We Address God as Our Father

We Address God as Our Father

I’m going to ask you the same question 4 times in a row this morning, but instead of chiming in with your answers this time, I want you to bank them in your brain. Answer each question silently in your mind and keep track of how similar or different your 4 answers are.

You’re 5 years old. It’s 2:00am. You are rocked out of a peaceful sleep when a peal of thunder rattles the panes of your bedroom window. You’re terrified. What do you do?

You’re 14. You tried out for the team or the play or the band. It took a lot of courage just to try out, and they laughed you off the rink or the field or the stage. You’re devastated and embarrassed and angry. What do you do?

You’re 19. You’re off to university or you’re moving out of the house to do your own thing. You just unloaded all of your boxes into your empty room and you’re about to spend your first night alone and on your own. You’re excited but anxious. What do you do?

You’re 25. You just found out that you’re going to have a baby! You’re overjoyed and a little overwhelmed. What do you do?

Did any of you have the same answer for all 4 questions?

Parents are special people. And they remain special to you whether you’re worried about wetting your bed or how to raise a little human of your own. And I understand that not all of you feel that way about your parents. You might not be crazy about your parents because they might not be great people. You might not even know who your biological mother or father are. But what we learn from Jesus’ perfect prayer today is even more poignant for you because of the contrast between your parents on earth and our Father in heaven.

Technically speaking, our sermon text is just 4 words long today, but there is so much to say about our Father in heaven. Let’s start by talking about why he chooses to make himself known the way he does, why he refers to our relationship with him in this very paternal, parental way. Or, in other words, why is it fitting for us to call God our “Father”?

There are a couple different ways to answer that question. The first is the most basic:

Do we not all have one Father? Did not one God create us?[1]

God is our Father because he created us – he brought us into this world. Without God, we would not exist.

If you knew nothing about God other than the fact that he is our Father, the one who brought us into this world, what could you assume or at least hope would be true about the way he feels about us?

How many things have you brought into the world? Some of you have children, and I know you love them very much. (They may make it difficult to love them from time to time, but on the most basic, primal level, as their parent I’m sure you have a deep affection for and personal investment in your child.)

We could even think of it in terms of things you’ve made. Maybe you started your own company, you wrote a song, you built something with your own two hands. Even if you’re a little embarrassed about how it turned out, chances are you feel similarly. You have a deeper affection for something you made than for something someone else made. You have a personal investment in it and you care about it.

If that’s how we feel about the things that we bring into the world, imagine how God feels about his creation – and about you, especially, as the crown of his creation! God refers to himself as our Father, in part because he created us, and in part because, as our Creator, he loves us like a father loves his children.

In the best case scenario, what kinds of things does a parent do for their children?

They provide for them – food, clothes, shelter. They care for them; they bandage scraped knees and wipe tears off cheeks. They comfort and console them when they’re sad. They support and encourage. They discipline and correct. They offer advice and sometimes write a cheque. Parents love their children and take care of them. God does the same and more for you:

“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!”[2]

Your Father in heaven always provides for you, even better than your earthly parents can and do. He gives you everything you need for your body and life. He takes care of you. He gives you good gifts.

Though my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will receive me. Teach me your way, Lord; lead me in a straight path.[3]

Your Father in heaven never forsakes you. Even if your earthly father or mother abandons you, God never will. He’s always with you, teaching you his will and leading you in a straight path – giving you guidance and support and direction.

God loves you like a Father loves his children, and this is just a sampling of the kinds of things that God does for us as our Father in heaven. But there are two sides to this coin. If God is our Father, then that makes us his children. If God loves and provides for and cares for us as our Father in heaven, what should we be feeling about and doing for him as his children on earth?

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”[4]

As our Father’s children, our first priority is to love him with every fiber of being, not holding anything back, not reserving room for anyone or anything to challenge God’s place as our first and greatest love.

But our responsibilities to God go beyond just what we feel about him. We also have certain expectations for what we should do:

As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”[5]

As our Father’s children, we should also be obedient. We should do everything in our power to be like him. And how does God describe himself here? Holy, i.e. sinless, perfect.

Is that you? Do you love God without reservation, without hesitation, with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind? Are you obedient, as God wants you to be, let alone holy as he commands you to be? I mean, how many of us can even say that about our earthly parents?

What kinds of things do you owe your earthly parents? How should you treat them? With love and respect and honor. With willing obedience and cheerful compliance. Not dragging our feet or grumbling under our breath, but with a smile on our faces and joy in our hearts, happy to be helpful and cooperative.

Is that what we always do? No. Sadly, how can we often treat our parents? With resentment and bitterness in our hearts. Begrudging our obedience to and dependence on them. Maybe neglecting or forsaking them. Talking back or mouthing off to them. Taking them for granted. And these are the people who put food on your table, who changed your dirty diapers, who got you through school, who helped you become the person you are today and bailed you out of who knows how many bad situations.

It's sad to say, but it’s even easier to resent and begrudge our obedience to an unseen God, to take his gifts for granted and to neglect our relationship with him, to be delinquent in prayer, lackadaisical in worship, indifferent in faith. It’s even easier to doubt and question the motives of a God you can’t speak with face to face. Sometimes we can go days without even thinking about him. Those are not the ways that we as children are meant to treat our Father in heaven.

If you disobey your earthly parents, what do they do? They punish you. They take away your internet privileges. They cut off your allowance. They ground you to your bedroom for a month.

If you disobey God, what does your Father in heaven do?

Since you call on a Father who judges each person’s work impartially, live out your time as foreigners here in reverent fear.[6]

Your Father in heaven judges you according to what you do. How does it make you feel to know that you will be judged? Peter talks about fear here, that would be understandable. God’s justice can be terrible. The wages of sin is death. The ultimate consequence of sin is hell.

But that’s not quite the kind of fear that Peter is talking about. Yes, our Father in heaven is our judge and will judge our works impartially; he will not show favouritism to us just because we are his creations. He won’t wink away our sin. But he did do something about it:

For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.[7]

You are not the perfect child. Even if you think you are better than your siblings, you have still disobeyed and let down your earthly parents more times than is worth mentioning. Much more than that, you have disobeyed and disappointed your Father in heaven more times than we’d be able to count.

But God is not just your Father. He is Jesus’ Father. And unlike you, Jesus is described as “a lamb without blemish or defect.” He is perfect, sinless, holy, just as called God you to be. But unlike you, Jesus was actually able to pull it off. He was the perfect son to Mary and Joseph, always willingly obedient and cheerfully compliant. He was thoughtful and considerate and did things without needing to be asked to do them.

More than that, Jesus was the perfect Son of his Father in heaven, being so obedient that he was willing to go all the way to death to be your Saviour. Your Father in heaven loved you so much that he was willing to sacrifice his one and only good child to save you a sinner, to redeem you with the precious blood of his sinless Son poured out on the cross to cover over all your sins.

When the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.[8]

Why did God send his Son Jesus? To redeem us, to be our Saviour – yes – but look especially at that last line: “that we might receive adoption to sonship.”

God is our Father in heaven by virtue of the fact that he created us. That’s true and that’s good to know. It gives us the hope that he loves us and has a vested interest in us. But I’m sure you know plenty of bad dads who don’t care at all about the children they brought into the world. If you ever had that fear about our Father in heaven, this truth can put that fear to rest, because God is not your Father in heaven just by virtue of the fact that he created you. He is also your Father in heaven by his gracious decision. He chose to adopt you into his family through the sacrifice of his Son Jesus.

That makes you God’s child by nature and by choice. That means that you do not have to fear that God doesn’t care or is unaware of what happening to you. He is aware. He does care. He cared so much that he sent his Son to be your brother and then to be your Saviour.

That’s the kind of God you have. That’s why Jesus teaches us to pray, “Our Father in heaven.”

Since you have a God who created you and loves you and provides for you and takes care of you and redeemed you and forgave you and saved you, then what kind of attitude can you have as you pray to him?

The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”[9]

Instead of fear, how can you feel when you pray to God? You can call him “Abba, Father.” “Abba” is the familiar form of the word Father in Hebrew. It’s not the formal, “dearest Father, would you please…” It’s more like, “Dad, I need your help.”

When you pray, you can pray not to some distant deity, but to your familiar Father. When you’re afraid, you can go to your Father in prayer with the same attitude you had when you crawled into bed with mom and dad when you were 5 years old and afraid of the dark or a monster under your bed. There’s familiarity with our Father that dispels fear.

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.[10]

When you’re feeling blue, when you’re down in the dumps, depressed, discouraged, embarrassed, ashamed, what can you do? You can pray to God. And with what assurance? That he cares for you. If you can vent to your parents in the van on the way home after a failed audition, imagine God’s capacity to hear your concerns and listen to your complaints without judgment or impatience, but with love in his heart and an eagerness to hear and heal.  

Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.[11]

When you ask God for anything, what kind of attitude can you have? You can have confidence that he cares about you and that he not only can but he will help you. If you can have confidence to ask your earthly father for help when times are tough – to write a cheque to cover your rent, to fix your leaky faucet, to give you advice on how to be a good parent – then imagine the confidence you can have going to your almighty, all-powerful, all-knowing Father in heaven. He can and promises to do so much more for you than the best dad on earth ever could.

So, what do you do when you’re afraid, angry, anxious or overjoyed? You pray to our Father in heaven. Amen.

[1] Malachi 2:10

[2] Matthew 7:9-11

[3] Psalm 27:10,11

[4] Matthew 22:37

[5] 1 Peter 1:14-16

[6] 1 Peter 1:17

[7] 1 Peter 1:18,19

[8] Galatians 4:4,5

[9] Romans 8:15

[10] 1 Peter 5:7

[11] Hebrews 4:16

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Prayer Is a Privilege

Luke 11:1-10

1 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.”

2 He said to them, “When you pray, say:

“‘Father,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come.
3 Give us each day our daily bread.
4 Forgive us our sins,
    for we also forgive everyone who sins against us.
And lead us not into temptation.’”

5 Then Jesus said to them, “Suppose you have a friend, and you go to him at midnight and say, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread; 6 a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have no food to offer him.’ 7 And suppose the one inside answers, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is already locked, and my children and I are in bed. I can’t get up and give you anything.’ 8 I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the bread because of friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity he will surely get up and give you as much as you need.

9 “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”

Prayer Is a Privilege

So, I warned you that during this new worship series I’d be leaning on you for some more interaction during these sermon/Bible study hybrids. Well, I want to hear your voices right away. I have a bit of a quiz for you: Name that Emoji! I’m going to show you 4 hand-themed emojis and I want you to tell me what they mean. If you sent this in a text message, what would you be trying to communicate?

Here’s your first one:

What does this emoji mean? “Hi.”

How about this one:

“Love”

And this one?

“OK”

And here’s the last one, which can be a little tricky:

“Prayer” Now, there’s some controversy about whether this is supposed to be prayer, or a high five, but I can send you the definitive, scholarly articles debunking the whole high five myth. This is the emoji for prayer. If you were to send this emoji to your friends – whether they’re Christian or not – chances are that they would immediately understand what this is.

That’s the interesting thing about prayer. It’s ubiquitous; it’s everywhere. People of just about every culture and background may not be able to write a dictionary definition for prayer, but they would be able to recognize it when they see it. Now, they may need some explanation, information, guidance, but even in our increasingly post-Christian world, prayer is still pretty common knowledge; and even in thoroughly Christian circles explanation, information and guidance are still very much needed.

We heard it a moment ago in Luke’s Gospel:

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.”[1]

Even Jesus’ own disciples – his inner circle – needed explanation, information and guidance for prayer, and so do we. That’s why for the next 9 weeks our focus in worship will not only be prayer in general, but the prayer that Jesus taught us to pray.

I gave you some sermon notes pages. If you grabbed a bulletin, there was one inside. If you didn’t grab a bulletin, they were still available to you from our service team today. We’ll use these as the basic outline for our conversation today (and throughout this series), and you can see that the first question on the page is a simple one: What is prayer?

Let’s read a few Bible passages that describe prayer before we try to define it:

May these words of my mouth and this meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer.[2]

Have you ever noticed that at the start of every single worship service, while the bells are still ringing, I stop and pause and face the altar for a minute? I’m praying these words from Psalm 19. It’s a good way for any of us to approach a worship service. How does King David describe prayer here in Psalm 19?

It can be something spoken or just thought in your mind or felt in your heart. 

How about another Psalm of David?

Trust in God at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge.[3]

How does David describe prayer here?

It’s a pouring out of the heart. Prayer is pouring out our soul to God. If we have fears, concerns, worries, we can unload them on God. If we have joy and happiness and gratitude in our hearts, we can raise them up to the Lord. Whatever we are thinking or feeling we can communicate to our God in prayer.

Which leads us to the dictionary definition you would find in the back of your Small Catechism:

Prayer is an act of worship in which we speak to God from our hearts.

It’s a simple thing, right? Prayer is the way that we talk to God. But there’s a whole lot more to prayer than just blurting out your unfiltered thoughts to the Lord. Prayer is a command God gives us. He says:

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and faithful.[4]

How should we approach prayer? With devotion and diligence and faithfulness. Prayer is not something God wants us to do willy-nilly, whenever we feel like it or remember to. He commands us to be devoted and watchful and faithful, to make it a regular practice we do intentionally and purposefully.

Or how about what Samuel says:

“As for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the Lord by failing to pray for you.”[5]

What would Samuel call a failure to pray? A sin. Prayer is a command of God, not to be taken lightly but to be obeyed.

And yet, that command is not burdensome. It’s a privilege and a joy, a gracious invitation from our God:

Call on me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you will honor me.[6]

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.[7]

What does God invite you to do with prayer? To turn to him in time of need, to unburden yourself from your cares and worries, to rely on him to get you through your most challenging moments in life.

Yes, prayer is “speaking to God from the heart.” But it’s more than that. It’s a command of God we are meant to faithfully obey, and an invitation we gratefully accept because of the promises God makes us.

I’m going to read a series of passages for you now, and, as you can see on your sermon notes page, we can think of them from both a negative and a positive perspective. As I read them, I want you to think about how you can fill in these blanks, but not only that. I also want you to think about why these passages give you confidence to pray to God at all:

This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.[8]

God never _ignores us_. God always _hears us_.

Now why would that promise give you confidence to pray to God? Because in prayer, you’re not talking to a brick wall. You’re not voicing your fears to the void. You have an audience who wants to hear from you and promises to hear you.

God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill?[9]

God never _lies_. God always _keeps his promises_.

Why would this promise give you confidence to pray to God? Because he’s trustworthy. You can count on him to tell the truth and you can rely on him to keep his promises. He’s not a hypocrite like we can often be. He doesn’t make promises he doesn’t or can’t keep. He’s steadfast and dependable.

“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!”[10]

God never _withholds good from us_. God always _gives good gifts_.

Why would this promise give you confidence to pray to God? He’s so much more than just a shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen. He can actually do something for you, and what he does for you is always good.

That’s why we should pray to God! He always hears us, always keeps his promises, always gives us good things. That’s why we should pray to God.

But now for a harder question. Why should God listen to us?

The short answer is, he shouldn’t. Consider Isaiah’s warning in chapter 59:

Your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.[11]

What could prevent God from hearing our prayers? Our sin. It’s not an inability on God’s part or a failure to hear. He’s not the one to blame when our prayers are not heard. We are. It’s our iniquities that separate us from God. It’s our sins that hide his face from us.

This is where it gets real. Prayer is meant to be a really happy thing – a lifeline with the Lord – but our sin can sever that cord. Isaiah even warns people who persist in their sin:

“When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide my eyes from you; even when you offer many prayers, I am not listening.”[12]

Is there a sin you persist in? Have you gotten so addicted to a substance or a secret habit that the moment your eyes see it or your lips taste it you feel powerless to do anything but disobey God? Have you given up trying to live life by God’s rules and just given in to whatever feels right in the moment? Have you made choices that have consequences that make you feel uncomfortable to be around certain people because of what you’ve said or done (or haven’t said, or haven’t done)?

Prayer is supposed to be a beautiful thing that keeps us connected to God throughout every moment of our lives, and yet our sin threatens to muddy it all up and separate us from our God forever.

And yet, God still commands and invites even sinners like us to pray to him. God had every right to turn his face from us forever, and yet his ears are still attentive to our prayers – not because of us, but because of him, as Daniel prayed in Chapter 9:

Give ear, our God, and hear; open your eyes and see… We do not make requests of you because we are righteous, but because of your great mercy. Lord, listen! Lord, forgive! Lord, hear and act! For your sake, my God, do not delay.[13]

What did Daniel appeal to when he prayed to God? God’s mercy and love to forgive. And forgiveness is exactly what God sent Jesus to give us. Even though our sin separated us from him, he bridged the gap and spanned the gulf that our sin created, through his sinless Son Jesus Christ. God sent Jesus to be our Saviour, to give his life as a ransom for our sin, to wash all our sin away forever. Through Jesus, God promises you:

In him we have redemption through his blood. The forgiveness of sins.[14]

In Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith.[15]

Our sins would have separated us from God forever… had it not been for Jesus, for the sacrifice he made for us on the cross, for the forgiveness he won for us through his blood. That’s mercy. That’s grace. That’s the reason you can be sure that God does listen to your prayers, despite your many sins, because God’s love for you is greater than your sin, and he wants you to be reconciled to him.

That’s one of the reasons why God invites you to pray in the first place, so that you can say with David and the many generations of sinners who have prayed before you:

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.[16]

What was David appealing to when he asked God to cleanse him from his sin? His mercy and unfailing love and great compassion. That’s what you can appeal to as well. That’s the reason you can be sure that God does listen to your prayers, because he loves you and has forgiven you, because your God is merciful and gracious and compassionate.

Why should God listen to our prayers? He shouldn’t, but he does because he loves you.

So, because God loves you, because he commands and invites you to pray, because he makes all these promises about prayer, how should we pray? Let’s take one last look at Luke’s Gospel today. Jesus tells a parable about one friend going to another friend at an ungodly hour of the night to ask for 3 loaves of bread for a guest popped in. The guy with the bread doesn’t sound thrilled at the prospect, but then Jesus says: 

I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the bread because of friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity he will surely get up and give you as much as you need.[17]

In other words, even if your friendship isn’t strong enough to get your buddy out of bed, your boldness will. The good news is, God loves you even more than your best friend does and God’s love for you would cause him to leap out of bed for you at the first knock on his door. But as Jesus says later, you still have to knock:

“So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.”[18]

Jesus wants you to be shamelessly audacious in your prayer life. Shameless – not that you have nothing to be ashamed of. There are going to be plenty of situations in your life that you need God’s help with that are entirely your fault, situations in which you have every reason to be ashamed. But you should never be too ashamed to ask, because you know who you’re asking, i.e. your compassionate and gracious God who loves you and forgives you and promises to bless you.

Jesus invites you to be audacious in your prayer life – don’t be afraid to ask God for anything, big or small, whether you think you deserve it or not. That’s for him to decide. But you can ask. Jesus gives you that permission and invitation.

Prayer is a privilege. It’s a precious gift from God, a lifeline with the Lord, a constant source of communication with your compassionate God. Don’t take it for granted. Obey God’s command. Accept his invitation. Pray with devotion and faith in your heart to the God who promises to hear and answer you according to his good will.

I mean it! Right now! There’s a space on your sermon notes page. Write your prayer there. There’s a space in our service right now. Pray for anything with shameless audacity to the God who promises to hear and answer you according to his good will. Amen.

[1] Luke 11:1

[2] Psalm 19:14

[3] Psalm 62:8

[4] Colossians 4:2

[5] 1 Samuel 12:23

[6] Psalm 50:15

[7] 1 Peter 5:7

[8] 1 John 5:14

[9] Numbers 23:19

[10] Matthew 7:9-11

[11] Isaiah 59:2

[12] Isaiah 1:15

[13] Daniel 9:18,19

[14] Ephesians 1:7

[15] Galatians 3:26

[16] Psalm 51:1,2

[17] Luke 11:8

[18] Luke 11:9

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