Abba: Invited Into God’s Family Through Prayer

Devotional

Day 1: Workshop Rules and Holy Ground

The workshop was no place for horsing around—a space of sawdust, tools, and purpose. Just as a child’s curiosity needed guidance among concrete floors and power tools, so our approach to God requires reverence. The phrase “no place to be horsing around” echoes the tension between wonder and respect. God’s presence invites exploration but demands seriousness, not because God is distant, but because divine work transforms. To call God “Father” is to enter a workshop where love and purpose shape us. [51:14]

“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.” (Matthew 6:9, ESV)

Reflection: Where do you sense the invitation to approach God with both childlike curiosity and holy reverence? How might “horsing around” distract you from the sacred work God is doing in your life?

Day 2: Abba’s Garage and Family Grammar

“Abba” is not a formal title but a child’s first word—a name whispered in trust. Like a grandfather’s workshop passed down through generations, the language of faith binds God’s family across time. Jesus’ use of “Abba” dismantles formality, replacing it with the intimacy of a parent bending down to listen. This familial grammar transcends bloodlines, creating kinship through shared action and presence. To pray “Our Father” is to inherit a workshop of grace. [49:47]

“And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Galatians 4:6, ESV)

Reflection: When has calling God “Abba” felt natural to you? When has it felt uncomfortable? How might this name reshape your understanding of belonging?

Day 3: Sawdust and Sacred Seriousness

Holiness is not a polished finish but the sawdust of divine labor. God’s workshop holds both joy and pain—unfinished projects, half-restored furniture, and the grit of transformation. To “hallow” God’s name is to acknowledge the weight of this work, where laughter and grief alike are held sacred. Prayer becomes the chisel, not a wish list, shaping us into family heirlooms. [52:12]

“The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.” (Psalm 34:18, ESV)

Reflection: What “unfinished project” in your life feels like holy ground? How might God’s nearness in both joy and pain change how you pray?

Day 4: Inheriting Tools and Transformed Tongues

The workshop’s tools were handed down—not as relics, but as active signs of legacy. Liturgical language, like a grandfather’s phrase, forms us when repeated with purpose. Saying “Our Father” weekly is less about rote recitation and more about muscle memory: training our tongues to trust the family we’ve been adopted into. These words become the nails and saws that build God’s kingdom. [55:55]

“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom.” (Colossians 3:16, ESV)

Reflection: Which repeated phrase or practice in your faith life has shaped you unexpectedly? How could shared language deepen your sense of spiritual family?

Day 5: Kin Beyond Bloodlines

Family isn’t made by DNA but by showing up. The workshop’s true treasure wasn’t the tools but the grandfather’s quiet presence on the workbench. God’s fatherhood is proven not in a title but in steadfast love—a love that claims outsiders as heirs. To pray “Our Father” is to renounce isolation, stepping into a workshop where strangers become siblings. [53:47]

“But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” (1 Peter 2:9–10, ESV)

Reflection: Who in your life embodies the “family beyond blood” that God invites you into? How might you extend that kinship to someone feeling like an outsider?

Sermon Summary

The opening picture of the backyard workshop shows how family language gets handed down. The phrase “no place to be horsing around” first sounded strange to a child, because there were no horses in the workshop. But the grandfather’s presence and love showed what the words meant. The workshop was full of treasures, scraps, tools, sawdust like snow, and endless possibilities, but it was also serious business.

The family phrase passed from granddaddy to dad, and then into another Sunday morning with children getting ready for church. Family has a way of owning a common language together, and that language matters. The Lord’s Prayer works the same way. Its first word had already taught that this prayer is not solitary; it belongs to a people standing alongside one another before God.

The phrase “Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name” requires careful unpacking because its language sounds old and stodgy. Jesus’ language for God does not mean God is male, and Genesis makes clear that male and female together bear the image of God. Yet Jesus calls God Father again and again, because for Jesus, God is family. The incarnation makes that claim strange and beautiful: Jesus has a human mother and, by miracle of miracles, a heavenly Father.

The prayer, then, invites others into Jesus’ own heavenly family. This is not kinship built on sameness, blood, DNA, or common interest. This is kinship claimed into existence despite difference. The Aramaic word “Abba” carries that point more deeply than the formal word “Father.” Abba sounds less like title and more like papa, dada, granddaddy, dad. It is a child’s word, a word of intimacy, presence, and love.

“Hallowed be thy name” pulls that intimacy into seriousness. The old phrase means that calling on God is “no place to be horsing around.” The things of God may be seriously painful, full of loss, fear, confusion, frustration, discomfort, and disappointment. The things of God may also be seriously joyful, full of gratitude, laughter, peace, comfort, and praise. Either way, prayer is serious because it draws people deeper into God’s family.

God’s parental presence and love know no limits. The family of God forms not through shared taste or shared background, but through action, presence, and love. The liturgical life of the Kirk gives that family a common grammar of grace, not as magic words, but as shared language shaped over time. God shows what the words mean, and God’s people are called to show that meaning to one another and to a world invited into the same family.

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Key Takeaways

1. Family language shapes belonging [43:03] Family language is not just a collection of repeated phrases; it carries memory, identity, and affection. The words handed down in a home become a way of recognizing what matters. The Lord’s Prayer functions like that kind of family language, forming people into a shared life before God rather than leaving prayer as a private religious habit. [43:03]
2. God’s Fatherhood is intimate kinship [49:31] The word “Abba” does not begin with formality or distance. It names a relationship known through presence and love, the kind of word a child learns before mastering explanations. Jesus gives access to that language, not as sentimental comfort, but as entry into the very family life he shares with God. [49:31]
3. Hallowed means serious business [50:28] The holiness of God does not cancel intimacy, and intimacy with God does not make holiness casual. “Hallowed be thy name” means that prayer belongs in the realm of things that matter most deeply. Pain, joy, confusion, gratitude, disappointment, and praise all become serious because God is present within them. [50:28]
4. Kinship transcends sameness and blood [48:17] The family Jesus creates is not held together by DNA, taste, tribe, or common interest. This kinship is deeper precisely because it holds together people who are different. God’s action, presence, and love create a belonging that human similarity could never sustain. [48:17]
5. Shared words become lived grace [55:42] Liturgical words are not empty repetition when they are received as family language. Over time, they shape how God’s presence and love are named, remembered, and practiced. The words become true in the community as God’s people show their meaning through presence and love.

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Youtube Chapters

[00:00] - Welcome
[37:35] - Prayer for God’s Promises
[38:11] - Family Language and the Workshop
[39:50] - No Place for Horsing Around
[41:00] - A Phrase Passed Down
[43:03] - The Lord’s Prayer as Family Language
[44:02] - Unpacking Father and Hallowed
[44:42] - God Beyond Gendered Reduction
[46:01] - Why Jesus Calls God Father
[47:18] - Invited Into Heavenly Family
[49:31] - Abba, Intimacy, and Love
[50:28] - Hallowed Means Serious Business
[53:10] - Presence and Love Create Kinship
[54:59] - Liturgy as Common Grammar
[56:15] - Showing the Words Through Love

Bible Study Guide

Bible Reading
- Genesis 1:27 (ESV): "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them."
- Matthew 6:9 (ESV): "Pray then like this: 'Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.'"
- Romans 8:15 (ESV): "For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, 'Abba! Father!'"

Observation questions

In the sermon, the phrase "no place to be horsing around" was tied to the workshop and later to prayer. What specific examples were given to show how family language creates belonging? [42:23]
How does the sermon explain the relationship between the intimacy of "Abba" and the seriousness of "hallowed be thy name"? [50:28]
According to the sermon, what does Genesis 1:27 clarify about God’s nature and human identity? [45:05]

Interpretation questions

Why might Jesus have chosen the word "Father" (and "Abba") to describe God, even though Genesis emphasizes that God’s image includes both male and female?
The sermon says kinship in God’s family is "not built on sameness, blood, or common interest." How does this redefine what it means to belong to a faith community? [48:17]
How does the idea of "family language" in the Lord’s Prayer challenge the notion of prayer as a private or individual practice?

Application questions

What phrases, traditions, or practices in your own family or faith community act as "family language" that shapes belonging? How could you intentionally pass these on to others?
The phrase "hallowed be thy name" calls prayer "serious business." What areas of your prayer life feel casual or disconnected? How might you approach them with renewed reverence? [51:14]
The sermon emphasizes that God’s family includes people who are different from us. Who in your life or community feels hardest to love or include? What practical step could you take to reflect God’s kinship with them? [53:29]
Liturgical words like the Lord’s Prayer are meant to become "lived grace." How could regularly praying this prayer reshape your daily actions or relationships? [55:42]
When have you experienced God’s presence as both intimate ("Abba") and holy ("hallowed") in a season of joy or pain? How did that duality deepen your understanding of prayer?

Sermon Clips

81s

“Here's the thing about that word, Abba. It doesn't denote a parenthood that's based on DNA or bloodline or sameness or titles or common interest, The things that we like to think community can be built around and belonging is built around. Rather, it denotes a parenthood that is based on action. A parent or child would call a parent Abba because of presence, because of love. See, God's parental presence and love for you and for this world, it knows no limits. There are no things of joy or things of pain or anything in between in which God is not present with you and I with love. And this presence and this love that God gives, there are all kinds of treasures to be found in it.”

58s

“The idea is that it's not simply repetition. It's not simply that God needs to hear the right words like some kind of spell before God would listen. It's the other way around. The idea is that over time, these words we say become our family language. They shape the way that you talk about God's presence and God's love in your own life. It gives us a common grammar of grace together. The key thing, though, in order for this language to work, is that we can't just know what it means. We know what it means because we've been shown what it means by God through presence and love.”

76s

“See, God's parental presence and love for you and for this world, it knows no limits. There are no things of joy or things of pain or anything in between in which God is not present with you and I with love. And this presence and this love that God gives, there are all kinds of treasures to be found in it. It opens up all kinds of possibilities. There are endless depths to explore. And in the same way, God's presence and God's love transcends our circumstances and our differences, it also calls you and I into a new kind of kinship with one another that transcends circumstance or difference. A profound family of God.”

74s

“It's such a strange thing to say but that is the claim of the incarnation. The claim is that to Jesus, family. And not just in a metaphorical sense. Now whatever you make of that, the radical shift that I want you to notice here in the Lord's prayer this morning is that in teaching us to pray this way, what Jesus is doing is inviting you and I to become a part of the very heavenly family. Because of what Jesus to whom God is family comes to do and to be, we too, by miracle of miracles, get to call ourselves family to God and to each other.”

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Abba: Invited Into God’s Family Through Prayer

Devotional

Day 1: Workshop Rules and Holy Ground

Day 2: Abba’s Garage and Family Grammar

Day 3: Sawdust and Sacred Seriousness

Day 4: Inheriting Tools and Transformed Tongues

Day 5: Kin Beyond Bloodlines

Sermon Summary

Key Takeaways

Youtube Chapters

Bible Study Guide

Sermon Clips

Abba: Invited Into God’s Family Through Prayer

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