Kyrie Eleison

“This, then, is how you should 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 today our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
Lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.’”
Matthew 6:9-13

If you call yourself by the name ‘Christian’, this passage should be burned into your brain.  As our primary method of communication with God, the importance of prayer can hardly be overstated.  In these few brief sentences, Jesus Himself lays out for us the pattern that His prayer did, and our prayer should, follow.

This prayer is not a formula; it is not a recipe.  This prayer is not a key that will unlock the power of God and cause Him to perform miracles.  These sort of ideas abound in our society.  The thought that we can control God, forcing Him to act on our terms is quite appealing to our ego.  In our modern world, we are unaccustomed to waiting for anything.  We want fast food; we expect on-demand entertainment from our TV's.  Many of us carry so-called ‘smart’ phones, ensuring that we continually have ready access to whatever information we consider essential wherever we may be.

In spite of, or perhaps because of our always connected nature, I would posit that, in general, our personal relationships have never been more shallow.  Social media allows us to easily maintain a collection of dozens or hundreds of friends, while at the same time making it difficult to develop the in-depth communication and history of shared experience that we need to have true fellowship.

In spite of what you may have read or heard, God doesn't have a Facebook profile; God does not want you to ‘Like’ His status.   What God desires is to have a deep relationship with you.  He wants you to seek Him, and to find Him.  He wants you to be free from sin to live a life according to His plan; leading you finally to His presence.  (See Psalms 105:3-4, Isaiah 55:6-7, John 4:23-24, John 17:20-26, etc...)

As I stated earlier, prayer is our primary method of communication with God, at least ideally.  With this in mind, we would do well to take an in-depth look at the pattern of prayer that Jesus himself laid out for us.  Let's go line by line.

Our Father in heaven

The first thing that Jesus does is to recognize his relationship with God.  While He was literally God's son, we too are God's children according to 1 John 3:2.  Sadly, we were not all blessed with perfect fathers.  Some of us have had fathers who were absent or distant.  Some of us had fathers who expected far too much of us.  An unfortunately large number of us have had fathers who were actively abusive.  A much smaller group of us grew up with fathers who followed God's example and raised their children with love and grace coupled with appropriate discipline, to the best of their ability.  I am quite blessed to count myself in this final group.

As our heavenly father, God cares for us, His children by providing for our immediate needs for love, forgiveness and acceptance, while disciplining us to mold us into the most ideal version of ourselves.  Because He is our father “in heaven”, He is unconstrained by the barriers of time, distance and lack of knowledge.  We can trust that He will always act in the way that is best for us.

Hallowed be your name

Hallowed is simply another word for holy.  In this statement, we recognize that God is righteous and just; He is, in a word, holy.  We do not need to state this fact for His benefit, but rather for ours.  When we understand this fact, we become less concerned with the affairs of this world and more concerned with how we can please Him.  This leads directly to the next point.

Your kingdom come,
Your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.

Heaven is God's dwelling place.  It is the place where everything takes place just as God chooses.  For the moment, God allows events on the Earth to be chiefly influenced by other powers.  Certainly, everything that occurs will, in time, fit into His greater plan for good; in this section of the prayer, we are, in so many words expressing a desire for God's plan for good to come to fruition.

Give us today our daily bread

There are seven main points to this prayer; only now at number four does Jesus suggest that we actually ask God for anything.  All too often when we pray, we bring to God and enormous list of requests.  We have our own agenda; we think we know what God needs to do, and come to Him expecting that He will act as we want Him to.  This is certainly not a new phenomenon; if you read chapter 16 of Genesis, you can see Abraham and Sarah trying to direct God in just this way.  Rather than bringing an enormous list of requests and needs that God already knows about, we should simply ask Him to meet our immediate needs, while recognizing that all we have comes from God in the first place.

Forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.

This is a potentially dangerous area of this prayer.  If we act in a non-forgiving, judgmental manner toward others, should we really expect God to treat us better?  Some may read this warning and think that we can control God with our attitudes; I do not believe that this is the case.  In order for forgiveness to occur, two things are required.  The offended party must be willing to offer forgiveness, and the guilty party must be willing to accept forgiveness.  By acting in a forgiving manner toward others, we train ourselves to accept the forgiveness that God offers us.

Lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from the evil one.

Before I began my discussion on this final section, I feel I must make something clear.  When you are tempted to sin, it is not God who is tempting you.

When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed.
James 1:13-14

God certainly does not tempt us, but, as we make our way through our fallen world, satan is certain to bring temptation our way.  For reasons that I doubt any human can truly understand, God allows this temptation to occur, within limits.  He has however, promised us that He will always provide a way out so that we can withstand temptation and not give in to it. (See 1 Corinthians 10:13)

Just as with praying for the advent of God's kingdom on earth, we can be confident that God will, when all is said and done, “deliver us from the evil one” in a triumphant, glorious manner that we cannot currently comprehend.  If we truly think of God as our heavenly father though, we will realize that God loves for us to come to Him and ask for the good things that He already has waiting for us.  Anyone who has been a parent for very long has felt the unique joy of hearing your child ask you for something that you have for them.

Now we have examined the model that Jesus gave us for prayer, we would do well to emulate it.  If you are in prayer, I would love to pray for you or with you.  Feel free to mention it in the comments section.