Hello, and welcome to another blessing Sunday. Traveling with me on this path are Abbie Johnson Taylor and Lynda Lambert who shared the idea with me.
Matt 6:9: This, then, is how you should pray: “’Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, (NIV)
Last week I discussed the first part of this verse, and today I’ll be talking about the second part–“Hallowed be your name. The definition of hallowed is holy, sacred, revered, respected, honored. The above-pictured church is humanity’s attempt to honor God’s name, and there are so many magnificent churches throughout the world.
Somehow, though, I have this niggling feeling that wasn’t what Jesus had in mind. I’m not saying He rejects these beautiful churches–far from it–but I don’t believe it was a priority of His.
John 13:34-35 NIV says:
34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
Paul, in 1 Corinthians 6:19 says:
“Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own;”
The point being is each and every person who calls Jesus their Lord and savior is His church because He lives in us. Our daily lives are our feeble attempt to honor Him. I think God feels His name is more honored by those who obey His commandments than by all the statuary and stained glass contained in the world. For my part I feel my life is pretty mundaine. But it’s precisely there where I can hallow His name. I don’t know who to attribute it to, but there’s a saying that each of us might be the only Jesus someone ever sees. I, for my part, try to take that seriously. Do I measure up? Of course not! That doesn’t mean I shouldn’t try. I am convinced that there are so many acts performed by people who’ve touched other people’s lives profoundly but who are totally unaware of their impact. I think heaven will have lots of surprises like that for us.
Father, help me honor your name every day this week by how I reflect Your light and love. Amen.
Hello, and welcome to another blessing Sunday. Traveling with me on this path are Lynda Lambert who shared the idea with me and Abbie Johnson Taylor
We say it every Sunday in church. We say it at weddings and funerals. It’s a prayer many have learned from earliest childhood. It spills forth from our lips with almost no thought required. Yet its importance can’t be overstated, for it’s the only time Jesus taught His disciples–which includes us–to pray. It’s what many call “the Lord’s prayer”, though I would say that designation is more suited to the prayer in John 17. But what do I know?
For the next however many Sundays it takes, I’m going to write my thoughts on this prayer. So much has been written regarding it already that I really wonder if I have anything to contribute on the subject that hasn’t been said previously. Then again, sometimes it only takes someone saying something in a different way to catch someone’s attention. So here we go–let’s rock and roll!
Matthew 6 9-13 contains the text.
9 “This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, 10 your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 11 Give us today our daily bread. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And lead us not into temptation,[a] but deliver us from the evil one.[b]’
Footnotes a. Matthew 6:13 The Greek for temptation can also mean testing. b. Matthew 6:13 Or from evil; some late manuscripts one, / for yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.
I’m going to focus attention today on just four words: “Our father in heaven.”
My first thought when I look at this passage is that this thing called Christianity is supposed to be communal. More than just a community, we’re a family, headed by a heavenly Father who loves each and every one of us so much that He sent His only Son to die on a cross so that we could be forgiven and live with Him eternally. Instead of the 613 commandments of the Torah, Christians are given but one:
John 13:34-35
34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.
35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”
Sometimes I wonder what would happen if every Christian took that seriously. I think there’d be a lot less misery on this earth–less hunger, less murder, less adultery, less war, and greater love, joy, and peace.
We are members of a great family–our ancestors in the faith who’ve gone before us, our brothers and sisters who share this world with us, and future generations who will walk this earth when we are long since gone. What we have in common is that we’re all loved dearly by our heavenly father.
The word father, as I mentioned in my post on Father’s Day, can be frought. But God our Father is everything a father should be and nothing he should not.
John 1:12 NRSV tells us:
“But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God,”
Lord please help me to take seriously every day the call you’ve put on my life. Help me to love those you’ve put on my path even half as much as You do, enable me to do your will. In Jesus’s name. Amen.
Hello, and welcome to another blessing Sunday. Traveling with me on this path are Abbie Johnson Taylor. and Lynda Lambert who shared the idea with me.
This week I’m about to celebrate another birthday. I will not be lighting candles for fear of a repeat of the picture above. In 2004, however, I was facing life-threatening complications of chemotherapy, and there was some question as to whether I’d live to celebrate my next birthday. I’m still amazed sometimes as to how I ever got this old. I guess it’s just a function of putting one foot in front of the other.
I’m grateful for the 2nd chance I was given. I hope the dear Lord feels I made it worth His while to give me that, and that it wasn’t wasted. I was able to see my beautiful daughter get married, and I’ve got 2 of the greatest grandkids this side of Jordan. I’m grateful to God that he helped me do what I said I’d do when I got my cancer diagnosis, i.e., open up a can of whoop-ass and send it runnin. Husband Karl and Amanda were heroes, and Dr. Wendt was a staunch ally. I will always be thankful for them, as well as for countless other relatives and friends who prayed and sent good wishes during that time. My brother & sister were right up there.
You don’t get through something like that alone. God provided me a whole host of folks on earth to help, and I believe some others in the heavenly realms as well. I’m excited about my birthday present, but even if I got nothing in the way of a physical gift, I have everything I need. The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want.
Thank you Lord, thank you family, thank you friends, thank you my medical team, & even thanks to strangers who prayed for me because they heard about my situation from other praying folks. May God bless you richly. & Lord, let me proclaim Your goodness for as long as you give me breath.
2 Kings 20
20 In those days Hezekiah was sick and near death. And Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, went to him and said to him, “Thus says the Lord: ‘Set your house in order, for you shall die, and not live.’ ” 2 Then he turned his face toward the wall, and prayed to the Lord, saying,
3 “Remember now, O Lord, I pray, how I have walked before You in truth and with a loyal heart, and have done what was good in Your sight.” And Hezekiah wept bitterly. 4 And it happened, before Isaiah had gone out into the middle court, that the word of the Lord came to him, saying,
5 “Return and tell Hezekiah the leader of My people, ‘Thus says the Lord, the God of David your father: “I have heard your prayer, I have seen your tears; surely I will heal you. On the third day you shall go up to the house of the Lord.
6 And I will add to your days fifteen years. I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will defend this city for My own sake, and for the sake of My servant David.” ’ ”
So what in blazes is a Semiquincentennial? It stands for 250. Semi means half, quin is 5, and centennial is 100–thus, half of 500.
Today we observe the 250th anniversary of the declaration of Independence. 56 men put their signatures and their lives on the line by signing the Declaration of Independence in 1776. An 8-year war raged, beginning in 1775 and ending in 1783, w/the United States of America being a separate, independent nation at its conclusion.
Throughout the years, America has weathered exhilarating highs and abyssmal depths, but she’s always come through, stronger and better than before. My prayer is this will continue to be the case.
On Nov. 10, 1938, Kate Smith first introduced what would become her signature song, “God Bless America.” She still does it better than anyone else, IMO. Here’s a link. The sound quality is that of an old time radio broadcast, but Kate nonetheless comes shining through.
In mid April, we were the victims of a scam. Because an investigation is ongoing, I cannot share additional details. I reported it to Bank of America, and, when they denied my chargeback, I filed a complaint w/the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB, as well as the AZ Attorney General, and the FBI. I had lots of evidence against the merchant in question.
Following my complaint to the CFPB, I was contacted by a gentleman from Bank of American named Dustin. I’ve been working closely w/him for awhile now. He told me that my chargeback had been denied by the merchant’s credit card holder, but that he wasn’t letting it go. He told me he was prepared to take this one as far as he needed to in order to help us not lose our money. He said he was with us every step of the way.
Sometimes it helps to have friends in high places. In this case, we have 2–one named Dustin and the other named God. I don’t know what will happen in terms of getting our money back. I do know that these 2 friends are with us, and it’s a great comfort. I thank God every day for Dustin and for the comfort of the Holy Spirit.
2 Cor 1:3-5 NIV
3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort,
4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.
5 For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ.
Update: After I finished writing this post, I checked my email to find, much to my surprise, a notification from Bank of America. Obviously I was not expecting that late on a Saturday night. The notification stated that the money will not be deducted from our account, and that this was a permanent decision. There are bad people in this world who want to take things that aren’t theirs. Thanks be to the dear Lord, there are also folks like Dustin who fight hard so that doesn’t happen. The world is a better place because of him and all those like him.
The problem, of course, is that God is viewed by Christians as a Father, and He gets all the garbage we project on Him because of our relationship with our own.
I remember once watching an episode of MASH (1 of my all-time favorite TV shows). Drs. Winchester and Pierce were talking. Winchester said to Pierce something similar to: “the difference between us is that I had a father. You had a dad.” Dr. Winchester’s tone expressed pain at how little his father had interacted with him. He was distant. He expressed love only when Dr. Winchester had done something exceptional, and even then only begrudgingly.
I think a lot of us view God that way. Actually, I think many of us look on Him as someone who delights in punishing us, who’ll send us to hell for the smallest of indisgressions,, maybe even like a predator torturing its prey before the final merciful kill.
The Bible says something different. It refers to God as “Abba”, which, in English, might be better translated as Papa, Dad, or Daddy, as opposed to Father, which is how it’s normally rendered.
The image God wants us to see, I think, is that portrayed in Luke 15:11-32, the parable of the lost son. Indeed, He loved each and every one of us so much that He sent His son to die on a cross so we could be with Him.
The late Dr. Larry Crabb wrote a book in 2006 called “The Papa Prayer.” I recommend it highly. In fact, I think I’ll read it again after I’m done with this, because no matter how many times you read it, there’s still something to be learned when you re-read it. The point is that God is our father–no, our Papa or daddy. He loves us so very much, and His greatest longing is that we come to him with everything–our hopes, dreams, joys, sorrows, and fears. No matter what your relationship to your father was, your relationship to God can be deeper and more fulfilling.
God is our very life. In Him we live and move and have our being. (Acts 17:28). He wants the very best for us, and, like the old TV show called “Father Knows Best” says, He actually knows what that is. It may not pertain to our earthly comfort, but it will lead to our union with Him if we’ll allow it.
I wish for you a happy Father’s Day. Even more, I wish for you the relationship God wishes to have with you. May He bless you richly.
The Parable of the Lost Son 11 Jesus continued: “There was a man who had two sons. 12 The younger one said to his father, ‘Father, give me my share of the estate.’ So he divided his property between them. 13 “Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. 14 After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. 15 So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. 16 He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything. 17 “When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! 18 I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired servants.’ 20 So he got up and went to his father. “But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him. 21 “The son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ 22 “But the father said to his servants, ‘Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. 23 Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. 24 For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’ So they began to celebrate. 25 “Meanwhile, the older son was in the field. When he came near the house, he heard music and dancing. 26 So he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. 27 ‘Your brother has come,’ he replied, ‘and your father has killed the fattened calf because he has him back safe and sound.’ 28 “The older brother became angry and refused to go in. So his father went out and pleaded with him. 29 But he answered his father, ‘Look! All these years I’ve been slaving for you and never disobeyed your orders. Yet you never gave me even a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours who has squandered your property with prostitutes comes home, you kill the fattened calf for him!’ 31 “‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. 32 But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.’”
Anyone who uses a computer knows the feeling. You’ve been working on a document & you suddenly realize that all or part of it is gone. Absolutely nowhere to be seen. You reopen the original, hoping the missing part will be there, but you saved the damaged document already, so it’s history. Your heart sinks to your toes. The last meal you ate is now headed in the wrong direction. You wanna cry. Maybe you do cry.
That happened to me this last Thursday. Rarely do cybersecurity professionals take their own advice, but I had emailed this particular manuscript to my writer’s group before its dissolution. I had a backup! Yay!
It felt a little like finding a $20 bill in my drawer or something. Truthfully, it felt like a smile of salvation. I’ll be much more cognisant of my backups from now on–until I’m not. I’m surely grateful to the Dear Lord for the help.
Scripture says “For nothing will be impossible with God.” Luke 1:37 ESV
He probably will not produce a backup you didn’t make yourself, so make sure you back up often. But if you’ve got 1 lying around somewhere, He’ll bring it to your mind like He did w/me. Do what you need to do, and He’ll take care of the rest.
The picture at the top of the post is of my nearly 10-year-old neutered male kitty we call Sunny. It fits his personality to a tee. He might be blind, but he always seems curious about someone new. And he’s such a shepherd when one of us gets sick!
He asked me to pick him up the other day. He does that by standing on his hind legs and putting his forepaws on my knees. He’s not a real touchy-feely kitty, but occasionally he likes it, and this was 1 of those occasions.
As I was holding him, I got to thinking about how different our worldviews were. He comes up to my ankles, so mostly what he sees, if anything, is down low. He uses whiskers for navigation. I know he can conceptualize things like his food and treats, but how he does that without language is beyond me. But as he lays in my lap purring his rumbling symphony and kneading my knee with his claws, and I massage his back, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt our feelings run very deep for one another.
How can it be, I wonder, that two beings with such widely divergent world views can love one another so much, and yet many humans despite far more similar ways of looking at the world can view things so differently–and worse, with so much vitriole toward those who disagree.
As we embark on this season of Lent, I think again of some of Jesus’s unanswered prayers. If I would ask most Christians about that, they’d immediately think of His prayer in the garden of Gethsemane. But there is another, found in John 17:20-21.
20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”
The sad truth is we as Christians are hardly one. I question whether most people who don’t share our faith can look at us and say something special’s going on. Yet we have so much more in common than we have differences. We love Jesus. We believe in Baptism, though the form differs. We believe in Jesus’s crucifixion, and most of us believe in His resurrection. And we believe one day we’ll go to Heaven–and yes–meet those with whom we disagree.
This Lenten season one of my prayers will be that we as Christians will find some of that unity and love despite such different world views, just like Sunny Kitty and me. I’m asking for God’s help with that. Maybe all of us can do so as well. We sure could use a lot more love around here.
Andrew Kearney was an elementary school teacher at Danes Hill School, in the small village of Oxshott. Assuredly he’d seen his share of spitballs and endured plenty of disrespect, not all of which was from students, more likely than not. Maybe he even wondered some days–perhaps many days–whether his efforts were worth the trouble. Might he even have wondered at times if his life really meant anything? Those are questions we all ask, I think. Sometimes it all just feels so small, so inconsequential.
But here’s what Jesus had to say:
GNT Luke 16:10 “Whoever is faithful in small matters will be faithful in large ones; whoever is dishonest in small matters will be dishonest in large ones.”
But 1 day a small girl, his student, took his teaching seriously. Tilly Smith was on a Thailand beach on Dec. 26, 2004, when she noticed something strange about the ocean. It had lost its rhythm. It jarred her back to a lesson she’d learned just a couple weeks before in Mr. Kearney’s class. He’d showed a video about the 1946 tsunami in Hawaii and talked about the warning signs, specifically irratic ocean behavior. She warned her parents. A Japanese man recognized the word “tsunami” and told them he thought the girl was right–that there had, in fact, been a 9.1 magnitude earthquake off the coast of Sumatra. The beach was cleared. Over 100 lives were saved that day. All because a teacher persisted in his efforts and taught the signs. All because a small girl had actually paid attention to a small town teacher in a small town’s school and persisted in warning her parents and others nearby. Small day-to-day acts that normally go unnoticed. But on that day, they didn’t. Perhaps saving 100 people seems pretty small in the face of 230000 souls disappearing from the planet as the result of events that occurred on a single day. But I suspect to those 100, as well as a small town teacher, it didn’t seem small in the least.
All we can do in our lives is plant seeds–seeds of love, and light, and joy, and peace, and other good things. And then hope to reap at least a little of the harvest we’ve sown. And who knows? Maybe in Heaven we’ll see the results–the answer to a prayer we whispered when we heard an ambulance siren; the prayers we offered earnestly for a family member in trouble, the value of our charity although it was small.
Matthew 31 He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. 32 Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.”
By Sanjay Acharya – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=905237
And here’s what comes out of that seed.
By Hopeoflight – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=23670673
Meanwhile, I guess, even when it’s hard, persisting in the small things has important consequences. Thank you, Andrew Kearney and Tilly Smith for doing so.
Many blessings for your Sunday and throughout the week.
Jesus ascended into Heaven. But His body remains here–in the form of the church. Not necessarily *a* church, but *the* church, the body of believers the world over, and each has a vital part to play.
People were never meant to live alone. God said that in the beginning: “It is not good for the man to be alone” Gen 2:18. With individualism deep-rooted as it is in the American spirit, living in community can be a difficult concept to grasp, especially in large cities where you may not know your neighbor in the next apartment much less in the next block. So sometimes God has to show us the advantages of needing help.
This past Wednesday I got sick with a stomach virus. I had to ask Hubby to do the chores I normally do, i.e., feed the cats and take out the garbage because I was having to stay too close to the bathroom to do it myself. I didn’t exactly like having to ask for help, but I was glad to have someone to rely on when I needed to.
We can always ask God for help, of course. But far more often than not, the Red Sea doesn’t part, and the sun remains in motion. Instead, he puts people in our path who serve as His hands, feet, and mouth for carrying on His work.
Many think that because they’re old, or disabled, or poor, or 101 other excuses, they can’t do anything. Others, like Lynda Lambert, take a different view. She often looks out the window and prays for those she sees walking down the street, or when she hears the sound of emergency vehicles. Does it really do any good? I’ll bet she’ll have a harvest waiting for her in heaven she never expected! We may never see the results of all that we do. But God knows. And may He bless those abundantly who respond willingly and eagerly when help is needed. Needing help, whether or not we ask for it, is a humbling experience. And which of us couldn’t use that occasionally?
May God bless you this week, and give you help whenever the need arises.
