I’ve put it down on paper (aka typed it into my journal) before and I’ll do it again. Repetition in Scripture is the Spirit’s megaphone. So, when Jesus is quoted as saying the same thing multiple times, it’s not because He can’t think of a different way to say something but because He really wants us to hear something we need to hear.

Sometimes the repetition is at the forefront of a passage, like it is this morning as I finish up Matthew 6. Three times in ten verses Jesus tells His disciple, “Do not be anxious” (6:25, 6:30, 6:33). So what’s the Spirit laying down that I should be tripping all over and needing to pick up? You got it . . . “do not be anxious.”

But sometimes the repetition is more an echoing background beat than it is an again and again center stage proclamation. It’s that background beat in the Sermon on the Mount that’s caused me to pause and wonder this morning. While I continue to be challenged by the ways of the kingdom being taught by Jesus, I’m comforted by my connection to the kingdom repeated by Jesus.

“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they? . . . Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all.”

(Matthew 6:25-26, 31-32 ESV)

Though I pick up the lead repetition of this passage, “Do not be anxious” it’s the supporting echo that captures my attention and my heart, this morning. Hear the refrain . . . your heavenly Father.

The “redundancy” has been going on for awhile now. Since I started in on the Sermon on the Mount a few days ago, eleven times I’ve taken note that Jesus refers to God, His Father, as my Father. Eleven times, so far, Jesus has reminded those with ears to hear that God is “your Father.” Your heavenly Father, as repeated in this morning’s reading. And whether this Father is the one “who is in heaven” (5:45), or the Father who “is perfect” (5:48), or the Father who “sees in secret” (6:4), or the Father who “knows what you need” (6:8), what’s jaw-dropping in Jesus’ repeated name dropping is that He repeats, again and again, that He is your Father.

My Father? Really?

Yes! Your Father. Really!

Everything the sermon says we are to be we can be, and everything we’re called to be we want to be, and that because the Almighty, Eternal God of Creation is your Father.

I hear the repetition again and again, as Jesus picks His words carefully. I’m drawn into the echo reverberating throughout the sermon, the Spirit accentuating the familiar chorus intentionally. God is Your Father.

I am a child of God. The heavenly Father is my heavenly Father. Not because of merit, but because of mercy. Not because of goodness, but because of grace. Not because I’ve learned all I need to learn, but because He loves with an everlasting love. Not because I’ve arrived, but because He has promised to continue to abide even as I continue to journey.

Then, I really am His child. That’s what the Spirit bears witness of this morning as, with wonder and awe, I settle into the repeated back beat of this passage.

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!” The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.

(Romans 8:15-16 ESV)

Your heavenly Father. Hear the words, again and again. Bask in the words, deeper and deeper. Rest in the words, more and more.

By His grace. For His glory.