Untitled Sermon (1)

Jesus Teaches About Prayer

The Lord’s prayer is recorded in both Luke and Matthew. In the book of Matthew, Jesus teaches the Lord’s prayer after teaching his disciples how to pray:

Do not pray to get compliments from others, but pray in secret so that you are not motivated to pray in order to impress others.

Do not babble repetitiously, thinking that God will hear you for your many words, because God the father know what you need before you ask him.

Jesus then teaches them to pray what we now call the Lord’s prayer.

There is a structure to the prayer that you might not have noticed before; it’s divided into two parts: “a prayer directed toward God” and “a prayer for daily needs”. The first three topics are about God (two in Luke, it’s missing, “May your will be done”), and the last three are prayers about us.

God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. His will for us from the beginning was to love him and to love those around us. We can see this in the Old Testament where the 10 commandments is strutured so that the first part is about loving God and the second part is about loving those around us. Even Jesus confirms this by saying that the greatest commandment is to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength and to love our neighbors as ourselves.

Therefore, I believe Jesus teaches us a prayer that is aligned with God’s heart, and therefore, no matter how we pray, we should always keep in mind this structure to love God first through our prayer and to love those around us.

This teaches us that prayer is not just about myself; Jesus doesn’t teach us to pray, “Give me today my daily bread and forgive my sins, and do not lead me into temptation.” It’s we, our, and us.

Interlude

When we pray, there might be times that it feels powerless, but I don’t think Jesus taught us this prayer so that it could be another one of our powerless prayers.

I am sure you’ve memorized the prayer and have recited it many times before, but has it made a powerful impact on your life? If not, I hope this study will help you pray it powerfully, so let’s jump in with a desire to learn!

Lord’s Prayer Breakdown

Jesus begins the prayer saying, “Father” The Greek was is ‘pater ‘and the Hebrew equivalent was probably ‘abba’ which is closer to ‘daddy’ than it is ‘father’. Think about it, God was Jesus’ father; how do you speak to your father? Do you say, “O Father, I humbly request of you to provide me with sustenance so that I may have the strength to do my daily chores.” No, you probably say, “Dad, can I have some food?” and if you were much younger, you’d probaby say, “Daddy.”

Jesus is teaching us that, as disciples, we have direct access to the father in heaven. The Lord’s Prayer was not a complex ritualistic prayer, but a simple request made to a father that you love, and a father that you trust to provide for you.

Then Jesus continues by praying, “may your name be treated as holy”. Have you ever had people talk bad about your dad or one of your parents? I have and I still remember it even though it was many years ago. You know why? Because it made me so mad that people would disrespect and dishonor my parents. Conversely, I remember the very moment in year 2008 when a man I respected came to me and told me, “Your father is a very good man.” That makes me feel good to this day.

There are millions of people alive today that curse God’s name and treat him as if he’s evil or as if he doesn’t exist. There are even thousands in the church that believe he is powerless to do anything in their lives. What does your heart feel when you see the world dishonoring God? As children who love their father, our desire should be for his name to be treated as holy.

Jesus then says, “May your kingdom come.” We should long for the return of our King Jesus, when he returns, he will do away with all evil and suffering. But while we wait, may the kingdom grow through more and more people joining the kingdom of God through us sharing the gospel.

Fourth has always been most memorable for me: Give us this day our daily bread. Imagine you’re in the wilderness like the Israelites when you left Egypt. There is no way you can farm on this land, you cannot work to provide food for yourself. But God miraculously provided food from heaven daily so that you can continue marching toward the promise land. We are to continue marching toward the promise land of heaven while trusting God to provide for us our daily needs!

Fifth petition is for the forgivenness of our sins as we also forgive every who has sinned against us. Of course, to pray this prayer, you should have already forgiven the person who has sinned against you before you started praying.

In Matthew 5:24, Jesus tells us that if we have an offering to give to God, but we remember that someone has something against us, we should first be reconciled to that person before giving an offering.

1 Peter 3:7 tells husbands to honor their wives so that his prayers may not be “hindered”

These two verses show us that we should resolve any ill feelings before be begin to pray to God.

And finally, do not lead us into temptation. This is probably better understood as “do not allow us to fall into temptation,” because James 1:13 tells us that God never tempts us. You literally need to pray this everyday, because God knows we fall to temptation daily. Actually, pray this every hour if temptation is that serious for you, and trust in the immeasurably powerful work that the Holy Spirit will do in your life! If the Holy Spirit was powerful enough to allow Samson to defeat a thousand men with a donkey’s jawbone, he can help you defeat a thousand (and more) temptations.

Now pray this,

Dad!

May your name be respected and loved in our church and in our families

May your kingdom come through more people joining your kingdom all over the world, and through the return of our King Jesus on earth! We are so excited for that day!

Give us each day our daily needs! Just like you provided manna to the Israelites, let us trust you to be our provider and not look to other idols to provide the feelings of joy, love, and peace, that only you can provide.

Forgive us our sins, because even though it’s hard, we have already forgiven everyone who has sinned against me. Let us forgive as you have forgiven us, not because we deserved it, but because you loved us.

And do not lead us into temptation. I want to stop living like the world, I want you to overcome the devil’s schemes and my sinful desires so that I can live a life that honors your name.