Thy Will Be Done
Download MP3Our scripture tonight comes from Matthew chapter 6. I'll begin reading 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.
Jeffrey Heine:Give us this day, our daily bread, and forgive us our debts as we have forgiven our debtors, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Pray with me. Lord, I pray that tonight you would, Lord, open up some cold and resistant hearts to hear from you. Lord, your words are life and everyone here needs life. We need the light of the world in this moment to shine into our darkness.
Jeffrey Heine:So God, I pray that in this moment, my words would fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore, but Lord, may your words remain and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. Do you remember as a child that moment, when you discovered for the first time that, your dad or your mom actually had a life apart from you? That they did more than just feed you or clean you, and, that their whole life wasn't completely revolved around you?
Jeffrey Heine:I can remember it vividly, actually, on a couple of occasions. 1, I just happened to walk into the kitchen one time, and my parents were unaware, and, and they were they were dancing together, and they were just singing silly little songs to one another. And the silliness there, I I had never been on display before me, and I was just mesmerized as I watched them. Another time I can remember, my dad, I think I might have been sick, he had to take me to work, and he worked at Lockheed in Georgia. He was one of the managers there.
Jeffrey Heine:And so, as we're riding in there, he actually went in this underground tunnel for the longest part, and then we popped up where his office was in the middle of the building. He had his own little parking spot there, and everybody there was mister Brooks and mister Brooks, and there was airplanes all around that were being built. And I just remember being in fascination on my dad's, like, oh, my gosh. Like like, he he does things. Like, he is, you know, this is a whole world I I I was not aware of.
Jeffrey Heine:Maybe that happened to you when you were a child and, and you were going out to eat with your parents, and at the same restaurant, you saw one of your teachers there. And, and one of your teachers was, was having dinner with her husband and drinking wine and laughing, and you're like, woah, wait a second, my, my teacher is not allowed to have a life outside of this, this little classroom there. I heard somebody tell how they saw their mom playing tennis one time, and it blew their mind. They were at a park with their friend. They didn't know that their mom had gone to the same park, and he looks over and he sees his mom playing tennis.
Jeffrey Heine:And she's wearing a tennis skirt, and she has on a tennis racket, and she's playing with 3 other people, and she's having fun, and she's really, really good. And it it this The world was blown because, no, wait, mom, you you exist to feed me, to to clothe me, to clean up after me, to to read me stories. But the reality that his mom had a entire life apart from him was just a lot to take in. Some of us have yet to make this revelation about God. We we know that God is our father.
Jeffrey Heine:We've we started looking at this 3 months ago as we began this series on the Lord's prayers. We know God is our father and that we are his children. And this means that we are perfectly accepted by him and that we can come into his presence and be loved by him. And this is all true, but we must not make the same mistake that we made as a child and that as our children make, and that's in thinking that parents exist merely to serve their children, that they exist to read, bathe, clean, dry, feed, give us toys. Children think they are the center of the universe, and sometimes it shocks the world when they realize they're not.
Jeffrey Heine:And and we need to have that realization about God. God does not exist merely to serve us. He is the center of the universe, not not us. And the first three petitions of the Lord's prayer remind us of this because they're all about God. They're about God's honor, God's kingdom, God's will.
Jeffrey Heine:So all these first petitions are about God and they remind us that we're, we're a part of something that's much bigger than we first thought. Something far bigger, far greater is going on than our need for daily bread. There's a God out there doing things. And so this is bigger than our struggle with a sinus infection. This is, this is bigger than our, our need for maybe a better income and a job.
Jeffrey Heine:This is bigger than, trying to put bread on the table. And these petitions, these first ones bring us out of that, and they give us the perspective we will later need when we pray for those things that so often consume our prayers. So when God gives us these first three petitions, he wants to expand our universe. He wants to us to take a step back and see see, I'm a lot bigger, and I'm doing a lot more things than you can imagine. And it's only when we realize that will we have the proper perspective to then pray for our daily bread.
Jeffrey Heine:You'll put it in its perspective. The writers of the New Testament understood this. If you read through Paul, he prays quite often through his letters, but he he never prays for the things that occupy so much of our prayers. He never prays for things like healing, for financial security, or really for any change in any circumstance whatsoever. He doesn't pray for those things.
Jeffrey Heine:It's really quite incredible, but we see when Paul is praying that his thoughts are much higher. His thoughts are very God centered. And so he prays for things like this in Colossians 1, he prays that we would just be filled with the knowledge of God's will. And Ephesians 1, he prays that we might have our eyes open to see what is the hope to which he has called us. Ephesians 3, he prays that we would know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge.
Jeffrey Heine:In Philippians 1, he prays that our love might abound and that we would be pure and blameless for the coming day of the Lord. And so Paul's prayers center on god's honor, on god's kingdom, and god's will. That's where his focus was and it put everything else in perspective. And this is what the Lord's prayer does for us. It lifts us up and it reminds us that he is big, that he is the ruler of the universe.
Jeffrey Heine:And he has a great plan that he is executing at this moment. And nothing drives this home more than this 3rd petition that we're looking at tonight in particular, your will be done. Your will be done. This actually tells us a whole lot about the nature of prayer because prayer is not coming to God with a laundry list of things that we need him to do or a list of things that he needs to get us. Prayer is about God, it's about his will.
Jeffrey Heine:There's a guy at the gym that I work out with, and he's an atheist, and you talked to him, and he says, well, one of the reasons he's an atheist is like, because prayer doesn't work. Doesn't work. I, I see all these Christians all the time and they're praying, God, give me a parking space. He's like, like, like that matters and like, it makes a difference. And it just shows that he completely misunderstands what prayer really is.
Jeffrey Heine:Prayer isn't, may my will be done, but prayers made. I will be done And it's not getting God to do everything we want him to do. But it completely turns prayer upside down on its head. It it would for this person. So we're seeking to be part of the bigger picture here, to understand that God's will is vastly more important than what we will.
Jeffrey Heine:Nevertheless, God asked us to pray. He asked us to pray. You know, God could do his will apart from us. There's really no no need for Him to ask us to pray this way. God could just be doing His will, but He says, I'm going to do my will and scripture says, He will do his will.
Jeffrey Heine:Nothing can stop his will. But then he says, I want you to pray for that to happen, that my will would be done. And what that means is, yes, I'm going to do my will, but I'm inviting you to be a part of what I am doing and who I am. I'm bringing you into this, which is an incredible privilege as a child of God. He's inviting us into relationship with him and this tells us about what prayer really is.
Jeffrey Heine:It's, it's jumping on board with God. It's, it's having our heart aligned to, to His. It's recalibrating our heart to where we begin to long for the things that He longs for. We begin to will the things that he wills for. And so in prayer, we need to remember that primarily God is after our heart because he's going to do what he wants to do, but yet he's asking us to join in in prayer.
Jeffrey Heine:Why? Because he's after our hearts. And we have to understand this if we're ever to really understand his words, thy will be done. Because I think so often when people pray that, it's it's almost like the give up prayer. You know, that is It's more of a prayer of resignation, You know?
Jeffrey Heine:Alright. Whatever. Your will be done. You know, it's it's like the the shea Sara. You know, what will be what will be.
Jeffrey Heine:The the American equivalent of that is it is what it is. You know, we just alright. Fine. It is what it is. God, you're gonna do what you're gonna do, and we just kinda resign ourselves to that.
Jeffrey Heine:That's not what Jesus is saying that we should do. He's not saying that we we begrudgingly resign ourselves to God's will. He's saying we need to wholeheartedly embrace it, rejoice in it, accept that his will is for our good. If you believe God is your father, the very first part of this prayer, our father. If you believe He is our father and that He loves you, then you have to understand that when you pray that his will would be done, it will result in your good.
Jeffrey Heine:You have to believe that. No, no matter what your eyes are telling you, no matter what you're feeling at the moment, if you pray God, your will be done, that it will be for your good. Cause that's what a father does is he is all for protecting and giving his children good things. So when we pray for things like if you're single here and you probably have been praying for a while that God would give you a husband or a wife, And so you pray, God, I would really like to be married. I I really I want to be married.
Jeffrey Heine:Nevertheless, your will be done. When you pray that you're, you're not praying, God, I really do want to be married, but whatever happens is is going to happen, and I'm just resigned to it. That's that's not what you're praying. It's not what you're supposed to be praying at that moment. We pray God, I really would like to be married.
Jeffrey Heine:It's it's my desire to be married. However, I want your will. I want your will be to be done in my life because I know that your will and your plan is far better than mine. There is far more good in it than I could ever imagine. So God, may your will be done.
Jeffrey Heine:Hear me on this. When we pray, thy will be done. What we are praying is God in this moment, I want you to ignore my request and I want you to meet my need. I want you to ignore my request and I want you to meet my need. And so, if you are single and you have been praying that God would give you a spouse, what God is gonna do is gonna hear that request, but he very well might ignore it.
Jeffrey Heine:He might ignore it, and instead of giving you a spouse, he's gonna give you what you really need, which is love and affection and acceptance by him. That's your ultimate need. And if he sees that a husband or a wife is the best way to meet that ultimate need, he's going to give it to you. But if he sees it is not the best way to meet that ultimate need, then he's going to withhold that from you in order that he might meet it another way. Listen, God God understands that his greatest adversary is his gifts.
Jeffrey Heine:His greatest adversary is his gifts. And so, if if he just always gave us what we asked for, it could actually push us away from him because we'd be so fixated on the gifts that we would forget the giver. So for me, this is how it works out in my life. As you all know, I've got my bum shoulder with with 7 surgeries. I would love for God to heal my shoulder.
Jeffrey Heine:I would love for him to take away the pain in my shoulder because it's always hurting. And so I pray, God, please take away the pain. And God, here's my request, but it it doesn't mean that he's gonna take away the physical pain. He very well might just ignore that request, but he's going to meet my ultimate need, which is giving me a joy that is not dependent upon any circumstance, a joy that's found in him. That's my ultimate need.
Jeffrey Heine:And if taking away this pain would steer me in that direction and guide me to where I really do find that joy no matter the circumstance, he will do it. But if it doesn't, he will withhold that. Might see that, you know, Joel, if I gave you that gift, you would no longer be crying out to me as often as you cry out to me. And it's really in my presence there is fullness of joy, And so if this is constantly bringing you into my presence, there is your joy. And the more and more I say, Lord, your will be done, I believe that your will be done.
Jeffrey Heine:The more and more I find my ultimate needs being met. And so God very well, he might be ignoring a request in order to give us what we need. Listen, as a father, I have to sift through every one of my children's requests, and I ignore 95% of them. I probably should ignore more. But I reject most of their requests, but I'm always trying to give them what they really need.
Jeffrey Heine:I'm trying to see beyond that request. You know, if I gave my children everything they needed, Caroline would be in Europe for the entire summer because she asked for that. Natalie, I think, would probably have a house made of candy. And, I would never be able to escape Georgia because she would have me reading to her a book 24 hours a day. And and that's just what they would want, but I gotta step back as a father and say, what is it that you're What's what's the underlining needs here?
Jeffrey Heine:Because as a good father, I want to meet that. I know if I just gave them everything they wanted, if they had an entire mountain of toys, it wouldn't meet the need. And so I'm always trying to sift through those and because I'm imperfect, I fail, but your heavenly father never fails. And when we pray your will be done and we rejoice in knowing that when his will is done, it will be for our good and we believe in that it gives God great honor and glory. Now, it's Christmas time, so I want us to see how this prayer really affects the way we view Christmas because really this is centered on the Christmas story, and I'm not trying to stretch that.
Jeffrey Heine:And it's because we see the fruit of this prayer. We see this prayer, and the fruit of this prayer happen in 2 places, and one of them is at the birth of Jesus. One of them is with Mary. If you remember the story back in Luke 1, Gabriel, the angel comes up to Mary and tells her that, hey, you're going to have a child even though you're a virgin, even though you're unmarried. And, and that had to be somewhat of a shocking news, and not the best of news.
Jeffrey Heine:I mean, in our day, having a child out of wedlock, it can be somewhat, you know, kind of embarrassing, But in that culture, it was completely shameful. It was the utmost shame. You would be mocked, and you'd be ridiculed your entire life. Beyond embarrassed. You would be scorned.
Jeffrey Heine:It wasn't exactly good news. She could look into the future as this was being told, and I'm sure she could envision all the different scenarios that were gonna happen. The mocking of the friends, both from from her friends, both to her and to her child. Why do you think Mary left right after she was pregnant? She left her hometown.
Jeffrey Heine:She's a teenager and she, she goes off to be with her cousin. She doesn't want to be around those who know her, asking all the questions and she knows it's gonna happen. Jesus was mocked and ridiculed his whole life about this. You see it in John chapter 8. Jesus has just said one of his most famous sayings.
Jeffrey Heine:I am the light of the world, and the people's response to this was stinging and it was meant to humiliate him. They said, Jesus, tell us, where's your father? I mean, we're, we're children of God. We're children of Abraham. Where's exactly is your father, Jesus, to sting him.
Jeffrey Heine:1 chapter later in John 9, Jesus is preaching to the crowds and he speaks, that he says that I speak only what I have seen and heard from the father. And their response was this, you know what Jesus? We weren't born from sexual immorality. Jab, sting. Jesus felt that his whole life.
Jeffrey Heine:And as Mary is getting this news from the angel that we always just think, great news. She's gotta be thinking of these things. This is going to be my life. Here's her response. Behold, I'm a servant of the Lord.
Jeffrey Heine:Let it be to me according to your word. Mary responded to God by saying, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. May the heavenly son come and be born into this earth through me. May your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Even though she knew it will bring a whole lot of pain, she recognized that ultimately it was going to be for her joy and not just her joy, but our salvation.
Jeffrey Heine:So this was uttered at the beginning of Jesus's life, and it was uttered at the end of his life in Gethsemane. And Jesus prayed this prayer in the garden, there in the garden, this was Jesus' final moments before he's about to be crucified. He's about to be arrested, and Jesus goes to his father and he prays. And we read this in Matthew 26. Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to his disciples, sit here while I go over there and pray and taking with him, Peter and the 2 sons of Zebedee, he began to be sorrowful and troubled.
Jeffrey Heine:Then he said to them, my soul is very sorrowful even to death. Remain here and watch with me and going a little farther. He fell on his face and prayed saying, my father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will. And he came to the disciples and found them sleeping.
Jeffrey Heine:And he said to Peter, so could you not watch with me 1 hour? Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit is indeed willing, but the flesh is weak. Again, for the second time, he went away and prayed, my father, if this cannot pass, unless I drink it, your will be done. And again, he came and found them sleeping in their eyes were very heavy.
Jeffrey Heine:So leaving them again, he went away and prayed for a third time saying the same words again, father, not my will. May your will be done. Now there's not a person here that can even come close to imagining the suffering that Jesus is experiencing in this moment. I am here in the garden. He's getting a taste and it's really just a taste of what awaits him, a taste of the abandonment, a taste of the agony that awaits him on the cross.
Jeffrey Heine:And just this taste makes him sorrowful to the point of, of, of death. So stressed that his capillaries began busting and he's sweating drops of blood according to Luke. When this happened, Jesus, he wanted out, says, father, if there's any other way, I, I know we were, we were heading this way all along, but now that we're here and now that I'm getting a taste of this, I really, really, really don't want to go through with this. If if there's any other way, can can I get out? Nevertheless, your will be done.
Jeffrey Heine:He prays that prayer 3 times. He really doesn't want to go through with this And it's, it's in this prayer that you really see the miracle of Christmas before you, because there's no other place in scripture that so fully demonstrates both Jesus's humanity and his deity than in this prayer at this moment, where we see him fully human and fully divine. Here is the word made flesh. I mean, Jesus is God and and so he should have the same desire as God. Right?
Jeffrey Heine:But here, we we see he has a different desire. But he's God, yet he has a different desire. Where does that come from? It's his human nature. I tell you, I have a hard time identifying with Jesus when he's, you know, walking on water, you know, healing blind people when he's calming storms.
Jeffrey Heine:I have a really hard time, But when it comes to self preservation, when it comes to wanting to avoid suffering, well, that's about as human as you get. And I can identify with Jesus there and the emotions he's going through. And so here, we see his human nature in full display. I I don't wanna die. I don't want to suffer.
Jeffrey Heine:Is there is there any other way? Jesus was fully human. This is the word made flesh. Yet he prays not my will, but thy will be done. God became flesh and was born in a manger 2000 years ago for that moment.
Jeffrey Heine:And it's here out of this deep agony of Jesus. Then when he says, God, not what I want, but what you want. I know it's best, and I know it's for my good. Do it. The fruit of that obedience was our salvation, and it was also Jesus's joy.
Jeffrey Heine:It was both. We we find I'll just read you 2 amazing verses from Hebrews. Hebrews 5 says, in the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to him who was able to save him from death, And he was heard because of his reverence. Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered and being made perfect. He became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey him.
Jeffrey Heine:God's will was that he would suffer so that he might learn obedience just as we have to learn obedience, so that he might have the full human experience. And he was made perfect in that. And through that, he became the source of eternal salvation to everyone who believes. And then he was given great joy, a joy that would have been denied him if he had not gone through this. But in Hebrews 12, we read that it was for the joy set before Jesus that he endured the cross.
Jeffrey Heine:So Jesus knew that submitting to God's will in that moment over what he wanted in that moment, but submitting to that would result in his joy and our salvation. Let me tell you, with the spirit of God living inside of us now, that same spirit that cried, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That same spirit is in us. And this should mean for us a radical life of obedience to where we look at the things that God might be calling us to do or things that God might be calling us to walk through. And what we can see is, God, I trust you in this that although I don't see anything for my good, I know that you're my father and you have a great plan for me, and I go through with this in confidence, your will be done.
Jeffrey Heine:And then we see the fruit of that being joy and salvation. This is what we celebrate tonight when we come to the Lord's table. We celebrate that moment when we saw the precursor of it when Jesus was sweating drops of blood. Later, he poured blood, poured it out on Calvary. On the night that Jesus was betrayed, he took bread and he broke it.
Jeffrey Heine:He said, this is my body broken for you. Same way he took the cup and said, this wine is my blood spilled out for your forgiveness. This is the wine of the new covenant. And as often as we eat this bread and we drink of this cup, we proclaim his death until he comes again or until the second advent when Christ returns. Pray with me now.
Jeffrey Heine:Our Lord Jesus. You became flesh. You became touchable, vulnerable, killable. We remember that now in this moment, or we praise you because you are a 100% God and you're a 100% human. You're both.
Jeffrey Heine:You're unique and you deserve all our worship. We thank you for this tangible reminder we have as we partake your broken body and blood. Thank you Lord Jesus. We pray this in your name. Amen.
