Praying to Our Father in Heaven (2)

We are taught to pray, “Our Father.”  “Father,” that is, and not “Mother.”  Perhaps there was a time when it would have been absurd for me to note this, but that time is not now.  We live in country crazed with re-defining gender.  Only feminist ideas and ideals are politically correct.  But our God has chosen to reveal Himself as “Father,” and so we address Him in that way.

Our Father has given us a mother.  She is the church, where His children are fed on the milk of His word through the work of the pastor.  She is the one whose deacons provide for the children’s needs when they are in want.  She is the one whose elders discipline them when they go astray.  Do you belong to such a mother?

                We are taught to pray, “Our Father which art in heaven.”  This heavenly Father is no earthly Father.  He is exalted high above us, the King of earth and heaven.  So we address Him as “Father” – not  “Dad” or “Daddy” – giving Him the honor that is His due.  Yes, He pities we who are His children.  He knows our frame: we are dust.  We would do well to remember our frame as well, for we show no thanks for His great mercy when we fail to address Him reverently.  Our first appeal is that His name be hallowed.  To pray this petition immediately after addressing God flippantly or without thought is a contradiction at the very least, and blasphemy at its worst.

Earlier this summer, a window salesman spent an evening in our home.  He arrived at suppertime.  After spending a small part of the visit marketing windows, he stayed on until after midnight discussing religion, reason, and the Christian faith.  He was an intelligent man, and, as my husband and I listened, he attempt to demonstrate why he doesn’t believe that God exists.  He spoke of the vastness of the universe, and accused Christians not only of stupidity, but of arrogance.  “You think that human beings on a tiny plant, third from the sun, are the reason for the universe!  That is arrogant!  That is not using reason!  The universe is much greater than human beings!” 

At the time I wasn’t sure exactly how to respond to that accusation, but since then I’ve read the quotation below by John Piper, from his book Don’t Waste Your Life:

Sometimes people say that they cannot believe that, if there is a God, he would take interest in such a tiny speck of reality called humanity on Planet Earth. The universe, they say, is so vast, it makes man utterly insignificant. Why would God have bothered to create such a microscopic speck called the earth and humanity and then get involved with us?

Beneath this question is a fundamental failure to see what the universe is about. It is about the greatness of God, not the significance of man. God made man small and the universe big to say something about himself. And he says it for us to learn and enjoy—namely, that he is infinitely great and powerful and wise and beautiful. The more the Hubble Telescope sends back to us about the unfathomable depths of space, the more we should stand in awe of God. The disproportion between us and the universe is a parable about the disproportion between us and God. And it is an understatement. But the point is not to nullify us but to glorify him.

                That is why we address Him “Our Father, which art in heaven.”