Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Mark 14:36 He said, "Abba, Father, all things are possible for You. Take this cup away from Me; nevertheless, not what I will, but what You will."
Matthew 6:9 In this manner, therefore, pray: Our Father in heaven.
ABBA, FATHER
Prayer, we know, is essentially turning to God and speaking to Him, not just with the lips, but with the heart. And Jesus makes plain what attitude of heart we are to have with the opening words of the Lord's Prayer, "Our Father."
But sin has made all people rebels, defectors, enemies of God. So bad is the human situation that most blindly deny there is a problem, or live under the delusion that they can set things right themselves. But what sin broke, we humans are unable to repair or restore. God had to do it. That's the connection between Christmas and Lent.
"But when the fullness of the time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, 'Abba, Father!'" (Galatians 4:4-6).
"Abba" -- Where have we heard that before?
In the darkness on the Mount of Olives in the Garden of Gethsemane. There Jesus prays in agony of soul. He paces. He kneels. He falls, stretched out on the ground. His heart races. So intense is the pressure that the sweat which beads on His forehead is red -- mixed with His blood.
What's going on here? What could cause Jesus this depth of distress?
That's a very important question. For unless we understand what happened there under the olive trees, we can't understand the opening words, the address, of the Lord's Prayer. What is Christ's burden, the weight that lies so heavily on His heart; that presses so painfully upon His soul? It is the guilt of this world's sin.
"The LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all" (Isaiah 53:6).
By placing our confidence in Jesus' living and dying for us, we are received back into God's family. God accepts us for Jesus' sake. "You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:26).
Therefore, we come to God not in cringing fear or false bravado, but with unhesitating confidence, as "dear children ask their dear father."
