Jesus said, “This,
then, is how you are to pray:
Our Father, who is
in the heavens,
may your Name be
held in reverence;
may your kingdom
come;
may your wishes
come about on earth,
just as they do in
heaven.
Give us this day
the food we need to live on.
And forgive us the
debts we owe,
just as we also
forgive the debts others owe us.
And don’t bring us
into testing,
but rather rescue
us from the Evil One.”
—
Matthew 6:9-13 (USC)
Just how
are we to approach prayer?
Jesus answers this
question in an elemental way. He gives the disciples a model for what and how
they are to pray. The ‘how’ has already been handled. Now we are directed to
the ‘what’.
These are the
components of the disciple’s prayer:
1.
Reverence: we are privileged
to be able to speak to God who is so like us on the one hand (we’re made in the
image of God) and so unlike us (God is holy) on the other. As we revere God we
approach appropriately.
2.
Kingdom: we are people of
the Kingdom; subjects of the King. Our life and our existence only has hope from
a Kingdom perspective. If the Kingdom never came our hope would vanish. But, as
it is, no matter what happens to us, our best is still so wonderfully yet to
come.
3.
God’s Will: when we pray that
things would be on earth as they are on heaven we pray that we, of ourselves,
would both discern and desire God’s will in our own lives; as far as it depends
on us.
4.
Our Needs: several times in
this chapter of Matthew the matters of prayer and God’s care of our needs are
joined. God is patently aware of our needs. He knows we need food, water,
shelter, clothing, etc. But he also knows we need other things. We can trust
his provision, but we are blessed not to take it for granted by praying for it.
5.
Forgiveness: here, as it’s
reinforced elsewhere, our forgiveness is conditional on us forgiving others – “just
as.” Forgiving others is an imperative as much as it’s obvious that we are
forgiven. As much as we struggle to forgive will we struggle to accept having been
forgiven. But as we forgive with copious grace, we experience the implicit grace of God that forgives totally in an
instant.
6.
Temptation (testing): it’s a wise
Christian who knows and accepts the strength of temptation as being
occasionally beyond him or her. Not all temptations and testing can we endure
without failing and falling. That’s the difference between us and the incarnate
Jesus.
7.
Salvation: having been
rescued once when we accepted Christ at our salvation we go on being rescued if
we’re in right relationship with him. Once a Saviour, he’s always a Saviour.
***
The disciple’s
prayer communicates love with reverence and seeks God’s Kingdom and his will. It
requests our needs be met and for forgiveness for sin, as well as protection
and deliverance from evil.
***
QUESTIONS in REVIEW:
1. The disciple’s prayer (a.k.a. the
Lord’s Prayer) is so famous, yet we probably don’t use it enough as a model
through which to pray. Why is that?
2. What elements of the disciple’s
prayer do you think are missing?
© 2015 S. J. Wickham.
Note: USC version is Under the Southern Cross, The New Testament in Australian English
(2014). This translation was painstakingly developed by Dr. Richard Moore, a NT
Greek scholar, over nearly thirty years.
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