Mat 6:9; You’ve Been Adopted and Your Father Is God.

Class Outline:

Tuesday August 6, 2024

 

Intro: Everyone at some time wonders, “Who am I? What am I doing here? What is the meaning of my life, if anything?” Often this reaches a debilitating level at the fountainhead of adulthood sometimes called mid-life. The old song, “I never promised you a rose garden,” comes to mind, and with it, “Tiptoe through the tulips.” Life was neither one. 

 

It is easy to forget that every person is sustained by the grace of God, purposely sustained.

 

COL 1:17

He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

 

HEB 1:3

And He is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power.

 

That means that you are alive only because God wants you to be. Then add the fact that the grace of God through Christ made you something more.

 

“Pray in this manner: Our Father,” or “say: Father” (LUK 11:2). 

 

New relationship with God as Father (new things have come). 

 

Prophecy concerning David and Israel. They will call Him Father.

 

PSA 89:26-29; JER 3:19. 

 

 

Was not foreseen as a relationship of the humanity of Christ to the Father (ISA 63:14; 64:8). 

 

Religious leaders saw Jesus’ use of “Father” as blasphemous (JOH 5:18). 

 

These words are new and they begin NT prayer. If we are going to pray properly, biblically, theologically, according to the way of the only One qualified to teach prayer, then we have to follow this instruction. 

 

It is not the only prayer, nor the only manner of pray, but it does encompass the foundation of NT prayer. 

 

If we do not pray with these words then our prayers will very easily be without direction or true meaning in terms of our relationship of sons and daughters to our Father in heaven. 

 

Christ graciously gives us the position of the same relationship as Him, son to Father.

 

It is a relationship where a son enters the audience chamber of God, not as a slave, not as an outsider, but as an heir - a born again son (ROM 8:15-17; GAL 4:5-6). 

 

This relationship is eternal, JOH 20:17. It is meant to give you the same comfort, love, guidance, peace, and fear as it did to the humanity of Christ. 

 

He is more than your Creator and Judge. He has pride in you, values you, and is in unchangeable intimacy that only a parent knows. 

 

The children do not know until they mature, if they mature.

 

The relationship of son to God the Father is to be understood in certain ways to the natural, human relationship that God has given to sons and fathers. 

 

MAT 7:7-12; LUK 15:17-24. 

 

He is the provider of all things that our hearts need. A Father, as God would define, is a provider, a protector, instructor, and leader. He loves unconditionally, encourages, shares his thoughts, is loyal, forgiving, faithful, inspiring, dutiful, intelligent, courageous, kind, etc., etc.

 

He knows what you need before you ask Him (Your life is hid with Christ in the heavens, COL 3:1-4). 

 

He alone knows what you truly need. Do you seek your needs in Him, in prayer, in these petitions, or do you assume that you know your needs already? 

 

Jesus summarizes those needs in these 6 petitions that we are to seek daily. 

 

He wording of the prayer leaves open the door to the expand upon their meaning, but not to change His words to our own liking. 

 

When we use His words we are not using original Greek so we are open to use words that mean the same (synonyms). 

 

The six petitions get to the needs that the Father knows His sons and daughters need. 

 

Application: The great question this places on us: Do we have the heart of the Father and know the same needs as He? Do we seek the needs that are in the mind of our Father every day, or do we assume we know them well enough?