A people of prayer
Matthew 6:5-8
Our reading from Matthew’s gospel just got to the part we’re all familiar with and stopped. The next words are:
This, then, is how you should pray: (let’s say these words together):
Our Father, who art in heaven
Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth
As it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread
and forgive us our trespasses
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
Reading the few verses we heard, we might be forgiven for thinking that Jesus is encouraging us to abandon public prayer, and make our conversation with our heavenly Father an entirely private affair. But if we read from the start of Chapter 6, we find that what Jesus is doing is to discourage ostentation: do not give, do not pray, and do not fast in a manner designed to impress the people around you. I’ve heard it said that morality is doing the right thing when no-one is watching. It’s not a tool to impress others, and neither is your spiritual life.
No, the focus should be on the intimacy of communion with God in one’s heart – this is at the centre of all prayer, whether it happens publicly or privately.
In the Lord’s Prayer, Christ provides us with a model for prayer, one which we can use to build our spiritual life whether we use it exactly as he provided or not. So let’s look at this model prayer:
Our Father, which art in heaven
Our Father: You won’t find I, me or mine in the Lord’s Prayer, although it was originally provided for private use. We should bear in mind the first great commandment: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength. Your focus should be on God – prayer cannot be self-centred, it focuses outward, so God is first, second are those surrounding our lives, last is me.
Father reminds us of our creation relationship. If the creator is described as Father, then the universe must be a friendly place. We are situated in a family, safe and intimate.
Immediately following this comes who art in heaven. Hallowed be thy name. God is a heavenly being. Hallowed conveys a sense of separateness, of difference. God is not like us. Remember that in Hebrew a name is not just a handle, it is the nature of a thing, the personality and character of a person. So when we speak God’s name, we are speaking out his nature. In doing so, we acknowledge his nature, his glory and power. We cannot treat this name like any other; it is unique.
There is a tension, then, between the familiarity of Father, and the other-ness of God in heaven, set apart from us by a gulf of glory. This relationship can be like no other, a combination of love and awe. William Barclay says the only English word fit to describe this relationship is reverence, a continual awareness of the nature of God, and the consequent desire to please him. Brother Lawrence wrote of the importance of having God in mind throughout the day’s menial tasks, gardening and cooking, even washing up to the glory of God.
It is worth noting that the version of the Lord’s Prayer we use most often not only begins with the glory of God, but ends with it too. Our petitions are sandwiched between two acts of reverence.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. These two phrases are counterpoint, the same thing from different perspectives. They are a prayer, not for us to steal away to heaven, but for the beauty and glory of heaven to be made an earthly reality. The Kingdom of God is life on an earth where God’s will is as perfectly followed as it is in heaven. It is Heaven on earth.
Summary
So we have three elements about God’s glory:
He is our father, he is revered;
We desire to keep his name Holy, showing how far he is above us;
We want his kingdom to come on earth.
There now follow 3 elements about us. Notice first that even when we pray alone, we pray for all of us. Not I, me , mine, but us. We pray for daily bread, forgiveness and deliverance for everyone, not just me.
For today, we ask for our essential needs, our daily bread. This we ask of God the Father.
For yesterday we ask for forgiveness. The word used in Matthew’s gospel means a debt, a failure to pay what is due. No-one human can claim to have perfectly fulfilled their duty to God. There is inevitably failure of reverence, failure of consideration, promotion of self. Forgiveness is the work of Christ the Son.
If Jesus assumes we will pray like this regularly and often, he acknowledges that we need forgiveness on a frequent basis. Though this will bring us up short, we know that such forgiveness is readily forthcoming. Christ follows with the immediate assumption that we will be forgiving. The heart that doesn’t grasp the relational significance of forgiveness won’t be open to accepting forgiveness when it is offered. How often do we continue to condemn ourselves when God has already offered us forgiveness?
For tomorrow, we ask protection from testing or temptation. We live in a spiritual battleground, we are not well-armed, and need all the assistance we can get! This is the work of the Holy Spirit.
Summary
We have a three-fold prayer: daily bread, forgiveness and protection, representing our needs in the present, the past and the future. These blessings are readily offered by Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Finally, as we come to our Father:
Do we recognise that as we ask for provision with the essentials of life, we are asking for these for both the poorest and the richest around us, and not just for ourselves?
Do we consider that we’re asking for forgiveness for everyone? Even those we ourselves struggle to forgive?
Do we realise we are embroiled in a spiritual battle that can only be won through the work of the Holy Spirit?
Most important of all, do we come to our Father, acknowledging his glory even as we seek intimacy with him? That is the heart of our prayer life. It is what we share, what we have in common above all else. Loving the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, strength and mind.
God at the centre – ultimate yet intimate.