Download OUR FATHER, WHICH ART IN HEAVEN

OUR FATHER, WHICH ART IN HEAVEN
(John 1:12, 18; Matthew 6:9-13)
INTRODUCTION
The story is told of a Roman army that entered the Imperial City after
a great victory on the frontier. Crowds lined the highways for miles. A
rainbow of colors greeted the eye. Everyone was eager to catch a glimpse of
the Emperor in his splendor. Suddenly a little boy broke through the ranks
and ran toward the chariot of the Emperor. A soldier caught him. “You
cannot do that,” he said. “He is the Emperor!” Quickly the boy replied,
“Your Emperor, but my father!’
When we come to the Lord’s Prayer Jesus taught us to come to God as our
Father, not as our Emperor! He taught us to start our prayer with “Our Father,
which art in heaven.”
Last week I gave an overview of the Lord’s Prayer. In response to the
disciples’ request to teach them to pray, our Lord gives as a pattern for prayer with
what we call “The Lord’s Prayer.” In this prayer there is an address to God, three
petitions related to God and His work followed by three petitions related to our
needs, then concludes with a doxology of praise. These are the essentials of prayer
that is pleasing to God. I asked that you pray this prayer at least once a day this
past week. Now for the check up! How did you do?
Another point I made last week was that we need to pray the Lord’s prayer
on three levels: with our lips, our minds, and our heart. Today we will consider
how to pray the Lord’s Prayer with our minds in gear, i.e. with an expanded
understanding of what’s involved in addressing God as our Father.
What are some of the things involved in addressing God our Father?
BECAUSE THIS IS HOW JESUS KNEW GOD
First we need to see that addressing God as Father was Jesus’ favorite way
of addressing God.
Over 165 times in the four Gospels Jesus refers to God as “Father.” This is
absolutely amazing. Jesus called God his father almost exclusive of any other way
of speaking about God.
What is amazing is that calling God “Father” was revolutionary for that day.
What was revolutionary about this emphasis of Jesus is that in the Old Testament
the term ‘father’ is rarely used of God.
January 22, 2017
Corntassel CP Church
Page 1
Why did Jesus refer to God as Father so many times? Some believe that
Jesus may have wanted to soften the Old Testament view of God from a God who
is harsh, very demanding, unapproachable, and who thundered from Mt. Sinai His
laws, commandments, and punishments. But this is not an accurate view of the OT
picture of God. I recall that Abraham was called ‘the friend of God.’ Abraham
has an intimate relationship with a loving God. Moses was said to have talked to
God ‘face to face.’ This is another picture of a close relationship with God.
Solomon saw himself as a child in the presence of God. David knew God as his
Shepherd, as His Rock, as His Deliverer, etc. Hosea pictures God as a grieving
husband over his unfaithful wife.
No, the Old Testament gives us a picture God who is merciful, forgiving,
loving, and gracious, although it does emphasize that God is righteous, holy, pure,
and who deals seriously with sin.
I believe that Jesus spoke of God as Father primarily because this is how
Jesus knew God. Remember that Jesus is the second Person of the God-head. He
is the eternal Son of God. He had always known God as Father because for all
eternity the Father and the Son has shared their life, their glory, and their love for
one another. When Jesus became a man He continued that relationship with the
Father and He wants his disciples to know the Father in the same way as He did.
He wants us to know the Father in the same way.
FATHER HELPS US TO SEE GOD AS A PERSON
Another reason why Jesus wants us to pray to God as our Father is that it
helps us to know God as a Person. We are coming to a Person, a heavenly Person,
in our prayers, not just to a force in the universe or a generic Being who people
refer to as a “higher power.” We are not coming to the “First Cause,” as the
philosopher Aristotle saw him, nor to the “Ground of all Being,” as theologian Paul
Tillich saw him, nor to the “Force” as Star Wars movies refer to God. When we
pray we are coming to our heavenly Father, a Personal Being, someone we can
know, speak to, and commune with. Jesus wants us to address God as “Our Father
which art in heaven” because He wants us to know the Father as a Person.
Some today hesitate to call God “Father” very much because of political
correctness. But that is a grave mistake in my view. One of the problems I have
with the “gender-neutral” language in today’s religious talk is that so impersonal..
God is personal and the image of Father gives us the right image of His strong,
caring, protecting, and providing love for us. When we remove all masculine titles
and pronouns for God in the Bible and replace them with the neutral terms what do
we have? We have a very bland and impersonal view of God. If we persist in this
we will lose our sense of an intimate relationship with the God and Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus wants us to address God in prayer as “Our Father”
January 22, 2017
Corntassel CP Church
Page 2
because we are praying to a Person, not an abstract idea or a bland, impersonal
Being.
PRAYING TO GOD AS OUR FATHER MOVES US TO REFLECT ON
HOW THIS IS POSSIBLE
When we pray to God as our heavenly Father we are to focus on our
relationship of a child before God. We should expand our thinking in our prayer
on how this is possible.
We should remember the part that Jesus played in bringing us to the
Father.
It is clear that it is through Jesus Christ we come to the Father. He said, "I
am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except
through me.”
When we pray “Our Father” let’s remember that we are able to come to the
Father only through Jesus Christ. How does Jesus bring us to the Father? It is by
his redemption on the Cross that we are reconciled to God. It is because of Jesus’
willingness to come to earth to be our Savior, our Sacrifice, our Righteousness that
God is our Father and that we are his children. Belief in Jesus is essential for
becoming a child of God.
John 1:12 NKJV But as many as received Him, to them He gave the
right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name:
In addressing God as Father we should thank Jesus for enabling this
relationship to take place. When we come to the Father we are coming in the name
of His Son.
We also should remember the part that the Holy Spirit plays in our
relationship to God as our Father and we His children.
We become God’s children through the work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy
Spirit is the One who regenerates us, i.e. gives us a new heart, i.e the new birth.
The Holy Spirit also is the One who gives us the Spirit of adoption and testifies to
us of our relationship to God as our Father. This is what Paul tells us:
Romans 8:15-17 NKJV For you did not receive the spirit of bondage
again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry
out, "Abba, Father." (16) The Spirit Himself bears witness with our
spirit that we are children of God, (17) and if children, then heirs….”
When we pray the Lord’s Prayer we should thank the Holy Spirit for His
renewing work in our lives, the sense of sonship He gives us, and His continuing
presence with us
January 22, 2017
Corntassel CP Church
Page 3
Thirdly, we are to remember God’s great love for us as our heavenly
Father.
When we pray the Lord’s Prayer we are to focus on His great love for us.
1Jn 3:1 See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we
should be called children of God! And that is what we are!
The love of the Father is what should be emphasized when we address God
as Father. God the Father’s love is the overflow of the love between God the
Father and the Son from all eternity.
Now I am aware that some people have had a bad experience with their
earthly fathers and it may be difficult to think of God as Father because of this.
But let’s think about it. We all have imperfect fathers so we can’t let a bad
relationship with an earthly father determine our relationship with our heavenly
Father. Why? Because our heavenly Father is perfect. He is the perfect father.
Everything that a sinful earthly father is not, He is.
We are to look at our heavenly Father not through the eyes of our experience
with an earthly father, but through the eyes of Jesus who knows the Father
perfectly.
Jesus wants us to get to know God as Father and He want us to address him
in prayers as “Our Father, which art in heaven” because He wants us to experience
the love that the Father has for us.
WHICH ART IN HEAVEN
Not only does Jesus want us to address God as our Father, but he adds:
“which art in heaven.”
Why does Jesus want us to add ‘which art in heaven?’ I believe that it is to
balance out his emphasis on the familiarity we have with God the Father, whereby
we even call Him “Abba” a term of endearment, with the fact that we are coming
to the exalted Sovereign of all the universe. We need to balance out our view of
God as the One who is intimately interested in us as our Father as well as the
highly exalted One who is far above us. Isaiah the prophet struck this balance in
Isaiah 15:15
Isa 57:15 For thus says the High and Lofty One Who inhabits eternity,
whose name is Holy: "I dwell in the high and holy place, With him who
has a contrite and humble spirit, To revive the spirit of the humble, And
to revive the heart of the contrite ones.
When we pray “Our Father which art in heaven” we are to remember that
God is the high and lofty One who inhabits eternity, whose name is holy. We are
January 22, 2017
Corntassel CP Church
Page 4
coming to the Creator of all the Universe, we are coming to the Sovereign Ruler of
all. If we leave out the idea that God is the high and lofty One who inhabits
heaven, we will have a tendency to see God only in too familiar of terms. He
becomes more our buddy, rather than our heavenly Father. God is not our ‘buddy’
He is the holy God who is far above us. But if we leave out the fact that we are
coming to our Father, we will have a tendency to see God as cold and detached
from our real need. God is also the One who dwells with those of a “contrite and
humble” spirit. Jesus balances this by saying we are to address God as , “Our
Father, which art is heaven.”
OUR FATHER
One more word in this opening address to God that Jesus taught us. He said
address God as “Our Father.” What does the word ‘our’ imply?
There are three thoughts I can have on this. One thought is that it shows is
that Jesus meant for us to pray this prayer together, as we do. Two, it shows us
that we can pray for each other using the petitions of this prayer. We can pray for
someone to relate to God as their heavenly Father. We can pray that others would
want to hallow God’s name, desire for God’s kingdom to come, be willing to do
God’s will. That God would provide their daily bread, forgive them of their sins,
not lead them into temptation and to deliver them from evil. This is not a bad way
of praying intercessory prayers for others.
But another thought is that it brings us into Jesus’ prayer circle. It implies
that He is praying to His Father and our Father for us. When we pray the Lord ’s
Prayer we should be conscience that we are entering into that eternal prayer circle
of Jesus who is interceding for us in heaven and of the Holy Spirit who is
interceding for us in our hearts.
When we pray “Our Father” we are not praying alone, but with one another
and with Jesus and the Holy Spirit.
CONCLUSION
There is much depth of meaning in addressing God as “Our Father which art
in heaven.” It is filled with meaning and personal intimacy. How we approach
God in prayer tells us a lot about how we view God and how we relate to God.
Jesus said for us to address God as “Our Father, which art in heaven.” Don’t
just use the address in a mindless way, without thought or understanding. Use it to
expand your prayers to include your thoughts about Jesus and the Holy Spirit.
Jesus wants us to see God as a Person, not just a force, etc. He wants us to
express our family relationship to God as Father/child. He wants us to know the
deep, deep, Fatherly love of God. He wants us to know God as He knows Him.
January 22, 2017
Corntassel CP Church
Page 5
He wants us to see God not just as our Father, but also our Father who is in heaven,
the One who has a sovereign plan and the power to carry out that plan.
So let’s learn to pray as Jesus taught us to pray. Let us address God as “Our
Father, which art in heaven.” As you pray the Lord’s Prayer this week spend more
time thinking about the implications of address God as “Our Father who art in
heaven.”
Amen? Amen!
January 22, 2017
Corntassel CP Church
Page 6