The Lord's Prayer

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

Introduction

Having recently been struck by the line “Give us today our daily bread” (Matthew 6: 11), and having learnt something of the imperative mood in Greek grammar I really want to follow up that recent short study with a more comprehensive look at this famous passage.

This prayer, found in Matthew 6: 5-15 and Luke 11: 1-4 is key to our understanding of prayer and our relationship with God the Father. In this study I will attempt to provide an overview of this passage, focussing mainly on Matthew, before walking through each line of the prayer itself.

At this point I recommend you read both passages, Matthew and Luke.

Overview

In Matthew this specific teaching on prayer is part of Jesus teaching the crowds in what is known as the Sermon on the Mount. In Luke it appears to be a more private moment, directed, it seems, just to His disciples. The content of the prayer is nearly identical. Matthew and Luke have recorded the teaching consistently. What Matthew records is a broader set of instructions before the prayer itself. We’ll look at those next, before summarising the prayer.

Across Matthew 6: 5-8 there are some very clear instructions:

• Prayer is not a performance art for the benefit of others, v5.

• Prayer is a private activity between you and your Father, v6.

• Prayer should be simple, v7.

We know that praying together with other believers is a good thing to do, Matthew 18: 19-20, and Acts 2: 42 for example tell us that. What Jesus is getting at here is about hypocrisy and play-acting. He is speaking against prayer that is for the benefit of those hearing it, that is focussed on making the one who is praying look good but where their life doesn’t line up.

I love verse 7:

“And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like the pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.”

Matthew 6: 7

This reminds me of the scene on Mount Carmel in 1 Kings 18. There we see Elijah compete with the prophets of Baal. In this story the prophets of Baal shout loudly, they use many words, and many actions, all to no avail. Elijah prays a simple prayer, 1 Kings 18: 36-37, and God answers. No fuss, just a simple prayer. No special incantations, just a simple prayer. This is how Jesus says we are to pray.

What this means is that there is no barrier to entry when it comes to prayer. I don’t need to be “performance ready” because it is just me and God. I don’t need to know lots of words or memorise lots of scripture because it is with simple words that I can talk with God. Jesus, here in His teaching, is telling us that prayer is simple and easy.

Next we should consider the structure of the prayer. Like prayers in Nehemiah 1: 5 and Daniel 9: 4 Jesus starts this prayer with a declaration about God that is foundational to what comes next. We also see two clear halves, verses 9b-10 are focussed on God before 11-13 bring our concerns to Him. This is a good model to follow, it lifts our gaze from our distractions and fixes it on our perfect Father.

If we look at the grammar of this prayer we can see something more of the relationship we have with God. We see, across these verses, several phrases that are requests:

• Hallowed be your name

• Your kingdom come

• Your will be done

• Give us today

• Forgive us

• Lead us not

• Deliver us

Each of these is an imperative, that is they are verbs used to express a command, or prohibition, or request. In Koine Greek the stylistic pattern of prayer is to use the imperative as a request. When used this way it indicates that the requests are from an inferior to a superior. (For more detail see Merkle, B. Plummer R. Beginning with New Testament Greek, An introductory Study of the Grammar and Syntax of the New Testament, B&H Academics, 2020, p259-260.) This tells us, quite clearly, that we are inferior and God is superior. As we pray we bring our heart and our requests to one who is so much greater than we are. We are not requesting an equal to help us, or commanding an inferior to do our bidding. We are bringing our heart before the only one who can help, we bring our requests to God who is superior to all. We must also be clear this isn’t at all like a career ladder, God isn’t simply further on, and we can attain that level. No, God, in being superior, is totally other, totally different to us. It is also vital that we recognise in this teaching that Jesus is telling us that even though God is so much greater we can still call Him “Father”, we can still come before Him. He is superior, He is not distant. He is totally different to us, but He is not shut off or inaccessible.

Within this prayer, and the verses that follow we see how important forgiveness is. We are to ask for forgiveness, but we must also be forgiving. This giving and receiving of forgiveness is something Jesus expands on in Matthew 18: 21-35 in His parable of the unmerciful servant. Together these passages teach us, quite clearly, how important forgiveness is; it brings life to as we receive it and as we give it.

Practical Application

• Slowly pray through this prayer, meditate on how the words acknowledge God is superior.

• Which verse is speaking to you or challenging you the most today? Spend a little longer praying in that way.

Our Father

Having given an overview of this prayer it is time to start working through it. I’m going to do this verse by verse, but note that where we have full stops the Greek tends to have semi-colons, making each clause build directly on the last. Only at the end of the prayer is there a full stop.

“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.’

Matthew 6: 9b

This opening immediately tells us something about God and our relationship with Him, and with each other. We have already seen that Jesus is saying prayer can be a private activity, verse 6, yet throughout this example prayer there are plural pronouns, such as “Our” here in verse 9. What this reminds me of, as I pray, is that I am part of a host of believers, and that I am united with them through our Father. God is not there for me and me alone, He is not there to address my every whim and fancy. No, He is there as the Father of all, with the big picture of the entire family. He is my Father, but more importantly He is “Our Father”.

As our Father we can trust Him. He knows the full picture where we only see in part. So, when we seek Him, when we ask Him to act we lay down those requests with our Father who knows all, and we trust Him to act from that position of superiority.

More than that, what we see here is a tension. On the one hand we are acknowledging God in heaven, God as the holy and transcendent one. The all knowing, all powerful one. At the same time we are calling Him “Father”, invoking a relationship of love and intimacy. We are balancing intimacy and openness with respect and honour, we are welcome before our Father, but we must remember that He is God. These opening words, echoing as they do the synagogue prayer known as the Qaddish, convey all of this as we begin our conversation with God. 

That synagogue prayer, one Jesus would have known, speaks of God’s name being exalted, being glorified, honoured, elevated, and praised. This is the end of this verse, “hallowed be your name”. The name represents God Himself, so this is a request that God would be made holy. God is holy, so what is this asking? It is perhaps a request to see God honoured and revered in the world around us, and expressing a longing for the day when all people would acknowledge God as Lord.

Practical Application

• What, about God being Father, has spoken to you most today?

• Spend some time acknowledging God as Father.

His Kingdom and Will

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

Matthew 6: 10

The first thing we must recognise here is that this is all about God’s glory and His kingdom. This declaration, this desire for His reign to extend across the earth comes before any request focussed on our needs.

There are three main areas in this verse; God’s kingdom and will, the earth, and heaven. We are encouraged to seek God’s kingdom, we are asking God to make His kingdom known on earth. In making this request we are acknowledging that only He can make it happen. Of course we are involved, that’s what Matthew 28: 19-20 is all about, but it is ultimately God who makes it happen. In Jesus God’s kingdom has come and we see from Jesus what it looks like to follow God’s will, Matthew 26: 39 is an example of Jesus following the will of the Father. But what does this mean for us? What does it look like day to day, to seek God’s kingdom and will here on earth as it is in heaven?

First we have to see that to do this is to hold in tension the fact that Jesus is victorious and that we don’t yet experience the full measure of that. There is a tension between the now and not yet, or to put it another way we are responding to God’s eschatological activity.

“Thy will be done… is peculiar to Matthew and seems explanatory of the previous phrase. It involves present ethical response but is in the context of God’s eschatological activity.”

(Ed: D Guthrie, J A Motyer, A M Stibbs, D J Wiseman, The New Bible Commentary Revised, IVP, 1975, p285)

In a day to day sense this means that we live knowing that Jesus has the victory, we can keep our eyes fixed on Him. This can be really hard. We may be facing situations like ongoing ill health, or be experiencing the pain of broken relationships, or any number of other situations that remind us that we live in a broken and fallen world. In the midst of that we know that Jesus brings healing, we know that he can mend the broken, but we don’t yet see it. This is a hard place to be. 

Whatever situation we face, whatever context we are in, our response should be one that points to Jesus. In all things we seek His will, we pause and ask God for direction just as Nehemiah does (Nehemiah 2: 4), we draw our purpose from Him. With the power of the Holy Spirit we live lives that declare that the rule and reign of God has come. All this while acknowledging that we do not yet see the full extent of God’s kingdom on earth, and so we continue to ask Him to make it known on earth as in Heaven.

Practical Application

• What does it look like for you, in your context, to live out the truth of God’s kingdom reigning?

• Where do you most experience the tension of now and not yet? Is it perhaps in your own heart or attitudes? Or perhaps in the health of another?

• Ask the Holy Spirit to help you in these situations.

Daily Dependence

I recently wrote a blog post on just this verse, looking at the parallels between this and the daily provision in Exodus 16 and the wisdom of Proverbs 30. In this study there is another lesson I want to draw out.

“Give us today our daily bread.”

Matthew 6: 11

As I have already mentioned this is a request from an inferior, us, to a superior, God. We are acknowledging a daily dependence on God for our most basic needs. In this request we are asking God to sustain us each day, admitting that we cannot sustain ourselves. Where we have “today” in Greek we see “ἐπιούσιον” (epiousion) meaning necessary for today, but also necessary for existence. So we really are asking for the essentials.

This raises the question: what is daily bread, what is essential for our existence?

I think the gospel of John has the answer to this question.

“Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.”

John 6: 35

Jesus is what we need, He is the daily sustenance we require. If we again consider the provision in Exodus 16 we see that each day there was fresh manna, each day the people were hungry. Jesus’ promise here is emphatic - “He who comes to me will never go hungry”.

Jesus is better than manna. The crowd He is addressing are seeking a sign, like manna, even after seeing, or perhaps experiencing, the feeding of the five thousand. Jesus is opening up that miracle, and expanding on the Exodus story with His claim that He is all you need.

“Jesus said to them, “I tell you the truth, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.””

John 6: 32-33

Going back in the chapter we see more clearly what Jesus means about the bread of life. He came to earth to bring life to all, all who come to Him will receive this life and be sustained in Him for evermore. This is so much more than food for our bellies each day, this is life with the risen King for all eternity.

So, as we pray and ask for daily bread it may be about our temporary needs in a very practical sense, God can, and does, meet those. But it is about so much more. It is coming to Jesus for Him to sustain us today and evermore.

Practical Application

• Thank Jesus that He is the bread of life that sustains us for eternity.

• Ask the Holy Spirit to empower and sustain you today for the tasks you have ahead of you.

• Bring your practical needs to God, ask for His provision.

Forgiveness

“Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors.”

Matthew 6: 12

This verse reminds me of how much we owe God. He has paid the ultimate price that we may know His forgiveness. It also reminds us that we are to forgive those who may wrong or offend us. We should also note that “debts” is a regular Aramaic term for referring to sin generally. So this forgiveness is from sin, which is how this clause is written in Luke 11: 4.

What is important to see here is the connection between being forgiven and forgiving others.

In both Matthew and Luke there is a strong connection between receiving and giving forgiveness. We must not think that God forgiving us is dependent on us forgiving others. Rather, it seems to me, the relationship is more like we receive a good gift and to live in the reality, freedom, and power of that gift we should pass it on. Jesus makes this pattern clear in Matthew 18: 21-35. In that parable the servant receives forgiveness, and the expectation is that he would pass it on. The hypocrisy that follows is where it all falls apart for him. We know, from reading the Gospels, what Jesus thinks of hypocrites!

So, what does forgiveness look like? It is not pretending the wrongdoing didn’t happen, or that the debt doesn’t exist. We see from the parable that the master and the servant acknowledge the debt and the need for it to be paid. Acknowledgement is the start. But it is the next step that is key; cancellation of what is owed. We can see this is because the servant goes out and acknowledges a debt owed to him. In that moment he could have had pity, he could have shown mercy, he could have passed on the forgiveness he had received. After all, his financial burden had just been lifted, and his life had been restored. Yet he chose to seek payment. His decision was not forgiveness. The result was that he did not get to live in the freedom of his debt being cancelled. His failure to forgive robbed him of the freedom he had been given.

Forgiveness, then, is acknowledging the debt or wrongdoing, or offence, seeing that some payment is owed and responding with pity and compassion. It is choosing to give life, not take it. This is the choice Jesus made on the cross. We have received that forgiveness, we live in good of it. Our response is to go out and pass that good gift on. When we forgive others it brings them freedom and it releases us to live more fully in the good of the forgiveness we have received.

Practical Application

• Give thanks to God for His forgiveness, and consider the freedom it has given you.

• Are there any people in your life you are not forgiving? Ask the Holy Spirit to help you forgive them, and make a plan to share that forgiveness.

• Ask God to help you be a person who readily forgives others.

Protection and Deliverance

If the previous verse deals with past sins this verse has an eye on the future. Here we are guided to seek protection and deliverance. 

Any of us who have followed Jesus for a while know that there are times of trial, times when things seem too difficult. We read about such periods in Acts and across Paul’s letters. This part of the prayer is asking God to lead us away from temptation, but it also seems to acknowledge that we will still face trials. At such times the prayer is for deliverance and rescue. It is important to see that we seek God’s guidance and protection first, and then deliverance. This is the pattern that Jesus is setting for us to follow.

How does this work out? How can we ask for protection and still need rescue?

“When tempted, no one should say, “God is tempting me.” For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed.”

James 1: 13-14

So, we are asking God to protect us from such desires and, at the same time, asking Him to rescue us when we give in. By His grace He does both.

Thinking about this in real terms I have known God to help me stand firm against temptation. I have also known His grace to restore me when I have failed. This is the power and truth of this verse.

“And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.”

Matthew 6: 13

Practical Application

• Ask God to strengthen you to stand firm against temptation.

• Confess where you have slipped and ask God for His rescue and restoration.

• Thank God for His amazing grace.