Hebrews 11:1-2

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Amen. We usually punctuate our prayers with that simple Hebrew word. Amen. And what the word means is a firm place. In fact, the Hebrew word picture is actually, if you can imagine taking a nail and driving it into a stud, into a firm place, and you can count on that nail holding whatever weight you need to hang on it.

For me, I have to tell you that I am not a handyman. In fact, when my wife and I first moved into our home, one of the first things I tried to do was hang shelving in our garage. And that night, we woke up to the sound of a big crash. Why? I had missed the studs and those screws pulled right out of the drywall when I hung weight on those shelves. For you and I that amen, that picture of driving a nail into a stud, is a beautiful picture for faith. Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. And just like with drywall, there are studs. There are places where you can hang that nail and you can count on it holding weight. There’s other places you can’t really.

Everyone has faith of some kind. Everyone drives that nail into the wall. Maybe their faith is in science and human reason, human logic or the ability to figure things out. Maybe their faith is in something like karma. What goes around comes around and that if I’d be a good person, then good things will come back to me. We hang our faith in all kinds of things. I can hang my faith in family, friends, and loved ones. I can hang my faith in career. But honestly, all these things are things that don’t have the real power to support me. If I drive my faith there, there’s nothing behind there to hold it up. It will crumble away. It will fall. It will come crashing down around me, just like my shelf in my garage.

Jesus is your Amen. I find it so neat that where we always end our prayers with Amen. In fact, Jesus in John, oftentimes before he says something, he says, “Amen, amen. I say to you.” And what is he saying? He’s saying, here’s the stud. Here’s the place where you can hang your faith. You can count on these words always being true. Heaven and earth will disappear. Heaven and earth will crumble away. But my words will remain forever. And it’s in Jesus words, where he wants us to plant our faith. Our Amen.

And you can count on the fact that he can carry it. In fact, those wounds in his hands and in his feet are the proof that we can hang anything on Jesus and he can carry it. He held the sin of the entire world, the entire human race on himself. And he did not fall. Jesus is your Amen. And because Jesus has lived and died and risen from the dead for you, because he bears those wounds in his hands and feet, you and I can pray our prayers. You and I can say the Lord’s Prayer and end with a confident statement. Amen. Here I place my faith. Amen.

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Today, there are two different words I want to talk to you about. The first word is eulogy. Eulogy means a good word. And so often you hear the term eulogy or a eulogy is used at the death of a loved one. At a funeral. People look at a eulogy and say it was a successful eulogy if it made us laugh and smile and maybe cry a little bit. In the minds of the hearers the eulogy helps bring that person back to life, if only for just a few short moments. In the end, though, a eulogy is much like the makeup that covers the body of our loved one. It has an impression of giving life, but it really doesn’t have the power to change the fact that that person is dead.

The second word I want to look at is doxology. Whereas a eulogy is a good word about the person, a doxology is a word of praise directed towards God in heaven. The Lord’s Prayer actually ends with a doxology, for thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory forever and ever. Amen, we say. A doxology is a word of praise directed towards God in heaven. And what’s so neat about doxologies is that if we look at the lives of our loved ones who have died in Jesus, each one of them has a doxology that they’ve left behind. Each one of them has lived a life of witness, a life of praise to God for everything God has done for them.

My question for us today is to ask: what do I plan on leaving behind? A eulogy or a doxology? I find so often in my life, I’m worried and stressed about the good word that other people will say about me. I’m worried about my reputation, how long my reputation lasts, what my kids think about me, what my family thinks about me and my friends think about me. And how that desire to have a good word, can drive us. But just think how long does that good word last? How long does a memory of a person last after they’ve actually gone into heaven? Not long. One day I’ll just be a picture, if that on the wall. No one will know much about me or my life.

The real question is what word does God have to say over me? See, when God looks at us, He doesn’t just brush over the bad things and try to hide it with a cheap, thin layer of makeup. God sees right to the core of what I am. And though the other people in my life don’t always see the sins in my heart or what goes on in my heart and mind, God does. He sees underneath this makeup facade I wear to the world and he sees I am a rotten corpse underneath.

But the most important thing that God does is that what God does for you and me is He speaks that good word over us. The good word God speaks over you and me is the word live. God brings us to life. He speaks us to life with this powerful, forgiving word. When God justifies the sinner, he resurrects us from the inside out. He gives you and me eternal life through Jesus. And because of that, our whole lives is a doxology of praise to God. Our life is a doxology of praise, for thine is the kingdom, a kingdom of people that have been redeemed by the blood of Jesus, His Son. Thine is the power, the resurrecting power that brought Jesus to life easter morning is the same power that God uses to bring us to life, not just spiritually, but one day when he raises our bodies from the ground. Thine is the glory. To you alone God be credit. And that’s going to be the hymn of praise we sing with all the saints in heaven for all eternity. For yours is the kingdom, the power and the glory forever and ever. Amen.

Psalm 23:4, Matthew 6:13

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Psalm 23 is a beautiful psalm about how Jesus, our Lord and good shepherd leads us his sheep through this life. But have you ever wondered when you get to that phrase in Psalm 23?

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; (Psalm 23:4)

As the sheep, do you ever wonder, do we have to go through this valley? Can’t we just go around it? Well, that’s an important thought as we deal with the next petition in the Lord’s Prayer.

Lead us not into temptation. (Matthew 6:13)

What this is saying is that God does not lead us into temptation, but he leads us through temptation. He leads us through those dark valleys of difficulty.

And you see, there’s an important distinction here between God knowing that we’ll face temptation and God causing that temptation. For instance, think about Judas the night that He betrayed Jesus. Jesus turned to Judas and said, What you are about to do, go and do quickly. Was Jesus leading Judas into temptation? No. The Bible tells us that God surely tempts no one to sin. Judas was drug away by his own lust for money. If you know this story, what happens after that, when Judas found out that Jesus had been sentenced to death. In despair, He runs back to the temple, he takes the 30 pieces of silver he had been paid for Jesus life, and he throws it at the chief priest and he says, I’ve sinned. I’ve betrayed innocent blood. And do you know what they told him? They said, What is that to us? You take care of it.

You see, that was Judas’ real temptation. He was told that he could take care of his own sin. And in the dark cloud of despair he thought that there was nothing he could do to pay for what he had done except to take his own life. And the greatest tragedy of Judas’ story is that as Judas hung on his tree, the answer he was so desperately seeking was hanging on a tree on Calvary.

There is a difference between God knowing we’ll face certain temptation, God causing that temptation, and though God doesn’t cause temptation because God knows we’re going to face temptation in his power and for his saints, God chooses to take that temptation and ultimately work it for our good.

At the same time, Judas faced his hour, his dark hour of trial and temptation, Peter faced a very similar one. Jesus had warned Peter that he too would deny Christ. Peter said, No, I won’t, and you might know what happens next. After Jesus was arrested, Peter had his chance to stand up for Christ. And instead he denied him, rejected him and renounced Jesus over and over again. What was Peter’s real temptation? He wasn’t just whether or not he would own up to being a disciple of Christ, but his real temptation came after the fact. How would he view himself after he had fallen into such a sad sin? Would he believe himself to be in such a dark place that God would never take him back?

Thankfully, Peter was led safely through that hour, that dark hour of temptation. He simply held on to Jesus and believed in Jesus and trusted Jesus’ words of promise. And he was brought safely through. You and I, as Christians, we have our dark hours as well. We face that dark shadow of death. Christians fall into deep pits. And oftentimes, again, the real temptation is how do I see myself in light of this sin?

So often there is that terrible voice in our head that says there’s no coming back. That how could God ever want me back? Or we can be sitting in church and hearing all these good things and thinking to ourselves that these good things apply to everyone else in the room, but not me. I’m the one that doesn’t belong here. That voice is a terrible lie. Take it from Paul, who was the chief of sinners, and God saved him and rescued him and forgave him. Take it from Peter who fell and Jesus personally restored. You and I were led safely through that dark trial. Those dark temptations. By that simple trust in Jesus promises.

Take John 3:16. God so loved the world that He gave his one and only Son. We can ask ourselves, Am I a part of the world? Yes. Then God loves you. You can ask yourself, who did Jesus die for? He died for sinners. Are you a sinner? The answer is yes. Jesus died for you. That means Jesus is your Savior. He has taken away your sins. And that faith in Jesus will see you through that dark time.

More importantly, it’s your Savior’s promise that no matter how dark of a cloud, no matter how dark of a valley we find ourselves in, it’s his promise that he will stay by your side. He will lead you safely through.

I will fear no evil for your rod and your staff, they comfort me. (Psalm 23:4)

That’s a comfort we have when we pray. That petition lead us not into temptation, but through temptation. Amen.

Matthew 6:12

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People always say time heals all wounds. I think what a load of garbage. Time heals nothing. Just think about your house, for instance. Right? There’s a mess on the floor. What is time going to do for that? If there’s a hole in the floor or something’s falling apart, time doesn’t do anything. Time just makes the problem get worse and worse.

Time doesn’t heal any wounds. What happens with time is we just learn to live with it. We learn to walk around the mess and we get so used to it being there that it just becomes part of our everyday life. It’s important for us to talk about time and wounds and forgiveness, especially as we think about the petition in the Lord’s Prayer, when Jesus teaches us,

Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. (Matthew 6:12)

How many sins do we commit in a single day? Well, if you think really hard, you might think of a handful of sins of commission, things that we do with our actions. But then Jesus takes a step further. He’ll say things like, Whoever looks at a woman lustfully has already sinned against her, committed adultery against her in his heart. (Matthew 5:28) So it’s not just the things we do, it’s even the things, the thoughts that go through our mind that we don’t act upon are also sin. Well, we can easily gather 100 in a single day.

Then there’s sins of omission. The things that we don’t do that we should do. Oh, those pile up fast, don’t they? Not just all my projects around home that I leave undone, but all the things in my life that I’ve left unsaid and undone and how quickly that pile adds up. But let’s say hypothetically, maybe if I weren’t able to do any sins of commission or sins of omission. There’s still just one sin that I’m guilty of. That’s Adam’s sin. Because I’ve inherited a sinful nature from my parents going all the way back to Adam. I could look at the whole house of the human race, the whole house of my heart and say it’s rotten to the core. That one sin condemns me.

And why it’s important for us to just go through that exercise of thinking, How many sins have I committed? Why that’s so important isn’t so that we can number our sins. But it’s important so that we can see how great of a savior we really have. Paul tells us where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more. (Romans 5:20) If you can even begin to imagine the countless sins a single person can accrue in a lifetime. Jesus paid for the sins of the whole world. In the six hours he suffered on the cross, he paid for every single one of those countless sins gone, forgiven, through his death and resurrection.

Jesus tears down the whole house of humanity and builds up a new house through his perfect life, innocent death and resurrection. By faith he makes us a part of that household. Why that’s important is because the second part of that petition,

as we forgive those who trespass against us. (Matthew 6:12)

God doesn’t forgive us because we forgive other people, He says forgive us as we forgive those who trespass. So, in other words, as members of Jesus household, forgiveness is just something we do. But what makes that so hard is because we were really hurt. Someone really committed a sin of commission or omission against me. And that leaves a wound. And it’s hard for me to forgive that. It’s hard for me to just let go. Is God asking me to pretend like it never happened? At a certain point we have to ask ourselves. What am I holding out for? By holding on to that sin am I trying to punish and hurt that person that sinned against me? In the end, the only one I end up hurting is myself. If the one sin against me wasn’t bad enough by holding on to that sin, I can endanger my own faith.

When it becomes a question of punishment and hurt for hurt. We have to remind ourselves that God has punished that sin. Jesus became our scapegoat. He became the sin of the world. So when I’m hurt, I’m looking to see God’s justice carried out. We’re to go to Jesus. We’re to look at Jesus and his back that was flogged over and over again and ask the question: has he suffered enough? We can look at Jesus and see his hands get nailed to the cross. And with each pound of that hammer, we can ask ourselves: has Jesus suffered enough? Standing there at the cross, Jesus cries out. “It is finished.” (John 12:30) Has he suffered enough? God the Father says yes. All sins are forgiven. Jesus Christ says yes, all sins are forgiven. I can say yes, that sin is forgiven.

1 Timothy 6:6-8

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What can’t you get enough of? For me, it’s the cheese biscuits at Red Lobster. When I order at Red Lobster, I am not only ordering constantly those baskets of cheese biscuits, but before I leave the restaurant, I am literally stuffing my pockets with those cheese biscuits. I can’t get enough.

How about in our life? What are the things we can’t get enough of? Paul says

But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. (1 Timothy 6:6-8)

Will we, though? Will I really be content if I just have enough to survive? I don’t want to survive. I want to thrive. Today we tell ourselves that we have a right to happiness. We have a right to over abundance. I have a right to the big house, the car, the boat, the cabin, the lake, and the list of things I need to be happy goes on and on and on. And even if I don’t have enough to supply all those things, what I tend to do is put it on the credit card and pierce myself with more and more griefs. Why? All because I just can’t have enough.

It’s interesting, even the most pious among us, we might say that I don’t really need to be rich. I don’t need a lot out of life. I just want enough so I don’t have to always worry about my finances. I just want enough so that I can buy the things I need to get and not have to worry about running out of money in the bank. But it’s interesting, what are we really asking for? We’re asking for enough so I don’t have to ask God for my daily bread. I want enough so I can be comfortable enough to forget about God and not have to go to him day after day and ask him and trust in him to provide.

And what I find is nothing exposes that idolatry of our own goods and wealth more than economic hardship. Stock markets as they start to crash and as we look with question at our financial future. We start to worry. When Jesus talks about worry he directs his disciples to the birds. He says, aren’t these birds, aren’t these sparrows worth only a few pennies? And what Jesus is telling us is when we face hardship and we worry and we ask how much and we wonder about the cost of things Jesus is telling us, we’re really asking the wrong question. We really need to ask him how much are we worth?

And Jesus is always ready with that answer. Jesus tells us you are worth so much more. You are worth so much the Prince of Heaven left heaven’s throne to come down here. Jesus took and embraced our poverty. He wore the rags of our sins to give us the riches of his righteousness. You are worth so much to Jesus he suffered and died on the cross and laid down his life to make you his own.

If that isn’t enough, the Bible promises that God wants to open His pierced hands and satisfy the desires of every living thing. You hear that? Jesus wants to satisfy your desire. And what’s amazing about this is every example from the Bible where God gives in his abundance. God doesn’t just give enough, he gives an over abundance, whether it’s the manna from heaven, the quail, the water from the rock, the widow’s flower and oil, the great catch a fish, the wine in Cana, feeding of the 5000. Or even the forgiveness of sins.

God doesn’t just give enough, he gives more than enough. He gives in abundance. He satisfies the desires of every living thing. And the reason God does that is he wants us to lift up our eyes away from all the things of this world and to fasten our minds and our hearts for our souls to hunger after the bread of life from heaven. The bread of this world, even the cheese biscuits at Red Lobster go bad. But Jesus is the bread that endures to eternal life. And in heaven, he’ll open the great treasuries of his heart to satisfy the desires of every living thing, to satisfy your desires for all eternity. This is what we pray for when we fold our hands and pray. Give us this day our daily bread. Amen.

Matthew 6:10

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A few years ago, my wife and I were visiting Norway, and one of the sights we saw was the National Cathedral in Oslo. And I love the artwork all over the walls. But the one thing that captured my attention and imagination was that the baptismal font. There at the baptismal font on the floor was a snake, but it was a mosaic snake in the tile. So we’d ask them about that snake. And our tour guide told us that was so that the fathers, when they were bringing their child up to be baptized, could step on the serpent’s head.

It’s a great picture for the petition in the Lord’s Prayer when we say

Thy will be done. (Matthew 6:10)

So oftentimes when we think about God’s will, we think about it as this hidden and mysterious thing. But really, in the Bible, God’s will is perfectly clear. His will is to break and defeat every evil plan and purpose of the devil, the world, and our sinful flesh. His will is that God wants all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth in Christ Jesus, their Savior. But when Jesus talks about that petition or that prayer, thy will be done, he says,

On earth as it is in heaven. (Matthew 6:10)

So there’s two spheres where God’s will is done. The first I want to look at is in heaven.

In heaven, God’s will is absolute. When the devil rebelled against God. God threw him down. The dragon and his angels made war in heaven and they made war against Michael and Michael and his angels fought back and they cast the devil down. God’s will in heaven is that the devil must lose. In fact, the devil’s greatest plans can ever only backfire against him. We see this when the devil and all of his angels took the Lord of Glory, Jesus Christ himself and the greatest evil they had planned against him, nailing him to the cross, crucifying the Son of God, only ended up backfiring. They accomplished God’s own plan of salvation by Jesus dying on the cross. And on the third day he rose again from the dead and he crushed the serpent’s head.

But God’s will is also carried out on this earth or in these earthly realms. And when God’s will is carried out here, it’s often carried out in a hidden way. For instance, God certainly wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. However, at the same time, God’s will is not to force anyone to believe in Him, but in fact, he gives people the freedom to simply walk away from him. God gives each one of us a time of grace, a period in our life where we can come to repentance and faith in Jesus as our Savior. And God wants each of us to seize that opportunity with all of our heart, seize Christ with all of our hearts.

In this life, all the trouble, all the trials, tribulation, suffering we face. Is because we live in this constant battle between God’s will and the will of evil. We live in the constant battle between angels and demons. The devil wants to exercise his will and power over us. He wants us to be convinced that we should reject God or that we know better on our own. We don’t have to listen to God in His Word. Or maybe that sin in my life isn’t really that big of a deal. In the meantime, God’s voice is always there. His word is always there, calling us to repentance, calling us back to him, calling us to crucify ourselves with Christ and and rise with him through baptism.

When we pray this petition, thy will be done, we are joining our Savior in humility in the Garden of Gethsemane, praying those same words, trusting in God’s mighty power that God’s will will be done. At the same time, it’s not a prayer of wishy washy hopefulness. It is a certain prayer of confidence that God will break and defeat every evil plan and purpose of the devil, the world in our sinful flesh. That God will see us safely through this life as His baptized children, and that the God of peace will crush Satan under your feet. Thy will be done. Amen.

James 2:26

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You live among a hidden kingdom. Its members are all around you every day. It is a kingdom that defies geographical borders. But without fail, these members of the kingdom, week after week, show their colors. They don their colors of purple and gold. Sometimes they put on these ridiculous looking hats with horns on them, sometimes even paint their bodies and wear these yellow mustaches. Without fail, though, they all gather together around their TVs in their stadium, proudly wear their colors and to cheer on their team.

Now, I don’t know what team you might cheer on, but if I were to tell you that I am a Vikings fan, but I have an outfit and it’s sitting in my closet. But I never wear it. I never gather for games. I never watch games and never cheer for the Vikings. Well, I would be lying to you if I told you I was a real Vikings fan because I’m not really wearing my colors.

This is what the Bible says in James when he says

Faith without works is dead. (James 2:26)

I can’t see a person’s beating heart inside their chest, but it’s really obvious when someone is actually alive and well because they’re doing something a living person does. They’re walking, breathing, talking, interacting with people. The same is true of the Christian faith. We can’t look into a person’s heart and see if there’s truly faith there. But by their actions, by that person wearing their colors and living a Christian life, you can tell if there is saving faith.

This is really important because in American Christianity we live amongst an epidemic of apathy. More and more Christians are telling themselves that I can truly believe in Christ, but I don’t have to live as a disciple of Christ. I can call myself a believer, but I don’t have to attend church or belong to a church. These Christians are deceiving themselves. Like James says, faith without works is a dead faith.

So what is the Kingdom of God? It begins with faith in the heart. But Paul tells us in Romans 15, it is a kingdom of righteousness, a kingdom of peace, a kingdom of joy in the Holy Spirit. It is a kingdom of righteousness. It’s not about our works, but what Jesus has done for us. He covers us with His holy, precious blood. He makes us members of his kingdom through the declaration your sins are forgiven. That truth, that reality gives us peace. Peace knowing we’re going to heaven. Peace, knowing we have a right relationship with God. Peace, knowing that if the worst were to happen to me today, that I confidently can look death in the face and know that my future is certain because I’m going to be in heaven with Jesus.

And that real righteousness that Christ gives you, that real peace that Jesus gives you produces real joy. Real joy that means I can’t let that stay hidden in my heart, but I’m going to wear my colors. I’m going to support my team. I’m going to cheer for the gospel and support the gospel and gather week after week with my fellow Christians to cheer on the home team.

That’s what we pray for when we pray. Thy kingdom come. We’re asking our Lord Jesus to first of all conquer our hearts so that through us he would continue to work his wonders. To continue to spread the gospel and help his kingdom here on Earth grow. So thy kingdom come. Amen.

Exodus 3:5, Matthew 6:9

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Reputation matters. In fact, if you think about it, how much of your life, how much do we spend on our reputation? Our clothes, our haircut, the car we drive, the perfectly manicured lawn. Reputation is worth investing in. And if it’s important for us, if it matters for us, what other people think about us, then that certainly also is important for God. His name, his reputation matters.

One of the neat moments in the Bible with God and His name and reputation is when Moses first meets the Lord and God reveals his personal name to Moses. Do you remember what happens? Moses comes up to the burning bush and the angel of the Lord tells him,

Take off your sandals, for you are standing on holy ground. (Exodus 3:5)

What is the holy ground in your life? What is that ground that is sacred and set apart for God and His holy name? Well, first, when we answer that question, we have to look inside. We have to look at our own hearts. Is my heart holy ground? I wish that were the case. When I look at my heart, I see all the times I haven’t put God’s reputation first or God’s honor first. I see a place that’s often inhabited by sin. I see a place that oftentimes I’m ashamed of, and I would want God to be everywhere but in my heart. However, God takes our hearts and He makes it His holy ground. He places His name on you. When God places his name on you in baptism, he takes you and me, and he consecrated us as his own. He dedicates our heart. He dedicates this earth, this body, as his dwelling place on earth. He washes away our sins.

What an amazing comfort that is that God wants his dwelling place to be in us. That He takes people like you and me and uses us to proclaim his reputation to the world. And God doesn’t just take our hearts and us as individuals and set us aside for the use of his name. But when we answer that question of what’s a holy ground in my life, I hope you also think about your church. Your home church, that place where God causes his name to dwell. We see that throughout the Bible, wherever people call upon God’s name and wherever God’s people gather together for worship that is sacred ground, a sacred space. It’s sacred because that’s where God’s Word is proclaimed. That’s where the gospel is shared, where people learn about Jesus, their Savior. And here God takes all these sacred spaces, whether it’s our hearts, whether it’s our churches. And he uses us to proclaim his holy name.

By being together as the body of Christ. God uses us to share the good news that Jesus is our Savior. He uses us to try to help make other hearts His holy dwelling place. And they, when they hear the wonderful, comforting message that Christ Jesus is their Savior.

You have holy ground. And whenever we pray that prayer.

Hallowed be thy name. (Matthew 6:9)

We’re asking God to not only to use our hearts and our churches, but to use all of us together to keep his name holy here on Earth. Amen.

Matthew 6:9

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Bill was searching for something. As one of my members, he was never shy about telling me that he had been adopted. But one of the neat stories about Bill was that the nurse that helped with his delivery in the hospital had recorded all the details of his delivery, wrote it down in a letter, and sent that letter with Bill to his adopted parents. And for Bill, it was always a comfort knowing that his mom had never really wanted to give him up.

You see, the question, though, that always haunted Bill was the question Where was my father? Why wasn’t my father there? There’s a lot of people in our world today that are asking those same kind of questions. We live in a world of broken fatherhood. We live in a world where more and more people are wondering. Where was my father when I needed him? Maybe Dad was present in the home, but not in any real meaningful sense of the word. Maybe people had grown up with a good relationship with their father, but that relationship was cut short and he was taken out of this world too soon. And there were so many things left unsaid and undone.

Today, there are many fathers that are striving to live up to this ideal of fatherhood. They’re making themselves the promise that they’re going to be better than the fathers that they had. Yet every day they feel that conviction in their hearts that they are falling short of that promise. More than anything, everyone realizes that to be a father means more than just creating life. It means to have a relationship with that life.

All this yearning, all this search for fatherhood is proof that there is an ideal fatherhood out there, that there’s an ideal that we are all striving for. And even if we all fall short of it, it’s proof that there is a real father, that we have a father in heaven. And for us it is such a tender note that God opens up the Lord’s Prayer by teaching us to address God as our Father who art in heaven. We’re confessing that He is the source of everything good. He is the source of justice and truth and fairness. That he is the perfect heavenly parent. He’s not like the helicopter parent that’s going to swoop in and keep us from everything bad that could ever happen to us. He’s not the snowplow parent that’s going to push everything out of our way. But as our Father in heaven, he’s going to let us face just the right amount of adversity in our life so that we grow in character.

But more than that, your God, your Father in heaven, he doesn’t just create life. He desires a relationship, a meaningful relationship with that life. And the Bible tells a story of everything God would do to create that meaningful relationship with you. The cross and the Open tomb declare the story of how much God was willing to sacrifice all so He could connect with you and take you into heaven to be with him. You have a father in heaven, a father who has taken you and has adopted you as his own child through Holy Baptism. A father who sends the Holy Spirit into your heart and searches you out through the word and sacrament. You have a father who puts the spirit of his son Jesus, in your heart that cries out through all of life’s troubles and hardships, abba father!

And God, your father in heaven does all of this so that you as his child can confidently approach him and confidently knock on that door to heaven and say, Our Father who art in heaven.

Bill found what he was looking for. In fact, the day before he died, he met his half-siblings and found out that his father, his earthly father, had been searching for him. And for Bill, it was such a comfort to know that even though his father had never really successfully connected with him, that he had been wanted. But you see, what had really given Bill comfort was that years before that had happened. He found his father in heaven. He found a God who loved him and searched him out, who sent his son Jesus to die for him all to take Bill and adopt him as his own child. And today Bill is there with God in heaven. You have a father in heaven. Amen.

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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.

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Maybe you’ve heard of the 80/20 rule. 80/20 rule suggests that in any group of people, family, organization that 80% of the work gets done by 20% of the group.

Knowing that rule I suppose is for us to concern ourselves with maybe burnout that those who are bearing 80% of the weight might become exhausted or incapable of doing the work.

What if 100% of the work were on one person? Wouldn’t that cause us great concern? That’s exactly what is established for us in the prayer that we are given to pray to our Father. That 100% of the work of our preservation in this body and of our rescue from this body from sin and death that 100% of that work are being placed right at the foot of our Father in heaven.

That he is the one who will make his name Holy; that he is the one who will cause his kingdom to come and cause his will to be done; that he is the one who gives us daily bread; that he is the one who forgives us all of our sins and brings us to forgive those who sin against us. That that one person he is the one who spares us in all temptation, the one who will deliver us from all evil. And why is it then, why are we not overly concerned that it’s too much? Why are we so confident in placing 100% of the work on one person?

Because the kingdom belongs to him. All of it. The grace, the forgiveness, the mercy, the gift of his Son. All of that is in his purview and the power is all his. The one who created all things by his mere word is the one who has the power to preserve and protect to prosper all of this, but finally to deliver us from death and the devil.

And the glory. It’s all his too. The credentials say he is the right one to give all of the work to. Creation sings his praises. His Son did his bidding in full and the resurrection of his Son says that it has been done completely and in your behalf and in mine. The 100/1 rule. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory. Amen.

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Palm Sunday is on its way. That’s the day in the gospel records where Jesus is recorded as riding into Jerusalem with all the pomp and circumstance of the people. We remember the day fondly we usually think of that day as a single day on the calendar.

Yet in the Lord’s Prayer we have given to us a Palm Sunday you might say, or it’s prayer, and it happens every time we pray the Lord’s Prayer. Those people, all excited and in the crowd, they pray simply Hosanna. That is, save us. Save us now. Save us urgently, they pray. And when Jesus gives us to pray in the Lord’s Prayer: Deliver Us From Evil, it’s really like a little Palm Sunday prayer right in the middle of that Lord’s Prayer.

We pray deliver us because we can’t deliver ourselves. We are as incapable of delivering ourselves as the mail is incapable of delivering itself to our boxes. We pray Deliver Us From Evil. That is deliver us from threats to our body. Threats of illness or of injury deliver us from threats of our property that it might be destroyed in tragedy or taken in a robbery. We pray that he would deliver us from dishonor that our reputations might be dragged through the mud. Finally we pray, deliver us from the one who is evil, from death, and the power of damnation. That he’d deliver us in the blood of his Son by taking us from this valley of tears to the summit of salvation to his eternal presence.

A little Palm Sunday right in the middle of the Lord’s Prayer. Deliver us from evil Amen.