A PRAYER FOR AN OBEDIENT WILL
Matthew 6:10

Friends, we have been studying the portion of the Sermon on the Mount known as The Lord’s Prayer.  If you are like me, you have prayed the words often without really understanding exactly what you were praying.  Jesus gave us this prayer as a model around which we were to offer our prayers to God.  We have noticed two thoughts already.  First, we must approach God with reverence for who He is:  Our Father, who art in heaven, Hallowed be Your name.  Second, we must pray for God’s coming kingdom, committing ourselves to reaching that goal:  Your kingdom come. 

Today we draw our attention to the third element in this prayer, which is stated in these words:  Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.  It would appear from its immediate connection with the coming of Christ’s kingdom, that Jesus is teaching that the kingdom of God can be experienced on earth where God’s will is as perfectly done as it is in heaven. 

But there is a problem today.  This portion of The Lord’s Prayer does not seem to fit with the psychology of today.  Our focus today is upon my will, my wants, my needs.  We want to do things my way.  That song of Frank Sinatra, “I did it my way,” has almost become the battle cry of today’s society.  And, unfortunately, this is often carried over into our prayers, which go something like this:  “Lord, bless me.  Lord, bless my work.  Lord give me money to buy a new car.  Lord, keep me well.”  And on and on we go.  The focus of praying is me and not upon God.  I want my will done; I don’t care if it is God’s will or not. 

How can I pray that God’s will be done?  Well, I can pray with a sense of defeated resignation, sort of like that song from Doris Day, “Que Serah… whatever will be, will be.”  There are a lot of believers who have this same attitude about prayer.  Why pray?  God’s got it all planned anyway!  What good does it do to pray?  Moses could have felt that way after Israel sinned with the golden calf, but he didn’t.  Neither should we.

Second, we can pray in unbelief that God will answer.  Friends, why are we so constantly amazed when God answers our prayer?  We should be so amazed when He does not!

Third, we can try to bend God’s will to ours.  Have you ever tried to strike a deal with God.  Perhaps if we vow to God to do something we know He wants, then he will do something we want.  I rather like these sobering words from Amy Carmichael:  And shall I pray to change Thy will, my Father, until it accord to mine?  But no, Lord, no; that shall never be.  Rather I pray Thee blend my human will with Thine.

Ah, there is the secret – it is the submission of ourselves to God.  It is that prayer of Paul on the Damascus Road:  “Lord, what will You have me to do?”  When we pray, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven,  it is the laying of all that have on the altar for God:  our homes, our families, our possessions, our money, our everything.

Father, It is very easy for us to pray for Your will to be done, but we find it so very difficult to surrender ourselves to that will.  Father help us to cast aside all forms of selfish intent.  Cause us to realize that it is only in living for Christ that we can really experience gain.  Help us to understand that truth Jim Elliot proclaimed, “He is no fool who gives up what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”  For it only then that that portion of The Lord’s Prayer will be realized in our lives.  We pray this in the name of the one who loved us and sacrificed Himself for us.  Amen.

 

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