Sermon on the Mount

Okay, brethren, do you want to be sure that your spiritual house is built on a firm foundation? You know, this is something we've been talking about now for a number of weeks, and I hope we are really taking this seriously because how we build our spiritual house is all important. There's really nothing more important because it's going to depend on whether or not we live forever or if perhaps we will be cast in the lake of fire. If we don't take seriously the words of Jesus Christ, the words that he said on the Sermon on the Mount, then it's not going to go well for us in the future. So they are very important words. That's why we're taking so long to go through this. I wanted to be sure that we understood these words from Christ.

It makes good sense to study them in detail because these are words that were condensed, the most important things, perhaps, that Christ said throughout his ministry, condensed in just a few chapters in the Bible. So as Christians, we do need to hark into these words and make sure that we're living by them. So today we're going to continue Christ's foundational teaching. Today we're going to talk about two very important topics.

First of all, the godly and proper way to give to others, and also the godly and proper way to pray.

So these are both very important topics. The Jews believed that there were three great pillars on which the good life was based. They considered almsgiving, giving to others, giving to the poor, and the needy. Prayer and fasting is the three most important duties that they had. Now that's not something that you can go to the Bible, but that's how the Jews felt about it. I mean, they are biblical principles, obviously, but whether or not they're the three most important, I'm sure that could be debated. But they are certainly important. And Christ addresses all three of these, almsgiving, prayer, and fasting in the sixth chapter of the book of Matthew. During the Sermon on the Mount, of course, Christ had no problems with his followers giving alms, helping the poor, praying and fasting. But he did have a problem because he realized that some of their motives behind their giving, behind their praying, behind their fasting were really not pure. And so he addresses that in the sixth chapter of the book of Matthew. So let's go to Matthew 6. Matthew 6, and let's consider what Christ does say about giving to others, about giving to the poor and to the needy, and especially about how we ought to pray. Verse 1, take heed that you do not do your charitable deeds before a man to be seen by them. Otherwise, you have no reward from your Father in heaven.

Therefore, when you do a charitable deed, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory from men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. But when you do a charitable deed, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, that your charitable deed may be in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will himself reward you openly. So let's talk about these principles in these first four verses of the book of Matthew. Here, Christ warns us to be careful how we handle our giving to others. It's obvious that we should take care of the poor and the needy amongst us. There are many, many scriptures in the Bible that we could go to that point out how serious God is about helping the poor, helping the needy, being generous. So Christ warns us to be careful how we handle our giving. We should not seek to bring attention to ourselves when we help others. I mean, that should go without saying, I suppose, but humanly, people have a tendency to want to be noticed. We should do these things as quietly as possible because the important thing is that those who are in need have their needs met, not that we are noticed for helping others. To many, giving alms or helping someone was the most sacred of religious duties. In fact, some made it synonymous with righteousness. You weren't really righteous if you were not helping the poor, you were not giving to the poor and taking care of their needs. If it isn't our power to help the poor and the needy, we ought to help them as quietly and as anonymously as possible. And I would say that it's probably in our power to help someone who's probably poorer than we are, needier than we are. We live in a very, very prosperous country at a very prosperous time, and we have much more than the average person in the world has. So it would behoove every single one of us to make sure that we're giving something to help those who are poorer than we are, that are in greater need than we are.

So none of us really are exempt from giving and from helping others.

Clearly, there is a reward that God has for those who genuinely give from the heart. This should not be something that we do out of obligation.

It should be something that we really desire to do, that we really have a heart to help others, to sacrifice of ourselves for the good of others. Ultimately, the reward that we'll have for giving to others is eternal life in God's kingdom. I mean, ultimately, it's that important. If we are selfish and miserly, then will we even be in God's kingdom?

It's a question that we should ask ourselves. God may choose to bless those who give unselfishly in a variety of physical and spiritual ways, but those blessings are not spelled out for us. We don't know exactly how God's going to give to us, but again, that's not the important thing. However, Christ was not bashful about saying that God would reward us openly. God does reward those who diligently seek Him.

It only makes sense. I mean, we reward our children when they do good things. We want to encourage them to do more good things. So, it's not wrong to reward someone for a good deed, but it's not something that we should be seeking for ourselves.

God wants us to know that He does reward those who diligently seek Him. One of the ways that we can diligently seek God is by being aware of the needs of others. So, every one of us should try to develop in ourselves an awareness of what's going on around us. We should strive to know those around us, those who do need help, those perhaps who haven't been working for maybe weeks or months through no fault of their own. They've been trying to get a job.

They just haven't been able to do it. We should be aware of those types of things, and then we should strive to help and try to ascertain whatever needs there are. The Greek word for hypocrite, Christ called them hypocrites. The Greek word for hypocrite is hypokrites. It is the word for actor. In this context, this is a person who puts on an act of giving that he might bring glory upon himself.

That's really what he's interested in. He's not really so concerned about the person who needs the help. He's acting apart so that he can have some kind of reward for doing something he thinks God will bless.

But he's not doing it really from the heart to help others. He's doing it so that he might draw some notoriety that God might notice him or that other people might notice him. God says he has his reward.

If you are doing something and do it in such a way that you're going to be known of others, then that is the reward. Some people might think you to be a generous person or a righteous person. If we can do it quietly, anonymously, that's obviously the best way to go about helping others.

Remember that God does love a cheerful giver as well, so whatever we should strive to give should be done cheerfully. It should not be done in a begrudging way. Otherwise, again, we have our reward. Whatever reward we might get from someone noticing that we're trying to help someone, at least, God looks deeper into our hearts. He knows our heart. He knows our mind. You know, the Scripture says that the heart is deceitful above all things, and it's desperately wicked.

The human heart has a tendency to want to be noticed. There's a prideful tendency in all of us, so we have to be careful that that's not what's motivating us and that we really are caring for others. It's also important to remember the example in the Bible of the widow. Remember the widow who gave her two mites? She had very little.

In fact, she gave of her substance. She was poor, extremely poor, but she understood that you can't really out-give God. And if she was willing to give of the little that she had, there would be a reward for that. But that was not her focus. Her focus truly was on helping others. You all heard the adage, you can't take it with you, right? Well, you really can't take it with you. So, I think too many people die with too much. You know, they'd really almost hoard things.

It's good to store up some for your children and your grandchildren. That's a biblical principle. But at the same time, we should be aware of those who are needy right now who could use help and we should be willing to help them. That's what Christ is saying here in the Sermon on the Mount. Also, let's go to Luke 12 and let's consider the example of the rich man who continued to hoard for himself things for merrymaking in the future.

He was really not looking out for others. He was certainly looking out for himself. Luke 12, verse 13, then one from the crowd said to him, teacher, tell my brother to divide the inheritance with me. So, here's a man who's concerned about his inheritance. Probably the other person is concerned too, his brother. And too often, we see family members that will fight over an inheritance. Verse 14, but he said to him, Christ said to him, man, who made me a judge or an arbitrator over you?

You know, Christ really didn't try to get into everyone's business.

Christ, I believe, felt that people should be able to make good decisions on their own. That they didn't have to always look to him for all the answers. You know, we should look to Christ for his guidance and his direction, but he's not going to make our decisions for us. We need to make those decisions. We're free moral agents. Verse 15, Christ gives us the instruction that we need so we can make the decisions. Verse 15, and he said to them, take heed and beware of covetousness. That's one of the 10 commandments, the last commandment, the 10th one. Thou shalt not covet. Take heed and beware of covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses. Then he spoke a parable to them, saying, the ground of a certain rich man yielded plentifully. God was blessing this certain rich man. There was rain in due season. There were many crops that yielded plentifully. And he thought within himself, the man thought within himself, saying, what shall I do since I have no room to store my crops? No doubt he already had a lot of storage. He had a lot of things that he already had accumulated. Instead of giving the excess away and helping other people, he said in verse 18, I will do this. I will pull down my barns. Okay, he put up these barns with considerable expense, no doubt. He says, I'll pull down my barns and I'll build greater barns, bigger barns. And there I will store all my crops and my goods. I will store them for myself. And I will say to my soul, soul, you have many goods laid up for many years. Take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said to him, fool, this night your soul will be required of you. Then whose will those things be which you have provided? In other words, what good will all of these goods that you stored up, what good will it do? It's going to go to someone else. I don't know if he had children or not. It doesn't say that he had anyone to even pass this on to. Verse 21, so is he who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God. And we're not going to take the time to read further, but it goes on to show that we really should not worry about tomorrow because God will provide for us. God will take care of us. Now there's a godly balance here. It's okay to set aside a little bit for rainy days. It's okay to set aside a little bit for children and grandchildren.

But we should also be giving to others along the way. That's the example that Christ shows us here from this parable, that we should not be like this person who stores up all of these riches and is not willing to share those riches with others.

Now let's go back to Matthew 6. Let's read a little bit further. So we've talked about the importance of giving, the importance of being a cheerful giver, not giving begrudgingly, being willing to sacrifice for others, and also that every one of us is in a position to give. Every single person here is in a position to give to those who are poorer or in worse shape financially than we are. None of us are exempt. Now, back to Matthew 6.

Matthew 6 and verse 5, And when you pray, Christ is instructing his disciples, And when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites, again, those who are play-acting. For they love to pray, standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. As surely I say to you, they have their reward. Again, their reward is that they are seen by men. They have the praise of men. Some people may see that example and think they're such righteous people, but deep inside, they're really not righteous at all.

They love to pray, standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. As surely I say to you, they have their reward. But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place, and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. He will answer your prayers. He may not answer all of your prayers, but for sure he'll answer some of your prayers, especially if they're unselfish prayers, if you really care about other people and you're praying for them. Certainly, God is going to answer those prayers as he sees fit, and certainly many times he will answer your prayers for the benefit and the good of the person you're praying for.

Verse 7, And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions, as the heathen do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Therefore, do not be like them, for your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him. God is fully aware of what we need and what other people need and what we should be praying for. Just because God knows it doesn't mean we shouldn't pray, though, does it? Because the instruction is clear that we ought to pray, but we should not just rotely pray, and it's not nearly as important the time that we spend praying as the quality that we spend as we pray. The quality in which we pray. So let's talk about these verses that we just read. Christ said, And when you pray. So clearly, He expects us to pray, doesn't He? When you pray. We should all be praying daily. That's the example in the Bible. The example in the Bible is not just praying once a day, but praying three times a day. Daniel prayed three times a day. Others set that example of praying throughout the day, praying without ceasing, always having this mind of prayerful mind, a prayerful attitude, as we go through our day, considering God and everything that we do.

So when you pray, we are expected to pray. He certainly did, and we should follow His example. Christ set the example of prayer. At times, He even prayed all night long. He fasted for 40 days and 40 nights, and He prayed during that time, right before He was tempted of Satan the devil. He prayed all night long before He was crucified. Jesus set the example of praying.

No nation had a higher ideal of prayer than the Jews. And that's to be expected, isn't it? Because they knew the true God. God revealed Himself to the Jews, or to the Israelites, to the children of Israel. And it's understandable that they had no higher ideal of prayer, because they understood to a large degree who the true God truly is.

Now, they didn't all understand it for sure. And a lot of the Jews did not accept Jesus Christ as their Savior. They didn't see that Jesus was the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They obviously overlooked something very, very important. God did not reveal that to all of them. Some of them, certainly the first Christians, were Jews. But God quickly began to graft in Gentiles.

The no nation had a higher ideal of prayer than the Jews. No religion made prayer a higher priority.

The Jews had a saying, He who prays within his house surrounds it with a wall that is stronger than iron. Prayer is powerful. We should be praying for our households. We should be praying for our loved ones, for our wives, our husbands, our children. We should be praying for our families. And we should be very serious about praying and not taking it for granted and not neglecting it. To neglect to pray is also actually a sin. I'm not going to take the time, but there's a place, I believe it's in 1 Samuel, where basically it shows that it's a sin not to pray. To neglect prayer is a sinful act. So we should all take seriously the times each day that we ought to be praying. But we must not be like the hypocrites. That's what Christ said. Do not be like the hypocrites. We know that God resists the proud. The hypocrites were filled with pride.

God resists the proud, but He listens to the prayers of the humble who approach Him in a humble manner and in a humble way. Those who like to be seen of men and praise for their devotion, for their piety, they have their reward, as we already mentioned. They have the praise of men, but they do not have the praise of God. We shouldn't seek the approval of men, but certainly we should seek God's approval. If we meet His approval, then everything else is going to work out just fine.

Christ said, do not use vain repetitions. The heathen pagan cultures were known for their long and repetitive prayers. They were also very superstitious in their prayers, and they would say things over and over and over again. You might remember in the book of Acts, chapter 19, when they were in Ephesus, the pagans cried out, Great is Diana, or Artemis, of the Ephesians. And they said the same thing over and over for two hours until they worked themselves into a veritable frenzy. It was a mob mentality. And, of course, that was the type of thing that the pagans would often do. They would even cut themselves and do these things. They would cut their flesh. That isn't what God expects us to do. He wants us to pray sincerely from the heart, and He's going to show us how to pray. He's going to show us the manner in which we should pray, and we'll get to that momentarily. Now, according to William Barclay in his commentary on the Gospel of Matthew on page 197, he says, The Jewish system of prayer made ostentation very easy. An outward show was very easy in regard to the Jewish system. It wasn't God's system. This was Judaism. It was a man-made system. They weren't truly following the examples that are given in the Bible. The Jews prayed standing. This was common practice. They prayed standing with their hands stressed out, palms upward, with their heads bowed, and it was an ostentatious show of prayer. Prayer was to be said at 9 o'clock in the morning, at noon, and at 3 p.m. So they had the three times a day down, but they did not have the manner of their prayers correct. And it doesn't have to be at a set time, either. So their prayers had to be said wherever a man might be. So wherever you happen to be at 9 o'clock, or at noon, or at 3 o'clock, that's when they would pray. So it was easy for a man to make sure that at those hours he was on a busy street corner, where he could easily be seen praying, or he was at the, perhaps, the top steps going into the synagogue.

So everyone on the outside could see him, and probably those on the inside could see him as well. It was easy for a man to pray in a lengthy way and demonstrate how truly righteous he wasn't by taking this approach. It was easy to put on an act of prayer which all the world might see.

That was the kind of show of prayer that many Jews would put on, not those who were truly converted. They knew better. Christ knew better. There is a godly balance in everything that we do, and it seems it's man's way to go way overboard or to go way under what they should be doing.

Godly balance is what God wants us, and Christ shares with us a godly balance in the Sermon on the Mount. He said, your father knows the things that you have need of before you ask him. Okay, that's fundamental to know. God is omnipotent. He's omniscient. He's all-powerful. He knows what we need, but of course, he also does want to hear us say it. But we don't have to say it over and over and over and over again, necessarily.

There's a balance that we should have in our prayers.

It is possible to go overboard, be laboring those things that you believe you need.

You may do that to the neglect of other important matters. You should spend time with your family, with your children. You have to work. You have other responsibilities. So, again, there's a balance in the time that we have with God, and it should be based on a close relationship with God. We should have a good feel for when we've prayed, perhaps enough.

God will help you understand what you should be doing and try to have a godly balance in all this. Now, this sample or model prayer that we're going to go through next is given to His disciples by Jesus Christ. His followers are to pray in the manner of this prayer. So, we can learn a lot from considering this sample prayer, this model prayer, by studying the elements of this prayer from our Lord and our Master. So, let's continue in verse 9 of Matthew 6. In this manner, therefore, pray, 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 forgive our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. Now, this is not a very lengthy prayer, is it?

Now, I don't think that means all of our prayers need to be this short.

I don't think that's what Christ was saying, but on the other hand, we don't have to overdo it, you might say. You know, we don't have to overdo it. We have to have a proper, godly balance in the prayers that we give. So, let's talk about this. Our Father in heaven. This is how our God wants to be addressed. He wants us to look at Him as our Father.

Our Father not here on earth, but our Father in heaven. God is not our human Father. We have a human Father here on the earth. Our relationship with our heavenly Father is going to be different from the relationship that we have with our earthly fleshly Father, but there will be many similarities as well. And, of course, the better relationship that we have with our earthly Father, certainly it does help in relating to our heavenly Father. So, for you Fathers out there, it is very important that you have a close relationship with your children, that you cultivate that relationship, that you spend not only quality time, but enough time. You don't want the song, Cats in the Cradle, to be true about you, and to perpetuate that from generation to generation. You want to have a close relationship with your sons, with your daughters, and you want them to also have a close relationship with their sons and their daughters, not making other things more important than they are.

Our families should be extremely high priorities. Having that close relationship with our children is a must. And all of our children, you set such an example for your children that, if you're not really seriously considering the kind of example that you set, you really need to start doing that more faithfully. Every day, you should probably be praying that God will help you set the right example for your children. It's that important. It should be something that we do daily. And if we're doing that daily, then we're going to do all right. We're going to do well with our children if we're thinking about it on a daily basis, if we're praying about it, if we're cognizant of the type of example that we're setting throughout the day, and if we're making it a priority to make sure that we spend some quality time with our children, there really isn't, except for God Himself, our children should be right there. You know, God deserves our utmost devotion, but our wives, our husbands, our children, our families should be right up there under God. I know we have to probably spend more time working in many respects, although there are 24 hours a day, and most of us only work eight or ten hours a day. So there is ample time to make sure we're spending with our children if we make it a priority. So it is very, very important how we approach our Father in heaven.

Our earthly Father is to provide for us, right? That's what we expect. An earthly Father is to provide for His family, for His wife, for His children. He is to be sure to see that the family has adequate food, adequate clothing, adequate shelter, but more importantly, in many ways, He is to provide strength for the family. He is to provide an example of faith, of comfort, of stability, of loyalty, of protection. The kind of example that a Father sets affects a child greatly in a wife. They're going to be a lot more secure if they know they're being well taken care of, and that they're high on the priority list for the husband, for the Father. Well, children are smaller. They especially depend on their earthly fathers. It's very important that from day one, we set the right example. I vividly remember when my daughter was born. I had been in the church a while. I came in the church when I was 18. I think I was probably 24 when my daughter was born. Let me think. No, I was older than that, wasn't I? 1981, I was born in 55. You can figure it out. 26? Yeah, I was 26 years old.

I remember on that first day, right after she'd been born, I started teaching her the Ten Commandments. She was just an hour old, and I was starting to teach her the Ten Commandments. I don't know if I did as good a job from then on as I did that very first hour, but at least I had the desire to teach my children God's way. My wife and I both put a very high priority on teaching our children God's way. Our children know God's way. They've been taught. They have a good foundation. That's all we as parents can do. We do our part. It's up to the children what they do with what they've been given. But we need to make sure that we're not going to look back and feel guilty about our parenting. It's very important, especially you young moms and dads that are just getting started or are not too far into the process. If you haven't been doing a very good job, now's the time to start doing a good job and continuing to do a good job in making it a high, high priority. God wants us to look at Him as His, as our Heavenly Father.

Much more than a human Father provides for His family, God will provide for you, and He will provide for me. And we have to have faith in that. We have to know that that's true. If a Father neglects His children, they will certainly suffer for it. Thankfully, God never neglects His children. God the Father does not neglect His children. He has promised that He will never leave us, and He will never forsake us, underlying the word never, not for an instant. Will God ever leave you or forsake you? He's always there with you through your trials. And I know trials can be very, very severe. They can be very, very difficult for a human being. They can be devastating. But we should always remember that God has promised to never leave us, to never forsake us. He's always there. And God has the power to always be there. So that's one thing that we never need to doubt. We never need to doubt that. Of course, it's easy to doubt it. And Satan wants us to doubt it. He wants us to doubt it all the time. But that's one thing that you really need to ingrain in your character. Know that God is always there for you. That He will never leave you. That He will never forsake you. And that you can always count on Him. It doesn't mean He's going to do exactly what you want. But He's there.

And He's aware of what's going on. And ultimately, He will be there for eternity, for us. So, no matter what happens, we have to believe in that and know that that's the case. Paul said he learned to be content in whatever situation he found himself in, whether it was in shipwrecked out in the middle of the ocean. He knew that God had not left him and God had not forsaken him. Even when he was being stoned, perhaps to death one time, God was with him. God had never left him nor forsaken him. Finally, we know he was martyred. He was killed. And God allowed that to happen. But I'm quite confident that Paul died knowing that God was right there with him. Because the most important thing is God's eternal Kingdom. It's not what happens on this earth. It's hard for us to get that into our heads. It's difficult. It's normal that we can't see it that way, especially in the face of trials. But I have faith that that is the way it is.

I mean, that's at the core of everything, isn't it? Trusting that God is always there. That God will never leave us. That he will never forsake us. God is omnipotent. He's all-powerful. He's almighty. His Spirit, the Scripture says, is everywhere. It's always there for us. So, it's always near to us. Back to human fathers. Humanly, sometimes we do neglect to do things that we should do. All we can do is repent of that and change as quickly as possible and as often as we need to. We're all far from perfect, so we have to repent on a regular basis. But we will do better if we have that approach. You know, even when a family is poor, if the father is there for support spiritually, then the family is far better off than having great riches. Great riches are not nearly as important as the example that a good father and mother set for their family and that care that they give. The needs that are fulfilled. Children need love more than they need riches, more than they need fancy clothes or fancy shoes or anything else. They need our love and they need our attention. They need our time. If a father may have difficulty providing financially and physically for his family, but he's always struggling for them and striving to do better, his children see that. They appreciate that. That's more important than any riches that he could provide for them. Now, our Heavenly Father provides all that we need, but, of course, he does not force himself upon us. He has promised us the written word of God for our instruction, for our guidance. We can read this Bible and we can know that in here are the words of life. Everything that we need is in the Bible. Really, everything that we truly need is in the Bible. The most important things are all in the Bible. They're contained here.

As I said, he's promised to never leave us or forsake us in the Bible. We know that he sent his Son to die for us. We know that for God so loved the world that he gave his only Son. It's not just words in a book. It's true. These are the words of life. This is a very special book written by a very special person, inspired by a very special, unique person, God Almighty. We are told by God to honor our earthly parents. There's a reward for honoring our earthly parents. How much more should we honor and reverence our Heavenly Father?

So we should go to God in prayer every day just because we honor him and reverence him. To neglect doing that is tremendous neglect, really. If you really want to think about it, getting down on your knees and showing the proper honor and respect for the one who makes it all possible, that should be something you do on a daily basis. It isn't something that you should allow to be crowded out. It should be a very, very high priority.

God resists the proud, but he does listen to the prayers of the humble who do approach him in a humble manner, who approach him lovingly as a child approaches his earthly father.

Those who like to be seen of men and praise for their devotion, they have their reward. They have the praise of men, but they do not have God's praise. We should not seek the approval of men, but of God, of God our Father and, of course, his Son Jesus Christ. If we meet God's approval, if we meet Christ's approval, then everything else is going to be just fine. In prayer, our relationship with God the Father and Jesus Christ should be all-important. How do we see? How do we perceive our Heavenly Father? Do we perceive Him as the loving Father that He really is? Do you see God as the one who has loved you so much that He gave His only Son to die for you and for other sinners like you? Do you trust Him? Do you love Him? Do you honor and reverence Him? Do you see Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, as your elder brother, who laid His life down for you, out of genuine love for you? We are told to honor God when we pray.

Our Father in heaven hallowed be your name. Holy is your name is the next part of this. God's name is holy, not so much because of any magical words, but it's because the name reflects God's very being. It reflects His character. He is the Almighty. There are many names for God, and all of them put together show God's character. God is holy in His conduct in every way. God has never sinned. He never will sin. He can't sin. Obviously, we should strive to emulate the Father in our conduct. We should strive to develop His character. When people say your name, what do they think of? If your name is Joe, you know someone with the name Joe? I don't know if there's anyone. I don't know if we have any Joes here or not. I think there aren't many Joes here, anyway, so let's use Joe.

When you think of Joe, you think of the way Joe is. I know some Joes, and I think of what they're like. I think if they're friendly, I think if they're trustworthy, if they're faithful. I don't really think of the pronunciation of the name. I don't think of how it's spelled, necessarily. I think more of what's behind the name, the character of the person, what he's like. How it would be God's name because God is holy. God is perfect. When we say or hear the word God, we naturally think of the God that's revealed in the Bible, don't we?

We think of all that we've read about God. We think of all the times we've considered God and what he's doing. We think of God as the Creator God. We think of his goodness. We think of his perfection, his power. We're in awe of God because God has made all of this. He's created everything, the universe and people, human beings. He's created everything and he sustains our lives.

The better we know and understand the Bible, the better we're going to know God and his character.

The more we study the Bible, the better we're going to understand who God is. And when we understand his plan, we know him better. God reveals his plan to us. There's a very special relationship with those whom God is calling now. That doesn't mean that others can't have a very good relationship with God. I believe there are many people who have a pretty good relationship even though God has not yet called them. You know, I don't know about you, but I really believe that there are people out there that do have a relationship with God and that we're not the only ones on earth that have a relationship. I think other people do. I think God loves them. You know, God cares for them. He's not calling them now, but he hasn't totally, completely cut them off and neglected them in every way. I think we would be naive to believe that. I think there's plenty of evidence that God works as he chooses to work in people's lives. He answers the prayers of some people that are not in this hall right today, in this area. I mean, I have no question of that. God is the one who chooses to do what he desires to do and what he wills to do, and he knows everyone's heart. I don't know everyone's heart. God knows their heart. A lot of people study the Bible pretty diligently. Do you think that doesn't make any difference in how they live their lives? Of course it makes a difference. We in the church think of God and Christ collectively when we hear the name of God. We understand that Christ is also God, as mentioned in John 1, verse 1, and the first several verses in the book of John, John chapter 1, we know that Jesus Christ said, I and my Father are one. We understand that means they are in complete unity with each other, and both God the Father and God the Son. Jesus Christ are perfect and they're all powerful. When we think of one, we are really thinking of both, aren't we? When we think of the Father, we naturally think of the Son. I and my Father are one. No one can come to me unless the Father draws him, Christ said, and no one can know the Father unless the Son reveals the Father to them.

So they work in conjunction. They work together. They're completely unified in their approach. Now, the Jews considered God's name as sacred. So sacred, they wouldn't try to say it. And they even lost track of it. They lost track of how to pronounce God's name in Hebrew. I suppose that was what they first learned it in, at least the children of Israel, the Hebrews. So they stopped saying the vowels. And then it became the YHVH, which is referred to as the tetragrammaton, the eternal that we find in our Bibles. But the important part is to be sure that you reverence God himself, that you reverence who he is, who his character is, not how you pronounce his name. They lost track of how to pronounce his name. I don't know that anyone really knows exactly how it should be pronounced in Hebrew. But, you know, my name is Mark in English, but I don't have a problem if someone calls me Marcos in Spanish, or if they call me Marcus in German, or Marco in Italian. God's not hung up on exactly how we pronounce and refer to him as long as we know who he is. That's the important thing. We need to know who the God of the Bible is, and that's who we should pray to, and that's who we should look to.

He said, pray your kingdom come. Pray that God's kingdom come and long for the establishment of God's government and kingdom upon the earth. This world is under the sway of the God of this world. It's under Satan's sway. Mankind is suffering so greatly in so many ways. We should pray, thy kingdom come. We should all desperately and fervently pray God's kingdom come, because the answers aren't here in this earth. It may be nice for us. We may have a great life. I mean, I'm enjoying my life. I'm not in any hurry, in some ways, for Christ to return, except that I know it's going to be better for all of us when Christ returns. It's going to be better for everyone, and it's going to be so much better for some people who are suffering daily in so many different ways. I mean, we are so very blessed in this country, and it's really easy for us to lose sight of how desperately we need God's kingdom to be established upon the earth. So pray fervently that God's kingdom come, long for the establishment of his government and his kingdom upon the earth.

Satan is the God of this world, and he has polluted this world greatly. We are to pray your will be done. Pray that God's will be done on this earth as it's done in heaven.

God's will is done perfectly in heaven. The holy angels, the 24 elders, the living creatures that it talks about in the book of Revelation, they all do God's will perfectly. It is here on earth where Satan, the demons, and mankind are disobedient, and not doing God's will. To pray for God's kingdom to come is to pray for God's will to be done. We desperately need the return of our Savior Jesus Christ. Give us this day our daily bread we are to pray. We should pray for our daily bread that God will provide our daily needs. God wants to hear it from us. He wants us to pray that we look to Him. We depend upon Him for our daily needs. So we should be praying daily for sustenance, for help, for the food that we need, that God will sustain us and provide for us each day of our lives. We should have faith that God is going to provide our every need. Bread was very, very important in ancient times. It was a major staple. And also, remember that God sent the living bread. He sent manna from heaven to feed the children of Israel while they were in the wilderness. There are very important lessons to be learned when we consider the bread from heaven, the manna that God sent. Just briefly, manna comes directly from God. If it were not for God, there would not have been any manna. It was a miracle that the manna was sent to the children of Israel. Manna comes directly from God. Our sustenance comes directly from God. God's behind it all. We owe everything to God. Manna comes exactly as God promised. Remember, the children of Israel doubted God's Word. Manna was sent six days. They were told to gather twice as much on the preparation day, on the sixth day. They were not to go out on the Sabbath. The manna was not going to be there on the Sabbath. If they gathered too much, then it would rot. It would breed worms. It would stink. They were told what to do, and they were to follow those instructions exactly, and they were to have faith that God would send it exactly as He promised. Manna is living bread. It does bring life. It brought the children of Israel life. It sustained them in a wilderness that would have killed them otherwise.

And manna is sufficient. The bread that God gives is sufficient. Some of them complained about the bread. They wanted greater variety. They wanted other things, but the manna was sufficient. God always provides what we need. What He gives us is sufficient for our needs.

We are told to pray, forgive us our debts. As we forgive our debtors, we should ask God to forgive our debts. We are indebted to God in so many different ways. Sometimes we are indebted to other people.

We should ask God to forgive our debts, to forgive our sins against Him, the things that we've done against Him, the sins that we have committed.

And remember that God forgives us in the same manner that we are willing to forgive others, others who have wronged us in various ways. We have all wronged God. Our sins made it necessary for Jesus Christ to die. Our sins made it necessary for His sacrifice to be made. We are to be a merciful, forgiving people if we expect God to be that way toward us. These are things that we should be praying for daily, asking God to forgive our sins on a daily basis. Because very likely, we sin on a daily basis. If not in the letter, we sin in the Spirit. Our thoughts go astray.

So we should be praying that God would forgive us on a daily basis.

And we should try to be mindful of our sins. And when we commit them, we should ask God immediately to forgive us our sins. These wrong thoughts that we have, that we dwelled upon too long, those things become sin. And we need to repent of them. So we should pray that God will forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. We should pray, do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. That should be something we pray every day. And we pray that fervently because we need that protection, don't we? We need that protection from Satan every day. We should have faith that God will deliver us from that temptation.

We know that God does allow Satan to tempt us, but again, not above what we are able when we rely upon God. When we depend upon God, then he gives us the strength that we need to overcome any temptation that Satan can bring upon us. God will provide the strength to overcome and to resist Satan. In James, it says, resist the devil and he will flee from you. That's what we need to do. We need to resist him. We need to pray daily that God will not allow Satan to tempt us to sin.

He may allow Satan to tempt us, but not to sin.

We should not follow Satan. We should ask for God to give us the strength and the help not to give in. God tests our character. He tests our spiritual strength and wellness by allowing us to be tested by Satan the devil. He also gives us, again, the help and the strength that we need to overcome Satan, to overcome our own human nature, to overcome the pride of life, the lust of the flesh. These are things that God gives us the strength to overcome if we are daily in prayer and always close to him. But humanly, do we not all neglect this at times? Am I the only one who neglects praying in the manner that I should? This is a difficult thing to pray in the manner that we really ought to pray every single day, three times a day, faithfully, day in and day out, not becoming weary in well-doing but fervently praying. And when we go back and look at this prayer, let's consider again, do you see any eyes in here? Do you see anything about, Father, give me this or I want this or I want that? Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. First, we start out by praising God, by honoring God, by referencing God. Hallowed be your name. Holy is your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done. We start out by looking to God and praising Him. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us, not just give me, but give all of us. And that's how we should pray. We should pray for one another. We should realize that we're all in this together and that God hears our prayers when we pray for each other. God doesn't hear our prayers so much if it's all about me, me, me, and I, I, I. But if it's our, our, and you, and us, others, then God does hear those prayers. Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our debts. Again, it's not about us particularly, just me. It's not about me. It's about all of us together. Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. Do not lead us into temptation. We should pray for each other that God would not allow Satan to tempt any of us.

To be a strong church, we need everyone praying for everyone. To be a strong congregation, we all need to be close to God. We need to be praying for each other. We need to take seriously the prayer requests that are sent out. We should have our directories on hand, and from time to time, we should go through the directory praying for everyone in it. Everyone in our directory. Then we'll get to know everyone, for one thing. And if you don't know who they are, then perhaps you will seek them out and get to know them. If we come a little early and we leave a little late, every Sabbath, we can get to know everyone in here, everyone that's a part of our congregation.

We should pray for each other. We should seriously take that directory to God. Maybe not the whole directory at one time. That would take a long time to go through every person, but start through it. One day, continue until you make it all the way through, and then start over again.

Keep praying for one another.

First, we start out by praising God and honoring Him. Then we express our longing for His kingdom. We pray for His coming. Then we pray for each other. We pray that God may bless, provide, sustain, heal all of us and be with us daily. We pray for forgiveness for one another. We pray even for our enemies. Chapter 5, Christ told us that we should pray for those who spitefully use us and persecute us, our enemies. We should truly learn to forgive each other. Pray for deliverance from Satan the Devil. Pray that God will deliver us from Him and His temptations. There is so much to pray about just from this little model of prayer. It doesn't take long to see this outline. This is an outline from which we can expand our prayers.

And obviously, the more time we can spend in prayer, the better.

It is important that we spend quality and quantity time in our prayers. We show the importance to God when we pray. What importance we have on prayer. We clearly show that to God by the way we pray and how we pray, the time that we pray, the fervency we pray. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. That's how the prayer ends. We start by praising God. We finish by praising Him. For Yours is the kingdom, the power, the glory forever. Amen. God does have it all. The kingdom, the power, the glory are His forever. We are blessed to call Him our Heavenly Father and to be a member of His family and a child of God at this time. We are greatly blessed to have such a high and holy calling, to be in the first resurrection, to be in the best, the better resurrection.

That's a special, unique relationship that only a relatively few get to have. Again, it doesn't mean that others don't have relationships with God to varying degrees, but we have an opportunity to have the closest of all relationships, to be in that first resurrection when Christ returns and actually to rule and reign with Christ.

The Bible says that Satan is the prince of the power of the air. We know that Satan does broadcast in moods and in attitudes and he affects all of us. He doesn't want us to pray faithfully and fervently. He wants us to find other things to do with our time, other things that we show are more important to us because we neglect our prayers. Satan is the prince of the power of the air. He will try to get you when it comes to your prayers. He doesn't like our prayers. He doesn't want us spending a lot of time in prayer.

But, you know, I've often thought about this. If Satan is the prince of the power of the air, who's the king of the power of the air?

Who's the king? I think God is the king.

I think God can also project his attitudes, his ways. Isn't that why you are the way you are? Because you are tuned in to God's wavelength. God is the king of the power of the air. His Holy Spirit goes everywhere. So we should consider that. You know, God is more powerful than Satan. Yes, Satan can have an influence on us if we allow him to, but if we allow God's, if we're on God's wavelength, if we resist Satan, he will flee from us. God continues to project his moods, his attitudes, and his ways. I think that's a very important mindset to have. God is the king of the power of the air. I don't know if that's biblically sound or not. It sounds good to me, but I'm hoping that it is. It seems to make sense to me.

If Satan can project his ways, certainly God is far more powerful to project his ways.

So let's make sure that we are tuned in to the king of the power of the air. And if you want to build your spiritual house on the rock, then take heed to what Christ says in the Sermon on the Mount. In the weeks ahead, we're going to continue to study and detail Christ's instruction that leads to peace and contentment. Next time, we'll talk about fasting, the proper way to fast. It's a very, very powerful tool. Christ talks about fasting, and it's something that his disciples ought to do.

So again, let's consider the peace and the contentment that we can have right now on this earth because God is good and God is gracious and God gives us so much to enjoy.