"Father"

Today's a great day as we come together to worship the Lord. In my library, I have a book by E.M. Bounds, and that book is very several volumes thick. He was a pastor, he was an author, and that book is all about prayer. And he has done an extensive study about prayer in the scriptures, and it's a marvelous, marvelous read. But there's one phrase he states in all those volumes that has stuck out in my mind more so than any other phrase that I have read that he himself has written. And he said this, he said, prayer honors God and dishonors self.

When I read that, I thought to myself, boy, that is just so right on. Prayer honors God and dishonors self. You know, our prayers are mainly selfish. Our prayers are mainly about us. But prayer is about honoring God and giving him the glory. The disciples' prayer, or the Lord's prayer, recorded in Matthew 6 and in Luke chapter 11, is a prayer that focuses in on God and his wonderful glory. And it sets God in proper perspective. It begins with God, it ends with God. Our Father, who art in heaven, to him be the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

Everything about the prayer is about God, and it's focused on God. And when you begin to think about your prayers, I don't know if you listen to yourself pray very much. You might want to do that every once in a while, just to figure out what you're saying. But so many times we find ourselves talking about me and I, and using those personal pronouns all the time. There are no personal pronouns in the disciples' prayer. There are none. We'll talk about that in a second.

But boy, we like to use a lot of personal pronouns when we're talking to God, because we think that prayer is about us. And somehow it's getting God to come down and touch me and meet me where I'm at, instead of realizing that prayer is about us ascending to the presence of Almighty God and submitting to his wonderful, perfect will. The prayer begins talking about our Father, who is in heaven. Years ago, years ago, when my parents and I used to have our devotions at home, we always used the daily bread growing up as a kid.

And we'd each read different portions of the scriptures. And my father would read the body and the daily bread. And then, of course, he'd pass it off. And one of us would read the little poem that was there. And then another one would read the quote at the bottom. The daily bread has been doing that for years. And one year, we were reading about prayer. And the quote at the bottom said, there are many people who pray our Father on Sunday but live like orphans the rest of the week. And I thought, boy, that's true.

We come to church, we talk to God as our Father, and then we live on Monday as if we have no Heavenly Father. We live as orphans. This prayer will help us understand how God is our Father and how he is supreme. Now, in Matthew's account of this same prayer, Christ had some grave concerns. And when Christ came to earth, everything was really upside down in Judaism. And so, when he began to preach the Sermon on the Mount, it really was an indictment against all the religious leaders and everything that they taught.

It just cut across the grain of Judaism entirely. And so, it wouldn't take the religious people long to be upset with Jesus. But the Lord said in Matthew 6, as we begin, just by way of introduction, there were some concerns that our Lord had. And in Matthew chapter 6, verse number 1, he says, Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them. Otherwise, you have no reward from your Father who is in heaven. People love to practice their righteousness before men. People love to be seen by men.

And that was the Jewish nation, the religious leaders. Their whole practice of piety was one where they were looking for the attention of man. Have you ever done something for man's attention? Christ just cuts that right down. They wanted to practice their righteousness before men so people would ooh and aww when they saw them coming. Then Jesus says this.

He says in verse number 2, When therefore you give alms, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets. They may be honored by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, that your alms may be seen in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will repay you. Not only did they want the attention of man, they wanted the acclamation of man. They wanted the sound, the trumpet, so all would know that hey, I'm giving.

Here's my check. Here's what I'm going to give to God. So all would ooh and aww and say look how much that individual gives to the God he says he loves. You know we do that today when we talk about how much we give to the church, or how much we give to the building fund, or how much we give for whatever it is we're giving for. We like people to know how much we're giving, as if that's some kind of great thing. Well that's your reward. Once you make that announcement, there is no eternal reward. That's it.

So whatever someone says in response to you, that is your reward. That's all you're going to get. You're not getting anything else. God says I want you to do it in secret.

So secret that your left hand doesn't even know what your right hand is doing. Your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. Christ had these concerns. Verse five, and when you pray, you're not to be as the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners in order to be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will repay you.

Boy, we love to pray so people will hear us pray. We love to wax eloquent in our prayers so people will say, wow, that man must really know God for all the words he says and how he says it. Christ says, you know, when you pray, just go to your closet, shut the door, and your Father will hear you.

See, man is just so, so accustomed to having other men's attention, other men's acclamation, other man's affirmation. We are a narcissistic society. The church has become narcissistic in its practices. We want to be seen. We want some kind of credit. We want to be recognized, and Christ condemns all of that. And then it says in verse seven, and when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore, do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you even ask him.

Not only did they want the attention of man, the acclamation of man, the affirmation of man, they thought they could get an audition before God because of the meaningless repetition of words that they would give. Now, let me just say it here at the outset, and let me say it and get it over with.

There is no private prayer language, if you think there is one. There is no praying in tongues. That's called meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do. There is no private prayer language, as someone asked. If there was a private prayer language, don't you think that Jesus would have said to his disciples, hey guys, listen, there's a private prayer language. Let me tell you about it so you can get in on it.

He never did. He never did. If there was some kind of private prayer language, he would at least engage in that throughout the time that he prayed, but he never did that either. And don't you think that if it was so important to pray in some kind of private prayer language where just you yourself would be able to commune with God in some vain, meaningless, repetitious kind of way, that it would not have been condemned in scripture, but commended in scripture. Paul never did it either. Nowhere in scripture do you ever find anybody ever praying in an unknown language.

You're supposed to pray intelligently. You're supposed to know what it is you're saying when you say it. That's why Jesus said, when you pray, pray this way, so you know how to commune with your Father in heaven. That's so important. So Christ, because of his concern, would give a construct about how it is you pattern your prayer life, centered around the preeminence and purity of God, his name and how it's to be hallowed, because he's your Father in heaven. Centered around his plan and its purposes.

It's his kingdom. Centered around his plan and its pleasure for your life. So that you could rejoice in all that he provides. So you could respond to his pardon. So you could rest in his protection. He gives us a pattern that we might know how to pray his way. So when you come to Luke 11, the disciples say, well Lord, teach us how to pray. They had seen him praying. Now that's very important, because you need to understand, as you move to point number two, that that prayer is that which commenced his priestly ministry.

Not only did it commence his priestly ministry, it characterized his daily ministry. It consummated his earthly ministry, and it consumes his heavenly ministry. Did you get that? Prayer commenced his priestly ministry. We talked about in Luke chapter 3, verse number 21, that when he was baptized, as he was praying, heaven opened up. Prayer commenced his priestly ministry. He was coming to suffer as our high priest. He was coming to sympathize as our high priest. Prayer commenced that earthly ministry there on the banks of the Jordan, when Jesus Christ himself was baptized.

And then prayer was that which characterized his daily ministry. That's why in Luke 11, the disciples, after he had finished praying, said, Lord, teach us how to pray as John taught his disciples how to pray. Because as you go through Luke chapter 5, and Luke chapter 6, and Luke chapter 8, and Luke chapter 11, you see the Lord characterized by daily communion with his God. You see, prayer was not only a necessity for the Son, it was natural for the Son. It's just what he did. He breathed prayer. He breathed communion with his Father in heaven.

So not only did it commence his priestly ministry, Luke 3, verse 21, not only did it characterize his daily ministry, Luke 11, verse 1, but it consummated his earthly ministry, Luke chapter 24, right before his ascension. He would lift his hands. He would pray a blessing upon his men as he would ascend into glory. And then prayer is that which consumes his heavenly ministry. Hebrews 7, verse number 25, he lives to make intercession for you and for me. I would say, based on that alone, prayer was pretty much important to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Therefore, it should commence any ministry we engage in. It should characterize every day of our lives. It should consume us as it consumes him because he is our example to follow. So the disciples say in Luke 11, our text for today, Lord, we want you to teach us to pray. As John's disciples heard from John, how to pray. We want to know how to communicate with our Father in heaven. I hope that's your desire. I hope that that's what you want to do. I hope you truly want to know how to commune with your Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, on a regular basis.

It is so important. So we'll take you through this instruction on what it means to pray God's way, give you some implications, and close our time out this morning by looking at the simple phrase, Father. Jesus said in Luke 11, one, these words, he said, or verse two, he said to them, when you pray, say, Father. Why begin that way? Let me give you three reasons.

Number one, is because it expresses his paternity. It expresses his paternity. He is our Father. Do you know that from Genesis to Malachi, God is referred to as Father 14 times? That's it. In the entire Old Testament, God is referred to as Father 39 times. And of those 39 books, 14 times. Of those 14 times, not once, not once is he referred to as Father in a personal setting. It's all from a national perspective. That God is the Father of Israel in a national sense. They are the children of God as a nation.

He is their Father as a nation. But never one time of the 14 times is he referred to as Father in a personal setting. So Jesus comes on the scene and over 60 times in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and over 100 times in the Gospel of John alone, Jesus refers to his Father in heaven. And not in a national sense, but in a personal sense. In fact, every time Jesus prayed, he began by saying Father. Every time. Except once. And that was on Calvary's cross. When he said, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

When he bore the sins of the world. At that time he was separated from his Father in heaven. And that communion, that sweet communion and fellowship that he had known from eternity past, and will always know from here on out, that three brief, three hours, that three hours of brief moment where he was separated from his Father, that fellowship, that communion was not there because he bore your sin and my sin in his body on that tree. But every other time he referred to God in heaven as his Father.

If you learn anything from today, when you drop to your knees, the first words out of your mouth are Father.

Because that's who he is. It's the Christian name for God, J. I. Packer, who wrote a book years ago on the attributes of God, said this. If you want to judge how well a person understands Christianity, find out how much he makes of the thought of being God's child and having God as his Father. If this is not the thought that prompts and controls his worship and prayers and his whole outlook on life, it means that he does not understand Christianity very well at all. For everything that Christ taught, everything that makes the New Testament new and better than the old, everything that is distinctively Christian as opposed to merely Jewish is summed up in the knowledge of the fatherhood of God.

Father is the Christian name for God. He's got a great point. He's our Father. It expresses his paternity. Now, if you've grown up in a home where you had an abusive father or your father was never there, sometimes it's hard to translate that over into what the Bible says concerning the fatherhood of God.

But it's so important that you be immersed in the Scriptures to understand the truth of God's fatherhood. That applies to your life and to mine. In fact, Jesus would use that Aramaic word, Abba, Father. Same word that we are to use in Romans chapter 8, verse number 15, where it says this, For you have not received the spirit of slavery, leading to fear again, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons, by which we cry out, Abba, Father. The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God.

We look at God as our papa, as our daddy, as a little Jewish child would call their father Abba because they would see that sense of family, that sense of responsibility, that sense of kindred spirit.

So, too, we have that same spirit because we have been adopted into the family of God and he is our father. And so, when we go to prayer and we say, Father, it expresses our paternity or his paternity that he truly is our father, that we are his sons. And number two, it emphasizes his sovereignty.

It emphasizes his sovereignty. Our father, as Matthew's account says, who art in heaven. It speaks of his transcendence. But by the time that that Jesus Christ came to earth, the Jewish nation was so far from God that they had lost all sense of intimacy with their father in heaven because their sin, see. And that old saying about, you know, if you feel far from God, guess who moved? You know, it wasn't God. God didn't go anywhere. He's on the present. You moved. It's your sin that separated you from that loving fellowship with your father who is in heaven.

But this emphasizes his sovereignty. Our father, who art in heaven, it speaks of his transcendence. And yet we, we are to transcend to him. We don't bring him down to our level. So many times in our foolishness, in our flippancy, we treat God with so, so much irreverency. By calling him the big guy upstairs or some kind of modern day vernacular that really is blasphemous toward our God, because he truly is our father who, who is in heaven. And it emphasizes his sovereignty because as he is in heaven, we know that his sovereignty rules over all.

We know that he sees all. We know he understands all. We know he knows all. So, so when we address him as our father, who art in heaven, we know and see him pictured above us, looking down upon us, seeing, knowing, understand everything about us because he overrules everything. You know, growing up as a kid, you, you always wanted to know that your dad was, was stronger and bigger and better than the other guy's dad, right? I mean, you know, my dad can beat up your dad. My dad's smarter than your dad.

My dad's faster than your dad. So, so as kids growing up, we wanted our dad to be the best. Now he might not have been the best, but we thought in our minds he was the best. See, we thought he was the toughest. We thought he was the, the, the best looking. We thought he was the smartest dad on the block and nobody could hang with, with my dad. And within that came that sense of security that my dad can do anything. Now we know our earthly fathers can't do hardly anything, right? But our heavenly father can.

He is the God who rules over all. He is supreme in knowledge. He is supreme in wisdom. He is supreme in power. He is supreme in all things. He sees all, he knows all, he understands all. It emphasizes his sovereignty as he rules over all. But I want you to notice that in, in, in Matthew's account, Christ said, when you pray, pray this way, our father, our father, and this emphasizes the family.

This emphasizes the family. Our is a pronoun that deals with partnership. Like I said earlier, there are no personal pronouns in this prayer. Give us this day our daily bread. It's not give me this day my daily bread. It's not that way. It's give us this day our daily bread. It's not forgive me my trespasses. It's forgive us our trespasses. It's not lead me not into, it's lead us not into temptation. See the difference? Folks, we are a part of a family. We are partnered together with our, our father who is in heaven.

He is our God. He is our father. We are his sons. We are his children. So we are partnered together with him in a unique relationship. We know that, that the liberals teach the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. But we know that from a, from a creative sense that that's true, right? The book of Malachi chapter two, verse number 10 says, have we not all one father? Hath not one God created us? Well, the answer is true. Yes, he has. There's one creator. And so God being the father of creation, yes, that's true.

In fact, Paul would say in Acts 17, 28 on Mars Hill, we are all his offspring. So God is our father in terms of a world when it comes to creation, but he's not everybody's spiritual father. Those only come to those who have received him, to as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God. In fact, listen, the most religious people in Jesus's day could not claim God as their father. Jesus told them in John eight, you are of your father, the devil. And that was the Pharisees.

They were the religious elite. They couldn't claim God in heaven as their father. Jesus said, your father is Satan himself. But those who have received him and believed in him, they become the sons of God, right? Oh, oh, what, what manner of love is this? First John three, one that the father has bestowed upon us that we should be called the children of God.

That's love. And the father would bestow that upon us that we would now be called his children. So when you pray our father who art in heaven, it eliminates every unbeliever in the world because he, God is not their father in a spiritual sense. He's not, he's only your father and my father, if we have come to saving grace. So by way of instruction, we need to understand how this prayer, our father who art in heaven expresses his paternity encompasses his sovereignty and emphasizes our family. We're all one.

Now, if he is our father, right? Then as we go to him, it affects our relationship with one another, doesn't it? To go to our father in heaven with a bitter, angry spirit toward another brother or sister, that's also a son of our father in heaven only hinders your prayers, does not help your prayers. It only keeps you from communing with your father because we are a family. We are one together. We're all brothers and sisters in Christ who have given our lives to Jesus Christ as our Lord and savior.

Let me give you some indications. I got seven of them for you this morning. Hopefully I'll get through all seven. I got to get through all seven of them today. Okay. Number one, when you pray our father who art in heaven, it deepens, it deepens your security.

It deepens your security. No more fear. No more fear. It just deepens my security because it's my father who is in heaven, who is looking out for me and caring for me. Remember Matthew chapter seven, verse number seven, Jesus said, ask and it shall be given to you. Seek and you shall find knock and it shall be open to you for everyone who asks receives and he who seeks finds and to him who knocks it shall be open or what man is there among you when his son shall ask him for a loaf will give him a stone or if he shall ask for a fish, he will not give him a snake willy.

If you then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your father who is in heaven, give what is good to those who ask him. When I go and I say our father who art in heaven, it just deepens my security because no matter what my earthly father can do for me, he can't accomplish what my heavenly father can do for me. That's why Christ says, you keep asking, you keep seeking, you keep knocking.

Why? Because your heavenly father knows what you need before you even ask him. Your earthly father doesn't, but your heavenly father knows before you even bring it to your lips because he reads your mind. He knows your heart. He knows it before you even think it. He knows it. It just deepens my security that I am, I am safe in the arms of my father. I am secure because I am a son of my father in heaven. And so I go to him because it deepens my security. That's why Jesus would say over in Matthew chapter six, he says, for this reason I say to you, do not be anxious for your life as to what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor for your body as to what you shall put on.

Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air that they do not sow, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them.

Are you not worth much more than they? In which of you being anxious can add a single cubit to his lifespan? And why are you anxious about clothing? You're anxious about the necessities in life. You're anxious about your longevity in life. And you're anxious about your beauty in your life. And you don't have to be anxious about any of those things because your heavenly father knows what you need before you even ask him. He clothes the lilies of the fields. He feeds the birds of the air. You can't add one extra day to your life.

You can't. Oh, I know you think you can. Well, if I eat right and exercise right, I'll live longer. No, no. Everybody dies on time. We think we can act at an extra day, an extra week, an extra month, an extra year, and the Lord God says, you can't add one more moment to your life.

Why even worry about how long you're going to live? Why are you worried about that? Why are you worried about what you're going to wear? Why are you worried about what you're going to eat? Your heavenly father knows what you need. He will take care of you. And so when I go to him and pray our father who art in heaven, it just deepens my security. It just deepens it because I know that my father who is in heaven rules overall. He's supreme. He is the wisest of all. He knows my needs. Number two, not only does it deepen my security, but it dissolves my solitude.

It dissolves my solitude. I love that verse in John chapter 14. When Jesus is talking about not leaving his disciples as orphans, he's going to send them another comforter. He says in verse number 23, if anyone loves me, he will keep my word and my father will love him and we will come to him and make our abode with him. Jesus is saying that the spirit of God will be in you. My father will be in you and I will be in you. The triune nature of God encompasses the heart and soul of a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ.

When I pray our father who art in heaven, it dissolves my solitude. Remember what Jesus said in John 16? John 16, he was talking to his men about how all were going to desert him. It says, behold the hour is coming, verse number 32, and has already come for you to be scattered each to his own home and to leave me alone. And yet I am not alone. Why? Because the father is with me. When you're a believer, you are never alone. You can't be because the father indwells you. He lives inside you. It dissolves my solitude.

It just erases my aloneness because I've always got company. There's always somebody to talk to because the father indwells me. I don't have to worry about going to my car at night alone because I got my father with me. I don't have to worry about walking into a crowded room alone because my father was with me. We go hand in hand to minister together. Dissolves my solitude. It deepens my security. The Bible says in Psalm 68, verse number five, that our Lord God is the father to the fatherless.

In Psalm 113, verse number five, it says these words, who is like the Lord our God, who is enthroned on high, who humbles himself to behold the things that are in heaven and in the earth. He raises the poor from the dust. He lifts the needy from the ash heap to make them sit with princes, with the princes of his people. He makes the barren woman abide in the house as a joyful mother of children. Praise the Lord. Only our Lord God can do that. The implications of praying our father who art in heaven, it deepens my security.

It dissolves my solitude. It derails. It derails my selfishness. Derails it. It's our father who art in heaven. In Ephesians chapter six, it talks about praying always in all kinds of petitions, in all kinds of supplications for all the saints, all the saints. Folks, the one thing that derails a selfish spirit is to pray God's way. Our father who art in heaven, you're praying not only for yourself, but you are praying for every son of God that claims God as his father in heaven. And so you go and you pray and claim him as your father.

There are no only children in the kingdom. There are no spoiled children in the kingdom. We are a family. And so when I go to prayer, my whole prayer life begins to change because just think about what you're saying each day. In fact, put a tape recorder on the next time you pray. Try it and go to prayer and see how many personal pronouns you use compared to how many plural pronouns you use that deal with the body of Christ as a family serving and honoring God together. And remember this, that God turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his friends.

When he prayed for himself, guess what? He remained in his captivity. But when he began to pray for his friends, everything changed. And why did he begin to pray for his friends, by the way? It's because God showed him himself. And when God began to show Job himself, when we see God for who he is, guess what? Our eyes are automatically off of us and onto God. And therefore we can be freed to minister to those who have greater needs than we do. And believe it or not, Job's friends had greater needs than Job did, even though Job lost everything.

Because they didn't have the perspective on God that Job did, see? So Job was free to pray for his friends and God turned his captivity. And maybe God has you in your captivity today, after all these years, because you have refused to pray for anybody else but yourself. You are so consumed with you that you can't even begin to think of your brother or sister in Christ. The implications of praying our Father who art in heaven deepens my security, dissolves my solitude, derails my selfishness, demands my submission.

It demands my submission. We are to obey God. We are to serve Him. If we are to honor and obey our earthly fathers who are imperfect, how much more should we obey and submit to our heavenly Father who is sinless and who is perfect? So if I'm going to go to Him as my Father, it demands my submission to His will. That's why the Lord God said, Father, if it be your will, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless not my will, but yours be done. Demands submission. Remember way back in the book of Malachi?

Listen to what God says. Verse 6, Malachi 1. A son honors his father and a servant his master. Then if I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my respect? Says the Lord of hosts to you, O priests who despise my name. But you say, how have we despised your name? You are presenting defiled food upon my altar. But you say, how have we defiled thee? In that you say, the table of the Lord is to be despised. But when you present the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? And when you present the lame and sick, is it not evil?

Why not offer it to your governor? Would he be pleased with you or would he receive you kindly? Says the Lord of hosts. It demands our submission. The Lord says, if I'm your father, where's my honor? Where is it? If I'm your father, where's my respect? And there are so many people today in the church who claim God as their father, but when it comes time to honor them with their gifts and with their offerings, they give him second-rate contributions.

And then they want to claim to say that they honor God. They respect God as their father. And when the Lord says, you give to me of the firstfruits of your increase. If you want to honor me, you want to respect me, you want to submit to me, you give to me first, not last.

But how many people do you know give last or what's left over to God? The blind sacrifice, the lame sacrifice. They're stowed in. Here, Jesus, take that. Multiply that, Jesus. Go ahead. That's our attitude. And the Lord God says, if I'm your father, where's my honor?

If I'm your master, where's my respect? When I go and I pray our father who art in heaven, it immediately demands that I submit to everything that he says. Everything. Whether I like it or whether I don't. And you know as well as I do that most things God says, it doesn't fit into our schedule.

We don't like it because it cramps my style. But yet if he is my father and I'm his son, then as a son submits to his father, oh by the way, fathers, your children pick up on this real quick. Your children pick up on this really quick in your household. If as a father, I'm not willing to submit to what God says, I will have trouble with rebellious children in my home.

They will rebel against your authority because they have seen, modeled to them, an independent spirit to do whatever they want to do. And if you call God your father and then don't submit to him, you give your son in their mind the right to say, well, why do I have to respect you or honor you? You don't honor your father. Why should I honor or respect you? And they begin to multiply that rebellion out in their lives. It demands our submission. How many have I given you? Four? Oh, we've got three more to go.

Hang on. It describes his superiority, our father who art in heaven. It describes his superiority. He is infinitely wise, infinitely wise. He knows everything. That's why Jesus said in Matthew 6, when you pray, go into your closet. Why? Because your father knows what you need before you ask him. Folks that describes his superiority. When you go to prayer, whenever you go to prayer in your closet, before you even open your mouth, the Lord knows what you need before you ask him. He does. We're so worried about making sure God gets all the information, the right address, the right phone number, the right size, okay, of what I need when it comes to clothing.

We want to make sure God gets all the information. He knows what you need before you even ask him. But boy, we want to spell it all out for him to make sure he got it because we don't want him to make a mistake. But he's our father who is in heaven. This describes his superiority. He rules over all. That's why he said in Isaiah 55, you know, my thoughts aren't your thoughts and my ways aren't your ways. So stop trying to make my thoughts yours and my ways yours. Just, just follow. Just follow. And if you follow, you will see that I know exactly what you need and I'll make sure you get it.

I'll make sure you have it because that's the kind of God we serve. Number six, it depicts his sympathy. When I pray our father who are in heaven, it depicts his sympathy for me. Psalm 103 verse number 13. God as our father is compassionate with his children. So the Lord is compassionate upon those who fear him. As a father is compassionate upon his children, so is the Lord compassionate upon those who fear him. This depicts his sympathy. He is so loving. He is so kind. He is so good. He is so sympathetic toward our needs.

He knows all that we need and he wants to meet those needs. He does. He's not like an earthy father who says, you know, you know, you know, I'd like to get that for you, but I just can't do it. I can't do it. I don't have the money. I can't provide what you need. God's just not that way. He has great sympathy, a tenderness about him that so desperately wants to to take care of his own. And so we are able to see that it depicts for us his sympathy. Jeremiah 31 verse number nine says it this way. Jeremiah 31 verse number nine, with weeping they shall come and by supplication I would lead them.

I will make them walk by streams of waters on a straight path in which they shall not stumble. For I am a father to Israel and Ephraim is my firstborn. The Lord God says when they come, they will walk by streams of waters.

I will take care of them. I will watch over them because I am their father. And that's what fathers do for their children. And so when I go to prayer and I say our father who art in heaven, it depicts his sympathy toward me in whatever need that I have. And lastly, when I go to prayer and I pray our father who art in heaven, it declares his sufficiency. It declares his sufficiency. Lord, I declare that you are sufficient to do all that you need to do in my life because you're my father. Over in Philippians chapter four, Philippians chapter four, verse number 19, we know well.

Verse number 20, we don't know so well, but verse number 19 says, and my God shall supply all your needs according to his riches and glory in Christ Jesus. He gives us according to his riches, not out of his riches. And we told you just a couple of Wednesday nights ago that when God gives, he gives according to not out of. That is he gives abundantly because he owns it all. And then verse 20 says, now to our God and father be the glory forever and ever. Amen. Listen to what the Lord God said through the pen of Isaiah the prophet, Isaiah 64, verse number one.

Oh, that thou would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake at thy presence, as fire kindles the brushwood, as fire causes water to boil, to make thy name known to thine adversaries, that the nations may tremble at thy presence. When thou didst awesome things which we did not expect, thou didst come down. The mountains quaked at thy presence for from of old they have not heard nor perceived by ear. Neither has the eye seen a God besides thee who acts in behalf of the one who waits for him.

Nobody has seen, nobody has heard of a God who acts on behalf of his people like our God does, like our God does. Why? Because he's our father. And then it says in verse number eight, but now, oh Lord, thou art our father. We are the clay and thou art, or thou are potter. And all of us are the work of thy hand. Do not be angry beyond measure, oh Lord. Neither remember iniquity forever. Behold, look now, all of us are thy people. Lord, we are your work. We are in progress. And you are our father. You are our potter.

We want you to mold us in the way you want us to be molded, because you are the one with all the sympathy, with all the sufficiency, with all the glory. And we want you to make us just like you. When we go and we pray our father who art in heaven, that's what happens. My prayer for you and for me this week, that as we go to prayer, we would see God as our father who art in heaven. That he is ours as a family. That we are partnered together with him. That yes, he is our father. And yes, he has called us his sons, but yet he is so far above us, he beckons us to come to him and bow before him in holy submission to follow everything he says.

And when we do, that solitude is erased. It goes away, because my father is with me. My selfishness is eliminated, because he's not just my father, he's our father. And I begin to see his sympathy, feel his sufficiency, as he watches and takes care of every need that I have. Our God truly is our father who art in heaven. Let's pray. Father God, thank you for today and the opportunity you give us, Lord Jesus, to come to you. Truly, Lord, you are more concerned about us than we can ever imagine. To know that you know every need before we even ask you goes beyond all comprehension.

And we are grateful, Lord, for your love. We are grateful for your sympathy. We are grateful for your tenderness and your compassion. And we ask, Lord, that as a church, we would see you as our father, respond to you as such. And that, Lord, we would submit to your holy will. And we pray, Lord, that if there's anybody here today who cannot call you father in the spiritual sense, may today be the day of their salvation. May they come to a place of true repentance. They might fall upon your grace and mercy, and receive the glorious grace of God.

We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.