Into The Lord’s Prayer
Aligning with God's heart
One of the reasons The Lord's Prayer is critical to the Christian is that it discloses those issues that are vital for us to keep front and center if we are to align with God's heart. If you're like me, you need this reminder to stay on track and not drift into a prayer-life that is one-dimensional.
Our Father (Matthew 6:9)
God would like us to know him as Father. While this is not the only way we see God, this is a profound, personal and true reality that is easy to overlook or take for granted. From beginning to end, God as Father is biblical and essential in helping us relate to the One who really is our father.
God’s not a distant and angry father but is a warm, loving, protecting, providing father who is dedicated to what's best for his children. Our earthly fathers, as good or bad as they might be, are not the reference point for being a good father, God is.
How is God our father?
While we all have an earthly father from whom we share DNA, God is the true and primary originator of our lives (Is 64:8; 1 Cor 8:6; 1 Tim 6:13), and we are made in his image.
God as our father:
will never leave us (Deut 31:6-8; Ps 94:14; Heb 13:5)
rescues us (Ps 34:19, 91:14, 138:7; John 3:16, 10:27-28)
disciplines us (Heb 12:3-11)
hears us (Mi 7:7; 1 Pet 3:12; 1 Jn 5:14)
protects us (Ps 5:11, 32:7; Rom 8:28; 2 Thes 3:3)
nurtures and trains us (Phil 2:13; 1 Pet 5:7)
meets our needs (Ps 23:1, 84:11; Rom 8:32; Phil 4:19)
When we see God as Father there is a personal connection with the One who is outside creation and is the Sovereign of everything he has created. God is not distant but attentive and caring. God is love.
How can God love us this way?
When we see the heart of God toward his children, thoughts and emotions of thanksgiving, love and joy should explode in us. We should also, continually, experience a sort of bewilderment. How can it be that God truly loves someone who is undeserving of this in every way imaginable? How can the purely holy One even look upon me without turning away?
And this brings us to the center of it all – the gospel. God looks upon us with a father's tender heart only because we have a brother, Jesus, who came here and took our sin and its results upon himself. Jesus, on the cross, absorbed the consequence of our sin. Jesus paid, with his life, the penalty. God does not love us because we are good but because Jesus loves us and represents us.
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Cor 5:21)
All who come to God through the gospel and trust in Jesus for salvation are loved by God in unimaginable ways. God is Father.
Hallowed be thy name (Matthew 6:9)
Arguably the biggest problem we have as humans is our unrelenting self-focus. Sometimes it's obvious, and other times our self-centeredness is deceptively hidden – but it's always there. Our time and energy and thinking and money are usually focused on us. So, it's appropriate that the first desire brought to God in the Lord's Prayer moves us in the opposite direction.
Hallowing is not a common twenty-first century term, but it's really important. When God is hallowed, he is being set apart in honor as completely holy and righteous. And since its God is being hallowed here, hallowing is uplifting his uniqueness. He is one of one. God's knowledge and purity and power and love and justice are infinitely complete. When we truly hallow God, we see him as he is an not as we want him to be.
So, the first Lord's prayer desire is the opposite of being self-focused. It's a setting aside of self and moving our focus and purpose to God. It reorients us to the very thing we're here for – the glory of God; the worship of the One who is the beginning and end of everything.
The Apostle John gave us a glimpse of this in Revelation 4:8-11:
And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say, "Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!" And whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to him who is seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before him who is seated on the throne and worship him who lives forever and ever. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying, "Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created."
We can see bringing glory to God as the driver of the life of Jesus as he moved toward the cross and prayed this:
"Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'? But for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name." (John 12:27–28)
"Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son that the Son may glorify you." (John 17:1)
Jesus came so that the Father would be exalted and shown to be who he is – indescribable love and mercy.
Hallowing God will help us be amazed at the gospel. The thought of Jesus giving up his rightful place and willfully subjecting himself to our hatred so that God would be lifted up should stun us.
If you pray using the ACTS method (Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication) hallowing God is the purpose of the first component. I have found that spending more time hallowing God builds a solid foundation for everything else that comes my way.
John Chrysostom, a fourth century Christian said this about hallowing God’s name: The prayer to hallow God's name corresponds with what Jesus has previously taught: "Let your light so shine before others that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven," just as the seraphim too, giving glory, sang "Holy, holy, holy." So "hallowed" means "glorified." In effect he is saying, "Enable us to live so purely that through us all may glorify you."
Hallowing God should be the core that moves everything in us
Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven (Matt 6:10)
After the recognition our Father for his holiness and love and goodness, what comes next is the logical extension – show yourself - please. God plan is that he would receive glory in eradicating sin and death, and rescuing his children through the gospel of Jesus. In other words, God's complete victory over sin and death – establishing his kingdom – is where history is moving. And our hearts should be aligned with and praying for this. In praying for God to bring the kingdom, we are asking that his will be done.
When they long for God’s name to be exalted among the nations: “God be gracious to us and bless us . . . that your way may be known on earth.” (Psam 67:1-2)
The focus of this petition, your kingdom come, your will be done, puts Jesus front and center. Only in Jesus is sin defeated. God's kingdom comes through the gospel. So, when Jesus came, the kingdom also came. This is what he told the religious rulers of his day when they asked about the coming kingdom. Jesus said, "For behold, the kingdom of God is in the midst of you." (Luke 17:21)
When Jesus gave his final instructions to the disciples, he was moving the kingdom forward. "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age." (Matthew 28:18–20)
And someday, God's kingdom will be here in its final form, which will be amazing. But until then, we long for the expansion of the gospel into the souls of the dying.
Give us this day our daily bread (Matt 6:11)
Three critical concepts jump out at me when I read this short prayer segment:
We should pray for our needs.
While food is the focus here, I'm assuming the intention is not to limit our asking to food. If God does not give us what we need for life, we will die. How long has it been since you've prayed for food or health or shelter? Praying for these things may seem strange or awkward because it's easy to take them for granted.
It's only God that gives us what we need.
It's easy to think that we have food to eat because we have a job, a Social Security check, a retirement plan to draw from, or parents that pay the bills. The truth is that all of those resources are entirely contingent on God's action. When we forget that God is the cause of everything we need we forget our dependency and God's goodness. This prayer section is an acknowledgement of our dependence. We see God as the great giver – he is always the giver and we are always the receiver.
God is faithful every day.
We have no independent control of the future. We are in the hands of God, and God will determine how our future unfolds. We should be looking, in faith, for God to meet our needs one day at a time. Just as God wanted the Hebrews to gather manna for only one day at a time and depend on God for the next day (Exodus 16), his mercies are new every morning (Lamentations 3:22-23) for us as well.
It's more than physical bread.
Jesus was bold in saying that he was the bread of life. Jesus said, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger… (John 6:35), and, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” (Matthew 4:4)
The only way we can live physically, day-to-day, is through God giving us what we need. And the only way we can live spiritually is through God giving us what we need in the gospel.
How do we know God will give us what we need?
We know that God will take care of our needs because he gave us Jesus. So, the One who gave up his own Son for us will also give us everything we need (Rom 8:32).
And my God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. - Philippians 4:19
Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors (Matt 6:12)
Let's just start this with a quick note: I'm assuming that the term debts in The Lord's Prayer refers to sin – see Colossians 2:14
Because we want to pray the way we should, we need to answer a few questions that this prayer segment raises:
Do we need to continually ask for forgiveness in order to maintain our salvation?
No. Just thinking about this logically should answer this question. No one can die with all sin confessed. All is lost if I must repent of every sin I have ever committed. I have sinned thousands of times and either forgotten about those or been unaware. I know that deep down I sin and sin and sin. But, because Jesus is my righteousness and champion, the Father looks at me through my substitute – the One who never sinned.
HOWEVER, it is vital that I continually examine myself and confess the sin I am aware of. This is not easy. We are not predisposed to take every thought captive (2 Cor 10:5) and see ourselves the way we should. We are not inclined to repent as we should. The Lord's Prayer is a continual prayer of priorities and heart disposition. Because we should be praying continually (1 Thes 5:16; Luke 18:1; Eph 6:18) and because Jesus is telling us to pray for our daily bread, at a minimum this is a daily prayer. The goal here is to maintain the right relationship with our Father. I should hate my sin, repent of it, and always see God's goodness to me.
How is my forgiving others connected to God forgiving me?
To me, this is the more difficult question. Does God forgiving me depend on me forgiving others? No. I was not forgiven after I forgave everyone who sinned against me. My salvation is based on faith. I am saved even though I am sinful. Just as Luther said, we are simultaneously righteous and sinner. I will never follow Jesus in a way that can earn God's favor.
At a minimum, however, my need to forgive others is a bold statement about how God's grace to me and the presence of the Holy Spirit in me produces big change. The gospel is about the extent to which God went to secure my soul. Jesus emptied himself and absorbed the consequence of my sin so that I could be forgiven (Phil 2:5-8). Feeling the magnitude of God's forgiveness (being saved) must lead to me forgiving others (see the parable of the unforgiving servant in Matt 18:21-35). My salvation must result in change.
Gospel-focused
This section of The Lord's Prayer should pull us to the gospel. Only because of the love of Jesus in his cross-work for me can I be forgiven. There is simply no way for me to be embraced by God unless my past, present, and future sin is dealt with. And there is no way I can be a forgiving person without the power that comes with the indwelling Holy Spirit.
Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil (Matthew 6:13)
If we could truly feel our sin and know its horrible consequences and the cost of our redemption, we would hate sin with everything we have. This part of The Lord's Prayer gives us a picture of the believer's disposition toward anything that would dishonor God (sinning). And this is so important that it's covered from both the negative and positive angle: Please keep me away from any situation that might lead to sin and deliver me from any trial you expose me to.
Does God tempt us to sin?
This piece of The Lord's Prayer is often misunderstood because we don't read it carefully. For some, this leads to a question; Does God tempt us to sin?
A simple and plain reading of this request should not lead to this question. We are not praying that God would not tempt us. We're praying that he doesn't bring us to a trial we might fail. And our failure would be sin. God doesn't tempt anyone (James 1:13). However, the great Sovereign does manage the events and situations of his children so that we turn to him and trust him. And God has every right to bring trial so that we grow. And we may need failure to develop.
What's the point?
In this day and age, the topic of sin is often avoided. And when we can't avoid it, the truth of the matter is massaged and compromised until the severity is gone. The more society embraces sin as virtue, the more we will be tempted to adopt an unbiblical vision of evil and join the cultural song.
The truth is we should know sin and hate sin and want to stay as far away from it as we can. After all, the wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23), those who live in sin will not inherit the kingdom (Galatians 5:19-21), whoever conceals their sin will not prosper but whoever confesses and renounces finds mercy (Proverbs 28:13), and the wrath of God is coming because of sin (Col 3:6).
In the end God's grace toward us is enough. He will expose us to whatever is needed for us to move toward maturity. And we should consider it all joy when we meet trials because they will lead to endurance (James 1:2).
So, we as God’s children should: see God as he is, long for his complete victory over sin, know that he is the giver of everything we need, be changed into forgiving people because we have experienced being forgiven, and hate sin. And this aligning with God’s vision is only possible, in every way, because of the gospel.