Sermon
Teach Us To Pray: Our Father
Sermon Abstract
TEXT
“Jesus said, “This is how you should pray: “Father, may your name be kept holy.” Luke 11:2A NLT
CIT
Jesus taught his disciples a pattern of prayer that begins by focusing on the greatness of God rather than the size of our needs.
CIS
Every believer should be accustomed to a life of prayer that both connects them with God and God with them by focusing on the greatness of our heavenly father first.
SO
The hearer will better understand the first posture of prayer is to put in perspective the greatness of our God before everything else.
TITLE
Teach Us To Pray: Our Father
Sermon Outline
ME
A few years back I made a new friend to go hunting with. Hunting friends are rare and hard to find because so much has to line up, but having been to this guy's house and seeing all the animals on the walls, I knew this guy did more than walk into the woods with a hunting rifle. He hunted. I knew I had a lot to learn.
On our first hunt, I realized that over the course of my life I had done a lot of sitting in the woods with a gun, but not much hunting.
He said something to me that I haven’t forgotten.
“You’ve got to see them before they see you. If you do that, half the job is done.”
We crawled through the brush. We slithered down ravines. We scanned the fields for turkey.
Finally, about 1 PM, a group of turkeys came at us so fast it was almost self-defense.
That one trip changed my whole view of hunting because it was no longer just about sitting in a stand or a blind. It opened my eyes to the fact there was a whole world of knowledge I hadn’t even known existed.
WE
It stands to reason that when it comes to things of the spirit, there are whole realms of knowledge we either currently have no idea exist or need to be reminded of and have our horizons expanded.
I believe today and over the next few weeks we need to expand the depth of our church prayer life.
There are a lot of ways to pray.
There are formalized prayers often referred to as liturgies that can be repeated, and they have their place.
The most popular of these is probably the book of common prayer.
For us, we will focus on Luke 11.
In Luke 11, the disciples came to Jesus and asked him to teach them to pray. This has become known as The Lord’s Prayer.
If you grew up in church, maybe you memorized it. If you didn’t grow up in church, perhaps you heard it on a TV show.
Let’s read it together in the King James Version.
“Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. Give us day by day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.” Luke 11:2-4 KJV
Today we begin a study that I believe will change your life and mine.
We’re going to go through this prayer together line by line to help us develop the prayer life Jesus taught.
Let’s pray.
GOD
The Father We Approach
“Our Father”
The first revelation is: who are we praying to?
Many people offer many prayers to many different things.
Some people pray to the earth. Some people pray to statues. Some people pray to their ancestors. Some people go out into the middle of the forest and commune with the trees.
“Our”
Nobody has cornered the market of God’s ear.
Your prayers are heard just as much as mine.
That’s not to say praying for each other isn’t relevant; it is. But we should realize that purely relying on others is not the way.
God designed us with the intent of having a personal relationship with each of us.
Further, regardless of race or family name, one thing we all have in common is our heavenly father.
“Father”
Where the difficulty with beginning a prayer with “Our father” comes in is that some of us have had poor examples of what a father is.
This is real, and it shouldn’t be overlooked.
God is meant to be your father in every sense of the word.
You can have an intimate, loving, lifelong relationship with God. You can feel safe with your Heavenly Father. He knows you. He knows everything about you. And He loves you with an everlasting, unconditional love.
What the word father literally means is, “one who imparts life and is committed to it.”
Not only does a father impart life, but a true father is committed to it.
Almost every morning, Haven will run to me as I leave for work to tell me to have a good day, make good friends, and give me a kiss.
Some days she’ll hug me and say, “I wish you didn’t have to go.”
However, as much as I would like to stay home with her, I am more committed to feeding her and providing for her. It’s my joy to work and to see her grow.
If an earthly father, who falls short of the glory of God, can be committed to the life of their children, how much more can a perfect heavenly father?
Transition
We pray to OUR Father who is…
The King We Trust
“in heaven,”
In this sense, not only do we pray to our father who is committed to sustaining our life, but we declare that he is in fact above all.
Jesus isn’t just giving us God's address to send our requests to. He is reminding us where God reigns.
“The Lord has made the heavens his throne; from there he rules over everything.” Psalm 103:19 NLT
When we begin prayer, we aren’t talking to a Father who is trying to gain control.
We’re talking to our father that already has it.
Prayer begins by remembering:
God is above government, diagnosis, economy, problems, and fears.
If He is in heaven, then nothing on earth is above Him.
The power of this is that it immediately puts our problems and lives into perspective.
Transition
We pray to Our father in heaven, and then we declare…
The God We Worship
“hallowed be your name.”
Look at the flow of this first line of prayer.
Our Father is about relationship.
In heaven is position.
Hallowed be your name is the proper response.
To hallow God’s name is to recognize Him as holy, separate, righteous, and worthy of honor.
This is more than knowing he is holy; it means our lives treat him as such.
God doesn’t become holier when we say these words; our hearts become more aligned with the truth that he is holy.
“Your name”
In scripture, a person’s name represents far more than a label. It often signifies their character.
It brings with it reputation, nature, and authority.
King David in the Old Testament said this about it:
“Some nations boast of their chariots and horses, but we boast in the name of the Lord our God.” Psalm 20:7 NLT
When Jesus teaches us to pray, “Hallowed be your name,” he’s teaching us to have the humility to begin a moment with God by saying, “May everything You are be honored above everything else in my life.”
YOU
Know Your Father
For some people, the word father brings comfort.
For others, it brings confusion, disappointment, or even pain.
Whether your earthly father was incredible or absent, neither of those are the standard. God is.
Look at these scriptures that help us understand God as a father:
“The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him.” Psalm 103:13 NLT
“Father to the fatherless, defender of widows—this is God, whose dwelling is holy.” Psalm 68:5 NLT
Honor His Name
Let your life honor what your lips proclaim.
When Jesus taught us to say, “Hallowed be your name,” or “Holy be your name,” he taught us to desire that God’s name be treated as holy.
The hard truth is if we honor God with our mouths but ignore Him with our lives, our prayers and practices don’t match.
The way we live should reflect the God we worship.
God’s word says:
“But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.”” 1 Peter 1:15-16 NLT
In different services, we keep revisiting the scripture because it’s a high bar to live by.
God believes within us is a capacity to be holy as he is holy because he created us to have that potential.
The question becomes: do we live to attain that potential?
Certainly, we do not attain that potential on our own, and prayer is the first step towards it.
Transition
To bring this to a close, the first line of the Lord's prayer leads us to one conclusion we must apply.
Give Him First Place
Before Jesus teaches us to pray for our needs.
Before we pray for forgiveness.
Even before guidance in daily life.
Jesus teaches us to put God first.
Every day, many things are competing for first place in your heart.
Your schedule, your worries, career, family, the phone in your pocket!
Many of you, during the few minutes of our time together, felt your phone notify you, and your focus went away from what God is doing right now and went to that digital device in your pocket.
Jesus teaches us to begin our prayers with one central truth:
Prayer doesn’t begin by trying to get God’s attention. It is about giving Him His rightful place in our lives.
When we say, “Our father in heaven, hallowed be your name.”