32 The Lord’s Prayer: What Jesus Meant by Thy Kingdom Come (Matthew 6:7-10)

Krisan Marotta: Welcome to the Wednesday in the Word Podcast. I'm Krisan Marotta, and this is my podcast about what the Bible means and how we know. Today is the 32nd talk in our series on the Gospel of Matthew, and we are going to be studying Matthew chapter 6, verses 7 through 10. The lecture notes for today's talk are on the link below this podcast. You can also go there directly by going to Wednesdayintheword.com slash Matthew 3 2. On wednesdayintheword.com you can find all previous episodes in this series, as your podcast feed might not have them all. I'm so glad you joined me today. We're continuing our study in the Gospel of Matthew, we're still in the Sermon on the Mount. We have finished the first major section, which was the Beatitudes, and the second major section, the antithesis, and we're now in the third major section of the sermon. So far, this sermon has been about one point, and we can state that point in a number of ways. We could summarize it as what does genuine saving faith look like? Or as who will inherit eternal life? Or what characterizes the children of God? Last week we began looking at Matthew 6 verse 1 through 18, and in this third section we're examining that same question from another angle. Beware of the kind of righteousness that the hypocrites have that is a show for other people. Jesus began this section by saying in Matthew 6 1, Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. And after making that statement, which I believe is the thesis statement for this whole section, he gives three parallel examples. Each of the examples is a traditional Jewish religious practice, giving to the poor, praying, and fasting. If you were a New Testament Jew and you wanted to practice your religion, these are the sorts of things that you would do. Everyone listening would have recognized these activities as the kinds of things a religious person would do. And in each case, Jesus describes how the hypocrites perform these practices. When they give to the poor, they blow a trumpet. When they pray, they stand on the street corner or in the synagogue so that everyone can see them. And when they fast, they disfigure their faces so that everyone knows their fasting. Whichever practice they choose, they do it in a very public way, and their goal is to be seen and approved of by others. And I have argued that these hypocrites that Jesus has in mind are the Pharisees, the religious leaders he has been targeting throughout this sermon. In each of these examples, Jesus repeats the statement, Truly I say to you, they have received their reward in full. They already have what they're looking for. These religious practices are supposed to be about their relationship with God. They're supposed to be doing them because they're devoted to God and they hope that one day God will accept them into his kingdom. But in fact, their goal is the approval of their peers. Their primary concern is not for God to be gracious to them in the future, their primary concern is for other people to see them, approve of them, and be gracious to them now. That was their goal, and they received it. They have their reward from others now, so they should not expect a reward from their heavenly father later, and they weren't really looking for that reward from God at all. And Jesus says don't be like these hypocrites. He basically says if you're going to do these practices, do them privately. Let them be between you and God. Don't worry about what other people think, but be focused on your relationship to God. If you are genuinely interested in God's approval rather than the approval of your fellow people, then God will respond. So the particular point he's highlighting is this idea of practicing your righteousness before your peers and seeking their approval as the reward. First he talked about giving to the poor, then his second example is prayer, and in the middle of that example, Jesus breaks away to talk more about prayer, and then he goes back to fasting, which is his third example. Last week we looked at the three examples and we skipped the section on the Lord's Prayer, and today we're going to go back and examine the Lord's Prayer. This section contains perhaps the most famous prayer in the world, the Lord's Prayer, and we aren't going to finish looking at it today. We're going to look at it over the course of several podcasts. But as we look at it, I want you to remember the context. The particular point he's highlighting is this idea of practicing your righteousness before your peers and seeking their approval as your reward. Let me read the entire section on prayer, which is Matthew six, five through fifteen, but we're only going to study through verse ten today. And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly I say to you, they have received their reward, but when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your father who is in secret, and your father who sees in secret will reward you. And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. Pray then like this, our Father in heaven, 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 debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. We talked about Matthew six verses five and six in the last podcasts. When the hypocrites pray they seek the approval of other people, and although their prayer is supposed to be directed toward God, they're not really looking for anything from God. What they really want is for other people to admire them for their piety and devotion. Then in six, seven, and eight, Jesus warns about a different kind of mistake in prayer. And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your father knows what you need before you ask him. So the pagan Gentiles are not like the Pharisees. When the Gentiles pray, they generally want their gods to give them something. They want rain for their crops, they want health, prosperity, and so forth. But like the hypocritical Pharisees, there is something about the Gentiles that Jesus warns his disciples to avoid. The ESV here says do not heap up empty phrases. The New American standard has do not use meaningless repetition. I would argue that the issue here is not stylistic. I don't think the point Jesus is trying to make is God will be pleased if you keep your prayers short. It's not that long prayers are bad and short prayers are good. The problem lies in their view of God. Notice Jesus adds, for they think that they will be heard for their many words, and he contrasts that with your heavenly Father knows what you need before you even ask. The reason the Gentiles heap up all these phrases is because they think that it will ensure that God hears their prayer. In other words, praying this certain way means that their gods will answer them. Their goal is getting their pagan deity to answer. How do they ensure that they will get their answer? Well, they use these meaningless phrases and repetitions. Now we don't know exactly how to translate this word empty phrases or meaningless repetitions. It appears only once in the New Testament right here. Some argue that it means to babble or to chatter or to use nonsensical phrases. I think meaningless repetition probably captures the idea as well as anything. The problem he's warning against is using prayer as a technique, and the Gentiles are using their words as a technique that they think will guarantee an answer. They believe whatever this way is, this babbling, this using the same phrases over and over or using many, many phrases and synonyms, whatever their technique is, they believe that the way they're using their words makes it more likely that their gods will hear them. And the problem is the view of God behind that attitude. For the Gentiles, God is this force out there that they have to learn to manipulate and control, and they think that they can use the power of their words to make their idols hear them. If they just develop the right technique and the right approach, the right spiritual practice, then their gods will hear and answer. And note the immediate contrast in six eight. Do not be like them, for your father knows what you need before you ask him. The God of the Bible is not a force to be manipulated by the skillful use of your words. God is a person like a father, he has a will, a character, and a fatherly concern for his children. Like a good father, he knows what his children need before they even ask him. He already knows more about what they really need than they do. So that's the situation when we his children start to pray. If we understand who God is, that he is our loving Father, then we understand it's not our place to manipulate and control him. The purpose of our prayers should not be to coerce him into giving us what we think we want. Rather, like a child going to a good and wise and loving father, we take our concerns to God, concerns which He already understands, and then we wait to see how He will respond. We trust His response. So Jesus sets up the Lord's prayer by warning about two very common perversions of prayer. One is using prayer as a tool to gain the worldly approval of others rather than seeking something from God. The other is using prayer as a tool to manipulate God into giving us what we want, some kind of earthly gain or worldly gain in this life. Now I wish I could say that all of us through the generations of church history have heeded Jesus' warnings and no one has this problem today. But I can't. Just go to any Christian bookstore today and you will find a whole bookshelf of books dedicated to teaching you the proper techniques of prayer, the spiritual disciplines of prayer, and everything you need to know about prayer so that God will bless you. We still fall into this trap today. We are still tempted by the worldly benefits that come from being admired and approved by our peers, and we are still tempted to use prayer as a technique to manipulate God into giving us what we want. Now just to be clear, folks who advocate spiritual disciplines or techniques in prayer, they may in fact be genuine believers. By challenging that teaching, I am not necessarily challenging the genuineness of their faith. They could be perfectly genuine and devoted believers and just be confused in that part of their theology, as all of us are. All of us have areas where we don't have it right. None of us have perfect theology, none of us apart from the apostles and Jesus have perfect understanding. Apart from the apostles, all of us teach and believe heresy at some point in our lives. We are still learning and we're still growing. And I think we can all fall into that trap today. I think Jesus is calling us here to see prayer very differently. Instead of a tool to impress God with my piety or impress my peers with my piety, or a tool or technique to get him to answer me in the way I want him to answer? Prayer is the arena where I wrestle with and come to terms with God. God already knows what I need. How am I going to respond? Am I going to agree with him about that? Will I approach him genuinely believing that he knows better than I do? Will I see the world the way he sees it and value what he values? Will I accept the plan he has for my life and be content with whatever boundaries he's placed on it or opportunities he's given me? Will I come to trust him even if my life is not going the way I want it to? Well, prayer is the place I sort all that out. I tell him my concerns, my needs, my worries, my thanksgivings, my priorities, everything I'm grateful for, and so forth. And in that process, I discover whether or not I am rightly focused on God's agenda and God's priorities or my own. In this prayer we call the Lord's Prayer, Jesus is showing us how we ought to think about prayer. It's not like the Gentiles and it's not like the hypocrites. He's telling us when you approach God in prayer, these are the kinds of things you should have on your heart and on your mind. This is how you ought to think about God and yourself. So I would argue when he says, pray then in this way, he's contrasting this way with the way the Gentiles and the hypocrites pray. I would argue that his main point is not to give us a ritual to perform, rather, he's giving us a model for what sort of thing a prayer should be. Now I expect many of you listening have memorized and recited this prayer in church. I am not knocking that as a practice. I am not telling you not to recite this prayer ever again. By repeating it, we have learned it and hopefully understood it, and we can slow down and think about what it means. Reciting this prayer can be a great thing, but what I'm suggesting is that Jesus' main point was not to give us a ritual. He was not commanding a practice. He was contrasting two wrong views of prayer with a proper view of prayer. When Luke introduces this prayer in his gospel, he says in Luke 11 1, Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, Lord, teach us to pray as John taught his disciples. Scholars have suggested that it was common at the time for rabbis to teach their disciples a prayer that encapsulated their main teaching. And I think that's what the disciples are asking for in Luke. Notice they don't just say teach us to pray, they say teach us to pray as John, meaning John the Baptist, taught his disciples to pray. And it could be that that is a request for a general teaching on prayer, like John taught his disciples generally about prayer, but I think it's more specific. Give us a prayer to help us remember your teaching as John gave his disciples such a prayer. I don't think they're asking for a general discourse on prayer, they're asking for a rabbi's prayer, a prayer that embodies the rabbi's main teaching. They want a prayer that embodies Jesus' main teaching like the other rabbis have. And that fits very much with the context of Matthew. Jesus criticizes the way the hypocrites and the Gentiles view prayer, and then he gives a counterexample, a prayer that models and embodies the right way of thinking about prayer and also captures his main teaching. The Lord's prayer is the sort of thing we should be concerned about when we pray because we are people who seek to follow God, and this is the sort of thing that God is concerned about. Even more important than reciting this prayer is understanding this prayer. So what does Jesus want us to understand by teaching us this prayer? If the scholars are right and this is a rabbi's prayer, we should expect the Lord's prayer to have one main point, and I think it does. I'm going to argue that this prayer is a prayer for one thing and really one thing only, and that is asking God to bring holiness. Each request comes in pairs, and all the pairs ask for a different aspect of this same idea, which is basically thy kingdom come. Thy kingdom come is the main point. It's echoed in each line, and it's asking for God to make us free from sin once and for all. It's asking for God to completely banish sin and death once and for all and to make us holy as He is holy. Okay, all of that sets us up then to tackle the prayer. Let's look at Matthew 6 9. Pray then like this, our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Now because this language is so familiar to so many of us, I'm going to give you a very wooden literal translation of the prayer. I want the translation to be kind of jarring so that you have to stop and think about the meaning. My kind of wooden translation of this is our Father who is in heaven, let it be holy your name. Now let's talk about Father first. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus refers to God as your Father fifteen times in thirteen verses, and eight of those times he qualifies Father by saying your Father who is in heaven or your heavenly father. And Jesus will continue to refer to God as our Father throughout the rest of Matthew's gospel. Jesus also talks about God as his father, and I would argue there's a different significance to that language, but we'll look at those instances when we hit one. Most likely Jesus spoke this prayer in Aramaic, and if he did, then this prayer would begin with the Aramaic word Abba. Abba is typically the first word a child would learn. It was used by children to address their earthly fathers. It was also used to address a respected person of rank. A student could use it to address a respected teacher, for example. So this word would affirm both the respect of addressing a superior and a profound personal relationship between the speaker and the one addressed. By contrast, in the Old Testament, father is never used as a direct address to God. The Hebrew word father is used only about a dozen times with reference to God in the Old Testament, and most of those uses are part of a simile or a metaphor. So in the Old Testament, Father is used as a metaphor to describe what God is like, but it is not used as a form of direct address. Now we get to the New Testament, and Jesus uses this Aramaic word as a title, which I think expresses both our profound respect for God and our profound relationship to him. There is some uncertainty about how common it was for the Jews of his day to refer to God as Father. Some scholars argue that it was never done, and that Jesus is introducing a new and revolutionary way to speak to God. Others have argued that well it wasn't common, but it was done, and that this is not new, but it might be unusual. And I don't know how to sort that evidence out. It could go either way. What's clear is that Jesus made Father his preferred way of talking about God when he is talking to his disciples. When he talks about God to us, he refers to God typically as our heavenly father. Now by starting this prayer with Abba, he's starting with something like father or daddy rather than something formal like the god of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Everyone has a father and all people address him equally. With the word Abba, there's no racial or historical or ethical insider or outsider. This word moves the family of faith beyond a particular people with a particular family tied to Abraham, and it extends the family of faith to everyone. But I think more importantly, father is a very apt metaphor for God. A father imparts his life to his children. A father cares about and cares for his children. A father passes on an inheritance to his children. A father is wiser than his children and he teaches them the way of wisdom. Children respect and seek to imitate their father, and we see all those ideas in Scripture when talking about God as our heavenly Father. One more comment about this word. The use of Aramaic may also be significant because in Jesus' day all the public reading of Scripture was done in Hebrew. Prayers, especially in corporate worship, were offered in Hebrew. An Aramaic speaking Jew in the first century would be accustomed to reciting his prayers or her prayers in Hebrew and not Aramaic. So to give them a prayer in Aramaic is to say there is no sacred language by which we must speak to God. And endorsing Aramaic as a language for prayer, I think Jesus opens up the door for the New Testament to be written in Greek and translated into other languages. So he starts with Abba, our loving Father who is approachable and yet dwells in awesome majesty in the heavens in all his glory. And what does he say? Our Father who is in heaven, let it be holy your name. Let it be holy your name is the first request. May your name be made holy. In the Old Testament, when the verb to make holy is used in the passive, God is always the actor, and we have a similar such passive construction here. Let it be made holy your name is a prayer for God to make his name holy. The prayer is for God to vindicate his name so that everyone on earth will know that he is holy. Now most of you hearing that probably go, Um okay, so we want God to make his name holy, isn't his name already holy? What's the big deal? Well to understand this better, let's look at Ezekiel chapter thirty six verses sixteen through twenty one. The word of the Lord came to me. Son of man, when the house of Israel lived in their own land, they defiled it by their ways and their deeds. Their ways before me were like the uncleanness of a woman in her minstrel impurity. So I poured out my wrath upon them for the blood that they had shed in the land, for the idols with which they had defiled it. I scattered them among the nations, and they were dispersed through the countries, in accordance with their ways and their deeds I judged them. But when they came to the nations, wherever they came, they profaned my holy name, and that people said of them, these are the people of the Lord, and yet they had to go out of his land. But I had concern for my holy name, which the house of Israel had profaned among the nations to which they came. Let me stop there and explain what we're looking at. Israel was in the land, the promised land, but they defiled it by turning away from God and worshipping idols. God disciplined them by sending them into captivity into other nations. So their enemies came and defeated them and carted them off into exile. And God says here, speaking to Ezekiel, as they're taken out of the land and into captivity, the people have profaned my name. To profane means to treat it as common or to treat it as something not holy. To profane is the opposite of to sanctify. To sanctify something is to proclaim it as holy. To profane it is to proclaim it as common, ordinary, and insignificant. So for instance, there were certain utensils and tools in the temple, in the tabernacle that were holy. You were not to use this particular candle for anything other than before God because it was holy, it was sanctified, it was set apart for his use. You might have a common incense burner in your home, that would be a profane incense burner, but the one that you used dedicated to God in the tabernacle, that was sanctified, that was holy, it was set apart for him. So to profane something is to treat it as common, treat it as normal, as not holy, to sanctify something is to proclaim that it is holy and other. It is not normal, it is not ordinary. Well the fact of the matter is God is holy. He is not common, he's not ordinary, like you and me. He is unique in his goodness, power, wisdom, his moral character, his judgment, his graciousness, and so forth. To profane his name means to come to see God as no big deal. To profane God's name is to refuse to see him as awesome and glorious. It's to refuse to acknowledge that he is the author and creator of the universe who needs to be reckoned with. Now, why was God's name profaned in the situation we just read about in Ezekiel? Well the Jews were defeated by their enemies. And that raises the question, where is your God when this happened? Your God must be a puny, rather insignificant God because he couldn't protect you, his people from the Assyrians or the Babylonians. What benefit is there to worshiping the God of the Jews if he lets his people get captured, defeated, and taken into exile? Let me read Ezekiel thirty six twenty again. But when they came to the nations wherever they came, they profaned my holy name, and that people said of them, These are the people of the Lord, and yet they had to go out of his land. God's name has been profaned. Israel's enemies were mocking God because they conquered God's people. The fact that they could conquer the people of God must mean that God is no big deal. He's ordinary, he's common, his name and his reputation have been profaned. The other nations are now mocking and scoffing at him because Israel is defeated. So God had to discipline Israel for her disobedience, and when he disciplines her and takes her into captivity, his name becomes profaned as the other nations mock and scoff at him. Let's continue in Ezekiel thirty six, this is verses twenty two to twenty eight. Therefore, say to the house of Israel, Thus says the Lord God, it is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am about to act, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came, and I will vindicate the holiness of my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them, and the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Lord God, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries, and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleanness, and from all your idols I will cleanse you, and I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you, and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh, and I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my ways, and be careful to obey my rules. You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God. Now there's a whole lot in that passage we can talk about. It's a wonderful passage. As I understand it, this is a description of the coming kingdom of God and has not yet happened. Now, scholars will debate that, but I think this passage is describing an event still in our future, especially because the next chapter talks about God sending his Messiah to rule over the entire world. But I don't want to get sidetracked on that. We see in this passage that God is going to forgive his people for their sins. They will walk in all his statutes and obey his rules, and they will be his people, and he will be their God. And in doing all this, he says he's going to vindicate the holiness of his great name. Now when that phrase gets translated from Hebrew into Greek, we see the exact same language that we have in Matthew. God is going to make his name holy. God is going to vindicate the holiness of his name. Now as we see in Ezekiel, God is going to vindicate his name when his kingdom comes. At that time everybody will see and understand once and for all that he is the one true God, and he is good and wise and holy and just, and everyone will say the Lord God is holy. God has made many promises. Until he keeps those promises, people are going to mock him and scoff at him and claim he's no big deal. But a day is coming when every last promise will be fulfilled, and then no one will be able to mock or scoff anymore. And that day is when God's kingdom comes. God is going to step into history, destroy all evil and death, and rule over his people in righteousness and justice. And when he does that, he will make his name holy. God is already holy, but in this world his name, his reputation are not acknowledged or recognized. And one day that will change. One day every knee will bow before God and say, Jesus is Lord. When Jesus the Messiah returns to establish his kingdom, God's name will be made holy. So to pray, let it be holy, your name is to pray for that day to come, to pray for that day to come when God establishes his kingdom on the earth. And I think the next request, which is in parallel to this, makes that even more clear. Matthew six ten, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And here's my wooden translation. Let it come thy kingdom, let it be done, thy will on earth as it is done in heaven. Now we've talked about God's kingdom several times in this gospel so far. We talked about this back in chapter four. We talked about it with the Beatitudes. For those of you just joining the podcast, let me review briefly. The Old Testament promises that a day is coming when God will intervene in history and establish his kingdom over all the earth in a new and fundamental way. God will send Jesus Christ, his Messiah, and establish him on the Davidic throne and give him dominion and authority over all creation. At that time all the people of God throughout history will be raised from the dead and they will live in peace and righteousness under the rule of the Messiah. This is the coming kingdom of God. Now there is a sense in which God is king and rules over the whole world now, but there is another sense in which his rule has not yet been established. God is king of the world, but the world doesn't recognize him. We look forward to the day when the kingship of God will be known and recognized and effective over the whole world, and in that sense the kingdom of God is something yet to be revealed. So we his people are waiting for the day when Jesus Christ, the Messiah, will return and bring judgment over all the wrong in the world, victory over the powers of evil, and for those who trust him, freedom from sin and death and eternal life in his kingdom. This coming kingdom will change both the world and the people in it. The fallness and evil in the world, the death, futility, decay, all the corruption will be done away with, and God's people will be fully and completely freed from sin and death. And this couplet is praying for those two aspects. Establish your holy and righteous kingdom in our hearts and in our world. Let it come thy kingdom, let your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. This is a call for God's holiness to come in the form of his kingdom and his will. The request is that his holiness and his righteous rule would be established on all the earth just as it is in heaven. Sin on earth has disrupted his rule and broken his people, and this is a request for God to restore his holiness to his people and remove sin and death. This is another way of praying for the kingdom of God to come, because this is what the kingdom of God means. We're not talking about a geographical place. The kingdom of God is the rule or the reign of God in our lives, in our hearts, and over all the earth. We're looking for God to establish His will on earth just like His will is established in heaven. He is Lord and King and Master over all creation now, but not everyone knows it. One day that will change. Right now we can rebel against God's will. We can do things that are evil in his sight. We can ignore him and worship idols and chase counterfeit promises. But one day that's going to change. As we just read in Ezekiel, God is going to give his people a new heart and a new spirit, such that we will be cleansed, forgiven, and holy like he is holy. We will want what he wants, we will value what he values. We will obey him without effort because that is what's truly in our hearts. Sin, death, futility, evil, and corruption will be no more. God's will will be established on the earth in a full, complete, and perfect way. His will will actually be followed and delighted in. And that's the day we're praying to arrive. So to summarize, our Father who is in heaven, let it be holy your name, let it come your kingdom, let it be done your will on earth as it is in heaven. All of these are praying for one thing, for the kingdom of God to come, for God to bring the day when no one dismisses or curses him anymore, for God to bring the day when everyone recognizes that God is the one true God, for God to establish His promised kingdom through the Messiah ruling over all the earth, for God to bring the day when all evil is vanquished and this world finally reflects God's commitment to holiness, righteous, and justice. That's the request of this prayer. Please bring that. May we see the day that your name is vindicated as holy. May we see the day when your kingdom is established through the Messiah and when your will is truly implemented over all the earth. Now before we move on, let's stop to think back to the immediate context. Jesus sets up the Lord's prayer by warning about two very common perversions of prayer. One is using prayer as a tool to gain the worldly approval of others. The other is using prayer as a tool to manipulate God into giving you worldly gain in this life. So when the hypocrites pray, they're seeking the approval of other people. Although prayer is supposed to be a conversation with God, they are not really talking to God. They want other people to admire them for their piety and devotion. The Gentiles, on the other hand, think they are using their words as a technique that will guarantee an answer. They think they can use their prayers in a way that makes it more likely that God will hear and answer them. If they just develop the right technique, the right approach and spiritual discipline, then God will hear them. Then Jesus gives us a prayer which focuses on requesting that God bring his kingdom. It seems to me that that challenges us to think about what we really want from God. We could have our hearts set on the applause of our peers, and we could use prayer as a means to gain that approval. We could have our hearts set on prosperity and security and the material blessings of this world, and we could use prayer as a means to gain that. We could be seeking to use prayer as a means to get God to solve all our problems and make our lives easy. Or we could have our hearts set on being freed from sin. We could have our hearts set on finding eternal life in the kingdom of heaven and being made holy. Jesus is not warning something like, don't use either of these other two styles of prayer. Instead, use this style. I think he's challenging us to think about what do you really want from God? What is your heart set on? Well, what you pray about is a really good indication of what your heart is set on. When we pray to God, the masks, the blinders, the delusions come off, and we see our main concerns and what they really are. And Jesus is saying, You want to be the kind of person who's concerned about holiness. Don't set your heart on the blessings of this world. Don't set your heart on a smooth and easy life now. Don't set your heart on the blessings of this world and the goodies of this life. Rather, set your heart on the kingdom of God. Or as he will say later, seek first his kingdom. I think he's saying you want to be the sort of people who pray in this way because you want to be the sort of people whose hearts are set on the right thing. What I, Jesus, want you, my followers, to desire most is the kingdom of God. And if you do that, this is how you will pray. You ought to know that nothing in this world will truly satisfy you or solve your deepest problems. What is it that you are longing for from God? What is it that you really and truly need? Well, if you are wise, you will cry out for God's kingdom to come because that is what you truly need. That's also what the world really needs. Your heart should be growing in this desire that God will come quickly and establish his kingdom, that his desires will prevail and that his name will be made holy and great. We often ask the question, does prayer work? If I ask God for stuff, do I have any hope that he will respond positively? Well, it strikes me as very interesting that in this first part of Jesus' model prayer, that's an irrelevant question. God's kingdom is going to come whether I pray for it or not. This is not like praying for rain, which may or may not happen, or praying for a sunny day, which may or may not happen. I am praying for something that God has already promised is going to happen. This is not an issue of I have to pray to make sure I get my preferred answer. Rather, the importance of this prayer lies in the nature of the decision that I have to make about what's important to me and therefore what I'm going to pray about. I have to decide what do I really want from God? What is the focus of my life? Why am I following Him in the first place? Am I preoccupied with the worries of this life such that my prayers are filled with requests for worldly prosperity and success? Or have I heard the promises of God about how to follow? Find a place in his kingdom and I long for them. I long to be in that kingdom. I think that's what Jesus is teaching us. God has promised that one day he will send his Messiah back to establish justice, peace, and righteousness over all the earth. God has promised that one day his name and his reputation will be vindicated through all of creation. Jesus is telling us to believe and embrace that promise. If our hearts are filled with the hope from these promises, then our prayers will reflect that. We will pray for the kingdom of God to come because we long for it to come, because that's what our hearts are set on. Now, in my humble and good for nothing opinion, I don't think the Bible ever commands us to pray as a routine. Prayer is a fairly natural response, and it's part of the human experience. Even people who don't believe in God end up praying sometime. When put in peril, even the most hardened atheists will often cry out to God. I don't think we need to be commanded to pray. Rather, I think the Bible urges us to be the right sort of people. We should be people who believe God's promises. We should be people who trust God. We should see past the empty promises of the world, and we should want to be holy like God is holy. We should care about other people as we care about ourselves. The Bible urges us to pray in a way that reflects a heart set on the right things. I don't think the command is be a person who prays. Rather, the idea is when you pray, be the kind of person who prays for the right things. If you're going to tell God, this is what I want, then it's important that you want the right things. I think that's why the Lord's Prayer starts this way. Above all, we should believe that God is going to bring about His kingdom. The world is fallen, broken, and sinful. We ourselves are fallen, broken, and sinful creatures. Right now, God is patient and forbearing over our sins, but one day he's going to come in judgment. He's going to bring justice, right every wrong, and put an end to sin, death, and rebellion. In that day of judgment, he has promised to gather a people to himself, a people who trust him and follow him and want to be holy like he is holy. And we should want to be among those people. He has told us the one and only path to being among his people is to have saving faith. And throughout this sermon, Jesus has been describing what it looks like to be a person of faith. Now when it comes to this prayer, he's telling us the kinds of things people of faith pray for. And what is it? Thy kingdom come. What greater thing is there to desire? What could I want that would be better than the kingdom of God? Thank you for listening to the Wednesday in the Word podcast, the podcast that explains not only what a passage means, but also shows you how to figure it out. You can hear all previous episodes in this series on my website, Wednesdayintheword.com. There's no charge, no spam, no donations, and no ads. It's all free to help you improve your study skills and understanding of scripture. I do have one request. If you've been blessed by this podcast, please subscribe to it. Leave a positive rating or review wherever you listen to your podcast. And most importantly, tell a friend what you learned. And if you can, tell them where you learned it. A big thank you to Reggie Coates for the use of his beautiful song Tenacious as our theme music. You can find all of Reggie's music on heartfeltmusic.org. Thank you for joining me today. I'm Krisan Marotta, and I'll see you next week at Wednesday in the Word.