Sermon on the Mount: The Lord’s Prayer

After this manner therefore pray ye:
Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. 
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil:
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever.
Amen.
Matthew 6:9-13

The Lord's prayer was presented by Jesus as a model. He is telling us what kind of things we should pray, not the exact words that we should use. I am not saying that it is bad to repeat it. It is a great idea to repeat God's word at any time, but sometimes we need to look deeper.  So let's look at this prayer a little deeper and see what we can find.

Our Father which art in heaven: Jesus opens up the prayer with "Our Father." This is a personal term. You don't go around calling people father. If you did, people would think you are weird. We can come to God as His children. I think this also answers the question "Who do we pray to?".

Hallowed by thy name: Worship. I have heard it said that you worship God for who He is and praise Him for what He does. There are many names for God in the Bible: Jehovah, Abba, Lord. I particularly like the Hebrew names for God because the are descriptive of God’s different attributes and sound beautiful. Notice that this comes before everything else. This helps us to have the proper attitude and to remind us that God is set apart and should not be spoken about or treated vainly. I think that it also serves to humble us.

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven: God's Will. In prayer and in life we should seek to do God's will. We should pray as Jesus did in the Garden of Gethsemane in Luke, "not my will, but thine, be done." (Luke 22:42). I love that Jesus put asking for God’s will before asking for our own needs.

Give us this day our daily bread: Provision and Petition. We can trust the God will provide for us for God says, thru Paul, that he “shall supply all our needs according to his riches in glory.” (Philippians 4:19) I believe it’s not only our needs but the needs of those we pray for as well. This also makes me think of Deuteronomy 8:3. "man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live." Prayer is not just us speaking to God, but also Him speaking to us. We should allow time to quiet our thoughts and let Him speak to us.

And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors: Forgiveness. Though Christ has already died for our sins, it is still important for us to confess our sins to God and to to ask for forgiveness. This, I believe, helps to keep us in right relationship with the Lord. It is also important for us to forgive others. When asked how many times should we forgive our brother, Jesus responds “seventy times seven.” (Matthew 18: 21-22) Which is 490 times, in case you were wondering. In other words, we should forgive them as much as possible.  We will speak more about forgiving others in more detail in the next post.

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: Protection. We cannot expect to withstand temptation by our own strength, we must lean on and trust in God for deliverance. I am reminded of 2 Corinthians 12:9 where God says “my grace is sufficient for thee; for my strength is made perfect in weakness.”

For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever: Doxology. This is believed to have been written by someone other than Matthew. A doxology is another chance to praise and worship God.

Amen: According to Strong's at the end of a prayer this means "so it is, so be it, may it be fulfilled." It is a good way to end a prayer, for we desire all our prayers to come to pass.

Has the Lord’s Prayer affected you? How?

Red Letter Teachings: Mark 11:23-24

For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain,
Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea;
and shall not doubt in his heart,
but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass;
he shall have whatsoever he saith.
The two main elements of these verses is faith and not doubting
Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire,
when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.

Faith according to Scriptures is “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” (Hebrews 11:1) Substance means confidence, firm trust, assurance. Evidence means proof, but it can also mean conviction, which I think fits better in this verse. So faith is the assurance of things hopes for and the conviction of things unseen.

How is this applied to the verses above? Jesus is telling His disciples that they can move mountains if they have the confidence and conviction that it will happen…as long as there is no doubt.

James says that “the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind.” (James 1:6 NASB) The sea when driven and tossed by the wind is never at rest. It goes back and forth. We should not be like that. Doubting something is to lack confidence in or to consider it unlikely. Doubt opposes faith.

If we ask for anything in prayer, we must make sure that there isn’t even the slightest bit of doubt in our hearts. If there is, it could prevent our prayers from being answered. God knows the intentions of our hearts, so if you feel like your prayers aren’t going anywhere, ask God to show you if there is any doubt in your heart.

Is there anything that creates doubt in your life?

Sermon on the Mount: Prayer pt 2

But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do:
for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.
Be not ye therefore like unto them:
for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.
Matthew 6:7-8

In these verses Jesus is warning his followers against vain repetitions while praying. The world that was translated repetition is Battologeo, which means to repeat the same things over and over, to use many idle words, or to babble. So He was telling His followers not to fill their prayers with meaningless words.

We shouldn’t fill our prayers with meaningless words in order to say I prayed for this long, or to impress others with how much we pray. God isn’t impressed by how many words we can fill our prayers with.

I think that this can also be applied to praying because you feel that you should, and not because you want to. I don’t know about you, but when I force myself to pray, my prayers lack substance. Also sometimes when I am praying, I’ve only prayed for ten minutes or whatever, but I feel like I should stretch it out. When that happens, my prayers also lack substance. My heart isn’t really in it.

“God’s there, listening for all who pray, for all who pray and mean it.”
Psalm 145:18 MSG

What our God desires is intimacy. He wants us to pray. He wants us to come to Him with our needs and desires. He wants to have meaningful conversations with us. He knows the intentions of our hearts. He knows when we we meaningfully come before him in prayer, and when we don’t.

Do you strive for prayers of quality or prayers of quantity?

Don’t Give Your Heart Away

My heart is fixed, O God, my heart is fixed
Psalm 57:7

Keep and guard your heart with all vigilance
and above all that you guard,
for out of it flow the springs of life.
Proverbs 4:23 AMP

Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart
Matthew 22:37

The best advice that I have ever received was from one of my youth leaders my senior year. I don’t remember exactly what I had asked him but it was concerning my on again, off again high school boyfriend. He told me that my heart is like a house. I cannot give it away because it belongs to God, but I can allow people in.

While it might not be the most profound advice, it has stuck with me ever since. I took his advice, but sometimes I think I take it too seriously and never let anyone in.

What was the best advice you ever got?