Romans 12:2 – So Much More

… be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Summary: In this meditation we look back on where we have been; four little words that have the power to change the world.

The Lord’s Prayer begins with, “Our Father in heaven…” These four words are so much more than just words.

By having us use the plural of “me,” God gently guides us into the second Great Commandment, “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:39). Personally, I find this illuminating. God has us go into a room alone and pray as if we were speaking for all believers or all people.

Then, we are allowed to call God “Father.” This is not some impersonal god who is arbitrary and vengeful. This is not a god who puts himself above all else. This is a God who loves his Creation. This God made us in his own image (Genesis 1:27). Like him, we are part physical and part spiritual. The God of All Things loves us. We are his children. Through the amazing power of Jesus, God in the flesh, we are allowed to realize our kinship with our Maker.

Oh, and one more thing: by calling God “Father,” we are acknowledging him as our father. That is a very loving thing to do. So in two words, “Our” and “Father,” Jesus fulfills the two Great Commandments. When we repeat these words, even if we do not understand them, we are being trained to do the same thing Jesus does: We fulfill the two Great Commandments.

“In heaven,” tells us where God lives, but like a wedding invitation that was left out in the rain, the return address is blurred. We don’t know exactly where “heaven” is. Yet we know it is there. We know this because God is real, his Word is real, and his Word is True.

As we meditated on where heaven might be, we discovered that wherever it is, God is still intimately aware of us, where we are, and what our needs are. He is in us, around us, and with us. God, our Father, deeply cares for us, and being in heaven does not keep him from knowing us or everything about us.

And then there are his angels. Spiritual beings can be here with us. They are able to travel between heaven and earth. There is much more to know about these beings that we have studied here, but we know that earth is accessible to these heavenly beings. For me, there is comfort in knowing God’s agents of Good are here with us.

If we said nothing else but “Our Father” we demonstrate good faith and love to our Lord Jesus and our Father in heaven. But there is more. Much, much more. These four words put us in the right frame of mind and the correct spiritual posture to come before our God. When we bend our will to his will, we conform to God’s template for our lives. When we conform to his will, we become his chosen tools to change the world. We are transformed by the renewing of our minds.

Application: Find a quiet place and with this meditation in mind pray the first four words of the Lord’s Prayer.

Food for Thought: How has meditating on these first four words of the Lord’s Prayer changed your understanding of the prayer?