In Luke chapter 11 it says that
it came to pass that as Jesus was praying in a certain place,
when he ceased, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to
pray, as John also taught his disciples. And that's where I
want to pick up in Matthew chapter 6. Just wanted to read that one
verse there. In Matthew chapter 6, we're going
to read from verse 9 to 13. And then at the end, I will go
back and pick that up in Luke chapter 11. This is a text of
scripture that many people have memorized. When I was a kid,
my parents would have us all kneel down and pray, and they
would have us repeat this prayer. So it's one you probably have
heard so much that you might have memorized it, you might
have prayed it. But this is what the Lord Jesus said to His disciples
when they asked Him, Lord, teach us to pray. In verse 9, He says,
After this manner, therefore, pray ye." After he had taught
them, don't be like the hypocrites, don't use vain repetition, don't
stand in the open place so that people could see you, enter the
closet. And this is the way you are to
pray. After this manner, he says, pray ye. Our Father, which art
in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be
done, in earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And lead
us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the
kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. The most
effective prayers in scripture are often quite short. And here
the Lord says that He knows your need before you pray. And you
won't be heard for your much speaking. But He gives us a very
condensed and very full prayer here in just these few short
words here. And I want to just go through
this with you and consider what He has said to us, the Lord Jesus.
As I read in Luke chapter 11 and verse 1, Jesus gave this
prayer to his disciples. They had asked him to teach them
to pray and this was his answer after this manner. Not word for
word, but according to the truth taught here. And with an eye
of faith directed to the truth Christ taught here. That's the
way we're to pray. Believing the truth that Jesus
taught in this prayer and pray with this truth in our heart.
The truth, the truth that Christ's people believe when they pray,
is what the Lord Jesus taught these to pray here. We're not
to say our prayers. I used to, as a kid, kids are
easily taught. And I used to say a little prayer,
now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, and
so on. You might have heard that prayer. It's not a bad prayer,
but the problem is we would repeat it, just as it was, without really
knowing what it meant, knowing the truth of the doctrine. One of the questions that comes
up is, how do we teach our children? The Lord Jesus taught His children.
He used to call the disciples children, and then He would speak
to them. Here the Lord Jesus teaches His
children, so we're to teach our children. How has the Lord taught
you? That's the way to teach your children. Don't teach them
something that's, you know, manufactured in order to make it a child's
thing, but teach them what the Lord has taught you. What has
He taught you? If you're one of Christ's sheep, He's taught
you that you're a great sinner and nothing at all. But Jesus
Christ is your all in all, hasn't He? And He's taught you by that
what you are to pray, how you are to pray. Because He is your
Savior, this is how He has taught us to pray. The life of a believer
is an attitude of prayer. Breathing out prayer at all times
unceasingly. In 1 Thessalonians chapter 5,
in verse 17, Paul says, pray without ceasing. And I used to wonder, how can
you do that? How can you work and pray? How can you eat and
pray? Because you imagine that you
have to be in a physical position in order to have communion with
your God and Savior. Because prayer is an attitude
of the heart. In 1 Samuel 1.13 it says, Hannah
prayed in her heart. Her lips moved, but she was praying
in her heart. Because that's where prayer takes
place. It's in the heart. That's the closet. And so prayer
is with our understanding. It's not repeating things without
understanding the truth expressed by what we believe. By what the
gospel has taught us. And prayer is an expression of
what we believe in our heart. What you say with your lips is
the result of what you believe in your heart. And what you do
is a result of what you believe. How you act. Denise and I were
talking this morning, and we talked about the example, how
especially children hear what we do more than what we say.
If we say, Christ is all to me, and yet we never talk about Christ,
and we never meet with God's people to fellowship in the things
of Christ. We never study the things of
Christ together. then they're going to interpret
what we've said in terms of what we do, and they'll think, well,
we say that he's important to us, but he's really not important.
These other things are important. And so prayer is an expression
of what we truly believe, and how we live is also an expression
of what we truly believe. Out of the abundance of the heart,
the mouth speaks, and that's the way we live our lives. And
so Christ is teaching us what the doctrine is here, in order
that when we believe it and we pray, we'll speak according to
the truth of it. And so the first thing to note
here is the Lord Jesus taught His disciples. They were His
people. These are the ones who can pray
this prayer according to the truth of it. Our Father. Jesus said in John 14 and verse
6, I am the way, the truth and the life. No man, no man, no
baby, no mother, no father, nobody comes to the Father but by me. We don't come to Christ any other
way than through the Lord Jesus Christ. He has to bring us to
God. And because He has to bring us,
God says in Hebrews chapter 2, verse 10, that it please God
to make Him like His brethren, in order that He might bring
them to glory. The Lord Jesus had to become
like us. He had to take our nature, and so that He could save us.
And that's the way we are made God's people, is what Christ
did. He brings us. He's the way. He's
the truth. He's the life. He's everything
to us. And so we can't pray this prayer unless we are Christ's
people. We can't say, Our Father, unless
we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's important. So, teaching children to pray
this, we must first teach them about the Lord Jesus Christ.
About God, who He is, the Creator, and about how He's the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and our only access to Him as
sinners is through the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, He opens up with
these first two words, Our Father. We all have fathers. Some of
us know our fathers pretty well. Some of us may not know our fathers
that well. But here, this term, father,
is the most endearing term that God could stand in this relation
to us, to be our father. to be our Father. It's the highest
possible privilege that we have to be called the sons of God. That's the highest possible privilege
that we could have to be called the sons of God. 1 John 3 verse
1 says, Behold, behold, what manner of love the Father hath
bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God. It's
a high privilege because there's none higher and none greater
and none worthy of honor as God, our Father. And there is no relation
to Him of greater privilege than to be called His Son. And so
when the Lord Jesus speaks these things, He's saying to us, you've
been brought to God. By His work, He doesn't say it
in this verse, but it's spoken of elsewhere in the Gospel. By
His work, Christ brought us to God and made Him our Father.
And now address Him, acknowledge Him, come to Him through Christ
as your Father, as our Father. That's a high privilege. To be
a son of God is the highest privilege because it is the relation Christ
holds. He's the Son of God, and there's
no one that God, our Father, loves as He loves His Son. He's His only begotten Son. He's
the Son of His love, the Son in whom He is well pleased, the
Son who has done all of His will, the Son He has exalted to the
highest place of glory, who is Himself co-equal and co-eternal
with God the Father. who had the throne before he
came into the world, but gave up the throne in appearance in
order that he might be made man, in order that he might bear our
sins. He lowered himself and that was a great act of obedience. There's nothing to compare to
it. He's the son of God's love, the son of God, the only begotten
of the Father, which means he's the only one who shares his father's
nature. The Son of God shares the nature
of God the Father. He's just like Him because He's
one with Him. As God the Father is eternal,
so is Christ as Son of God. As He is almighty, so is the
Lord Jesus Christ. And so, as God the Father is
uncreated, so is the Lord Jesus Christ. Christ created everything. And everything was created by
Him and for Him. And so it's all His. And so,
in order to create everything, the only way that could be done
is if He Himself was uncreated. Which means He had to be eternal,
because He created all things and time, and He will bring all
things to their close in time. And He will bring them to their
fulfillment. This is our God and Father. In Psalm 90, verses
1 and 2, it says, "...Lord, Thou hast been our dwelling place
in all generations." Before the mountains were brought forth,
or ever thou hadst formed the earth and the world, even, from
everlasting to everlasting, thou art God. And in Hebrews 1.6 it
says, Under the sun, he saith, thy throne, O God, is for ever
and ever. And Micah 5 says, the one who
comes into this world, who would be born as a baby in Bethlehem,
his beginnings would be from everlasting. He's the eternal
father. He's the eternal son. They're
co-equal, co-eternal, almighty. Christ is the creator of all
things because he did it all that his father told him, gave
him to do. And so it says in Deuteronomy
33, 27, The Almighty God is thy refuge and underneath are the
everlasting arms. This is our God and Father. This
is the Son of God. And so we're made like, we stand
in relation to God the Father as the Son of God does, as the
sons of God. That's beyond understanding.
That's a high privilege. To be a son of God is to be the
object of God the Father's eternal love, His sovereign love. In Jeremiah 31.3 it says, I have
loved you with an everlasting love. And in Hosea 14.4 he says,
I will love them freely, without finding the reason for love in
them, but finding that reason in God's heart Himself. Because
love never finds a reason in the object, but in the one who
loves. That's why that love of God the
Father is eternal, unchanging. It can never be increased, and
it can never be earned or deserved. Therefore, when we pray, we must
come owning in our heart that Christ is our Lord and Master,
and He has given us this prayer, the form of it, to pray to God
our Father. He is the one who taught His
disciples. He is our sin-bearing substitute who has fulfilled
God's law and fulfilled God's covenant as our mediator. He
has given us warrant in this prayer, according to His instruction
and in His name, to come to God, His God and Father, as our God
and Father. Jesus said, pray, ask what you
will in my name, and I will do it for you. And remember what
Jesus said in John 20, verse 17. Take a look at that, in John
20, verse 17. He says, he's speaking to Mary
Magdalene there. He had just risen from the dead. And he sends Mary with this message
to his disciples. In verse 17, After Mary said
to him, Master, Jesus said to her, Touch me not, for I am not
yet ascended to my father, but go to my brethren." Now, he's
the Son of God. If we're Christ's brethren, what
does that make us? Sons of God. Go to my brethren.
My brethren, what a condescending relation that the Son of God
is to us, my brethren. And say to them, I ascend to
my Father and your Father, to my God and your God, our Father. We're to come as Jesus has instructed
us. He is our Father because we've
been brought to God the Father by the work of Christ the Lord.
So the word our, in this phrase, our Father, means we call on
God the Father as the Father of Christ, as all who call on
God the Father do call. We're all brethren. We're all
brethren. That means we have, there's not
one of us who has a greater access to God the Father than one another. We all come through the Lord
Jesus Christ. We're all brethren. And if we're
brethren, then we share the same Father, the same Lord and Master,
the same Savior, the same inheritance. the same gospel. Everything has
been given to us. It says in James 1, verse 16,
Do not err, my beloved brethren, every good gift and every perfect
gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of light,
with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. Every
good gift, everything that's good for us, comes to us from
God our Father. And then he goes on, he tells
us about this great gift of his own will, God the Father's own
will. Begat he us, he gave birth to
us, with the word of truth, the gospel. That we should be a kind
of first fruits of his creatures. So he birthed us that we might
be the first fruits of his creatures. The first fruits, the most treasured. And therefore, he says, wherefore,
my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to
speak, slow to wrath, and so on. Our Father, that's what he's
talking about. Our means that we call on God
the Father, the Father of Christ, as ours with all who do call
on him as God and Father. And our, in our Father, means
we all call together when we're together. When we meet together
we call on God our Father as all of us call on God our Father.
And our means, the word our means that none of us is above one
another. Remember in Philippians 2 verse 5 it says, let this mind
be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. Remember? Remember what
he did? who, being in the form of God,
thought it not robbery to be made equal with God, but made
himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant,
and was made in the likeness of man, and being found in fashion
as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross. Let this mind be in you. We're
brethren. Christ is our Master, and He's
our Brother. by this redeeming work, by God
the Father's choice, eternal choice, and so not one of us
is above another. This word, our, also emphasizes
that our relation to God is not limited by our race or our parentage,
not to our physical parents, not to the place that we live,
not to our status in the world, whether it's high or low, whether
we're poor or we possess wealth, whether we're strong or weak,
whether we have natural wisdom or are simple-minded. All of
this has to do with what God has done. Nothing about us makes
us the sons of God. It doesn't start with us. Just
like our birth to our parents doesn't start with us, it starts
with them. And so God, the Father of His
own will, begat He us by the word of truth. If you look at
Ephesians chapter 1, you see this very clearly, but it can't
be by our work. It's by His choice, by His will.
Ephesians chapter 1, in verse 2, notice how He says it. He
says, actually in verse 1, He says, Paul, an apostle, sent
one of Jesus Christ by the will of God, by God our Father, to
the saints which are at Ephesus, those who have been sanctified
by the work of the Spirit of God and by the redeeming work
of Christ, which are at Ephesus, and to the faithful in Christ
Jesus, because all who are in Christ are believers, and believe
in Christ, they're faithful to the doctrine God has taught them.
Verse 2, grace be to you. Notice this is from God our Father.
Grace be to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord
Jesus Christ. How many times did you wait for
your father to come home to give you a whipping? It's not a pleasant thing to
wait for. But our earthly parents, though they chastened us after
their own pleasure, our Heavenly Father chastens us for our good,
for our good according to His good will. And so, grace be to
you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
He's made peace in the blood of Christ and He sends grace
to us out of His own character, His own name and purpose and
grace. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places in Christ, according as He has chosen us in Him, in Christ,
before the foundation of the world, not our choice but His,
that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love. Because God the Father is holy,
He made us holy in Christ. He chose us to this. He chose
us to be holy and without blame before Him in love. Nothing between
my soul and my Father because Christ has made reconciliation
and made peace. Verse 5, "...having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according
to the good pleasure of His will, to the praise of the glory of
His grace, wherein He, God our Father, hath made us accepted
in the Beloved Christ, is the Beloved in whom we have redemption
through His blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches
of His grace." His will, His grace, His purpose, His praise,
it's all to God our Father. And so we're to adore Him and
worship Him and to come to Him through Christ, owning Him as
the Lord Jesus has taught us here, that He is our Father. What a blessedness this is. were
made sons of God, according to this scripture we just read in
Ephesians, by the will of God the Father, to the praise of
the glory of His grace. He predestinated us to the adoption
of sons to Himself by Jesus Christ our Lord. His act of predestinating
us to the adoption of sons was our adoption. What He willed
to do in adoption was our adoption to Him. He put His name on us. He called us His. There was nothing
in us. We weren't born sons of God.
We weren't His sons by nature. We were actually the enemies
of God by nature. And yet we were made sons of
God by His purpose of grace in Christ. To adopt means to choose,
and He chose us to be His sons. And He put His name upon us,
but not only did He put His name upon us, but by the Lord Jesus
Christ He did this. Because we can't be sons of God
and be bound as slaves. The sons of God are free. But
they're not free until Christ redeems them by His precious
blood and sets them free from sin and the curse of God's law.
And then we can become the sons of God. And so we read in Galatians
4, in verse 4, But when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth
His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them
that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption
of sons. And because, because you are sons before Before you
knew about it, before the Spirit of God was given to you, you
were called the sons of God. Because you are sons, God hath
sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying,
My Father, Abba, Father. a very dear term that a child
expresses his relation to his father, my father, by Jesus Christ. And the Spirit of God sent to
us gives us life and faith in Christ, and by that faith in
Christ we see he's been made my father by his electing love,
his purpose of adopting me, And by the Lord Jesus Christ and
the Spirit of God given to us is the birth into his kingdom
as his sons. No one is in the kingdom of God
who is not born of God. Jesus told Nicodemus, except
a man be born again, you cannot see the kingdom of God. You cannot
enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh
is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is Spirit. You
can't enter. You can't see. You're not in
the Kingdom of God unless you're born of God and were born of
God by the Spirit of God. And that birth to God, our Father,
by His Spirit, produces faith in our heart to look to Christ
and Him crucified is all my salvation, all my desire. Everything I need
from God is found in Christ my Lord. The fullness of the Godhead
dwells in Him. He took away the curse by His
death on the cross. His substitutionary death, He
made us holy by His own blood, Hebrews 10.10 and Hebrews 13.12. And He gave us His Spirit, the
Spirit of promise, because He redeemed us. And now, by the
Spirit of God, we're born of God, we're partakers of the divine
nature. We have the seed of God Himself,
His Spirit, by His Word, the Gospel, pointing us to Christ. This is an amazing thing. And then I want you to see that
after this in Luke chapter 11, take a look at Luke chapter 11,
immediately after this prayer, and I've spent quite a bit of
time on the first two words, Our Father, because it's important. This is the gospel preached in
these two words, condensed in those two words. Never assume
that a man born into this world is a son of God. He's not until
he's born of God. And we're not born unless we're
redeemed, and we're not redeemed unless God the Father chose us
to be redeemed and set his love upon us. But after giving this
prayer, look at in Luke chapter 11. He says in verse 5, In which
of you shall have a friend, and shall go to him at midnight,
and say to him, Friend, Lend me three loaves, for a friend
of mine in his journey has come to me, and I have nothing to
set before him. It's midnight. And he from within
shall answer and say, Trouble me not. The door is now shut,
and my children are with me in bed. I cannot rise and give thee. And Jesus said, I say to you,
though he will not rise and give him because he is his friend,
yet, because of his importunity." Because the man who is asking
for the bread comes with importunity, meaning he comes with persistence. With urgency, he can't be turned
away boldly, shamelessly, asking for bread. Because another friend
came to his house traveling at midnight. He didn't have anything,
so he goes to his friend. I need some bread. I can't come.
It's midnight. My kids are in bed with me. I'm
not going to get out of bed. I cannot rise, Jesus said, because
He keeps coming. He will rise and give Him. Even
though He doesn't rise because He's His friend, He will rise
and give Him because of His opportunity as many loaves as He needs. And so Christ is teaching us,
God is your Father. Go to Him with urgency, with
shameless persistence because of what Christ has come. Come
in Christ's name. In His name. His authority. His
warrant. His work. His merit. By His grace. Because He died for His people,
and you're a sinner, and you're trusting Him, you come to Him
and say, Lord, receive me for Christ's sake. Hear my needs.
Hear the needs of my heart, and the needs that I'm presenting
for you, and just keep coming, and coming, and coming. And then
Jesus taught this in verse 9, And I say to you, Ask, and it
shall be given you. Seek, and you shall find. Knock,
and it shall be opened to you. For every one that asks to receive,
and he that seeks findeth. And to him that knocketh, it
shall be opened. Keep coming. Knock. Seek. Ask. And in James, I think he says,
you have not because you ask not. I don't want to go without
because I don't ask. Lord, what do you say then? What
do you say? I'm going to get up every morning
and start asking? Yes, you might do that, and that
would be fine. But go to the Lord for the grace
you need to do what He's told you to do. Go to Him and ask
for this grace. Don't presume that you're going
to work this up out of your own self. And then in verse 11, notice
the relationship here between Christ's underscoring to our
Father here. He says that if a son shall ask
bread of any of you that is a father, Will his father give him a stone?
Dad, I'm hungry. Oh, here, have a stone, son.
Or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?
Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If you
then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children,
this is a label that we have to own. We're evil by nature.
Our sinful nature is an evil nature. Out of the heart comes
all these things. Fornication and lasciviousness and wickedness.
He says, If you which are evil know how to give good gifts to
your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father Give
the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him. He also tells us what
to pray for. This is the way we come. This
is how the Lord Jesus ends the prayer. Ask and it shall be given
you. Keep knocking. Keep coming. The
door will be opened. He is our Father. Now back to
Matthew chapter 6. The next words He says are, Father
which art in heaven. Our Father which art in heaven,
in Psalm 115 it says, our God is in the heavens. And he's contrasting
the idols to our God. But our God is in the heavens.
He hath done whatsoever he hath pleased. Psalm 115 verse 3. And in Psalm 135, verse 6, it
says, "...whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did He in heaven,
and in earth, in the seas, and in all deep places." So, this
title, Our Father, which art in heaven, shows us that God
rules. He rules over all things at all
times. He who sits in the heavens does
all things. He's our Father. The One who
has all things, who works all things, who is before all things,
from whom is all things, is our Father. Why would we not then
in faith go to Him and ask Him for what we cannot do? In Ephesians
3.20 it says He's able to do exceeding abundantly above all
that we ask or think. Therefore, go to Him, our Father,
which art in heaven, who rules over all, the everlasting God,
who has been our dwelling place from generation to generation. Our Father. All things come from
Him. All things. In Acts 17 and verse
24, the Apostle Paul told those at Athens. He says, "...God that
made the world and all things therein, seeing that He is Lord
of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands,
neither is worship with men's hands, as though He needed anything,
seeing He giveth to all life and breath and all things." That's a gift of God our Father.
Drink the water. That's from your Father. Your
heart is beating. That's your Father's gift. Everything. Do you see? Do you hear? Do you move? Do you have food? Do you have a home? Do you have
things? It comes from God your Father.
Are you going to have something tomorrow? Then it comes from
Him. All things come from Him. All things are by Him and all
things are for Him. Oh, the depth of the riches both
of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are His
judgments in His ways past finding out who hath known the mind of
the Lord, who has been His counselor, or who has first given to Him.
who is first given to him, and shall be recompensed, or paid
back to him again. For of him, and through him,
and to him are all things, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Of thine own hand, Solomon prayed,
have we given so liberally after this sword? What have we given
you, but what's yours?" Children like to give things to their
parents, and as a child, I liked to give things to my mom and
dad, too, because I wanted to please them. I loved them. I
wanted them to be happy with me, of course. And so I would
bring them something. But inevitably, everything I
gave them was something that they provided for me. And they
received it as a gift from me. That's a gracious thing that
they did. Then look back, though, in Matthew chapter 6 and verse
9. He says, Our Father, which art
in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. As a little child, when we would
say that, I didn't know what hallowed meant. But it means holy. Holy. God is holy. He's in heaven. He rules over
all. He's sovereign. He has all power. Everything
is His. Everything is from Him. All that
we have is from Him. He gives it to us by His active,
ever-present will. He's good. Why doesn't the world
collapse on us? Why don't we get consumed by
bacteria? Why don't animals have control
over us and things stronger than us and things beyond our wisdom? Why doesn't the world overheat
or get too cold? And things because God our Father
is dependable. He's faithful. He doesn't change. And He's gracious. All these
things. We should see it. He's holy. All that he does is right. It
can't be done better than what he does. He's holy in his character. He's holy in his thoughts. He's
holy in his words. He's holy in his actions. All
of his care for his people is done in a holy way. Why would we want anything else
but what is holy? And so we pray to him. Our Father,
which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. You're holy. Jesus
said this in John 17 11. Holy Father. That's the way He
prayed. That's the way we're to pray.
Holy Father. It reminds us who God is. That
He's above us and greater than us and all that He does is right.
In Isaiah chapter 6, the seraphim flew and Isaiah saw them and
he heard them. The temple was shaking and they
said, holy. This is what they cried, holy,
holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. And in Leviticus and several
places in scripture it says, you shall be holy for I am holy.
We can't be the sons of God unless we're holy. Unless we are pure
in God's sight, we cannot be His sons unless we're absolutely
holy. And it says in Hebrews 10.10
and in Hebrews 13.12 that we're made holy by the offering of
the body of Jesus Christ, by His blood, His shed blood, and
holy by the sanctifying work of the Spirit of God when He
shows us Christ and gives us a holy nature. Ephesians 4.24,
our nature, our new nature is created in righteousness and
true holiness. This is who our Father is. And
this is what we are by Christ's work and by the Spirit of God
in us. And therefore we're to live before God in a holy way. Our Father is holy. Don't you
want to please your Father? Don't you want to be like Him?
Then look to Christ. And what do you see? A holy Son.
Worshipping and praying to a holy Father. And he says this in scripture. He says in Psalm 145, verse 17.
Let me read that to you. Psalm 145, verse 17. He says,
The Lord is righteous in all his ways, and holy in all his
works. Holy. So whatever God does in our lives,
it's holy. it's holy. And so when we pray
to Him, we know we're coming to God, our Father, because of
Christ, because of His Spirit given to us, because of all that
He has done, His gifts, and He's in heaven, He rules over all,
sovereign, and He's holy. All that He does is right, and
we trust Him. You can trust God, can't you? Our Father, because
of Christ, can't you trust Him? Our Father. He's our Father. It's a precious thing. Other
religions don't have this relation that we have to God as our Father,
our Father. And then he says this in his
prayer. Now he's acknowledging so far in the prayer who we are
because of Christ, because of God, the Father's gift of His
Son. He made us His children by the gift of His Son and His
own Spirit. And so we're acknowledging these
things. Our Father which art in heaven, hallowed or holy is
thy name. You're holy in all your character
and works and words. And everything that's about you
is holy. There's nothing unholy about God. Then he says this.
Here's the prayer. Thy kingdom come. Your kingdom
come. Come to men on earth, by your
spirit, come to this heart of mine." In Luke 17, 21, Jesus
says, the kingdom of God is within you. Lord, your kingdom come
to me and in this earth. Bring your sheep, bring your
people in, your adopted sons, into your kingdom. Translate
them from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of your dear
Son. Jesus said in Acts 26, 18, He
sent Paul to preach the gospel that those who hear it might
be brought from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to the
power of God, that they might be sanctified, made holy by faith
which is in me. Looking to Christ, we see that
He has made us holy and that we're His sheep. And so we pray,
God, Your kingdom come. Come to me. Come to Your people.
Exalt Your name. Exalt Your Son in this world.
Make Your purpose, Your eternal purpose, come to pass. It's already
done in heaven. And so He says that in the next
phrase. He says, As it is in heaven,
so on earth. His kingdom has been put into
the hands of Christ, our mediator. And so Jesus instructs His people
to pray for it to come. Everything that's done in time
is done in order to bring about God's kingdom. His kingdom. His kingdom in this earth. When
the Son shall have delivered up all things to His Father,
then God the Father will rule over all things. That's in 1
Corinthians chapter 15, verse 26 or so. And then he says this
in his prayer. This is the heart. Again, this
is what we pray, believing who God is, our relation to Him as
our Father because of Christ and by His Spirit. And so we
pray this, not only your kingdom come, but your will be done.
This is an attitude of submission, isn't it? It's an attitude that
Jesus had when He said, not my will, but thine be done in the
garden. It's an attitude of complete
trust. In Psalm 22, 8, it says that the Lord Jesus rolled Himself
on Jehovah, His Father. He rolled Himself. He just rolled
the entire weight, the success of our salvation and His eternal
case as the Son of Man on His Father. He trusted his Father. Thy will be done. Whatever happens
to me, your will be done. If it seems good to you, Lord,
let your will be done. If it seems good to you, if it
would be pleasing to you, if you can be glorified in this
thing, then let this be what you do. We pray for things, and
we ought to, but we always pray it with this attitude, Lord,
your will. I don't know what needs to be
done. Let your will be done. And you'd come to your father
and say, Dad, can I do this? Can I have that? Whatever. And your dad says no, or he might
say yes. If he says no, then you trust
him. It must be because it's not best. If you love your father
and you trust your father, you know he's looking out for your
good, don't you? Especially our Heavenly Father who can't do
wrong. Thy will be done. Thy will be done. He reveals
himself to us in the Lord Jesus Christ. Your will be done. on
earth as it is in heaven, because it's already done in heaven,
isn't it? Everything God has done, He's already done in heaven.
It's established in the heavens. God's works are known before
the foundation of the world. Everything He's going to do.
And then look at the next phrase. He says in Matthew chapter 6,
in verse 11, Give us this day our daily bread, He doesn't say,
tomorrow, could I have something for tomorrow too? No, just today. Because we're to depend on God
our Father each day. We don't get an injection that
lasts a month. We come to Him daily, moment
by moment, trusting Him. Lord, I need to eat. Don't you? I need to drink. I need to do
this work. I need to raise my family. Lord,
give me what I need. The basic things. Because when
we pray for those things that we think come automatically,
what we're doing is we're expressing what we believe in our heart
that it's God who gives us everything. And if He gives us everything
and we come to Him for it, then we're acknowledging it's His
good pleasure. It's His goodness and grace towards
us. And also, would you ever go to your father and ask him,
can I go sin now? Would you give me something to
go against your will? Of course not. So when we have
this attitude of complete dependence on God for our daily needs, then
we also have an attitude of submission to His will. Give me what I need
in order that I might be obedient to you, believing you. Isn't
that what it means? Our Father gives us all things.
We must ask Him for all things. That's what it teaches us. Ask
for everything. And acknowledge that it is He,
and not another, nor we ourselves, who gives us all things. And
we're to thank Him for everything because He has given us everything. We can't ask Him for what our
sinful nature wants. We ask Him for what He has taught
us in the Gospel, what He's put in our heart. Conform me to the
Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that the gift we want? Give me your Spirit as Christ
prayed. Make me like your Son. I want to see Him. Show Him to
me. Give me this faith that I might
walk with you day by day. And if He gives us all that pertains
to this physical life, the lesser things we need to live in our
body in this world, how much greater do we need Him to give
us all things for our spiritual life? We can't even see it. We
don't even see spiritual things. We can't obtain them. He has
to give them by grace. Not only give me what I need
day by day, my daily bread, but give me Christ, the bread of
life, day by day. That's what we're asking for.
Lord, we come to him day by day. Give me all things, for spiritual
life, for physical life, for everything. Quench the thirst
of my soul. Satisfy the hunger of my soul
with Christ in him crucified. Satisfy the longing of my desires
with eyes of faith that see the glory in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And so then he says this in verse 11 still. He says, and forgive
us our debts. Now it's clear by this that this
is the gospel message, isn't it? Forgive us our debts. Because
if the Lord Jesus is teaching his disciples to pray, forgive
us our debts, what does it mean about them? That they are debtors. It's clear that we who are the
sons of God have sinned and we will continue to sin until our
bodies of sin are dead and are changed after they're raised
to eternal life. And yet, the Lord teaches us
here, ask the Lord to forgive us our debts. Clearly, He wants
us to ask Him to forgive us, doesn't He? I know of someone
who used to say, well, we're not supposed to ask for forgiveness
anymore because we're forgiven for Christ's sake and that's
an eternal thing and so on. But doesn't the Lord teach us
right here, forgive us our debts? And what is sin but a debt? And
isn't it a debt because we sin against God, our Father? Our
sin is against God, our Father. And that sin accumulates a debt
to Him, which we must pay, but we don't have anything to pay.
We have nothing to pay. What are we going to do? Lord,
forgive me my debt. My sin debt. And how does He
do that? He forgives our sin debt by the
payment Jesus Christ made in His death. Forgiveness is not
cheap with God. He doesn't just say, okay, no,
He had to slay His Son, deliver Him up to death. Jesus took our
sins, He made them His own, He suffered for them because they
became His to pay. And Christ's death was the payment
for the sins of His people. And God forgives our sins because
Jesus paid all that we owed. And God our Father received a
full payment from Him for us. And Jesus left nothing unpaid.
And our Father looks upon the payment Jesus made and forgives
us for what He sees in Christ. That's the gospel. And that's
what Jesus is teaching in this prayer. That's why it's only
a prayer for the believer. We need our Father to forgive
us. And Jesus is the one who taught us to ask Him to forgive
us our debts. And so this prayer teaches the
gospel. When we pray, we pray in faith, with faith in Christ
according to the revelation of Him to us in the Gospel. He died
for our sins according to the Scriptures. He was buried. He
rose again the third day according to the Scriptures. The Gospel. That's what He's teaching us
here. And if we're children of our Heavenly Father, we also
do what our Father does. What does He say here? Forgive
us our debts as we forgive our debtors. Our Father does not
forgive us because we pay Him back. He forgives us because
Jesus paid Him back for our sins. In the same way, we're not to
make others pay us back, to make them make up for the things that
they do wrong against us. We're to forgive our debtors
as our Father forgives us our debts. And how did He do that?
For Jesus' sake. For Christ's sake. Alone. I forgive
their debts, but out of grace, for Christ's sake. And so how
are we to forgive if we're children of our Father? Out of grace,
for Christ's sake. The same thing. If our brother
sins against us, are we to hold it against him? Are we to make
him sweat it out? Did God make us sweat it out?
Did He hold it against us? We didn't even know about the
Lord Jesus Christ until He brought the Gospel to us and told us
He has made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might
be made the righteousness of God. He has made peace with us
by the blood of His Son. He delivered His Son up to death,
and now He gives us all things with Him. That's the grace of
God, and that's the way we're to forgive. We forgive when we
are forgiven, if we're the children of our Father. When we ask our
Father to forgive us, we're doing what Jesus taught us to do. We're
remembering what Jesus did to pay our sin debt, and that our
Father would not remember our sins, because He remembers Jesus
for us, and therefore forgives us our sins. And that's what
we do if we're God's children. He doesn't forgive us because
we forgive others. We only forgive others because
He's forgiven us. It's the evidence. It's the fruit
of faith. And then He says this in verse
13, "...and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from
evil." You know we're tempted when we're led away by our own
sinful lusts. He can't be tempted and He doesn't
tempt men with evil. You're tempted when you're drawn
away by your own lusts. In James 1, 13 and 14, He says
that. If our Father left us to ourselves,
what would happen then? We'd be led away by our own lust
to do all sorts of things. So what do we pray? Lord, don't
lead me into temptation. Hold me back. The psalmist says
this, remove from me the way of lying and grant me thy law
graciously. Psalm 119, verse 29. And he says
this, in verses 35 through 37 of the same psalm, Psalm 119,
make me to go in the path of thy commandments for therein
do I delight. Incline my heart to thy testimonies
and not to covetousness. Turn away mine eyes from beholding
vanity, and quicken thou me in thy way. Order my steps in thy
word, and let not any iniquity have dominion over me. Lead us
not into temptation. Keep me from sin. Lord, iniquities
prevail against me. Show me, Christ, that you've
purged my sins, and then hold me on the way. Give me faith,
and keep me in the faith. And so we know that we are not
illegitimate sons when the Lord does that. If we were not God's
children, He wouldn't chasten us. He wouldn't bring us to cry
to Him, as the righteous are taught to do, to save us from
our sins. We wouldn't pray to Him like
this. We wouldn't ask Him, because God wouldn't love us, and He
wouldn't chasten us, and He wouldn't do it if we were illegitimate
sons. But because He does in our life, and by His Word afflict
our conscience, and using providence and His Word together, He draws
us to Himself to say, Lord, don't lead me into temptation. Deliver
me from evil, from the evil I deserve. The judgment I deserve from you,
deliver me from that. The condemnation that I deserve,
deliver me from that evil. And the evil in my heart. And
the evil in this world. The evil in religion. of hypocrisy
and works religion, the evil of Satan and his purpose to murder
his people by twisting the truth. And so we pray, Lord, give me
rest in my soul, in my God, deliver me from evil, and we give Him
this final praise, for Thine is the kingdom and the power
and the glory forever. Amen. Let's pray. Dear Lord,
our great God and our Father, we come to you because of the
Lord Jesus. He taught us this, He brought
us by His own blood, and He sent His Spirit in our hearts that
we might know our adoption and cry to you, Abba, Father, our
Father, my Father. Give us your spirit, Lord. Teach
us by the gospel that we are to come to you through the blood
of Jesus and offer our supplications before you that your kingdom
would come, your will would be done. All you do is holy. Do
your will, Lord. And forgive us our debts, how
many they are. Give us our daily bread and cause
us, Lord, in our hearts to be forgiving to others as you've
taught us, you've forgiven us. and don't lead us into temptation,
but deliver us from this evil, your kingdom. You deserve all
the glory. You have all the power, and you
have all the wisdom, and all blessings, and everything belongs
to you. So we pray, out of your grace and your supply, give us
what we need in Christ our Savior. In his name we pray, amen.