
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  We see that in Psalm one eleven. For your namesake, Oh Lord,
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  preserve my life. So we pray like that, for your namesake,
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  preserve my life in your righteousness, bring me out of trouble. So God's
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  acting for his namesake and his acting in righteousness are parallel. They explain each
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  other each other, And when you think about it, this makes really good
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  sense. What is the ultimately right thing for God to do? When God
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  has no book to consult outside himself about what's right and wrong, He only
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  has himself to consult. There's just God, there's nothing else. Before he
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  creates anything, He is a measure of all that is right. The right
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  thing to do, I would argue, is for God to always act in
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  a chord with the infinite worth of his own name, his own being.
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  I think that's the essence of his righteousness. It's right for him to always
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  act in a chord with the infinite worth of his name. And I think
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  that helps us in our praying because we always want God to do the right
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  thing in answer to our prayer. Do the right thing, which will mean
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  act for thus take of your name. That's the ultimately right thing for God
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  to do. Number Three, keep in mind what it means to pray in
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  Jesus's name. I used to say to my kids when they were growing up,
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  and they'd end a prayer with a throwaway sound in Jesu's name, Let's
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  just pause here, that's not a throwaway phrase. It may be that one
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  of the reasons we stumble over seeking God's glory in our prayers is that we
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  forget what we're saying when we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. In John
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  fourteen thirteen, Jesus taught us to pray in his name. To pray in
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  Jesus' name means that it is his death in our place that makes it possible
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  for God's wrath to be removed and God's grace to pour down all over for
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  us in answer to our prayers. So Jesus's name refers to the basis or
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  the foundation of every single gracious answer to prayer. In Jesus' name means because
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  Jesus died for me and purchased the grace of every answered prayer. No cross,
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  no answered prayer. But in Jesus' name also means the giver gets the
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  glory. If he paid for every answered prayer, he gets the glory for
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  every answered prayer. So let the meaning of in Jesus' name have its full
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  effect as you speak it and every prayer with the thought you, Jesus are
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  my only hope for any gracious answer to this prayer, and when it comes,
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  I will be glad for you to get the glory. Number four.
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  Keep in mind that there is a reason that the first petition of the Lord's
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  Prayer is hallowed. Be your name. Hallowed means sanctified, that is,
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  set apart as sacred, holy, precious, valuable, infinitely worthy of all
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  our admiration and desire and praise. It would not be far off to translate
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  it glorified. Be your name, admired, be your name praised, be
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  your name treasured, be your name, which means that every time you pray
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  the Lord's prayer, you are asking first and foremost that the Lord would cause
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  his name to be glorified. You don't have to add that later, as
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  you need to stick on an artificial Be sure you get glory from a prayer.
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  Lord, you begin with it, Jesus begins with it. Lord,
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  my heart's desire number one desire is that your name be glorified in every answer
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  to my prayer. So let the first petition of the Lord's prayer remind you
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  that the first concern of every prayer is that God be glorified. And then,
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  finally, number five, whether you say it out loud or not,
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  let every request that you make in prayer be like Paul's desire in Philippians one
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  twenty, where he said it is my eager hope. And thus you could
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  say it is my prayer that Christ be magnified or glorified in my body,
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  whether by life or by death. In other words, even if you don't
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  say it out loud, let your whole mindset in prayer be this, Lord,
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  I pray that you would deliver me from my enemies and let me live
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  another day that I might serve you. But whether I live or die,
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  the main passion of my heart with the Apostle Paul, is that you would
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  be magnified. In my life, whether I live or whether I die.
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  So my prayer is that these five observations from Scripture will help us all to
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  build into the mindset of our prayer a constant desire, a primary hope that
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  God be glorified however He answers our prayer. That's a wonderful, orienting perspective
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  over all of our praying. Thank you, Pastor John. And this episode
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  takes me back to twenty sixteen when we release an episode that a lot of
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  people found helpful over the years, titled seven Simple Tips to Refresh your prayer
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  life. It's ABJ episode eight twenty. You can find it at Aspastor John
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  dot com. Type in the episode number there eight twenty for more on prayer
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  from Pastor John's great episode in the archive. The archive is a treasure trove
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  of edifying content and practical helps, which is one reason why I wrote that
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  new APJ book just to illustrate what I mean when I say that the archive
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  is loaded, make use of it. Thanks for joining us today. I'm
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  your host, Tony Ranky. We will see you on Monday.