Fred Shade: Church - Sermons

SERMONS

THE LORD'S PRAYER:
THE PRAYER OF GOD'S FAMILY

The Lord's Prayer is sometimes called the prayer of God's Family, a beautiful description. It is a communion with the Father of All; it is the Prayer instituted (in its present form) by our Lord Christ himself (Matt.6:9-13). It invites God into the deepest recesses of our being, reinforcing what we say at the Offertorium, that "we may evermore abide in Christ and he in us", the Son being our link with the Father. This Prayer helps us in our personal encounter with God.

The whole Christian community or parish is really a family of God, and the regular use of this prayer is showing the family at prayer. It is also the one which unites all denominations, another compelling reason for its use in the celebration of every Eucharist. It is the prayer of the faithful, an intimate meeting of the hearts and minds in a common will and a common purpose. This unity becomes the foundation on which we carry out our spiritual work in His Name.

The structure of the Prayer is important. Just as we do not start talking about ourselves when when meet a friend, but rather enquire after them, so too in our encounter with God do we give respect. Our first words in the Prayer are all to do with God, it is only later do we turn to ourselves and our own concerns.

Our Father, who art in heaven.

The word for Father is Abba, a very intimate and private calling of the Father of All. It is like our word 'daddy' - a term of endearment, of love, of complete trust. Notice also that we qualify the title with Our, emphasisng the fact that we pray together, as a community, as well as on our own. Remember, we believe in God, but this faith needs to be acted out in community.

In heaven. It would be easy to just dismiss this imagery as a primitive understanding of the location of God - up there in the sky! But it doesn't mean that at all. It is a simple and effective way of describing God as infinitely beyond our earthly grasp, beyond our power of thought or imagining. Yet this Father in heaven is at the same time our Father, with all the intimacy that the word can imply, and indeed far more. For he is nearer than hands or feet. He dwells in our hearts and minds and souls; our heavenly Father dwells in us and we in him. Such is He whom we encounter when we set ourselves to prayer.

Hallowed be Thy name; Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Notice the emphasis which we place on the personal pronoun in the next sections: "Hallowed by Thy name; Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done". The sacredness of the Holy Name, so devalued and abused in society today, is our attempt to express in words our adoration of the Holy One - the Divine Other. But, for a moment, we forget this degradation in the world around us and dwell in the very presence of the Sacred when we say 'hallowed by Thy Name'. (See Footnote 1.)

Our world is very much an imperfect world, and we have a long way to go in making it like heaven on earth. When we read the daily paper, almost every page is a rejection of that which is holy, the dignity of God as well as the dignity of Man. It is therefore only natural that we call for this outcome, this completion of the Divine Plan - the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth. Of course, the Kingdom has been inaugurated by our Lord. But it has still to be fully established, and it is our privilege to pray for its fulfilment and also to be co-workers in this process. It should also be remembered that the official motto of the Liberal Catholic Church is "Adveniat Regnum Tuum".

Thy will be done. This is the heart of the matter. By this petition we mean two things, because the will of God has two aspects for us. The first can be called the will of God commanded and the second the will of God accepted. The first is based on the commandment to love God and also our neighbour. The will of God accepted comes to us in the things which happen to us, good fortune and ill fortune alike. Both good and bad happen to us in life. It is a paradox that an all-loving God permits both to occur! But let us put this in a proper context. Most personal misfortunes a self-inflicted, but not all, of course. And the daily news of tragedy for individuals and communities are largely the result of Man's inhumanity to Man.

Those things which are inexplicable test our faith and our belief in an all-loving God. But the big mistake is to bring God down to our level, and demand that He be subject to our limitations and those of this world. But the mind of Man is not the Mind of God; the plans of Man are not the Plans of God. But we do have a priceless gift - mankind has been given the perilous gift of freedom, freedom to choose.

The problem of evil and suffering in the world is something which all religions endeavour to explain away. In a sense, I don't think Christianity explains it away as some other belief- systems do, rather, we are told that we must face up to it, accept that it is there, to change what we can and accept the outcome when we cannot. I think it is our response to these circumstances which is the main test, and an essential aspect of our journey as spiritual beings.

Saint Augustine had a few things to say on the mystery of suffering: "God is so good that He would assuredly not allow evil to exist, were it not that he is so powerful that out of evil he can bring a greater good". Certainly, such a final outcome is not usually seen in this life. Ultimately, all will be explained to us, all will be revealed, but we are not yet ready for this. (See Footnote 2.) Meanwhile we pray "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

Give us this day our daily bread.

Now that we have put God first in our prayers, we can turn to our own needs. There are many references in the New Testament to where our Lord directed the faithful that, if they pray and with confidence, it will be answered by the Father (Matt.11: v22-23). We have immediate access to God, and we can ask for anything. And so we pray "Give us this day our daily bread". Nothing could be simpler. We are asking only for the bare necessities of life. The Lord Most High provided the bare necessities for the chosen people when they were in need (re: manna, Exod. ch.16). Likewise, our Lord fed the 4,000 (Matt.15:32-39), indicating in a very direct way that the love of God knows no limits when it comes to caring for His people.

Another aspect on which we should reflect is that our Lord was not meaning only this present twenty-four hours, but that the prayer is also referring to the "eternal day", when we will abide forever in the presence of God and be provided with all that we need.

And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us.

An essential element in our spiritual life is the capacity to forgive others, not just once or twice, but many times. We assume that God 'forgives' us continually, as He is all-loving. But the test for us is to do likewise within the ordinary affairs of daily life - that is a great challenge! And so, when we ask for God's forgiveness, his healing, his blessing (e.g. Kyrie Eleison), we do so with our acknowledgement to Him that, yes, we have forgiven those who have offended us. This is essential - we must first forgive others (Matt. 6:14). It's not easy, and the more sensitive we become to God's presence as well as the needs of the world, the more aware we are of how often we have been unforgiving. I think that is why we are exhorted to pray this Prayer every day (at least once, and preferably more frequently), just because we fall short of the ideal; we "miss the mark" - which is what the word sin means.

And so, when we recognise our own faults, we discover that they are pretty much like our neighbour's faults. Then we realise that we must make the effort to forgive, and forgive, and forgive. The "I'm O.K., you're O.K." attitude is a very healthy one to maintain: we are trying to establish right relationships with others as well as with ourselves. And don't you notice how this also affects our relationship with God? We are able to enter into a deeper relationship with our Lord when we are more accepting of ourselves and more forgiving of others.

Our Lord made the very provocative statement (He made many of these!) - "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your father in heaven is perfect" (Matt. 5:48). We say this rather gliby at times, thinking that 'we've made it', that we are 'saved'! But, if that were the case, why would our Lord instruct us to use this Prayer, to pray to the Father in this way, and to pray unceasingly? Why would he instruct us to participate in the Holy Eucharist regularly if we had already 'made it'? Our journey back to God has just begun.

A priest in another denomination was telling his spiritual director how badly and frequently he had been hurt by a superior who certainly should have known better. The director's advice to him was not to try to feel forgiving towards the offender, but to acknowledge before God the depth of the hurt, and to lift it and the hurt self and the offender to the Lord, and ask him to sort it out: he is better at it than we are! How often we hold the hurt to ourselves and try to sort it out ourselves, ignoring the presence of Christ and his healing and love which are always available to us.

Lead us not into temptation.

This is perhaps the most puzzling petition in the Prayer. What does it mean? Our Lord has warned his followers that temptation will come, that our service to God will sometimes lead us into situations of temptations. Trials are inescapable in this life. ("No pain, no gain".) The glamour of this world is, by definition, a temptation. We cannot escape from it. But Saint Paul says that God will not allow us to be tempted or tested beyond our powers (1Cor. 10:13), and it is for that continued protection by God that we pray in this way. Our Lord, the risen Christ, is our declared Advocate - he will help us through this life, as well as the next. He will stand by us here, now, as well as in the greater life which is to come.

But deliver us from evil.

There is a danger of placing the emphasis on the last word rather then on 'deliver'. We are asking for freedom, for deliverance from every kind of evil and danger that can afflict us. Our Lord has power over both life and death. We are assured, and can experience, his abiding presence. And by such deliverance, he has made us sharers in his own victory over all the negative forces of the world. Saint Paul had absolutely no doubt about this, for he claimed that: "Yet, in spite of all, overwhelming victory is ours through him who loved us. For I am convinced that there is nothing in death or life, in the realm of spirits or superhuman powers, in the world as it is or in the world as it shall be, in the forces of the universe, in the heights or depths - nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom. 8:38-39). If we do indeed believe this, then the problems of evil, sin, temptation and pain, must be in accordance with some divine plan; they have a greater purpose and we can but have a glimpse at what it may be.

This is the last petition in the Prayer but, by tradition, the Church has added what is called the Doxology. This is our praise of the Holy and Undivided Trinity, its Kingdom, Power and Glory, its eternal existence beyond all things of this world. (See Footnote 3.)

The Lord's Prayer is the prayer of the whole Christian family. Even when we pray in solitude we are not alone - we bring with us all the faithful in our prayer. Indeed, our prayer is the prayer of the whole church - we pray with and for the whole family, not just for ourselves. Also, we go to church not just for our own sakes, but to pray for the whole world. And so we go to church not only to receive the sacrament for ourselves (which is right and proper), but also to become a channel of Christ's blessing for others - to be "a light to lighten the Gentiles" (Luke 2:32). And so our period of introspection in prayer must always be seen in this wider context.

The Lord's Prayer has been used in the celebration of the Holy Eucharist at least since the fourth century and probably earlier. It appears after the Eucharistic Prayer and as a preparation for receiving communion, as it does today.

Our Lord Christ is the head of our family. He came among us and commands that we pray through him, as he is our advocate in heaven. Our Lord is Immanuel - "God with us", i.e. he is the face of God. And, as recorded in John (Jn. 10:30), he is with the Father, and he has also shared his sonship with us through the breaking of bread. So now we know that we are truly children of God the Father. Under God, Jesus is the head of our family; he prays with us and in us, and we with and in him, and all this we declare in the prayers of the Holy Eucharist.

This Prayer is the one which our Lord directed us to use, and to use frequently as a personal prayer and as a prayer of the whole community. Can we but do otherwise?

Very Rev. Frederick A. Shade

Footnote 1
I have used the traditional version of the Prayer, from the Authorised Version of the Bible, as it is more poetic than most of the modern versions, and it also retains thee/thou when addressing God, thus reinforcing the sense of the sacred Other.

Footnote 2
In the Liberal Catholic liturgy of the Eucharist, we declare our faith in this ultimate revelation of all things in the prayer after communion : "Under the veil of earthly things now have we communion with our Lord Jesus Christ; soon with open face shall we behold him and, rejoicing in his glory, be made like unto him. Then shall his true disciples be brought by him with exceeding joy before the presence of his Father's glory."

Footnote 3
The words Kingdom, Power, Glory, come form the sephira, or points of light, on the Kabbalistic Tree of Life. In fact the whole of the Lord's Prayer can be placed on the Tree of Life (as can the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes), but that is another story!