A Prayer for Salvation

so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, (Philippians 1:10 ESV)

There it is again: "the day of Christ."

We are only a few verses into Paul's letter, yet this is already the second time we have run across it. The first time was in verse 6 where we were promised that the work God had begun in us would be performed until the day of Christ. Now we see how God is working in us with a purpose, that purpose being that we might be "pure and blameless for the day of Christ." God is sanctifying us now, in part, to prepare us for the next world.

This is our salvation. There is coming a day when God will judge the world, and this judgment will be done in the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus himself said so in John 5:

For as the Father has life in himself, so he has granted the Son also to have life in himself. And he has given him authority to execute judgment, because he is the Son of Man. (John 5:26-27 ESV)

Paul affirms this in his sermon before the philosophers at the famous Areopagus in Athens:

The times of ignorance God overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed; and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead.” (Acts 17:30-31 ESV)

Knowing that this is so, Paul prays for the saints at Philippi that they will be found "pure and blameless" for that day of judgment.

Do you find it odd that he prays for their full and complete salvation when he has already said that he is "sure" of it in verse 6? It may seem odd to us, but it shouldn't. Salvation is a work of God's grace in us from beginning to end, that is certain, but that work is brought about through means--chiefly the gospel. We are not fully and finally saved the moment we believe the gospel. No, that's just a beginning. The gospel, and faith in Christ and the gospel, are what carry us through all the way to the finish. And though the work is sure because it rests upon God's faithfulness, nevertheless we pray for it to be done in us and others every day. This is what faith does--it goes to God in faith, claiming his promises, and asking him to do what he has promised to do. It is because he knows God is faithful that Paul can boldly go to God in prayer asking him to complete his work of grace in them.

In the same way we should pray for each other, that God's sanctifying work of grace will be done in us, that we will be found pure and blameless for the day of Christ. 

In the same way parents should pray for their children. We do not just pray for their souls until they make some sort of 'profession of faith' and then quit. We pray for them continuously, night and day, until God has completed that work in them. In so doing we imitate the apostle. Indeed, we imitate Jesus himself (see John 17).

So I believe you and I have some praying to do today--because that day is soon coming. For whom are you praying?

Hallowed Be Thy Name . . . Part 1

It is a rich, old Anglo-Saxon word, replete with color and feeling, much better, I think, than "sanctified." Not that it is any more accurate. "Sanctified" is exactly the word we would use in modern English to translate this Greek word. By the time, however, that this passage of Scripture was being translated into English by King James's chosen scholars the prayer was so firmly set in the minds and hearts of the common people that the decision was made to keep the word "hallowed" intact.

We still use the word nowadays, by the way. You may have once or twice found yourself standing on "hallowed ground" or roaming the "hallowed halls" of some institution or other. And we are all familiar with the pagan festival turned children's excuse to dress up in costume and gorge themselves with candy known as "Halloween" or "All Hallows Eve" or "All Saints Eve" (since it falls on the day before the Roman Catholic "All Saints Day"--November 1).

Hallowed be thy name . . .

What does it mean to hallow something? It means to sanctify it, of course. It means to set it aside or apart as something holy, something special, something above or beyond the mundane. It means to make it holy.

The name of a deity was very important in the ancient world. Recall that when Jacob wrestled all night with the angel of the Lord he asked the angel of the Lord to give him his name, but the angel refused to give it. Recall also that when Moses stood before the burning bush and received his commission from God that he wanted to know a name so that when he returned to Egypt he would have an answer for them when they asked him for the name of the God who had sent him. The name of  a deity was important because it told us something about him.

Note also that in the ten commandments, specifically in the first table of the law which encompasses the first four commandments (those which deal specifically with our actions and attitude toward God), that it is very important that we treat God's name with respect, reverence, and awe:

“You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain."

Without getting into a discussion of the full meaning of this commandment, let us simply note that God's name is very important to him. He wants it esteemed, respected, hallowed--the opposite of used or treated in an empty fashion.

So let's look at these first few words of the Lord's prayer . . . hallowed be thy name. It is a petition. In fact, it is the first petition of this, our model prayer. How should we pray? What should we request? What should be the first thing on our minds when we approach the throne of God?


Hallowed be thy name.

References to God doing things for his name's sake are all over the Old Testament. In fact, it is saturated with them. Here are a handful if you want to look them up. It is only a small sampling--Psalm 23:3, Psalm 25:11, Psalm 31:3,  Psalm 106:8, Isaiah 48:9, Psalm 79:9, 1 Samuel 12:22.

God's name is important to him. I think it is safe to say that God does everything that he does for the sake of his name. But what does that mean?

God's name is his fame. God's name is his reputation. God's name is how he is known to creation.

What is the ultimate charge to be leveled against sinful mankind? What is the ultimate sign of his guilt before a holy God? Is it not that we have sullied his name? As his offspring, what do our actions say about him? Would anyone look at us, at our lives, at our daily failings, and conclude that the God in whose image we were made is holy? The only honest answer is 'no.' And if our daily actions serve to sully his holy name, what right have we to approach Him whom we have habitually offended? None.

Yet he invites us approach him. That, in itself, is grace immeasurable. (How it is possible for God to do this and yet remain holy and just would be the subject of many posts. But to summarize it, it is only because of Calvary.) But make no mistake. When we approach God we are immediately confronted with this, the sum of our crime against him.

Hallowed be thy name.

In approaching him I immediately turn my thoughts away from me and my needs and my wants and turn them toward Him and what he wants. My thoughts and wants and needs are usually trivial in comparison to this . . . hallowed be thy name.

And in this petition we have also a principal that serves to explain why God does what he does in general and why it is he is doing what he is doing specifically in our lives at any given moment . . . that his name might be hallowed.

When we remember that, we change our petition. We may even drop our complaint, you know, the one that brought us before him in the first place.

This is only the first part. In my next in this series we will look at how to apply this petition specifically to our everyday lives. How shall we pray this prayer . . .

It's the Same Prayer

I was at a men's Bible study tonight at our church, a study hosted by our Sunday School teacher. We were at the end and about to close with prayer and each one of us was mentioning specific things that we wanted the group to pray about. I mentioned someone I know who is a troubled individual and who needs prayer to be turned and brought back to God. "Are they a Christian?" was asked. "Well, this person made a profession of faith way back when, in childhood, but if you were to ask him now, he would say he doesn't believe in God." Then someone said, "Well, if they really were saved and had the Holy Spirit they wouldn't say that." To which I responded, "I think it is possible that he doesn't really believe what he said, but that he was simply being rebellious when he said it. But either way, it's the same prayer."

Is it not? Think about it.

When an individual apostatizes (leaves the faith) one of two things has happened. Either this is temporary and God by his grace will bring him back. Or this is genuine and his previous profession was a sham. Consider:

1 John 2:19 They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.  

Philippians 1:6 (NKJV) being confident of this very thing, that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ;

Just because we are born of him does not guarantee that we will never wander, fail, or fall. But it does guarantee that we will not fall finally if we genuinely belong to him.

So how are we to pray for those who have once made a profession and have now fallen away from it? How are we to know whether or not their profession was genuine? Well, we can't know, not until the end. However, when an individual disavows his profession he should be taken at his word and treated as an unbeliever. How, then, are we to treat unbelievers? We treat them with love, compassion, and truthfulness. How do we pray for them? We pray that God will bring them to repentance and faith, for that is the greatest need that they have.

That is also our need.

We tend to think of salvation in terms of conversion. "I was saved on such and such a day and it happened like this . . ." we would say. If someone were to ask us what one must do to be saved we would tell them one must repent and believe. But repentance and faith are not tools used in conversion and then laid aside. Repentance and faith are daily attributes of the Christian's life. As Christians we are always repenting and believing. Repentance is the state in which we live and belief is the state in which we live. So when we see an individual away from God, away from a state of repentance and faith, we pray that God will bring them to this state whether they have ever made a profession or not.

So the prayer for the wayward Christian is the same as the prayer for the unbeliever, because in practice at least, they are both unbelievers in need of repentance.

It's the same prayer: "Father, take this individual and bring him to the place in his life where he repents of his sin and turns to Christ in faith determined to follow Christ every day till the end of his days."

That prayer is pleasing to God and will work for anyone, regardless of what we think we may know about his spiritual condition. In fact, you could feel free to pray that prayer for me anytime you wanted. As the hymn-writer once penned:

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love.
Take my heart, Lord, take and seal it
Seal it for thy courts above.

Philippians 1:19 for I know that through your prayers and the help of the Spirit of Jesus Christ this will turn out for my deliverance,

Who knows who shall be delivered through your prayers? Or mine?

"Our Father in Heaven"

Pray then like this:  "Our Father in heaven . . ."

I imagine the conversation going something like this:

"What should I call you?"
"Call me dad."

This invitation to familiarity with the Almighty is something we take for granted today, but it was not so common in the days of Christ. If anything, our tendency with God is to be too familiar and not sufficiently reverent. But for the people in those days the opposite was true. They feared God to the point of being afraid to approach him. And no wonder. Everything in the Mosaic system of worship given them by God was designed to let them know that God was holy and they were not, that they were unworthy of him, that they should fear him greatly, that if they approached him the wrong way they would die.

And all of that was true. In fact, it is still true today. But it is not all that is true about us and God. Jesus invites us to pray to God and to do so in this way: "Our Father in heaven . . . "

God is like an earthly, human father, but as a father he transcends mere human fatherhood. He is a heavenly father. He embodies (if I may misuse that term) the very ideal of perfect fatherhood. As Paul implies in his first letter to the Corinthians, this idea of God as Father signifies that we are both from him and exist for him (1 Cor. 8:6).

We belong to him. He is responsible for us. He loves us.

Rather than go about trying to think up every benefit that this relationship to him might entail, let me give you the immediate application that Jesus gives to his disciples over in Luke 11:11-13.

"What father among you, if his son asks for a fish, will instead of a fish give him a serpent; or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

We do not always know our needs, do we? Like children, we know what we want, but not necessarily what we need. Our Father knows. Our Father always gives us what we need. We need not fear to go to God and ask--because we are children and he is our Father. He is committed to caring for us. If evil, human fathers are decent enough to give to their children the good things they need, how much more the gracious heavenly Father who loves us with incomparable love? Right?

But did you pay attention to that last line?

". . . how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!"

What does that mean, anyway? I have often wondered myself. But upon reading this scripture this evening I was reminded of the passage on prayer in Romans 8 and the meaning became clear. Tell me if it does the same for you. First there is this:

Romans 8:14,15: For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” 

Those who may go to God as Father are his children by covenant and by promise. They have been given the Spirit as an earnest of their inheritance among the saints (Eph.1). It is by God's Spirit that we are enabled to cry to God as little children "Abba, Father!" The word chosen here by Paul is a sweet Aramaic word that every Jew would recognize as that used by little children for their father. The English equivalent would be "dad", "daddy", "papa" or something similar. We have been brought--by the Spirit--into tender familial relationship with God. Goes right along with the beginning of our model prayer, does it not? But there is more. Further down he says:

Romans 8:26,27: Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. 

So we don't know what, specifically, we should ask for in prayer. That's okay. Our Father, who is dedicated to supplying our needs, has given us the Spirit. The Spirit intercedes for us according to the will of God. That same Spirit which teaches us to cry "Daddy, Father" also makes intercession for us! He turns our misguided prayers into good prayers. We ask for toys and comfort. He gives us shelter, and food, and discipline. We ask for ease and help. He gives us strength and encouragement. We want comfort from affliction. He gives us comfort in affliction. He gives us what we need.

". . . how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!"

If you belong to Christ you have the Holy Spirit. So go to the Father and pray. Ask. Ask and it shall be given you. What shall be given you? Your perfect idea of an answer to prayer? Now why would you want that? No, God will give you something better. He will give you his perfect idea of the best answer to that prayer. Why would your Father give you anything less?

Thoughts on Prayer II - God already knows.

Luke 6:7,8 “And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

Empty phrases. Meaningless words. Saying the same thing over and over without even really knowing what you are saying. Sounds like what a lot of people do with the Lord's prayer, doesn't it? Think on the irony of that for a moment.

But what is the difference between doing that--repeating the words by rote over and over--and approaching God with one's own flowery formula equally unthought-out, making it up on the fly, without any real clue as to what one should say to God?

The heathen believed that their gods were busy doing their own things and that if one were to get their attention it would have to be done through a virtual flood of words and perhaps some sacrificial bribery. Long incantations would be repeated over and over in the hopes that the god would hear. Likewise, Jewish prayers of the time were full of flowery phrases stated one way, then another way, then a third way, so on and so forth, changed only by a re-ordering of the words in an attempt to either impress God or (more likely) those around them. But we are told not to pray that way.

Why not?

for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

Sometimes the things that can most radically change the way we think (or in this case pray) are the things that are right there in front of us. We just don't see them.

Of course God knows what we need before we ask him. And as a Father to us he is dedicated to supplying those needs. He knows what we need better than we do and he knows it before we do. Don't miss this last part either. He already plans to give it to us.

Philippians 4:19 And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus.

So there is no need to try to convince or cajole him. It is not our job to persuade God to do something. He knows the need we have for it is he who has given us that need. Likewise it is not necessary to inform him of a situation or predicament. He gave us that situation or predicament.

So then why do we pray? We pray because we need God. Prayer is an act of faith in God and an acknowledgement of God's sovereign care for us. We approach God with the knowledge of his knowledge and wisdom, with a faith in his sovereign goodness toward us (Romans 8:28). Then we humbly ask him to magnify his great name and be true to himself by keeping his promises and being our Father. Prayer is about getting our hearts in line with what God is doing in our lives and honoring him with our faith in him.

"Father, I need you. Thank-you for reminding me of that. You know my need already. I ask that you will supply it according to your riches in glory in Christ Jesus. And do it for your name's sake and your faithfulness. Amen."

That is a biblical, God-honoring, God-pleasing prayer.

All of this does not mean that we do not need to be specific in our prayers. Of course we should be specific. But in the end we do not always know exactly what we need, do we? But God knows. So in the end we always say, "Nevertheless not my will, but thy will be done."

Again, prayer is not about convincing God that he should give us what we want. It is not about informing God of a situation in which he might want to intervene when he would not otherwise have done so. No, prayer is about acknowledging God's greatness in our lives as a Father and our utter dependence upon him for everything.

Thoughts on Prayer I - The Right Motivation

I filled in for our Sunday School teacher again the other day and I thought I would make more than one blog post out of the lesson this time. The topic is a very important and also a very practical one--prayer.

I chose the topic as a challenge to me both because I do not pray often enough and also because I have lots of thoughts on prayer which would be beneficial to others if I were to actually coalesce them and present them in an orderly and challenging fashion. This I attempted to do last Sunday and this I will attempt to do here.

I am the worst example when it comes to faith because, while I easily presume upon God's goodness, I am often way too confident in self to actually depend upon God, or recognize the fact that I do. I suffer from a self-deluding conceit. I know as a concept that I depend upon God for everything (as does the entirety of the universe) but in practice I am far too often deluded by self-sufficiency. To a degree all of us are this way (though hopefully you are not as bad as me). This is why God often brings problems into our lives which are beyond our ability to solve. These problems remind us of our need for him.

Back to prayer. If we are going to learn to pray or how or what to pray, the first place we should go is to Christ. This is what the disciples of Jesus did as recorded by St. Luke in Luke's gospel chapter 11:

Luke 11:1 Now Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he finished, one of his disciples said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.”

John had taught his disciples to pray in a unique way as his disciples. Jesus's disciples want to know if Jesus has something similar for them--something unique as his disciples.

This is where our ears should perk up. What Jesus is about to teach is not just for them, but also for us, for we are his disciples as well. How should we pray? What should we pray? How often should we pray? How long should our prayers be? All these questions and more will be answered in this passage and in its cousin passage in Matthew 6. Let's look there now.

Matthew 6:5,6 “And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.

First a few quick lessons.

(1) Prayer is not for our own glory. It is not a religious exercise designed to make us look good before others. This type of prayer is not prayer at all, it is pretense. The key phrase is, "to be seen of others." Here Jesus condemns the motivation, not so much the action. Motive is everything.
(2) Private prayer is more important than public prayer. There is a place for public prayer, but as Christians we also need a place for regular private communion with God.
(3) There is a real, heart-felt, genuine faith that motivates us to pray and commune with God. This faith, which comes from God, is the faith that will be rewarded by God.

In the Sermon on the Mount, which is quoted above from Matthew's gospel, Jesus is addressing an audience of self-righteous people. This is why he emphasizes true religious exercise over pretense. He is both teaching about prayer and also condemning their self-righteousness. But over in Luke 11 we have a private scene between Jesus and his disciples and in that passage nothing about the pretense is mentioned, presumably because the sincerity of the disciples was evident in their question.

"Lord, teach us to pray."

Personalize that. I challenge you. Make it your prayer, right now. "Lord, teach me to pray." Both the desire to pray and the knowledge of how to pray correctly come from God.