A Prayer for Losers

Introduction: Story

Weather’s changing. Fall temps are coming. And for me, that means some time out in the woods in a tree stand with a bow.

Just a couple of weeks ago, I was up in our timber doing some maintenance of our trails. We’ve got about 3 north/south trails that run through our woods that we keep clear of trees and debris as well as mow some of the underbrush.

So I’m on one of our ATV’s, and I’ve got the mower going behind me. And I’m gonna clear out the trail furthest west in our woods. It runs east and west along the northern boundary of our land, but then it bends south along the Wapsipinnicon River that runs through it.

And right at that bend… the trail is actually pretty easy to lose in the woods—because the Wapsi, whenever it floods (which it does frequently), can deposit a bunch of debris all over the place, so that when it recedes, you can’t quite tell where that trail bends south and then picks up.

I mean, there’s been plenty of times where I’ve been walking on it before sunrise and, thinking I was on the trail, walked for 10 minutes until I realized...

I am not on the trail. I am in the middle of the woods.

So: I’m up there. It’s middle of the afternoon. Mower’s churning behind me. And I get to that bend to the south.

And so I stop. And I’m looking to see where it’s supposed to bend to.

And I pick up a reference point about 20 yards ahead of me… and then another one about 40 yards, and another one at 60.

In other words, I think I can see where the trail should be. And sure enough, the river had deposited some deadfall and other brush and junk that I’d need to drag out or cut with the chainsaw. But no big deal.

So I’m going. And I get to the first deadfall. And I chop it up; drag it out of the way.

Back in the ATV. Continue to mow.

And I do this for about… 50 yards.

Until...

Until I come up to a deadfall that has obviously been there in that particular spot for like... 5 years.

Which means...

This isn’t the trail.

What this starting to be, though, is a brand new trail that I’m creating that leads to absolutely nowhere and is just burning up a lot of gas in the saw and battery in the ATV.

So I gotta work my way back to where I think I got off track, and find the right reference point around that bend to get me back on the trail south.

Here’s the thing:

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It’s easy to get off track—even when you think you’re headed in the right direction.

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I mean, I stopped and looked. For awhile. For longer than I even care to admit to you as I’m telling the story. I stopped and looked. I’d been there more times than I can remember. I’d even made that mistake before. And I thought I had picked out the right reference points.

And yet… there’s now a freshly cut trail in those woods that is really gonna mess with the next person who finds themselves following it.

And here’s what’s also true:

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It’s easy to get off track—even when you think you’re headed in the right direction.

You’re guaranteed to get off track when you pick the wrong reference points.

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I picked out a few trees that looked like they had the right gaps between them… kinda looked like a trail… kinda looked like the right direction… but:

Nope.

And the further I went, the clearer it became: I had just picked the wrong reference points.

Transition: What If Jesus Was Serious

This weekend as we continue in our “What If Jesus Was Serious” series, we’re going to get to a part of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount where he teaches his disciples how to pray with a prayer that’s become known as “The Lord’s Prayer.” You might have grown up in a church that said this prayer weekly.

But what you may not be as familiar with is the context of “The Lord’s Prayer”—which is what Jesus said right before he taught it to his disciples. In other words: there was a reason he felt like he had to teach them how to pray. And if we can catch on to that reason, we’ll be able to catch on to the prayer itself.

Exegesis: Matthew 6/Approval

So, here’s the context; here’s the reason Jesus feels like he’s gotta teach his disciples how to pray. Take a look at this passage from Matthew 6:

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Matthew 6:1 “Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.”

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So there’s the statement Jesus makes. This is the beginning of backdrop to the prayer he’s eventually going to teach his disciples.

And just so we don’t misunderstand what Jesus is saying here:

Jesus isn’t saying that doing good things in front of people is always bad, in and of itself. It’s not like Jesus is saying, “Only secret good behavior. The only time it’s ok to do what’s right is when no one else is watching. And you should feel bad whenever someone praises you for doing the right thing.”

No. What he’s saying is this:

There’s a bunch of people out there who make sure that they do the right thing in the most visible way possible.

And the reason they do that is so that they’ll get everyone’s approval. That’s who they really are and that’s what they’re really after.

Don’t be like them. Your Father in heaven… he’s not a big fan of them. They’re bad reference points.

And this was what was going on in Jesus’ day: there were a bunch of people who kinda set themselves up as examples of good people—models of what a godly person was supposed to be like—who Jesus says in reality aren’t good models at all.

And he gives some examples. First in Matthew 6:2:

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Matthew 6:2 “So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.”

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What’s he talking about here? People are giving their offering in the church or giving some cash to beggars on the street, and there’s like a mariachi band that sounds off when they do it?

Well, it’s unclear if Jesus is talking literally here (like, actual trumpet blasts) or metaphorically (like, “blow your own horn” or making a big deal of what you’re doing). Some scholars think he might be referring to people clanging their coins into the offering plate or the beggar’s cup.

Either way, Jesus is saying: they’re giving in a way that wins them a ton of approval and admiration from everyone else around them. And in fact, that’s exactly why they’re doing it. And therefore, they’re a bad reference point. You don’t wanna be like them.

I know that everyone else wants to be like them. I know that everyone else is “amazed at their generosity” and that they’re the “standard” for who everyone hopes to be one day.

But watch out:

If you use them as your reference point and strive to be more like them, you’re gonna get way off track from who God wants you to be.

Similarly, in Matthew 6:5 Jesus says:

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Matthew 6:5 “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full.”

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Same pattern here: everyone thinks these professional pray-ers are so great and so holy and so godly. But they’re a bad reference point. They’re doing it to win other’s approval.

And notice what Jesus calls both types of people:

“Hypocrites.”

Did you notice that? He calls people who do the right thing only to win the approval of others “hypocrites.”

Why are they hypocrites?

Well, let’s remember what a hypocrite is, first of all:

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I’m a hypocrite when who I am on the outside doesn’t match up with who I am on the inside.

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Which is how most of us would define it. A hypocrite is someone who’s outside doesn’t match up with the inside. It’s someone who leads a double life.

And if we had to come up with an example, we’d just point to the most recent scandal—whichever high-profile politician or religious figure had just gotten exposed for doing the very thing they were telling everyone else not to do. That’s a hypocrite.

But Jesus’ examples of a hypocrite aren’t really “scandalous.” His examples are a little different.

And it’s important that we see this kind of hypocrisy here or we might miss the power of what Jesus is pointing out.

According to Jesus...

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I’m a hypocrite when who I am on the outside doesn’t match up with who I am on the inside.

When what I’m doing is good, but why I’m doing it isn’t.

When I’m doing the right thing for a wrong or selfish reason.

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Anybody can pick up on a hypocrite once their hypocrisy is made public. Wow… what a horribly hypocritical person. Glad I’m not like that.

But it hits a little closer to home, I think, when you consider that Jesus’ examples of hypocrites weren’t people who were living some sort of secretly horrible life while enjoying fame and fortune in the public eye.

Jesus’ examples were people doing the right thing... for the wrong reasons. For motives that were selfish… but hidden.

It’s people who were giving charitbly in a way that was a huge blessing to others.

It’s people who prayed and preached in a way that crowds loved to hear.

But those people weren’t giving because they were generous and they weren’t praying or preaching or because they had this deep desire for others to know God like they did.

No; that’s not who they were on the inside. That’s not why they were doing what they were doing. Their motives were selfish. They wanted to win the approval of others.

And that, Jesus says, is the kind of hypocrisy you really gotta be on the lookout for. Because why? Because:

It’s easy to get led astray by those kinds of hypocrites.

And it’s easy to get led astray because a lot of times, everyone loves them. They love them for what they say, or what they do, or what they stand for, or how gifted they are, or what kind of “impact” they’re making. On the surface, they look like a great reference point.

But they’re not. Because all too often, below the surface, they’re doing or saying the right thing for the wrong reason.

And then eventually… when the stuff on the inside isn’t good; when they’re doing what they’re doing or saying what they’re saying primarily to win the approval of others… to sell books… get views… get downloads or subscribers… get votes… get influence…

Eventually they become blind guides, pied pipers, sometimes leading masses of people completely astray.

People who do the right thing for the wrong reasons are bad reference points. Dangerous examples to follow. This is what Jesus was saying.

Application: Bad Reference Points

I can’t help but continue to reflect on the craziness of the last 18 months.

And the thing I can’t help but continue to reflect on is how many just plain bad reference points there were throughout all of it. How so many got so lost thinking they were following someone who was a good reference point, but turned out not to be so great. So many bad reference points.

Here’s what it feels like for me as a pastor recently—and I’ve said this to more than a few people over the last few weeks:

It feels like I’m in a rescue raft. Our ship got torpedoed; we all had to bail; and we’ve been scrambling to find the survivors who have drifted out to sea. We’ve been drifting for the last 18 months, battered first by the pandemic, and masks, and the racial upheaval, and the derecho, and the election.

But then there was Jan. 6th, and the vaccine, and the mandates, and the supply chain, and the labor shortage, and Afghanistan.

But now, there’s starting to be moments—moments where I’ve been able to reconnect with someone, maybe for the first time in a long time. And we get to a point in our conversation where they share this with me. Here’s what they say that causes me to realize, “Oh… you’ve been drifting. You need a hand. You need to get pulled up out of the water and into the boat.”

Here’s what they share. They’ll say to me:

“I didn’t think I’d ever be so disappointed and disillusioned with people who I respected; who I thought were solid followers of Jesus; who I had a good relationship with at one time; who I listened to and trusted, and who just… went…

Nuts.”

And they went nuts because they followed some pretty horrible reference points. They followed someone or a group of someones down a path that led to nowhere good.

And that’s a pretty disorienting time.

It’s disorienting when you discover that someone who you thought was a good and trustworthy example turned out not to be

It’s disorienting when it’s difficult to really know who or what to believe.

And it’s disorienting when some of the people you trusted and even loved most in the world are leading themselves and others down a path that you don’t think you can or even should follow.

Transition: The Lord’s Prayer

And so this, my friends, is why Jesus taught his disciples how to pray. Because the same thing was true in his world back then. There were plenty of people setting themselves up to be examples to follow who were not really good examples. And so once Jesus paints that picture, he gives them this prayer—and in it, some much better reference points.

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Reliable Reference Points in The Lord’s Prayer

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So let’s walk down Jesus’ prayer, now that we understand why he gave it to his disciples. There are some things in here that are great reference points, things that we should be on the lookout for in ourselves and others—things that if we were to dig below the surface in our lives and the lives of other who set themselves up to be examples, here’s what we should find.

Strive to be people who are like this. Follow people who are like this. Here are your reliable reference points.

Let’s start reading together in verse 9:

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Matthew 6:9 “This, then, is how you should pray: “ ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name...”

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Hallowed is respected, revered. That’s what that word means. So here’s reliable reference point #1:

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Reliable Reference Points in The Lord’s Prayer

Inspire more awe of God than them.

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It’s the first thing in Jesus’ prayer because it’s the most important, and everything else that Jesus prays flows out of and is connected to it. People who are reliable reference points are the kind of people who are inspiring, for sure—but they inspire more awe of who God is, what God has done, what God is doing, what God can do, what life with God is like… way more than who they are, what they’ve done, what they’re going to do next.

Let’s go to the next verse:

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Matthew 6:10 “...your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

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Your kingdom, God. Meaning: your rule. Your reign. Your ways. What life and society would be like if you were fully in charge of it, God. And not just in heaven some day; but here and now.

Here’s your reliable reference point:

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Reliable Reference Points in The Lord’s Prayer

Inspire more awe of God than them.

Hopeful—not in the world, but about God in the world.

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Which follows from the first thing. If I’m absolutely in awe of who God is, what he can do, what he is doing, what he will do…

Then I have absolutely every reason to be hopeful and optimistic about the world that I live in and his desire to save it, redeem it, fix it, love it, and rule over it.

Which isn’t to say that we’ve got to be hopeful and optimistic about everything in this world. We’re not Polly Anna, rose-colored-glasses, always look on the bright side/ignorance is bliss kinds of people. Of course not. Those people aren’t reliable. They refuse to see the really screwed up things that are going on.

But you know who else isn’t reliable? Those doomsday, conspiracy theorist, this-world-is-going-to-hell-in-a-hand basket kinds of people either.

And there’s a whole lot of them these days that, with every new crisis, gain a larger following and claim to be speaking in the name of God. Whether it be this biblical prophecy, or this current event headline, or this new insight into Revelation… whatever.

They’re not reliable. You wanna know why?

Because Jesus doesn’t pray the kind of prayer that says “Look out! Hole up until it’s all over! God is going to be completely absent from the world and leave you high and dry until I come back. Good luck!”

No! Jesus says: pray that God will intervene more. That this world, here and now, the one that you and I live in, will look more like heaven—more like the place where God is completely in charge.

Be hopeful people! Not hopeful in the world, but about God in it. Not because of the world, but because of the God who is in charge of it.

Next one:

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Matthew 6:11 “Give us today our daily bread.”

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Here’s your reference point:

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Reliable Reference Points in The Lord’s Prayer

Inspire more awe of God than them.

Hopeful—not in the world, but about God in the world.

More dependent; less independent.

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Reliable reference points find their freedom, their identity, and their well-being in their dependence on God.

The more dependent they are on God, the more confident and at peace they are.

The more dependent they are on God, the more steadfast and secure they are.

More dependence.

There are so many unreliable reference points who tell you that your identity or freedom or your well-being or even your faith rests not on your dependence on God, but on your independence—on being free from whatever threat is out there to your religious freedom, or to your Christian values, or to your beliefs and traditions.

No. It 's not. None of those things depend on any of that.

Your whole being rests on God being good and providing for your every need. Your daily bread. And he can and will do that no matter what you face next.

Stop following people who tell you to protect your independence at all costs. Those are unreliable reference points.

Start following people who tell you to be dependent upon God at all costs. Those are reliable reference points.

Next one:

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Matthew 6:12 “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.”

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Here’s your reference point:

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Reliable Reference Points in The Lord’s Prayer

Inspire more awe of God than them.

Hopeful—not in the world, but about God in the world.

More dependent; less independent.

Know they’ve been forgiven much and easily forgive others.

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I tell you what: whenever I see someone in the public eye get up on a soapbox and just start railing away at someone or something—even if they’re right; even if I agree with them—whenever I see person do that, I can’t help but wonder:

Have you forgotten just how messed up you are?

Have you forgotten how justified God would’ve been to just write you off—but didn’t?

Do you have any kind of awareness of just how much you’ve been forgiven as you get after someone for who they are and what they’re doing?

Reliable reference points usually aren’t the loudest voice around the table or on the internet—because they know just how much God forgave them. Hard for them to climb up on that soapbox and shout down at others when they know that Jesus climbed up on a cross for them. And so their posture, their default towards others, tends to be much more forgiving than condemning, or angry, or vitriolic.

Here’s the last one from verse 13:

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Matthew 6:13 “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’”

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So, number 5:

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Reliable Reference Points in The Lord’s Prayer

Inspire more awe of God than them.

Hopeful—not in the world, but about God in the world.

More dependent; less independent.

Know they’ve been forgiven much and easily forgive others..

Aware of how fragile their integrity really is.

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Reliable reference points know that there’s only one true hero; only one who is completely and utterly reliable all the time; only one who has perfect integrity that you can always count on. And that person isn’t them; it’s Jesus.

Unreliable reference points demand that you trust them; that their viewpoint is the right one; and that you can have absolute confidence in them.

But reliable reference points know: we’re fragile. We’re tempted. There’s nothing that we’re ultimately not capable of. And because of that, we’re all just one step away from screwing it all up and losing everyone’s trust and confidence.

Put your confidence in God, not me—that’s what a reliable reference point will do.