Matthew 6: 9-15 – “Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will Be Done In Earth, As It Is In Heaven”
The Lord’s Prayer by Austin Peery of Christ’s Sanctified Holy Church.
2017 Feast Meeting – Greensboro N.C.
Austin: …and I’m glad to be converted and sanctified and I’m…since I came back to the church, I’ve been trying to find my place and I feel like my place is back there. And I could just be enjoying this meeting, but I get filled up when I come here, to Greensboro. And there have just been some things going on that I just felt like… I’m going to just say it and then I can move on and then I’ll be in the back and can enjoy camp meeting. But I thought about…I’ve been thinking about prayer. I mentioned this. Anamaria and I were here for Sunday school last week, and we talked about…something about prayer.
And Anamaria and I had visited my parents’ church the weekend before. There was a graduation thing there and it’s very…it’s rituals. And one of the rituals is the preacher says, “Let us pray,” and then meanders where he wants to go or she wants to go. It used to be a lady. And then they just get to a point where they say… and taught us how to pray by saying. And then we all say The Lord’s Prayer-Matthew 6:9-15. That’s what we do and everybody just sort of… the kids can be talking or whatever and then everybody stops what they’re doing and they say it.
And I thought about how it says…now it just left my brain…but how we talk about His will in the Lord’s prayer. And so I thought about this scripture. Joanna talked so pretty last night and talked about naming our petitions. But I’ve been thinking about…I have some friends back there that, because they know I pray, will text me their prayer requests. And I got to thinking about how we sort of, when we do that, we sort of already have the outcome we want. Like, we’re asking for something, in particular, you know? We’re asking for somebody to get better, or we’re asking for a situation to go away. But I thought about this scripture and it’s just two verses and when Jesus…what He had to face, you know? We think about what we have to face.
And when he went to pray and saying
Father, if Thou be willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will but Thine be done. And there appeared an angel unto him from Heaven, strengthening him. Luke 22:42-43
And I know that’s just two verses but somebody told me a long time ago that you get up to talk at the altar to read scripture and that’s the one that’s been in my mind because I thought I want to learn to do that. To just say, you know, “If this is what you want, Lord” or “Show me what you want, Lord” would be the way to go.
But something else that’s been on my mind, back there. One of the…I’ve got several things I do now, around town, and one of the places I help out is the library. I do their books and do some other things. They’re understaffed so I help out, out front some and they have two things going on that have caught my eye this summer. Well, one thing is there’s this federal program where free lunch for kids. And my hometown is very poor. And they line up and you see kids who are very hungry and something… I first set foot in this place 21 years ago, this weekend. I’ve always said, “Don’t take this for granted,” because I think some of you, raised in it, get to where you take it for granted. But when I see what’s around, I just really know…I’m so much more reminded, “Let’s don’t take it for granted.”
I answered the phone. Nobody was answering the phone, nobody was at the front desk. One day I was in the back doing payroll. And so I grabbed it, and it was a child who said, “Does my mom have to be with me for me to get lunch?” And we have children my daughter’s age bring little brothers and sisters to get this lunch, no adult with them. And I just think how good we have it that the children in this church are not starved for attention and what a blessing.
My parents’ church, I help them now with their books some. Its outside bookkeepers do it, but they want somebody familiar with the place to just sort of review the stuff and do some reports and so I do that for them. And they do some analyses of the number of people and they were looking at the last 12 years, and they’ve had one wedding. They’ve had five graduations, and they average about four funerals a year. Now, you think about…you don’t have to be a genius at math to know that church is not going to go on. And one thing my mom said, one of the first times she visited for a feast meeting, she said “Y’all are going to go on.” And I left for a while and Christ Sanctified Holy Church went on. It didn’t need me but people wanted me around and so I just thought about this situation.
There’s a kid…I call him a kid. He’s 18 so society says he’s not a kid any more… who now finished high school but before he finished high school, he rides his bike to the library every day. The library and the pool are like…it’s cheap child care for the town and so their kids come. And he comes and a lot of times he’s in the same clothes two or three days in a row, and he checks things out. He uses the computers and stuff. But one day he didn’t bring everything back. He always brings everything back, and I noticed he didn’t bring everything back. So this lady I work with, she said “Oh, I’ll pull up his phone number and call.” And the dad said “Oh, well I don’t have anything to do with him anymore. He’s 18. He’s not my responsibility.” And I just thought what a blessing we have in this church, that everybody’s wanted, that the kids… You know, I’m an older guy, so they’re not going to take what I say but I thought let’s, you know, around camp meeting, let’s make sure they all feel it.
You young people, you kids, you young adults, you belong. Sometimes young people don’t know their place, but you are loved and you belong. And I wasn’t going to talk but then when Becky showed up at Ruthie and Leon’s this afternoon, Uncle Leon said, “We need to sing.” And so Becky and Rosalie followed him back to the piano and a few of us went back there and he was just pulling out songs and we were singing. And I didn’t remember this song and they sang “Someone to Care” and it really made me think about…it said, “Someone to care, someone to share, all your troubles like no other can do. He’ll come down from the skies and brush the tears from your eyes. You’re His child and He cares for you.” And I just thought I want to…let’s make sure these young people know that. That they have a place and that they’re loved and I desire your prayers that I stay strong.
I know that's just two verses but somebody told me a long time ago that you get up to talk at the altar to read scripture and that's the one that's been in my mind because I thought I want to learn to do that. To just say, you know, "If this is what you want, Lord" or "Show me what you want, Lord" would be the way to go.
