Biblical Prayer: Hallowed Be Thy Name

The Purpose of Prayer and the Model Prayer in Matthew 6

Okay, this is part six of our series on biblical prayer. Part six. The title of this is, Hallowed Be Thy Name, which will become obvious in a few minutes. What we've done so far in the study, just by word of review, we've examined the purpose of prayer.

We looked at false teaching on prayer. Then we answered two particular questions. If God is sovereign, why pray? And second, does prayer really change things? Then we examined what prayer should not be, and we've begun to examine the model prayer in Matthew 6, verses 5 to 13, and specifically because in this text, Jesus gives us an inspired pattern for prayer.

Now last week we looked at the prefix, preface, in verse 9, pray then in this way, remember? And so today we introduced the first petition. Remember, we're looking at this from three parts, the preface, the petitions, and then the conclusion.

So the first petition is, Hallowed be thy name. Pray then in this way, our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Names are important in scripture. Not so much anymore, well some people it is, but we see some people being named some ludicrous names, and I won't get into that, but anyway.

But in scripture, names were given or changed to commemorate events of significance. For example, the example of Abraham in Genesis 17, 5. No longer shall your name be Abram, which means exalted father, but your name shall be Abraham, father of a multitude, for I will make you the father of a multitude of nations.

Now that's God changing Abraham's name, and you can see there's a very specific reason for the name change, from Abram to Abraham. When Moses struck to rock to get water, remember the people had been rebellious, Moses strikes the rock, God named the place Meribah, which means contention.

So the very name of the place was named because of what had taken place there, and that's in Numbers 20, verse 8. Now there's numerous other examples in scripture which I'm not going to go into this evening, that was just by, one more though, got ahead of myself.

When the Ark of the Covenant was captured, remember Eli's daughter-in-law was with child, she gave birth to a child, and she named the child Ichabod, which means the glory has departed. The Ark was removed, the symbol of God's presence, and she names the child Ichabod.

There are a number of buildings that purport to be churches that that name should be stapled on the top steeple. So looking at the first petition, hallowed be thy name, so we're going to do a little study into the names of God.

If names of places, people, and things are important in scripture, how much more true is that of the name of God? Okay, and I know, question?

At the risk of seeming dumb, when you say petition, in my mind I'm thinking of a petition as like a request. That's exactly right. Okay, so then how is.

Hallowed be thy name a petition? That's what you're asking is that God's name would be made holy. It's a request. Okay? Sure, no, it's good. Alright, so where we're at then, if names, places, people, things are important, how much more true is that of the name of God?

The Meaning of God’s Names: El, Elohim, and El Elyon

So if we're praying that God's name would be made holy, we should know a little bit about God's name, and we're actually told quite a bit about God's name in the scriptures. In Psalm 20, verse 1, we have, May the Lord, and I'll get into why that's capitalized in a little bit later.

May the Lord answer you in the day of trouble. May the name of the God of Jacob set you securely on high. We see that phrase, the name of God, used so many times throughout scripture, and we should know by now that when it talks about the name of God, it's really talking about the essence of who God is himself.

And that's one of the purposes for this study before we get into all of the other petitions, of finding out what it is that we're asking when we are petitioning him to make God's name holy, and what is the significance of his names.

So God has chosen to reveal himself through various names, and his names that he has chosen are descriptive of his character. Therefore we must know his names in order to pray. So if we're praying, Hallowed be thy name, what name are we talking about?

Does it matter? It seems to me that it should matter. And if we don't, we're kind of praying in ignorance, which we shouldn't be doing. One of the first names for God we find in the Old Testament, it's very common, is just simply the word El.

And we see that it means mighty, strong, or the strong one. El is translated God over 250 times in the Old Testament. Is something going on? Oh, okay. I knew something was going on. So El is translated God over 250 times in the Old Testament.

We see it in Deuteronomy 10, 17, for the Lord your God is the God of gods, the Lord of the lords, the great, the mighty, the awesome God who does not show partiality nor take a bribe. The one that I've underlined here is the one that is translated as El.

The others, the first Lord, the capitalized Lord is Yahweh, the others are all Elohim. We'll get into that in a little bit. But this is the one that we're looking at right now, just a simple El. The next one is Elohim, which is like a plural of El.

Elohim is translated God or Lord over 2 ,570 times in the Old Testament. It's a term that conveys the unity of God, yet it does allow for the plurality of the Trinity. Just because it's a plural form doesn't mean it is referring to the Trinity, but it certainly makes allowances for that.

So Elohim stresses the great contrast between God and man. And like I say, 2 ,570 times. We see it right in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. That word God down there is Elohim. Next name is El Elyon.

You can see it's used as a form of the very first word name, El Elyon. It literally means God, the highest God or the most high God. If you noticed, I've included a pronunciation guide next to it, and I did that for all of the names of God because most people have no idea how to pronounce the names of God, and you hear all kinds of mispronunciations, and it is the name of our God.

How does he feel if you mispronounce his name? Well, let me put it this way. How would it be for a woman if her husband constantly mispronounced her name? Couch time, right? Okay. So El Elyon literally means the highest God or the most high God.

El Elyon is the exalted one who is lifted high above all else. El Elyon is sovereign, indicates his sovereignty, that he is in absolute control, and we see this, the best example of this is where Abraham is coming back from his victory over the kings and he meets Melchizedek, all right?

Melchizedek in Genesis 14, starting verse 18, and Melchizedek, king of Salem, brought out bread and wine. Now he was a priest of the most high God. That's El Elyon, all right? And we're going to continue because you see it used, and he blessed him and said, blessed be Abraham of God most high, possessor of heaven and earth.

You can see even in the text a description of who God is as El Elyon. And blessed be God most high who has delivered your enemies into your hand, and he gave him a tenth of all. And the king of Sodom said to Abraham, give the people to me, take the goods for yourself.

And Abraham said to the king of Sodom, I have sworn to the Lord God most high, possessor of heaven and earth. Notice over and over again, you see God most high. So you can see how even the three names that we've seen so far tell us a little bit different things about the nature and character of God.

El Shaddai and Adonai: God Almighty and the Lord

And there's El Shaddai, that's God Almighty. This name is derived from mountain in Hebrew. And as such, the name suggests strength, stability and permanence. We know that mountains are frequently used in scripture as symbols, and with Mount Zion, Mount Horeb, Mount Gerizim, Mount Sinai, we see all of these mountains.

And it's always indicating something strong, something permanent. So El Shaddai is the immovable God. His promises are sure, his word cannot fail. Notice how this aspect, this name of God brings forth different types of characteristics.

It is the name God uses when he establishes the covenant with Abraham in Genesis 17 verses 1 and 2. Now when Abraham was 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abraham and said to him, I am God Almighty, walk before me and be blameless.

That is El Shaddai, God Almighty. And I will establish my covenant between me and you, and I will multiply you exceedingly. Okay? Following? Then here's another name, Adonai. And notice that only the first letter of Lord is capitalized up there.

Okay? We see this in Psalm 8, 1, O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is thy name in all the earth, who has displayed thy splendor above the heavens. Now notice you have Lord, the first Lord is all caps, and the second Lord is just lowercase with a capital letter at the beginning.

Almost every time you see the Lord that first way, it's translated from Yahweh or Jehovah. Okay? When you see it the other, almost always it's translated as from Adonai. All right? So what that's, what it's saying is, oh, Yahweh or Adonai.

You see the same thing in Psalm 110. My Lord said to the, the Lord said to my Lord, same two words are being used there. All right? This, this word is more of a title rather than an adjective. It's a name itself because there are other people in the scriptures that are referred to as Adonai, other than God.

It's not just a name of God. It's, it's a title. Of course, he is the Lord of Lords. All right? Does that make sense? The word also suggests plurality. Again, you can't prove the Trinity from this, but it certainly allows for plurality.

And it signifies that he is the ruler or master of everything. This is the attitude that was expressed by Thomas when he acknowledged my Lord and my God. Remember when Thomas was absent the first time Jesus appeared and then he comes into the room and he sees the nail holes and he says, my Lord and my God.

Now that's not Yahweh and Adonai. Who wants to tell me why? Those were the Hebrew names. The New Testament is written in Greek. So who knows what the names are? My Lord and my God. No, that's Hebrew. It's Kyrios and Theos.

It's Kyrios. My Lord is my Kyrios and my Theos. Remember that's what they wanted Caesar to, the Christians to bow to Caesar and say, Kaiser Kyrios, Caesar is Lord. But they wouldn't, of course. My Lord and my God.

Acknowledging his Lordship is necessary for salvation. I just threw this in there. But if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be saved.

Yahweh and the Covenant Names of God

For with the heart man believes resulting in righteousness and with the mouth he confesses resulting in salvation. So Jesus, you must understand that Jesus is Lord for salvation to be genuine. Now here we come to the name that we're all familiar with, Yahweh or Jehovah as one of the primary names for God 6 ,823 times.

That is used, it's the most often used for God in the Old Testament. And when you see the words in your English translation, when you see all capital letters, L-O-R-D, 99 times out of 100 it's going to be translated from Yahweh.

Okay? That's just a little translation. I don't know why they just don't put the Hebrew names in. You know, it seems to eliminate some confusion.

With Lord in the Old Testament, they took out the vowels and it's Y-H-W-H.

Y-H-W-H.

Well, all these words are written in Hebrew. So it wasn't just Yahweh.

Yahweh is derived from the Hebrew verb Havah, which means to be, which makes a whole lot of sense if you think about what's coming up next when God reveals himself to Moses. This is God's personal name, all right, with his people.

It's the name that he revealed to Moses in the wilderness. Remember, when he's commissioning Moses to go back and stand before Pharaoh, God said to Moses in Exodus 3 ,14, I am who I am. All right. God is Elohim and he says, I am who I am.

That's Havah and Havah were translated Yahweh. And he said, thus you shall say to all the sons of Israel, I am, that's Yahweh has sent me. You following? If you don't get it, let me know because I think it's very important that we do.

All right. So notice that I am comes from the same form what we would consider to be Havah is the same, that state of being in Hebrew. All right. And that's what God tells him, I am. Question? No, it's Elohim.

Okay. God furthermore said to Moses, thus you shall say to the God of Israel, the Lord, Yahweh. All right. The God of your fathers, oops. The God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob.

That's all some form of El or Elohim, those other names for God there. This is my name forever. This is my memorial name to all generations. So you can see that Yahweh is certainly one of the most important names for God that we can, that we can, we can speak.

And you'll see that as we come, because this name stresses his personal redemptive and covenant relationship with his people. So that's why this is a particular importance both to the Hebrews and to us in the church today.

Yahweh is the God of righteousness, holiness and love. Now you'll find so many people that make a strong dichotomy between Old and New Testaments and say the God of the Old Testament wasn't love, but Yahweh was revealed as a God of love.

He never changes. When God reveals himself as Yahweh, he often uses qualifying or explanatory words that give a fuller understanding of who he is. And we're going to go through a few of these now.

PJ, question. Would you say that it's problematic for people to use Jehovah as a name? As far as I understand it's a mistranslation or based on something incorrect. Isn't that the case?

No, it's not the best translation, but I don't think it's wrong to say that because there is some basis for how they did it, how they translated it. In fact, I think in the Latin it begins with an I. There's always a little bit of bias and personal preference coming into translations.

There's no such thing as translating it literally. And if you did transliterate everything, it wouldn't make sense because of the way language is structured. So I wouldn't say that it would be wrong. Obviously, I prefer Yahweh.

And you'll see coming up why. This is another name for him, Yahweh Tetzkenu. Say that three times fast. This name is used only by Jeremiah the prophet. It means Yahweh, our righteousness. And you'll see that each one of the suffixes that we're going to see for Yahweh tells us something very specific about God, who he is or how he has revealed himself in a particular circumstance.

That's why this is only used by Jeremiah the prophet. And here's how it comes in. In Jeremiah 23 verses 5 and 6, Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I shall raise up for David a righteous branch.

And he will reign as king and act wisely and do justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved and Israel will dwell securely. And this is his name by which he shall be called, the Lord our righteousness.

I wonder who he's talking about. I hope everybody can see it's a perfect prophecy of Jesus. But that's the Lord our righteousness. That's Yahweh Tetzkenu. Then we have Yahweh Emkadeshem. That means Yahweh, your sanctifier.

We see that in Exodus 31, 13, But as for you, speak to the sons of Israel, saying, You shall surely observe my sabbaths. For this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you.

And what do we know about sanctification? Jesus is the fulfillment of this name. It is Jesus who sanctifies his people. I hope what you can see here too, I didn't put this aspect in here, but notice how you have fulfillment and perfect harmony between Old and New Testament.

Every name that's used of God, Jesus fulfills in the New Testament. Yahweh Shalom. Yahweh Shalom. Everybody should know this. What is Shalom? Peace. Name means Yahweh is peace. We see this in Judges when Gideon built an altar to the Lord and named it, The Lord is Peace.

And it's to this day. That's what he says. So we see Yahweh Shalom. And of course Jesus is the fulfillment of this too. He is the one who brings peace. How do we have peace with God? Only through Jesus Christ.

How can we have peace with anybody? Only through the peace that Christ brings in our heart. Then we have Yahweh Shema. Yahweh Shema. That means Yahweh is there. This name is used in the very last verse in the book of Ezekiel.

And Ezekiel is describing the New Jerusalem. Alright, look at what he says. Ezekiel 48 -35, the city shall be 18 ,000 cubits round about, and the name of the city from that day shall be, the.

Lord is there. Yes. The Shema that's used, is it the same word as the Shema when they.

Say hero Israel? I believe it is. I'm not absolutely positive. I didn't check that. It might be the same. It could be the same. Alright, so we see that the Lord is there. What is he talking about here in Ezekiel?

Where is the Lord going to be? The New Jerusalem. The church. The church. What did Jesus say to the woman? By the way, the day is coming when they're not going to worship on this mountain or Mount Gerizim, right?

Because the Lord is within you. That's what Jesus Christ said. The kingdom is within you. And the kingdom was at hand back then. So the kingdom of God is here in the church. And we're, what does it say?

We're two or three are gathered together. There is the Lord in the midst. So where is the Lord? He's in the midst of his church. That's the New Jerusalem. Now of course he's going to be in heaven. You know, Jesus will be in heaven as well.

Yahweh as Healer, Provider, Banner, and Shepherd

Yahweh Rophe. Alright. This name means Yahweh, your healer. Alright. Coming out of Egypt, the Israelites were given a reminder in Exodus 15, 26. And he said, if you will give earnest heed to the voice of the Lord your God, do what is right in his sight, give ear to his commandments and keep all his statutes.

I will put none of the diseases on you, which I have put on the Egyptians, for I, the Lord, am your healer. Oops, I'm sorry. That was a mistake. I, the Lord, am your healer. That's Yahweh Rophe. How is that fulfilled in Christ?

Yeah. By his stripes we're healed. And then of course it's not only physical healing, but it's healing of the whole person. Your spirit, your soul, your mind, everything. And then in the resurrection we will have perfect, perfect bodies.

Then we have Yahweh Yireh. Usually as you've heard it pronounced Jireh, but that's not the way it's supposed to be pronounced, Yahweh Yireh. That means Yahweh, your provider. See how it goes? God reveals this name in the context of Abraham's sacrifice.

Genesis 22, 14, and Abraham called the name of the place, the Lord will provide, as it is said to this day, the mount of the Lord, it will be provided. That's when he provides the sacrifice and saves Isaac.

Jesus our provider provided himself as the sacrifice. Yahweh Nissi, that means Yahweh my banner, Yahweh. God reveals this name in the context of victory in battle. In Exodus 17, this is where remember Moses' arms got tired.

So Joshua overwhelmed Amalek and his people with the edge of his sword. Then the Lord said to Moses, write in a book as a memorial, then recited to Joshua that I will utterly blot out the name of memory of Amalek from under my heaven.

And Moses built an altar and named it the Lord is my banner. The Lord Jesus is always our victor. He had victory over death, the cross, and sin. Yahweh Rohi, familiar one, the Lord is my shepherd. God reveals this name in the context of his loving care for his people.

Psalm 23, the Lord is my shepherd, that's Yahweh Rohi. I shall not want, and if Jesus obviously revealed himself in the same way, I am the good shepherd. See how all of these names? So now let's get down to the petition.

Pray for God's name to be hallowed. What does it mean to hallow something? Very simply, it means to sanctify it. That means to set it apart, consider it holy. It is the duty of all Christians to hallow God's name, but it is also the duty of every Christian to pray that God's name would be hallowed in all the earth.

So those are some of the things, what it means to hallow something or call something holy. Thomas Watson said, you know I had to get a Puritan in here somehow. As the vessels of the sanctuary were said to be hallowed, so to hallow God's name is to set it apart from all abuses, to use it holily and reverently.

In particular, hallowing God's name is to give him high honor and veneration and render his name sacred. We can add nothing to his essential glory, but we are said to honor and sanctify his name when we lift him up in the world and make him appear greater in the eyes of others.

And then just last couple of thoughts. Pray for God's name to be hallowed. That's the instruction of Jesus in the first petition. Hallowed be thy name. And it is in fact a petition, it's a request. Before you pray anything else, this is the first petition.

Before you pray anything else, before you ask for anything, pray that God would be honored in all the earth. That's the priority and of supreme importance and it is that God's name is hallowed. How do we hallow his name?

By confessing and professing his name publicly, by making him number one in our thoughts, by trusting his promises, by speaking his name in respect and reverence, by loving him with all our heart, soul, and mind, by worshiping him in spirit and in truth.

And are there any questions?