The Lord's Prayer ~ Forgive us...

Last Sunday, Rodney King died. Mr. King was the victim of an incident of alleged police brutality involving 4 Los Angeles Police Officers on March 3, 1991. When those 4 officers were later acquitted, the verdict sparked the 1992 LA riots which led to 53 deaths and over 2,000 injuries and one of those injured was a truck driver named Reginald Denny. Mr. Denny was driving his truck through an intersection when he was pulled from his cab and viciously beaten by four men. The entire scene was caught by a news helicopter which broadcast the beating live to the world and one of the lasting images of the LA riots is of a cinder block being dropped on Mr. Denny’s head. When the four men were later caught and brought to trial and that trial ended in an acquittal of most of the charges, Mr. Denny walked up to Georgina Williams, the mother of one of his attacker’s, and hugged her. As he offered this mother and her son forgiveness, family members of other attackers embraced him as well and they all exchanged words of reconciliation and peace. As that powerful scene of forgiveness was being reported by a member of the news media their comment was, Mr. Denny is suffering from brain damage.


Unfortunately that is what many people in our world today think about forgiveness. They believe that you must be brain damaged or mentally unbalanced to offer any kind of radical forgiveness, but offering this kind of forgiveness is exactly what we say we will do every time we pray the Lord’s Prayer. As we have already seen, the Lord’s prayer is dangerous and it is difficult if we are going to take it seriously because it calls us to do things that the world really does believe are crazy or naïve or downright impossible and nowhere do we see that more clearly than in this phrase: forgive us our trespasses (or our sins) as we forgive those who trespass (or those who sin) against us.

If you read through the entire Lord’s Prayer you will see that there is only one thing that we explicitly state that we will do and that is to forgive. While the prayer is full of implied actions on our part, like helping feed those who are hungry and working for God’s will to come to earth, the only clear thing we promise God is that we will forgive. And notice that it doesn’t say we will forgive those sins that don’t really matter, or those who sins that aren’t socially reprehensible, it says we will forgive those who sin against us – period. All who sin against us personally and all whose sin has an impact on our community are to be forgiven, no matter whom it is or what the sin is. Today, these are difficult words for us to hear in Centre County and as followers of Jesus this is a difficult message for us to share with others, but we need to. The Lord’s Prayer states clearly that as followers of Jesus we will ask God to forgive us and then we will forgive others no matter who they are and no matter what they have done. So, yes, that means that today and in many of the days to come we need to wrestle with what it means to extend forgiveness to people like Jerry Sandusky

But before we can do that, in fact before we can extend forgiveness to anyone for anything, we need to come to terms with the first two words of this phrase: forgive us. When we pray these two words we are confessing to God that we are sinners and we cannot overlook this. In our world it is easy to see the sin of others but none of us what to admit our own sin. In Jesus sermon on the mount, just a few verses after he teaches us the Lord’s Prayer Jesus tells us that before we can judge others and before we can really comment on their sin we need to come to terms with our own sin. Look at Matthew 7:3-5. So before we comment or pass judgment on the sin and failures of others we need to first confess the sin and failures found in our lives but this kind of honest self reflection and confession is not easy. Whether it is in politics, business, sports, schools or just among our family and friends, none of us want to admit that we have a log in our own eye. None of us want to admit that we are sinners and none of us want to take responsibility for our failures because to do that makes us weak and vulnerable.

In politics, someone’s failures open the door for their opponent to score points and get more votes. In business, a company’s failure can lead to lawsuits and financial hardships. To admit any kind of moral or ethical failure in our schools and communities can lead to a loss of status and position or power – which in turn can lead to the breakdown of institutions that we have learned to depend upon. Even in our family and among our friends where relationships of love and trust are supposed to be the strongest we struggle to confess our sin because we are afraid that even among people who say they love us – we fear that we might be rejected if they knew the truth. So none of us want to admit that we are sinners, but the Lord’s Prayer doesn’t give us that option. When we pray, forgive us our trespasses, we are making the bold statement that we are sinners and we need to take this confession seriously.

Instead of trying to avoid confessing out sin and working hard to justify it by saying, at least I’m not as bad as he is, we need to be honest and confess our sin to God. Here is a very practical application for all of us this week, when we start thinking about the Jerry Sandusky situation and the crimes he has now been convicted of, before we pass any kind of judgment and before we give any kind of opinion we should first stop and confess our sin to God. What are the ways we have sinned against God this past week? How have we failed God in our attitudes, words and actions? How have we let others down and failed to live out our faith in ways that inspire and encourage and help others? How have our actions, words and attitudes torn down and hurt those around us? Now the point isn’t to wallow in the darkness of our failures, the point is to identify our sin and confess it to God so that God can forgive us.

Look at 1 John 1:8-10. So if we confess our sin – God will forgive us which also implies that if we don’t confess our sin, God will not forgive us. When we don’t confess our sin, if we aren’t honest about our sin then in some sense we are saying that we have not sinned – or that our sin is not that bad, and when we do that we make God out to be a liar and when we do that, God’s word and grace are not in us which means there is no forgiveness which means there is no life.

So we need to confess our sin to God and when we do, God forgives. It is as simple and powerful as that. When we humble ourselves and honestly confess our sin to God – God forgives and the reason God forgives is because it is in God’s nature to forgive and the reason it is in God’s nature to forgive is because it is God’s nature to love. Actually, it is again in 1 John 4:8 that it says, God is love. It is because God loves us so much and wants an eternal relationship with us that he willingly forgives us.

And let’s be clear, God loves everyone this much. Sometimes we have a hard time understanding how God’s love can be so unconditional and all encompassing – but it is. John 3:16 says… God so loved the world… not some in the world, not everyone but those who do certain things… God loves the world - everyone. And then 2 Peter 3:9 says… God wants everyone to be saved, which means that God wants to forgive everyone – which means that God wants everyone to confess their sins so that he can forgive.

So in the Lord’s Prayer we confess our sin so God can forgive us but before we can move on and talk about forgiving others we have to ask ourselves if we have accepted God’s forgiveness? Have we accepted God’s grace and love and allowed it to free us from sin and the burden of guilt that sin often brings? If we haven’t accepted God’s forgiveness, we might as well stop here because I’m not sure we can go to the next step and talk about forgiving others until we have learned to accept God’s forgiveness for ourselves.

Why do we have such a hard time accepting God’s forgiveness and grace? One of the reasons I think we struggle to accept God’s grace is because we often don’t feel worthy enough to be forgiven, but the Lord’s Prayer has already addressed this issue. When we call God Our Father we are saying that our lives have value and dignity because we have been created in the image of God. It’s not always easy, but we need to learn how to set aside our feelings and accept how God sees us and what God has done for us. God loves us and God forgives us. Look at Psalm 103:11-12. It is because God loves us that God forgives us, and again God does forgive us, look at 1 John 1:9.

So the Lord’s Prayer tells us that God love us and that God forgives us and it is only once we have accepted this love and forgiveness that we can move on and begin to forgive others. There is a reason Jesus formulates the prayer the way he does and it is because forgiving others is only possible after we have confessed our sin and been forgiven ourselves. It is God’s grace working in us that helps us forgive others and that grace only comes through God’s forgiveness which only comes when we confess our sin. So once we experience God’s forgiveness we can begin to reach out and forgive others but many times our struggle to forgive others comes because we misunderstand what forgiveness is all about.

Let’s be clear about a few things. Forgiveness is NOT looking the other way when people sin and it is NOT giving people a pass when they hurt us or others. And forgiveness is NOT staying in situations and relationships of abuse and allowing the pain and destruction in our lives to continue. Forgiveness does NOT mean there is no justice; remember our God is both a God of grace and a God of justice. So what is forgiveness? At its core, forgiveness is just not seeking revenge against those who have hurt us. Forgiveness is not wanting and plotting to see those who have sinned against us be destroyed Forgiveness is learning how to let go of our bitterness and anger toward others so we can walk forward in peace and experience the fullness of life God has for us.

For there to be this kind of forgiveness, one of the things that is needed is for us to see the value in life - both our lives and the lives of those who sin against us but at times this is not easy. When we see and hear about or maybe have experienced for ourselves such painful and horrendous actions as we have heard recently, seeing value in people who inflict pain and suffering on others is not easy, but it is the call of God. Jesus looked at his accusers, from Judas to Pilate to the soldiers who drove the nails into his hands and he didn’t seek to destroy them. Instead of seeking revenge Jesus looked out from the cross and saw value in the life of a thief and in the crowd who was insulting at him. It is not easy to see value and dignity in the lives of those who have committed devastating sin and painful crimes – but there is value and dignity in all life because all life is from God.

The truth for us today is that we are all struggling with what it means to forgive in the very real context of the Jerry Sandusky trial and verdict. As we struggle with what the Lord’s Prayer means for us in this situation, let me be as clear as I can. Forgiveness requires us to acknowledge that sin is real and it has very real and destructive consequences that need to be addressed in our world. People need to be held accountable for their actions and there needs to be justice, but as followers of Jesus we are called to not hold these actions against people forever, the way God doesn’t hold our actions against us forever. Forgiveness today calls us to be open to and work for reconciliation not revenge and if reconciliation is not possible then at least we begin to learn how to let go of our anger so we can move forward and walk in the grace and power of God. While we struggle to figure out what forgiveness looks like, a great example of what forgiveness does look like in a difficult situation was given to us this week by a 68 year old woman in upstate New York.

Karen Klein works as a bus monitor near Rochester NY. If you didn’t see the video of this event, Mrs. Klein was riding as a monitor on a middle school bus when she was viciously bullied by the 10-12 year olds who were riding with her. I find it very interesting that here we are grieving for victims who were 10 and 11 years old, but in NY it is the attackers who were 10 and 11. Sin knows no age. Not only did these children say things that were reprehensible, but they threatened this woman’s physical safety and well being. When I first saw the video I was outraged and even though I had been working all week on a sermon about forgiveness, my gut reaction was to want to lash out at those children and make sure they were punished. What they said and did was horrible and I have to be honest and say that forgiveness was not part of my thought process, but thank God it was for Mrs. Klein.

Mrs. Klein has said that she does not want to press any charges or take any further action against the children and she said that she wants to continue in her job as a school bus monitor but on a different bus and she also said that she is willing to accept a letter of apology from the students. That’s what forgiveness looks like. She has not excused what the students did and she has not said that it was not that bad – she knows it was bad and she and the school are holding them accountable to the truth, but she is not seeking revenge and she is not seeking to have those children destroyed emotionally or financially. She is seeking reconciliation. She wants to continue in her job as a bus monitor but she also wants an apology from the students. She shows us what forgiveness is all about.

There is no question that the phrase, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us is one of the most difficult sections of the Lord’s Prayer (or any prayer) because it calls us to do three difficult things. First it calls us to acknowledge that we are sinners. It requires us to humble ourselves and confess our sin to God which is never comfortable but necessary. Second it calls us to accept God’s forgiveness for ourselves and allow God’s grace to shape our hearts and lives. Again, there is no forgiving others until we can accept God’s forgiveness for ourselves, and third, it says that we will forgive others, not just when it’s easy, not just when it is convenient or we feel like it, but at all times. These are words that we often say without thinking, but they are difficult words to pray when we stop and think about how we need to live them, but when we get it right this forgiveness leads to freedom and life for ourselves and for others, and when we get it right like Reginald Denny and Karen Klein did, it is a shining beacon of hope for our world because it shows those around us who God is and what God’s love and grace and kingdom are all about.

As a church in Centre County today, I believe God is calling us to show the world what real forgiveness is all about. We have an opportunity in our conversations at work and in the community this week to bear witness to what forgiveness really looks like. It’s not about letting someone off the hook and it’s not about looking the other way - forgiveness and justice go hand in hand. Forgiveness is letting go of our anger and it is seeing the value and worth God has placed in all people and it is asking God to bring the power of his grace and love and healing into everyone’s hearts and lives. That we are talking about forgiveness today, and dealing with this call to forgive in the midst of all that is going on in our community is not a coincidence, God is calling us as his people to live out this pray in a way that brings healing and hope to our community. God is calling us to wrestle with this today because while forgiveness is messy and difficult and misunderstood by many people around us, it is also desperately needed by us and our community. The question for us is whether or not we will do it, will we forgive others as God has forgiven us.

It’s not easy to pray these words. Maybe you are struggling to confess your sin to God, maybe you are struggling to accept God’s forgiveness and grace or maybe you are finding it difficult, even next to impossible, to forgive someone in your life or in our community. God knows this isn’t easy stuff, but he promises to give us the power of his spirit to pray this prayer and then to live it, so I invite you to take a step of faith and do exactly that today. Ask God to forgive you and then allow God’s forgiveness to help you forgive others and so that together we can live this prayer out and show our community and world what forgiveness is all about and who our God really is. Would you pray with me?

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and glory forever. AMEN




Next Steps:  Forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those who trespass against us.

Read 1 John 1:8-9
What sins do you need to confess to God? Take some time to humble yourself and honestly admit your failures and shortcomings to God. Write them out and with open hands offer them to God in prayer. Wait in prayer until you feel the reality of God’s forgiveness enter your heart and life.

Read the following Psalm which makes clear to us the forgiveness of God. Psalm 103:3-5, 11-12
(For reflection: Why is it often difficult to accept God’s forgiveness?)



Read Matthew 18:21-35, 6:14-15
Is there anyone in your life you need to forgive (possibly even someone who has died or who you have no idea how to contact)? How will you open yourself to God’s forgiveness in ways that will move you toward forgiving the person(s) who wronged you?

Write down their names and offer them to God asking for the power to forgive.

How can others pray with you and support you in this?
(For reflection: Why is it often difficult to forgive others?)

The Lord's Prayer ~ Give Us This Day Our Daily Bread

Gregory of Nyssa was a bishop in the church during the 4th century and he had this to say about the Lord’s Prayer. So we say to God: Give us bread. Not delicacies or riches, nor magnificent purple robes, golden ornaments, precious stones, or silver dishes. Nor do we ask Him for landed estates, or military commands, or political leadership. We pray neither for herds of horses and oxen or other cattle in great numbers, nor for a host of slaves. We do not say, give us a prominent position in assemblies or monuments and statues raised to us, nor silken robes and musicians at meals, nor any other thing by which the soul is estranged from the thought of God and higher things; no--but only bread! In all of the Lord’s Prayer there is only one earthly thing we ask for and that is bread. We don’t ask God for wealth or riches or position or power – only bread, but let’s not take this petition for granted.


By including this in the Lord’s Prayer Jesus does two things, first he reminds us that we are completely dependent upon God for life. Remember how the Lord’s Prayer starts, Our Father – God is the creator of all life. God is the one who breathes into us the breath of life and then God continues to make life in this world possible by giving us air to breath and water to drink and bread to eat. So we are dependent upon God, but including this in the context of the Lord’s Prayer also reminds us that God longs to provide for us. God doesn’t give us bread grudgingly or reluctantly, God does it joyfully and generously. God is the Father who loves us so much that he can’t wait to provide for us here and now which means we can confidently and boldly ask God for bread. Jesus teaches us this in his sermon on the Mount in Matthew 7:9-10. So Jesus reminds in the Lord’s Prayer that all life comes from God and that God’s desire is to provide for all life by giving us what we need.

As we reflect on this part of the Lord’s Prayer, I want us to reflect on three specific questions:

• How does God give us bread?

• Why are we to ask for daily bread?

• What exactly does Jesus mean when he says bread?



Jesus tells us that we need to ask God for bread, but then how does God provide us this bread? For that matter, how does God provide us with any material thing in this world? The answer is through the hard work and giving hands of others. Let’s just think about a loaf of bread – how does God provide this bread for us. First there are farmers who plant the seed, pray for rain, tend their crops in order to harvest the grain. Next there are all the people involved in transporting that grain to mills where another group of people process the grain into flour. More people then transport that flour to bakeries where yet another group of people turn the flour into bread and then one final time it is transported to stores and restaurants where we are able to purchase it and then finally eat it. So think about all the hands involved in placing this bread in our hands: farmers, truck drivers, millers, bakers, more truck drivers, store clerks, waitresses. Dozens of hands have worked somewhere in this process of God providing us bread.

So God uses the hands and hard work of others to give us bread which means that God will also use us to help provide bread for others. When we pray, give us this day our daily bread, we aren’t just asking God to feed us, we are also saying that we will work to help feed others. So how is God calling us to help provide bread for those who are hungry around the world? According to the website www.bread.org close to 1 billion people go hungry every day. Every day 16,000 children die of hunger related causes; that is one child every five seconds or 12 children every minute. We have been in worship for about 40 minutes which means that 480 children have died of hunger related causes while we have been here. Now the truth is that there is no shortage of food in the world; there is simply a problem with food distribution. Some places have too much while other places have too little. For example, some nations have battled the reality of widespread starvation for generations while we in the US struggle with the epidemic of obesity. Some countries have too much and others have too little.

Now the problems of why some nations continue to suffer with chronic starvation are complex and we won’t be able to solve them by simply shipping them grain or even bread, the question we have to ask ourselves is if we are we willing to do what we can to help those who are hungry both here and around the world? Are we willing to give our hands to God so he can use them to provide bread? Our own local food bank serves over 350 families every month. There are over 800 people in our own community who are hungry each day and when they pray, give us this day our daily bread, we need to become the answer to their prayers. What are we willing to do this week to help feed those who are hungry both here and around the world? Last week we heard that every time a hungry person is fed we see the God’s kingdom come to earth and if we pray – thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth – then we need to be part of that work and help to bring in God’s kingdom. So what can we do and what can we do as a church to help feed those who are hungry? I want to invite you to check out the next steps and see if there are ways God can use you to give bread to those in need.

So when we pray, give us this day our daily bread, we are first acknowledging that God is the one who gives us what we need in life, but we are also saying that we understand God works through many people to provide what we need which means God will at times work through us to provide for others. So give us this day our daily bread requires us to not only receive from God hands but be willing to be the hands of God for others.

The next thing we want to look at is this word daily. We don’t ask God for weekly, monthly or yearly bread but for daily bread because we need to learn what it means to be dependent upon God. Why we need to ask God for what we need day by day is explained well in Proverbs 30:8-9. So the problem is that if we accumulate too much we begin to think that we don’t need God to provide for us. When our cupboards and pantries are stocked full of food we don’t stop and think about how we need God to provide us with bread each and every day, but the truth is that we do. Not only do we need God for food each day, but we are dependent upon God for everything we need each day. Each day we need God to keep the earth spinning in its orbit and the sun and moon to follow in their paths. Each day we need plants to produce the oxygen and process our carbon dioxide. The truth is that each day we need God and are dependent upon God for survival and asking God for daily bread reminds us of this.

Using this idea of daily bread as a reminder that we are completely dependent on God goes back to the story of Moses and the Israelites. The people of Israel had been slaves in Egypt for generations and during that time they had forgotten what it was like to depend upon God for all they needed in life. While they had to work hard as slaves in Egypt, it was their Egyptian masters who gave them what they needed to survive. When God finally set his people free from Egypt and began to lead them into the Promised Land, the people didn’t know how to depend upon God, so God taught them through the gift of daily bread.

When the people of Israel woke up each morning they would go out and find manna on the ground. They would collect this manna which they then made into bread and it was this bread that physically sustained them for 40 years, but they couldn’t gather more than what they needed for each day. If they tried to gather more than what they needed and kept it in a jar until the next morning, the manna would spoil during the night. By providing manna one day at a time God was teaching his people how to trust him and depend upon him for all that they needed in life.

We need to learn this same lesson. When we accumulate more than what we need for today it becomes easy for us to say in our hearts that we don’t really need God to provide for us. It’s too easy to just not think about God when we have all that we need, which is why God calls us to ask God for daily bread. This is a reminder that we do need God every day. Give us this day our daily bread reminds us not once but twice (this day and daily) that we are dependent on God every day.

So we ask God to give us what we need because He is the One who created us and sustains and longs to provide for us and we ask God to give us what we need day by day so that we will learn to trust God and not live life trusting in our own strength and ability and then finally what we ask for is bread. Again, notice that bread is the only physical thing Jesus tells us to ask for in this prayer and while bread here does mean bread, the actual food we need to survive in this world, it doesn’t just mean physical bread. Jesus himself said that we will not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God, so daily bread isn’t just physical food, it also includes spiritual food and the spiritual food we need is Jesus himself.

In John 6:35 Jesus says, I am the bread of life, so the daily bread we need isn’t just food it’s also Jesus and the presence and power of God that Jesus offers us. Just as manna was the symbol of God’s presence and power and provision for his people, so is Jesus. Jesus is the presence of God in our world and in our hearts and Jesus is the power of God in our lives and through his power Jesus helps provide for all that we need. So how do we partake of this spiritual bread?

Jesus said this bread was every word that comes from the mouth of God – so God’s written word in the scriptures is one way we can consume spiritual bread, but God’s word also comes through the Holy Spirit speaking to our hearts and minds in times of prayer and silence and reflection. The spiritual bread that sustains us can also be worship and praise, it can be service and fellowship with others and it can be the inspiration and encouragement we get from one another in the body of Christ. Jesus offers us spiritual bread in many ways; the question is whether or not we chose to eat this bread because if we aren’t, we aren’t growing in our faith.

Have you ever fasted from food for a day? Maybe you did it for health reasons like a blood test or upcoming surgery, or maybe you did it for spiritual reasons, either way, have you ever gone without food for 24 hours? How did you feel? Did you feel strong and energized and full of life? Were you focused and ready to move forward? Many times fasting takes a lot out of us physically and emotionally and after 24 hours of no food we can become grumpy, irritable, short tempered, tired, unfocused and ineffective. I spent a semester in college fasting one day a week and as much as I tried to have a positive attitude through that time, the truth was I was miserable on those days and you probably didn’t want to be around me. Now think about fasting for a week. Literally no food for a week – would you be feeling strong and vital? Would you be focused and ready to take on all the problems of your life and job and family and community and world?

My guess is that most of us would be exhausted and ineffective after going without food for a week and we would never do this, but many of us do this each and every week – spiritually. Too many of us come to worship on Sunday and we feast on the spiritual bread God provides. We worship and pray and consume God’s word together in fellowship and we leave energized and ready to live out our faith with passion and conviction, but then we forgo the daily spiritual bread God provides and slowly the passion and conviction and energy fades away. We need daily spiritual bread to sustain our faith. We need daily spiritual bread if we want to grow and develop our faith.

So as we close this morning, I want to invite you to try an experiment. This week take some time every day to consume the spiritual bread God provides and set your menu today. Decide the days you will feast on God’s word and the days you will center on prayer. Set aside time to serve God this week and even make time for quiet reflection to hear the whispers of God’s Holy Spirit. For the next 7 days try eating the spiritual bread God provides every day and feast on the living bread of a deeper relationship with Jesus and see how you feel this time next week. If you need some resources there are devotionals available as you leave, or you can go to any number of online devotional sites and have messages sent to your computer or smart phone. Put times of prayer on your calendar and maybe at least once during the week spend time in fellowship with God’s people to be nourished by the body of Christ.

When we pray, give us this day our daily bread, we aren’t just asking God to give us physical food to nourish our bodies, we are also asking for spiritual food that will nourish our souls and strength our faith. God provides this food, he can’t wait to provide this food – will we consume it?

Give us this day our daily bread reminds us that we are completely dependent upon God for all that we need in life, physically and spiritually, so let us ask God to give us what we need today and in each and every day to come and when we ask – let’s remember that God, as our Father will provide - so let’s be ready to eat.

Would you pray with me…
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. AMEN



Next Steps: Give us this day our daily bread.
How have you seen God provide for your needs over the course of your life? Identify 2 or 3 examples of God’s direct provision for you and your family. Thank God for these!

1.

2.

In Mark 6:35-37 Jesus told his disciples to feed those who were hungry and today God still calls us to be part of how He provides food for others. Who is God challenging you to feed physically? Spiritually? How will you respond?

Help provide bread for the 1 billion people who are hungry around the world by supporting our local food bank or ministries like WorldVision, Compassion, or Bread for the World


Reflect on Proverbs 30:8-9. When has having too much caused you to turn away from God? When has having too little caused you to take matters into your own hands and not trust God? How do you balance planning for the future and trusting God for today?



Jesus quoted Moses when he said, one does not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. (Matthew 4:4 and Deuteronomy 8:3) In what ways can God nourish us spiritually? Many of us only feast on this bread once a week (on Sunday)? How can you feast on this bread every day this week? Set your menu today:
Monday:
Tuesday:
Wednesday:
Thursday:
Friday:
Saturday:
Sunday:

The Lord's Prayer ~ Thy Kingdom Come...

The Lord’s Prayer is so familiar that we can easily pray it without really thinking about it, which is why we are taking this summer to stop and really think about it, but another problem with the Lord’s Prayer being so familiar is that when we do pray it we feel so comforted by the words that we forget about the courage needed if we are going to take these words seriously. The Lord’s Prayer is a dangerous prayer because it strikes at the very heart of who we are and how we live our lives and nowhere is this seen more clearly than in the phrase – thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. When we ask God to send His kingdom into this world we are declaring to God and others that we are willing to let go of our kingdom for his. Praying this part of the Lord’s Prayer means that we willingly abandon our will and what we want in order to embrace God’s will and experience the fullness of God’s kingdom. So let’s talk for a moment about the kingdom of God. What exactly is God’s kingdom? Well, Jesus answers this for us in the Lord’s Prayer. The kingdom of God is simply God’s will being done in all circumstances.


Of course this then leads us to the question, what is God’s will? In a broad sense, the will of God is just a reflection of God’s character and God’s nature. For example, the Bible tells us that God is just – look at Deuteronomy 32:4. “Upright and just is He.” So God is just and so God’s will is for justice to come to all people and therefore justice is a characteristic of God’s kingdom and we see this in Micah 6:8. The Bible also tells us that God is love – look at 1 John 4:7-8. So God is love and God’s will is that all people are loved and that love is a core value of all relationships and decisions in God’s kingdom – again look at 1 John 4:11.

God also values all life and we know this because God created all life and called all things good. Go back to the creation story and after everything God created he said, this is good. So God values all life which means that God’s will is that all life is respected and valued which means that in God’s kingdom all people are to be honor and respected. In God’s kingdom all people are to seen as precious and valuable, in fact, all life is so precious to God that his desire is that none should perish, look at Matthew 18:14. It is not God’s desire that anyone perish and in 1 Timothy 2:4 it says that God doesn’t want anyone to perish. So to understand the fullness of God’s will we need to see the fullness of who God is and begin to understand what is ultimately important to God. The Bible can help us see God’s will which in turn gives us a glimpse into what God’s kingdom is all about, and it’s important for us to see what the kingdom of God is like so that we can begin to think about what it means for that kingdom to come to earth and what it means for the kingdom of God to come into our very hearts and lives.

As we think about the kingdom of God being a place of love, justice and respect and care for all people, we don’t have to look too far to see that God’s kingdom is not being fully experience in this world. God’s kingdom is not fully here. When we see injustice and poverty, when we see greed and broken relationships, and when we look at our families, political systems and the global problems and see so much bitterness, anger and division we know that God’s kingdom is not being fully lived out in this world and there is a reason for that - too many times too many of us choose our kingdoms over God’s. We chose our will over God’s will.

Let’s go back to the creation story and Adam and Eve. God created Adam and Eve and placed them in the garden of Eden which in many ways was the kingdom of God – and everything was good. The garden of Eden was a place of wholeness and beauty and grace and peace. It was the place where God’s will was done on earth and where God’s kingdom was seen in this world, but when given a choice of living in God’s kingdom or in their own kingdom, following God’s will or their own will, Adam and Eve chose theirs. They knew God said don’t eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, they knew that was His will but they ignored it and did what they wanted to do and every time we choose our will over the will of God we keep God’s kingdom from entering our world. Every time we choose our will over the will of God, every time we place our own interests and our own desires over the will of God we are keeping God’s kingdom from coming to earth.

This why this one phrase of the Lord’s Prayer is perhaps the most dangerous prayer we can ever pray, because it puts our will and our own desires and our own need to be in control up against the will of God. To ask God to send his kingdom to earth means that we have to let go of our kingdom and this is not easy. Jesus himself had to struggle with this in his own life. At the beginning of his ministry Jesus faced this very choice. Was he going to follow God’s will or his own? Was he going to pursue God’s kingdom or was he going to take hold of all that the kingdoms of this world had to offer him?

This was one of the temptation Jesus faced when he was taken by Satan into the wilderness. Look at Matthew 4:8-10. Jesus had to decide if he was going to work for God’s kingdom or if he was going to settle for all that the kingdoms of this world had to offer him. This is the very struggle we face when we pray the Lord’s Prayer. When we pray, Thy kingdom come it means that like Jesus we have to be willing to turn away from the kingdoms of this world and all that they might have to offer. It means we need to turn away from self and our own desire for power, wealth and glory to pursue life in the kingdom of God.

So to pray this part of the Lord’s Prayer requires us to turn away from ourselves and to turn back to God, and this turning is what it means to repent. To repent doesn’t mean to feel sorry for our sin, it means to turn and what we are turning away from is our self and the pursuit of our own will and the building of our own kingdom and what we are turning to is the kingdom of God. This is why Jesus sermon to the people about experiencing God’s kingdom began with the word Repent. Repent for the kingdom of God is near look at Matthew 4:17. Jesus preached this because he has just lived this. Jesus knew the kingdom of God would only come through repentance so his message was that the God’s kingdom was near and that it was available for people to experience, but the only way they would was if they were willing to turn away from their own kingdom. They had to repent. If we want to experience God’s kingdom and if we are serious about this prayer, Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, then we also need to repent, we need to turn away from our will and our desire and start living for God.

After we repent we need to keep praying and ask God help us see what his kingdom really looks like. We need to have a clear vision of what the kingdom of God is like and what God’s will is all about so we can celebrate it when we do see it and so we can work to further it when God begins to establish it. Think about it, if we ask God to send his kingdom into this world then we need to anticipate it coming and if we expect it to come to earth we need to be prepared to see it and then work to help establish it when it arrives. I think this is why Jesus spent so much time talking about the kingdom of God. If you look at the material we have given you for further study you will see that Jesus talked about the kingdom of God a lot and he used parables to give us a picture of what the kingdom of God was like. God wants us to see it so we can experience it, celebrate it and work for it.

Again, if we look around today we can clearly see that God’s kingdom is not fully here, but the truth is that the will of God is done countless times everyday all over the globe and when we see it or hear about it we need to celebrate it and we need to help others see and experience it for themselves. Where have you seen God’s kingdom at work? Where have you seen God’s will at work in your family, at your job, in our community or in the world around us?
• Every time someone forgives – we see the kingdom of God.
• Every time we serve someone - we see the kingdom of God
• Every time someone serves us - we see the kingdom of God.
• When children are loved and welcomed and taught about God we see the kingdom of God.
• Every time someone is fed,
• every time we give our time to comfort someone in need,
• every time someone accepts Jesus as their Savior and places their lives into the hands of God – we see the kingdom of God

We need to identify these moments of God’s kingdom breaking into our world so we can celebrate them and then work to keep them going.

You see it is not enough to just repent and pray for God’s kingdom to come, and it is not enough to just look for God’s kingdom to break into the world around us; we have to be willing to work for God’s kingdom to be established in this world. This is another reason why the Lord’s Prayer is such a difficult and dangerous prayer to pray, because it calls us to live life differently. When we pray, Thy kingdom come we aren’t just asking God to do something, we are saying that we believe God’s kingdom and will are so important that we will work for them and sacrifice for them ourselves in all that we think and say and do.

The example we have in this is Jesus. Jesus didn’t just preach about the kingdom of God and he didn’t just lift up a vision of what the kingdom of God looks like he lived it out. When Jesus loved people he was establishing God’s kingdom. When Jesus fed people it was establishing God’s kingdom. When Jesus forgave people, when he honor people, when he lifted people up and gave value to their lives and saved them through the cross, he was establishing God’s kingdom. Everything Jesus did helped bring the kingdom of God into this world, in fact in many ways Jesus was the embodiment of God’s kingdom walking on earth, which is why when Jesus said the kingdom of God is near – it really was, it was near to the people because Jesus was near to the people.

When we pray, Thy kingdom come, thy will be done we are saying that we want our lives to look like the life of Jesus so that everything we say and do is a reflection of God’s heart and helps people see and experience in and through us God’s kingdom. In many ways, the kingdom of God needs to break into this world through us as it did through Jesus. It needs to be near to people through us as it was near people through Jesus, and while this is our desire and it is often what we give our lives to, the reality is that the kingdom of God will only every been seen and experienced here in part. God’s full kingdom won’t come until Christ returns and establishes God’s kingdom once and for all, but that doesn’t mean we don’t work for God’s kingdom to come and God’s will to be done each and every day. The truth is every time we pray the Lord’s Prayer we are declaring that we are going to live our lives in such a way that God’s will and Gods kingdom will be seen and will come this world. Which is why this pray is dangerous and requires and faith and courage to pray.

One last reminder for us, we saw last week that this is not a personal prayer but a prayer of God’s people, so we aren’t just asking God’s will and kingdom t come in and through our own personal lives, we are also asking God to send his will and kingdom into this world through us the church. We need to live our lives together as the church in such a way that God’s kingdom and God’s will can be seen in all that we say and do.

So the Lord’s Prayer is a dangerous prayer because it challenges us and calls us to let go of our will and it is a prayer that takes courage and risk and strength because we are committing ourselves to live in such a way that God’s will and kingdom will be seen and experienced in our lives and our life together and work together and worship together as the church. It is a dangerous prayer. It requires risk and faith and courage – but what an awesome prayer to prayer to pray together. Would you join me in pryaing it?

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.  Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who tresspass against us.  And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.  For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.  Amen.

Next Steps:

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

1. What do you see when you think about the kingdom of heaven?
What words, images, relationships and actions come to your mind?

Where have you seen the kingdom of God break through in your own life? (Thank God for this!)

Where have you seen the kingdom of God break through into our world? (Thank God for this!)


2. Jesus had to turn away from the kingdoms of this world (Matthew 4:8-10) and his own will (Matthew 26:36-46) to help bring God’s kingdom to earth. What things do you need to repent from in order to work for God’s kingdom on earth? In what areas is God asking you to submit your will to His?

Repent, and offer these things to God in prayer.



3. Ask God to show you how and where he wants you to work for His kingdom
today:
this week:
this month:
this year:
throughout your life:

What changes do you need to make now in order to help God’s kingdom come and God’s will be done in your life and in your sphere of influence (your kingdom)?

The Lord's Prayer ~ Our Father...

Have you ever prayed the Lord’s Prayer and not really thought about the words you were saying? Have you ever been praying the Lord’s Prayer and while the words were coming out your mouth – you mind was thinking about something else? If you have had those experiences, don’t worry – you are not alone. Most of us have experienced the same thing. Without a doubt the Lord’s Prayer is the most familiar prayer we pray and since many of us learned it as children, we have been saying it our entire lives and when something becomes so familiar we often take it for granted. We can pray this prayer without even thinking about it, which is often the problem, we pray this prayer without really thinking about it, so what I want us to do over the next six weeks is to take some time to think about it. What are we saying when we pray this prayer? What confession of faith are we making? What are we saying about God? What are we saying about ourselves? What commitments are we making to God about how we will order and live our lives?


The reason we pray the Lord’s Prayer as much as we do is because this is the only prayer that Jesus ever gave us. In Luke 11, Jesus disciples come to him and ask him to teach them how to pray and in response Jesus gives them a shortened version of the Lord’s Prayer. The prayer became so important in the life of the early church that by the end of the first century, Christians were told to pray this prayer 3 times a day: morning, noon and night. The Lord’s Prayer also became a central part of the worship life of the early church being included in all baptisms and times of communion and it has remained a central part of worship for over 2000 years.

One of the interesting things to notice about the Lord’s Prayer is that in many ways it is structured like the 10 Commandments. Last summer when we looked at the 10 Commandments we saw that the first 4 all have to do with our relationship with God and the last 6 have to do with ourselves and others. In many ways the Lord’s Prayer is set up the same way. The first thing the prayer does is center our hearts on God. We call God our heavenly father, we lift up his name and we ask for his kingdom and his will to be done. So just like the 10 Commandments, we start with God and then move to ourselves and others by asking God for food, forgiveness and the deliverance from evil. So the movement in the Lord’s Prayer is from God to us, the same way the movement in the 10 Commandments is from God to us, but it all starts with God.

So the prayer begins, Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed by thy name. Let’s just start with the first word – OUR. What is important for us to see in the Lord’s Prayer is that it is never a personal prayer. It is not my Father, it is our father, it is not my daily bread or forgive me for my sins, it is our bread and forgive us our sins. The Lord’s Prayer is always plural which means it is to be prayed together and it reminds us that our faith is supposed to be lived out together and it has always been this way.

When God created Adam he realized it wasn’t good for him to be alone so he gave him a partner which then produced a family. When God called Abram it wasn’t to make him a great leader, it was to make him the father of many nations. When God called David it was to be the king of a nation, when Jesus chose disciples it was to form a team and when the Holy Spirit filled the followers of Jesus on the day of Pentecost it didn’t send them off to live life on their own – it drew them together to live life as one body in the church. God’s desire is for us to live in community with one another and the Lord’s Prayer reflects that at every turn by showing us that this is not a personal prayer but a prayer of the people. That is one reason why we pray it together in worship because it is supposed to be prayed together.

The other thing that the word OUR tells us is that God is ours. He is our Father, but this is not an exclusive claim, he is ours and no one else’s, it is an inclusive claim, God is the father of all. In Malachi 2:10 it says, Have we not all one Father? Did not one God created us? And in 1 Corinthians 8:6 it says there is but one God, the Father from whom all things came and for whom we live. So when we call God OUR father we are not only placing ourselves in the larger community of the church but we are acknowledging that the God of the universe, the One who created this world is the father of all. While not all may call God their father, God is the father of all. He is our father he belongs to us and we belong to him.

So let’s look at what it means to call God our father. The important thing here is not gender but the qualities of being a good parent. Throughout the Bible God is described as the perfect parent who not only gives life to his children, but is also the one who nurtures them and cares for them and protects them and provides for them all through life. The Bible is full of images of how God as a loving parent cares for his children. There is a list of scriptures in the next steps that you can use this week to explore some of the ways God is seen as this perfect parent, but let’s just look at one, Deuteronomy 1:31. God is seen here as the father, or mother, who picks up their child and carries them in life when they grow tired or weary or when they are in need some help or support.

When we call God our father, we not only acknowledge that God is the one who created us but we are proclaiming that God is the one we turn to when we need this kind of help, support, encouragement, love, direction, grace and mercy. When we call God our father we are also saying that as his children we want to reflect his name and character in this world. I have had the honor of speaking at the funerals of many faithful and loving parents and one of the things I often say is that the best way to honor them, the best way to honor a father or mother isn’t in words that are spoken at a funeral, but in how we live our lives and when we call God our father it doesn’t just mean we turn to God for help but it means we want to honor God by living the way God has taught us and the way God has shown us. We’ll look at that more a little bit next week when we ask God for his kingdom to come in this world.

Now let me just say a quick word about the gender issue and why throughout the Bible God is most often described as a father and not a mother. It is not because men are better than women or fathers more important than mothers. The people of Israel lived in a culture that was dominated by pagan fertility cults where images and idols of women and mothers were often worshipped so it could be that simply in order to avoid any confusion that Israel was worshipping these pagan gods that talking about God as a mother just wasn’t used very often, but there are a few images in the Bible and they are powerful. Again I would encourage you use your next steps and look up Isaiah 49:14-15 and reflect on the beautiful and powerful image of God as a mother. Again the reality is that when we call God father it is not a gender issue, it’s to remind us that God is that parent, that faithful and loving parent who created us and cares for us and desires to have an ongoing loving and intimate relationship with us.

So we call God our father, but he is not an earthly father, God is a father who is in heaven. The word heaven here means air or sky which means that God is not off in some faraway place or in some other world unable to hear us and help us, it means that God is right here surrounding us, as close as the air we breathe and as constant and ever present as the sky we see. This idea of God’s ever present nature is what the psalmist writes about in Psalm 139:7-12. God is everywhere which means that God is always with us. We don’t have to ask God to be with us – He is. We don’t have to ask God to go with us – He will. In fact God is already there. So when we talk about a God in heaven we aren’t talking about a distant God but a God who not only is everywhere we look and everywhere we are, but a God who also dwells deep within us. God is the air we breathe which means that God dwells deep within our hearts and lives.

By calling God our father in heaven we also are saying that God is above and beyond the powers of this world which means that God can actually do something to solve the problems of this world. God is larger than our personal problems. God is larger than our community problems and national problems and political problems and global problems. God is larger and more powerful than it all, which means that we can pray to God for big things. We can ask God for world peace and for an end to hunger and poverty and injustice because we know that God is able to bring this about because he is not a God who is limited to this world, he is a God in heaven. But we need to be careful if we are going to pray to God for big things because the way God might want to solve these problems will be through us living life a different way by taking a bold stand or making a faithful statement. Again, we’ll look at this more next week.

And then the last part of the opening phrase has to do with the name of God. Hallowed be thy name. The word hallowed means to make holy, which means we honor or lift up and glorify God’s name. Once again, we see here a similarity to the 10 Commandments where one of the commandments is to not take God’s name in vain. Another way of stating that commandment would be to honor God’s name and use it wisely. Before we ask ourselves if we are doing that, let’s just look at the name of God. What is God’s name?

The name God gives himself is I AM, which means that God is eternal, powerful and that God transcends all time and space. By calling himself I AM, God is stating that he is all powerful, all knowing, all loving, all forgiving, all providing, all protecting, all everything and because of his greatness and his goodness we need to honor his name and make it holy and there are two ways we do this, by what we say and by how we live.

Let’s start by looking at what we say and how we use God’s name. When we looked at the 10 Commandments last summer we learned that many times we use God’s name without really thinking about it. We often say “O God” as an expression of surprise or even frustration without even thinking about it, and that’s the problem, we use God’s name without thinking about it. We need to think about how we use God’s name and make sure when we do use it we are doing it in a way that honor God and reflects God’s true character. It can be a challenge to change old habits of speech, but when we do, those changes honor and glorify God, they hallow his name.

More difficult than changing our words, however, is changing our lives and making God’s name holy means that we stop trying to glorify our name, or live just for ourselves and start living in such a way that God’s name and character are lifted up and seen by those around us. Through Jesus, God has shown us an example of what it looks like to honor God’s name – it looks like a life of humility and service. It looks like a life of worship and prayer. It looks like a life of joy and peace that comes when we are connected to God. Do our lives reflect the name of God? When people look at us – do they see Jesus? When they do, we know we are truly hallowing God’s name.

When we begin this prayer, Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, we are proclaiming that God is the one who created us and gives us life, and that God is the one who calls us to live this life together with others and that God is present with us to help us tackle the big problems in life and it begins to lay out this idea that our lives need to reflect the name or the character and nature of God and God’s kingdom. These are powerful words that we can’t take for granted, we need to pray them with faith and trust, we need to pray them with humility and gratitude, and we need to pray them with the courage to live them out in our lives each and every day.

Will you prayer them with me now.
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.
AMEN.



Next Steps ~ The Lord’s Prayer

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name…

OUR Father: All language in the Lord’s Prayer is plural which means we need to:
• Pray Together: this week pray the Lord’s prayer with others: Family, Sunday School Class, Small Group, Friends
• Grow Together: find ways to connect with others in the church: join a class or Bible study, volunteer to serve with others, join a ministry like the choir / bell choir, join us for lunch after worship today.

Our FATHER: what do these scriptures tell us about God as our father:
 Malachi 2:10,
 I Corinthians 8:6,
 Ephesians 4:6,
 Deuteronomy 32:6 and 1:31,
 Matthew 6:25-34 and 7:1-4,
 Isaiah 49:14-15,
 Psalm 131:2
• What “parental” quality of God do you appreciate the most?
• What quality do you need to experience the most?

Who art in HEAVEN: (auromos, which means air or sky)
• Our God is EVERYWHERE:
How do you need to personally experience God this week?
• Our God is BIG and POWERFUL:
What big thing can you pray for this week?

Hallowed by Thy NAME:
• This week focus on only using God’s name in ways that honor Him and reflect His power and love.
• What two changes can you make this week to reflect more of God’s nature and character?