“Be Careful what you pray for!”
Matthew 6: 1-13
In the C.S. Lewis novel now made famous by a movie
“The
Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”
a young girl discovers a wardrobe through which
one enters a strange new world of Narnia.
It is a
world in which animals talk and the Lion, Aslem,
really is the king and yet there is a battle
Between
the forces of good and evil
Even
in this land called Narnia
To
read the book or see the movie is to enter into a strange
New
land where things aren’t as they seem
And
where one makes a choice to
Whom
one is obedient- the evil queen
Or the Lion King, Aslem.
C. S. Lewis wrote this story to help us
discover
that we who
regularly recite the Lord’s Prayer
live in such
a place as well.
It is a place
that is ruled by our Lord, Jesus Christ,
And yet there still is a battle going
on
For our
obedience and loyalty.
Are we going
subject ourselves to Christ’s rule in our lives
Or are we going to be tempted by
material temptations
For us the strange new world is not
entered through a wardrobe
But rather through God’s word, the Bible.
Karl
Barth wrote a book called:
“The
Strange
in which he challenged us to consider
How
different God’s kingdom is
Than that which the world offers.
We remember the words of Jesus in the
Gospel of John
Which are
most often recited at funerals:
“Peace
I leave you, my peace I give you,
not as the world giveth, do I give
unto you.”
That is
Jesus’ way of saying that the world’s values
And the world’s peace and the world’s
hope
Are
radically different from God’s.
And as
Christian’s we are ultimately subject to
The values, the peace, the hope of God
revealed in Christ
Jesus, Our Lord.
Lent is a good time to take the
It
is a good time to go on a spiritual journey
Into the strange new world of the Bible.
We
have many Bible studies and Faith Studies
That
are going on during Lent
And
each of those studies
World
be a great adventure
For this Lent.
But I want to invite you today into a
study of the Lord’s Prayer
In
both the Wednesday night Bible study and
The Sunday morning worship.
The
Lord’s Prayer is so familiar to us that many can
Recite
it at the drop of a hat and yet it is perhaps
One
of the most controversial prayers we pray.
We heard it as our scripture lesson
today
As part of Jesus’ teaching on prayer.
We
should have been warned how controversial
This
prayer is by the introduction Jesus offers.
“Do not pray like the hypocrites; for they
love to stand and pray in the synagogue and in the streets, so that they may be
praised by others…but when you pray go into your room, and shut the door and
pray to your Father who is in secret.”
You see this prayer is so subversive
that Jesus is counseling his followers not to be seen in public praying this
radical prayer.
We will need someone to guide us on this
Lenten journey
And
I would recommend Walter Wanergin.
I
have traveled with Walter through the journeys
And
writings of Paul and found him to a be
Trustworthy and interesting guide.
Wangerin’s video series on the Lord’s Prayer is called
“Entering
God’s Country” and so he is profoundly aware
of the radical nature of God’s kingdom
up and against our own.
Wangerin talks about “going
to a country where
God is the head and his will is established.”
And
he starts at the end of the Lord’s prayer.
“For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory,
forever and ever. Amen”
That part is not even in our reading in
Matthew.
In
fact it’s not in the version of the Lord’s Prayer
in the Gospel
of Luke either.
It
was actually added by the early church
as a response
of the congregation
to the prayer.
It
is taken from
When
The
“Thine, O Lord, is the
greatness, and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty; for all
that is in the heaven and the earth is thine, thine is the kingdom, O Lord and thou art exalted as head
above all.”
You’ll notice that our response at the
end
of the Lord’s
Prayer is actually much less flowery
than the prayer
of
the
components of obedience and loyalty
that
is
radical.
That means that for
It
means that
Important than loyalty to family, even his son Solomon.
It
means that trusting God’s was more important
Than
trusting the power that
had amassed in
his time as King of
or the wisdom and wealth that Solomon would
amass in his time as king.
It
meant that God was the star and not
Famous and revered King of
That’s what it is to enter God’s Country
through the Lord’s
Prayer.
It is to start realizing that everything we
hold onto:
our national
identity,
our wealth,
wisdom, power, our reputation,
even
our family and our name is
secondary
to our God.
And so our journey this Lent begins.
Every
week we will look at a different petition
in the Lord’s
Prayer and discover what that prayer
says to us
and how that petition turns our world
upside
down so that we might see and know
the
very
Amen