Trusting the Master's Mercy: Thy Will Be Done - Luke 16:1-11 & The Lord's Prayer

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Monday morning, I stood in the NICU – neonatal intensive care unit – at Christus Spohn South Hospital in Corpus, looking at the smallest baby I’ve ever seen. His name is MJ and at birth he weighed one pound, nine ounces. To put that into perspective, his body weight equals one and a half boxes of butter, or 135 quarters, or six smart phones. His body isn’t much longer than your hymnal and his head is the size of a baseball. His diapers are the size of a Kleenex tissue. Even now, a week later, he has a breathing tube, heart monitors, a pulse ox sensor, and a couple other unidentified wires attached to his little body.

That morning, while mother was recuperating and resting from the event that brought the little fella into the world, the father and I stood at the incubator and watched MJ in wonder and amazement at a baby, so tiny and so little. The nurse gave me a small dropper of distilled water and reaching into the warm, sterile environment that was his home, I baptized him in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. For the previous two weeks we had prayed that the Lord would keep him safe in the mother’s womb and that he would continue to grow in the safety of her belly. Last Sunday evening, the Lord saw fit that little MJ was born at 24 weeks, sixteen weeks premature – a very risky situation. I don’t remember the exact words, but Monday morning, I choked out a prayer that just as the Lord had rescued and redeemed the child’s life through water and Word, the Lord would also preserve MJ’s life through that plastic cocoon so that he might grow. I concluded, “Thy will be done. Amen.”

Then, Wednesday afternoon, an old college friend made comments on his social media page that led me, and other friends, to believe he was having an economic, emotional, and spiritual crisis. From 2000 miles away, I prayed for his wellbeing, “Thy will be done.” Thursday, I watched with the news of the flooding from Houston to Beaumont and I was checking in with friends, praying their homes, businesses, livestock and churches would be preserved. “Thy will be done.”

“Thy will be done.” On the one hand, those four words are very freeing. It surrenders everything to the perfect will of God. My prayers may be selfish, they may be slap-dash, they may be misguided. But, carried by the Holy Spirit through Christ, the will of God shall be done. What if God’s will isn’t what we want? Because, on the other hand, those four words are terribly frightening.

Those four words are at the heart of Christian prayer. They are both words filled with faith and power, and, if we are honest, words that at times are filled with fear and angst. It’s easy to say them in this holy house on a Sunday morning like today when all is well and right in the world. It’s easy to say them when surrounded by brothers and sisters in Christ who join voices together with you, raising our sacred petitions together. It’s a whole ‘nother thing to say them at the bedside of an infant who already is fighting the battle of his short lifetime just to survive, surrounded by beeping machines, sterile equipment and hushed voices of nurses.

So, that’s the very crux, isn’t it? How do we surrender ourselves to the Lord’s will is in that moment? Do we dare commend that infant, or our grandmother on her deathbed, or our homes as floodwaters rise, or our marriage when it seems to be on the rocks, or our own well-being -  whatever the prayer request might be – how do we surrender that to the Lord’s will knowing full well that might not be what we really are asking for? How is it possible that, filled with faith, we entrust that petition to the Lord while at the same time being OK if His will is opposed to our own?

As I held that little water-filled tube over MJ’s tiny head, I couldn’t help but think of Abraham and Isaac. What must Abraham have been thinking as his own hand was suspended over his bound son? On the one hand, Abraham is willing to relinquish his own, only-begotten son whom he loves more than anything else. Yet, at the same time, Abraham is trusting the promise of God that through this son his offspring will outnumber the stars of the sky. That promise cannot happen without his son, who was already a promise fulfilled; but, God has commanded Abraham take his own son’s life. This, but that. It’s an absurd belief, a paradox of faith, trusting that while God demanded Isaac’s life, God would not take Isaac’s life.

Abraham isn’t alone. You remember the story of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. They are arrested and condemned to death in the burning furnace for failing to pray to King Nebuchadnezzar’s gold statue. In their own, “Thy will be done” moment, they tell Nebuchadnezzar, “If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve…will deliver us from your Majesty’s hand. But even if He does not, we want you to know, your majesty, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up,” (Dan. 3:17-18). Even as they hold dear to the promises of God, they simultaneously surrender their claims on their own lives. This, but that.

Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego are not alone. For you have prayed that prayer as well – maybe not in those same moments, but in your own moments, you have prayed “Thy will be done.” You know the tension. Yet, you pray it.

How is this prayer possible?

Those words, “thy will be done,” do something remarkable. This word, this prayer of Jesus creates the very faith that is necessary to both make the request and trust God’s answer. It’s no longer a throwaway petition, sort of a reverse psychological “wink” at God, a hail Mary of prayerful proportions. We cannot presume God’s actions but, like the steward in this morning’s Gospel lesson, we presume God will look upon us and act toward us in grace and mercy. “Thy will be done” is a deliberate submission to the perfect, omnipotent and omniscient will of God, surrendering the burdens that are too heavy for our own shoulders to bear to the strong arms of Jesus.

Abraham was prepared to sacrifice his son. Jesus would be the perfect Sacrifice made by the Father on our behalf. Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were prepared to face the fiery furnace. Jesus would face the fiery wrath of God, to be consumed in the crucible of the cross. Jesus knew this terrible death was in store for Him. He knew this was His purpose, to be the atoning sacrifice to rescue and redeem God’s own creation, but still, when confronted with His mortality, Jesus prayed, “If possible, take this cup from me, yet not my will but thy will be done.” In his hour of need, even as He makes His request to God, He submits to the Father’s will. Jesus will go to the cross. Jesus will die. Jesus will redeem. Jesus will save.

You’ve heard the term “prayer warrior,” before. I’m not a big fan of the term, to be honest; it makes it sound as if one is doing battle with God and by your prayers you overwhelm and subdue Him. I would like to suggest another term. I once read of Abraham described a “knight of faith” (Soren Kirkegaard, Fear and Trembling; page unknown). I much prefer that picture of a knight, protected with faith in the blessings and promises of God, as we face the challenges and uncertainties of life.

So, when we stand at the bedside and intercede for a preemie baby, or we pray for the storm to stop and floodwaters to abate, or we pray for our family in the midst of conflict, or we pray that our burdened hearts might find peace, we do so as knights of faith, trusting that God will hear and He will make things right. We trust the mercy of God who has already acted by sending His Son to restore that which was broken.

There is a great paradox here – that we cling to God’s promises with both hands, but at the same time those hands are open. It’s called the theology of the cross. It seems backwards, this cross-living, but it’s the way of the Lord. There’s life through death. Victory comes through defeat. And so, one holds fast by letting go. But it is His will, which is done among us and, sometimes, even in spite of us, that He distributes great blessings.

Horatio Spafford was a Chicago area businessman. His only son died at age 4.  A year later, his estate was destroyed by the Great Chicago Fire of 1872. In 1873, he sent his wife and daughters on a European vacation, but half-way across the Atlantic, the ship sank. Only his wife survived, sending a simple two-word telegram home to her husband: “Saved. Alone.” He went to Europe to be with his wife, and when he returned his insurance company refused to pay damages for the fire that destroyed his newly rebuilt law offices, citing “An act of God” as their reasoning. Broke, without work, and having buried all of his children within a three year timespan, he wrote a poem to help himself come to grips with all that happened. He understood life under the cross. Whether in joy or hardship, in times of strength or times of helplessness, the Lord is still the same Lord who died – more than that, who lives! – sins paid in full.

He lives, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought;
My sin, not in part, but the whole,
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more.
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!
It is well with my soul, it is well, it is well with my soul.

And, Lord, haste the day when our faith will be sight,
The clouds be rolled back as a scroll,
The trump shall resound and the Lord shall descend;
Even so, it is well with my soul.
It is well with my soul, it is well, it is well with my soul. (LSB #763)