Our Father

Transcript

Hello, my friend… so glad you're with me today. This is By God's Call — day 9, Our Father.

Listen to this word. Let it settle.

"Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." Matthew 6, verses 9 and 10.

Jesus was teaching his disciples how to pray. And the very first thing he does — before bread, before forgiveness, before any request at all — is point to a relationship. He doesn't say "Almighty God, receiver of our petitions." He says: Father. Our Father. That's where everything begins.

Think about the weight of that. You are not a stranger knocking on the door of a palace with a list of demands. You are a son. You are a daughter. And the Father was already waiting for you before you ever opened your mouth.

And notice — he didn't say "My Father." He said "Our Father." Every time you pray, you do not pray alone. There is a family — a vast family, stretched across every corner of this world — praying alongside you in this very moment. You are never alone in this prayer. Never.

Now, this Father is in heaven. And that matters. It means he is bigger — bigger than the problem weighing on you today, bigger than the situation that feels like it has no way out, bigger than the fear that woke up with you this morning. He is in heaven. But at the same time — and here is the miracle — he lets himself be called Father. He is nearer than you think. Infinite and intimate all at once. That is the beautiful tension at the heart of the gospel.

And then Jesus goes even deeper. "Your kingdom come." Before my plans, his kingdom. Before my agenda, his will. Praying this way doesn't mean escaping life — it means reordering it. It means placing God's priorities in front of my urgencies. And when you do that, something shifts inside you before anything shifts around you.

"Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven." Surrendering your will — that sounds hard, doesn't it? We tend to think that yielding is losing. But Jesus is saying the opposite. In the Father's hands, surrender becomes rest. You are not handing yourself over to a stranger. You are handing yourself over to a Father. And that changes everything.

The prayer Jesus teaches is not a ritual. It is not a formula. It is a map of the relationship between a child and a Father. It begins with who He is. It stays with what He wants. And only then does it arrive at what you need.

So today — before breakfast, before your phone, before anything else — do this one thing: pray the Lord's Prayer slowly. Out loud. And when you reach the word "Father"… stop. Stay there for ten seconds. Just ten seconds. Let that word say what it means: that you are a child. That you are loved. That you are not praying to a distant judge, but to a Father who knows you by name.

Stay close to God. Pray — then act. I'll see you tomorrow, my friend.