Matthew chapter 6, beginning in verse 9. Pray then like this, Our Father 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 lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Let's pray. Our Lord, we pray that we would learn the lesson which you aim to teach us in the text. Namely, that we would learn how to pray. How to pray as Jesus would have us pray. How to pray as you would have us pray. Knowing that Those two things are one and the same. Lord, we pray especially this morning that You would help us to grasp the meaning and significance of hallowing Your name. Work in us so that we might be enabled to do just that. We pray in the name of our Lord and Savior. Amen. Names are important. We know that truth, I think, intuitively, even if we haven't spent much time thinking about it. Just consider the fact that when you meet someone new for the first time, usually your name is the very first piece of information that you share with that other person. That's usually the first thing that they share with you. Our names are important. Our actions demonstrate that we believe them. and maybe you know from experience that it can be somewhat awkward down the road if you didn't catch someone's name the first, second, third time that you heard it. The name learning window is a short and unforgiving one and the acceptable amount of time that it takes to learn a name and latch on to a new identity For a new acquaintance, it's one that expires quickly. For some, it can become a matter of offense if you forget their name or continue to mispronounce it, though we all certainly hope to be shown grace on such occasions. I know that there have been people in my life who I realized far too late that I had been calling them the wrong name for quite some time. So we hope to show grace and be shown grace when we mess up this important aspect of who someone is. The thing here to recognize that if it is true, that we deem our own names important enough to be known by others and to be known for basically anything else, even upon our first meeting, then how much more importance ought we to attach to God's name? Our text this morning, as we come to what has been called the first petition of the Lord's Prayer, our text this morning provides us with a clue as to just how important God's name is by bringing the hallowing of God's name to the front of the line. This is the first request. It is of central concern. And so we want to catch a glimpse of the centrality of hallowing God's name in the Christian life this morning. Now, just to give you a taste of how weighty this is, think upon the words of the Puritan author, Thomas Watson, who argued that this petition was so fundamental that it is the one petition in his view that we will continue praying for all of eternity. Here's what he says. Hallowed be thy name is the first and great petition. It contains the most weighty thing in religion, which is God's glory. When some of the other petitions shall be useless and out of date, As we shall not need to pray in heaven, give us our daily bread, because there shall be no hunger. Nor forgive us our trespasses, because there shall be no sin. Nor lead us not into temptation, because the old serpent is not there to tempt. Yet the hallowing of God's name will be of great use and request in heaven. We shall be ever singing hallelujahs, which is nothing else, he says, but the hallowing of God's name. That's the sort of mindset with which we want to consider our text this morning. This is something weighty and not to be passed over lightly. And so if the hallowing of God's name is our primary aim on earth, the first in line in the Lord's Prayer, and the central activity of heaven, as Thomas Watson has argued, then we do well, I think, to acquaint ourselves with its meaning and learn to pray for it. And so to this end, for our text and contemplation this morning, I want to ask and answer three questions today. What is so important about God's name? That's the first question. What does it mean to hallow God's name? That's the second question. And what does it look like for God to answer this prayer? That's the third question. What is so important about the name? What does it mean to hallow the name? And what does a yes answer to this prayer actually look like? So first of all, what is so important about God's name? I would say first and foremost that the importance of God's name is attached to the fact that God reveals Himself through His name. He reveals Himself through his name. Many names are ascribed to God in the Bible. We could not possibly hope to stand here and list all of them this morning. God, God Most High, Mighty God, the Ancient of Days, maybe some of the other ones are rattling around in your mind. There are many such examples and all of them together reveal different aspects, different facets of who God is. They tell us different things about his being. The name I think by which he is most prominently known is that name by which he revealed himself to Moses at the burning bush. Remember that story, remember that tale? Moses there in Exodus chapter 3, he's keeping his flocks in the wilderness and suddenly an amazing thing happens. The angel of the Lord appears to him in the burning bush. And he turns aside to investigate. And as he approaches that burning bush, he hears a voice speaking to him out of the midst of the fire, telling him, Moses, you're standing on holy ground. Take off your shoes. And he is then greeted as the one within the fire reveals himself as the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And then in the midst of that conversation between Moses and God, God commissions Moses to go down to Egypt, bring up the Israelites into the land of Canaan. He is to be the deliverer, the human deliverer at least, of the household of faith. But you'll remember Moses, he was not exactly on board right away. And he lets God know that before he's willing to go, before he's willing to do what he's been asked, he wants to first know who it is that's sending him. Who shall I say has sent me? He says in Genesis 3.13, If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, The God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they ask me, What is his name? What shall I say to them? What's his name? And then God reveals himself through his name in Genesis, excuse me, not in Genesis, though in Genesis, but here in Exodus, chapter three, verses 14 and 15. God said to Moses, I am who I am. Now, if a human said that to us when we asked for their name, we might take offense, but that's what God said to Moses. And he goes on, he says, say this to the people of Israel, I am has sent me to you. And God also said to Moses, say this to the people of Israel, the Lord, Yahweh, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob has sent me to you. This is my name forever. And thus, I am to be remembered throughout your generation. And so there are many names by which God reveals himself in the Bible. Again, you can think of many of them, but the primary name, I think, by which God is known in the Old Testament is, I Am, Yahweh, the Lord, all of which are intricately tied together by this story. So what's important about God's name is that He reveals Himself through His name, and therefore, when we observe the way in which God's name is revealed in Scripture, we are led to conclude, I believe, that His name stands in for His very being. It's not just a way of distinguishing God from other beings, as if His name were Yahweh instead of Fred. That's the way that we typically use names and think of names. We put a lot of importance on them, but we think of them as important because they distinguish one thing from the other. Obviously, the Bible depicts God's name as something greater than that. It says not just who He is, but something about who He is. It reveals His essence and His nature. When God speaks to Moses at the burning bush, He's not just saying, my name's Yahweh, what's yours? He's saying, I'm the God who is. As God introduces His name to Moses, He's telling him something significant. The name explains His identity. He is the great I Am. He is the self-existent, self-dependent, eternal One who is being itself, apart from whom no one and nothing exists. He is the fountain of life. He is the One who already is what He will be, not subject to change. In short, He is Yahweh. creator of all, and covenant Lord of Israel. You see, when God speaks that name to Moses, He's telling Moses, this is who I am and what I am like. My name is me. And consequently, given that the revelation of God's name entails the revelation of God's being, God's name is worthy. of the highest honor. His name is worthy of the highest honor. This is why God's name is so important. This is why, think of what we've just read this morning in Deuteronomy, this is why included within the Ten Commandments, which sums up everything God wants us to do, we read these words. 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. We are, in the teaching of the Bible, we are to handle God's name like the most precious thing imaginable. It is like fine china. It is like a precious jewel. It is not something to be tossed around carelessly, lest it be broken or marred. or to treat it with reverence and respect. And this principle extends much further than most Christians today recognize. Many people think that as long as they aren't using God's name as a curse word, then they're hallowing it, and they're avoiding its vain usage. If they're not cussing with His name, then they've done all that's required of them. The Reformed tradition has always said, no. And we see this in the way that the larger catechism teaches that our reverence for God's name should extend to his, quote, titles, attributes, ordinances, the word, sacraments, prayer, oaths, vows, lots, his works, and whatsoever else there is whereby he makes himself known. And this makes good sense when you stop and think about it. If God's name is really a revelation of who he is, and we are to hallow that revelation of who he is, then we should hallow everything. Everything which God uses to reveal himself, which includes those items listed in the Catechism. We should speak reverently of all of those things, because God is teaching us about himself through those things. Along these lines, the Westminster Divine, William Gouge concludes the following, he says this, God's name is that whereby God is made known. For that is the end and use of a name, to make known and distinguish that whose name it is. Thus, whatever it is whereby God has made known unto us may be comprised under the title name attributed to God. He's explained to us, again, the logic of how we group all of these things together as indicative of who God is, how he reveals himself to us, reminding us that we are to hallow and treat respectfully all these things. And the implication of this connection, is that the way in which we treat God's name is ultimately the way in which we treat God. If you've not taken anything else from this section, what's so important about God's name? The way that we treat God's name is ultimately the way that we treat God. If you misuse His name, you are mistreating God. You are sinning. you're making little of Him. And this helps us understand why Jesus would make God's name the subject of His very first petition. So if this is how the Bible teaches us to understand God's name in general, as a stand-in for His very character, essence, nature, and being, which we are to treat as we would want God to be treated, then, in the second place, what does it mean to hallow God's name? What does that mean? Well, most basically on a definitional level, if we were looking at a dictionary, the word hallow means something like to make holy, make something holy. It's to set something apart, transferring it from the realm of the common to the realm of the sacred, to set it apart for special use. And for this reason, the same verb which is here in our text is often translated in the Bible as to sanctify. It's the same underlying word, to sanctify. Consider a couple of examples where this verb shows up elsewhere being translated as sanctified. I'll try to highlight it as I read through these examples. First of all, 1 Corinthians 1-2, to the church of God, this is Paul writing, he's addressing the church, to the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified, hallowed, we might say, in Christ Jesus, called to be saints together with all those who in every place call upon the name of our Lord Jesus, both their Lord and ours. So when Paul addresses the church, he addresses them as the sanctified, those who have been set apart and made holy. Similarly, we read in 1 Thessalonians 5, verse 23, Now may the God of peace, we go from one end of the book to the other, now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. And may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. So the saints can be spoken of as those who have been sanctified in Christ Jesus, and they can also be those who are in need of being sanctified completely, continued to be pushed towards holiness. One more example, Hebrews chapter 2 verses 10 to 11. For it was fitting that He, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. For, note here, He who sanctifies And those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he, he being Jesus, is not ashamed to call them brothers. In these examples, the thing that I want you to see, the thing that I want you to observe, is that God is the sanctifier who sets apart or hallows, in these instances, the believer. The sanctifier sanctifies the sanctified. If that makes good sense. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. He takes those who are sinful and makes them holy, granting them access to the realm of the sacred, His presence. But that raises a question, doesn't it? How can such a thing be done to God's name? Because God's name is already holy. His name is already holy. Listen to the words of Leviticus chapter 22 verses 31 to 33. God says to the children of Israel, so you shall keep my commandments and do them, I am the Lord, you've heard that name already, and you shall not profane my holy name, that I may be sanctified among the people of Israel. I am the Lord who sanctifies you, who brought you out of the land of Egypt to be your God. Again, I am the Lord. In that text we see that the people who were set apart to keep God's commands, they were sanctified by the one who calls himself the Lord. Because, not because his name needed to be made holy, but because his name was already holy. They were to sanctify him in the land, in the sense not that they made him holy, but that they recognized and acknowledged and reflected that holiness in the way that they conducted themselves. So to hallow is to make holy, but God's name is already holy. So holy is God's name that in Isaiah 57 verse 15, he is referred to as the one who is high and lifted up, whose name is holy. He is just the one whose name is holy. And that's why, so remarkably, so memorably, earlier in the book, Isaiah chapter 6 verse 3, the seraphim sing with gusto, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory. We could add many other passages to these to highlight the inherent and immutable holiness of God's name. There is no lack of examples in the Bible. But these are sufficient to show that whatever hallowing God's name means, it doesn't mean that we are making God's name holy, transforming something unholy into something newly holy. When God hallows or sanctifies us, He does, in fact, make us holy. But Matthew 6, 9 is speaking of something different. What is it speaking of? Well, it's in light of this observation which we just made that to hallow is to make holy because God's name is already holy. It's in light of this observation that I think we can make the following determination about what this means in the text. To hallow God's name is not to make it holy. But to ask God to hallow his name is to ask God to work in the world in such a manner that the holiness of that name is recognized and reflected by the creatures. We are asking him to make that inherent, that intrinsic, that immutable holiness known in the creation. It is, in sum, a request for God to glorify Himself among His creatures by showing forth His holiness in His dealings with them by helping them to perceive it. When we say, Lord our Father, hallowed be Your name, we're asking Him to help us hallowed in our hearts and in our minds. As Shorter Catechism question 101 puts it, in the first petition, which is hallowed be thy name, we pray that God would enable us and others to glorify him in all that whereby he maketh himself known, and that he would dispose all things to his glory. We're not adding holiness. We're not adding glory. We're asking that that glory and holiness would be seen, that it would be revealed. That we would have the spirit to receive such revelation. In the words of Phil Riken, writing much more recently, when we ask Him to hallow His name, he says, therefore, all we are doing is asking Him to reveal that He is exactly who He is. Since God is holy and his name is holy, to ask God to make his name holy is simply to ask him to live up to his name. It's an appeal for God to reveal himself as he actually is. A request for God to offer a glimpse of his hidden holiness. He concludes, hallowed be your name means make yourself known as the holy one that you are. It is a prayer, he says, for God to display the Godness of his Godhood. A prayer for God to display the Godness of his Godhood. That's what it means for God to hallow his name. And that is something which we are taught to request, to petition and plead for in the Lord's Prayer. That brings us to our third question, which is, what does it look like when God answers this prayer? What does a yes look like? Remember, first of all, as an observation, that when we pray, hallowed be your name, we are asking God to do something. And since God's name is already holy, We are not asking Him to do something to Himself. He doesn't need to make Himself holy. Instead, we're asking Him to do something to us. When we say, Hallowed be your name, we're asking God to do something to us and to those around us and to the world in which we live. So again, William Gouge, I think reflecting basically the teaching of the Westminster Catechism, which we just read a moment ago, in his reflections upon this petition, he argues that when we pray, hallowed be your name, we're really asking God to do three basic things, to give three basic things. We are asking, he says, first of all, for such graces in ourselves as may enable us to hallow the name of God. We're asking God to give us grace that we might hallow him. Second of all, he says, we are asking for such graces in others that may enable them thereto. So it's not just about us. This is about what God is doing on all the world. And so we want God to give us the grace to hallow his name. But we also want God to give those around us the grace to hallow his name because we want his name hallowed everywhere. It's holy. And he says in the third place that we are asking for such an overruling providence in God as may direct everything thereto. So this is, we want God to work in us, we want God to work in each other and those outside these walls. We want God to direct everything in this world towards the glorification of His being and the hallowing of His name. That's what we're asking for. When we say, hallowed be your name. So that raises the other question of, then, if to pray hallowed be your name is to ask God for graces that would enable us to hallow his name, then we might ask, what are the graces which we need to hallow God's name? What specifically are we asking him for? And many things could be sided here. I think Thomas Watson lists something like 15. I'm gonna stick with three. So just understand this is not meant to be exhaustive. This is a brief overview. What are we asking for in us when we say, hallowed be your name? Well, first of all, I would say that we are asking God, because again, the name is God's revelation of himself. We are asking God to grant us knowledge of himself. We're asking God to make himself known to us. In his high priestly prayer of John chapter 17, Jesus speaks of the way in which he has glorified his Father on the earth through the work which he has done. And at this point he is reflecting upon the way he has made the Father known to the disciples. But remember at this point, Jesus has not yet died. He's not yet resurrected. That is going to be part of his work, but it's not yet complete in John 17. So how is it in John 17 when he's praying that he has at this point already made his father known? He answers him in question in verses six and seven of John chapter 17. Here's what he says. He says, I have manifested your name. I have manifested your name to the people whom you gave me out of the world. Yours they were, you gave them to me, they have kept your word, and now they know that everything that you have given me is from you." So Jesus glorified the Father by manifesting his name, revealing who he was to the disciples. He, we might put it this way, Jesus revealed who God was, who the Father was, in his own words and works. That's what he refers to in the shorthand, manifest the Father's name. And as Jesus explained on the same occasion to those same disciples in John 14, 26, This is not something that they would be dependent upon themselves to remember every bit and piece of. He was going to, after he ascended to heaven, he was going to send the Spirit to help them remember those things which he had manifested and taught. In other words, Jesus glorified his Father by giving his disciples knowledge of the Father, and by helping them to internalize and maintain that knowledge, by the Spirit. And the reason I raise this example is because the same situation pertains to us. If we are to hallow God's name, we need to know, as Jesus' disciples did, we need to know the One whose name we are hallowing. We need knowledge. And we must come face to face with God in the person of Jesus Christ in order to get that knowledge. We need to be taught by the Holy Spirit. We need to get to know the one who has created us and redeemed us. And therefore when we pray as Jesus has taught us to pray, hallowed be your name, we are asking God in the first place to teach us more about himself. to teach us, to reveal Himself to us. We are asking Him to do the work which Jesus did in the life of His disciples today in our lives, to reveal His holy character, to reveal His holy works. We are asking for real spiritual wisdom so that we might know how to conduct ourselves appropriately while on this earth in a manner which hallows His name. Very practically speaking then, What's answering this prayer look like? God is answering this prayer when He helps you see more of His greatness and glory. Both in creation, where we get something of a perception of who the Creator is, and also in the Scriptures, where God has most explicitly revealed Himself. So when you're reading your Bible, and you begin to understand more about who God is, and you begin to love Him more, God is answering your prayer to hallow His name. He is glorifying Himself through the work that He is doing in you. So we need knowledge. We need knowledge of God. We want to know the One we're hallowing. But the second grace which we're asking for, similar to this one, related to this one, is that we're also asking for faith. in God, to grant us faith, to increase our faith. It's not enough that we simply know God and intellectually perceive His glory and holiness. There have been many people who have looked upon the wonders of creation and said there must be some sort of God. That's part of the design. God meant it to communicate that. But that's not enough to save. That's not enough to cause someone to intentionally and purposely hallow His name. And so we need, alongside our knowledge, saving faith, because when we truly begin to hallow God, we truly begin to hallow Him at the moment when He works saving faith in our heart. Think back on 1 John 2.12, we read it already today, where John says, I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven, For His namesake. Your sins are forgiven. Why? For His namesake. What's the connection? Well remember, let's do a little theology here for a moment. Forgiveness of sins is a benefit of our justification. Forgiveness of sins is a benefit of our justification. Remember the very helpful answer, Westminster Shorter Catechism, question 33. Justification is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardoneth all our sins, accepteth his righteousness aside only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us and received by faith alone. So in our justification, we are, among other things, pardoned, we are forgiven, for our sins, and we receive this, how? By faith alone. So, let's try to put the pieces together here. If our sins are forgiven, as John tells us, for the sake of God's name, if our sins are forgiven for the sake of God's name, And if forgiveness comes by faith, then it follows that we receive the grace of faith in order that God's name might be made hallowed. God gives you faith so that His name might be hallowed, because the forgiveness of sins is all about the hallowing of God's name. That means that when we pray, hallowed be your name, we are asking what? We're asking God to give us faith and to give faith to others. It's a discipleship prayer. It's an evangelism prayer. It does lots of things. It's worth praying. And why? Because His name is shown to be great and glorious when God works salvation in the hearts of sinners. He is seen to be wondrous and wonderful and mighty when He does this saving work. And those who are made to benefit from that salvation become active worshippers of God, who intentionally hallow His name, praising, honoring, reverencing Him. Practically speaking again, we need the grace of faith when we pray, Hallowed be Your Name. And that means that an answer to this prayer often looks like repentance from all manner of sin. placing faith in the crucified and risen Savior, and then worshipping Him. Hallowing the name of God, in short, leads to conversion, to service, to worship. And we are here today for the sake of God's name. Worshipping Him as those who have been forgiven by Him. This is all an exercise in hallowing the name of God. That's why we came here today, to hallow His name. And so, if we are to do that, week by week by week, we need faith. Faith in Christ, faith which is growing, that we might hallow Him more and more. So we need knowledge of God, we also need faith in God. Finally this morning, one last example, we need God to work in us a willingness to submit to Him. We need Him to work in our will that we might be willing to submit. When God gives us the grace to hallow His name, it doesn't just manifest itself in knowledge and faith, things going on in our head and in our heart. It works its way out in our hands. It results in a willingness to submit to God in thought and word and deed. What He is doing inside of us works its way out as the one whose name is sanctified graciously sanctifies us. as James 1 and 22 teaches, but be doers of the word and not hearers only deceiving yourselves. So we need the grace not just to hear but to do. That our life may be a holistic force for the howling of God's name. So remember us, as Christians, we are set apart, made holy, In our baptism, God's name is placed upon us. When we are converted, God sanctifies us and calls us saints, holy ones. Then the Spirit works within us over the course of our lifetime, giving us the grace needed to obey. And therefore, Jesus can say elsewhere in the Sermon on the Mount that we are to be holy because He is holy. We're going to be holy because the Holy One is at work in us, teaching us to submit, teaching us to obey. The grace which God gives us through Jesus Christ, He gives us so that we might obey and reflect the holiness of His name. Not just seeing it, not just acknowledging it, but reflecting it in our souls. We hallow God's name when we act in a manner which is consistent with that revelation of Himself. Practically speaking, this means a number of things. It means, first of all, in a Ten Commandments sense, we return to the Third Commandment, this means that when we hallow God's name, we learn to speak reverently of God. We learn to speak reverently of the things related to God. We've got to be careful. When His name is on our lips, we should ensure that when we speak of Him, what we are saying is harmonious with the knowledge and faith that He has already given us. But that's just the beginning. Just learning to speak reverently of God, that's sort of the most direct application here, but really all of our obedience to the law of God is meant to glorify God. thereby hallowing His name. Every good work we do, every bit of obedience, every bit of submission to His will is meant to hallow His name, to glorify Him above all things. Your submission to God, your submission to God is an affirmative answer to the first petition in the Lord's Prayer. So you need God's... Pray hallowed be your name. Asking God to give you the grace to hallow Him. By knowing Him more and more. By placing your faith in Him. And by serving Him. In ways that bring, not ill repute, but honor to His name, His reputation, and His being. So brothers and sisters, learn from Jesus this morning. To pray for God's name to be hallowed. Nothing more important than you can pray. His holy name stands in for all that He is, and it is our duty and privilege to recognize and reflect that holiness, His set-apartness, His supremacy, as God gives us grace. Might as well get started, because if you're a Christian, you're going to be acknowledging and adoring His holy name from this time forth and forevermore. Get started today. Practice up. If you fall short, you can be sure that the Lord will teach you how to do this right in heaven. So let's ask the Father to help us get started now, because when we learn more about the Bible, when we learn more about theology, when our faith grows and our trust increases, when we advance in holiness, learning to obey the Lord, well then we can trust that God is at work in us. He is teaching us, directing us, that we might know how to hallow His name. He's answering prayers as He works in our hearts. Let's pray.