In the Name of the Father and of the Son X and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Our Lord prayed the most perfect prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. He trembled as he knelt on the hard ground. Great drops of sweat poured forth from His sacred head like blood falling to the earth. He prayed those words: “My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will” and “My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.”
“Thy will be done.” The perfect will which is part of the prayer we know so well: the Our Father. “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” God’s will is perfect. It never fails. But man’s will is weak. Therefore, his prayers are weak.
Outside the Garden of Gethsemane, Peter, James, and John languished as they waited and watched for their Lord’s sake. Their eyes were heavy and they were sleeping. They had lived as if God did not matter and as if they mattered most. Their Lord’s name they had not honored as they should; their worship and prayers had faltered. Our Lord said, “Sleep and take your rest later on. See, the hour is at hand, and the Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.”
Your will is weak. Even when you are strong your will is hindered by other things. You pray that God would remove all impediments so that His mighty will may be done. You pray, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” In this petition you acknowledge and confess that by you own strength, you cannot do or fulfill the will of God. You cannot do that which is taught in keeping the Law or in accomplishing the Gospel.
Therefore, you pray that the Lord would give you regeneration and holiness. That He would create in you a clean heart and renew a right spirit within you. That He cast you not away from His presence, and take not His Holy Spirit from you. That He restore unto you the joy of His salvation, and uphold you with His free Spirit. The Savior creates in you a new heart and takes away the stony heart. He abolishes your stubbornness. He destroys your impatience. When the Father annihilates the wicked lust from your flesh, He conforms your will to His will. He conforms your prayers to His listening.
He conforms your forgiveness to His forgiveness. In fact, He teaches you how to forgive. You pray that the Lord would forgive your sins that they would trouble you no more. In so doing, you gladly forgive those who hurt you by the way they live. In such forgiveness, this community of Christ serves each other willingly.
You serve each other out of faith in the One who will ascend to the angels in heaven. In 4 days, on Thursday May 21th @ 7pm, here in our nave, we will celebrate the Ascension of our Lord. This Feast of the Ascension precedes the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Remember how Good Friday also precedes Easter Sunday. Messengers announce the tidings at both the Resurrection and the Ascension of our Lord: “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. He is not here, for He is risen, as He said. Come see the place where He lay.” Similarly, the Ascension: “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into heaven? This Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw him go into heaven.” This Thursday @ 7 the church will celebrate the Ascension with the joyful anticipation of Christ’s return in glory.
Christ, who was taken into heaven, is the same Lord who sends the Holy Spirit. “When the Spirit of truth comes, He will guide you into all the truth, for He will not speak of His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak, and He will declare to you the things that are to come.” The Holy Spirit will take what is God’s and declare it to you. What the Spirit declares is the Father’s will to be done on earth.
When you ask that the Father’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven, you are asking that earth and heaven be united. This union is found only in the Father’s Beloved Son. In Christ, all things in heaven and on earth are reconciled and set at one, as St. Paul says, “For in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of the cross.”
Heaven and earth are united in this One Man. In Him, blessed angels and men form one company. “You have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.” A new kingdom is forged by God’s Only Begotten Son for you to dwell in now and to eternity.
You pray, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” You pray that this unity between the company of angels and men may be begun in this life. You pray that with Mary Magdalene, Peter and John, and with all the witnesses of the resurrection, with angels and arch-angels, and with all the company of heaven you may laud and magnify the Lord’s glorious name. You pray that you may don the crown of victory which now adorns the victorious saints’ brow in the church triumphant.
You belong to this heavenly communion of the church triumphant. You conform yourselves to this community of heaven and not to this world of fleeting vanity.
The most famous Lutheran musician of all time is Cantor Johann Sebastian Bach. While many of his compositions are well known in secular realms, Bach also wrote musical explanations for virtually every Sunday in the church year. This Sunday, Rogate Sunday, the Sunday of prayer, was no exception. In Bach’s 86th cantata, he wrote the following:
I will yet indeed
pluck roses,
even if they prick me with thorns.
For I have confidence
That my prayers and my pleading
go straight to the heart of God,
because he gave me His word.
You have all felt the thorns of the rose. Perhaps some of you have felt them even in this place. Perhaps ill words have pierced your soul and your heart. But I thank the Lord that you continue to come here, to God’s house. You courageously cling to the rose in spite of the pain. You know God’s Word is a healing balm and I thank the Lord for you.
God helps indeed, even as he promises: “Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, He will give it you.” Amen
The Peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Amen.
XBJFX