Matt 6:7–15 — The Lord’s Prayer, Part 2: Hallowed Be Thy Name

The Lord’s Prayer contains an address and six petitions. “Our Father in heaven” reminds us of our adoption through Christ. The petitions that follow teach adoration, anticipation, submission, dependence on God’s provision, confession, and prayer for protection.

We now consider the first petition: “Hallowed be your name.” It teaches us to adore God—to ask that his name be treated as holy. The Heidelberg Catechism explains the petition in two parts. First, we ask for grace truly to know, honor, glorify, and praise God for his works and attributes. Second, we ask that everything we think, say, and do would honor his name rather than cause it to be blasphemed.

We will consider what it means to treat God’s name with reverence, why adoration should begin our prayers, and how adoration should shape our lives.

Treating God’s Name with Reverence

Hallowed be your name means help us to truly know you, to honor, glorify, and praise you for all your works and for all that shines forth from them. Your almighty power, wisdom, kindness, justice, mercy, and truth. And it means, so there’s two main things that it means. The first is to help us to truly know you and honor you. But secondly, and it means help us to direct all our living, what we think, say, and do, so that your name will never be blasphemed because of us, but always honored and praised.

I’m going to go through this first petition of the Lord’s Prayer under three points. The first point is treating God’s name with reverence. The second is adoration, beginning prayer with it. And then third, adoration, letting it affect our lives. And you can see that those second two points correspond roughly to the Heidelberg Catechism.

First, treating God’s name with reverence. That’s what the Lord is commanding us to do in this first petition of the Lord’s Prayer. He’s commanding the disciples to pray that God’s name would be treated with reverence. And thereby, if you’re praying that God’s name would be treated with reverence, you’re also praying that would be true of yourself, that you would reverence God’s name and honor Him. Now first we need to understand what we mean by God’s name. What is God’s name?

Everything by Which God Makes Himself Known

It’s an interesting concept. It’s found throughout scripture. It’s a biblical theological theme that you can find throughout the Old Testament and into the New. The name of God is not simply like we think of as a proper name. Someone’s name is Robert. That’s not simply what we’re talking about when we talk about God’s name. God does have a proper name. He’s revealed that in the Old Testament as Yahweh.

But that’s not simply, that’s not the only thing that we’re talking about when we talk about God’s name. Reverencing God’s name is not simply reverencing the syllables or reverencing the proper name of God. Rather, God’s name focuses upon God himself and all that he is, but focusing that on how he has revealed himself to us. The Westminster Shorter Catechism, question 101, has an interesting statement explaining this, that the Westminster Shorter Catechism defines God’s name as everything whereby God makes himself known.

It is God, reverencing God’s name is reverencing God, but it’s reverencing God insofar as and as he has made himself known, as he has revealed himself. God’s revelation of himself in scripture, the titles of God, the names of God. Yahweh is one of the names of God that is prominent in the Old Testament.

God’s mighty deeds, his actions in history are also part of his revelation. He makes himself known as a mighty warrior. He makes himself known as a judge. He makes himself known as a redeemer when he does those things in history, when he judges and when he redeems.

God’s name then is a comprehensive term. It’s not just the syllables. It’s not just the words. It is like everything by which we know God because of how he has revealed himself in scripture and in his mighty deeds. Interestingly, there are specific times in the Old Testament where God specifically puts his name somewhere. This is an interesting language that we find in the Old Testament. For example, In Exodus chapter 23, God is talking to the people of Israel. They’ve just come out of Egypt. They’re now at Mount Sinai. They’ve received the law of God at Mount Sinai. And then God is continuing to instruct the people.

And one of the things he wants to tell them about is this interesting figure called the Angel of the Lord. Now the Angel of the Lord is a real angel. Created being, but this angel of the Lord is somehow so closely related to God himself that God’s name is in him. So Exodus 23 says, pay careful attention to him and obey his voice. Do not rebel against him for he will not pardon your transgression for my name is in him. Isn’t that interesting?

I think that in terms of like the whole flow of redemptive history and biblical theology, we can see that as a picture of Christ. Ultimately the angel of the Lord is a picture of Christ, and Christ is the one in whom God’s name is ultimately placed. Christ the incarnation, the incarnate God, God in the flesh.

We beheld his glory, glory as of the only begotten Son. But there are other things and other places where God puts his name, for example. When Solomon built the temple, and he has that wonderful prayer of dedication, and then God responds to his prayer and says that he has consecrated this house, God says, I have indeed heard your prayer, and I’ve set apart this house, this temple that you’ve built, and I’ve done so, I’ve consecrated it, I’ve set it apart as holy by putting my name there. God has put his name in the temple somehow. And so it’s interesting how in the Old Testament you have this idea of God.

His name is all that by which we know God. It’s all of God’s revelation of himself. But there are also these specific ways in which God identifies his name with specific persons and places, all of which, of course, is ultimately pointing us to Christ. Christ is the angel of the Lord. Christ is the true temple. Christ is the one in whom God has placed his name. God’s name is also closely associated with God’s glory.

There are a couple of verses in the Old Testament where the term, my name and my glory, are almost interchangeable. For example, Psalm 8, O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth. And then the very next verse says, you have set your glory above the heavens.

Or Isaiah 48, 11, referring to restoring the remnant of Israel and bringing them back. His name would be profaned if it seemed as if God’s covenant promises failed and the people are in exile forever. For how should my name be profane? But then the very next sentence says, my glory I will not give to another. So God’s name and God’s glory are almost interchangeable. Now they’re not exactly the same, but they’re very closely related.

God’s name focuses on God’s own revelation of himself when he puts his name somewhere, when he reveals something about himself, when he acts in history and reveals himself to be a judge or a redeemer. That’s God’s name, it’s more the from God to us direction. God’s glory is also tied directly to that, but it’s more as we respond to that revelation, as we look at God as he has revealed himself in all of his attributes and revelation and actions and deeds, or even those specific places where he has put his name in the angel or in the temple, and then we respond to that and we honor God’s name, that’s God’s glory. God’s name and God’s glory are almost like two sides of the same coin, but focusing upon the objective and the subjective aspect, from God to us and then from us back to God.

Hallowing God’s Name

That then explains what it means in this petition here. The first petition of the Lord’s Prayer is, hallowed be your name. Or another way to translate that is, let your name be set apart and treated as holy. That is the glory aspect. So God’s name is God revealing himself and then we respond by honoring God, by glorifying him, by setting apart his name as holy. Now this is an interesting concept, right, to sanctify God’s name. That sounds somewhat strange because we’re used to hearing that language of sanctifying as something that refers to what God does to us.

God sanctifies us. We have definitive sanctification, which we’re once for all transferred from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light, where we’ve died with Christ and been raised with him, and that’s a fact. We also have progressive sanctification where we become more holy. We’re not just set apart as holy, but we’re being progressively made holy. So we’re used to hearing that word sanctify or set apart as holy as something that applies to us.

How does it apply to God? It doesn’t make sense. How does it apply to God’s name? We can’t sanctify God. We can’t make God more holy. He’s already holy in and of himself. But we can do this. We can treat God as holy. We can treat God with reverence and awe. We can stand in awe of God.

We can respond to his revelation of himself, that is his name, by respecting that and honoring that and glorifying God because of it. And so, let your name be set apart as holy, let your name be sanctified, is simply another way of saying, cause us, oh God, to adore you more. Cause us, oh God, to have our thoughts focused upon you and to honor you and to stand in awe of you. It is the adoration of God that, hence my one word summary of this clause, adoration. It’s about how we treat and honor God. Just think about in the Old Testament all the times where God is so concerned about His name and His being being set apart and honored as holy.

And also He’s concerned about His name not being profaned, not being despised by the sin of His people. Leviticus 19 verse 12, which is almost a commentary on the third commandment, you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, says this, you shall not swear by my name falsely, so that’s the same thing as taking God’s name in vain, but then it adds, and so profane the name of your God. If you use God’s name for a false purpose, If you take God’s name in vain, if you place God’s name upon something that He does not wish to be identified with, then you are profaning the name of your God. You are causing God’s name to be despised, to be trampled in the gutter. In the Old Testament, there’s so many passages that talk about this idea, how God desires to be honored as holy.

Think of that one incident. This is an amazing one. Remember that time when Moses struck the rock in a way that was dishonoring to the Lord. It’s not exactly clear what it was that he did wrong, but maybe an anger or frustration with God’s people. But he did something that caused God to be dishonored. And so the Lord said to Moses, this is in Numbers 20, verse 12, Moses was barred from entering into the promised land because of this one sin that he committed. It’s an amazing thought. That’s how seriously God takes His holiness and His honor. You didn’t honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites. You somehow despised me and mistreated me. We see a similar thing with Nadab and Abihu.

These were sons of Aaron who took strange fire. It’s hard to know exactly what that means, but some fire that wasn’t from the altar or something. And they offered it to the Lord on the altar. And of course they were instantly killed as a result of that.

And this is what the Lord said in response to their sin of not honoring God. God desires to be honored, to be treated as holy, to not be treated as some flippant thing, as a mere creature, as bringing him down to our level and not honoring the majesty of God. And then again, there’s another interesting passage in Malachi. Very last book of the Old Testament, this time the people have come back from the exile, they’ve rebuilt the temple, but they’re slacking off in their worship of God, and Malachi is very concerned about the priests who are not really honoring God.

They’re offering up blemished offerings. Remember how God required that if you bring an animal to sacrifice it to the Lord, it has to be without blemish. It can’t be blind, it can’t be lame. It has to be a perfect, blameless animal. Because that’s honoring to God, to give him the best.

Malachi 1.6, the Lord says, “…a son honors his father, and a servant his master. If then I am a father, where is my honor? And if I am a master, where is my fear? Says the Lord of hosts to you, O priests who despise my name.” They’re despising God’s name by bringing blemished offerings to the Lord.

all of this then is, of course, this is an Old Testament flavor to it of this if you don’t do it exactly right, you’re going to be killed or you won’t be able to enter the land. But you see the same idea being carried over into the New Covenant.

In Hebrews chapter 12, the author of Hebrews says, yes, it’s true, we’ve come to a greater mediator, to a greater, we have a greater high priest, we have a greater sacrifice. But he also calls the people of God to the same reverence. So Hebrews chapter 12, he says, you’ve not come to what may be touched, to blazing fire and darkness and gloom and tempest. You’ve not come to a mountain that is physical and that is shaking with the threatening presence of God. But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem.

And yet even there he says, therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire. Thank God that we have a mediator. Thank God that we have Christ to absorb that wrath for us so that we’re not consumed by the holiness of God. But let’s not take that lightly and think that, oh, it’s no big deal to come into God’s presence. Let us still come to the Lord with reverence and awe.”

Beginning Prayer with Adoration

That then brings us to my second point, adoration, beginning prayer with it. I think that this is a helpful thing to think about both for our personal prayer life and for corporate worship. That the first thing we should do when we pray is not to immediately jump into all the list of things that we want and our concerns, but rather to lift up our thoughts to God. And to hallow His name, to set it apart as holy.

That’s why Jesus makes this the very first petition. He’s going to give us this day our daily bread. He’s going to get to all these other things that we need to pray for. But before we even get there, the very first petition of the Lord’s Prayer is telling us something. It’s telling us that in our prayer life, whether it’s in our private prayers or in corporate worship, we ought to lift up our thoughts to God and hallow His name. We ought to set apart His name as holy.

We ought to quiet ourselves before the Lord and think about who it is that we’re talking to. We’re not just talking to our friend. We’re not just talking to a creature. We’re talking to the Creator God. We’re talking to the Sovereign Creator of all things who is also our Redeemer in Christ. It means this. It means not simply Adoring God in the sense of going through all the long list of His attributes. I was raised in a church where they thought you had to do that.

If you’re going to have a proper prayer, then you got to spend at least five minutes just going through every single attribute of God before you get to anything about your own petitions and so on. And I think that’s somewhat missing the point. I don’t think that’s what Jesus is getting at. In fact, his own words are very brief. He just says this one petition, hallowed be your name. And so I think the point of this initial adoration of God that we ought to have is simply to honor God as God. Isn’t that really all it is?

It’s simply quieting your thoughts and your hearts before the Lord and realizing who it is you’re talking to. You are talking to the living God. You’re talking to the creator of heaven and earth. You’re talking to the triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

And we can admit that we struggle with this sometimes. I think that it’s somewhat hard to do that because God is so distant from us. God is so great and so awesome. He’s invisible. He’s eternal. He’s omnipresent, and even the attributes of God that we list off so glibly and quickly are almost impossible to completely fathom. What does that even mean that God is omnipresent? What does that even mean that God is this infinite, eternal, and unchangeable being?

It’s hard for us to grasp, and so I think we sometimes struggle somewhat with this first thing in prayer of going to the Lord and adoring him for who he is. But that’s okay. We can admit that sometimes we struggle in this area. In fact, I think that’s why Jesus gives us this first petition. Because by saying, Jesus is giving us permission to say, Lord, help us. Help us to honor you as we ought. Help us to acknowledge you as we ought. Help us to have that reverence and awe and to acknowledge your greatness. The greatness of God, the awesomeness of God.

He is not a creature like us. He’s not just an old man up in the sky. He is God, and that is something that we struggle with, but yet God desires us to have that, to let it weigh upon us and to let it hit us that we are talking to, we are addressing our Father in heaven.

By the way, that’s another point, too, that the Heidelberg Catechism brings up in its exposition of the first clause, our Father in heaven. So the Heidelberg Catechism has two questions on this first clause. The first question is on our Father. The second question is, why do we say, in heaven?

And the answer that the catechism gave there, if you recall, we looked at this last week, was, these words, who is in heaven, teach us not to think of God’s heavenly majesty in an earthly way, and to expect from his almighty power everything needed for body and soul. Notice there’s an interesting combination of thoughts there. Not to think of God in an earthly way, but also, so not to think of him as just a creature, but to think of him as who he truly is, the almighty, omnipotent, eternal, unchangeable being who is God Almighty, but then at the same time, to expect from him all that we need. Because He is our Father. So there’s that distance, there’s that sense of God is totally different from us, and majestic, and holy, and greater than anything we can conceive of, and yet at the same time He is our Father in Christ, and He cares for us, and He has all that power, and omnipotence, and might, and all those glorious attributes of God. He has all those for us, and for our good and to help us to give us all that we need for body and soul in this life and ultimately for our salvation at the end.

That’s the main application then, point two of my sermon, is to begin prayer with adoration. And the same thing applies also in our worship service, in corporate worship. That’s why we have you look at our bulletin there, we have a prayer of adoration near the beginning of the service, a time to get out of ourselves and out of our own anxieties and concerns and problems and all the things of this life and to just lift our hearts up to heaven and to think about God himself and to be in awe of his glory and his majesty.

And again, how wonderful it is that in contrast with the fear of the old covenant saints as they were standing at Mount Sinai, we have Christ as our mediator. And so we are able to do that because God has placed His name there. God has placed His name in Christ. And so we are able to honor God and to respect Him and to have that sense of awe.

Letting Adoration Shape Our Lives

Not out of trembling fear that we’re going to be cast into hell, but out of the joy of knowing that we are accepted in Christ and that we have a mediator who brings us to him. But then third, adoration, letting it affect our lives. If we engage in this prayer of adoration, privately and corporately, then we will naturally ask God to keep us from causing his name to be blasphemed because of us. Heidelberg Catechism 122, help us to direct all our living, this is the second part of the answer, help us to direct all our living, what we think, say, and do, so that your name will never be blasphemed because of us, but always honored and praised.

Again, this gets back to this whole idea of God’s name being all that he expresses in his revelation of himself, but then God’s name being something that is placed upon certain things. Placed upon not only the angel of the Lord, not only placed in the temple, but also placed upon us. The name of God is placed upon us in baptism. We’re baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And so God’s name is placed upon us, and therefore how we live is going to reflect upon that name.

It’s going to reflect upon God. Help us then to, we’re praying in this prayer, Hallowed be your name, to help us so that when we live our lives, God’s name will not be dragged into the dirt because of us. Of course, this means all that we do, all of our lives, throughout the day, throughout the week, not just what we do on Sunday.

All of Life as Worship

Colossians 3.17 says, Whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him. All of our lives, 24-7, the whole of our lives, all that we do with our work, our employment, our careers, going to school, we interact with our neighbors.

All of it is to be done as a service rendered unto God. All of it is to be done as like Israel was called a kingdom of priests. Yes, there were the priests, the Levites and so on who were specifically tasked with offering the sacrifices and leading the people in worship of God, but all of God’s people were a kingdom of priests. And so in all that we do, we are to acknowledge God’s lordship over us and to honor Him in our lives. If we are supposed to do everything that we do for the glory of God, how else can we do that? Without doing all things in prayer.

Isn’t that what it means? If you’re going to go and do, let’s say you’re going to go to work and you’re going to do that to the glory of God, how else can you do that except by praying about it? That’s what it means to live koram deo. I’m sure you’ve heard that phrase before. It just means in the presence of God. It means bringing all of our thoughts and actions before God’s presence. It’s interesting how if we do that, if we pray about all the things that we do, it has an interesting way of clarifying things. Sometimes we’re not sure about whether we should do this or that, or whether this is the right thing. Things that are clearly defined in God’s law as being sinful, of course those are obvious, but there are other things in life where it’s not 100% clear. There’s all these areas of matters of conscience. We wonder sometimes if X, Y, or Z is okay to do.

It’s amazing how praying about it so quickly clarifies things. Sometimes all you need to do is sincerely address that question to God. I’ve experienced this. All I need to do is just sincerely ask God about it, talk to Him about it, and even as the words are coming out of my mouth, the answer is obvious.

It’s like, how can I do this if it’s not pleasing to the Lord? You can’t ask God for permission to sin. Even saying those words would just be like you would blush. If you’re a true child of God, you have the Spirit in you. You can’t ask God for permission to help you to sin. And so sometimes praying about those things helps you to clarify whether they are acceptable to Him or not. Paul says that in Romans 14, verse 23.

Remember that whole discussion about the weak and the strong? The strong thought that it was okay for them not to keep the Jewish food laws, and the weak still were thinking that they needed to do that. And so Paul’s encouraging the Christians, the strong and the weak, to get along. The strong should not despise the weak. The weak should not condemn the strong. And at the very end of that whole section, Romans 14, 23, the very last verse, he says, whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.

This principle applies directly to our decisions. If we can bring an action before the Lord in prayer, we may proceed in faith. If we cannot speak honestly with God about it, that is a strong indication that it is not right. Paul makes a related point in 1 Timothy 4:4–5: everything God created is good when received with thanksgiving, for it is made holy by the word of God and prayer. Prayer should therefore permeate all of life. This is how we walk coram Deo—before the face of God.

This is how we glorify God in all that we do and fulfill Colossians 3:17: “Whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”

To pray “Hallowed be your name” is therefore to ask for more than reverent words in worship. We ask God to teach us to adore him and to bring every part of life into his presence. May our thoughts, words, work, relationships, and choices show that his name is holy and worthy of praise.