Twelfth Sunday after Trinity – Wednesday

For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. – Matthew 6:13.

This is the conclusion of the Lord’s Prayer.  By adding these words we should say to God in childlike simplicity that, being the Lord and King of the kingdom in which we have obtained citizenship, it is He alone with whom we should seek help; that He alone has the power to grant our petitions, and that, therefore, all glory, honor, and praise accruing therefrom shall be His alone.

And then we should say: “Amen.”  And this “Amen” we must not attach to the end of our prayer by force of habit, thoughtlessly, but it must be a conscious, strong, firm, believing “Amen.”  For what is meant by the word “Amen “?  “Amen” is “Yes! Yes!  It shall be so!”  We should be certain that these petitions are acceptable to our Father in heaven, and heard by Him, for He Himself has commanded us so to pray, and has promised to hear us.  God says “Amen” to such petitions, and so we, too, should rejoice in faith and confidently say: “Amen!  Amen!”  “Yes!  Yes!  It shall be so.”

Dear Christian, study the Lord’s Prayer, and learn and consider what God bids you to pray therein, and what He thus promises to give you.  You will find therein an abundance of gifts for which you may ask, and which God will give to you, and which will make you truly happy and blissful in time and eternity.

The Lord’s Prayer is an open storehouse, full of treasures, and God shows you the treasures and says: “Ask Me for them, and I will surely give them to you.”  There open wide your eyes, your heart, and your lips, and ask, and believe, and say: “Amen!  These treasures are mine!”  Amen.

PRAYER – My dear heavenly Father, I, a poor sinner, thank Thee through Jesus Christ, my Savior, that I may so address Thee.  Write this Thy name, “Father,” into my heart by Thy Spirit working through Thy Word.  Let me remain in Thy kingdom here in time and hereafter in eternity.  This is Thy gracious and good will; let this will be done in my life.  Also, give me my daily morsel of bread.  And graciously, daily comfort me with Thy gift in Christ of the forgiveness of all my sins, and grant me an abundance of Thy grace to gladly forgive those who sin against me, repent, desire, and need my forgiveness.  And let me not fall into temptation, but deliver me from evil at all times, and finally from each and every evil.  Amen, my Father; Thou wilt surely do this.  Amen.

Amen; that is: So shall it be!

Confirm our faith and hope in Thee,

that we may doubt not, but believe

what here we ask we shall receive.

Thus in Thy name and at Thy Word

we say: Amen; Oh hear us, Lord!

(Hymn 458, st. 9; TLH)