Proper 12C (Pentecost 7 2025)

Text: Luke 11:1–13; Genesis 18:17–33

Introduction

Today, Jesus teaches us to pray. And today, we also give thanks for something the Church has confessed for 1,700 years: the Nicene Creed. At first, those may seem like two different topics—one about speaking to God, the other about speaking about God. But they are not so different. Because every time you pray, you are confessing what you believe. And every time you confess the Creed, you are declaring to whom you pray.

I. What Kind of God Do You Pray To?

Prayer is universal. But that does not mean all prayer is the same. In fact, the way you pray reveals what kind of god you believe in. And that is the key: every prayer is a confession. Every time you pray, you are bearing witness to the god you believe in. Whether you realize it or not, your prayers are saying: This is who I think is listening. This is what I think He’s like. This is what I believe He will do. You may not be reciting the Creed, but you are living one out.

Some people pray as if God were a distant bureaucrat who needs to be persuaded. Others pray as if He were a vending machine—insert the right formula, push the right button, and expect a result. Still others stop praying altogether—because they suspect that no one is really listening. And then there are those who pray as if they are doing God a favor by checking in.

But Jesus teaches something very different. He teaches you to pray to the One whom the Creed calls “the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth.” The One who fashioned galaxies and feeds the sparrows and numbers the hairs on your head. That is the One you are invited to address as Father.

You do not pray into the void. You do not offer your petitions to fate. You are not trying to appease the ancestors or manipulate the universe.

You are calling on the God who made all things—the One who measured the oceans in the hollow of His hand, who set the planets in motion, who brings forth justice like the dawn and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. The vastness of this universe that He spoke into existence points to a power and authority we can not even begin to comprehend. The laws that govern everything from the vast galaxies billions of light years away to subatomic particles points to His holiness and justice.

And that is where the tension begins. That God of holiness and justice— Jesus teaches you to call on Him as ‘Father’. If this is who God truly is—if He really is almighty and holy and just—then what gives you the right to speak to Him at all? How dare you, a sinner, presume to call upon Him, much less call Him Father?

Long before humanity understood the laws that govern the movement of the objects in the heavens we understood how God created us to live. From Adam and Eve on, every one of us has known what is right and what is wrong. And every object in creation— from the largest to the smallest— obeys the laws that their creator established to govern them— except you and me. The planets move unerringly in their orbits. But you live with pride and hubris rather than than humility, with envy rather than kindness. Trillions of atoms interact and combine in amazing and consistent ways but, for you, it is too much to treat othes with patience rather than wrath.

And yet you would approach your creator with your wants, with your needs, and your trials.

That reality shatters every illusion of self-sufficiency. It reminds you that you are not coming on your own merit. You are not presenting your credentials. You are simply taking Jesus at His word. You are praying as one who has been invited.

And that is why this opening word of the Lord’s Prayer—“Father”—is not just an address. It is a confession. A confession of the kind of God you are praying to. And a confession of the kind of child you are—one who has no claim apart from grace, but every confidence because of it.

The Lord’s Prayer begins where the Creed begins—with the Father Almighty. And it will lead us to the Son and the Spirit. But for now, let this word sink in: Father. That is not just what you say when you pray. That is what you believe.

II. You Pray Because You Know the Son

If every prayer is a confession of faith, then your prayer begins and ends with Jesus.

It would be utterly presumptuous for sinners like us to call the Creator of the universe “Father”—unless Jesus had made it possible. But He has. And more than that—He has invited it. You are not born with that kind of access. It is not something you discover through self-exploration or build through spiritual effort. It is a gift. It is adoption. It is grace—and it comes through Jesus Christ alone.

That is why the Creed does not stop at “I believe in God, the Father Almighty.” It goes on—immediately and necessarily—to say: “And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God…” He is the reason you can call the Creator “Father.” He is the one who reveals the Father to you, who reconciles you to the Father, and who brings your prayers into the Father’s presence.

So when Jesus says, “When you pray, say: ‘Father…’” (Luke 11:2), He is not just giving you a formula. He is giving you Himself. He is placing His own name on your lips. He is commanding you to pray—but notice how He commands it. Not like a drill sergeant, but like a son pulling you into the circle of the Father’s love. He commands it as only the beloved Son can: with authority and compassion. The way that only He can say, Come.

And yet, God does not only command you to pray—He invites you. He promises to hear you. He promises to answer. He sends His Son not only to tell you that you may call God Father, but to make it so. Just as the Lord once revealed His judgment to Abraham so that Abraham might intercede, so now He reveals His heart to you—so that you may call upon Him in faith.

Abraham stood before God and interceded—dust and ashes, pleading on behalf of the wicked. “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?” he asked. “Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city—will you then destroy it?” And God said, “I will spare the whole place for their sake.” So Abraham tried again: “Suppose five of the fifty are lacking—will you destroy it for forty-five?” God said no. “What about forty?” Still no. “Suppose thirty are found there… twenty… what if there are only ten?” And the Lord said, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it” (Genesis 18:24–32). And Abraham stopped there.

But ten could not be found. The Lord searched the cities, and the wickedness was great. And so Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed.

That could have been the end of the story—not only for Sodom, but for the whole world.

Because what God saw in Sodom, He sees in every city. What was true of those two towns is true of the whole earth. The corruption. The violence and wrath. The pride and hubris. The envy and unbelief. It is not confined to a single region or generation. It is the human condition.

And so the Lord says, as He once said of Sodom, “The outcry against humanity is great, and their sin is very grave. I will go down and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to me” (cf. Genesis 18:20–21). Not just to see what is happening in Sodom or Gomorrah—but to see what is true in every heart. Every household. Every nation. He searches not just two cities, but the face of the earth, to see whether even one might be found—righteous, blameless, without sin.

And what does He find?

He finds no one. “There is no one who does good, not even one” (Romans 3:12). Not in Sodom. Not in Jerusalem. Not in Unionville. Not in you.

And that should have been the end of the story. Because if the Lord were to deal with the world as it deserves—if He were to treat us all as He treated Sodom—then there would be no city left standing. No child uncondemned. No hope.

But the Lord did not stop with the search. He did not stop with judgment. When He found none righteous, He sent One.

He sent Jesus—God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God. Not created, but begotten. Not one among many, but the only one who is righteous. And for His sake, God does not destroy the world. For His sake, you are spared. For His sake, you are made righteous.

Jesus does not merely ask that the guilty be spared. He takes their place. He does not say, “Spare them for the sake of ten.” He says, “Spare them for My sake. Spare them because I will bear their sin.” And the Father listens.

He listens—because the righteous One has gone to the cross. In Sodom and Gomorrah, we saw a terrifying display of God’s judgment—fire and brimstone rained down from heaven to consume the wicked. But even that cannot compare to the judgment poured out on Jesus at Calvary. There, on the cross, the full weight of God’s wrath was unleashed—not upon the guilty, but upon the sinless Son. The condemnation that should have fallen on the world fell instead on Christ. And the One who was lifted up on a cross for your salvation—is now risen and ascended, seated at the right hand of the Father—and still interceding for you.

That is the kind of Lord you have. Not a heavenly negotiator. Not a spiritual influencer. Not a moral example. You have one “who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven… and was made man” (Nicene Creed). You pray in His name—not as a tagline, not as a spiritual password, but as a child who has been baptized into His death and resurrection. You pray in the name of the crucified and risen Lord, and that changes everything.

You do not pray as a beggar trying to impress a judge. You pray as one who is clothed in the righteousness of Christ. You do not come in your name. You come in His. And He is heard.

Here is the final portion of the sermon manuscript, completing Section III, Section IV, and the conclusion:

III. The Spirit Teaches You to Trust and Wait

If prayer is a confession of who God is, then it is also an act of faith. And faith, by definition, means trust in what is unseen. That is where the Holy Spirit comes in.

You do not teach yourself to pray. You are taught. And you are not taught by technique. You are not trained by repetition. You are led by the Spirit—the same Spirit whom the Nicene Creed calls “the Lord and giver of life.” The One who proceeds from the Father and the Son. The One who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified. The One who spoke by the prophets. And now, the One who dwells in you.

Jesus does not end this teaching on prayer with, “Say these words and everything will go well.” He ends by pointing you to the Father’s generosity: “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (Luke 11:13). That is the promise. Not that you will get everything you want. Not that your prayer will be answered on your timeline. But that God will give you what is best—and what is best, above all, is His Spirit.

The Spirit teaches you to cry out, “Abba, Father” (Romans 8:15; Galatians 4:6). The Spirit gives voice to your groaning when you do not even know what to say. The Spirit sustains your faith when the answer is silence. The Spirit is the one who keeps you praying, even when the world tells you to give up. He is the one who turns your questions into trust—not blind trust, but trust in a crucified and risen Savior.

Sometimes, that trust means waiting. Sometimes, it means weeping. Sometimes, it means going on praying when you have no strength left. And sometimes, it sounds like this: “Lord, You promised. You promised not to give a stone when Your children ask for bread. You promised that even we, though we are evil, know how to give good gifts—and that You would not do less. But it seems like what You are giving me is a stone. It feels like a snake. And still—I trust that it cannot be. I trust that, in the end, it must be good.” That is not weakness. That is faith refusing to let go.

You do not pray that way unless the Spirit is at work in you. You do not wrestle like that unless the Spirit has taught you the promises of God and fastened your heart to them. That is what the Spirit does. He gives voice to your groaning when you do not even know what to say. He sustains your faith when the answer is silence. He is the one who turns your questions into trust—not blind trust, but trust in a crucified and risen Savior.

And because of the Spirit’s work, you are not only heard. You are held.

That is what Jesus is giving you when He teaches you to pray. Not a magic formula. Not a transaction. Not a guarantee of comfort. He is giving you the name of the Father, the intercession of the Son, and the indwelling of the Spirit.

And He is giving you this assurance: Your prayer is not a cry into the darkness. It is the voice of a child carried by the Spirit, in the name of the Son, to the heart of the Father.

IV. To Pray Is to Confess the Creed

The Lord’s Prayer and the Nicene Creed are not two separate things. They are two ways of holding fast to the same truth: who God is, and what He has done for you.

The Creed begins: “I believe in one God, the Father Almighty…” The Lord’s Prayer begins: “Our Father who art in heaven…” One proclaims it. The other prays it. But they both confess the same thing. You do not pray to a vague spirit. You do not believe in a distant force. You call on the God who has made Himself known—as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

When you pray, “Hallowed be Thy name,” you are confessing the holiness of the One whose name you bear—the One God in three persons.

When you pray, “Thy kingdom come,”you are praying that the reign of Christ, the crucified and risen King, would be made known in your life.

When you pray, “Thy will be done,”you are placing your trust in the God who was willing to be pierced for your transgressions.

When you ask for daily bread, you are acknowledging the Father who provides, the Son who gives Himself as bread, and the Spirit who satisfies your deepest hunger.

When you ask for forgiveness, you are placing your entire hope in the cross.

When you ask for deliverance from evil, you are confessing that Christ is risen, and that His victory will one day be your own.

You are not inventing your own prayer. You are stepping into one that Jesus Himself has given—and one that He Himself prays. That is why He teaches you to say “Our Father.” Not just “mine.” Our.Because you do not pray alone. You pray with Him who is your Brother, your Savior, your great High Priest. You are drawn into His prayer, and He joins your voice to His own.

And when you say Amen, it is not a hopeful guess. It is a creed in one word: I believe. It shall be so.

To confess the Nicene Creed is to stake your life on the God who has revealed Himself in Christ. To pray the Lord’s Prayer is to entrust that life—day by day, need by need, breath by breath—into His hands.

You believe. You pray. You belong.

Conclusion

So let us come back to where we began.

What kind of God do you pray to?

Not a distant force. Not a cosmic judge you must impress. Not a vending machine for your desires.

You pray to the Father Almighty. You pray through the Son who gave Himself for you. You pray by the Spirit who will not let go of you.

And that means your prayer is never alone. It is never unheard. It is never wasted.

When you say “Our Father,” you are stepping into the prayer of Jesus Himself. You are drawn into the fellowship of the Triune God. You are confessing that this is the God who made you, redeemed you, and now claims you as His own.

And when you say Amen—you are not wishing. You are trusting. You are saying, Yes, this is true. Yes, this is mine. Yes, He will do it.

You believe. You pray. You belong.