Luke 11 1-13 The Our Father                             dc.ca 7-25-04

Some of you might of already heard today’s gospel reading from Luke and a sermon on it’s meaning. But instead of finding another reading I feel this one is so hope filled that I really don’t think we can hear it enough or reflect on its meaning for or lives too much.

This reading seems to naturally divide into three sections teach us to pray, additional teachings on prayer and reward of prayer. I would like to share with you a few points of interest.

Teach us to pray. With this request the disciples show they realize there is something good here, something of value that they want to partake of also. Jesus’ response, of course, is to teach them and us, The Lords Prayer. He begins by addressing God as Our Father or in Hebrew: Abba, which in that language is a very humble affectionate title for father that tells us Jesus is not only interested in teaching us words but also the attitude we are to have in our prayer.

“Thy kingdom come thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven”, the truth we as Christian’s hold is expressed in these words and gives us hope to base our sincere desire for peace and justice in this world and the next.

“Give us this day our daily bread”, we state our deep dependence on the Lord not only for food for our physical body but life giving strength for appropriate functioning of mind/body and spirit.

“And forgive us our sins as we forgive”, Oh Oh! I think many of us, if not everyone kind of cringes at the part, “As we forgive”.  This has to be one of the more difficult calling as a Christian although we have to admit Jesus does bring it up many times in his teachings. And for good reason; forgiveness is a very healing, freeing and life-giving act for both the person that forgives and the forgiven.

If only it was that easy, what can we do to encourage our growth in this ideal act of forgiving. As starters we are doing it right now, we are gathering together as a group of people in the name of Jesus. He has promised to be in our midst when we gather in his name. What value does that have? His presence in the read Scriptures, our prayers and community guides, strengthens and gives us insights. Accordingly we may understand and act on the directions He gives us for a life in harmony with His Father and each other.

We should keep in mind that being reconciled is not just confined to our relationship with the Lord and other people, but also includes ourselves. How much unnecessary weight and guilt are we burden with by not forgiving our self for not acting in a certain way or making a wrong decision? Jesus also encourages us to bring the personal disappointments we might have for not acting the way we might think we should of but didn’t.

Jesus wants very much to forgive whatever wrong we have done to others but often we forget or think it’s not right to include our self. The Lords invites us to bring to him and lay at his feet these dark sides of our lives. And he will give the strength needed to free ourselves from our afflictions and also answer our request as we pray. “Do not subject us to the final test.”

Some of you might have observed that our prayers, worship and good acts are not responded to in a manner we would like right away, this can happen.  Jesus answers that uneasiness with his additional teaching on prayer, in his story about the friend that won’t go away.

It is not uncommon that we can feel unnoticed by the Lord but his message to us is, “keep on knocking”.  I have little doubt in my mind that the various prayer, bible study and worship groups that gather here and in other nursing home are living examples of this very teaching of Jesus.

We must keep in mind when we are dealing with things of the spirit we are dealing on God’s time and God seems to have a lot more time then we do. Although we don’t normally see it, we have inherited a piece of God’s time, that faith has to be part of and provide groundwork for our confidence that we will see the results of our prayers in this world or the next.

The final part of this reading from Luke speaks to the reward of prayer. To me it is so positive it is almost scary.  “And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and it will be opened to you.  God through His son has promised us that there will be a positive response to our knocking, seeking and asking. We must preserver with our requests and continue with love our devotion to the One that promises fullness of life in this world and the fulfillment of life in the next.