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“our FATHER” /Text: Luke 11:1-13 / Pastor Lucas Andre Albrecht / Hope Lutheran Church

Sermon – July 27th, 2025
Hope Lutheran Church, Port Coquitlam BC
Text: Luke 11:1-13
Theme: “our FATHER”

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Intr Looking to our world, this is the way the Lord’s Prayer seems many times to be read in our day:

Father somewhere out there:

Shallowed be thy name;

My kingdom come, my will be done on Earth;

Don’t give us this day our daily bread (for we are overweight)

Forgive me my debts if I have any, (for I make mistakes like everyone else) so I can be judgmental with others who sin differently than me.

Blame us not for the temptations we cave to;

Don’t judge us for our evil, for mistakes are learning opportunities;

For mine is the kingdom, and the power and the glory.

A man. Or a woman. Or something else.

 Our first thought might be: “Yeah, the world out there is getting crazy by the day, right?” Well, I’m not talking about the world out there, people who don’t share in our Christian faith. Because this prayer was not given for them. Jesus gives this prayer to His disciples. One can expect that type of attitude from the people of the World. But it is the People of the Word who received this prayer, and it is a banner, a logo, a trademark for followers of Christ. Our need to constantly go back to the prayer the Lord has taught becomes evident because we want to avoid the pitfalls of these misuses, misunderstandings, and even blunt twisting of the words that the Lord has given us. [1]

 

1 – Prayer

When we think about prayer, the first thing to notice is that that Jesus doesn’t say “if” but “when” you pray. It is implicit that as a Christian, one of the things you do is to pray. Fire generates light and heat. Lightning generates thunder. It rains in Vancouver. A Christian prays. Since Jesus himself prayed many times, why wouldn’t we need it? For this is our condition: “We are in a situation where no person can perfectly keep the 10 Commandments, even though he has begun to believe. The devil, with all his power together with the world and our own flesh resists our efforts. Therefore, nothing is more necessary than that we should continually turn towards God’s ear, call upon Him and pray to Him. We must pray that He would give, preserve and increase faith in us and the fulfillment of the 10 Commandments.”[2]

“Yes, but will God hear my prayer as he hears those from a better Christian, or a pastor, or a spiritual leader?”  Yes, your prayer is considered by God as valuable as the prayers of St. Paul, or Peter, or Luther, or the greatest pastor and Christian person you know, because God accepts prayers not because of the person, but because of Himself and His promise in the Word. [3]

Next, remember that when you pray the Lord’s Prayer, you are praying to Your Father. You are a child of a beloved Father. How radically different is that from not only the way deity and spirituality are dealt with in the World? When many talk about an energy, a Ruler, an Old Angry Man, a Patriarchal Opressor… we talk to our Father.

So, as you pray to a Father, you know these as true:

  • First of all, you are a child, son or daughter. You were adopted by Him and you belong to His family;
  • You have someone who has authority over you. It is not your will, but His will connected to yours that enlightens your life and guides your steps.
  • You know you have someone who shows you when you fall and disobey. A good father doesn’t only praise his children but also corrects them. Repentance and faith are needed on a daily basis.
  • You want to do His will because you love Him. Children obey their parents not because they need to become their children, but because of being their children they want to become more like them.
  • You know you have a good model of a Father. If an imperfect father can give good things to his children, what about our Perfect Father in Heaven?
  • You are loved unconditionally. In a world with many bad to terrible examples of fatherhood, He provides us with the perfect Father Figure, who never abandons you, is always present and will always be.

Now, you’ve noticed in the Gospel today that Jesus says, “ask whatever you want.” It is tempting to think here about all the desires of our will and soul. But Jesus is talking about God’s will. First of all, He is talking about the Holy Spirit that God will freely give to us. This is the starting point and the finish line of our entire prayer life. From there, we connect our will to His, knowing that He will always provide, even when his providence is not equal to our expectations. It will always be paired with what’s best for our heart and for our life.

Pray, pray boldly, every day. When in doubt if God will listen, think about this: who would wake a King or the Prime Minister at 2am to ask for a glass of water? Well, I know who would do that: a child. (Tim Keller) You have this same type of access not to the Prime Minister or the King, but to God, your Father, who listens to your prayers and answers them inside His Will.

 

2 – Praying the Lord’s Prayer

After we reflected about prayer in general, let’s take a few moments to revisit the Lord’s prayer.

My first question is: do we say it from top to bottom, or do we often read it backwards? [4] That is, do we start by what we need for our personal good, and then—time permitting—we remember to pray about God and His will and His Kingdom? A good question for our daily requests before God.

Then when we look at the pattern of the Lord’s prayer, we see that Jesus sets a beautiful and encouraging order in his Model Prayer:

Your Name – In a world of shallow things and people who are just another number, you know your Father has a name. He is not just “someone up there.” This is pure Gospel. You can call your Father by his name.

Kingdom and Will – People like to exalt as a virtue when someone lives his or her life “on his own terms.” In the Lord’s prayer we ask the opposite—We want to live in God’s Kingdom under God’s will. That makes a world of difference – a Kingdom of difference.

Bread – An Easter egg message in this petition is contentment. We don’t ask for bread for a lifetime. We ask for the bread we need for today. Trust that the Lord will provide is implied in this petition.

Forgiveness – The former petition could go together with the bread one, “Give us this day our daily forgiveness.” What bread is for the body, forgiveness is for the soul. For where there is bread, there is sustenance. Where there is forgiveness of sins, there is salvation and life eternal.

Leading, Deliverance – Where do you want God to lead you? Away from temptations and further away from evil. He leads you to green pastures, calm waters. He leads you in Christ to life everlasting.

We see sort of encrypted in the prayer the main points of our Christian faith: The existence of God, our salvation, forgiveness, belonging, and our daily life under his protection and care.


Conclusion –
Now, there will be times that you will pray and think that your Father is not hearing you. At those times, this illustration may help you through:

Parents who have had the experience of taking their child to the first day of school or daycare know that it can be a challenging and difficult experience for the child. It is the moment when they move away from family safety to a place we might call, looking through the child’s eyes, both lonely and hostile.

From an adult’s point of view it doesn’t seem like much, right? They drop the child off early in the morning, and at some point, in the afternoon they are there to pick the child up. How much would that be, 6 or 7 hours? A day runs so fast that it’s not that much…

But what about the kid’s perspective? I think we remember rather well that when we are children, the notion of time is different. Everything seems to take longer. For the child that day seems to have no end. There may be doubt, anxiety, fear, crying. “Where is my father, my mother? Why did they turn their back on me, did they forget about me? When will this all end?”

After what seems like forever, the moment comes when they are there to pick us up. Then comes relief, peace, the comforting assurance of their presence.

We can remember this illustration in the hardest, most lonely moments of our existence, when the feeling is that Father has dropped us somewhere and turned His back on us; that He has forgotten His children. Remember, our notion of time is different, and that’s the source of many a distress, insecurity, and fear.

But the Father never forgot us. He never ever forgets us. In Christ He never stops looking after us, not even for a second. He was always there and always will be, all the time. The Lord’s Prayer is there for you for everyday life to remind you and assure you of His presence. It doesn’t matter how the people of the world may look at it. As you are part of the People of the Word, you may share in faith your joyful hope you have from your Father. Our Father. In Heaven and here, on earth, close to our hearts.

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[1] While parallel Gospel readings give us the fuller version of the Lord’s Prayer, here in Luke we can already see the whole: where the Kingdom of God is, there His will is done. And where the Lord doesn’t lead us into temptation, there we are delivered from evil.

[2] Luther, M. The Lord’s Prayer. Large Catechism. In: Book of Concord. Reader’s edition, p.577-78

[3] Large Catechism. Book of Concord. Reader’s Edition, p. 581.

[4] As Martin Luther refers to it. From:  Lc 11.1-13 – Prof. Dr. Vilson Scholz – 7º Domingo após Pentecostes – (Perícope – Trienal C) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1iY5cJXqvA

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