In the sermon 'Praying to the Thrice Holy God,' Peter Allison explores the depth and significance of the Lord's Prayer from Luke 11. He emphasizes the importance of recognizing God as our Heavenly Father, which informs the liberty and devotion with which believers can approach Him. The sermon highlights the concept of God's holiness, defining it as His transcendence and separation from all creation, and explains that praying for God's name to be hallowed is a request for His character and will to be recognized and glorified universally. Allison discusses the essence of God's holiness and its unique emphasis in scripture, urging believers to seek grace through the Holy Spirit to glorify God's name. The sermon encourages believers to glorify God in thought, word, and deed, emphasizing the need for prayer to be filled with praise and the recognition of God's providence in daily life. Allison concludes by calling for the removal of atheism and idolatry, advocating for a life that seeks to hallow God's name in all aspects.

Please turn in your scriptures, copy of God's Word, to Luke 11. As we continue to work our way in this Lord's Prayer, in this Lord's Prayer. Hear God's Word. Now it came to pass, as he was praying, in a certain place, When he ceased, that one of his disciples said to him, Lord teach us to pray as John also taught his disciples. So he said to them, when you pray, say, Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us day by day our daily bread and forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. And he said to them, Which of you shall have a friend? And go to him at midnight, and say to him, Friend, lend me three loaves, for a friend of mine has come to me on this journey and I have nothing to set before him. And he will answer from within and say, Do not trouble me, the door is now shut and my children are with me in bed.

I cannot rise and give to you. I say to you, although he will not rise and give to him because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence he will rise and give him as many as he needs. And so I say to you, ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and it will be opened to you.

For everyone who asks, receives, and he who seeks, finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish? Or if he asks for an egg will he offer him a scorpion if You then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children How much more will your heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him. Let us rejoice that this is word as one who finds great treasure.

Gracious Father in heaven, thank you for your word and for its richness, for its beauty, it is truth. We ask that you would give us an understanding of it, an understanding that leads to obedience, to action, to doing. An understanding that leads us to greater and greater fidelity, and greater communion with you and to knowing you. We ask all of this Lord through Jesus Christ and we ask that your Word as we hear it this morning might be mixed with faith and that you would sanctify this vessel of clay to speak your word. In Jesus' name, amen.

We've been looking the past few weeks at prayer as we study this section where Jesus teaches his disciples how to pray. Now it's not that we don't know the mechanics of how to pray, of how to bring our petitions to the throne of grace. Every believer at some level knows how to pray, just like an infant knows how to breathe. We know how to pray. But Jesus here, I think, is teaching this disciple that is asking, he's teaching him the context of prayer, the attitude of prayer, the way in which we pray, The heart with which we pray, the mind with which we pray, the mindset with which we pray, the fervency with which we pray, the consistency with which we pray, the spirit with which we pray.

These are things that Jesus is addressing here. And we saw last week that Jesus taught us that we are praying to our Father, our Heavenly Father. We are praying to the one who has given to us His name. We are praying to the one who has given to us his name. We are praying to the one who has brought us under his fatherly care and given to us the privileges and the liberties of sons of God, children of God.

That we are praying to our father as Joint heirs with Christ as those who have been given this spirit of adoption the spirit of sonship By whom By whom we cry Abba father this spirit is Some is a person by whom we cry Abba Father. So you see that greatly our understanding of our sonship greatly influences the way in which we can come to the Father, the liberty with which we can come to the Father, the freedom with which we can come, the devotion with which we come, as we remember that He is our Father. He is the one who is providing for us. He is the one who has loved us. He is the one who has put His name upon us.

We are coming not to an impersonal oracle, as some people go to. We are coming not to simply a judge, to simply a master. Yes, He is the judge of all the earth, and yes, He is our Lord and Master. But Jesus says in prayer, you're coming to your Father. Your Father.

And that's how He teaches us to address Him. As our Father. The One who has given us life. The One who has given us everything that we have, just as earthly fathers have given to their little children everything that they have Right What is a little Oliver given to himself over here? Where he hasn't provided his shirt.

He hasn't provided his clothes. He hasn't provided his food. He didn't get himself here this morning. He didn't have anything to do with the making of himself. See, all that has been given to him by his parents.

And so this is how we are to come to the Lord. As the Lord delights in us as His children. He delights to give us the things that we ask for according to His will and in His name. But the second thing then that Jesus teaches us, that having come to our Heavenly Father, our very first desire should be the holiness of God. Our first desire should be that our Father's name would be hallowed.

To hallow something, to make something hallowed, means to regard or to recognize and glorify something that is completely separate, completely other, wholly other. We tend to think of, in English, holiness as being righteous, as being pure. And yet, that is a use of the word, but it's really the secondary use of the word. The primary use of the word is to describe something that is separate from, that's wholly other. We might speak of things that are separate as our good China, our good silverware.

It's kept over here in this other drawer, this other place, and we only get it out at special times and special occasions. That's an aspect of what this word, holy, means. It's something that's separate. It's distinct. But it's more than that.

It's something that's utterly transcendent. To transcend is to go beyond, to far excel. And so when we speak of God's holiness or His transcendence, we are referring to His magnificence. We are saying that God is higher and superior to anything in the creaturely realm. That which is holy is that which is different.

It's set apart for a special use. God is holy. Above all else, God is holy. He's transcendent. He's holy, separate, and distinct from all of His creation and from us.

This is this verb here, hallowed, it's a verb. It's an imperative. It's a third person imperative. That's not a construct we have in English. When we give a command, it's always in the second person.

It's always to the person that we are addressing. So we don't even have to, in English, don't even have to use the subject because it's assumed. It's the person we're addressing. It's always second person. But in the Greek language, you can give a command in the third person.

How do you give a command in the third person? I mean, that person isn't there, right? But this is a generic command. It's a generic command. It's referring to everybody.

It's also in the passive. In God's name, be holy. So it is something that God is accomplishing and something that He will surely and certainly accomplish. Hallowed be your name. God's name is to be made holy.

Now what's in a name? What does it mean for God's name to be made holy? Well, We think of names as often just, well that's what they're called, and we don't typically think of a name as being that descriptive of that which it names. But in the Hebrew worldview, names were a revelation, names were a descriptive of that which they named. And so God's name is a revelation of His character and His will.

It includes everything and in every way, everything and every way in which God makes Himself known in the Scriptures. So God is El Shaddai, it's a name, because He is the God Almighty. He is Jehovah, Jehovah Jireh, God, the God who provides. He is Jehovah Rophah, the God who heals. He is Jehovah Ra'ah, the Lord, our shepherd, the one who feeds us.

He is Jehovah Shemu, the Lord is present. Or he is Emmanuel, God with us. Exodus 34, 14, For you shall worship no other god for the Lord, for Jehovah, whose name is jealous is a jealous God. See there, His name is describing the character of God, the name that is given. God whose name is jealous is jealous.

He is jealous for His worship. Leviticus 21, 5 and 6, You shall not make any cutting in their flesh. They shall be holy to their God and not profane the name of their God. See, the name of God is profaned when we make cuttings in our flesh. We are to be holy, separate, set apart for a special use for God.

They shall be holy to their God, they shall not profane the name of their God, for they offer the offerings of God made by fire and the bread of their God, therefore they shall be holy. Moses said in his song in Deuteronomy 32, the first couple of verses, For I proclaim the name of Jehovah. And then he goes on to describe some of the attributes of God. Ascribe greatness to our God. He is the Rock.

His work is perfect. All His ways are justice, a God of truth, and without injustice, righteous and upright is He." He was proclaiming the name of God. I proclaim the name of God. And in doing so, He is describing the character and the attributes of God. In 1 Kings 8, 17, the writer Jeremiah says, Now it was in the heart of my father David to build a temple for the name of the Lord God of Israel.

A name to build a temple for the name. Solomon prayed that prayer. It was in the heart of his father David to build a temple for the name of the Lord God of Israel. That name there has reference to all that God is. David was building a temple for all that God is, for all that God is represented.

And that is all encapsulated, it's captured, it's subsumed in the name of God. Psalm 25 says, we will rejoice in your salvation, and in the name of our God we will set up our banners. May the Lord fulfill your petitions. Some trust in chariots and some in horses. But we will remember the name of our God.

Some are trusting in horses and chariots and that's contrasted to the name of God because the name of God is a strong tower the righteous run to it and are safe. In the name of God there is deliverance. Psalm 4420, if we have forgotten the name of our God or stretched out our hands to a foreign God. To forget the name of God is to forget God. And it's described as worshipping another God.

We have forgotten the name of our God or stretched out our hands to a foreign God, a strange God. Or Isaiah 9, 6, for unto us a child is born. Unto us a son is given and the government will be upon His shoulder and His name. His name, He's going to have a lot of names. His name will be called Wonderful, Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

You see, these names are all a revelation of the character of God. God is the Prince of Peace. God is the wonderful Counselor. God is the Mighty God. Psalm 102, 15, So the nations shall fear the name of the Lord.

They will fear the name of the Lord. They are fearing the Lord because His name represents all that He is, all of His attributes, His excellencies, His character, His will is all in His name. The nations will fear the name of the Lord and the kings of the earth, Your glory, though through You we will push down our enemies. Through your name we will trample on those who rise up against us. Through the name of the Lord that we are victorious against God's enemies.

The name Of God is a place of refuge because God is a place of refuge. At the name of Jesus, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that He is Lord to the glory of God the Father. See, God's name then, that we are to make holy is a reference to His titles, to God's titles. He's the Creator. He's the King of Kings.

These are titles. It's a reference to His attributes. He is omniscient. He knows all things. He's omnipotent.

He's all-powerful. He's eternal. He's eternal in His being. He's infinite in His being. He's infinite in His wisdom.

He's holy. He's just. His ordinances. Those things that He has ordained. Those ordinances that God has ordained.

The sacraments come to mind as holy ordinances, but marriage is an ordinance, not a sacrament, but it's something that God has ordained. It's a type of picture of the relationship of Christ with His church, and that's holy. The marriage bed is holy. And we profane the name of God when we profane marriage and the marriage bed with pollution, with anything that hinders or breaks or tarnishes that ordinance. The offices He's created.

The King is His ordained servant. Elders are His servants, or His ordained servants. These are ordinances of God, institutions and offices. His works, the name is a reference to His works, of work of creation, of making all things. And we greatly, His name is greatly blasphemed by anyone who would deny that God is the Creator, or anyone who would Change in any way the work that God has done or seek to give that glory to somebody else.

His providence, That's God's works, His providence. What He does each and every day, moment by moment, in working all the details of our lives together and governing all His creatures in all their actions, everything that we do. God's name is all He is in and of Himself. It's all that He has done. It's all that He is doing.

It's the wonders of creation. When people study the world that God made and they attribute the wisdom, the beauty, the intelligence that is represented before them, when they attribute that to somebody other than God, God's name is being blasphemed. His name is not being glorified. Because that is His work. The reason that rock is there, the reason that rock has the incredible properties that it does, the reason the earth is the way it is, is because God made it that way.

The reason the heavens are so magnificent and so vast, and so incredibly awe-taking because God made him that way. And when we give the glory that is due to another that is due to God. God's name is not being hallowed. God's name is in the work of His hands in creation and providence as well as in all the wonders of salvation in Jesus Christ. And so as Herman Hoeksema said, in this petition, because this is a petition of God.

This is something that we are praying This is not a need that God has For for himself to be glorified. He is glorified He does glorify his name When Jesus said that he had glorified the Father, the voice spoke from heaven, I have glorified it and I will glorify it. God doesn't need anything from us. He certainly doesn't need us to glorify His name, but we do. We have a need of this petition.

We have a need that God's name be glorified. And so we are asking in this petition then that God would reveal himself and that his self-revelation be recognized and acknowledged by us and that His name may stand out in the world as a name of infinite wisdom, an infinite power, of absolute lordship and sovereignty, of unchangeable righteousness and truth, perfect righteousness, perfect justice, of matchless beauty. We're asking that then that God's self-revelation would be acknowledged by us and by all the earth as one of matchless beauty, of greatest love, of boundless grace. This is what we are seeking, that God's name would be hallowed, that He would be glorified. We are, in praying, hallowed be your name.

We are first then recognizing that God is holy. This is the essence. More than anything else, more than any other attribute, this is the essence of God's nature. We emphasize today by underlining something, by making it bold if we're writing something. If we're speaking we emphasize it by saying it louder, or with more force.

But in the Hebrew world, things are emphasized by their repetition. Remember Jesus would say verily, verily, if it's the King James Bible, or truly, truly, he was saying Amen, Amen. Why is he saying it twice? To add emphasis to it. To say, what I'm about to say, because he always said it before he said something of importance.

He was saying, what I'm about to say is important. Amen means, so let it be truly. He's saying truly, truly. This is very true. And by saying it twice, he was emphasizing its importance, emphasizing its truth.

Well, God's name is holy. God is holy. And there is only one attribute in all of scripture that is ever raised to a three-fold repetition. The Bible says that God is holy, holy, holy. It never says that He is mercy, mercy, mercy, or love, love, love, or justice, justice, justice, or wrath, wrath, wrath.

He is a God of vengeance. He is a just God. He is a merciful God. He is love, but He is holy, holy, holy. Isaiah describes a picture of this holiness, and he describes what it's like to be in the presence of a holy God.

In Isaiah chapter 6, he says, In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne high and lifted up. And the train of his robe filled the temple, And above it stood Seraphim. Each one had six wings, with two he covered his face, with two he covered his feet, with two he flew. And one cried to another and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts, Jehovah of hosts. The whole earth is full of his glory.

Now just the very mechanics of these seraphim, these are the messenger angels, not the serabeam which are the warrior angels. These are the messenger angels, the angels that surround the throne of God, that proclaim His holiness. And because they are in the presence of a God who is holy, holy, holy, they use two of their wings to cover their face, to cover themselves from the holiness of God. Remember Moses after he had been in the presence of God, his face shown and he had to put a veil over it to cover what the New Testament says was passing away, a glory that was passing away. The Seraphim in the presence of a holy God cover their face.

And with two of their wings, they cover their feet. And they cry, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts. You see when the second response of people who are in the presence of a holy God is fear, absolute terror. The guards, You can think of the guards at Jesus' tomb. They fell down as dead men in their fear of being in the presence of the angels of God, the holiness of God that was reflected in them.

Or Minoa and his wife, when they were in the presence of the Holy God, the angel of the Lord, Minoa, he thought they were going to be killed, simply by being in the presence of God. And his wife said, well, I don't think the Lord would have given us this promise if He was going to kill us. But Isaiah also describes the effect of this holiness, of being in the presence of a holy God, somebody who is utterly transcendent, holy, other, and different from anything that we are. The post, he said, That as Ziserafim cried out, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord of hosts, that the posts of the door were shaken by the voice of Him who cried out. The posts of the door were shaken.

And the house was filled with smoke, and Isaiah says, Woe is me, I am undone, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, Jehovah of hosts." That's the response of all creatures in the presence of a holy God. There is only one characteristic of Almighty God that is ever communicated in the superlative three-fold repetition by the mouth of angels, and that's the holiness of God. So we are in praying that God's name be made holy. We are acknowledging that God is holy, but we are also acknowledging that we are utterly unable and indisposed in ourselves to glorify God. That's why we have a need to pray this prayer.

We have a need for God to enable us to glorify Him, to equip us to do so. Because we are utterly unable in our own right to please God, in our own strength. Those, Paul said in Romans, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. We cannot glorify God and make His name holy in our own strength. We have in ourselves no natural desire to praise God or to pray to God.

You notice how often when we go to pray there's always something else that's in the way. There's always something that's trying to distract us, and our flesh is so easily distracted. We find lots of other things to do. We have no natural, natural desire to praise God or to pray to Him. Without Christ, we can do nothing.

We need God's grace and His Holy Spirit to glorify and to hallow His name. And so we are praying then in this petition for grace in this petition for grace to sanctify our hearts and our minds so that we can glorify our Father who is in heaven. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of grace and pleading for grace. Zechariah 12.10. The Holy Spirit tells us that the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of grace and the pleading for grace.

He not only applies saving faith, He is the one moving us to pray for the application of that grace in our lives. And we need to remember in this prayer that we are praying that God's name be glorified. We are praying that we don't divide his glory with ourselves. We like to take credit for things. We like to be the one who thinks that we have done something.

Even if we don't tell anybody else, we tend to think to ourselves that we have done something. And so when we think that way, we can be robbing God of His glory, trying to divide it. We acknowledge God did it, but we want to glorify ourselves too. We need true knowledge. We need the true knowledge of God to glorify His name.

Before we can honor God, we need to know Him. We need to know Him. And that knowledge comes through the Word. We deepen and broaden our knowledge of God through His Word. And we are asking God to enable us to know Him more and more and to preserve and to persevere in the truth of His Word.

That's what we're asking when we pray, We pray, Halleluiah be your name. When we are blessed to know and to honor Him as God, then we will acknowledge His love and knowledge of God in prayer and in praise. This is exemplified in Psalm 67, God be merciful to us and bless us, and cause His face to shine upon us, that your way may be known in the earth, and your salvation among the Gentiles. Let the people praise you, O God. Let all the people praise you.

See, they will when His salvation is known. When He is known on the earth. God, be merciful to us and bless us. Cause His face to shine upon us, that your way may be known on the earth, and that your salvation might be known among the nations. Let the people praise you.

That will lead to the people, all the people praising God. And so this is also then the second major request, second major request in this petition, one that we are recognizing that God is holy, and acknowledging and knowing that He is holy. But then we are also desiring that God's holiness be made known universally throughout the earth. His name be glorified throughout the earth. God's name is made holy when we glorify Him in thought, word, and deed.

Psalm 19, 14 says, Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord my strength and my Redeemer. We glorify Him when we show appreciation, when we recognize His impressiveness, when have God glorifying thoughts about Him. We're appreciative because we have recognized His impressiveness. We glorify the Lord when we adore Him. We praise and adore Him for His impressiveness.

When we glorify His name in our submission, when we submit to the authority of His Word in all that it says and what He requires of us. Submission to Him. We glorify His name when we witness, when we give a good opinion, a good opinion of God by our witness, by our life, and by our words. We glorify God when we are not ultimately concerned with ourselves and our liberties, but are more concerned with what promotes the glory of God. When our life is more about how will God be glorified in what I am doing.

Paul said that Whether we eat or drink in everything we do, we are to glorify God. Whether you eat or drink, do all to the glory of God. Even these mundane things like eating and drinking are to be done such that God's name is made holy, that He is glorified. And when we eat and drink to the glory of God, we acknowledge His gifts. We acknowledge that this food that's before us is his gift to us, that it wasn't our cunning and ingenuity, it wasn't our power and our strength that got it for ourselves.

We glorify God in eating and drinking when we eat and drink with love. That is sacrificial. That is, you see, love is, or gapé love is that which gives. It's that which gives. It's that which sacrifices.

Laying down our desires, laying down our wishes or liberties for the benefit of others is love. When we eat and drink with love, we glorify God. God is glorified when we are content with His will, what He has brought to pass, even in the little things. The time you didn't make whatever you were trying to do, the store because it closed, or whatever. Those little things that happen all the time.

God is glorified when we are content with what He brings to pass in our life. When we're content with the weather He sends. When we're content with the circumstances in which we find ourselves. God is glorified. God is glorified when We rejoice that the gospel is being preached regardless of who is doing it or the credit that it, who is getting the credit for it.

God is glorified when we rejoice that His word is being preached in any way. Paul gives these examples from his own life in Philippians. His own life in Philippians. He said, some preach Christ even from envy and strife, and some also from good will. The former preach Christ from selfish ambition, not sincerely supposing to add affliction to my chains, but the latter out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel.

What then? What then? Some are preaching the gospel, Paul said, out of selfish ambition, trying to add affliction to him. He says, what then? Only this, that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, God is preached and in this I rejoice, yes, and I will rejoice.

Regardless of who was doing it or who was getting the credit or what was happening to him as a result, Paul was rejoicing that in every way, in any way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ was being preached. We glorify the Lord when we are in, hallow His name, when we are so devoted to the spread of the gospel that we are willing to go to any length, we are willing to sacrifice everything for the sake of Christ. Paul said, I know that this will turn out for my deliverance through your prayer. Prayer there is a means of deliverance and the supply of the Spirit of Jesus Christ. It's going to turn out for His deliverance and the supply of the Holy Spirit.

According to my earnest expectation and hope, that in nothing I shall be ashamed but with all boldness, as always. So now also that Christ will be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death." It doesn't matter, Paul is saying, what happens to my body. My whole prayer is that the Lord is glorified, whether I live or whether I die, whether in life or by death, for to me to live is Christ and to die is gain. But if I live on in the flesh this man, this will mean fruit from my labor. Yet what I choose I cannot tell, for I am hard pressed between the two.

Having the desire to depart and be with Christ, which is far better, nevertheless to remain in the flesh is far more needful for you. And being confident of this, I know that I will remain and continue with you all for your progress and joy of faith. That your rejoicing for me may be more abundant in Christ Jesus." There's Paul, so devoted to the spread of the gospel that it didn't matter to him whether he lived or died. As long as Christ was being preached, as long as God's name was being hallowed. So we're praying then in this petition for the removal of atheism.

Psalm 67 says, God be merciful to us and bless us and cause His face to shine upon us. That your way may be known in the earth, in your salvation among the nations. Let the peoples praise you, O God. Let all the people praise you. O let the nations rejoice and be glad and sing for joy, for you shall judge the people righteously and govern the nations on earth.

We are praying for the removal of atheism. Nations must repent of their ignorance, idolatry, and profaneness. See, God is teaching us to pray for the removal of atheism from earth, that His name would be made holy. He's teaching us to pray for the removal of ignorance. Hosea says, God's people, my people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.

Now that's not simply that we just didn't know something. It's not that people lack knowledge to make correct decisions, but that they have rejected knowledge. Because Hosea goes on to say, My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge because you have rejected knowledge. So we're praying then that ignorance might be removed. The suppression, Romans 1 speaks of the suppression of the truth and unrighteousness.

We're praying for the removal of idolatry. Psalm 97, 6 and 7 says, The heavens declare His righteousness, and all the people see His glory. Let all be put to shame, who serve carved images, who boast of idols, worship Him, all you gods." That's the prayer there. That all men might be ashamed of idolatry and repent. Through the prayers of the church, Paul reports that many people turn from idolatry.

And we are to pray that they turn from idolatry and all men would worship Him. Now Hebrews 1 Verse 6 applies this to Christ. All men would worship Him. Psalm 86, 9, All nations whom you have made shall come and worship before you, O Lord, and shall glorify your name. We're praying that God would remove all profaneness and anything that is dishonorable to God.

Everything and anything. Zechariah 14.20 says, In that day holiness to the Lord shall be engraved on the bells of the horses. The pots of the Lord's house shall be like the bowls before the altar. Yes, every pot in Jerusalem and Judah shall be holiness to Jehovah of hosts. The bells and the horses, the pots, every pot, every pot in Jerusalem, every pot in the city of God will be holiness to the Lord.

Everyone whose sacrifices shall come and take them and cook in them, in that day there shall no longer be a Canaanite in the house of the Lord of hosts. Even the most trifling things, The eating and the drinking, the pots and the pans, the bells on the horses, the sirens, the horns on our cars will be holiness to the Lord. That's what we're praying for. That in every way, in every day, in everything, in all the littlest things to the greatest things. The Lord's name would be made holy.

He would be glorified. We're praying that God would order, through His providence, all things for His own glory. Even Psalm 76, 10 says, even the wrath of men will praise the Lord. That God would even ordain the wrath of men to be to His glory. So what can we learn?

What can we take away this morning? Well, one, we have here a written prayer. Jesus said that this is how we are to pray. Written prayers can be very helpful. They can be a hindrance if we say them without thinking them and understanding what we are saying.

But they can be an aid to stirring up our thoughts and ordering them and bringing them into the presence of God and stirring up within us holy thoughts. Jesus gives us here a written prayer for us to use. And so yes, we don't want to become dependent on them or we cannot pray, but there is a place for written prayers. It can be used along with our extemporaneous prayers to deepen our prayers. But secondly we need to learn to spend time in our prayer praising God.

This is the very first petition here in the prayer that Jesus gave to us. How often do we start our prayers with a quick word of thanks and then we run to the things that we need, the petitions? Our prayers are these big, lengthy petitions. How much time in our prayer is spent just praising the Lord? Just praising the Lord.

Just glorifying His name. This week, Take a time of prayer and just spend it praising the Lord. Just see if you can praise the Lord for five minutes, for ten minutes. Just praise the Lord. Nothing else.

Just look at some of the examples in the Psalms of people who are praying. Psalm 99, the Lord reigns. Let the peoples tremble. He dwells between the cherubim. Let the earth be moved.

The Lord is great in Zion. He is high above the peoples. Let them praise your great and awesome name. He is holy. The king's strength also loves justice.

You have established equity. You have executed justice and righteousness in Jacob. This is just praise, praising the Lord. Exalt the Lord our God and worship at His footstool. He is holy.

Praising the Lord. Or Moses' prayer, his song in Exodus 15. He just praises God. Who is like you, O Jehovah, among the Gods? Who is like you, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?

You have stretched out your right hand, the earth swallowed them. You in your mercy have led forth the people whom you have redeemed. You have guided them in your strength to your holy habitation. Moses is just praising God. Just praising God.

It will stir up within you awe awe and holiness, to simply praise God, to become exercised in praising God. We can glorify the Lord in professing His name before men. Social media just loves this. They almost demand your praise before other people. They are very bold in asking for your praise.

Everybody now, you buy something and they want you to praise them and they'll chase you up with emails and emails Can you praise me for this thing that you bought? Is it tell me how wonderful not just tell me, tell everybody else. And one time I sent back, I don't respond very often, but one time somebody had done a really good job and I sent, I just sent a quick little note back recognizing that they had done well, praising them. And they came back and they wanted it published. It wasn't enough, this private email, they were like, oh, could you put this out somewhere where everybody can see it?

See, When we publicly profess God's name before men, He is glorified. It's a very important aspect of God's name being hallowed, especially today, especially when all men are forgetting it. We need to be those who profess His name publicly before men. Seeing His hand at work in all the daily providences as we mentioned earlier, recognizing God's providence in our daily affairs of our life, the little as well as the big, and praising Him for them. Praising Him for them.

God's name is hallowed. Trusting only in His name for our healing, for our security. Yes, the Lord uses means, but what are we trusting in? We trust in the Lord to use those means to provide for us, to give us safety and security, to give us prosperity, trusting only in His name, Mentioning His name only with the highest of reverence. And that means when we say name, all of His attributes, titles, ordinances, words, works, all of these things, mentioning them only in the highest of reverence.

Loving His name. A special love that we give to no other. A love that is joined with His worship. Psalm 5 says, Let all those that love your name be joyful. His name is hallowed when we hallow this day.

His day, His day. And spend this day not doing our own pleasure, but as He says, turn aside our foot from doing our own pleasure and call this day at the light, the holy of the Lord, and honor it. We honor, we glorify the Lord. We make His name hallowed. When we say this day is holy to the Lord, and we're gonna set it apart as a holy day, We're not going to do the things that we normally do, the good things that we normally do, but we're going to make this day holy.

Remember that means set apart, different. This day is different. We're not going to spend it doing what we want to do. We're going to spend it in public and private exercises of worship and devotion to the Lord. Except of course there are things that are necessary to do, works of mercy and other necessity.

But this is a day that we can set apart as holy to Him. Worshipping Him in spirit and truth. You know, it's so easy for us to worship Him outwardly, in form, to say words, and our heart can wander away. Our heart can be distant. But we make the name of God holy when we worship him with fervency in spirit and in truth.

We hallow the name of God when we obey Him simply. I delight to do your will, oh my God, Psalm 48. I delight to do your will. When we sympathize with Him, when we grieve when His name is dishonored, And when we defend the honor of His name, these are just some of the ways that we who love His name, who love our Lord and Savior, can hallow His name in everything that we do as we go about our day-to-day lives. May the Lord enable us this week to hallow His name, to make His name holy.

Almighty Heavenly Father, we pray that you would strengthen our prayers, that in them we may be able to pray with aggressiveness, we may pray with fervency that your name would be made hallowed in our lives, in the lives of our families, in this church, in our community, and in our nation. O come, Lord Jesus, we ask in Jesus' name, Amen. Thanks for watching!