Kingdom As Commonplace: Sermon on the Mount - Intercession

All right.

New screens.

Like it.

Cool.

That's a weird way to start.

Sorry about that.

Well, let's uh start actually today.

I think it'd be a little tone deaf if uh we're gonna teach on the Lord's Prayer not to start by prayer.

So if you guys uh don't mind joining me, uh I just want to pray for us before we jump in.

Uh Lord, we uh we thank you that you love us.

Uh or let me uh again, Father.

We uh we start there and just we say, Father, thank you for uh for loving us.

Father, thank you for uh allowing us to have a way to uh commune and to uh just connect with you, Lord, this this beautiful uh just creation of prayer, God, uh, where we get to uh just really uh draw near to you, Lord, and uh and and recognize and and know that God, that you are our ruler and creator of all things, God, that all things are in your hand, God, and that we uh as your children, Lord, um we get to rest in the beauty of that, God.

And so I just pray this morning, God, uh, would you just uh through your spirit uh open open our eyes to things you want us to see, Lord, through this prayer that Jesus has taught us, Lord.

Um and I just pray, God, that we would just be encouraged, uh just through the the reality of the gospel and uh just how we have uh relationship and restored life and new life and abundant life and eternal life through what Christ has done.

Uh so we just pray this in your name, Jesus.

Amen.

All right, so uh really good to be here this morning.

Um and I just wanted to share just uh what a joy it is to uh you know be together as a church uh family here at Commonplace.

Uh my name is Kirkman the pastor here, and uh just grateful that we have an opportunity to be together once again to study the Word of God.

And and um we're gonna do uh really something kind of kind of neat today.

We're gonna look into what's called um if if you've maybe seen a TV show, uh they have sometimes they have what's called like these one-offs, like these kind of like uh what's a better word for it?

Uh the something that where you can kind of just dive into like one particular character, one particular theme throughout.

That's like a bigger one.

So we're gonna do that today is we're gonna look at uh this passage that Jesus tells us.

Because last week we did, we went through uh this this portion of scripture, and and yet as I was kind of praying through it, it just felt like, hey, we need to spend a little bit of time here and we need to kind of really dive in.

So um that's what we're gonna be doing.

It's a spotlight episode.

That's the word I was looking for.

Spotlight episode, that's what we're doing today.

And we're spotlighting this prayer that Jesus gives us.

And it's it's an incredible prayer.

And and as I was thinking through, my hope is that um we view this prayer from uh just the the way that Jesus intended it to be.

Now, let me explain that a little bit.

So I think for most of us, maybe maybe we did grow up in the church, maybe not, we we probably have some sort of like familiar, uh familiarization with this this text here or this prayer, the Lord's prayer.

It's it's probably not necessarily totally foreign to many of us.

And and yet I think here's the challenge with that.

Um sometimes we find ourselves, it just becomes something like repetition, right?

Like, think about if I was to uh all of a sudden just break out and lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance, right?

We automatically would have like a response.

Most of us would be able to just kind of to share, you know, uh, and and just we'd start getting that going, right?

And I think sometimes the same thing is with the Lord's Prayer, where it's it's it's something we can just memorize, right, which is a good thing, but often we miss what Jesus is trying to really uh do through that, right?

And and I think the way I was looking at it, I you know, I don't think Jesus really intended this prayer to become something we just simply recite.

I I think really he intended to become something that does this, that reshapes us and reforms us.

And and so here's really the framework I want to brought, I want to bring us through this morning.

It's it's something like this the Lord's prayer isn't merely like this formulaic thing, right?

In fact, it's a prayer that I believe is is is form it's formative.

It's it's not merely formulaic, it's it's formative.

Because we won't we don't want something that's so sacred, right, to just become so familiar that we stop even like hearing the the truth of what's being said.

Right?

We just begin repeating words though, but without letting those words do this, reshape our hearts.

Because that's what Jesus is calling us into, right?

Jesus didn't give his disciples information just to memorize, right?

He he gave them words that would do this, would slowly transform.

They would transform the people into what they were becoming, what he desired us to look like.

And so my hope is this we could take some time this morning.

We're gonna dive into this prayer because every sentence of this prayer I think does is formative.

It's forming something inside of us.

Every uh phrase, every petition, every acknowledgement, every every request, it's shaping, it's shaping our hearts, the hearts of God's people.

And so this morning, here's the focus.

Um, what kind of people is Jesus desiring to form through this prayer?

And the first thing I think he shapes is this it's our identity, right?

The Lord's prayer forms our identity.

Now let's read this opening uh line together.

It just says this our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.

So I don't think these words our Father are new to many of us this morning, like we talked about a little bit earlier.

So for a moment, I just want us to do this.

I want to pretend like um like they are, because I want us to do our best to hear the words of Jesus the way that his initial audience heard these words.

Okay, so for Jesus' audience, right, they're sitting around, they're hearing these words, this idea of God the Father, this is mind-blowing.

This is this is shocking, right?

This is even scandalous because primarily, Hebrew audience, there was a people group who spent generations there referencing God with names like like um Jehovah or Yahweh or Adonai.

But this term Abba, Father, right, that that wasn't typically placed on the God of Israel, right?

Israel, according to their worldview, they had a father, right?

According to that, their father was, of course, Father Abraham, right?

And Father Abraham had many sons, and many sons of Father Abraham, and you guys know the song, okay.

Uh, if you don't know it, look it up, Google it.

But um, so yeah, here we have Jesus.

He is addressing this prayer to who?

Right?

It's not to Father Abraham, but to God.

God, our Father.

And so as Jesus chooses to uh this word father, right, that would have stopped people dead in their tracks.

Like, what in the world?

And I think I think the hope of that term, I think it should do the same for us.

We just kind of we say it very often, but do we actually reflect on what that is?

And this moment, Jesus, he's not he's not merely just bringing some sort of new uh terminology.

He's doing this, he's actually revealing a new relationship.

And notice he doesn't say this, he doesn't say my father.

He says, our father.

That's incredible, right?

Not just for those listening at the time, but but like I shared earlier, but for each one of us, even here today, if we're following Jesus, right?

Because before Jesus ever teaches us what to ask for, here's what he does: he reminds us who we belong to.

God, our creator, our father.

Right, and and here's what Jesus reveals with this acknowledgement here about identity and prayer.

It's prayer begins with relationship before it ever begins with requests.

That's the heart.

That's the heart Jesus is teaching us in this first portion, right?

Because relational connection to our heavenly father, right?

What Jesus is pointing to is the reality that it's through his work, it's through Christ's work, through what he's accomplished, through his death, through his resurrection, right?

The gospel.

We talked about that earlier, right?

The distance that sin had created.

Well, Christ, right, he stepped in, he overcame.

And from that, he adopted, he adopted those who receive his work into this new family.

And and not because humanity suddenly was worthy of it, right?

But because Christ makes us worthy.

Paul would write later in Romans, he would say, We receive a spirit of adoption, right, by whom we call cry, Abba Father, right?

And that's that's like revolutionary.

That that should blow our minds, right?

The God who spoke galaxies into existence, right?

This God, the God who formed mankind from dust, this God who has no beginning, no ending, right?

He has no rival, right?

He invites redeemed sinners to call him father.

That's that's incredible.

And that changes the way we engage with him and how we reflect him.

Because if you think about it, healthy children, right, they naturally reflect the character of that father.

And it reminds us that we don't we don't become children by imitation.

We imitate and we reflect because we're already his.

We reflect the one who loves us, the one we know.

And so as we spend time with our father, we slowly begin to look more like our father.

And so that's why Jesus begins right here, right?

He doesn't he doesn't begin with daily bread, he doesn't begin with forgiveness, temptation.

He starts with identity.

Because identity, well, it it always shapes everything that follows.

And so then Jesus adds these words.

He says, Hallowed be your name.

So, all right, this word hallowed, um I it's not really a word we use too often in our in our conversations, is it right?

I don't think many of us walked in church this morning and we're like, man, it's a hallowed day outside, or have uh, you know, uh hallowed hello.

Like I just don't think that's it's a rare word.

So with that being true, what what is this what does this mean?

So hallowed is is is this it it simply means uh it means holy, it means set apart, completely unlike anyone or anything else.

And so here's what I love.

In this hallowed, right?

God isn't simply described as holy, right?

Holiness finds his definition in him, right?

He he is holiness within itself.

So that means he's not just simply righteous, he defines righteousness.

He's not simply set apart, he is, right?

But everything else finds its distinction because he alone is utterly like anything else in all creation.

Meaning our heavenly father, right, is not merely bigger than our earthly fathers, it's categorically, he's categorically different.

And could he every earthly father, even the very best ones, the reality is they have limitations, right?

We grow tired, make mistakes, say things we wish we could take back, but we forget, we fail.

But Jesus reminded us our Father in heaven, he set apart, and he knows no limitations.

But he's perfect, perfect in all of his ways.

And so when it comes to prayer, uh something we begin uh by highlighting, uh it's not something we begin by highlighting our issues or or our challenges or our struggles, right?

Jesus is offering something different.

Really, that prayer doesn't begin by magnifying our problems, prayer begins by magnifying our Father.

That's that's the order.

Because here's the reality because the bigger that God the Father becomes in our hearts, honestly, the smaller everything else begins to feel.

And what that is right there, that's formation.

That's a formation.

Every time we begin with this prayer, our Father, hallowed be your name.

We're reminding something, reminding our souls whose family we belong to, whose character we're being shaped into.

We're reminded of who holds all things together.

What a powerful picture we have.

And we're reminded that it's Jesus.

Jesus is the one who establishes our identity as a child of God.

It's Jesus who allows us to be adopted in.

It's that reminder that Jesus, he immediately then begins to shape everything else, right?

Because children, children who know who their father is eventually begin to care about what their father cares about.

Here's the next words that Jesus gives us.

It says, Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

So the next place Jesus points to is this very, I would say, relevant space that we exist and we know in our human in your humanity, right?

Our human existence or experience.

It's the personal kingdoms.

These personal kingdoms we tend to desire to build for ourselves.

And then offering this from God, offering of a kingdom that's like no other.

God's kingdom, right?

The kingdom of God, like no other.

And Jesus is calling his disciples to do this, to desire God's kingdom before all other kingdoms.

And here's what I believe he's showing us is prayer, it's it's not designed to convince God to join our agenda, right?

Prayer is designed to align our hearts with his, our kingdoms that we put out with his kingdom, right?

That's what Jesus is forming, it's alignment.

So why align with God's kingdom, right?

Over over just pursuing our own?

Uh let's do some reflection on that, okay?

Let's reflect on the offerings of the kingdom, kingdoms in our current world, okay?

We're calling these the kingdom of man.

And let's ask, how is that going for us?

Right?

What's our current war count these days?

Any concerns about like economic position we might find ourselves in this world right now, in our country, right?

How about the potential for disease?

I mean, uh, you know, nothing big.

We're just just coming off like a you know diarrhea epidemic that's coming around, right?

How about the environment, right?

Nothing like having these like you know uh floods and and like uh tornadoes in our backyard this summer.

So how are we doing?

Right?

These individual, man-led kingdoms, right?

Are are are we desiring more of those realities to come?

Do we want to see more of those?

I don't think many of us are asking, like God, like Lord, let your kingdom in which like uh explosive diarrhea runs rampant, come, right?

We're not doing that.

We're not like Lord, let your kingdom where innocent bystanders lose their lives over war.

Or for what?

But those those are the offerings of our human kingdoms.

Yet God's kingdom is different.

And here's the reality about every human kingdom.

Eventually it reveals this it's the inability to deliver what it's promised.

And that's exactly why Jesus came preaching something different, the kingdom of God.

Right?

It's not a kingdom of this world.

Jesus didn't come preaching like self-improvement for this man's kingdom, right?

He didn't come preaching political reform, not a better version of Rome.

No, Jesus is announcing something so different.

He says the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

And with that, he's not simply offering another kingdom, he's offering the perfect kingdom, a kingdom where righteousness reigns, where justice is perfect, where peace isn't just temporary, where love isn't conditional, where the king is actually good.

Right?

That's why Jesus He teaches us to pray, your kingdom come, your kingdom come.

Right?

He doesn't say, hey, pray that Lord bless my personal kingdom.

He teaches us to surrender ours.

It's a very different prayer.

And I think every time we pray, your kingdom come, we're saying, Father, I want what you want.

And I want it more than I want the things for my own kingdom.

And when that happens, here's what's taking place.

Isn't that formation?

That's formation.

It teaches our hearts to love what heaven loves, to value what heaven values, to pursue what heaven pursues.

Right.

Then Jesus, he continues, he says, then your will be done.

Now I think this may be one of the hardest prayers, parts of the prayer in all in all scripture, because here's what tends to happen, at least I know for me.

Um, we we tend to love God's will as long as it agrees with ours, right?

And we can find ourselves even fearful of what his will might entail, right?

If it doesn't match our plan, our desire.

But here's here's what I'm reminded of this morning.

Hopefully it's a reminder for for you as well, if that's something you struggle with.

If God truly is our Father, if He truly is good, then His will, His His will is never something for us to fear, it's something for us to trust.

Even when we don't understand it.

I want us to think about Jesus Himself, right?

The one who's teaching us this prayer.

He would later kneel, he would kneel in another, in a garden, right?

The garden of Gethsemane.

And what would he pray?

He said, Not my will, but yours will, your will be done.

And and here's what Jesus is modeling.

He's modeling, he's never asking us to pray for something he himself wasn't willing to pray for, right?

He he lived it, he lived it perfectly.

And so then notice this final phrase that says, on earth as it is in heaven.

And I don't I don't want us to miss this, okay?

I love that Jesus doesn't tell his disciples to escape the earth, right?

He's not saying, just get out of here.

That's not the case.

He he does this, he teaches us to pray that heaven would invade the earth.

That's a very different posture, right?

And why is this important to point out?

Because here's the thing, sometimes as followers of Jesus, we we may get into the mindset, like our goal is simply like, get me out of here, right?

But Jesus says something different.

He says, No, pray that heaven starts showing up here.

Pray that homes begin looking like a little bit more like heaven.

Pray that marriages begin reflecting heaven.

Pray that churches like this one become outposts, little these small outposts of heaven, right?

That neighborhoods would start catching glimpses of heaven.

That's the that's the prayer, right?

Revealing this, the kingdom of God isn't something we're merely like just waiting for someday.

It's something we're called to even display, even today.

That means every act of mercy, every act of forgiveness, every act of generosity, every act of justice, every time someone chooses truth over deception, grace over bitterness, humility over pride.

Here's what happens the kingdom breaks through.

These little glimpses, like these are little previews, they're they're little reminders that heaven is touching earth, and that's what Jesus is teaching us to long for, right?

Not simply heaven later, but heaven beginning to shape the way we live now.

And and the more we pray, your kingdom come, here's what happens, the less satisfied we become with building our own kingdoms.

And then that's exactly what prayer is supposed to do, right?

It slowly loosens our grip on these little kingdoms that we get so so we hold so tightly to.

And so so we can joyfully live inside of his kingdom if we let those go.

And so don't miss what Jesus is also doing through this prayer.

You see, the Lord's prayer, it's centering and forming our priorities, it's teaching us that before we ask God to change our circumstances, we we we want to ask him to shape our hearts.

That's that's the hope.

That's what the child the children of the Father desire.

His kingdom, his will, his glory.

Now, now here's what's beautiful.

Once Jesus, once he establishes that identity, once he gives us this uh posture for our priorities, he arrives at this place where most of us naturally begin our prayers, our needs, right?

Because once we know who our father is, and once we've surrendered ourselves to what our father desires, well, now Jesus says this.

Jesus says, Bring your needs to him, bring your request.

And that's where we're going next.

It says, give us this day our daily bread.

And here's what this reveals it's the Lord's Prayer, it forms our dependence.

Now, now I don't know about you.

If um if I were writing this prayer, I'd probably start like this like God, um, here's everything I need.

Here's my bills, here's my health, here's my family, right?

Here's my concerns, here's my stress, here's my schedule.

Here, how about it?

And yet, Jesus, he intentionally waits.

Because I think I think this is true.

Until we know who our father is, until we desire what our father desires, we'll just misunderstand the purpose of God as provider, as being dependence of God.

Because daily bread, it's not simply about receiving things.

It's more than that.

It's about learning dependence.

That's what he's showing.

Notice Jesus doesn't say, give us this year's bread.

Right?

He doesn't say give us a retirement bread.

He doesn't say, hey, give us enough that we'll never need to trust you again.

He says, today's bread, daily dependence.

And you know, I think I'll be open.

This dependence, this level of dependence, that's difficult for us.

I know it's hard for me.

Right?

We're a self-sufficient society.

And why wouldn't it be difficult?

We love control.

We love certainty.

We love knowing we've got enough.

Enough money, enough security, enough savings, enough plans, enough insurance, enough backup plans for our backup plans, right?

And listen, none of those things are inherently wrong, right?

Wisdom, yes, plans.

Scripture celebrates wisdom.

But Jesus reminds us that provision and dependence, they're not necessarily the same thing, right?

Because it's entirely possible to have provision without ever depending on the true provider.

Let me explain that.

There could be this idea, or there is this idea of imitation provisions.

I'll give us an example.

So I don't know if you've been to the grocery store lately.

Um and the whole idea of inflation, okay?

Right?

Well, you know, a few years ago you walk in with some money, you get like maybe a few items.

Now you get like half an item.

So um, but but here's what we started doing.

Uh, well, we try to do it, we're not great at it, but we we try to start buying these off-brand products, right?

So, you know, no fruit loops, you get fruit whirls, right?

Um Dr.

Pepper becomes Dr.

Thunder, right?

So you from Walmart.

It's good stuff.

Um, and and you you turn to the imitation, right?

The off-brands.

And that's not the end of the world, right?

We're uh we're surviving off of dramen noodles, which are uh it's called ramen with some issues, dramen.

Yeah, okay, dad jokes.

There's nothing wrong with off-brand imitations, right?

And I'm not here to start grocery store debates, but sometimes imitations, yeah, they work just fine.

But here's what Jesus is teaching us.

When it comes to the deepest needs of our soul, there are no acceptable uh substitutes.

Right?

So created things can entertain us, but but they're not ever designed to sustain us.

Don't miss that.

Everything created has limits, right?

It's true, with the exception of the one who created it all, our creator God.

Right?

Only our creator God exists without limits, without boundaries.

And so that's why Jesus teaches us to ask the Father for daily bread, because he's slowly teaching his children, right, who it is that actually sustains life, that actually keeps breath in our lungs so that we can live.

And as I was studying this text this week, I couldn't help but think about um something that's been true in my my life for a long time, this idea of like breath being sustained.

Like uh I've I've had to deal with asthma for like since I was a kid.

Great time, right?

And and some pretty severe seasons.

Actually, there was a time I found out horses are like my biggest trigger now.

Uh we went to medieval times, that didn't go well.

Um, but but thankfully, here's the thing modern medicine gave gives me and many of us something incredible.

My my rescue inhaler, right?

Anyone have one of those things?

Yeah.

And and now, listen, I I try not to leave home with that one because I never want to meet a horse.

But um, and and I'm I'm grateful for it, right?

Uh that's so silly.

Uh but here's the thing, it's helped me breathe on countless occasions, right?

It's an incredible gift, and I'm so thankful for it.

But here's something else I know.

My inhaler doesn't actually sustain my life.

Yes, it helps me for a moment, yet one day, when the Lord decides my earthly life is complete, no inhaler in this world will be able to give me another breath.

Ultimately, breath, breath belongs to God.

He sustains it.

He breathes air into our lungs, right?

At conception, and he takes when life comes to completion.

See, as a pastor, I've um had like the sacred privilege, I believe, of sitting beside people in um in some of the most vulnerable and holiest of moments.

I've stood in hospital beds, sat with families as they watched their loved ones just finish their race.

And and and I even had the um the journey of my own mother and being you know while she took her final breath.

And if you've ever experienced this moment, you know there there's a sound unlike any other.

That one final breath, and then silence.

And in those moments, you realize something.

It's that breath has never, it's never truly belonged to us.

It's always been borrowed, it's always been a gift.

Right?

It takes us back to Genesis and listen to how humanity begins.

It says the Lord God formed man from dust of ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became what?

A living creature.

Did you guys catch that?

Like dust.

It couldn't breathe itself alive.

And I point that out because here's what I feel like it's just important to reflect and be reminded of every breath we've taken this morning has been a gift.

It's been a gift from your father.

Every heartbeat, every sun, every sunrise, every meal, every relationship, every opportunity, everything good has ultimately come from him.

And that's why Jesus says, give us today this daily bread.

He's teaching us to recognize what has always been true.

We've never been self-sustaining, we've always been sustained by God.

And so here's where I think this prayer becomes really practical here.

Because every one of us has the tendency to turn good things into ultimate things, starting to develop these like rescue inhalers for life.

Money becomes our rescue inhaler.

Certain relationships become our rescue inhaler, careers become our rescue inhaler, right?

Control becomes our rescue inhaler.

And these rescue inhalers, sure, they may be helpful for the journey, but they're never meant to sustain and become the source of our lives.

Only the Father holds that place.

Only the Father truly sustains.

Only the Father gives breath.

Only the Father gives life.

That's why prayer, this prayer here is so beautiful.

Because it gently pulls our hands off of these substitutes.

And God is calling us to let go of those.

Because only the Father can do what we truly need.

And every time we pray, give us this daily bread.

The reality says, Father, everything I have, everything I need, everything I am, has always come from you.

Always.

And it brings us to these final moments of these movements of these prayers, of this prayer.

It says, forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.

And so here's what we see here.

Ultimately, the Lord's Prayer, it forms our repentance.

So after reminding us who our Father is, after teaching us to desire his kingdom, teaching us to depend on his provision, Jesus turns to what every child of God continually needs.

Grace.

Grace.

It says, lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

And there's something just beautiful about the full order of this prayer that Jesus gives.

He begins with relationship.

Because repentance wasn't designed to earn the Father's love, right?

Repentance is a response of people who recognize, recognize the love of God.

That's an important distinction.

Because sometimes we begin thinking that Christianity is primarily about like trying harder, it's about doing better.

It's about cleaning ourselves up enough that we God will accept us, right?

But that's that's not the gospel.

The gospel says, because Christ has accepted us, we we now can continually return to the Father.

We can turn to him within repentance.

And so repentance is this, it's not merely just feeling bad about our sin.

I believe it's returning home.

It's turning back.

Jesus begins to forgive us our debts.

And I love that Jesus, he's using the language of debt, okay?

Because debt creates an obligation.

We can never just satisfy ourselves.

We've we've all experienced some sort of debt, I'm sure, right?

We live in a country where, well, we got a lot of debt.

Um, but but you borrow something, right?

You owe something, something must be repaid.

And Jesus says, hey, sin works the same way, it creates a debt.

Because the reality of sin is this.

Sin, it's a condition every one of us finds ourselves in.

We've all inherited it, right?

It's a condition that our human, if we consider ourselves humans and not like AI bots, like we all exist within this.

And the reality is this like sin has been uh a received inheritance for all of humanity since the fall of man.

That's the genetic disposition, right?

That's the DNA of being a human.

That's what we've been handed down, right?

It contains the presence of sin.

And maybe that's hard for us to hear, or we don't want to hear that, and I get that.

But think about it this way.

Um, like so when I was born, um, I don't remember it that well, but uh I was handed, I wasn't like handed like an interior or like exterior uh design plan from God, right?

He didn't like uh like how I wanted to be formed, how I want to be created.

God didn't sit me down and walk me through the options, right?

Internal design.

He wasn't didn't say like, hey, we're thinking we're gonna go with like overly sensitive, maybe some space in that corner there for like some crippling anxiety, um, you know, toss a little ADHD in there to spice things up a little bit, right?

Um, like I that that was not a process that I was a part of, my creation process, right?

But but that was the plan, right, that that God had and wasn't you know something I was I was privy to.

And and now most of these like wonderful uh internal realities were inherited, passed down, right?

Similar to like external.

Like most of us had, if we've been given the design plan an opportunity, we probably settled maybe on some differences in the way we, you know, with our our external looks, right?

Maybe some of us would take the non-bunyan options, like myself, but um once again, those are exterior designs, those are inherited.

But I share this to point out when it comes to sin, or there's no option for human design without it.

That's the reality of the fall of man.

Genesis 3.

It says the curse came upon all of humanity.

It says, cursed is the ground because of you.

What's happened is we've inherited iniquity.

It's not, it's it's it's the reality.

Sin isn't just something we do, it's innate to who we are.

Sin creates an offense.

An offense, of course, to those who we might sin against or to us when we've been sinned against, but ultimately, sin's main offense is found against who?

Well, not merely against other people.

Ultimately, it's against God Himself.

You see, you see, David understood this, right?

After one of the darkest seasons of life, after adultery, after murder, right?

After being confronted by Nathan, David cries out in Psalm 51, he says, Against you, he's talking to God, and you alone have I sinned.

Now listen, David certainly sinned against other people, right?

Bathsheba suffered, Uriah suffered, Israel suffered, consequences they were they were real.

But David understood something profound.

Every sin is ultimately an offense against the holy character of God.

Why is that?

Because sin rejects his design.

Every sin really chooses our kingdom over his.

Every sin says, my will instead of yours.

But that's why forgiveness is such good news, right?

Because the debt we have we can never repay.

Jesus paid it, he paid it on the cross.

Right?

The one who taught this prayer would become the answer to this prayer.

The one teaching us to uh ask for forgiveness would purchase that forgiveness with his own blood.

So I think it's important that we don't ever separate the Lord's Prayer even from the cross.

This prayer points to it.

Every request for mercy, it ultimately finds its answer in Jesus.

And I now here's something I think worth noticing.

Jesus, he doesn't simply teach us to receive forgiveness, he immediately says, We have also to forgive others.

Means if we've experienced grace, we respond to grace.

If we experience forgiveness, we respond with forgiveness.

We become forgiving people, right?

And I know we don't do this perfectly, but progressively, right?

Just like every other part of this prayer, it's formation.

Jesus is teaching his children to resemble their father.

Here's the last part.

It says, Finally, uh, lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

Um, now I'll briefly say um this verse has generated a lot of discussion over centuries, okay?

Because there's a challenge we see with uh this petition here.

It's a translation struggle.

Right?

The Greek word here can take on some nuance, it translates of like testing and trial.

But here's what Jesus isn't stating.

He's not saying, you know, do not lead like the idea of path towards temptation, right?

What was communicating is that uh God is leading the opposite of the path of this world.

Like, like think of it this way: um, God, do not do not be like this world, right?

As the world leads me into temptation, God lead us in the opposite, right?

Lead us not into temptation.

It's this contrast of the world and God, right?

Because we're reminded in James, it says very clearly, God tempts no one.

So Jesus isn't saying the Father delights in leading his children towards sin.

Rather, he's teaching us to pray, Father, lead me away from the paths that destroy me.

And here's the thing every day there there are these roads before us, right?

This road towards towards life, and the other roads towards destruction.

This is sin, right?

One path leads towards this idea of freedom, the other leads us into bondage.

One reflects the kingdom, the other reflects, well, the world.

And and and listen, the reality is because of sin in our lives, none of us tend to drift towards holiness on our own.

We we tend to drift towards whatever's easiest, which which is why I think we need a father who does this, who leads us.

Right?

Think about um, you know, if if you do have kids, like a loving father doesn't simply point out danger and say, like, good luck, right?

He takes their hand, he walks with them, he steers them away from something that might destroy them.

And that's exactly what Jesus is teaching us to pray here.

Father, keep leading me, keep leading me.

Not because I'm strong enough, because you are.

Lead me, deliver me, protect me, form me.

Right.

That that's that's not the prayer of someone who's trying to earn even God's affection, right?

That's the prayer of a son, that's the prayer of a daughter, that's the prayer of someone who knows they have a father who is worth following, who is trustworthy.

And so let's just leave with some final questions.

Like when Jesus gave us this prayer, what was he really giving us?

Was it just simply giving us words to memorize?

Of course not.

Right?

Was he giving us that religious formulas?

Not at all.

He was giving us a way of life, he was giving us a rhythm, a pattern.

It's a prayer that slowly shapes the hearts of his people.

Because here's the thing, every time we pray, our Father, we're reminded of who we belong to.

Every time we pray, your kingdom come, we're reminded of what matters most.

Every time we pray, give us our daily bread, we're reminded who truly sustains us.

Every time we pray, forgive us, we're reminded of just the extent of grace we've received and the extent to which we respond and give to others.

This prayer isn't just simply something Jesus wanted his disciples to say, it's something he wants his disciples to become.

And every time we pray it, here's what happens: the father is quietly, he's shaping his children.

And so maybe that's the invitation for some of us this morning.

Not to simply know this prayer, right?

That's good.

Not simply recite it, those that's not bad, but do this, let the prayer reshape us, right?

Become people who increasingly reflect the Father, the one whose name we hollow, who increasingly people who long for his kingdom, who long to depend on him for all things, who increasingly walk in forgiveness.

So the Lord's prayer, once again, it's not formulaic, it's formative.

And so as we leave today, not with just simply praying words, but having been changed by them.

That's our prayer.

And listen, if this whole Jesus thing is is new to you, I'm so glad you're here.

Um Jesus does offer us a way uh to the Father.

He says he is the only way.

And and that invitation is open to anybody.

Um when we turn from our sin and we uh turn to what he's done for us on the cross.

As we talked about forgiveness, that was a cost.

It was a cost of Jesus' life.

And yet he laid down his life so that we might live.

And so this morning, I just want to invite anyone maybe who's never taken that step towards Jesus.

Um I want to I want to just leave us with the Lord's prayer, but I also want to pray.

So I'm gonna ask the worship team to come up and uh we'll pray together.

Father, uh, who are art in heaven, uh, hallowed be your name.

Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Would you give us today our daily bread?

Would you forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us?

And would you lead us not into temptation?

Would you deliver us from evil?

Father, we thank you that um once again we're able to just speak words to you, Lord, but also, Lord, allow those words to to shape us and to change us and to form us and ultimately to to renew us and transform us, God.

God would would this prayer uh not just be something we just continue to recite, but it would be a way that we walk in our lives.

God, would you just remind us once again of your love?

Would you remind us of your grace?

Would you remind us that you are Jehovah Jireh, you are provider, and that God, we um we have the opportunity to desire the things you do, Lord.

That we pray for your kingdom come, Lord, not our personal kingdoms, Lord.

Would you just align our hearts with the beauty of your kingdom?

And God, as we uh just respond to uh your word this morning, God, I do pray for just a time of just stillness in our hearts, Lord.

Just reflection, reminder that you are the one who gives us breath, God.

You sustain each one of us.

And we thank you for that.

I pray in Jesus' name, amen.