The privilege of prayer is a great blessing. Believers in Jesus Christ should take prayer very seriously. We find this reality of taking prayer seriously in all the main characters in the Bible. They all cherished with humility the opportunity to come into the presence of the Lord in prayer. We see this fact by noticing all the many actual prayers in the pages of Scripture. The saints of God pray in many ways, seeking the Lord’s help and blessings. But of all the prayers we find in the Bible, only one prayer is given as a model for others to pray. That prayer has come to be known as the Lord’s Prayer. It comes from our Lord Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.
The Lord’s Prayer is found in Matthew 6:9-15. It is a short prayer as prayers go, but it is amazingly powerful. Every word has a deep meaning. The prayer is well-known and loved by many people. It is recited corporately in the worship services of some denominations, and in those denominations that do not recite it in worship, most everybody knows it by heart. People use it in their devotions to draw near to God. I have preached, taught, and written about the prayer many times. The Lord’s Prayer as a pattern for prayer or as a literal prayer to be prayer must not be neglected by followers of Jesus.
The Lord’s prayer is the model prayer from Jesus meant to be prayed by his disciples, primarily with other disciples. It can be prayer privately by individual believers, but we know it was meant for community prayer by how it begins, “Our Father who is in heaven.” The use of the plural pronoun “our,” shows the corporate nature of the prayer. Plural pronouns continue to be used throughout the prayer. We find seven petitions, four kinds of prayer, and two contrasting realities in the prayer. It is important to consider the three aspects of this wonderful prayer from our Lord when we pray.
Seven Petitions
Petitions are the main part of most of our prayers. Petitions are the things for which we ask God. God encourages us to ask him for things. We need things from him. We are dependent on God’s provision for life. Jesus challenges us with the command, “Ask and you will receive.
The first thing we ask for is not something directly for us but for God, though it most definitely is a great blessing for us. The first petition is, “Hallowed be thy name,” or “May your name be considered holy.” God’s name is holy. We cannot make it holy, but we can consider it holy. We can revere the name of God as holy. God’s name is who he is. It is his person, his glory, and his praiseworthy nature. The word holy means that God is separate. He is set apart from all other things. He is unique and exalted above all else. To consider God’s name holy means that we regard the Lord God as transcendent above everything else in life. We worship, revere, love, serve, and obey him above all. When we pray this first petition, we pray this for ourselves and others. We desire all people to hold God’s name in holiness.
The second petition is, “Thy kingdom come,” or, “May your kingdom come.” Jesus came into the world for the purpose of establishing the kingdom of God in reality. Many of the promises in the Old Testament related to the Messiah are about the kingdom of God. The kingdom of God is the reign and rule of Jesus as King and Lord over the hearts and lives of people. We pray for people to enter the kingdom of God and live in the kingdom, and we pray for the kingdom to come in its fullness upon the earth when Jesus returns. Kingdom prayers are significant prayers and must be a priority in our prayers.
The third petition, “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,” is related to the second. When God’s kingdom comes, God’s will is being done on earth. As God works out his plan to bring his kingdom to fulfillment, he is causing his will to be done. People often do things that are contrary to the will of God. God is working in the world to produce a set of circumstances where the will of God is happening. We pray for God’s will to be done even when we don’t fully know exactly what is the will of God. God’s will is only perfectly done when Jesus returns and establishes the kingdom of God on the earth.
The fourth petition is, “Give us this day our daily bread.” God promises to provide for his people. When we pray for daily bread, our own or others, we are praying for the physical needs of life to be provided. While most of the prayer has to do with our spiritual lives, this petition is about the physical needs we all have. The prayer for daily provision requires that we ask in faith. The needs we face can be a source of worry and anxiety. The needs of life are no small thing. As we trust God to provide for us, we experience peace. The prayer for daily bread is primarily a prayer for others. We do pray for ourselves, but our prayers’ main focus is on other people’s needs.
The fifth petition is, “Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.” The need for forgiveness is one of our fundamental needs and, therefore, one of the crucial prayers we pray. We notice in the prayer that Jesus relates our need to be forgiven with our need to forgive others. Jesus is saying in this connection that forgiven people forgive people. Receiving forgiveness from God does a work in our hearts, but it also requires that we do the hard work of forgiving others. This is often a process that requires the power of the Holy Spirit. The basis of our own forgiveness and the forgiveness we give is that Jesus has paid the debt of our sins on the cross.
The sixth petition in the prayer is, “Lead us not into temptation.” Temptation is real, deceptive, and destructive. We experience it every day. We need God’s constant leading in our lives. Temptation leads us astray, while God leads us on the narrow path of his righteousness. We find throughout the Bible that our temptations can come through three sources: the world, the flesh, and the devil. All of these seek to lure us away from God. Our prayer is that God’s leading will overcome the deception of temptation for ourselves and others.
The seventh and final petition of the Lord’s Prayer is, “Deliver us from evil.” The Bible literally says here, deliver us from the evil, or the evil one. This is a prayer that we be rescued from the clutches of the devil. Our enemy seeks to do us woe. He is often called the tempter and uses deceptive schemes to lure us in. There is a spiritual battle in our lives that has the potential to lead us from God. Temptation is the big weapon the devil uses to lead us astray. Prayer, along with the word of God, is our weapon to defeat the devil. We cry out to God because, without God’s help, we would be defeated.
Four Prayers
As we read and meditate on the Lord’s Prayer, we notice that the seven petitions are given to us in four sentences, which are really four kinds of prayer. The first kind of prayer we find is a prayer for the glory of God, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.” The Holy Father is worthy of praise and glory. We must realize that God’s glory is in his holiness. The second kind of prayer is a prayer for the mission of God, “Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” God’s mission, and our mission, is to establish his kingdom where his will is always done. That is the work of the church. The third kind of prayer we see is the prayer for the needs of God’s people, “Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.” All people face needs that are both physical and spiritual, and only God can fully meet these needs. The fourth, and final kind of prayer we notice is prayer for the spiritual conflict God’s people are engaged in, “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” Spiritual warfare requires spiritual resources for God’s people to be victorious. We need God’s strength and leading through His Spirit and Word.
Two Realities
In all the petitions and the kinds of prayers we see in the Lord’s Prayer, we observe two contrasting realities that take us to the heart of the prayer. We see God’s greatness and our neediness. God is great! The focus of our lives demonstrated in our prayers must be on God’s name, kingdom, and will. Our heavenly Father has a plan for our lives that we can know and live as we follow him. But to do so, we must recognize our neediness. We need daily bread, forgiveness, and God to rescue us from the devil. In this short prayer, Jesus encapsulates all the needs and struggles of our lives. We can pray the prayer as it stands or use it as a guide for a more extended prayer based on the seven petitions and four kinds of prayers. However we use the prayer; it is our model that Jesus gave us to connect with the Father. The Lord’s Prayer can be a safe harbor in all the storms of Life and lead us to our heavenly home.
Comforting.