The Forgotten Gift

Our Father who art in Heaven, Hallowed be thy name.

Have you ever really pondered what you are saying when you speak these opening words of the world’s most famous prayer? Like do you know what you are saying about God when you speak this, or has it just become like the opening line of the rest of the prayer?

So much about our day to day life is so routine that we don’t even stop to think about what’s happening.

We take for granted our breathing and the beating of our hearts. We take for granted the mechanisms of the world working properly — like cars starting and traffic lights going from green to yellow to red and then back to green again.

We take all of these things for granted because they are just so routine that they only garner a second thought when they don’t work the way they are supposed to.

So again I ask you — what are you saying about God when you open your mouth and heart to the most famous prayer ever recorded?

Well, you are making an appeal to the one with whom you have the most intimate possible relationship — the parental relationship on steroids right? Like as a parent who has had his own parents I can attest to the fact that I know things about my two little boys that no one else besides my wife knows. Even some really really gross things. And now I reflect on the fact that my parent’s know all that same stuff about me — and that they still love me deeply.

And that’s all well and good, until we turn to the next phrase: hallowed or holy is your name. I think this loses its punch if we don’t explore it a little bit more — holy means that God is so beyond our comprehension of goodness and righteousness that it really warrants God to be distinguished and set apart from all other beings in existence.

So when we open our mouths and say Our father in heaven, holy is your name what we are admitting is that while God is the deepest and most intimate relationship that we have in this world, it is a gift because it defies logic and reasoning. God is by nature holy and we are not. Yet God chooses or is compelled for some reason to seek after and enter into relationship with us. And that is a wild fact. And even more wild is that we likely don’t ponder this reality on a daily basis at all. Until, it stops working the way it should. Until something happens in our lives that wakes us up to the fact that our core most relationship — the divine relationship is needing repair.

We are in a series call “A Part of Your World” where we are looking at what all kinds of thinkers have coined the concentric circles of belonging. What this means is that humans are connected beings who exist in a series of relationships of varying levels of intimacy. It’s who we are and what we do. And it’s who we are and what we do because we are beings that are made in the image of the Triune God — the first and eternal community of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

What we are looking at for the next several weeks is how these relationships rely on one another in order to allow us to be the socially healthy creatures that God created us to be so that we can live out the mission that God created us to accomplish on Earth. Essentially — how we can be the best followers of Jesus that we can be.

Today we turn our emphasis to the innermost and most intimate of relationships — the divine relationship. For most of us this is the relationship that is easiest to neglect. This is the relationship that goes mostly unseen and largely unspoken about. But it’s the most important relationship to the overall health of every other relationship that we have in this world. If we aren’t right with God, we can’t truly be right with one another.

So what does the Bible say about our relationship with God? I can tell you what I always assumed it said about it, and maybe you have a similar experience. I came to know Jesus and have a relationship with God through a church, and particularly made a decision to follow Jesus after hearing about sin and redemption on a special night at a summer camp that I went to. That night I prayed a prayer led by some camp counselors and as far as I understood because I said I was sorry for my sin and asked Jesus to forgive me I was all set for life. The relationship was set in stone. Signed, sealed, delivered.

Anyone else? All well and good, until you totally neglect the relationship. Like imagine getting married and then just ignoring your spouse for the rest of your lives. It’s crazy right?

So I like to think of the relationship in a much more robust way — and I think the story of Israel is my favorite way to illustrate the way that God works on the God side of this relationship.

So the people of Israel were God’s chosen ones and they had like a real bad track record of holding up their side of the relationship. They were constantly forgetting to worship God or worshiping other gods and treating other people really really poorly. And This was God’s response to all of that nonsense:

Ezekiel 36:22–28 NRSV

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. I will sanctify my great name, which has been profaned among the nations, and which you have profaned among them; and the nations shall know that I am the Lord, says the Lord God, when through you I display 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 upon you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will remove from your body the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you, and make you follow my statutes and be careful to observe my ordinances. Then you shall live in the land that I gave to your ancestors; and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.

God is like listen: Everybody in this world knows that you are my people. But look at they way you are acting. You are making me look bad. So this is what I’m gonna do. I’m gonna love you so deeply, I’m gonna lean into our relationship so much stronger, so that people will know that they way ya’ll act isn’t the defining reality about who I am. I’m going to love you so much that you are transformed, and when you are transformed the whole world will know that I am in the business of this transformational divine relationship stuff.

A new heart I will give you, I will put my spirit in you, and I will cause you to live differently. You will be my people and I will be your God.

And this is just such a beautiful picture of God’s deep commitment to us. Although these words were spoken to Israel, they are just as true for us today. God is continually, unrelentingly pursuing us with the goal of transforming our hearts and our lives.

And so how are we called to respond to this love? Well lets see what Jesus said about it:

John 15:1–11 NRSV

“I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes to make it bear more fruit. You have already been cleansed by the word that I have spoken to you. Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing. Whoever does not abide in me is thrown away like a branch and withers; such branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask for whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples. As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

Abide in me. Remain. Lean in. Accept the forgotten gift. Make my love something that you don’t forget, that you don’t just take for granted each and every day of your lives.

It’s probably the most common reality within the church that we are not good at abiding — truly abiding. We are not good — and I’ll be the first to admit this — we are not good at nurturing the divine relationship. So when it breaks down, when we feel disconnected from God — the problem is that we are in a one sided relationship. And spoiler alert — God ain’t the one not holding up his end of the deal ok.

What if we really lived as though prayer changed things? What if we lived as if prayer was the means by which we actually continued the process of “abiding” in Jesus?

In a really incredible book by one of my favorite Pastors called Praying Like Monks, Living Like Fools Tyler Staton writes these words about Prayer:

"Prayer is the invitation to intimacy. It’s where we bring our true selves before God and discover His true heart for us."

"Prayer is not a transaction but a relationship. It’s where we learn to listen, to trust, and to love more deeply."

"In prayer, we don’t just talk to God; we are transformed by Him. Our souls are shaped in the quiet moments of communion with the Divine."

Prayers are Quiet moments of communion with the Divine that are intimate, stripped down and away from all of the platitudes and false strength that we project to the world. Prayer is our acknowledgement that we stand toe to toe and heart to heart with the God of the universe, and that the very God who created all things has inclined his heart and ear to embrace us in our raw humanity and hear the pleadings of our frail hearts.

And most of the time we forget this is even happening.

But what if we stopped forgetting. What if we remembered that in every moment we have access to this most intimate divine relationship. What if we remembered in every moment that we have been commanded to lean into this intimate divine relationship. What if we realized that every single relationship that we have suffers because we don’t pray enough. The divine relationship is the most profound and foundational relationship that we have. It’s health drives or derails our ability to have healthy family relationships, friendships, and communal relationships.

When we pray, we are reminded of the posture that we are called to have towards others. It’s that same posture that God has towards us.

So here’s what we are going to do. Every single one of us is going to wake up every morning and say the Lord’s prayer before we do anything else. First thing. Our Father in heaven, holy is your name. And then finish the prayer, but hang heavy on those first words. You are talking to the most infinite and eternal being in existence and you are talking to the lover of your soul. How incredible is that.

Then come back here next week and we’re gonna see if anything changed in our lives since. Let’s pray.