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 also have forgiven our debtors.
And do not bring us to the time of trial,
but rescue us from the evil one.
We have just had ‘in heaven’ and it seems the real intercessory prayer follows with on earth as in heaven. In between comes this phrase ‘hallowed be your name’, so the positioning of it seems key to move from the intimacy to the more declarative part; it both connects back and forward.
Hallowed – maybe if we used a non-word translation ‘holy-fide’; a recognition of the setting apart of the name of God. The name declaring who this God is, not where we can control God, know God in the sense of understanding everything, for the revelation to Moses was ‘I will be who I will be’. Unchanging in the eternal sense but adaptable, surprising, something new.
The name of God is to focus on who s/he is. The Yahweh names; the El / Elohim names; the name of Jesus… The God in heaven, that same God who is among us, who is this God? Too big to hold all of God, but perhaps a good way is to sanctify the name that is needed for now? How else are we going to pray – other than in nice theory and maybe simply quoting a verse to bolster our ‘faith’ – on earth as in heaven?
Faith, trust. Really kicks in when circumstances say differently. Really kicks in when we pray and nothing changes! That’s the time when we lose sight of the ‘name’. I don’t like some of the biblical books – Job being one of them. ‘You give and take away’; ‘even though he slay me…’ Don’t think for one minute that Jesus would agree that there is a revelation of God in those texts, and neither do I, but… quite a revelation of how to respond in the face of difficulty. Even if it appears to me that God could have, I will still trust, I will still honour, halllow the name of God.
Not all prayer is answered as we anticipate, but all prayer that has a trust in God is sown into the now of the ‘not-yet’ to contribute to the harvest of the ‘then in fullness’.
This is why a focus not simply on the intimacy of God: ‘Father’; the inclusivity of God: ‘our’; but on the name of God, who this God will be is so important. If we are going to pray ‘on earth as in heaven’ we need to hallow the name. God will be who God will be.
I love the word ‘hallowed’. It has so much profundity of meaning and so mysterious. To me it invokes holiness, unfathomable depth, vastness, infinity etc. And yet God reveals themselves in scripture as knowable and intimate too. Even in their holiness and set apartness their desire is union with us. Remarkable really!! That God is not really present in other religions so directly. In Islam the holiness is there but not the intimacy at least on a theological level yet some Muslims particularly the Sufis would also connect to that facet of his nature. Though I know a Muslim who is a Sunni but genuinely heart devoted to Allah, keeps all his devotions and the verses in the Quran and the Hadiths he quotes are the compassionate ones and he is the best person I ever met – always helping people, always generous and kind! He may have crossed over into that intimacy with the Father without even realising it? I’m really enjoying this series Martin, Thank you – so much to digest and to ponder on as ever!!
Well it’s a job to deal with Job (all Groans accepted 😆) But it is good to keep in mind that not all OT texts have a pre-figuring of Christ in them. And most importantly, it is good to remember that they were written before the Cross happened. I.E. Their understanding of how the Divine Source of All Origin operated is not the same as ours.