Matthew chapter 6 verses 9 through 15 is our passage this morning. Matthew chapter 6, we'll start in verse 9, read through verse 15. Pray then in this way, our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your heavenly father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, then your father will not forgive your transgressions. In verses one through four, Jesus spent time exploring the principles and motivations behind our tithing. It becomes the natural disposition of a Christian to want to give to the Lord's work, to want to tithe to God's church. We learned this early on in Genesis chapter 28, When Jacob had left his home, he laid down to go to sleep in Luz, which soon became Bethel. God revealed himself to him in Jacob's ladder. And after God had done speaking to him and telling him that all the nations were going to be blessed and the people of his nation would be larger than the dust of the earth, he said this in verse 28, he said, And this stone, which I have set for a pillar, shall be God's house. And of all that thou shalt give me, I will surely give the tenth unto thee." He was not catechized in this. It was a natural disposition of Jacob to give 10% of all that he earned to God as soon as God had saved him. He is now going to give us And then after that, in verses 5 through 8, he gave us the principles and motivations in prayer. Don't be like the hypocrites. Be this way when you go into your closet. So on and so forth. And I don't want to review this. We just dealt with it last week, and I want to spend all of our time in the Lord's Prayer. And now he's going to give us the mechanics of prayer. He's going to teach us how to pray, what to say, what's important. These are all, you can look at all these verses as headings, and then we can fill in the blanks after each heading. We must understand also that this is not as is commonly known as the Lord's Prayer. For the Lord could never pray this prayer because he is the sinless son of God. And he could not ask God to forgive him of his trespasses in any way. And so this is a model for how we are to pray. Jesus is specifically teaching us how to pray in this very precise and concise model of prayer. we can look at it in a series of six headings. The first three concern the honor of God, the kingdom of God, and the will of God. And the final three deal with our personal legitimate needs. And so we'll go through these things in the time that we have. So when we enter into our prayer closet, We always want to make sure that we enter in with humility and honesty before our sovereign God, our all-knowing God, and our holy God. It does us no good to go into our prayer closet trying to deceive ourselves and deceive God. So the first thing we need to do is be as open and honest to God as we possibly can. And that requires that we pray with passion. It requires that we pray with feeling and honesty, and again, with humility. And it takes away the temptation, I believe, to get through our prayers mechanically, because it's so easy to pray the Lord's Prayer ad nauseum. Jesus uses the words vain babblings in verses 5 through 8. We don't want to just say it out loud and just think we're getting through the prayer. This is a model for our prayers. It is not a prayer in and of itself, and though it can be, sometimes all you can do is say the Lord's Prayer. But we must never say it without true feeling and meaning behind it. We don't want to ever go into our prayer closet without feeling. We don't ever want to go into our prayer closet mechanically, because it's our duty, because it's time to do that. We have to fight against these issues all the time, because we're human beings, and we're busy, and we're self-centered, and we're sinful. And so these are the things we have to think about when we enter into our prayer closets. A true Christian is a man who first feeds off the Word of God. That is first, it is primary, and without that we will fail in all other aspects of our walk with God. Secondly, a true Christian is a man who is consistently and honestly engaging in intimate communion with God. Reading and prayer is the sign of a healthy Christian. Believers have this natural desire for God to speak to us daily through his written word. And we also have this natural yearning to commune with God because we have been born again. We have been adopted into his family. He is our father and we are his sons. So consider the fact that there are billions of people in our world today that have no access to God. They don't read their Bibles. The Bible's a closed book to them because they're dead in trespasses and sins. They're lost. They live in darkness. They have no desire to commune with God or to seek God or to please God in any way. And so they don't read their Bible. And I'm sure that almost everybody on the planet has access to a Bible, and therefore they don't pray. They don't yearn to commune with their creator, because they do not know him. But for the believer, to read the Bible and to commune with our God is as natural as breathing for us. That's how we need to think about our lives. Our lives are bound up in communion with God, whether it's reading or speaking. Our lives are bound up in wanting to glorify him in all that we do. Okay, verse nine. After this manner, therefore, pray ye our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. The Old Testament reveals that God revealed himself 14 different times in the Old Testament as the Father. But he never revealed himself as the Father in the context of prayer. He used it as a name of one of his many names. He revealed himself as the I Am, the Being, the Self-existent One, Jehovah, the Most High God, and many, many more names. All of these are found in the Old Testament to reveal the Old Testament Jehovah God. But for the first time in human history, on that day, the day that Jesus stood on that hilltop looking down over the Sea of Galilee and preaching to those thousands of people, Jesus authorized, he authorized to you and to me, believers, that we can call our God, our Savior, Father. And that's an amazing thing. And he does this because of the spirit of adoption. We have a right, by grace, through the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ, to approach God, the God of the Old Testament, as Father. Galatians 4, verses 4 through 6, a very, very important verse. But when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth his Son. made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying Abba. father, daddy, father. We have this instinct now. We have this new relationship that nobody else has ever had in the history of the world. And it started at the advent of the Lord Jesus Christ earthly ministry. It's an amazing thing. This is the first time. where God commanded men to call him Father. Romans chapter 8 and verses 15 and 16 is also a very important verse. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear, but ye have received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. The writer to the Hebrews explains our sonship this way, for both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all of one. Sanctified people, believers. for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren. Jesus Christ looks upon you and me as sanctified by his precious blood, by the work of the spirit, and he's not ashamed to call us brethren. That's an amazing thing. And therefore, he is not going away from the fact that we too can address God in the same manner in which he addresses God in all of his prayers, Father. Father. Father. It's an amazing thing. Then we are brought to our senses, though. Once we've figured out that we can call God Father, he gets us to the next part of the verse. Father, obviously we just dealt with that, which art in heaven, now we have him high and lifted up. Hallowed be thy name. Thy name. On the one hand, he is our father. and we are his children. That's been established by the Lord Jesus Christ in just that first word, Father. On the other hand, he is self-existent. He is self-sufficient. He is eternal. He is holy. He is infinite. He is omnipresent. He is omniscient. He's immutable. never changes, knows everything, he's sovereign, he's righteous, he's the God of heaven and earth, the mighty God, the king of kings. So we have this intimate ability to see him as our daddy, and then we see the immensity of his glory and all the names that he has been revealed to and all of his attributes. Father, may your name be glorified. May your name be hallowed. May your name be known throughout and over the whole earth. And may it all be glorified. Because this is the primary purpose of the life of every human being. Whether you're a Christian or not, what's the first question in our catechism and in the confessions of faith? What is the chief end of man? The chief end of man is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. Everything we do is for the glory of God. Verse 10, thy kingdom come, this next petition, thy kingdom come, thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven. We are acknowledging God's sovereign rule over all creation when we petition this, when we ask God that this may be true. But more so, we're asking God to make sure that this is true in our lives. Not just over the world, but that he is His will will be done in our personal lives, that he will reign supreme in our lives. Let your kingdom reign supreme in all aspects of my life is the prayer for a Christian. And may you reign grace, not R-E-I-G-R-A-C-E. G-N, but R-A-I-N, may you rain grace upon the world. May you rain grace upon our generation of lost sinners that do not know you. That's our prayer. Then, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Lord, may your will be done as it is happening in heaven, in perfection up there without any opposition. May your will be manifest like that in my life and in the world around me. His will is, like I said, perfectly obeyed in heaven. And we are asking God to allow us to have that same desire, to obey Him perfectly, which of course we cannot because we are plagued with sin. But the desire must be there for us to do that. May it be like that for my life. May it be like that for my neighbor's life. may be like that for my lost family members. Because true happiness in this life, true contentment in this life only comes when we are found walking with God according to his will. There is no happiness, there is no joy, there is no contentment in this world if we are walking outside of the will of God and living for ourselves. It is a life of misery. Ask all those poor people in Pacific Palisades and the Los Angeles neighborhoods in Malibu. They had everything the world could offer them, and it's all been taken away in a moment of time. Great tragedy. Horrible tragedy. Horrible criminal tragedies, no doubt about that. But the hand of God has moved. And it's so very, very sad to see so many people so devastated. And they should be devastated. And I would be devastated, obviously, to lose all of your worldly possessions in a moment of time is a great, great trial. And yet, if that's where they thought they had their happiness, each and every one of them knows that there was no happiness found in these earthly possessions. Verse 11, give us this day our daily bread. Now we are transitioning to the personal, our personal and legitimate needs. We have done everything and asked that God would be glorified in these aspects of his life. And now we are going to ask for things that are very, very important to you and to me. We are to have complete dependence on God Our Father, for our most basic necessities, give us this day our daily bread. It doesn't get more basic than that type of a prayer. It acknowledges that we are completely dependent, and what we have is because God has been gracious enough to give it to us. It doesn't get more basic. for you and me to get on our hands and knees and ask God to provide our bread, because we take it for granted, do we not? And he tells us, never take anything for granted. I want you to get down on your knees every day and ask for your daily bread, because it's what you need to stay alive. It teaches us that everything we have comes from God. It doesn't come from any other place but God. The world was created by God. Everything in it comes from God, and everything we possess comes from God. We must never be prideful in our possessions. It's so easy to become prideful in our possessions. Think of all of the trophies that were burned up in all those rich neighborhoods. Some 1937 Dusseldorf. or a first year Shelby Mustang, perfect mint condition, warehouses full of all of these wonderful things. And they are wonderful things. And they are the art of our generation. And they should be preserved. I'm not trying to belittle any of that. But now it's all gone. It's all gone. We should never think that anything that you have or I have came from ourselves. We never want to think that we are self-sufficient and we act alone. Again, so many people in Los Angeles have had everything taken from them in a moment of time. It's so very, very sad. My heart breaks for all of these people. and we should pray. And I know that we are praying that God would provide for their daily needs. They would get through day by day since, what is it, day five now? Day six? And the city is still on fire? But more so, we don't want to pray just for their bread. And again, everybody needs bread. But we want to pray that this profound moment in their life will be used for God's glory and their eternal souls would be saved. Pray that God would use this horrible, horrible providence, this horrible tragedy. Again, this criminal act probably that was perpetrated by many different types of people on the city of Los Angeles. Pray that God would open their eyes, not to the crimes of men, but to their own immortality, to their own mortality, and the glory of God in all of this. Pray that God would open their eyes. Pray that they would see the true state of their souls. Pray that they would cry out to God. What should they cry out for? Give me bread? No. Pray that they would cry out, our Father which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. If they could pray that, then it would be easy for them to pray for, give us day by day our daily bread. You see? Because a man that can pray from his heart for all of these wonderful things that are so celestial, we really can't get our heads around them calling God Father. asking that God's will be done in our lives as it is in heaven, the man that can resign himself to the sovereign will of God, then he can pray that he would provide his daily bread. So pray that that the people of Los Angeles would not start with asking God for daily bread, but would start with the first half of the Lord's prayer. What did Job say? Job lost everything. He had 10 children. He had 11,000 heads of cattle. He had many servants. And by the providence of God, the work of Satan, everything was destroyed. Everything. He lost all 10 of his children. Things burned down. Cattle were destroyed. Slaves were murdered by the Sabians. And Job sat down and he said in chapter one, the last two or three verses of chapter one, he said, then Job arose and rent his clothes. He rent his mantle. He's in great grief. He shaved his head and fell down upon the ground and worshiped. He worshiped. And said, naked came I out of my mother's womb and naked shall I return thither. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. In all this Job sinned not nor charged God foolishly. This is the attitude that we want to pray for, for the people of Los Angeles. that they will come to this place by this horrible, horrible thing that has happened to them. God wasn't done with Job yet. The devil was forced to stand before God again. He said, you're putting a hedge around Job, that's why he won't sin against you. God says, you can do anything you want to him, but don't kill him. So he gave him boils. He gave him a horrible skin disease from the bottom of his feet to the top of his head. And he was in great, great misery. Chapter two in verses nine and 10. His wife burst into his room. He's sitting there. She's lost all 10 of her children, by the way. and said to him, do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die. Kill yourself. It's over. But he said to her, you speak as one of the foolish women speak. Dear, we can't live like this. We can't speak like this. Shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity? In all this, Job did not sin with his lips. When it's finally time for him to pray, when it's finally time for him to let go of his emotions, chapter 3 is where you'll find that. And it's okay to be greatly grieved. It's okay to weep over the loss of all of your stuff. but it's how we deal with the reality of our relationship to God is what matters. Look what he said in chapter three in verses 25 and 26. For what I greatly fear has come upon me, the death of his children, all of them, and what I dread befell me. I am not at ease, nor am I quiet, and I am not at rest, but turmoil comes. That's real. That's reality. And so these people, these people in our lives that we don't even know are going through what Job has gone through. The question is how will they go through what Job has gone through? Because the last thing I want them to do is just want to get more stuff back. What a tragedy that is. But to pray the way Job prayed, to speak the way Job spake, that's true contentment. It's true comfort in the time of great grief and trial. None of that went away. He was sick in his heart from all that happened to him. And yet we see comfort and we do see contentment even in all of that. He moves on to verse 12, teaching us how to pray. And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. As Luke says, this is the daily call of all Christians. It's a daily call of all God's children. Because how can it not be? How can it not be like this for us? If you're a Christian, your daily cry is, forgive me of my sins. The Christian is in a constant place of repentance. That's the life. We are constantly aware that God has forgiven us and cleansed us of all unrighteousness. At the same time, we are plagued with indwelling sin and it breaks our heart. And so we're always repenting for our sins. And that means it's a place where self-righteousness dies. If you're repenting of sin, there's no place for self-righteousness. It's a place where true honesty before God flourishes. Because once we say, forgive me of my sins, that's honest. We're not hiding behind anything. We're telling God the truth. Father, forgive me of my sins. is a petition that we naturally say before we walk out the door and see the world every morning. See, you haven't even got out of bed yet and you've already sinned? If you know your heart, you know it's true. And then it's prayed again and again and again throughout the day. That's the life of a Christian. The true test of our salvation is found in the second part. Because if we do not and cannot do this, then we are not Christians. And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors, as we forgive those who have sinned against us. Father, forgive us of our sins as we are perpetually forgiving those who have sinned against us. How can I do that? That jerk deserves to be punished for what he did to me and my family. No. Pray that God would forgive them of their sins. It reveals our hearts. It reveals who we really are as God's chosen people, as God's redeemed. Do we ask God to forgive us? Do we expect God to forgive us? then we naturally desire the same for those who have sinned against us, you see. If we expect God to forgive us of our sins because we are believing on his son, then we naturally want that for everybody around us, even our enemies. For if we ask for mercy and self-righteously desire wrath for our neighbors, then I don't think we really understand what grace is. For grace is not deserved. Grace is undeserved. Grace is freely given to the one who deserves wrath. And a Christian above all people knows that because grace has been lavished upon the Christian when we were all undeserving of it. And so it should be natural for us to desire grace upon our worst enemies. because God did it for us. And if we do not love each other, if we do not love our enemies, if we do not love our neighbors as ourselves, then we're not going to ask God to forgive other people. We're going to self-righteously believe that we deserve to be forgiven and they do not. Our prayers must be baptized in love. You see, that's not easy, is it? that we're surrounded by sin and hate and murder and wrath, and we're to be a people of love through it all. J.C. Ryle said that if we do not desire that the sins of our neighbors be forgiven, it is as much as saying, do not forgive me at all. There it is in a nutshell. Okay, verse 13. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. This is a wonderful last petition that Jesus teaches us because again, it keeps us grounded in humility. Deliver us from evil. Lead us not into temptation. Well, God does not tempt us. He tests us, he tries us, but he would never tempt us. So what does it mean? It means that you and I as Christians are so weak, so weak, that if we were left to ourselves to live this Christian life without the hand of God upon us, we would fail miserably and immediately. When you and I decide that Bible reading is unimportant, not important, gonna skip this day or the next few days or the next week, our prayers will soon diminish. And once we stop reading and communing, we are not going to be able to have a balanced life. We're not going to be able to walk with God as Enoch did. That puts us in grave danger. Lead us not into temptation. Father, keep me bound up in you through meditation upon your word. Father, no one can pluck me out of your hand. Protect me from myself and from everything around me. Father, no one can harm me if I am seeking you in word and in deed. May the trials that you have ordained for me not cause me to sin against you and destroy my own soul in rebellion against what you have designed for me. Father, do not let me injure my own soul, because we are our worst enemies. The worst enemy you have as a Christian is you, and the worst enemy I have is me. Lord, deliver me from evil. Keep me from the evil that is all around me. Keep me from the evil that is in me. And keep me from the evil one that is trying to destroy me. Do you see how practical this prayer is, this model for our prayer is? We're almost done. We're almost done. Do I have any more time? You have a few minutes. I'll go quickly. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever, amen. We are to end our prayer in praise to God alone. One true God manifest to us in the Trinity. One eternal kingdom that has power over all kingdoms and governments in the world. And we glory in this reality and glorify him by acknowledging these eternal truths. That's all we're doing when we praise God. We're acknowledging these eternal truths. The prayer for the model is over, but he wants us to focus on verse 12 now. Because he's now going to redirect us back to verse 12, because it's the most important thing for you and me. Because it's vitally important that we understand the difference between eternal life and eternal damnation. Because our relationship to verse 12 is going to determine where we spend eternity. Verses 14 and 15. For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. That is as cut and dried as it gets. We'll just go through this quickly, very quickly. Are we truly desirous to call God Father? Are we seeking His glory by hallowing His name, by glorying and honoring the names of God? Because we're all found in all of his attributes. Go through a list of the attributes of God and worship him in those attributes. Do we see or do we desire to have the kingdom of God reign in our hearts and reign in the hearts of our neighbors? Do we believe that God actually provides for our bread on a day-to-day basis? If those things are true, then we will desire to forgive our neighbors of their sins. You see, it's that simple. If our neighbors trespass against us, we will desire the best for them. And God will forgive us of our sins if we are like that. And if we are not, then God will not forgive us. That's what he says in verses 14 and 15. Very, very important to this passage of scripture. So I have one observation, and I have two minutes to do it. I'll probably take three. A life without intimate communication with men is a tragedy. A life without prayer to God is a life of vanity. It's a life of vanity. There's no purpose to life. If you cannot commune with God, you have nothing. I want you to consider a relationship between a man and a wife, husband and wife. He meets a woman, they agree to be married. Now, it would be outrageous, and yet this is all too common, by the way, for a man to reason, I have married a wife, therefore I will work, I will make money, and I will pay the bills. She, on the other hand, will give me children. and she will take care of the home and she will make sure that dinner's on the table at 5 p.m. This is what is required in our marriage contract. I have gone through the fine print and this is how our life will be. She has her responsibilities and I have mine. There are a lot of people that live like that, cold, no communication, meanness, hostilities. I had lunch at a man's house, the deacon of a Baptist church, very mean to his wife. And she was running around. She's a very nice lady. And she made us a really nice meal. And he had finished his plate. And he went, more meat, just like that. And she ran over there and gave him more meat. And I thought, how horrible. How horrible for them. How horrible for her. How horrible for him that he doesn't understand what love is. I've never forgotten that. I was young when it happened and I laughed. Later on, because I was probably nervous. But I look back and that is one of the great tragedies of life. That you can live with a woman that God has given you. Treat her like a slave. What's my point? My point is that this type of marriage is a cold and a calculating relationship based on a marriage contract. Well, that's what you do when you take out a loan to a bank. But the key ingredients of love, the key ingredient of affection and compassion and passion, they're non-existent in the relationship. How sad for the woman. So without daily communication in a marriage, without daily love, without affection and passion and concern, without continually loving your spouse, the marriage will disintegrate. Sometimes sooner, sometimes later. But nobody can live like that, right? Because a true and legitimate relationship cannot survive without honest communication and intimacy, loving intimacy, honest and humble intimacy. Such is the case with us, with God. It's the same principle. We cannot have a contract with God that I've believed on Jesus, Jesus shed his blood for my sins, covered me, God sees me in that, and now I'm safe and sound in the hands of God. That's all true. But if it stops there, it's a cold and calculating relationship. No, we desire. We long to hear God from his word. And he longs to hear from us in prayer. Why do you think he's teaching us how to pray? Because without communication, open communication, the way Job did, our relationship will dwindle to nothing. May we learn to communicate with God. May we understand also that our private relationship to God, how should I say this? Our private relationship to God will reveal itself in our personal relationships with those closest to us. Meaning, the way you treat your spouse, the way you treat other people, is reflective of your relationship to God himself. Are you loving and kind and generous? Or are you a gossip and a slanderer? You see the difference? You can't separate the two. They go together. Your relationship to God, my relationship to God in prayer and reading will reflect itself in our relationship to other human beings that we love the most in this world. All right. Our Father, we thank you for your goodness to us. We thank you for your word, and we thank you for your intimacy with us. In Christ's name we pray, amen.