The Lord's Prayer

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SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to another episode of Jubilee Life Coaches Life Blog. This is where I share my scripture union meditations as well as share some what I think is useful and meaningful uh information that helps Christians walk the walk. Um yes, I've been meaning to share uh something about the Lord's Prayer for some time and and I came across the Bible Project's episode, and you know how I like and respect the Bible Project's uh contents. Uh so I looked into it and I said, Hmm, this is good. So here we go. Um Our Father which 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 debts as we forgive our debtors, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. From thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen. This short Bible project video makes an observation worth pausing over. The Sermon on the Mount has an introduction, a main body, and a conclusion, and inside the body is a section on religious practice. Inside that section, Jesus takes up three practices. The middle one is prayer, and at the heart of that is the Lord's Prayer. So this video calls this the center of the center of the center. It is a literary observation, but not a trivial one. And Matthew did not place this prayer casually. So most of us know these words well, well enough to walk past them. So today we will walk through them a little bit more slowly, one line at a time. Now, note on the counting though. This video counts seven requests, three plus four, with seven signaling completeness, but the reformed uh confessions count differently. The Westminster Shoder Catechism gives a preface, six petitions, and a conclusion, treating lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil as a single petition. Now, neither is wrong. One count is literary and the other is confessional. Now this post follows the catechism's shape. The first thing the video notices is the first word. The prayer does not open with my father, but it opens with our father. Now, even when we pray alone in a close room, Jesus put a plural in our mouths. We pray as members of a family, even in solitude. Now then comes the balance. Beside the intimate name sits in in heaven, the video reads this as a metaphor. Just as the skies are high above us, God stands above every category we can imagine. And yet he is near like a good father. The Shoto Catechism stands in the same place as well. Question 100 says the preface teaches us to draw near with holy reverence and confidence as children to a father who is able and ready to help us. Then it adds one more thing that we should pray with and for others. Now reverence and confidence lose either one and prayer collapses. Reverence alone makes God distant. And Jesus gave us both in the opening line. Then the petition one to three Name, Kingdom, and the Will. So the first half of the prayer repeats one word three times. Your name, your kingdom, your will. Three times, and not one of them is ours. The video sets the first petition inside the biblical story. God attached his holy name to Israel and meant to bless the nations through them. Israel broke the partnership and God's reputation was discredited among the nations. But the prophet said God Himself would act to restore the holiness of his name. Now this prayer asks for exactly that. The second and third petition say how that restoration comes. One quiet note here. And the video says this prayer aligns our desires with God's desire, and that's that is true. The reformed instinct is to ask one more question. Who does the aligning? Shotokatechism 103 says, We pray that God, by his grace, would make us able and willing to know, to obey, and to submit to his will. Philippians 213 says the same thing. So the prayer begins with three requests about God. Our needs come second, and that order is itself pastoral care. Let's move on to petition number four, bread for today. The prayer turns here. Now we ask for what we need. And the first thing we ask for is startingly plain bread. The video makes an honest observation at this point. Most of us carry worry and fear about survival, and so we hoard. Right in the middle of that, Jesus tells us to ask for one day's worth. The petition also remembers the wilderness. God sent bread from heaven, but only enough for a day, so that Israel would stay in a posture of gratefulness and trust. It puts it beautifully. Not abundance, a sufficient portion. And notice that the asking does not stop at receiving. It asks that we would enjoy what we receive. And I hope we can pause here a little bit and ask ourselves this question. Now how many of us are too busy counting the reserve to actually enjoy what came today? One more. One a closer look. Now um in IFS language, the internal family systems, it's um the therapy method that I um I'm somewhat trained in. Now in in this language, the part that stockpiles is what we call a protector. Now it's not a bad part. None of the parts in the IF IFS language um is uh is bad. What it does is that it took that job long ago in order to keep you safe. And quite possibly there really was a season of scarcity behind it. Now many of us who grew up in immigrant households recognize this one. That part does not need scolding, it needs to learn that it is carrying a load that it was never able to carry. No reserve makes tomorrow safe. So this petition moves the weight to someone else. Give us today the request faces outward. Alrighty, now let's move on. Forgive us our debts. So this uh video names uh symmetry accurately. Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. And it draws the conclusion that our ability to receive God's forgiveness is bound up with our ability to f uh to give it out. Now, the symmetry really is there. Uh Jesus makes it sharper in the very next verses, Matthew six four fourteen and fifteen. There is no reason to blunt that. But how the sentence lands matters. Let me explain. To someone holding a name they cannot yet forgive, it can sound like a condition. Forgive first and then God will forgive you. Now heard that way, the prayer stops being a door and becomes a gate. What do I mean by that? Well, a shorter catechism one hundred five sets the same symmetry in a different order. We pray that God for Christ's sake would freely pardon all our sins. Then it is the reason we are the more encouraged to ask. Because by his grace we are enabled from the heart to forgive others. So notice the sequence, please. Our forgiving is not the price of God's pardon, it is evidence that grace has already reached us, and it is what that grace is doing in us. Then what about a heart that cannot yet forgive? It is serious. Jesus says so. But it is not a verdict of this qualification. It is a signal that grace needs to go deeper, not a checkpoint to clear first, it is a way to carry to God, not a fee to pay before approaching him. David Paulson spent years on this in his work on anger and bitterness. Forgiveness is not a technique for suppressing feeling, it is the slow relearning of how God has dealt with us. Now let's recite the Westminster uh shorter catechism one more time. Forgiving is not the price of God's pardon, it is the evidence that grace has already arrived. Let's move on. Petition six. Lead us not into the test. So in the last petition, the video explains the Greek word perasmos. Now it means a test meant to reveal what is true, not a trap. In Scripture, God's tests have a purpose to reveal character and to invite people into a relationship of trust. Then why ask to be spared? The video's answer is honest. Tests can be difficult and painful. And so when the right choice costs too much, there is a small voice suggesting the easy way out. James chapter one verse thirteen says plainly that God tempts tempts no one. So this petition does not make God the tempter. The shorter catechism words it with real world sobriety. We pray that God will either keep us from being tempted to sin or support and deliver us when we are tempted, either or a life without testing is not an offer. Now let me make a comment on that small voice. The video calls that small voice the voice of the evil one. Here we want to move a little more slowly. IFS would hear that voice as a part, usually a protector trying to spare us a cost. And there is something to learn from that. You see, not every inner voice urging to retreat belongs to the enemy. Some of them are frightened parts carrying on old burden. And what they need first is a hearing and not a rebuke. And at the same time, Scripture is clear that our own hearts deceive us, Jeremiah chapter seventeen nine, and that a real tempter does exist. So not every inner voice is innocent either. So what remains is discernment then, curiosity toward the heart, honesty about sin, and dependence on the spirit for both. So yeah, this is one reform distinction that we hold on to here. In IFS, the healer is the self. In Scripture, the one who leads and delivers is God. So the petition itself makes this very plain. It does not say, Help me find my true self. No. It says lead us and deliver us. The request faces outward always. Alrighty, let's close. The video closes by saying this prayer of Jesus shapes us into people who long for God's kingdom. Now that is well said. One thing to add, this prayer forms us not because we perform it well, but because it was given. The moment reciting it becomes a technique, it turns it turns into the very thing Jesus warned about a few verses earlier. And it is short, strikingly short. And this comes right after warning against thinking that we are hurt for our many words. Jesus simply gives his disciples about ten lines. So your prayer does not have to be impressive. Today's portion is enough. Well, thanks for joining us. Um on my homepage, jubileecoach.com under the live blog section. I have five questions, Jubilee Coach's questions, and I hope you'll take the time to visit there and ask yourself that reflective questions. Godspeed.