The Final Word: Week 7, March 4, 2018

Istrouma Baptist Church Podcast

I’ve always been fascinated by people’s last words. I heard last week about a Union General during the Civil War. His name was John Sedgwick. He was a respected and high-ranking general. In 1864 he led his troops to Spotsylvania, Virginia for one of the last battles of the war.

Confederate sharpshooters had been peppering the area all morning on May 9, wounding, among others, General William Morris. Staff officers cautioned Sedgwick not to approach the road, but he disregarded their warnings in his desire to encourage his men to face the enemy. When his men warned him to take cover, Sedgwick responded by joking, "They couldn’t hit an elephant at that distance." Just then, a sharpshooter’s bullet crashed into his skull, right below his left eye, killing him instantly.

He was the highest ranking Union officer to be killed during the war.

It’s dangerous to underestimate your enemy. Don’t do it.

Jesus did not do that. He understood full well the spiritual battle in which we are engaged. Because of it he turned to a vital piece of our spiritual arsenal—prayer. We have a record of his prayer offered the night of his greatest battle—just as he faced arrest, trial, and execution. This prayer opens our eyes as nothing else to the deepest longings of Jesus’ heart. It teaches us what He values and how we, too, can overcome the world.

The Final Word

“The Real ‘Lord’s Prayer’”

John 17:1-26

1. Timing of Jesus’ prayer
   1. Reinforces a pattern
   2. Releases a power
2. Targets of Jesus’ prayer
   1. I pray for me
   2. I pray for mine
   3. I pray for missions
3. Triumph of Jesus’ prayer