If he is Father, then he is good, then he is loving to his children. And here is the first and great reason for prayer. God is willing to bless; let us ask for a blessing. ‘Our Father’ — our Creator, the Author of our being; he who raised us from the dust of the earth, who breathed into us the breath of life, and we became living souls. But if he made us, let us ask, and he will not withhold any good thing from the work of his own hands. ‘Our Father’ — our Preserver, who day by day sustains the life he has given; of whose continuing love we now and every moment receive life and breath and all good things. So much the more boldly let us come to him, and ‘we shall find mercy and grace to help in time of need’. Above all, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and of all that believe in him; who justifies us ‘freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Jesus’; who hath ‘blotted out all our sins’, ‘and healed our infirmities’; who hath received us for ‘his own children, by adoption and grace’, ‘and because we are his sons, hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying Abba, Father’; ‘who hath begotten us again of incorruptible seed’, and ‘created us anew in Christ Jesus’. Therefore we know that he heareth us always; therefore we ‘pray’ to him ‘without ceasing’. We pray, because we love. And ‘we love him, because he first loved us.’
Upon our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount, VI (1748)
I imagine him preaching these words, or something like it, in the open air to grimy coal miners, who hear for the first time that they are children of their loving Father in heaven.
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Chris,
This is one of those messages that I GET, but would think that a first timer (the coal miners in your post) would be left asking “WHAT is he talking about?” (I guess the coal miners have not heard of dangling prepositions but that is another subject.)
God as our Father works for us once we have come to understand that Creator God wishes to have a relationship with us as individuals. To someone who has not yet come to understand that, I would think that John would have left a few people behind with this (wonderful) illustration and description.
JW’s published sermons do read like theological essays, but I wonder what his open air preaching was like. Thousands listened to him, in fields and marketplaces. He must have held their attention. I just think for ordinary folk in England, working in mines or factories, this message of the loving Fatherhood of God would have touched them. But yes, I hope John said it differently than these precise words.