The Lord's Prayer
Have you ever found yourself thinking ‘What do I pray – what can I say to God?’. In this period of lockdown, some of us might be considering for the first time in a while what it looks like to pray on our own. Or some of us might find prayer hard work and feel like we run out of steam sometimes and it can be helpful to refresh ourselves. So over the next few weeks we are going to be reflecting on Jesus’ answer to ‘What do I pray?’ His answer comes in Luke Chapter 11.
And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.” And he said unto them, “When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. Give us day by day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.”
Millions of people know the Lord’s prayer off by heart. But sometimes it is so familiar, it becomes just a routine to say, and we forget to stop and think about what we are saying to God. And actually, it is more than just a set prayer. It is the fundamentals, from God the Son himself, on what prayer is. It is the ABC of prayer. In the ancient world Rabbi’s taught followers to pray, by teaching them headings to organise their prayers under. The Lord’s prayer is the list of headings Jesus gives for his disciples to organise their prayers under. And in the next few weeks, we are going to pause and reflect on some of these headings with the aim in helping us in our own prayers.
We will start simply with ‘Our Father’. Praying to God as Father is uniquely Christian among world religions. Jesus expands on this in 11:11-13, “If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?.” Even the average human father knows what it is to give good gifts to their children. How much more then does the loving creator know how to give good gifts to his children?
Here is a question worth pondering by ourselves for a few minutes: ‘What difference does it make to a Christian, that they can pray to God as Father?’ For example, one difference it makes to pray to God as Father is that it reminds us that we are completely at peace with God, if we are trusting in Jesus for our salvation, we can pray in close relationship to him. Because through Jesus, he has forgiven our sin. And he invites us to pray to him as his children.
So this week, when saying the Lord’s prayer, why not pause after ‘Our Father’, and ponder or thank God for a number of the implications of him being ‘Father’. The collect for the week below provides a great example.
Next week we will reflect on what it means when we say ‘Hallowed be your name.’
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