Amen: It is Done (The Lord’s Prayer, Part 10)

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Amen. We say it so often but what does that word even mean? Amen.

My toddler is under the distinct impression that the word ‘amen’ means ‘all done.’ As in all of this quiet sitting around confined in this little space is all done.

He’s not entirely right, but he’s also not all that wrong. Let me explain. When we say the word amen at the end of the Lord’s Prayer for instance, we are in essence saying ‘all is done.’ Namely that all that we have been given to pray for, by our Lord, in this prayer, that it is all done and that it is all being done.

That the kingdom of grace and the forgiveness of all of our sins is done and it’s being done and it’s coming to us. That the death that Jesus died on the cross that the forgiveness of our sins and the forgiveness of our neighbors sins through us it is done. And it is being done. That our bodies that are suffering and dying are being delivered from death and from this fall in the world to our Lord in heaven. All of it is done.

We often say this word ‘amen’ at the end of prayers and rightly so it very much suits that there. But Jesus often uses this word in discourse with others and he often uses that at the beginning of a phrase or something very important. It’s often translated “truly, truly” or “certainly, certainly, I say to you.”

When we pray amen at the end of the Lord’s Prayer Jesus gives us the certainty that all of this gracious work for our body and for our life is all done and it is all done well for you. Amen. Yes. Yes, it shall be so.