Foundations of Spiritual Formation I: The Work of the Spirit

Transcription

1 Foundations of Spiritual Formation I: The Work of the Spirit SF507 LESSON 05 of 07 Richard E. Averbeck, Ph.D. Professor of Old Testament and Semitic Languages at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois This lecture is entitled Holy Spirit, Redemptive Community, and Relational Spiritual Formation. This is part two the practice of this relational spiritual formation. Earlier we focused on the spiritual discipline of spiritual reading lectio divina. We re going to move here in this section to talk about the practice of prayer and worship and daylong contemplation our preoccupation with God s Word and work in and through our lives. So we re going to move in that direction now in light of the fact that we are a redemptive community. These concepts of prayer, our practices of prayer and worship and contemplation are actually bound up with the last two stages in lectio divina: oratio and contemplatio. They are more in the area of exhaling in terms of the description that we gave in lecture three of disciplines. They are exhaling, rather than inhaling, as spiritual disciplines. We re talking about expressing out now from the effects of what has been brought in. Now one read says in the reading at this point in working through and meditating on the Bible and thinking, This is about me too, today. That s really what this is about now. So we worship, we pray, we think, and we live God s work back to Him, motivated and guided and empowered by the Holy Spirit, who s the one that inspired the Scripture in the first place. Contemplation is thinking and living out what we re paying attention to. It s all about taking the Word of God into daily life with us so that it becomes our preoccupation along the way in leading and guiding us and forming and transforming us in the midst of our daily walk. Psalm 1 comes at the beginning of the Psalter, and I want to reflect on that just for a few moments for you. It s apparently written as an introduction to the Psalter, or at lest units of the Psalter. So we have here: 1 of 17

2 How blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers! But his delight is in the Law of the Lord, and in His Law He meditates day and night. The result of this is verse 3: He will be like a tree firmly planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither; and in whatever he does, he prospers. As the introduction to the Psalter with Psalm 2, which introduces the Anointed One this particular psalm Psalm 1 emphasizes the need to be meditating on the Word of God in order to worship well. It s the context out of which worship really comes. Romans 12:1-2 we talked about earlier, I urge you, brothers, in view of God s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God this is your spiritual act of worship. But verse 2 goes on, Do not conform, that s another morphae word in Greek related to the kind of word we re talking about in formation and transformation, Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed [metamorphosis] by the renewing of your mind. It s the taking in the effects of what God has spoken to us that renews us. That is part of the transformational work, and the Word is central to that. Then you will be able to test and approve what is God s will His good, pleasing, and perfect will. Basically daily life then, as Romans 12:1-2 would suggest, daily life lived well is itself an act of worship. As the temple of the Holy Spirit which is one of the things we re focusing on here in this section on the Holy Spirit and building the community of God, the temple of God (a temple is, first of all and above all, a place of worship and prayer) so as the temple of the Holy Spirit, individually and corporately the Holy Spirit who indwells us is making us people of worship and prayer. That s one of the main things that is core to who we are one of the main patterns. So we want to talk our way into this in terms of what is this about and how does it actually work. Prayer is actually tied directly with worship right from the beginning of the Bible. The combination of the two is the only way to respond to the condition that we find ourselves in as a result of the fall and corruption in Genesis 3. We were first in 2 of 17

3 Genesis 1, Created in the image and likeness of God. Everything was created perfect; it was all very good. Then corruption came into it in chapter 3 a fall into sin. Romans 8, in fact, in the New Testament talks about all the groaning that we go through along with all the creation because of this corruption that came into this perfect creation. [Genesis] 4 gives the aftermath of that. Now there is an important principle here as we look at this material in Genesis 2 4. Genesis is structured according to a certain formula, a certain generation Hebrew Toledoth Formula. In Genesis 2:4, this is the account, literally these are the generations of the heavens and the earth in 2:4. That is the first occurrence of this generations formula that structures the book. The next one does not come until 5:1: This is the book of the generations of Adam. This means that you have to treat chapters 2 4 as a unit. Now all too often what happens is that we treat chapters 2 and 3 the paradise in the garden and the corruption and the curse in chapter 3 and forget about following into chapter four. That creates a problem for understanding what this material is all about in the first place. So I really want to focus on what happens here as we get to the end of chapter 4. Genesis 4:26 is the conclusion to this chapter. The last clause reads, At that time men began to call on the name of the Lord. Now in the context here just before this, we have the Cain and the Abel discussion, and we come to the end of that Cain and Abel unit in verses 23 and 24 with Lamech. Lamech had two wives. And he said this: Lamech said to his wives, Adah and Zillah, listen to my voice, you wives of Lamech, give heed to my speech, for I have killed a man for wounding me; and a boy for striking me; if Cain is avenged sevenfold, that s what was said earlier in the chapter. If someone killed Cain he would be avenged sevenfold because the Lord protected him from being killed, Then Lamech seventysevenfold. Isn t he a nice guy? He is bragging to his wives that a man struck him so he killed him, and a boy struck him so he killed him and boy, isn t he great. What a wonderful guy. He is bragging about this. The last thing Lamech is going to do is call on the name of the Lord. He is going to take care of it himself. He is in this for himself and for himself alone. 3 of 17

4 But then the chapter concludes starting in verses 25-26, Adam had relations with his wife again; and she gave birth to a son, and named him Seth, for, she said, God has appointed me another offspring in place of Abel, for Cain killed him. To Seth, to him also a son was born; and he called his name Enosh. Then men began to call upon the name of the Lord. Actually literally it reads, It was begun to call on the name of the Lord. This is the very end of this unit in chapters 2 4. The last clause of the unit actually tells us what it looks like to handle the situation well now in our fallen condition. The only answer there has ever been and ever will be to the corruption that came into this creation is through calling on the name of the Lord. This is a very important expression in the Bible. It is turning to the Lord, and it is very closely connected to worship and being a good worshiper. In fact, in this chapter we begin with the whole sacrificial problem between Cain and Abel. That s what leads into this whole thing. But over in Genesis 12 Abraham has just received his commission. He has come out of war with the Chaldeans and from Haran, and now he has come into the land. The Lord has told him in verse 6 that this is the land right at Shechem. He announced to him that this is the land that was going to be given to his descendents. Then in Genesis 12:8 we read, Then he proceeded from there to the mountain on the east of Bethel, and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east; and there he built an altar to the Lord and called upon the name of the Lord. Now that is the same expression that occurs back in Genesis 4:6 as the conclusion and the answer to the problem that developed in chapters 2 4 in the beginning of Genesis. So right from the beginning what we have here is this altar kind of worship. It is a place, an action of worship, building an altar in the Old Testament. At that altar, what you did was call on the name of the Lord. This is the word of worship. So you have the word, the action, and the procedures of worship, and then you actually have the expressions through word of worship by calling, invoking the name of the Lord right into your context where you are calling upon the Lord from your situation where you are, the kind of circumstances you re in. This is what this is all about this calling on the name of the 4 of 17

5 Lord. Now this becomes, from Genesis 4:26 on, a pivotal expression through the entire rest of the Bible as we know. For example (and I will skip over many, but you can follow this up through just concordance work), I Kings 18, we have the prophet Elijah in his confrontation with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel. First Kings 18:22-24 reads this way: Elijah said to the people, I alone am left a prophet of the Lord, but Baal s prophets are 450 men. Now let them give us two oxen; let them choose one ox for themselves and cut it up, and place it on the wood, but put no fire under it; I will prepare the other ox and lay it on the wood, but I will not put a fire under it either. Then you call on the name of your god. They are going to call on the name of Baal. It s the same expression, but Baal is being referred to, and I will call on the name of the Lord. The god who answers by fire is God. And the people said to this proposal by Elijah, That s a good idea. So they did it. And you know what happens. The prophets of Baal try to get Baal s attention. They cut themselves to get his mercy. Their god never responds. Then Elijah does this: in fact, in verse 30 he repaired the altar of the Lord at the altar that was dedicated to Yahweh, the Lord there at Mount Carmel, which had been torn down. He built it again. And then he dedicated it. Israel shall be your name in verse 31. He built it up, named it after the Lord. He arranged wood on it. Then he poured all sorts of water on it and the Lord still sent His fire to consume this offering on the altar and the altar itself and all the water. The point is this calling on the name of the Lord is an expression that keeps coming up as the way to handle the situation we are in. Worship and prayer are bound together in the very nature of what it means to call in the name of the Lord. This keeps on coming extensively through the Psalms. One place that maybe would help to illustrate this and again, I have given a list of some of the places [is] in Psalm 116, and it keeps on bouncing out into the text when we come to it in verse 2: Because He has inclined His ear to me, therefore I shall call upon Him as long as I live. Verse 4: Then I called upon the name of the Lord: O Lord, I beseech You, save my life! 5 of 17

6 That s what he called. So we get an idea here of what it would be to call on the name of the Lord in the Old Testament. You just call out to Him asking Him to be with you right where you are and dealing with the situation and the various kinds of circumstances in which you are suffering or that you are concerned about in other people s lives or whatever. Verse 13 also has this: I shall lift up the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord. So he is going to lift up and praise God, calling on His name with his positive praise for his salvation. He talks about paying the vows in that context. Verse 17: To You I shall offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving, and call upon the name of the Lord. So calling upon the name of the Lord is a general expression that is meant that you call out to Him with whatever is going on, whether it s in need or is in praise or it s in concern for someone else, whatever. This is what this is all about. It s calling on the name of the Lord concerning whatever is going on. Now this expression comes through in very pivotal places. I will say more about Joel 2:28-32 in the next lecture, but I want to anticipate that a little bit here where it says in Joel 2:32 at the beginning of that verse, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. The same expression. This is the passage then. In fact, with that particular line Peter ends his quote of Joel 2 in Acts 2 the day of Pentecost. He ends with that particular line and then launches into his sermon in which he deals with the need for them to turn away from what they did in crucifying Jesus, to actually turn back to this One and call upon the One they crucified. Call on the name of the Lord, who you crucified, in order to be saved. That is the main point of the message in the day of Pentecost in Acts 2. We can follow this through in all sorts of different places. In Acts there are several others. In Acts 7:59 we read this: They went on stoning Stephen as he called on the Lord and said, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit! That s what he said in his invoking the Lord and calling upon him right in the middle of the situation. This, of course, is Stephen when he is being stoned to death and he is calling out on the 6 of 17

7 name of the Lord. There are many other places there. One of the passages that you might know is actually in Romans 10. That s part of the way we sometimes witnessed people through this Romans Road approach to it. But in it we start right back in verse 9, Romans 10:9-12: That if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. For the Scripture says, Whoever believes in Him will not be disappointed. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call on Him. And then you get the quote, for whoever will call on the name of the Lord will be saved. using this same expression. This runs all the way through then from the last clause of Genesis 4 all the way through the Bible. It is a basic principle of how we handle the situation that we are in. We are created in the image and likeness of God. We are corrupted. And that corruption creates great groaning in our lives. The only way to really handle it, the only answer there ever has been or ever will be is calling on the name of the Lord. That is tied directly in with turning to the Lord and worship and recognizing and bowing the knee to him. This is what this is all about. This is what it has been all about from the beginning, and it will always be about this. Many of the Psalms then are prayers tied to worship. In fact, one could use some of them as inspired prayer journal entries as one looked at the Psalms. We can talk about Psalm 2:12. In the Psalms, chapter 2, this is the second Psalm. One of them is part of the introduction to this altar with Psalm 1. But it goes through [and] it talks about how the nations are in a war against the Lord and against the Anointed of the Lord, but the Lord is going to make Him the ruler. Verses 11-12: Worship the Lord with reverence and rejoice with trembling. Do homage to the Son, that He not become angry, and you perish in the way, for His wrath may soon be kindled. How blessed are all who take refuge in Him! This take refuge expression occurs 37 times in the Old 7 of 17

8 Testament. Fifteen of them are in this first book of the Psalms Psalms And you can see all sorts of expressions of this need to take refuge. And you do this by calling on the name of the Lord right in the middle of the situation. A lot of these Psalms in this unit of the Psalter are really based upon this principle of calling on the name of the Lord. It is a pervasive thing in scripture. You can do the same in other parts. I m not going to go into the Psalm 102 to 103 to 106 content at this point. Now the central, unifying principle of truly biblical spiritual formation then, really, is worship. Worship is the spiritual practice par excellence. It s the dynamic core of spiritual formation, and that s on the individual and on the corporate level. We can worship God in our private personal life; we can also worship him together. Prayer then is embedded in worship. It s in the context of worship that prayer makes sense. We can see this already in Genesis 4:26, which we talked about above. We can look at all of life lived with God and for God as actually an act of worship. Romans 12:1: present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable. It s talking about not killing this sacrifice but presenting it in living as a sacrifice in 12:1. We live our life in that way. So what I want to do is I want to break this down a little bit further then and talk first about worship, and then talk further about prayer. These are spiritual disciplines. You can call them that. They are practices that are meant to, we might say, put up the sails in our lives and catch the wind of the Spirit driving us along. This is one of the ways that we really call upon the Lord to affect us through the power of the Spirit. I m convinced that until we get the centrality of worship straight in our minds and work it into our daily lives and communities of faith that we work it in we re just going to be working harder at the Christian life and really getting nowhere. We are, first of all and above all, worshipers. You can recall the passage in Ephesians 5:15-17 where it begins, Be very careful, then, how you live not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord s will is. Well what is the Lord s will? The Lord s will continues in verses 18-8 of 17

9 19: Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit. Speak to one another in psalms, and so on. We talked about this earlier, this particular passage. This is God s will: Spiritfilled worship that occupies our whole spirit and our whole life. We get filled up with it so that we function in life out of being worshipers, first of all and above all. Whether as individuals or as communities of believers, Christians are first this: they are worshipers. The first, best thing we can do together is worship, because that is what puts everything else we do on proper perspective. That s true whether it s in our lives or in our churches, or even in any particular context where we re functioning together. God becomes the focus of attention, and that in turn has a profound affect on the way we engage in everything else we do. The most spiritually transforming activity we can engage in is genuine worship of God in spirit and in truth John 4:24 as Jesus puts it to the woman at the well. Now let s talk a little bit about worship and how it actually works. Worship is about seeing God who He is and what He has done. It s about getting a clear vision of Him, focusing our attention upon Him. We do this with the eyes of our heart, which is an expression that the apostle Paul uses in Ephesians 1:18 for the way we encounter God in Christ. It s a metaphor for seeing with more than just the eyes. It s seeing with our person who God is as we adore Him. One thing is for sure: if we really do see God like Isaiah in the throne room of heaven in Isaiah 6, we will most certainly get impressed. You don t see God without getting impressed with who He is and what He s done. It s an overwhelming experience when you re right in His presence and practicing His presence. One of the main problems that we have to deal with in our lives and in our ministries is that we re all too often impressed with the wrong things. We get impressed with ambitions of various kinds in ministry even, or get impressed with worldly things of various sorts. This impresses us; that impresses us. The deepest kind of transformation takes place in us when we become so deeply impressed with God and His purposes in and through our lives that our will our volition, our decision making becomes engaged in the process of change and growth. We just end up being impressed with something, and when what we are impressed with changes, then what we desire changes with it. We pursue what we re impressed with, and so if we get deeply impressed with God, 9 of 17

10 we pursue God. Deep and meaningful change takes place when the things that matter to us change. The Holy Spirit s goal in worship is to overwhelm us with God and the things He has freely given us, as it says in I Corinthians 2:12. That s the passage that talks about how the Holy Spirit knows the depths of God and the human spirit knows the depths of the human person and what we have received as the Holy Spirit to transform us in the human spirit by direct contact with our human spirit. And in that way then He brings to bear upon us so that we really see what God has already done. We worship Him. One of the main, primary driving forces behind spiritual transformation is worship. But worship is not just about seeing God. That s a wonderful thing it s a great thing but we need to combine that with something. Worship is about seeing God while you re looking life right squarely in the face. It s not an escape from life, but it s a presentation of our life to God, whether personal or communal. We can t leave life behind in order to worship if our worship is going to be authentic and genuine. We come into God s presence and offer whatever is there to Him. Whatever we are is what we offer. We need to worship in spirit and in truth. Whatever is true, whatever is going on in spirit, all of that is what we come to God with. So we need to be concerned that we not think about: you kind of worship God by leaving the concerns of life behind. You bring them right on in, and you bring them to God and you present them there and you see God while you re looking these things right squarely in the face. We have a chance to bring to God what is true in our life, look Him straight in the face with it, see it in the light of His presence and purpose, and leave it there before Him. It becomes like an offering of ourselves our true self, what s really going on to Him, and [we] put [it] there in front of Him as something for Him to enable and to work in us concerning. Sooner or later, we go forth from there from that place of looking God straight in the face while we squarely face our life. We come forth from there transformed, because life looks different when you look at it with God right in the center of your vision. This seeing God while looking life squarely in the face is at the very primary, authentic core of what worship is about. When we present our life to Him in worship, we actually have a chance to put it in perspective divine perspective. The psalms teach us this in all 10 of 17

11 sorts of ways. As in the psalms, so it is in life. Sometimes we give thanks in worship because we re in a thankful place in life. Sometimes we lament in worship because that is where our heart is at the time. If you re lamenting in your life if you re sorrowful and troubled to be real you ve got to go into worship with that. We have many different lament psalms, because the worship that shows up in the psalms is manifesting all these different angles on experience that we bring to God in the context of worship, and work it through there right in His very presence. We come out the other side looking at it differently because now it s in divine perspective. We see God and we see therefore all these things in light of who our God really is. We re so impressed with Him that pursuing Him is the only thing that really counts to us anyway right in the middle of whatever it is we re going through. So sometimes we give thanks, sometimes we lament in worship, sometimes we proclaim our faith, our confidence in the Lord. Sometimes we confess our sinful corruption; there are penitential psalms. Sometimes we cry out for help; we re just in the middle of something [and] we just need His help. That one passage in Psalm 116 specifically expresses it that way. Sometimes we praise, and sometimes we pray. That brings us to the subject of prayer as it relates to this whole worship context. Now worship, again, is at the center of spiritual formation. And prayer then comes to the very heart of worship. It s right in the middle of all that. [For example], Jesus with the woman at the well just reminding us of that. He s saying that a time is coming when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. That s the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. This is very important. There are not a lot of things in Scripture that say that God is looking for this or pursuing that. One of the things that stand out is right in this passage. We know that one of the things that the Father actually seeks from us is this worship in spirit and in truth. And that is, in the context then, being prayer as part of worship. Therefore prayer actually becomes an act of worship itself. It s bowing before Him, honoring Him by approaching Him in praise, but also approaching Him in petition and in need and in concern. Prayer, again, is a spiritual discipline of breathing out exhaling. You re voicing back to God the impact of His Word and His work and your situation right in the middle of life s circumstances. 11 of 17

12 This is all tied in with the contemplation that we talked about. As you re walking through life preoccupied with His Word, that always brings the Word to bear in situations that we re facing. So this is all tied together. Prayer comes out of the combination of these things happening in our life. It s a part of worship. Worship and prayer go together. There are some basic places in the Bible where we learn a lot about prayer. The one that I m going to focus on is an obvious one; that s the Lord s Prayer in Matthew 6, because here we get an actual pattern; one that helps us to get the idea of what this is all about in the first place. Now this concept of prayer: I want to look therefore at Matthew 6 and work through the Lord s Prayer, but do it in the context of how He leads into it, what He does in terms of framing the Lord s Prayer. We start out in verses 5 and 6: When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you. First, it s done in quiet and in solitude real prayer. Now there is such a thing as public prayer. The problem is when that public prayer becomes something that you do in order to look good or in order to present something to people rather than truly pursue God. But especially what the Lord is looking for is just quiet, solitude prayer in your own life. He wants it to be worship in spirit and in truth. And so this is really at the core of understanding where prayer comes from. If we do public prayer, it needs to come out of a life of this quiet, solitude prayer. If it doesn t, then the public prayer becomes hollow. Now it goes on in verses 7 and 8 and adds another thing in terms of the background for the Lord s Prayer. Verses 7-8: And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. So do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need before you ask. You don t have to keep on explaining and going round and round. God is fully aware of all that s going on in our lives, and the passage will develop that further. The point is you need to keep 12 of 17

13 that in mind too when we re praying. They need to be meaningful words; words that really count and have this substance to it. And the substance then is what the Lord s Prayer really is. He actually explains what He means by that by then saying, Pray, then, in this way. So He leads into the Lord s Prayer out of these concerns for quiet and solitude, and especially directly from... it s got to be meaningful; it s got to have some substance to it, not just vain repetition. The content of the prayer then goes this way. First, we have an address to our Father. It begins with an invocation of God as Father: Our Father who art in Heaven [Matthew 6:9]. It s based upon the adoptive, abiding relationship that we have. In fact, this is a form of what we re referring to when we talked about calling on the name of the Lord. You address God, you call out to Heaven, and that s calling on the name of the Lord. We re beginning here from Genesis 4:26 again. Our Father who art in Heaven. That s calling on the name of the Lord. Then we have, second, a praise word a praise to our Father in verse 9, the third part of it, when we read, Hallowed be thy name. Worship posture is the framework for prayer. We ve already been talking about this. Prayer fits into the context of worship, and the remainder of the prayer is surrounded by worship worship of God as holy and powerful and glorious. That s especially true if the ending of this text, in verse 13b, is genuine. There s a textual problem here, but I have it on the sheet as verse 9c, Hallowed be thy name. And then at the end we have, For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. This is worship. This is worship terminology, and it frames the petitions that follow in the following verses. Petition is then expressed in the context of truly addressing God, calling upon the name of the Lord, Our Father who art in Heaven, and then coming to Him as one who s a worshiper, first of all and above all. In that context, petition makes sense. So first then, in terms of the first petition in verse 10, we have Jesus telling us that we should pray for the kingdom will of god now in heaven and on Earth, and specifically, it seems, in my life. We read, Thy kingdom come thy will be done, on Earth as it is in heaven. This is a kingdom prayer. Now in the gospel of Matthew Jesus is coming as the King. Herod, of course, got upset at this in Matthew 2 when the wise men came 13 of 17

14 and said, Who is born king of the Jews? So he sent and tried to kill the child. Then, in the context of preaching, John the Baptist has this kingdom message which we read in 3:3, For this is the one referred to by Isaiah the prophet saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, make ready the way of the Lord, make his path straight! Just before that in verse 2 we read, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. The kingdom of heaven is at hand. This is a kingdom book. Then Jesus, when He is preaching in 4:17, we read, From that time Jesus began to preach and say, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Now we come down then to the introduction, the background, the ministry in Galilee, the Sermon on the Mount in verse 23 in chapter 4, Jesus was going through all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease, and so on. Then we come to the Sermon on the Mount in 5:1-3, When Jesus saw the crowds He went up on the mountain; and after He sat down, His disciples came to Him. He opened his mouth and began to teach them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. What we have here is the king, Jesus, of the kingdom of heaven, promulgating a specific set of laws, rules, patterns, principles for this kingdom that He is the ruler of the kingdom of heaven. As the king, He promulgates the law of the kingdom. This law begins with the Beatitudes, the Blesseds. We may say more about that a little bit later, but the point is this: we are talking about kingdom living. So the first petition in this Lord s Prayer is this: Thy kingdom come thy will be done. If His kingdom comes, His will will be done on earth as it is in heaven. It seems like the way this continues then is that He is talking about the kingdom coming someday in the eschatological day when He sets all things right, when He returns in glory. But there is this coming on the kingdom right now too, in and through us. We become the kingdom of God right now in the middle of this world. Even though we are not a nation, we are a kingdom; a kind of kingdom that actually has the Lord 14 of 17

15 working as our king right now. He is our Lord right now. Now this is essential then to understanding what it is to pray. The first thing about which you are going to be concerned is God s will. It doesn t make any sense to pray against God s will. You are praying for God s will. The more you are tied into God s will in the first place the more you are going to be praying in ways that are going to make sense. Because they only make sense when they fit into the very direction in which God is taking the world in our lives in the first place. So, Thy kingdom come thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. The second petition is to pray for our basic daily needs. Verse 11 develops this. Give us this day our daily bread. So it casts that concern upon us. One of the things that is true about every one of us day by day in our lives is that we need to eat. It is built into the organic nature of who we are as physical beings. So He gets down right to the core of basic need every day. It s interesting that later on He talks about don t worry in the same chapter about what you re going to eat. God takes care of the lilies, He takes care of the birds, He is going to take care of you too. One of the ways we learn to not worry is by casting cares upon Him like, Give us this day our daily bread, give us our basic needs today. We are dependent upon God and we recognize that dependence. And so, again, this is part of bowing the knee before Him and praising Him and worshiping Him in prayer even through petition. Then the third petition is pray for forgiveness of past sins. One of the main concerns here is forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors [verse 12]. And so you are praying for past sins, for things that have been part of our corrupt life. You re asking for forgiveness. But you re asking it in the context of one who has transformed in such a way that you are willing to forgive others. We will come back to the passage that follows. It says that Don t expect God to forgive you if you re not willing to forgive others, because you are not part of His world in the first place. You re not part of his kingdom in the first place if you re not willing to forgive others and then you go and ask Him to forgive you. So there is this pray for forgiveness of past sins. Then the fourth petition is pray for deliverance from future 15 of 17

16 temptation. So not only do we want to deal with past sins, we also want to prevent future sins. Verse 13, Do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Help us not to be tempted. It s important to see how important the issue of personal sin and holiness here really is in the Lord s Prayer. It s very much something that we are concerned about in terms of what we have already done or are doing and what we might be tempted to do in the future. This should be on our hearts and minds. We should want to be people who truly live in a way that is pleasing to the Lord. So it should be one of the main concerns that we pray about in our lives. Actually we all know that in Scripture we have a certain kind of revelation that helps me to be able to say to any one of us here, to you, to me, to others, I know about 95 percent of God s will for your life already. God has already told us what His will is for how we are supposed to live. We already know 95 percent. I know it of you and you know it of me. The Bible tells us so. But there is that other 5 percent of which we are not really sure because it s peculiar to each one of us and in the particular ways that God is leading us. But if we are living well according to what we already know, God will guide us and direct us into what we don t know. We trust Him with this. One of the ways of living well is to deal with past, present, and future sin and to take that seriously. We just want to live in a way that is pleasing to God. He guides us as His children along the way as we do that. The following verses as I mentioned earlier in Matthew 6, right after the Lord s Prayer after the Amen comes verses 14-15, For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions. One of the main ways we know whether we really know the Lord is because we are forgiven, and so it is just natural to forgive others. It s the very nature of the way it works. He goes on in verse 16 and following, Whenever you fast, now fasting is often connected specifically with prayer. So this whole Lord s Prayer is surrounded by context, beginning at the front and ending at the end, that shapes further our understanding of what 16 of 17

17 Jesus means by real prayer here. So you have verse 16, Whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do, for they neglect their appearance so that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. This echoes some of the things said before the prayer. But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face so that your fasting will not be noticed by men, but by your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you [verses 17-18]. So this is about actually living out the effects of being transformed in such a way that you don t want to be seen as fasting. This isn t a show. This is something that you are dedicated to giving yourself to God in. Fasting is a way of dedicating yourself to God and His work along the way in your life in the midst of prayer and praise and worship. The following passage actually goes into not being worried about money and about provisions because you have already cast that upon Him in the prayer Give us this day our daily bread, and so live like that. And it comes to the end, verses 33-34, But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. God takes care of us. Prayer and pain, prayer connected with pain and fear and anxiety, this is what this passage is about. We can cast upon Him. We have this passage in I Thessalonians 5:17, prayer is an ongoing web of activity: Pray without ceasing. Christ-Centered Learning Anytime, Anywhere 17 of 17