The School of Prayer: Our Deepest Needs

How in Tune are you with your needs?

Sometimes it can be difficult to seprate the concepts of need and desire. If we look at the defenitions, a need speaks to something that is essential for living while a desire speaks more to something from the will.. less essential.

In 1943, physchologist Abraham Maslow developed what he thought was a system of communicating both the basic and growth needs for human thriving. Have you ever heard of Maslow’s heiarchy of needs?

At the very base of this pyramid, you have ones physiological needs: food, breath, shelter, sleep. heigeine, etc.

As one moves up the diagram, the needs become more oriented towards human thriving. And that’s the essence of needs isn’t it? We all want to be whole. To feel fulfilled in our day to day… the only thing is, what makes us whole?

Now, I’m not here to critique whether this is helpful or not, but at the end of the day, if we are to claim that our worldview is through the lense of Jesus, then we have to acknowledge that before we look to any means, we have to begin our understanding of need with the creator Of all life. Psalm 139 speaks to this:

Psalm 139:1–2 (ESV)

O Lord, you have searched me and known me!

You know when I sit down and when I rise up;

you discern my thoughts from afar.

Psalm 139:13–14 ESV

For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.

Each part of this psalm speaks to being known by the God who has created you… and let’s make no mistake: creator always knows the creation better than it knows itself.

So if God knows us more than we know ourselves, then when it comes to seeking provision from him, then we have to recoginize that we have much to learn.

As Jesus instructs his disciples around the topic of prayer- how does he speak to our needs?

Matthew 6:11–12 ESV

Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

here are two very different provisions- practical needs and mercy

So the first question that we need to ask when we see this text is: How do these two ideas connect?

it is fairly common to seek out provision for what we need on a practical, felt level (daily bread), but we aren’t always as quick to jump towards forgiveness.

This leads me to our first observation:

Your needs in life are not only physical, but they are spiritual as well.

Today, we are going to look both directly at what you see and feel on a day to day basis, but also challenge the notion that human beings are limited to thise simple felt needs (i.e. Food, water, shelter)

In order to take a holistic look at what a human requires to function, we have to see that Jesus speaks to the body, soul and mind, and they are of equal importance.

So as we launch into this next part of the school of prayer, let’s allow the truth to invade what we perceive our needs to be, and let’s allow the words of Jesus to influence what we seek from our Heavenly Father.

Matthew 6:11 ESV

Give us this day our daily bread,

As Jesus begins to discuss our needs, he starts with what I would consider to be the “basic, felt needs”. What do we consider to be included in that statement: Daily Bread?

There are a couple of Jewish traditions and historical moments that can help us understand what is at the heart of the matter.

First off, we have this unique story of God’s provision in Exodus 16- Manna from heaven. The Israelites are early in their freedom from Egypt and they begin to complain because they are hungry. God hears their grumbling and provides meat in the form of quail and bread in the form of something called manna.

Now- what I want to pay attention to is the instructions that accompanied their collection.

Exodus 16:16–20 ESV

This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Gather of it, each one of you, as much as he can eat. You shall each take an omer, according to the number of the persons that each of you has in his tent.’ ” And the people of Israel did so. They gathered, some more, some less. But when they measured it with an omer, whoever gathered much had nothing left over, and whoever gathered little had no lack. Each of them gathered as much as he could eat. And Moses said to them, “Let no one leave any of it over till the morning.” But they did not listen to Moses. Some left part of it till the morning, and it bred worms and stank. And Moses was angry with them.

So here you have this literal provision of “daily bread” in that the people of Israel were compeletely dependant on the nation for their day-to-day needs. They were not to look at tomorrow.

There is also record of traditional Jewish prayer structure, where they would pray in the morning for “today’s bread” and they would pray in the evening for “tomorrow’s bread.”

As one author helps us understand, this posture is one of total dependance that shifts the individual towards trust in God and faith as defined in Hebrews 11:1

Hebrews 11:1 ESV

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Engrained in God’s interaction with humanity is the assurance that if He is in charge, each day is taken care of.

Now- Jesus expounds on this form of living, which is very counter-cultural, in His words towards the end of the chapter:

Matthew 6:25 ESV

“Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

Matthew 6:31–34 ESV

Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them all. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

All of this goes to say that when we trust God daily- when he is in charge- our needs will be met. We will be more than taken care of. To pray “give us this day our daily bread” is more than just handing over a grocery list- but it speaks to a deep understanding that in God, you have everything that you need.

It is re-establishing the trust that the creator of all things can meet your needs more than you can yourself.

In a world that is rittled with anxiety over uncertainty- whether that be economic or anything else- the church has the opportunity to embody what life looks like when God is truly in control. The only thing is, we have to commit to actual trust.

God is in control- and when we begin to surrender our day to day needs over to Him, praying “give us this day, our daily bread”, anxiety can shift to rest.

So as we mentioned earlier- the provision that we receive from God goes beyond our felt needs- We must now ask the question “how does God provide for our spiritual needs?”

Matthew 6:12 ESV

and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

If you pay attention to the overall story of the Bible, one thing becomes quite clear… humans are in need of mercy.

We all sin, we all stray from God through various actions or inactions that we take- and the deepest longing of the human soul is to be in right relationship with God.

Fortunately- God is merciful- an attribute that wasn’t magically inherited at the Cross, but it is something that He has carried with Him over all of time.

And if you look at the way that this is phrased, when the language of debts was used, the typical assumption was that debts referred to sins.

So here Jesus acknowledges God’s mercy as being an absolute necessity for human existence. As much as we stray from Him, God makes a way back.

But that is not the complete story of the petition.

Note that there is a responsibility, through prayer, of our action in forgiveness as well. Jesus expounds on this in v.14-15

Matthew 6:14–15 ESV

For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

I want to start this by saying that God is deeply aware of your heart. It is entirely possible to take time to heal over when we’ve been hurt in the past and that’s ok.

But in the same breath, we have to be keenly aware of the fact that when we withold forgiveness from others and choose to carry a grudge and empower the fracturing of relationships, that has a deep impact on your connection with God.

Why is it so important to forgive? Can’t unforgiveness be that one thing that we let slide?

This idea is revisited in Matthew 18 in a parable. To summarize, a master is collecting debt that is owed to him. One servant begs for patience and the master releases him… he forgives his debt. Now the same servant then goes and does a little debt collecting himself- except when someone begs him for that same mercy, the man throws him in prison. Let’s look at what happens when the master catches word of this:

Matthew 18:32–35 ESV

Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt. So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”

Forgiveness is an essential need to the human soul because it enables us to be released from our sin. The only catch is- what we receive God expects us to freely give.

Where this gets really crucial is that we are desperately in need of mercy in order to live in right relationship with God. So when we carry unforgiveness in our lives, we actively prevent ourselves from having our own needs met.

So to put this as plainly as I can- if we are in deperate need of grace, then we better translate that desperation with an urgency to forgive.

So let’s go back to the big picture:

Matthew 6:11–12 ESV

Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

Two things we take away- trust God with your day to day needs and maintain right relationship with God by reciprocating mercy.

and as we wrap up today, I want to remind you that coming to God in prayers of need Assume that we are more than just physical beings, we are spiritual as well- and when we consider that- the longing to see God’s provision goes hand in hand with getting more comfortable with dependence on someone other than ourselves.

think about this for a moment:

-according to scripture, when you operate independently from God, that is, trusting in your own ability provide, there are so many variables in that equation that it is impossible for things to go right., .. or as the saying goes, “the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry”- the eventual outcome of independence is anxiety

-in that same sense, when we neglect to trust God in seeking forgiveness and forgiving others (spiritual needs) the likely outcome is deep resentment, broken relationships, and even separation from God through the withholding of mercy.

So the journey towards wholeness can be seen when we do three things:

1. We practice dependence through asking in faith.

2. We seek mercy with the understanding that it is a necessity for relationship with God.

3. We give forgive freely because we do not receive what we are unwilling to give.

It is only when we practice this type of dependence that we experience wholeness because we are seeking God for what we truly need rather than settling for anything less.

God knows you deeper than anyone ever could and when you trust Him to provide for your needs, body, soul, and mind, you will discover His vision for what it means to be human.