The Lord’s Prayer

Oh what a privilege we have to be able to approach our King, our Friend, our Provider, our Leader anytime and anywhere! I have read, memorized, and talked about the Lord’s Prayer many times, but yesterday as I read it, something new popped out. Have you ever noticed the progression of Jesus’ prayer?

Matthew 6:9-13

“This, then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,”

Jesus started praying with his thoughts WAY beyond his own circumstances. He started by focusing on who God is. He began by acknowledging the beyond-our-universe supremacy of God. When we start our prayers with thanksgiving and acknowledgement of God’s supreme power and authority, it puts our prayers/needs/wants in perspective.

“your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

Moving from acknowledging God’s supremacy over all existence, Jesus then moved into a smaller circle – our earth. Do we pray that what is done on the entire globe will glorify God? Do we pray that the actions of the leaders of China, Afghanistan, and the United States will be in line with God’s will? Do we pray for those suffering Christians in persecuted nations? Do we pray for the financial hardships of those in Africa?

“Give us today our daily bread.”

Thankfully, God doesn’t care only about the “big” people of our world. He doesn’t just orchestrate nations and natural disasters. Jesus brings the circle in even closer to our individual lives. “God, I know that you take care of nations, but I pray that you also give me the food I need to live today.” God wants to ask him for our physical needs. He wants us to pray about our material concerns. This is the category that I think most of our prayers tend to encompass, but we should not only camp here. We need to let the circle tighten even more.

“And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.”

Instead of keeping God at arms’ length, asking for material, physical, and worldy needs, we need to allow him to infiltrate our very hearts. This is the closest and most intimate part of our prayer life. We ask God to examine our lives, our actions, our motives. We ask God to point out where he needs to work in us. We ask for forgiveness for our pride, our selfishness. We allow God to mold who we are, what we think, and how we act. We acknowledge that God is the potter, and we willingly give ourselves to him as the clay. This part hurts. This part also heals. Peace, joy, and love can only flow when we allow God into our inner self.

Try praying with these circles as Jesus prayed, starting from the beyond-our-universe acknowledgement of God’s supremacy and working inwardly toward your own dependence on God. As the circles become more intimate, so will our relationship with God.