The Lord’s Prayer: Petitions 4-7 – Fed & Forgiven, Saved & Delivered

I would like to step back to the end of last week’s sermon where we reflected on the fourth petition, “Give us this day our daily bread.” I want to do this because as I was looking at these last four petitions of The Lord’s Prayer, I noticed something I not considered before. Conjunctions. Why is that important? Remember, long ago, on Saturday mornings. Schoolhouse Rock…”Conjunction junction, what's your function?/ Hooking up words and phrases and clauses.” Two major conjunctions, and and but, connect these four petitions and their concepts together. “Give us,” “forgive us,” “lead us (or save us)” and “deliver us.” The direction of these actions is from God toward us. These actions are so descriptive of the work and mission of the Trinity whom we confess in the Apostles’ Creed. The Creator who gives us all the bread, body, mind and soul, we need for body and life, the Redeemer who by his death and resurrection forgives us, or releases us from our sinful actions, and the work of the Holy Spirit who not only does not lead us into temptation, but saves us from the time of trial and tribulation and delivers us, or protects us from evil, or the evil one. So these conjunctions hold a special place in this section of The Lord’s Prayer. These hook up the conceptual Trinitarian activity on our behalf.

So God’s giving of bread, whether that be daily manna in the wilderness, miraculous feeding of a group, or the ultimate bread of life himself, Jesus Christ, it is only the beginning of the immense grace of God shed upon all people everywhere. The bread that supports this body and life is closely connected to the last three petitions that follow.

“Forgive our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us.” The literal translation of the Greek text in Matthew asks for “release“from our “debts.” The older translation of “trespasses” while the parallel in Luke 11:4 reads “sins.” The assumption is that sin is like a debt that is owed to God and is beyond our capacity to repay. I have heard it said that borrowing or giving money to a friend or family member changes the relationship because that creates a level of ower-ship.

Within relationships, people accumulate hurts and grievances, which end up defining the relationship. As long as wrongs or indebtedness from the past define the present, the wrongs also close off the future. So here also.

The term “forgive” is literally “release.” Forgiveness is not saying that what has occurred does not matter, but, rather, to forgive is to say that the wrongs that have occurred no longer define the relationship. Notice, it is does not say “forgive and forget.” It is hard to forget, especially when the wound has been so deep. And after all, as we recall from two weeks ago, when we looked at the Introduction to The Lord’s Prayer, God is another and we are not God.

God is able to remember our sins no more. Or is it something else? God remembers all his promises, God remembers his covenant with us and with creation. How could he not remember our sins.

Maybge it is a little like selective memory. Like when you tell your child, claen your room and then you can watch TV. Instead, they watch TV and never to their room. They remember “watching TV” but forget the part about “cleaning the room.” By grace God choses, selects to forgive and forget our sins. God selects to live with us in a forgiven relationship, in a new future relationship.

So, to forgive, or “to release,” means that there can be a different future not defined by the past. We are to see ourselves first of all as the recipients of a gracious release, and then, live in that gracious and forgiving and forgiven relationship with others who will, like us, continue to sin or trespass against us and create a debt.

God begins the process of opening up the future for new relationship by his acts of forgiveness. Those who have received forgiveness from God are then in a position to extend it to others. Forgiving does not mean perpetuating destructive patterns of relationship by turning a blind eye to it and “letting things go” on in the old way. Forgiveness or release is designed to bring change. It accomplishes its purpose when it opens up a future that the wrongdoing from the past had closed off.

It is in that new, forward looking relationship, that we pray the last two petitions, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” The newer translation, “Save us from the time of trial,” reflects our discomfort with the idea that God would ever “lead” us into temptation, since God tempts no one to sin (James 1:13). Temptation is more properly ascribed to Satan, the “evil one” mentioned in this final petition.

However, Matthew’s version  of the prayer leaves open the possibility that God could “bring” people “to the test” by situations that challenge their faith (Genesis 22:1; Exodus 16:4), like challenging us to be forgiving as we are forgiven.. The petition recognizes the confrontational side of God. The prayer affirms that even if God IS capable of challenging people, it is God who saves.

That is why Jesus instructs his disciples to call upon God in ever need. That is why Jesus taught us to pray in this manner. That is why we, as a community of faith, come together Sunday after Sunday, to prostrate our souls before the Father and Creator who sustains our body, mind and spirit with his gifts of grace. To hear again that Word of life, the promise of life that is ours through Jesus Christ, the Son of God. To invoke God’s Holy Spirit to call, gather and enlighten us and the whole Christian church on earth. That God’s kingdom might be establish, that God’s Will might be done. That God may feed us with the bread of life so we might share forgiveness in the name of Christ, our Savior and Redeemer, our Lord. All the while having that fear, love and trust in God above all things. And that my friends, is God’s gracious and good will.

Would you prayer with me the prayer our Lord taught us to prayer…and…let’s…take…it…slower and think about these precious words of this central prayer of God’s church on earth

Our Father, who art in heaven,

Hallowed be thy name.

Thy kingdom come,

Thy will be done,

On earth, as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread.

And forgive us our trespasses,

As we forgive those who trespass against us.

And lead us not into temptation,

But deliver us from evil,

For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.

Amen.