HE RESTORES MY SOUL

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
He leads me beside quiet waters,
He restores my soul. 

Psalm 23 is a song of absolute trust written from the perspective of a sheep towards his shepherd. I suspect that the reason it resonates so deeply for us is because it’s so profoundly personal. David didn’t describe the Lord as “our shepherd,” but rather “MY shepherd.” He was writing as one who knew His shepherd intimately, and had seen countless examples of his shepherd’s capable care.

I suspect we have also seen countless examples of God’s capable care, of the ways He provides for us in times of scarcity and guides us through difficult seasons. And in a time like this, when we are experiencing levels of scarcity and trouble unlike any other time in our lives, it has never been more important for us to remember who our Shepherd is and how capable He is of caring for us.

Yesterday, we began to unpack the second verse of the Shepherd Psalm. After declaring his absolute trust in his Shepherd, David writes:

“He makes me lie down in green pastures, 
  He leads me beside still waters,
  He restores my soul.”  

We’ve already commented on the irony that our Shepherd has to make us lie down. Even after a shepherd has properly fed and watered his flock, sheep are prone to wander in search of one more tuft of grass to crop or another mud-choked puddle to drink from. So shepherds regularly need to make the sheep lie down and rest.

Similarly, even though we intellectually understand that our identity is found in our relationship with God, not in what we do, we are still prone to wander in search of things that can prop up our identity and affirm that we matter. And in a time like this, when we are forced to isolate in our homes, being still can feel like a punishment. But I would suggest it’s a time when our Shepherd is inviting us to lay down and rest in His presence, because He is enough.

But it’s that last line that I want to zero in on this morning: “He restores my soul.”

What does that mean? How does our Shepherd restore our soul?  To answer that, it helps to understand how a shepherd restores a sheep that has become cast down.

One of the most dangerous things that can happen to a sheep is it becomes “cast” – that means it’s fallen and isn’t able to regain its footing by its own strength. This could happen for any number of reasons: perhaps it’s grown too fat, or its fleece has grown too full or it has gotten clogged with mud and branches,  or it’s simply stumbled into a ditch and can’t get out. Initially, it’s simply uncomfortable for the sheep, but if it’s not restored back to its feet in a reasonable time, it can die.

Like sheep, we too can get cast down. It happens for lots of reasons: perhaps we stumble in sin, or we get too full of ourselves, or we get bogged down with fear and anxiety about the unknown. Or maybe we just get sideswiped by life. I think a lot of us find ourselves in that place right now. The coronavirus came out of left field and has swept the legs out from under many of us and we just don’t know how to get back to our feet. Thankfully, this is where the shepherd comes in.

A good shepherd is constantly looking for those sheep who have fallen, and when he finds one that is cast, he “restores it” to its feet with gentleness and grace. The same holds true for us.

When we find ourselves flat on our back and unsure whether we have the strength to get back up, we might think that God will be mad with us, that He will be disgusted and fed up. But that’s not the attitude of our Shepherd. A good shepherd cares for his flock, and we have the best of shepherds. He knows that we all get cast down from time to time, so rather than getting disgusted with us, He takes pains to restore us to health and wholeness.

If anyone knew this to be true it was King David, the guy wrote this psalm. David fell harder than any of us have. It started innocently enough. He saw a woman bathing and didn’t look away. His initial interest turned to infatuation, then to lust, and that’s when things really went sideways. The woman in the bath, who was aptly named Bathsheba, turned out to be the wife of one of his closest friends. David got her pregnant and then tried to cover it up by bringing her husband home from war so they could easily write the baby off as his. But when that didn’t work, David tried to clean up his mess by intentionally sending his friend to the front lines so that he would be killed.  In a matter of days, David not only became an adulterer, but a murderer (even if he didn’t wield the sword that killed his friend).

Now, God could have easily rejected David at this point; He could have taken the throne and even David’s life for his mistakes. But he didn’t. Nor did God simply ignore David’s misbehavior. He didn’t turn a blind eye to it, because left unchecked it would have caused even more destruction. Instead, God restored David gently, through the Prophet Nathan.

Nathan presented David with the truth of his sin, and David was humble enough to acknowledge the mess he had made. Now, you might say, “God was judging David by exposing his sin,” but I beg to differ. Exposing his sin was God’s grace. God’s judgement is when He gives us over to our destructive tendencies - when He leaves us cast down.

What I love about David, and one of the primary reasons why he continues to be called “a man after God’s heart,” is that once his sin is exposed, he doesn’t deny it, excuse it or try to run and hide from it. Instead, he owns it, confesses it openly, and runs to his Shepherd for consolation. 

In fact, we have a record of David’s response, penned by his own hand. It’s Psalm 51, and it is a beautiful cry for help from a cast sheep to his shepherd. Let’s listen in:

Create in me a clean heart, O God.
    Renew a loyal spirit within me.
Do not cast me away from your presence,
    and don’t take your Holy Spirit from me.
Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
    and make me willing to obey you.
                                  - Psalm 51:10-12


Father God, you are my Shepherd, and you are faithful. Even when I am not; even when I am drawn away by the things of this world, or my faith is eclipsed by my circumstances, still you are faithful and vigilant. I thank you for your patience with me, and thank you for your grace. I pray that you would restore me to my feet, and help me stand. Jesus, I pray in your name, Amen.

He Makes Me Lie Down

“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads be beside quiet waters…

There was a time, about 6 years ago, when David’s declaration of trust from Psalm 23 was like a drink of water in the midst of a desert. At the time, I was a new father, an adjunct college professor, and an associate pastor at a growing church down the street. Life was exciting and I was running hard and fast. It felt like there were never enough hours in the day to do everything I needed to get done, and my relationships with my family and with God bore the brunt of my harried schedule.

Whenever my wife would ask me to choose her and our infant son over work, I would feel frustrated. Couldn’t she see that everything I was doing was for them?! Wasn’t it enough that I was providing for them and serving God?  Speaking of God, during this season I was acting a lot like Martha. I was far too busy working for God to actually spend any time with Him.  So I drove myself into exhaustion, never realizing that I was in danger of burning out. Looking back, I can clearly see the warning signs. I was red-lining and running on fumes, but the excitement of feeling needed kept me going. Little did I know that a break down was imminent.

 

It’s funny how people around us can see the warning signs better than we can. I was physically present, but emotionally distant. My marriage was suffering and my desire to minister to others was waning. It was even hard to scrape together the desire to worship at church. Something was amiss; I was in a funk and everyone around me could tell.

So one day, my director at church pulled me into his office and voiced his concern. “Eric, I don’t know what’s going on with you, but the joy-filled guy that I know is gone,” he told me. “I’m concerned about you and I want you to take the rest of the week off to spend some time with God and your wife and figure out what’s going on.” I know that he only wanted the best for me, but in the moment it felt like I’d been called into the principal’s office and suspended.

I went home and collapsed onto the couch with Cathy, feeling utterly defeated. Thankfully, it was my son Ethan’s nap time, so my wife and I spent the next hour praying together for God’s wisdom and direction.

During that time, He gave me a mental image of me lying in a bed, under a heavy blanket. But as the sheet was pulled away, I saw that my body was withered and emaciated. I knew in my heart that God was showing me the state of my soul, which had grown dry from constantly pouring out but never stopping to be refilled.

It feels ironic to admit that, as a pastor, I had grown spiritually dry, but it was true. In my drive to care for other’s needs, I’d neglected my own relationship with God, so I’d been pouring into other people out of the dregs, not the overflow of my heart. As a result, ministry had become an obligation, not a joy, and though I didn’t realize it in that moment, my Father in Heaven was putting me on the sideline for my own good and the good of those who depended upon me the most.

During a time of quiet reflection one morning during my forced sabbatical, He led me to Psalm 23 over and over again. David’s words felt as if they were written specifically for me:

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not be in want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters, he restores my soul.

As I sat in the stillness of my home, alone with God as everyone else in the house was still asleep, I felt as if my Shepherd was using David’s words to tell me that He needed to pull me out of ministry so that He could minister to me. My Shepherd was going to make me lie down in a green pasture to rest.

It’s seems odd that the shepherd has to make the sheep lie down, doesn't it?! But shepherds need to do it all the time, because sheep are prone to wander off in search of one more tuft of grass to crop or one more mud-choked puddle to drink from. And like sheep, we are prone wander in search of things to prop up our identity and prove our value to ourselves and others around us. But our identity and value has never been found in what we do for a job or how in-shape we are. They are found in our relationship to our Shepherd, and sometimes our Shepherd needs to make us be still so that we can remember that.

For many of us, this season of self-isolation feels like being forced to lie down in a green pasture. We can’t run to the things we normally run to for consolation and purpose, so we sit at home and wonder if anybody even misses us. But what if this is a time in your life when your Shepherd is inviting you to be still and know that you are enough, just as you are, because He is with you and He is watching over you.

I remember how painful it was during that forced-sabbatical to sit and be still. It felt punishment. Like I was in time-out. But David’s words from Psalm 23 were like a balm to my aching heart, because they assured me that my Shepherd’s intention was not punitive, but rather restorative.  

He was going to restore my soul.

We will explore what it means to have our souls restored, and how God does that tomorrow. 

For today, I would simply invite you to spend some time in silence, resting in these truths:

• You are not alone. Your Shepherd is right there with you.
• He loves you - not for anything you do, or anything you will do - but just for being you.
• You are enough, and so is He.

The Lord is My Shepherd

Psalm 23 is one of the most well-known passages in the Bible, rivaled only by John 3:16. But there’s a danger to familiarity – when we know something so well, we can stop really listening to what it has to say, like a song we’ve sung so many times that we never consider what the lyrics mean. So our goal over the next two weeks will be to strip away the familiar veneer and chew on this beloved psalm one verse at a time, so that we can truly consider the gravity of what it declares.

This morning, I want to start with that first verse that we know so well:
“The Lord is my shepherd, I have everything I need.” Or as most of us memorized it, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not be in want.”

It’s important to remember that, as famous and well known as these words are, they were penned by a real person, a guy named David who happened to be the most famous King in Israel’s history. But he didn’t start out as a king. When we first meet him in the Bible, he is out tending his father’s flocks. That’s right. As a kid, David was a shepherd. So it’s no coincidence that when he was searching for an analogy to describe his relationship with God, he would choose to call God his shepherd.

And that means David identified as one of the sheep.  Which is an interesting choice, because sheep can’t take care of themselves. They have no claws or horns to defend themselves. They aren’t fast enough to run from predators, they aren’t smart enough to feed and care for themselves. Sheep are, by nature, dependent creatures, and it is the shepherd’s job to lead and guide, protect and provide for them.  That means that the flock’s well-being is directly tied to the quality of the shepherd caring for it.

Psalm 23 is an emphatic declaration of David’s complete and utter trust in his shepherd. Just consider the opening line: “The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in want.”

As the king of Israel, David could have said, “The Lord is OUR shepherd.”
But he didn’t. Instead, he declared, “the Lord is MY shepherd.”  It’s a much more personal statement, and the Psalm as a whole has the feel of a sheep resting contentedly under his shepherd’s care. And because God is caring for him, David declares, “I shall not be in want.”

Now, I’ll admit that this could sound like a bit of an overstatement, as if David is suggesting that he has no desires beyond what God gives him. But that’s not what he’s saying. There’s a huge difference between wanting something and being in want. Remember, it’s the shepherd’s job to provide for the needs of his flock; however, that doesn’t mean the shepherd will or should always give the sheep everything they want. Imagine if I gave my boys everything they wanted? We’d be eating ice cream at every meal. To give into our children’s every whim is the best way to ensure that they will be fat, unhealthy and spoiled. And in the same way, a good shepherd recognizes the difference between what his sheep want and what they truly need. Every one of us want things that could hurt us, and a good shepherd will protect us from them. A good shepherd will tell us “No” from time to time.

Perhaps we should paraphrase the opening this way: “The Lord is my Shepherd; He gives me what I need so I shall not be in want.” David experienced this first hand. He saw God’s hand of guidance, provision and protection throughout his life, in both the good times and the hard ones (and let’s not forget that David had plenty of hard ones). He spent years on the run from Saul. He had moments of doubt when it seemed like God had abandoned him and destruction was just around the corner (just read the Psalms, which are full of his cries of frustration and disappointment). He had some painful moments when he fell flat on his face into sin. Yet even then, his Shepherd didn’t abandon him. Rather, God met him in the midst of his mistakes and led him out of bondage to sin and guilt. David could say with confidence that “the Lord God is MY Shepherd, I shall not be in want.”

Can you say that?

As you survey the pathway of your life, the twists and turns, the triumphs and the disappointments, can you see God’s hand of guidance?

Can you see the ways that he has protected you from things you wanted, but ultimately needed to avoid?

And can you see the ways He’s provided for you?

I sure can. Though life hasn’t always gone the way I would have expected, I can see God’s sure hand of guidance and protection all along the way. At times He’s led me with a clear, loving ‘No,’ and my life is better for it. Sometimes He’s led me with the rod of discipline, to get my attention and set me on the path of righteousness again. And sometimes He’s just flat out blessed me beyond what I could have ever imagined.

So the Lord is a worthy, capable shepherd. But he’s more than that. He’s also our rightful owner. After all, He created us and sustains our every breath. And He paid the price to buy us out of slavery to sin. He is our rightful owner, yet he doesn’t force His ownership upon us. He allows us to choose whether or not we want him as our Shepherd. He allows us to choose whether we will follow His lead.

So I ask you again, is the Lord Your Shepherd?
Have you chosen to submit your life to His care?

A lot of times we treat this like a one-time decision – whether to pray the prayer or not – but the truth is that following our Shepherd is a daily decision. Every day and every circumstance is an opportunity to declare our faith, through both our thoughts and our actions. Will we take up our cross and follow Him, or will we choose to chart our own course, running after the things that we think we need to be happy and fulfilled?

I think Joshua said it best: “Choose this day whom you will serve.” Choose this day whom you will place your trust in and follow. God is the rightful ruler of your life, the only one who has both a claim and a capability to guide your steps through this sin-scarred world. But He still gives you a choice. So choose whom you will serve. As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord. Why?

Because the Lord is my shepherd, 
and I have everything I need.

The Lord's Prayer - Part 5

Lead Us Not Into Temptation

This week, we’ve been slowly working through the Lord’s Prayer. And as we’ve seen, it’s more than simply an incantation by which we force God’s hand to do what we want. Rather, it is a declaration of our dependence on our Father in Heaven, who stands above the chaos of our circumstances but still cares about us as we walk through them.

As we dive into the final part of Jesus’ prayer, let’s ground it in the context of the whole thing:

"This, then, is how you should pray: 

   ‘Our Father in heaven, 

      Holy is your name.

   May your kingdom come, 

      and your will be done, 

      on earth as it is in heaven.

   Give us today our daily bread.

   And forgive us our debts,

      as we also have forgiven our debtors.

   And lead us not into temptation,

      but deliver us from the evil one."

                             - Matthew 6:9-13

Now, it would be easy for us to misunderstand the last part of the Lord’s Prayer as suggesting that God intentionally tempts us to sin, perhaps to see if we'll give in. Otherwise, why would Jesus use the language, “lead us not into temptation?” But we know from James 1:13-14 that God doesn’t tempt anyone.

“When tempted, no one should say, ‘God is tempting me.’ For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed.” James 1:13-14

So God’s not the one doing the tempting; it’s our own impulses towards things we yearn for that lead us into dangerous territory. I can think of a lot of temptations in a season like the one we’re in:

·       We may be thrown off by the radical changes to our daily rhythms that this pandemic demands. If so, we might be tempted to ignore the requests to shelter in place and go on with life as usual, regardless of the consequences.

·       We might be fearful that God won’t provide what we need in this time of scarcity, and so be tempted to run from store to store to stock up on anything and everything we could ever need.

·       In our hunger for interaction with the wider world, we could be tempted to fill our days with social media, which is like cotton candy - momentarily satisfying but lacking the relational nutrients we really need.

·       Nobody knows what’s coming next, and that’s frightening. But in our fear, we might be tempted to spend our days consuming every news report that comes out so that at least we won’t be taken by surprise.

These are just a few of the temptations we might feel in a time like this. I’m sure you could add others. In fact, take a moment and consider what you’ve been feeling lately and what you’ve been tempted to do in order to alleviate the discomfort.

No seriously, stop and think about it. I can wait…

Now, I want to be sure to mention that it’s not sinful to be tempted. Jesus was tempted, but he was without sin. He just never gave into his temptations. He never allowed them to dictate his actions. The same holds true for us. We will all be tempted. But our temptations only become sinful when we give into them and allow them to lead us away from our trust in and dependence upon God.

So the last part of the Lord’s Prayer is simply a cry to our Heavenly Father for protection from the things that would draw us away from Him and make us vulnerable to attack. Most of those temptations originate within us and arise in response to our fears and appetites. But the words “deliver us from the evil one” acknowledge that we have an enemy that is actively working to distract, discourage and dishearten us.

We are told that the devil is like a prowling lion, roaming around looking for someone to devour. (1 Peter 5:8) And like any lion, he tends to attack us when we are at our most vulnerable – in our moments of weakness and isolation. But that’s why it’s so imperative that we remember that we are never alone. Though we may be separated and unable to gather together with one another, our Father is always with us and He’s greater than anything we will face – greater than a virus, greater than anxiety, greater than financial hardship, greater than our enemy.

And we can take comfort in God’s promise that he won’t allow us to be tempted beyond what we have the ability to endure.

 “No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.” 1 Corinthians 10:13

So Father, we thank you that you never leave us or turn your back on us. And we’re grateful for the ways that you provide a way out when we feel tempted to stray from your side. So we choose to fix our eyes on you and follow your lead. We know that you won’t lead us astray, and that you are so much greater than our enemy. So Father, lead on. We will follow. 

Lord's Prayer - Part 4

The Prayer of a Forgiven People

Today, we are going to explore the topic of forgiveness, but before we get to that, there is one huge assumption that Jesus made when he taught his disciples the Lord’s Prayer: he assumed that the person praying actually identified as a child of God. After all, if we don’t accept that God is our Father in Heaven who is Holy (and therefore worthy of our respect), then we’re not going to be interested in seeing His Kingdom advancing into our world, or His will being carried out in our spheres of influence. And if we don’t accept God as our Heavenly Father, then we won’t look to Him to provide what we need - our daily bread.

But if God IS our Father, then it follows that our values would reflect His values. Or at the very least, as members of His family we’d desire that our values be a reflection of His. And this is nowhere more important than when it comes to forgiveness.

   Forgive us our debts,
       as we also have forgiven our debtors.

A debt is something owed to another, and when someone owes us, we’re usually pretty aware of it: If someone runs into my car, they owe me what it costs to fix the damage. If someone says something rude to me, they owe me an apology. If someone takes something that belongs to me, they owe me that thing back. Right?

My guess is you can think of several things that people owe you. Take a moment to think about it. And I’m not just talking about money or things people have borrowed. Think of people that have wronged you, hurt you, sinned against you.

Are you thinking of someone? Maybe a couple people? What is it that you feel they owe you? What is it you want from them?

Repayment? 

An apology?

That they feel bad for what they did? 

That they suffer like you’ve suffered?

But forgiveness is the act of releasing someone from what they owe us, without the expectation of repayment, and as children of God, He calls us to forgive as we have been forgiven.

One of Jesus’ disciples asked him how many times we should forgive someone. “Up to seven times?” the disciple asked. According to Jewish rabbinic teaching, if someone harmed you three times, you were to cut that person off and have nothing to do with them. This disciple doubled that number and added one. I’m sure he felt he was being overly gracious. But Jesus blows his idea of grace out of the water:

“I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” (Matthew 18:22) 

In other words, never stop forgiving. Never run out of grace towards others. Why? Because God has already forgiven us more than we could ever hope to repay. Consider how much selfishness and rebelliousness was nailed with Jesus to the cross. It would be ridiculous not to show the same sort of grace towards others.

Jesus illustrates this point with a parable about a servant who owes his master more money than he could ever repay. If he’d tried, even if he’d paid every penny he earned at the average daily wage, it would have taken him 200,000 years to pay it all back. Yeah, he owed a lot.

But here’s the crazy thing: when the servant begs for patience, his master not only relents, he actually forgives his debt in full. The servant didn’t have to pay back a penny. I bet you wish someone would do that with your mortgage, huh?

Later on, this servant runs into a man who owes him a whole lot less (about 1/600,000) of the debt he’s just had forgiven. But rather than show mercy to the man who owes him, he begins to demand repayment and even goes so far as to have the poor guy thrown in jail.

You can read the rest in Matthew 18:21-35, but let’s just say that when the master finds out, it doesn’t go so well for the unmerciful servant. And the point of Jesus’ parable is that it is both unfitting and spiritually dangerous for children of God to be unforgiving towards others. If we hold onto grudges and slights, then we have no right to ask for forgiveness from our Heavenly Father.

Now, forgiveness is not the same as ignoring abuse or submitting to more of it. If someone is being physically or emotionally abusive towards you, Jesus is not suggesting that you allow this person to continue hurting you. All it requires of us is to release this person from the debt we feel they owe us, just as we have already been released by God. And as has been said many times before, when we hold onto grudges or unforgiveness, we are actually hurting ourselves. It is like ingesting poison and hoping the other person will die.

Nor is forgiveness the same as reconciliation. Forgiveness requires one person to release another; reconciliation requires both people to want the same thing. While reconciliation can happen, and I pray that it does, all you can do is choose to release the person from the debt they owe you. It may be hard, but I can assure you, the debt you forgive is far less than the one your Heavenly Father has wiped away for you.

Father, thank you for the immense gift of grace you shower upon us day after day. As your children, we pray that you would help us reflect your heart. We invite you to search us and unearth any bitterness, anger, resentment or unforgiveness that has taken root in our hearts. And when it is exposed, we pray that you’d give us the courage and strength to lay our right to demand repayment. Help us to forgive as we have been forgiven. Amen

The Lord's Prayer - Part 3

Give Us Our Daily Bread

We have been journeying through the prayer that Jesus modeled when his disciples asked him how they should pray. As we’ve seen, he begins by reminded us who we are praying to: God is our Heavenly Father who loves us, but He also transcends our momentary circumstances, standing above them. And because He is God and we are not, it is His Kingdom purposes that we are looking to advance, His will that we pray will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

However, our own needs matter to our Heavenly Father, and as we come to the central verse of the Lord’s Prayer, and it could not be more personal:

“Give us today our daily bread” - Matthew 6:11

Intellectually, I’ve always known that this is a declaration of dependence upon our Heavenly Father.  But as someone who has grown up in an affluent family in America, praying for bread has never felt all that pertinent. I’ve often viewed "bread" as a metaphor for money rather than food. After all, whatever I’ve needed has been available, either in my fridge, my pantry or just down the street at any of a dozen stores. All I’ve needed was the money to buy what I wanted. It wasn’t until I saw lines wrapped around my local grocery store that the thought crossed my mind: will I be able to feed my family?

For many of us, this current crisis is the first time we’re experiencing a true sense of scarcity.  It may be the first time in our life when we truly feel dependent on God for what we’re going to eat. But for the Jewish community, dependence upon God was a central part of their national identity. After all, for forty years, God had placed them in a state of daily dependence on Him for their sustenance.

After God led the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt and brought them through the Red Sea, they found themselves in the wilderness, with Egypt behind them and the Promised Land somewhere ahead. But all they could see in that place was their hunger, and they began to grumble against God, and romanticize what life in slavery had been like.

But God had a plan.

“The LORD said to Moses, ‘I have heard the grumbling of the Israelites. Tell them at twilight you will eat meat, and in the morning you will be filled with bread. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God.” (Exodus 16:11-12)

And that’s just what happened. That evening, a flock of quail settled in the camp and provided meat, and in the morning a strange bread-like substance appeared on the ground. The people had no idea what it was, so they called it mana, which means “What is it?”

But God unexpectedly commanded the Israelites not to collect more than they needed for that particular day. No more quail than they and their family could eat for dinner, and no more mana than they needed to last them that day. In other words, no hoarding.  Why? Because God wasn’t just providing for their physical needs. He was teaching them to trust Him.

Each day, He wanted them to go to bed with full bellies but nothing left in their tent, so that in the morning, they would wake up with the knowledge that their survival was dependent upon His provision.

Of course, many of the Israelites struggled with this directive. They hoarded meat and mana, stashing it away in the back of their tent in case their heavenly Father didn’t come through the next day. But God wasn’t thwarted by their disobedience; any excess that they kept overnight was spoiled in the morning, because He alone was to be their provider.

The current toilet paper shortages are a reminder that we still haven’t learned to trust God. We may pay lip service to Him, but deep down we all feel a lot better when we have a nice big cushion of food and TP in our pantry just in case He doesn’t come through. But at what cost? Perhaps our heavenly Father is inviting us to literally trust Him for our daily bread. What if this season is about more than merely surviving – what if He wants to use this time of scarcity to show us that He truly is our provider.

Admittedly, both my wife and I have been concerned about the shortages we’ve experienced. Both of us have stood in those lines outside of our super market. But through this whole crisis, do you know who hasn’t worried about what they will eat? My kids. Because they know their parents will take care of them.

In the same way, Jesus’ prayer reminds us that our Father in Heaven is our provider, so we don’t need to worry. He’s got us, and He knows what we need even when we don’t. And that’s why just a few verses later in the very same sermon where Jesus teaches us how to pray, he reiterates our need to trust God:

“So I tell you again, don’t worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the unbelieving world runs after these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. Instead of worrying, seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will take care of itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 631-34)

Father, you know what we need before we ask. Yes, we need food, we need money, we need TP. But even more than those things, we need you. We pray that you will use this time to teach us to remain dependent upon you. And as you did for the Israelites in the wilderness, we pray that you will use this time of scarcity to grow our faith – to increase our trust in you. So Father, we ask that you would give us the bread we need for today and no more. Because you are our Provider and you are enough. Amen.

The Lord's Prayer - Part 2

Your Kingdom Come…

Yesterday, we began an exploration of the prayer Jesus taught his disciples. He told them:

"This, then, is how you should pray: 

"Our Father in heaven, 

   hallowed be your name.

Your kingdom come, 

   your will be done, 

   on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread.

And forgive us our debts,

   as we also have forgiven our debtors.

And lead us not into temptation,

   but deliver us from the evil one."

                             - Matthew 6:9-13

Our goal is not simply to memorize the words of this prayer, but rather to understand the heart behind it. As we saw yesterday, Jesus began his prayer by grounding it in two crucial aspects of God’s character: He is our Heavenly Father who loves us, but He is also the Holy Creator and Owner of this universe who stands above our momentary trials and is not overwhelmed by them.

After rooting his prayer in a recognition of who we’re talking to, Jesus continues with these words:

Your kingdom come, 

   your will be done, 

   on earth as it is in heaven.

Now, before we can ask ourselves what God’s kingdom is like, we should first define what a kingdom is. In his book The Divine Conspiracy, Dallas Willard explains that “a kingdom is anywhere that the sovereign’s will is done.” In other words, a kingdom is the sphere of influence where the sovereign ruler has his or her way. So if the king were to say, “Blue is my favorite color, so I want everyone to paint their houses blue,” then you’d have a pretty good idea where the boundaries of his kingdom are based off of where the blue houses stopped.

A kingdom is a place where the sovereign ruler’s will is carried out. 

So that means the Kingdom of God is wherever God’s will is done.

When you think about it that way, the statement, “Your kingdom come, your will be done” is a little redundant. If God’s kingdom truly breaks into our reality, then His will really will be done here just as it’s done in heaven.

But how does this happen? How does God’s will get done here on earth? Through the citizens of His kingdom. Of course, this raises another question: who is a citizen of God’s kingdom? According to our definition, a citizen of God’s kingdom would be anyone who willingly chooses to do God’s will.

The first and greatest example of this is Jesus himself. When crowds began to follow him and started talking about making him king of Israel, Jesus declared, “I have come down from heaven not to do my will, but to do the will of him who sent me.” (John 6:38) And He was the first person in history who faithfully did God’s will, even when it cost him. 

This is nowhere better illustrated than on the night before he was crucified for our sins. Keep in mind, he wasn’t looking forward to the cross. He wasn’t a masochist who liked pain. As he prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, he cried, “Father, if you are willing, take this cup [of suffering] from me.”  I suspect I would have done the same thing. But he didn’t stop with that plea. He continued, “yet not my will, but yours be done.” Even in the face of unbearable suffering, he was willing to carry out the will of His father.

Similarly, if we choose to submit to God’s rule in our life, if we choose to live in accordance to His heart as revealed in scripture, and submit to the still, small voice of His Holy Spirit, then we truly are citizens of His Kingdom here on earth.

The truth of this perspective is backed up a little later in the Sermon on the Mount when Jesus warns his listeners, “Not everyone who calls me Lord will enter the kingdom, but only those who do the will of my father in Heaven.” (Matthew 7:21) In other words, if you claim to trust God and follow Him, then you’ll actually submit your desires to His. You will be willing to model your life off of his and obey the nudging of God’s Spirit within you. Otherwise, it’s just lip-service. And there were plenty of people who paid lip-service to God without backing it up with their actions. That’s why both the Father and Jesus lamented about people who “honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.” (Isaiah 29:13; Matthew 15:8)

But how does this apply to prayer? Well, even in our prayers, as children of God and citizens of His kingdom living in this world, our greatest desire should be to see His will done and His kingdom advance. And if our desires conflict with what God wants, then it is His will that should take precedence in our hearts. 

Admittedly, our prayers are not often that lofty. More often than not, they have more to do with our own needs and desires. But there’s space in Jesus’ prayer even for that, as we will see tomorrow.

On Earth as it is in Heaven
Newport Back Bay