Rev 4:9-11, And when the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to Him who sits on the throne, to Him who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders will fall down before Him who sits on the throne, and will worship Him who lives forever and ever, and will cast their crowns before the throne, saying, "Worthy art Thou, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for Thou didst create all things, and because of Thy will they existed, and were created." 
We have been looking at the means of God, through the prayer of His church, to fulfill all that His heart desires on this earth. In reading this verse, we must understand that it is prayer which takes us here, to the locale of this morning’s passage, before the throne of God. One of the key aspects of our prayer life, individually and corporately, is understanding the fact that we are called into relationship with God in Jesus Christ. It is on the basis of that relationship that we are enabled to commune, to talk with God and to listen to Him.
We will deal more specifically with this reality following the holidays. We need to have a basic understanding, in terms that we can hold, in a manner which makes some sense of the infinitely incomprehensible Glory of what God has accomplished in Jesus Christ. We have talked at length about our oneness with Christ, and our union with Him, being part of the plan and purpose of God’s glory on this earth. 
Before we continue, it is important that we heed a warning with regard to our understanding of our union with Christ. In the last days there will be many who claim that they are Christ. We must be certain that we are not taken in by such deception. If we are truly in union with Christ, we will be far from the idea that we can become Christ. That is the manner in which this deception enthralls the minds and hearts of those so deluded. They think that they will become deity unto themselves. They hold fast the false concept that they are able to do everything through the enlightenment that they receive, as if they were God. 
The reality of our union with Christ is that as we truly see Jesus, we also truly see ourselves. As we behold His glory and His life, we see, as did Isaiah, that we are undone. We gain the true view of His eminence and power and honor which shows forth our absolute inability and unworthiness. We live by His life, counting ourselves dead in deed. We see Him high and lifted up and the amazing love and grace of God that suffered all for the sake of the salvation of such as we. As He becomes more and more preeminent in our hearts and minds, we become aware of our utter shame and helplessness. In the light of Christ, to ever think that we would become any type of deity is absolute audacity and revulsion and an offense against the heart of the One Who saved us unto Himself. 
In continuation, this morning, at the very core of this certainty of our union with Christ, is the relationship that we have with God through His Son. The closest example that we have on this earth is that of the marriage bond. This is a very vital aspect of why God takes marriage so seriously. It is the earthly type of that relationship which we have with Him in Christ. He guards it and He commits Himself to it.  
Mal 2:13-17a, "And this is another thing you do: you cover the altar of the Lord with tears, with weeping and with groaning, because He no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. "Yet you say, 'For what reason?' Because the Lord has been a witness between you and the wife of your youth, against whom you have dealt treacherously, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. "But not one has done so who has a remnant of the Spirit. And what did that one do while he was seeking a godly offspring? Take heed then, to your spirit, and let no one deal treacherously against the wife of your youth. "For I hate divorce," says the Lord, the God of Israel, "and him who covers his garment with wrong," says the Lord of hosts. "So take heed to your spirit, that you do not deal treacherously." You have wearied the Lord with your words. 
	Notice the fact that God is very, very serious in His valuation of the marriage covenant. It is such an important relationship in God’s eyes that He does not listen to the prayers of those who trample it underfoot. When we are untrue to our covenant with God, with our relationship to Him in Jesus Christ, unfaithful and adulterous in our hearts before Him, we put up a wall that our prayers will not penetrate. 
We are concerned with the effective prayer of the Church, yet if the Church, or the members of the Church are in direct disobedience to Him, do we really expect Him to listen to any prayer other than that of repentance and the seeking of His forgiveness for our wrong-doing? Never let it be assumed that just because we are part of the Church, that God must hear our prayers. That is very far from the truth. It is only through Jesus Christ, through the power of the Holy Sprit, that we can come unto God. When there is a severing of that relationship with Christ, on our part, through our defiance of His Holiness and His Righteousness, we dare not expect God to heed or to attend to our petitions and supplications. We have no standing or basis before Him except in Jesus, our covenant head, our savior, our husband.
Consider the Apostle Peter’s admonition to us in 1 Peter 3:7, You husbands likewise, live with your wives in an understanding way, as with a weaker vessel, since she is a woman; and grant her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered. If God is so intent on our earthly relationship with our spouse, how much more is He intent on our spiritual relationship with His Son? Can you think of anything worse or more devastating than to know that God will not listen to us any longer because we are forsaking our covenant relationship? We must guard our hearts in the intimacy of our union with Christ, as we must guard that intimacy in our union with our spouses!
What are some of the aspects of this intense, spiritual relationship that we have with God that leads to effective prayer? The first element is that it is based completely on nothing else within us. It is all by virtue of Who Jesus Christ is and what He has done in our lives. There is nothing in us worthy of any consideration before God. As we oft times mention, there is no worthiness that we bring in to this relationship. There is no amount of goodness on our part or in our heart that makes us more lovable to God. It is all set in His great love. As we read in 1 John 4:9, By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. 
We do not know how to love, to truly love in the full measure of the word. We can have affection for others, but the love that is from God can only be known by those to whom He has revealed it in Jesus Christ. 
We can be loving in our actions towards others apart from God. There are very loving husbands and wives who are not Christians, very loving parents in the realm of this age who deal effectively and consistently with their children, but they are incapable of expressing the deep love of God to others. It is impossible to love selflessly, to love without the contamination of human motives and desires apart from Jesus Christ. No matter how good our intentions, if we do not know Christ, we are lost in the sinful nature of self and operating out from its accursed lusts. No one can earn a way into the heart of God. Only through Jesus is that avenue open to us, as we so often read in John 14:6, …"I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but through Me. 
Even our ability to believe on Jesus comes from God. It is not within us, it is His faith that is put into us by God, Himself. As we read in Hebrews 12:1+2, after the great catalogue of those who lived by faith, Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance, and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Jesus is the author and the perfecter of our faith. It comes from Him and it leads us to Him. It is not of our ability, but completely from Him. 
This relationship, then, is with God and from God. He chooses us to be joined to Himself without any basis in what we bring into the relationship. There are very many Christians who feel that they need to earn the right to talk to God, that they need to be the possessors of something beyond the person of Jesus Christ in order for God to take them seriously. They give into the idea that they must prove themselves to be worthy of the calling of God. Yet that is absolutely in opposition to what God desires. 
After all, He chooses us for His purposes and for what He can do through us, and not what we can do for Him. 1 Cor 1:26-31, For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world and the despised, God has chosen, the things that are not, that He might nullify the things that are, that no man should boast before God. But by His doing you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom from God, and righteousness and sanctification, and redemption, that, just as it is written, "Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord.” 
Once this relationship is in place in our hearts, there develops within us, or at least there should develop within us, a desire to please God in all that we do. This necessitates that we talk with Him in order to come into a greater understanding of what His purpose is in our relationship with Him. It is easy to state that it is to please Him in everything that we do, which is entirely the case. However, we need to learn what it means to please Him. We need to learn what His desires are, as we walk in His light and truth according to His Word and under the guidance of His Holy Spirit. 
Many of us feel that it is necessary to know the exact course that He has set for our lives, but that is entirely not the case! We do not need to know how He is going to use us. We do not need to know the precise direction we are to take. Each day with the Lord is an adventure in the manner in which He guides us, the people to whom He chooses take us, the direction of our service unto Him. This is not, by any measure an unplanned and haphazard life about which we are dealing. It is very structured and guided and directed by Him. Ps 139:1-6, O Lord, Thou hast searched me and known me. Thou dost know when I sit down and when I rise up; Thou dost understand my thought from afar. Thou dost scrutinize my path and my lying down, And art intimately acquainted with all my ways. Even before there is a word on my tongue, Behold, O Lord, Thou dost know it all. Thou hast enclosed me behind and before, And laid Thy hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is too high, I cannot attain to it. 
To follow Him means that we are learning to listen to Him and to obey as He guides. This necessitates that our hearts be focused on Him at all times, in order to hear Him as He leads. Our Lord Jesus tells us the manner in which this listening develops. Mark 12:30, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.' It begins with wanting to hear Him, wanting to talk with Him, wanting to be more and more a part of the development of our living relationship with God in every facet of our lives.
Ps 62:5-8, My soul, wait in silence for God only, For my hope is from Him. He only is my rock and my salvation, My stronghold; I shall not be shaken. On God my salvation and my glory rest; The rock of my strength, my refuge is in God. Trust in Him at all times, O people; Pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us. Selah. There develops a trust in Him to do all that He says He will do. We learn, day by day, to rely completely upon Him in all His Providential work in our lives. We rely upon Him more and more as each day passes, much like a husband and wife learn to rely and to depend on each other as their love develops and flourishes. The key with God, however, is that there is no other motive than love in all that He does. We soon come to realize that it matters not the road upon which He chooses to take us. We can trust Him to lovingly show forth His glory in everything and in every way.
We also begin to realize that we must guard our hearts unto Him. It is so easy to take Him for granted and to become complacent in our part of the relationship. When this begins to take place, we start to lose the intimacy of our hearts before God. We begin to develop attitudes and behaviors that threaten our relationship with Him, much as we do when we take our marriage relationship for granted and lose the zeal of intimacy with our spouses.
The Prophet warned against this complacency and after the need to guard our hearts unto God in Jer 29:13, ‘And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. We must choose to seek Him continually with all our hearts. That is one key aspect of our prayer life as His Church. We are committing ourselves to seek Him constantly in all that He chooses to do. We are calling to Him and we are working on our communication skills with our Lord and Husband.
When we do nurture our hearts unto Him, we will find our everlasting joy in Him. Ps 16:11, Thou wilt make known to me the path of life; In Thy presence is fulness of joy; In Thy right hand there are pleasures forever. It is not a burden to be in this living relationship with God in Jesus Christ. It is the call that has always been upon God’s heart in His creation of man. He desired to have the perfect means of showing forth His glory in His love and grace and mercy. It is in His Church that He finds this ideal avenue of fellowship. That is why He sent His Son to redeem us unto Himself as the only means of establishing such a glorious bond. 
	The Apostle Paul describes it in the following manner. Gal 2:20, "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered Himself up for me. When we can live forth in the life of Jesus, our prayer life will no longer be seen as something that requires work and effort and sacrifice. It will develop into an intimate communion with our beloved husband. It will be the natural and close communication of the oneness that is seen surely, yet imperfectly, in those marriages that have survived all that this world order throws against them. It is the oneness that transports us to the very throne of God in heaven, into the immediate presence of God. So be it!
"Worthy art Thou, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for Thou didst create all things, and because of Thy will they existed, and were created." Amen.

This morning’s benediction is this morning’s passage, Rev 4:11. "Worthy art Thou, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for Thou didst create all things, and because of Thy will they existed, and were created." Amen.