The Lord’s Prayer 5 - The Holiness Of God, Sharing The Father's Heart Series

The Lord’s prayer 5 - The Holiness of God, Sharing the Father's heart

Let your name be made holy, let your kingdom come, let your will be done, as in heaven so also on earth.

When I was in school I found some subjects very boring and even thought that they were irrelevant.

One such subject was History but I remember my teacher telling us that one day when we are adults we will appreciate history and find it interesting.

Well he was right! I find the history relating to the Romans fascinating especially the occupation of Israel at the time of Jesus and the early church.

Then there are the stories of ancient times, Aeop’s fables – ideal for children in teaching important morals, Greek mythology – this gives us an idea of the way people of that time thought.

When we read Holy Scripture and try to understand God’s Word it is important to put it into context, the context of the whole – chapter, letter, book, testament but also the context of the writer's day - their way of life, their environment, their beliefs, the politics and so on..

Jesus when He taught us to pray – Our Father was introducing a totally new concept about our relationship with God and we can only really appreciate this if we examine the time in which Jesus lived – the context.

The context has to be examine from two angles, from the view of the gentile world – the heathen world and the Jewish.

In the days before we possessed fire, when we ate raw meat and vegetables, when we had no warmth from a fire the Greek god Prometheus took pity at the miserable state we were in.

Prometheus decided to take fire from heaven and give it to us.

But Zeus, the king of the gods was not happy at all with this and in his anger he had Prometheus chained to a rock in the middle of the Adriatic sea.

There he was tortured with the heat of the sun, the thirst of the day and the cold of the night.

But worse than that Zeus had a vulture to tear out Prometheus’ liver, which only grew again and then to be torn out the next day.

A living hell – this is what happened to a god who helped and showed compassion.

The heathen world lived in terror of their gods – they dared not upset one or neglect any in fear of the vengeance they would suffer as a consequence.

In the 60’s there was this popular tv programme called, ‘Monty Python’s Flying Circus’.

The series was so popular that they made a number of feature length films, one of which was, ‘The life of Bryan’ very loosely connected with the life of Jesus. – looking at the funny side of life.

John Clease played the part of the High Priest and the scene is outside the city walls of Jerusalem where they are about to stone a man for blasphemy.

He has dared to say the Holy Name of God, Jehovah for which the penalty is death by stoning.

In the Monty Python’s type of farce the scene ends with everyone trying to stone the High Priest who we seen running away from the scene.

What impressed me about this scene was its accuracy as it showed so vividly how distant the Jews had become from God that they couldn’t even say His NAME.

In John’s gospel ironically we have a similar scene from the passion narrative which is so detailed and full of meaning.

When the soldiers come to arrest Jesus in the garden He asks them who do they want, "Jesus of Nazareth," they replied.

"I am he," Jesus said. When Jesus said, "I am he," they drew back and fell to the ground.

They fell to the ground in homage because Jesus has uttered the Holy NAME – I AM.

Ironically in Holy Scripture God’s Name seems to evolve and is expressed in many different ways, from Jehovah or Yahweh to I AM to LORD.

God’s name is so Holy and we such sinners that we dare NOT utter God’s Holy Name and come up with alternatives.

So we have a dilemma in the Lord’s prayer, the words ‘Our Father’ giving a very personal and intermit relationship with God but on the other hand never forgetting the holiness of God.

Turning to God as a loving Father but in reverence and godly fear, not terror as in the days of old but giving Him His due respect.

Many prayers we use put it so well: Almighty God our Heavenly Father

Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy Name, Thy kingdom come Thy will be done; on earth as it is in heaven.