The Disciple's (Lord's) Prayer
When we pray.
There are things in our world that we do automatically and for the most part without thinking. This is true for tying our shoestrings to praying.
Here are a few thoughts about our praying.
The disciples who learned to pray the prayers of Judaism with their first spoken words now saw a practice Jesus observed in His prayers which was so different that they asked Jesus to teach them to pray as He did.
Jesus followed a practice which you can see culturally in our Scripture. The most important item is put the most important items first, and the less important last. This is seen in the arrangement of the books of the Bible, which is why the Gospels are first thought written after the Epistles. This was the pattern of Jewish thought at that time. The Ten Commandments have the most important items first.
Read John 1:1 "In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God and the Word was God.." Jesus began the prayer he taught His Disciples with the same principle, the most important items first.
The prayer taught to Jesus Disciples thus begins with the one word, the most important word:
OUR
– An affirmation that means we all have God’s DNA in us. We are individuals but we are also His offspring, we are all siblings where it really matters.
– This first word reminds us we are not in life alone and our Creator is eternal, hence this (eternity) is our inheritance. As Jesus said, “because I live, you too shall live.” The Issue for each of us to decide was whether Jesus was lying or was He telling us the most beautiful thing mortal ears have ever heard.
FATHER
-- Which means giver of life, protector, provider who cares for us, guides, and gives good gifts for our well being and growth and maturity. Here as Stewart Hamlin said after his conversion, (He wrote the song: “There is no Secret What God Can Do.”) “We Protestants dial direct, while Catholics dial operator” and so we say when we pray, “Our Father.”
Our God, our Heavenly Father, Creator is:
Deut: 33:27a “The eternal God is your refuge and underneath are the everlasting arms.”
WHO ART
-- Who is, was and ever will be. Gen: 1:1 “In the beginning God created…” Eternal, a word which is beyond what our understanding and what we can not grasp, because we exist in the limits of the capsule of time and space. “I AM” is and Ever Will Be.”
IN HEAVEN
This world we live in is temporary, so is the temporary housing in our bodies of our person hood, but also all that we know except God, because our very earth and sun are also temporary.
All we know is made up of whirling atoms, electrons, quarks, and what else that is or may be their substance, all put together for our well being. This goes from the Van Allen Belt that protects us from deadly radiation to our skin that wards off infection.
II Cor 5:1 “For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”
HALLOWED
-- I am not sure we know what that means. The word means" set apart”, “Other” or “different” We had to take our shoes off to visit Ghandi’s grave. I did this out of respect, not because I believed I was on ”holy” ground. An altar is set apart because it is different. God is different than we mortals and is the Holy Other.
BE THY NAME
-- Name is indication of character, the personhood statement of who we are. We are to be given a new name, says Scripture. God’s name is Hallowed. We work towards that goal, or as the vow United Methodist pastors take “going on to perfection.” (not there in this life time, but striving)
The perfection of God’s place which has been prepared for us, we are not able to grasp or understood because of the limits in which we live and dwell.
We can not grasp what heaven is like any more than we could grasp what the world is outside of the womb when we dwelt there. “Things beyond our seeing, things beyond our hearing, things beyond our imagining, all prepared by God for those who love Him, that it is that God has revealed to us through the Spirit.” 1 Cor 2:9
THY WILL BE DONE
-- That is the perfection we strive for, and when we muck things up, we realize how different it would be if we had done the will of the One who loves us so much that He gave…to make it so as if we hadn’t”.
ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN.
-- No locks, no police persons, no contracts, “No sickness or death, for God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.” Heaven is rightfully our first goal. Revelation 21: 2-7
GIVE US
-- As in the family, God’s family, we can ask and we have permission to ask. As Jesus said, would a Father give a scorpion to His child if he asked for bread? We not only have the right to ask, we may be remiss if we do not. We as God’s child have “throne rights.”
OUR DAILY BREAD
Those things we need and by which we live. Jesus called Himself the Bread of Life. We ask for that which sustains our lives, both for our body and for our soul’s needs, for the purpose of our growth and maturity. Jesus is the bread, the soul’s nourishment we need.
In the Last Supper Jesus took bread,(and remember there were no forks or spoons, one used the bread to dip into the common dish. Without the bread, you didn’t eat.) Again, Jesus said He was the bread of life, without Him, we do enter into, we do not participate in the life God has for us without Him. He Is The Bread Of Our Eternal Life.
AND FORGIVE US our TRESPASSES (sins-failings-bad choices, missing the mark, or sometimes just not thinking, translated: moments of moral stupidity, foolish or thoughtlessness acts.)
This is the imperative, for that which separates us from the only source of life there is. This blotch has to be removed or overcome, or else there is no life. Life comes from God alone and what cuts us off from God is tragic because it can only be defined as the absence of life or as we call it, death.
Sin separates us from God but here is our life line. We ask, and we are “justified”, or” just as if we had never sinned”. That is the awesome Good News, the Gospel. We are covered, as Scripture says, with the Righteousness of Christ. That is why there is a prayer of Confession in every Service of Worship in the United Methodist hymnal. We all need to be aware of what can and does separate us, (dulls us off, or bars us) from the presence of God.
AS WE FORGIVE THOSE WHO TRESPASS AGAINST US.
-- This is the hard one. How is it that we can not forgive when we have claimed forgiveness? We mortals can rationalize anything. We can see clearly and vividly the sins in others but we can be very myopic when it comes to owning up to our own.
AND LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION
-- Why would God ever do that? Protect us from that edge where we step over the line. Keep us on the path that leads to life and not a path that is beyond our strength. Ask our Heavenly Father to keep us from stepping into the trap that can separate us from Him who gives us life.
BUT DELIVER US FROM EVIL
-- May evil not have power over us, or over-power us. Be aware that evil is always the distortion of the good, and sometimes we lose our judgment to distinguish the evil that is presented in the wrappings, the twisting, the misrepresenting of that which is good. There is always truth in evil but only a half truth, which makes it a dangerous lie.
FOR THINE IS THE KINGDOM, THE POWER AND THE GLORY
-- This is the surprise. An affirmation of faith, a statement of belief, and it was not in the prayer Jesus taught the Disciples to pray.
Because of the Reformation, Protestants discarded most everything that had the mark of Roman Catholicism such as kneeling, images, liturgy etc..
But here were added words, not that the Lord gave us, but a liturgical ending to the prayer that the Roman Catholics do not use.
This prayer we are taught was not taught to the masses, but rather to the Disciples who asked how they should pray. You and I are, as followers of “The Christ”, His Disciples.
-- This is our prayer. The prayer Jesus gave to His chosen disciples.
There are things in our world that we do automatically and for the most part without thinking. This is true for tying our shoestrings to praying.
Here are a few thoughts about our praying.
The disciples who learned to pray the prayers of Judaism with their first spoken words now saw a practice Jesus observed in His prayers which was so different that they asked Jesus to teach them to pray as He did.
Jesus followed a practice which you can see culturally in our Scripture. The most important item is put the most important items first, and the less important last. This is seen in the arrangement of the books of the Bible, which is why the Gospels are first thought written after the Epistles. This was the pattern of Jewish thought at that time. The Ten Commandments have the most important items first.
Read John 1:1 "In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God and the Word was God.." Jesus began the prayer he taught His Disciples with the same principle, the most important items first.
The prayer taught to Jesus Disciples thus begins with the one word, the most important word:
OUR
– An affirmation that means we all have God’s DNA in us. We are individuals but we are also His offspring, we are all siblings where it really matters.
– This first word reminds us we are not in life alone and our Creator is eternal, hence this (eternity) is our inheritance. As Jesus said, “because I live, you too shall live.” The Issue for each of us to decide was whether Jesus was lying or was He telling us the most beautiful thing mortal ears have ever heard.
FATHER
-- Which means giver of life, protector, provider who cares for us, guides, and gives good gifts for our well being and growth and maturity. Here as Stewart Hamlin said after his conversion, (He wrote the song: “There is no Secret What God Can Do.”) “We Protestants dial direct, while Catholics dial operator” and so we say when we pray, “Our Father.”
Our God, our Heavenly Father, Creator is:
Deut: 33:27a “The eternal God is your refuge and underneath are the everlasting arms.”
WHO ART
-- Who is, was and ever will be. Gen: 1:1 “In the beginning God created…” Eternal, a word which is beyond what our understanding and what we can not grasp, because we exist in the limits of the capsule of time and space. “I AM” is and Ever Will Be.”
IN HEAVEN
This world we live in is temporary, so is the temporary housing in our bodies of our person hood, but also all that we know except God, because our very earth and sun are also temporary.
All we know is made up of whirling atoms, electrons, quarks, and what else that is or may be their substance, all put together for our well being. This goes from the Van Allen Belt that protects us from deadly radiation to our skin that wards off infection.
II Cor 5:1 “For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.”
HALLOWED
-- I am not sure we know what that means. The word means" set apart”, “Other” or “different” We had to take our shoes off to visit Ghandi’s grave. I did this out of respect, not because I believed I was on ”holy” ground. An altar is set apart because it is different. God is different than we mortals and is the Holy Other.
BE THY NAME
-- Name is indication of character, the personhood statement of who we are. We are to be given a new name, says Scripture. God’s name is Hallowed. We work towards that goal, or as the vow United Methodist pastors take “going on to perfection.” (not there in this life time, but striving)
The perfection of God’s place which has been prepared for us, we are not able to grasp or understood because of the limits in which we live and dwell.
We can not grasp what heaven is like any more than we could grasp what the world is outside of the womb when we dwelt there. “Things beyond our seeing, things beyond our hearing, things beyond our imagining, all prepared by God for those who love Him, that it is that God has revealed to us through the Spirit.” 1 Cor 2:9
THY WILL BE DONE
-- That is the perfection we strive for, and when we muck things up, we realize how different it would be if we had done the will of the One who loves us so much that He gave…to make it so as if we hadn’t”.
ON EARTH AS IT IS IN HEAVEN.
-- No locks, no police persons, no contracts, “No sickness or death, for God shall wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.” Heaven is rightfully our first goal. Revelation 21: 2-7
GIVE US
-- As in the family, God’s family, we can ask and we have permission to ask. As Jesus said, would a Father give a scorpion to His child if he asked for bread? We not only have the right to ask, we may be remiss if we do not. We as God’s child have “throne rights.”
OUR DAILY BREAD
Those things we need and by which we live. Jesus called Himself the Bread of Life. We ask for that which sustains our lives, both for our body and for our soul’s needs, for the purpose of our growth and maturity. Jesus is the bread, the soul’s nourishment we need.
In the Last Supper Jesus took bread,(and remember there were no forks or spoons, one used the bread to dip into the common dish. Without the bread, you didn’t eat.) Again, Jesus said He was the bread of life, without Him, we do enter into, we do not participate in the life God has for us without Him. He Is The Bread Of Our Eternal Life.
AND FORGIVE US our TRESPASSES (sins-failings-bad choices, missing the mark, or sometimes just not thinking, translated: moments of moral stupidity, foolish or thoughtlessness acts.)
This is the imperative, for that which separates us from the only source of life there is. This blotch has to be removed or overcome, or else there is no life. Life comes from God alone and what cuts us off from God is tragic because it can only be defined as the absence of life or as we call it, death.
Sin separates us from God but here is our life line. We ask, and we are “justified”, or” just as if we had never sinned”. That is the awesome Good News, the Gospel. We are covered, as Scripture says, with the Righteousness of Christ. That is why there is a prayer of Confession in every Service of Worship in the United Methodist hymnal. We all need to be aware of what can and does separate us, (dulls us off, or bars us) from the presence of God.
AS WE FORGIVE THOSE WHO TRESPASS AGAINST US.
-- This is the hard one. How is it that we can not forgive when we have claimed forgiveness? We mortals can rationalize anything. We can see clearly and vividly the sins in others but we can be very myopic when it comes to owning up to our own.
AND LEAD US NOT INTO TEMPTATION
-- Why would God ever do that? Protect us from that edge where we step over the line. Keep us on the path that leads to life and not a path that is beyond our strength. Ask our Heavenly Father to keep us from stepping into the trap that can separate us from Him who gives us life.
BUT DELIVER US FROM EVIL
-- May evil not have power over us, or over-power us. Be aware that evil is always the distortion of the good, and sometimes we lose our judgment to distinguish the evil that is presented in the wrappings, the twisting, the misrepresenting of that which is good. There is always truth in evil but only a half truth, which makes it a dangerous lie.
FOR THINE IS THE KINGDOM, THE POWER AND THE GLORY
-- This is the surprise. An affirmation of faith, a statement of belief, and it was not in the prayer Jesus taught the Disciples to pray.
Because of the Reformation, Protestants discarded most everything that had the mark of Roman Catholicism such as kneeling, images, liturgy etc..
But here were added words, not that the Lord gave us, but a liturgical ending to the prayer that the Roman Catholics do not use.
This prayer we are taught was not taught to the masses, but rather to the Disciples who asked how they should pray. You and I are, as followers of “The Christ”, His Disciples.
-- This is our prayer. The prayer Jesus gave to His chosen disciples.
Labels: WHEN WE PRAY
posted by Lee Truman | 9:14 AM
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