Mm. In a world in which God's name is mocked and trivialized, It's important that believers take to heart hallowed be thy name from the Lord's Prayer. Today, on Turning Point, Dr. David Jeremiah reflects on the meaning of that phrase and shares ways for you to put it into practice in your daily walk. From Prayer, the Great Adventure, here's David to introduce today's message, Hallowed be thy name.
And thank you for joining us. We are studying Prayer Together. I know that's a That's a challenge to a lot of people because As I've said quite often, all of us feel as if we don't pray as we should and wish we could pray better than we do. But that's why the Bible gives us instruction to encourage us and strengthen us and help us to pray. As the Lord taught us to pray in Matthew chapter 6, we are in the very beginning of this series.
And today we come to the phrase in the prayer where We read these words, Hallowed be thy name. Hallow is an Old English word that appeared in the King James Version of the Bible in 1611. Most modern translations have retained it because its reverential sound, as well as its meaning, is just part of our history and reminding us every day of that prayer. But why is hallowing God's name the first step in prayer? What does it mean to hallow the name of God?
It's not a word we discuss very often, but it's a word we're going to discuss today. And again, we'll finish it up on Monday.
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Here we go with hallowed be thy name, Matthew chapter 6 verse 9. Donald McCullough has written a contemporary book which he introduces by Telling An experience that he and his wife had, which has been enjoyed by a number of. folks from the West Coast. He was invited to hear the great tenor Luciano Pavarati. And they were told that the performance would probably be his last performance here on the West Coast.
And so, even though they knew how much the outrageously priced tickets had cost. They accepted the invitation and they went to hear Pavarati sing. In his journal, he said, the concert exceeded our expectations. We were stunned by the master's music. In aria after aria, he demonstrated his remarkable talent.
talent that set him apart from the thousands who had come to hear him. But that set apartness was revealed in his generous giving. His uniqueness was shown in a gracious offering of himself. He held back nothing. Every single note was filled with boundless passion and glorious beauty.
And we had to respond. We jumped to our feet, said McCullough, and we clapped and we hooted and we whistled. And we did not stop. Not for a long time. Wave after wave of grateful applause was sent up to the platform, calling for encore after encore.
In the midst of this mayhem of gratitude, when my hands were beginning to hurt from the pounding they were taking. I thought to myself, This is deeply satisfying. This is a profound joy. It felt right. To offer praise in response to such excellence.
And this sense of appropriateness created a congruence in which my life, my little world, at least for a moment, seemed perfectly ordered. And then McCullough said, in a similar way, God's gracious self-giving in Jesus Christ calls for the response of faith and worship. And when we worship God, for that moment as we worship. We find that our lives are little worlds. at least for that moment seemed perfectly ordered.
The Lord Jesus is teaching his disciples to pray. And as he teaches them, we are learning as well. We learned that we come to address our Father who art in heaven. And today the phrase which is before us is this one. Hallowed be.
Thy name. I must confess that of the seven statements in the prayer, we know the least about this one. Hallowing the name of the Lord. When we say the word hallowed, It's an archaic word. It's a word we don't use in our vocabulary today, but the translators of most of the various translations of the New Testament have kept the word in the prayer because of its very special nature.
Actually, the word hallowed comes from the Greek word hagiatzo. Which is a very important word in the Bible. For the noun haggias means holy. Literally, we could say as we pray this prayer, Our Father who art in heaven, Holy be thy name. The word means to be sanctified or set apart.
or to be praised. John Calvin said it this way. That God's name should be hallowed is to say that God should have His own honor of which He is so worthy, so that men should never think or speak of Him without the greatest veneration. We should hold his name. In the sense of the holiness which it represents.
But what does it mean to hallow someone's name? Does that mean that the name God or the name Jesus has some special significance in the combination of the letters that make up the word? My name is David. There are five letters in that word. And we're to honor the name of David.
We would be honoring a lot of folks because there's a lot of Davids in this world. And we don't hold up that little five-letter word and say, isn't that a wonderful name? Let's hallow that name. No, when we hallow a name, when we ascribe praise to a name, what we're doing is we're ascribing praise to the person who stands behind the name, and the name represents the person. The name oftentimes gives us a clue to the kind of person that is.
So When we pray with reference to Christ or to God, hallowed be thy name, the deep and sincere desire of all who know the Lord should be that men and women everywhere would revere his name. And in so doing, we would recognize and honor the one that that name represents, for he alone is worthy of our adoration. When Jesus taught his disciples to pray, hallowed be thy name. He didn't specify which of the names. He just said the name, and behind that name is all that God is.
We know that we're to Bring honor and glory and ascribe holiness to the name of God. But how do we do that? When we pray, Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. What does that mean? How do we Enact that.
I've written down in my journal two or three thoughts, one of which is that when we hallow the name of the Lord, we do so by rehearsing who He is. A.W. Tozer said that no church will ever be greater than its concept of God. Unfortunately, in many of our churches and in many of our own personal lives in these days, we do not have a very high view of God. That is reflected in the way that we go about Trying to address our Expressed feeling toward him.
Soren Kierkegaard, a theologian, said: We have gotten very confused about who's doing what in worship. He said, We think of worshipers as an audience, pastors as entertainers, and God as the prompter. In fact, he said, Worshipers are the performers, pastors are the prompters, and God is the audience. And when we gather for worship, whether with a handful in a storefront chapel or with thousands in some large church, we perform a drama with different parts, speaking and singing and praying and giving money and baptizing and eating bread and drinking wine, and we do it all for the delight of God. And at the end of the show, he said, the only applause that should matter is the applause that comes from God.
When we worship God, we ascribe praise to Him. and we lift up all that we do. to his name. It is an interesting thing that the word name is here because. In the Bible, there are many names for God, are there not?
Listen to these names. This is who God is in the Old Testament: He is Jehovah Sidkinu. Jehovah, our righteousness. He is Jehovah and Kedish, Jehovah who sanctifies. He is Jehovah Shalom, that one we know, Jehovah who is our peace.
He is Jehovah Shamma. Jehovah is there. He never leaves us. He is Jehovah Rapheh, one that I have come to know and love. He is our healer.
Jehovah Jireh the Lord will provide. Jehovah Nisi, the Lord my banner, and Jehovah Rohai, the Lord my shepherd. That's who he is. And the Lord Jesus said, When you pray, pray like this: Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Each one of those names gives us a little glimpse of something about God that is not only important for us to know, but it's important for us to know about us and how we relate to Him.
For instance, I took my notes, wrote down all those names, and was reminded that each of those names responds to some particular need in my life at one time or another. Have you ever thought of that? I am a sinful creature. And you are too. You're all sinners, and I'm a sinner.
Let's just get that out of the way right up front. That's what the Word of God says.
Well, when I think about being a sinner, I think about the part of God that is Jehovah Sidkinu. God is my righteousness. When I think about my Need to be holy. I think of Jehovah Emkedesh, the Lord, my sanctification. Once in a while, I have some anxiety.
Believe it or not. And when I have anxiety, I like to worship Jehovah. Shalom, God who is my peace. And there are times when all of us are lonely and then we need Jehovah Shama. When we're sick and we need healing, we need Jehovah Rapha.
When we have needs financially and we don't have enough, it is Jehovah Jireh, the Lord will provide. And when we are lacking in self-esteem and who we are, we discover that the Lord is our banner. And when my life and my direction and my understanding of what's going on in my life is not clear, I need Jehovah Rohai, the Lord is my shepherd. You see, every part of the name of God, every name that is given, does not reflect all that He is, but reflects a little of who He is. And as we focus on the names, We come to know who the person is behind the name.
When the Lord said, When you pray, pray like this: Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. He wants us to not just know the name God, but He wants us to know all we can know about God so that when we worship Him, we can lift back up to Him praise for all that the Word of God reveals Him to be. And when you come to the New Testament, we discover that the greatest of the names is Jesus, the God-man. And then a whole new list of names comes through, doesn't it? He is the bread.
He is the way of life. He is the truth. He is the resurrection, the good shepherd, the branch. And all of the New Testament is filled in the Gospels with names to help us know the one we worship. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
And here are the things about God. That we know from the names that have been given us. I have on occasion selected just one little name of God. and tried to think about it for a whole week. Jehovah Jireh, the Lord provides.
How many of you know that God provides? That he does. Isn't that a wonderful thing? And just for one week, just say, Lord, this week I'm going to hallow your name and I'm going to consider for my own praise. What you have done to provide for me, you are Jehovah Jireh, the Lord provides.
and every day focus on some time. to reflect on his provision. Not only do we hallow His name by rehearsing their meanings, but we hallow His name by respecting His greatness. God is uncommon. He's extraordinary.
He's unearthly. He's separated from sinners. He's undefiled. And the Bible says he's holy. And we are to speak of God in reverence.
We are to sanctify him, to hallow his name, means to hold his matchless being in reverence so that you will believe what he says and you will obey him and you will honor his name. We are given here in this prayer a wonderful tension so that we don't go off in some crazy direction. When we talk about our Father who art in heaven, and remember He's Abba Father, He is, according to the New Testament language, the daddy, He's our daddy. That is intimate. But in the same sentence, we're told: Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
And God is not pleased when we forget that he is. The great and majestic one to whom we come, he's the creator of the universe, and he deserves to be treated with respect and honor.
So, whatever we may do, whatever we may say that would in any way diminish his greatness, we ought not to do. We ought to hold him up. With great reverence and respect. We hallow his name by respecting his greatness. Thirdly, We hallow his name by relinquishing control over our own lives.
Martin Luther said, how is God's name hallowed among us? when both our doctrine and our living are truly Christian. We hallow the name of God by the way we live when we give ourselves totally to Him and allow Him to control our lives. When we say, hallowed be thy name, we are praying like this, May the whole of my life be a source of delight to you and may it be an honor to the name which I bear, which is Your name. Hallowed be Your name.
Psalm 19:14 is a prayer that we sometimes pray in church. It goes like this: Let the words of my mouth And the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my rock and my Redeemer. That ought to be the prayer of each one of us every day. Lord, I hallow your name. by giving you the control of my life.
and living in obedience to you. Fourthly, We hallow His name by recognizing His presence in all of our lives. We hallow his name when we are constantly aware of his presence. David said in Psalm 16:8, I have set the Lord always before me. That's the key.
We live our lives in the presence of God. And we honor and respect Him. And when we come into His presence, not flippantly, quickly, just sort of with a, oh, by the way, Lord. We come into his presence, we prepare our hearts to come and to pray. and to honor his name.
And I want to say to you, men and women, that if we learn to pray as Jesus taught his disciples, it will make an incredible difference in the way we live. That God does not wish us necessarily to always be rushing into His presence with our grocery lists of things. God wants to be worshiped. The Bible says He seeks those who will worship Him in spirit and in truth. And when we come to Him, we need to bring our gift of worship to Him first.
before we ask him to fill our hands with other things. I am so confident that this is a critical part of where most of us are in our spiritual walk with the Lord. And I'm still just learning. I'm a student like the rest of you. And I wrote down six things that entering into the presence of God with worship changes in everyone's life.
It will change your life just as it's changing mine. We're all in the growing process. We're not there yet, but hopefully, we're on the road toward understanding more and more about who God is and how He works in our lives every day. And here are some of the things that I reflected upon. Number one, When I worship, when I come into the presence of God with hallowed be thy name, Worship enhances my appreciation and my love for God.
I am caused to see him as he is. Is God's greatness changed by my worship? Not in the least. Can I add or subtract one whit to who he is? Not at all.
But when I reflect in my own heart upon his greatness. When I come in my prayer, and maybe I've learned some of the attributes of God, some of the names of God that tell me more and more about who He is. When I reflect those back to Him, something happens within me. The greatness of God is impressed upon my spirit so that I see Him and understand a little bit more about who He is and the greatness of God. is enhanced in my life.
I remember preaching a sermon some years ago talking about a lot of folks who have a big God and some who have a little God. And I got all kinds of mail when that went on the radio because some people thought I'd gotten into idolatry. I had to straighten that all out. And that's not what I was talking about. I was talking about the fact that sometimes the way people respond to God, their God is very little.
He is Circumscribed by their own restrictions. They have never seen God as the scripture presents him, and they have never worshipped that God. It's as if God were out there waiting for us to come and see him. And in the back of our mind, we have an image of who he is, and it's not a very. Enhancing image.
It's sort of a. Not a very great image of who God is. And then. The day comes, and we're allowed to go into His presence, and for one moment we see Him as He really is, and all of a sudden. Our whole expression and appreciation for God changes.
That's what worship does for me. Every time I really understand what's going on in my own heart as I worship the Lord, I begin to see God and He is enlarged and enhanced in my own heart, not as He is, but in my heart. Number two, when I worship. Worship expands my vision. You know, one of the things we're prone to do is to look at life in terms of our own limitations.
That's the way the average person does. When I worship God, I began to see life not in terms of what David Jeremiah can do, but I began to see life in terms of what God can do through David Jeremiah. There's a big difference, my friend. I am a very limited, flawed human being. And if it's just me doing my thing for God, it's not going to accomplish very much.
But when I worship God, something happens within me. It expands my vision to think about what God can do through me. What he can do through you. I'm reminded. Often of one of my favorite stories in the Old Testament about the spies who went into the land.
You remember that story? It's like a lot of things that happened. The majority report came back, and they all said, we can't do it. That's the way a lot of majority reports come back. You know, we've got the idea that the majority is always right, but a lot of times in the Bible, the majority was wrong.
And the majority came back and they said, We've been into the promised land. And we've checked it all out, and we want you to know what our appraisal is. Our appraisal is like this. Those are some big people. Those giants were eight feet tall and taller, the Anachim, they're called.
And the majority report came back, and they said, We checked them out, and we checked them out. And you want to know what our appraisal is? We are like grasshoppers before them. And we don't think we should mess with them. We don't think we should go in.
God had told them to go in. They said, no, we saw them. We saw us. We're like grasshoppers. Joshua and Caleb, the minority report, they came back and they said, you know.
We were in the same land. Walked down the same streets, saw the same giants, saw the same situation, but What we want you to know is, those are some big people, but they are no match for God. And the only difference in the majority report and the minority report was the comparison. The majority compared themselves to the problem, and the minority compared the problem to God. The large group had a small God.
The small group had a large God. And what happens when you worship, my friends? When you come into the presence of God and you say, My Father who's in heaven, hallowed be your name, and you reflect upon his greatness, all of a sudden you begin to see things. and a much different perspective. Number three.
Worship not only enhances my appreciation and love for God and expands my vision, but thirdly, worship eclipses my fears. I was in Cedarville to speak at the college where I graduated. in Ohio. And I don't know how these things work, so I'm going to show my ignorance. But in Cedarville, Ohio, there was a full eclipse of the moon.
And we went out to eat to some ice cream place that we go out to eat. And afterwards, we walked out, and everybody was standing in the parking lot. Looking up at the sky. And nobody had told me this was happening, so I didn't know what it was. And I walked out and I looked up, and sure enough, Up there you could barely see the moon.
You could just barely see the little edges of white around. It was totally covered. When I worship God, that's what happens to my fears. Any of you ever have any fears? Are you fearful people?
You know what? We're all fearful people to some degree, aren't we? We can talk about our bravery, but we have these fears in us. And I've said this to you before, and I've discovered this in my own life, and this is a very practical thing: that sometimes if life kind of piles up on you during the day. You don't really think about it too much, except you sort of take it to bed with you at night, and it sort of works on your subconscious, and then you wake up in the morning.
and you wake up with this spirit of fear. About The day, the appointments. The sickness the problems, the difficulties, the children, whatever. I'll tell you the best anecdote I know to fear. is worship.
Well Hallowing is worshiping. We've learned that today. Holy be thy name. Adore the name of the Lord, and you are fulfilling the first phrase of this prayer. Yeah.
We'll have more about this on Monday, but let me remind you on this Friday edition of Turning Point that one of the ways you will grow in prayer and fellowship with others in prayer is when you go to church. And I know it sounds kind of strange to be telling people who listen to a Christian broadcast that they need to go to church, but far too many Christians have come through COVID and never recovered, and they've just stayed home. And I want to encourage you that the Bible says we're together together as God's people. Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together, says the book of Hebrews.
So get to church this week. You'll find a chance to pray in the service. You know, being led in prayer by your pastor, your Sunday school teacher, your friends. And you'll discover this is a really important part of walking with the Lord. And we'll see you right here on Monday.
Thank you for listening today. The message you just heard came to you from Shadow Mountain Community Church and senior pastor Dr. David Jeremiah. Turning Point is also on radio and TV this weekend. To learn where to find it, visit our website davidjeremiah.org slash radio.
That's davidjeremiah.org slash radio or call 800-947-1993. Ask for your copy of David's new book for strengthening your prayer life, everything to God in prayer. It's yours for a gift of any amount. You can also purchase the Jeremiah Study Bible in the English Standard New International and New King James Versions, complete with notes and articles from Dr. Jeremiah's decades of study.
If God's moving in your life through this ministry, let us know at TurningPoint P.O. Box 3838, San Diego, California, 92163. This is David Michael Jeremiah. Join us Monday as we continue the series, Prayer: the Great Adventure, on Turning Point with Dr. David Jeremiah.
