I was praying this morning and thanking God for all He has done for me and my family. I was thinking about the Lords Prayer during this process. As you will remember this prayer was given by Jesus Himself when instructing His followers how to pray.
The Lords Prayer starts out by praising Gods glorious name and then asking that His kingdom come soon and that God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven. It goes from there into asking God to give us our daily bread, forgive our sins as we forgive others, and dont let us yield to temptation. He closes again by praising the Father.
I wondered about the structure and order in which Jesus gave us this prayer. Nothing is insignificant in the Bible. I assume Jesus told us to pray in this manner for an important reason and the prayer is put in this specific order deliberately to serve His purpose.
Obviously this would mean that it would be important to include everything Jesus thinks is important in His prayers in my prayers, remembering that the Bible also instructs that our prayers are to be from the heart, not to be recited mindlessly in vain repetitions, or chanted and that we should pray without ceasing.
It is important to me to note that Jesus begins His prayer with praise for the Father. How often do we just jump into the heart of the matter and ask God for His help in whatever is vexing us without telling Him how much we appreciate Him and what he has done?
Then note that Jesus tells us to ask that God’s will be done, not our will. There used to be a television show called, Father Knows Best. This describes this notion. God’s will for our lives is the best thing for us, albeit it is difficult or near impossible sometimes to understand some things such as tragic events. We should acknowledge this in our prayers.
Next we may ask for the things we need including forgiveness and help in resisting the wiles of satan, etc. We should always close our prayers similar to the opening with tremendous praise for our awesome God.
As we claw our way through life, let us praise God’s name and thank Him for what He has done and continues to do in our lives. Sure we can ask Him for the things that we think we need and for His help, but we should remember our manners and who exactly it is we are talking to. God loves us more than anyone including our closest family member and/or friend, but He is also a heavenly King and almighty Creator of the entire universe and should be treated with respect.
Children should respect their father even though love abounds from both sides. We are not the focus, although admittedly sometimes it is hard not to focus on ourselves. God should always be the focus. Everything was created by Him and for Him, including you and me. Most of all we should keep in mind the tremendous price that He paid for us on Calvary and realize that if it were not for Jesus Christ we would be trapped in darkness and prevented from ever having access to His love and the light.
Matt.6:9
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.
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.
How well do you know the Bible?
When Jesus gave the Lords prayer, He also stated something about where we should pray. Where?
Matt. 6:6
But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
Have a great weekend and go to church this Sunday!