Who Art In The Heavens
Matthew 6:9
Dismiss Grove KIDZ
MGCC 2000 years ago…
While doing life with Jesus, His guys saw Jesus do something that really blew them away! NOW – at first glance it is not what we would think it would be…
UNDERSTAND – it was not the walking on water, the opening of blind eyes, the casting out of demons, the healing of diseased skin or even the raising up people from the dead… that blew them away…
INSTEAD – it was Jesus’ prayer life.
LIKE – they had never seen anyone pray like Jesus.
AND LISTEN – they had seen people praying their entire lives.
I MEAN – prayer was a regular part of their day.
Temple worship involved several times of prayer each day – where a priest would enter the ‘holy place’ and offer incense to God. AND MGCC - they no doubt had heard many Pharisees pray with eloquence and splendor… BUT - they had never seen anyone pray like Jesus.
QUESTION – wouldn’t you love to have a ring side seat to the Son of God praying to the Father?
I MEAN – when JESUS prayed it was beyond obvious that He was connecting to GOD in way like no one else ever had. And throughout the Gospels we see Jesus praying... a lot.
before HE began HIS ministry – Jesus prayed
when HE was attacked by the evil one - HE prayed
when HIS schedule got demanding and HE was tired and overwhelmed - He prayed
when HE had to make big decisions - He prayed
when HE suffered a lose - HE prayed
when HE was worried about HIS friends - HE prayed
when HE needed to pull away from the growing crowds and HIS growing popularity and get some perspective - HE prayed
when HE was concerned about the unity of those who would follow HIM - HE prayed
when HE faced a HUGE challenges and difficulties. HE - prayed
OKAY – so check out these words in Luke 11...
One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.” He said to them, “When you pray, say: “‘Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread. Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us. And lead us not into temptation.’ – Luke 11:1-3
YEAH – here a year plus into His ministry Jesus reminds His guys of the prayer that He first unveiled on the hillside during His Kingdom Manifesto.
A prayer we began a deep dive into last Sunday as we are continuing in our verse by verse study of the Gospel of Matthew (The King and His Kingdom).
AND REMEMBER...
the goal of this study is not to make you feel guilty about your prayer life. INSTEAD – throughout this study I just want to remind of the incredible reality that ‘you’ can connect to the Lord of the Universe though pray… SO THAT – you will be (encouraged, equipped and empowered) to pray more frequently and freely and naturally – to pray like Jesus.
When you boil it all down is simply, communicating, having a conversation with your heavenly Father…
That’s what prayer is.
Prayer is a believers communication with God the Father through the authority and person of Jesus Christ, assisted by the Holy Spirit.
How to use this prayer throughout this study.
- As a framework for your daily prayer...
pray this prayer stopping at each phrase turning it over In your. Or maybe pray a different phrase each... Like Monday, ‘Our Father who are in the heavens,’ Tuesday..
- As a way to help you rest in God’s presence...
Slowly repeated this prayer over and over... in the rhythm of your breathing, meditating on Scripture is very Biblical.
Our Father who art in the heavens, hallowed be your name, Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For Yours is the Kingdom and the Power and the Glory, forever and ever. Amen – Matthew 6:9-13
OKAY – let’s try a little meditation of this prayer.
SERIOUSLY – think about it...
For 2,000 years, wherever people who love Jesus have gathered, they have prayed this prayer…
IN FACT – this week, I watched the final service for Queen Elizabeth at the Chapel in Windsor Castle.
Some were estimating that a couple billion people around the world were tuning in.
And during that service the name of Jesus was unashamedly mentioned a lot. I wish I would have counted them... And the Lord Prayer was also recited.
And it was very powerful.
UNDERSTAND - as I said last week it is so CRAZY crazy, soo JESUS to pack so much power in a mere 72 words (that’s how many words are in the Greek text when you include the doxology at the end)…
AND LISTEN – the truths, the concepts and the insights that JESUS packed into this prayer contain the power to mold and reshape our lives entirely. Our individual lives. Our Church. Our community. Our world. Overstatement? Exaggeration? Not at all!
UNDERSTAND – in the coming weeks as we dive down deeper into this 2000 year old prayer given to us by JESUS Himself, we will see… that yes it is a powerful template for prayer… BUT – we will also see that it is so much more. We’ll see – that is a means, a key, a pathway to living the life we were created to live… and becoming the people we were intended to be.
LAST SUNDAY - we unpacked the first two words of this prayer, the word ‘Our’ and the word Father.’
Two very powerful and loaded words.
Our
UNDERSTAND – Jesus could not have picked a better word to start off this prayer.
I MEAN - in a single word Jesus calls us together… and unleashes ‘The Power Of OUR.
OUR – speaks of a shared experience – shared ownership, OUR – speaks of community – of relationship.
WHERE - Me and My produces isolation and loneliness…
OUR – produces community and family…
OUR - teaches us that...
we are not an only child in this family,
we are part of something so bigger than ourselves
it’s not just about me and my personal relationship with God. Yes, I have one... But it’s about us and our.
OUR...
breaks down walls
creates community
diffuses conflict
empower God’s dream for us, to become a reality
meets our innate needs to be both known and accepted
is the key to no one doing life alone
While some of us may prefer a more private faith and existence, perhaps even praying, “My Father,” the Lord’s Prayer calls us to a corporate life, a life shared with others, a life in which God works through each of us to bless each of us.
AMEN?!
NOW – there was a quote from the book, ‘Living the Lord’s Prayer, that I intended to share last week, but I skipped over it because of time...
Shane Hipps discusses the rise and apparent popularity of virtual community through the electronic media today. He writes:
In virtual community, our contacts involve very little real risk and demand even less of us personally. In this sense we experience the paradox of intimate anonymity.
This virtual community - functions a bit like cotton candy: it goes down easy and satiates our immediate hunger, but it doesn’t provide much in the way of sustainable nutrition. It spoils our appetite for the kind of authentic community to which Scripture calls us. . . .
If virtual community functions like cotton candy, then authentic community is more like broccoli. It may not always taste good but it provides crucial nourishment for the formation of our identity. Authentic community will undoubtedly be marked by conflict, risk, and rejection. At the same time it offers the deepest levels of acceptance, intimacy, and support.
The illusion of the virtual community will reap the wind in generations to come because it presumes that intimacy is compatible with anonymity. The two terms, however, remain mutually exclusive.
While email enables us to control the conversation—answering only what we want to answer when we want to answer it and with as much or little detail as we like—we evade real encounters that incorporate loads of nonverbal language and wrest control from us.
Authentic relationships cannot be formed in a virtual environment. At some point, we must lower all masks and surrender all controls whereby we may truly know and be known. Such is the power of our as it escapes our lips at the start of the Prayer.
Father
UNDERSTAND – no one before Jesus ever addressed God as Father or prayed to God as Father.
AND NOW – in this prayer Jesus invites us His followers to do the same.
MGCC – even though it is hard for 2000 years on the other side of Jesus and of this prayer...
THIS – is huge, this is a radical shift in our relationship with God!
YES – God is the Sovereign King of the universe – but we must never forget that we can approach Him confidently in prayer because we are His kids.
How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!
1 John 3:1
‘Our Father’ – the combination of the two terms binds us together as family and refuses to validate private faith. It acknowledges the new community – a family – to which we now belong...
MGCC - our faith finds its footing in ‘Our Father’ – an inch of lettering that bridges our seclusion from each other and the Lord. It declares good news and reorders the foundations of our lives – lives now lived in the context of love and family; lives now marked by security and companionship; lives now devoted to grace and mutual support.
AND – this morning we are going to look at the next 5 words of The Lord’s Prayer,
Who art in the heavens hallowed be Your Name…
AND LISTEN - these 5 words answer the ‘where is God when I pray to HIM’ question.
Who Art In The Heavens
NOW – I don’t know about you… but for about the first 30+ years that I prayed The Lord’s Prayer – I had always prayed Our Father who art in heaven.
THEN - one day while doing some studying on Matthew 6 and I discovered that the Greek word for heaven...
‘Ouranos’ (oo ran os)
Where we get our word for the planet Uranus is plural not singular.
UNDERSTAND MGCC – on that Galilean hillside 2000 years ago when Jesus taught us to pray He said,
"Our Father, the who is in the heavens."
AND LISTEN – the very moment I realized that the word heavens was plural… I was like… wow! No way…
That is soo awesome!
QUESTION – what’s the significance of this word heavens being plural…?
WELL – in order for us to grasp the significance, we need to understand that the Jewish people who lived in the time of Christ, had a concept of heaven that consisted of a first, second and third heaven.
The first heaven - is the atmosphere, the sky, the place where the birds fly... it’s the air we breathe.
The second heaven - is where the planets, stars and galaxies are.
The third heaven - is the dwelling place of God
Paul in 2 Corinthians 12, talks about a time when he was called up into the 3rd heaven.
UNDERSTAND B/S – Jesus was very intentional when He gave us this prayer…
The word ‘Our’ calls us into community,
The word ‘Father’ invites us into intimacy with our Creator, and...
The words ‘who art in the heavens’ reminds us of three very important truths.
God is great
God is near
There’s more going on than our eyes can see
I. God Is Great
QUESTION – have the things in your life ever seemed too big for you?
LIKE - have you ever faced something, a challenge, a difficulty, a situation that like a mid-western tornado came out of nowhere and threatened all that you have worked for or cared about?
Have you ever dreamed dreams that stir your heart, but seem to be too far out of reach?
Have you ever been afraid, confused, uncertain and unsure of what your future holds?
Have you ever wished that you were bigger, stronger, faster, smarter, braver, wiser, surer?
I don’t know about you, but I have felt all of those feelings before… THE TRUTH IS - many times life just seems to be too big for me. I MEAN – let’s face it, this world isn’t the safest place to pitch our tent.
AND – I know that I am not alone on this road.
UNDERSTAND – most of us constantly face GREAT problems, GREAT difficulties and GREAT challenges.
AND NOT ONLY THAT – but we seem to have this burning in our heart to dream dreams and have hopes that are much GREATER than we are.
AGAIN – we are not alone in this. Others have walked these paths before us.
ABRAHAM is called to leave everything he knew to become the father of a new nation. JOSEPH the little brother, dreams of saving his family and the world from a famine.
MOSES is asked to overcome his security and lead God’s people out of slavery. DAVID faces a giant that is so much bigger than he is and a crazy, insecure king that wants to kill him. JOSIAH a teenager becomes king and is called to bring revival to a nation that had turned their backs on God.
AN ORPHAN who becomes queen is told by her adopted father that she is the one God has chosen to save His people from genocide.
THREE MEN were asked to continue to trust in God as they were literally tossed into a blazing furnace.
PETER is not only challenged to not fear the storm and the waves crashing around him, but also to leave the safety of the boat and walk on water... A group of frightened, unstable, uneducated, defeated, financially challenged men were called on to take the Good News to the ends of the earth. PAUL, after an encounter with the risen LORD, is commanded to join the people he had been hunting down and killing, and then take the message of God to people he had despised his entire life.
AND UNDERSTAND – what these people needed and what we need as well, is not a great pep talk or great philosophy. WE NEED – a GREAT God.
AND LISTEN – in those words, “Our father who art in the heavens… Jesus reminds us that God is bigger and far above all of creation.
He reminds us of the GREATNESS of Our Father.
CHECKOUT… these incredible words from the prophet Isaiah… that speak about the GREATNESS of Our Father…
Who has measured the oceans in the palm of his hand? Who has used his hand to measure the sky? Who has used a bowl to measure all the dust of the earth
and scales to weigh the mountains and hills? (40:12)
The nations are like one small drop in a bucket; they are no more than the dust on his measuring scales. To him the islands are no more than fine dust on his scales. (40:15)
God sits on his throne above the circle of the earth, and compared to him, people are like grasshoppers.
He stretches out the skies like a piece of cloth and spreads them out like a tent to sit under.
He makes rulers unimportant and the judges of this world worth nothing. They are like plants that are placed in the ground, like seeds that are planted. As soon as they begin to grow strong, he blows on them and they die, and the wind blows them away like chaff.
God, the Holy One, says, "Can you compare me to anyone? Is anyone equal to me?" Look up to the skies. Who created all these stars? He leads out the army of heaven one by one and calls all the stars by name. Because he is strong and powerful, not one of them is missing. – Isaiah 40:12,15-26
QUESTION – have you ever really thought about...
HOW - awesome, great, amazing, powerful, huge and indescribable our God is?
I MEAN – there is no one like Him…
TO – who can you compare Him?
WHO – is His equal? I tell you who… no one!
YEAH – I really think David, nailed it 3,000 years ago when he said that the heavens declare the glory of God… AND – that the works of His hands are speaking day after day, and night after night making His GREATNESS known. Telling all how awesome our God is…
I MEAN – think about the planet we live on - Earth is a big hunk of rock. (24,000 miles around)…
YET – 1 million earths would fit into the Sun (our closet star)… YEAH - I’d say the sun is pretty big… 93 million miles away and it still can warm this entire planet.
BUT – as big as the sun is there are some stars so large that 500 million suns could fit inside of them.
The nearest star to earth is called ‘Alpha Centauri’ it is 4 ½ light years away… (one light year is 6 trillion miles)… This means if you traveled at the speed of light (186,000 per second)… even though you would reach the moon in 1 ½ seconds and the sun in 8 ½ minutes it would take you 4 ½ years to reach Alpha Centauri…
IF – you could travel 24,000 mph it would take you 120,000 years to get there.
Earth – here on stage
Furthest planet – the end of our parking lot
Nearest star - Baltimore
The star Betelgeuse is 520 light years away, it is one of the brightest stars on Orion’s belt. It’s diameter is 310 million miles… which means that if it were hollow, the earth could comfortably revolve around the sun inside this star..
Our solar system is part of a galaxy called the Milky Way… IT’S – 100,000 light years in diameter and has somewhere between 750 billion and 1 trillion stars…
AND - the Milky Way is just one of 125 billion galaxies according to estimates by the Hubble Space Telescope…
50,000 galaxies
Closest is Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy 25,000 light years
Furthest HD 1 – 13.5 billion light years away
Our Father who art in the heavens... Are you kidding me!
Sometimes people stumble over this vastness in relation to the apparent insignificance of man. It does seem to make us very small. But the meaning of this magnitude is not mainly about us. It’s about God… the reasons for ‘wasting’ so much space on a universe to house a speck of humanity is to make a point about our maker, not us..” - John Piper
AND LISTEN – the point it makes about Our Maker is that He is Great!
I Mean – no wonder the Psalmist cried in Ps 145:3 …
Great is the LORD and most worthy of praise; his greatness no one can fathom.
Just one more thing about the heavens declaring God’s glory… The whirlpool galaxy is 37 million light years away… AND – since it’s discovery in 1773 it has been one of the most popular and most photographed galaxy…
NOT – too long ago the Hubble took a picture of its core.
A core made up of trillions of stars. The image in the core is 1,100 light years (7 trillion miles) in size…
DO – you know what the core is shaped like?
An accident? No way... It’s a message, a statement!!!
MGCC – Our Father is GREAT!
He spoke and that which was not – was!
Slow down for a minute and think about that.
Out of nothing God created everything!
And He did it according to Genesis one in 6 days.
GOD has always existed (now tell me that doesn’t blow your mind). AND HE - has never been tired, confused, overwhelmed, taken by surprise or faced a situation He could not handle.
GOD is all powerful, ALL knowing and ALL present.
GOD’S power is constant, His love is secure; His character is true; and His will is being done.
GOD is BEFORE all things, OVER all things and he HOLDS all things together. The sun, he made it.
The oceans, he tells them where to go.
The stars and distant galaxies, He hung them there. The trees, mountains, rivers, waterfalls, snowflakes, lakes, fish, birds, insects, life… yeah all His too..
OKAY – I hope by now you can see what I am trying to say, Our Father is GREAT! AND YOU KNOW - whenever I really think about God and how great He is I am just blown away, amazed… awed…. I MEAN – it is so awesome to think about HIS GREATNESS when I am praying… especially when my problems seem so big and I seem so small.
UNDERSTAND...
IF GOD created all of this (and He did)…
IF HE – holds the oceans in the palm of His hands (and He does)…
IF HE – can reduce rulers to nothing…
THEN HE can handle whatever I am (you are) going through…
Our Father... who art in the heavens reminds us that God is great, and...
II. God Is Near
YES – our Father is in the heavens whenever we pray to Him. He is in the 3rd heaven (His heavenly dwelling) and He is in the 2nd heaven (every corner of this vast universe)...
AND – He is also (in the first heaven) right here, with us
UNDERSTAND - When you say, "Our Father who is in the heavens," you are not saying, "Our Father from a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away."
INSTEAD - You’re saying, "Our Father who is all around me." "Our Father who is as close as the air I breathe." "Our Father who is right here, right now."
Paul said In Acts 17 to the philosophers in Athens that the reason God is involved in the affairs of men is;
“so that men would seek him and perhaps find him, though he is not far from each of us. For in him we live and move and have our being..” Acts 17:27,28
MGCC - Our Father is not a distant deity or long distant Father. NO - He is with us!!!
AND LISTEN - because He is so close, we are never alone.
UNDERSTAND - there is something about being in the presence of someone who is stronger than we are, that soothes our fear and melts our terror.
A child's fears after a terrible dream go away, when he is in his parents room
A boy confidently walks by the bullies who had beat him up, because his older brother now walks beside him.
The wife who has had a terrible day when the whole world seems to be against her, rests in the arms of her husband.
The shepherd boy with just a sling, faces a 10 foot giant that has an entire nation shaking in their boots, because he knows the Almighty God is with Him....
UNDERSTAND – God throughout scripture constantly reminds His people that he was with them, that he was close…
What other nation is so great as to have their gods near them the way the LORD our God is near us whenever we pray to him? – Deuteronomy t 4:7
AND – in Isaiah 40 in the midst of all the talk of God’s greatness we find these powerful, comforting, beautiful words...
He tends his flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart; he gently leads those that have young. - Is 40:11
AND B/S – you gotta love what the Psalmist wrote in Psalm 139 about the nearness of our Father.
I can never escape from your Spirit! I can never get away from your presence! If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I go down to the grave, you are there. If I ride the wings of the morning, if I dwell by the farthest oceans, even there your hand will guide me, and your strength will support me. I could ask the darkness to hide me and the light around me to become night— but even in darkness I cannot hide from you. To you the night shines as bright as day. Darkness and light are the same to you. You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand! And when I wake up, you are still with me! – Psalm 139:7-18
MGCC...
Our Father dwells in the heavens.
He is as close as the air that we breathe.
There is no place we can go that HE is not near.
AMEN?!
When Isaac was afraid, the Lord appeared to him and said,
I am the God of your Father Abraham. Do not be afraid I am with you… - Genesis 26:24…
When the prophet Jeremiah was afraid of the King of Babylon God said to him,
Do not afraid of Him, for I am with you - Jeremiah 42:11
AND – in his farewell speech to the people, Moses told the people as they were about to enter the promise land,
The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. - Deuteronomy 31:8
Jesus said...I am with you always, to the very end of the ages. Matthew 28:20
YES B/S – Our Father is in the heavens and He is GREAT and God is NEAR!
AND LISTEN – Our Father’s greatness and HIS nearness is intended to shape us and in so doing change the way that we live…
UNDERSTAND – it was their belief in God’s greatness and HIS nearness that both enabled and empowered…
David to step into the valley and face Goliath
Moses to lead God’s people out of slavery
Esther to risk it all and put her life on the line to save His people from genocide
Elijah to battle the 850 false prophets on Mt. Carmel
The disciples to leave everything to follow Jesus
The early church to be bold and confident in the face of persecution.
AND – I am sure over the years that many of have seen people who because of their belief in the greatness and nearness of God...
Our Father who art in the heavens...
III. There’s more going on than our eyes can see
Back in 2013... we did a yearlong message series, called ‘The Story.’ It was basically an overview of the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation.
The audio is available
NOW – of the concepts we talked about in this series was this idea of an upper story and a lower story.
Lower story is what you and I see from a 6 foot level
And the truth is sometimes our lives from the 6 foot level do not look so good.
Upper Story – is about what is going on from God’s point of view... it’s about God’s Story unfolding that we cannot always see with our eyes.
D – day example... to the troops on the ground it look like they were losing, but to the commanders observing from the air it was looking like a complete victory
UNDERSTAND – there is a reality beyond what our eyes can see...
One of my all-time favorite examples of this in Scripture is found in 2 Kings chapter 6.
The King Aram has sent his army... to Dothan to kill the prophet Elisha. Soldiers and chariots have completely surrounded the city.
When the servant of the man of God got up early the next morning and went outside, there were troops, horses, and chariots everywhere. “Oh, sir, what will we do now?” the young man cried to Elisha.
“Don’t be afraid!” Elisha told him. “For there are more on our side than on theirs!” Then Elisha prayed, “O LORD, open his eyes and let him see!” The LORD opened the young man’s eyes, and when he looked up, he saw that the hillside around Elisha was filled with horses and chariots of fire. – 2 Kings 6:15-17
UNDERSTAND - the threatening circumstances had completely distracted the servant. THEN - in an act of grace the Lord opened the frightened servant’s eyes to see the angelic army that stood between the city and the advancing armies.
AND LISTEN - that cosmic perspective—recognizing the greater reality that lay behind the apparent circumstances— dramatically changed the servant’s attitude, and the rest of the story.
AND - just four or five decades later the great prophet Isaiah also received a life-changing glimpse behind the veil:
In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him were seraphs, each with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they were flying. And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.” Isaiah 6:1–3
Did you notice that Isaiah connects the throne of God with the Temple in Jerusalem, and it’s the whole earth that is filled with His glory?
In Isaiah’s vision, God does not dwell in a remote, far-off celestial zone. Instead, Isaiah’s eyes were opened to see a reality behind the visible reality.
Without understanding the simultaneity of the physical and spiritual realms, we find ourselves mired in a superficial (and somewhat defeated) faith. Spiritual maturity involves a growing awareness of the unseen world and its interplay with the material world in which we live.
– David Timms (Living The Lord’s Prayer)
Our
Father
Who Art In The Heavens
