"How you should pray" - some thoughts on the Lord's Prayer

"This, then, is how you should pray: ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’" (Matthew 6:9-13)

This well-known Scripture, possibly the best known by Christians and non-Christians alike because of it's frequent use at weddings and Christmas services, is known as the Lord's Prayer. I'm not going to dispute that name but rather make the implication that the Lord's intention was that it should be our prayer. Jesus, as the only perfect man and Son of God, gave us a model of prayer to follow and this prayer is one of many.

Throughout the gospels we see Jesus engage in prayer to His God and Father on frequent occasions. Matthew 14:23, after the feeding of the 5000, records Jesus going up on a mountainside by Himself to pray. We would get the impression that this was a regular occurrence for Jesus and is what He outlines in our passage about 'secret prayer' - an individual prayer between the Christian and their Father God.

Of course a Christian will also pray out loud as they pray with their family, friends and church. Jesus' teaching about secret prayer is not to disallow public prayer but, I believe, to show that public prayer should be consistent with our individual prayers. Public prayer should not be a song and dance which draws attention to the one praying. Whenever Jesus prays out loud in Scripture He is glorifying God. Just read John 17 to get an idea how Jesus spoke to his Father and what he prayed about.

A further example of Jesus praying comes in the garden of Gethsemane where He prays "may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will" (Matthew 26:39) Jesus knew that He would be going to the cross and suffering terrible pain at the hands of wicked men. However I believe it would be a mistake to say that Jesus feared death and suffering. The cup that made Him sorrowful and troubled was the anticipation of His being made sin and suffering the wrath of God. "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46) God forsake Him in the moment of His being made sin for us. (2 Corinthians 5:21)

Jesus' prayer in the garden was Him talking it through with God. Sometimes we may face difficult and terrible circumstances and trials that cause us great sorrow or even anger. it is then that our prayers may take on this form, effectively wrestling with God until He grants us the grace to see all that He is doing for our blessing and His glory.

So in the Lord's Prayer, Jesus is teaching us how to pray. In that, I don't believe He intended for us to repeat these words (although there is of course nothing wrong with doing so!) but learn what form our prayers should take.

"Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name"

The Epistle to the Hebrews presents Jesus as our Great High Priest, by whose sacrifice we now have access to the presence of God where He makes intercession for us. First and foremost in our prayers we must remember that we are approaching the throne of Almighty God. He is our Father and we cry "Abba (Father), Father" by the Spirit of God (Romans 8:15). Jesus desired that we should know His Father as our Father and so we approach God as sons by adoption and know closeness and intimacy with Him.

Yet this closeness should never let us become irreverent or disrespectful. Our Father is always God. The Queen is Prince Charles' mother and they experience that family relationship, but he is always subject to her as monarch like the rest of us and must follow all the necessary customs.

Let us always remember that we are praying to the God of heaven who has reached out to us through His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. If we do that, we can have assurance that our prayers are being heard by the One whose ways and thoughts are higher than ours, since the heavens are higher than the earth (Isaiah 55:9) and who has power and authority to do immeasurably than all we ask or imagine (Ephesians 3:20).

"Your kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven"

Jesus came to make the kingdom known. Many of Jesus' parables in Matthew's gospel begin "the kingdom of heaven is like...", showing that Jesus was teaching the kingdom. (Interestingly in Mark's and Luke's gospels the comparison is "the kingdom of God is like..." There is a difference but not one I will go into now...!)

As already referred to, Jesus also came from heaven to earth to do the will of God. Hebrews 10:7 says, quoting the prophecy in Psalm 40:6-8, "Here I am - it is written about me in the scroll - I have come to do your will, my God."

The scope of God's will goes far beyond the Law given through Moses. As Hebrews 10 continues to show, God was not pleased with the many sacrifices and offerings because they represented the continual sin of His people. "The Lord detests the sacrifice of the wicked, but the prayer of the upright pleases Him" (Proverbs 15:8). The service of the priests in the tabernacle, and later the temple, was detailed and intricate, and yet you could never say that the Israelites truly knew God. So Jesus says, during the same discourse as the passage we are considering, "I have not come to abolish [the Law or the Prophets] but to fulfil them" (Matthew 5:17). Jesus came to make God's ways and thoughts known to us. So we can't just write off the Old Testament instructions and say 'well we're now under grace, not under law, so they are no longer applicable'. "Every Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness" (2 Timothy 2:16) We may find reading Leviticus challenging and wonder what God wants us to learn about defiling moulds, not clipping beards or mixing materials in clothes, but every verse of the Bible is there to teach us about God and His will.

"Give us today our daily bread"

God is the faithful provider of our physical and spiritual needs. The children of Israel received their daily supply of the bread-like manna for the whole of their 40 year wilderness journey. (To be more accurate, they received it every day except the Sabbath and received a double portion on the day before the Sabbath) In a conversation with Jesus, the Jews challenged Him, asking what sign He would do for them to believe and referred to the manna. Of course they conveniently forget that the manna didn't keep them believing, despite the faithful provision of God, and that many times they were rebuked and disciplined by God because of their unfaithfulness. Graciously, however, Jesus replies that "the bread of God is the bread that comes down from heaven and gives life to the world" (John 6:33) and that "I am the bread of life" (v 35). (Just to say, I am planning an article on the I am's of John's gospel) We have a constant and eternal provision in Christ.

So God provides our needs and encourages us to ask: "Ask and it will be given to you" (Matthew 7:7). Our Father in heaven desires to "give good gifts to those who ask Him" (v11). Does that mean we get everything we ask for? No! The Father gives only good gifts; those which are for our benefit and spiritual prosperity and for His glory. You see, in making our requests to God, we are still praying in view of His kingdom. We may come before God with many requests and desires and there is nothing wrong with that. Jesus says "...ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you" (John 15:7) but we should not take that out of context because He precedes that with "If you remain in me and my words remain in you..." The closer we are to the Lord, through frequent prayer, obedience and study of His word, the closer we will be to understanding God's will for our lives and praying accordingly. The apostle Paul wrote to the Philippians about how his imprisonment had benefited the advance of the gospel (Philippians 1:12-14) and to the Corinthians about his thorn in the flesh (2 Corinthians 12:7). He had prayed about it, even pleaded with the Lord, three times but had been told "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness" (v9)

Sometimes there is greater blessing for us, and glory to God, when He gently tells us 'No' or 'Wait'. Maybe in this life we may understand His reason, although He is Sovereign and owes us no explanation, but I believe that in the glorious eternity to come we will finally understand the meaning of every trial and every 'unanswered' prayer.

"Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors"

How can we come before the throne of God who has forgiven us so much, to the cost of His only-begotten Son, if we still possess a spirit of unforgiveness? Jesus tells the parable of the unmerciful servant (Matthew 18:21-35) in response to Peter's question: "How many times shall I forgive my brother...? Up to seven times?" (v 21) Peter probably though that seven was very gracious and a heavenly number to follow! Jesus replies that it should be "seventy times seven" (v 22) but, of course, every single one of us would far exceed 490 offences! Jesus is pointing towards the illimitable forgiveness of God.

The servant in the parable had been forgiven a debt of ten thousand talents (a debt equivalent to 200,000 times the average worker's salary), yet went straight out to demand payment of a debt of a hundred denarii (about 100 days wages).

How can any debt against us, any wrong doing or offence, come close to the offence we caused God. The God of the universe would be 100% justified in paying to each one of us the "wages of sin", i.e. death (Romans 6:23), yet forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to us in the gospel and "everyone who believes is set free from every sin" (Acts 13:38,39).

As the old hymn goes:

"My sin - oh the bliss of this glorious thought -

My sin, not in part but the whole,

Is nailed to His cross and I bear it no more,

Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, oh my soul!"

It Is Well With My Soul (When Peace Like A River)

Horatio Spafford (1828 - 1888)

So we pray knowing that our sins have been forgiven, yet we want to be completely right with God. We may ask Him for help in dealing with sin in our life and express our sorrow and repentance when we have sinned. We may ask for help in managing a difficult situation with someone else that is going to require us to be forgiving, even though we may not feel like it! Yet this sentence implies that we have forgiven our debtors, that our heart is a forgiving heart and that there is the potential for others to learn the forgiveness of God through our own forgiving attitude. The verses immediately after this prayer underlines the importance of forgiveness. If we are true subjects of God's kingdom then forgiveness should be an important part of our daily life.

"And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one"

"When tempted, no one should say 'God is tempting me'. For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone" (James 1.13). It would be a mistake to think this passage means that God tempts us. That is the work of the enemy, from whom we are praying deliverance. What we are praying is that God leads us and that we can follow Him, without falling into temptation and without losing our faith through testing times.

"God is faithful; He will not let you be tempted (or tested) beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted (or tested), He will also provide a way out so that you can endure it" (1 Corinthians 10:13).

We are called to be holy and sanctified, to turn away from wickedness and to be pure and blameless before God. However we will constantly find sin an issue because we are still in the world, surrounded by sin and its influence. Yet we can take steps to avoid it. We can ask the Lord to help us deal with an issue in our lives. We may confess that sin to Him, and perhaps to others who can help hold us accountable. But our frequent prayer should have the effect of making our hearts more resistant to sin.

"For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory for ever. Amen"

This may be missing from your Bible as it's authenticity is disputed by scholars because of it's absence from early manuscripts. How do we approach such Scriptures?

I heard a useful message from John Piper on this issue which you may also find helpful. https://www.desiringgod.org/interviews/can-we-skip-the-parts-of-the-new-testament-not-in-the-original-manuscripts

In it he says "What is most significant for the reliability and authority of the New Testament is that the variations that textual critics are unsure of are not the kind that would change any Christian doctrine."

In other words, these disputed verses don't change any of the meaning of a text or contradict any other Scripture. So we need not have any issues with using this doxology which, consistent with John Piper's words, appears to sum up the whole prayer rather than take the Scripture in any different direction.

So let us be praying in light of God's kingdom - the realm in which He makes His glory known to us. Let's be approaching God's throne with reverence and yet with boldness, knowing that the One who has taught us how to pray is there interceding for us. Let us ask for our needs, knowing that God answers according to what He rightly judges is good for us. And let us do all things knowing that we have been forgiven through the sacrifice of His Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and show that spirit of forgiveness in every aspect of our lives.

Prayer is a blessing, but can be a great challenge to the believer. What should we say? How do we listen to God when we pray? How often and when should we pray? The Lord has given us this teaching in Matthew 6 but He continues to be our teacher and, if asked, will continue to guide us in our prayer life and all of our walk with Him. The greatest pray-er ever wants us to know the wonderful nearness to God that we can experience through prayer.

I encourage anyone reading to study this prayer and all the other references to Jesus praying (as well as other notable pray-ers such as Daniel, who was prepared even to die in order to maintain his prayer life) in order to learn from all that He has to teach us.