Lord, Teach Us to Pray
Prayer, Part 2
I recommend you read Part 1 first.
Jesus’s disciples saw Jesus pray continually. He prayed for them. He prayed for the crowds. He went off by Himself to pray. One day, they asked Him to teach them to pray because who could be better to ask?
Now it came to pass, as He was praying in a certain place, when He ceased, that one of His disciples said to Him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.”
So He said to them, “When you pray, say:
Our Father in heaven,
Hallowed be Your name.
Your kingdom come.
Your will be done
On earth as it is in heaven.
Give us day by day our daily bread.
And forgive us our sins,
For we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
And do not lead us into temptation,
But deliver us from the evil one.” (Luke 1:1-4)
I like the version in Matthew:
In this manner, therefore, 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 this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts,
As we forgive our debtors.
And do not lead us into temptation,
But deliver us from the evil one.
For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.
Amen. (Matthew 6:9-13)
“Our Father in heaven,” A father is someone who has authority over you, but loves you dearly. By addressing God as Father, we are submitting to His authority while showing love. This is a good way to start our prayers. (I’ll admit, with the trinity, I always fret over the best way to address God: God, Father, Jesus, Spirit. I have the tendency to address my prayers to Jesus, but probably should address them according to Jesus’s recommendations in His model prayer.)
“Hallowed be Your name.” Hallowed means holy. God is holy. His name is holy. His word is holy. (I’m currently reading a book “The Holiness of God” by RC Sproul and may need to write a post on God’s holiness.) God’s holiness is amazing and is important to understand if we want to have any idea of who God truly is. I’d say this line of the model prayer is how we should praise for who God is. There are many things to praise Him for. We can praise Him for His holiness, for His mercy, for His sacrifice, for His creation, etc. Worshipping Him for who He is and not just what He has done for us should be a part of our prayer to Him.
“Your kingdom come.” We should be excited about the return of Jesus and the establishment of His kingdom. We should be so excited that we call for His kingdom where righteousness and justice reigns, where His mercy is fulfilled and evil is judged. We should say as the second to last verse of the Bible states, “Amen. Come, Lord Jesus.”
“Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” In everything we should ask that God’s will be done. Praying for God’s will is always an appropriate prayer, but I especially like this prayer as a start to my day. I found a nice little prayer in a book on prayers that I read. I got it printed up on my sunflower picture and hung it in my toilet room, so I would see it first thing every morning and encourage my prayer.
O God, all my life is thine. Help me so to plan and arrange the hours of this day that I may serve thee in them all, for they are thine. — M.L. Playfoot
I am praying that I will live my life according to His will in all that I think, say, and do. I am praying for help submitting to His will in all things and acknowledging His authority. This is a hard prayer to do, but everything in life gets better when we fully submit to His will.
“Give us this day our daily bread.” This is our request for help with our needs. It is also the area that is most misused. So many people try to use God as their magic genie who will give them everything they ever desired (whether it is actually good for them or not). Notice that this prayer is primarily a prayer for needs. It isn’t a prayer for a big house, a high paying job, a fancy car, etc. This doesn’t mean we can’t pray for something really want, but just like Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, prayers for wants should be followed with “not My will, but Yours be done.” We should center our prayer on requests that our needs will be met and for the needs of others. Jesus says,
“And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. So do not be like them; for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him. (Matthew 6:7-8)
We don’t necessarily need to go through every detail of our needs because God knows what we need better than we know ourselves. He does want us to ask for His help. He wants us to acknowledge His love, His strength, and His wisdom. Wisdom is one of those needs that we all have and should ask for daily.
When it comes to requests, I have learned to pray problems rather than solutions because God knows what we really need. One perfect example is this story from Jesus’s life.
And some men were carrying on a bed a man who was paralyzed; and they were trying to bring him in and to set him down in front of Him. But not finding any way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and let him down through the tiles with his stretcher, into the middle of the crowd, in front of Jesus. Seeing their faith, He said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven you.” (Luke 5:18-20)
Notice this was a man who was paralyzed. We would consider that a major NEED. We would pray for Jesus to heal this man’s paralysis, but Jesus saw his greatest need and said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven you.” More than physical healing, this man needed forgiveness. Of course, Jesus being the loving God that He is, also healed the man and made him able to walk. We need to make sure our prayer requests aren’t too narrow. God can give us better than we can imagine and can give us, and the people we care for, more than we can ever dream. Sometimes He gives us what we don’t want, but what we need. We need to be open to God’s best.
“And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors.” We all need to repent and ask for forgiveness. This isn’t just a once at salvation kind of thing. We always need to repent. The key point here is that we need to forgive as we are forgiven. We can’t expect to be forgiven when we are being unforgiving. Sometimes we may need to make a prayer request for the ability to forgive someone who has hurt us deeply. Forgiveness definitely doesn’t come to us as easily as it does to God.
“And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one.” Our goal in life should be to live our lives in obedience to God and according to His will. We cannot do this on our own. We need to pray for protection from temptation and from the evil one. We need to pray for the wisdom to know what is right and what is wrong. We need to pray for guidance from the Holy Spirit, who indwells all true believers.
I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you.
“These things I have spoken to you while abiding with you. But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you. (John 14:16-17,25-26)
“For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.” Bookending your prayer with more praise and worship is a great idea because our God, creator, and savior deserves non-stop praise: praise for what He has done and praise for who He is.
“Amen.” Many of us robotically say “Amen” at the end of our prayers, but do we really think about what we are saying or is it just a religious form we do without thinking? Amen means “so be it.” We are effectively saying “Your will be done.” We are accepting His will, His result. If we truly trust His goodness, His holiness, His love, His wisdom, His strength, we should be happy to submit to His will because “… we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:28)
When it comes to praying continually, there isn’t just one formula you have to follow for every prayer. There are many kinds of prayers that are all appropriate at the right time. Don’t let this formula make you avoid prayer because you don’t think you can do it right or because you don’t think you have time. It is better to fit a few short, casual prayers into your day than to have just one prayer that fits a formula. That being said, this was an example given by Jesus, so there is a lot to learn about a deep, God-honoring prayer.
When my youngest gets frustrated during homeschooling because I correct him on something, I remind him that we are all learning. We practice because we need to get better. We wouldn’t be doing school if he knew everything perfectly. In the same way, nobody starts praying in what anyone would consider a perfect manner. Everyone needs practice. As you pray more, your prayers will grow deeper, more meaningful, and more frequent. Unlike schooling, getting better at prayer will lead to more prayer and not less practice. My prayer is that your prayer life will grow and draw you closer to the savior and creator God.
Trust Jesus.
your sister in Christ,
Christy
FYI, I plan to do another post with more information on prayer. I’m trying to make my posts a little shorter and more accessible because we all live busy lives.
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