“In this manner, therefore, pray:
‘Our Father in heaven,
Matthew 6:9-13 NKJV
Hallowed be Your name.
Your kingdom come.
Your 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 do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.
For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.'”
Christ’s teaching on prayer so far is a wonderful and practical guideline on His expectation of our prayers, what not to do with our prayers, and His commanding our prayers. But He doesn’t stop there – He also gives us a through example of prayer. I mean, it’s most commonly known as The Lord’s Prayer for cryin’ out loud! This example is perhaps one of the most well-known prayers in history. And for good reason: it’s pretty thorough.
I won’t get too bogged down in the nitty-gritty in the following verses, and I’m certainly not going to address the textual variations of the end of this prayer either (each of those things would require significant in-depth study and writing, and those topics are not the focus of this series anyway); however, I will say briefly that regardless of the original ending to this prayer there remains a blatant truth: we should look to the Scriptures and Christ for our instructions to pray. God is the Almighty Creator of prayer and it would be of utmost importance to see what He says about how He wants us to communicate with Him. So let’s check out what this passage tells us.
“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
Verses 9 and 10 of the Lord’s Prayer show us a few things: 1.) God is our Father and we pray to Him; 2.) He is in Heaven; 3.) His name is to be hallowed – kept holy; 4.) We are to desire His kingdom and will here on earth as it already is in Heaven. If I could sum it up in one sentence it would be that God should be the audience, object, and focus of our prayers. It seems obvious enough, but so often we make prayer about ourselves rather than about Him. Not that we can never make requests, but what do we desire more? Our will or His? This example of prayer shows us that God is the most important aspect of our praying – not us.
“Give us this day our daily bread.”
Verse 11 shows us that God is the supplier of our needs. Not our wants. Not what we think are our needs. He provides our actual needs to sustain us every day. What Christ communicates here is that we need to ask Him to reveal our real needs to us and ask Him to meet those needs.
“And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.”
Aren’t we as believers already forgiven of our sins? So why do we need to ask for forgiveness? Because even though we are justified (declared righteous) before God, we still sin sometimes (read: everyday). While we may sin less than before our conversion, we now live a life of war against the desires of the flesh. Some battles we lose. And we need forgiveness for when we give in to our temptations. First John chapter 1 tells us that if we say we are without sin, we are liars and the truth is not in us. Yes, we may be saved by Jesus and on our way to Heaven when we die, but don’t be deceived into thinking we can’t sin anymore. Seek forgiveness of your sins from the Father in your prayer time.
Additionally, Christ insinuates that we are to be forgiving of others who sin against us. He tells us that we should be forgiving our offenders the way the Father has forgiven us – freely and without grudge.
“And do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.”
The first chapter of James tells us that God does not tempt men to sin. So why does this example of prayer in Matthew 6 say to God to not lead us into temptation? A cursory reading of this line in modern English can lead us to think this was a bit redundant. But if I may help convey the real message here, I’d say this to you: God does not tempt us, He leads us away from it. I think the misunderstanding of this line comes from the second half of the sentence “but deliver us from the evil one”. We usually don’t make the connection here, but Jesus isn’t saying “Father, don’t lead us into temptation” only. The real idea here is, “Father, lead us out of temptation.” First Corinthians 10 tells us that God will provide a way out of every temptation, but this passage in Matthew shows us that we must request that God make that way known to us and to lead us out of that temptation and away from the evil spiritual entities that entice us.
“For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.”
As stated earlier in this writing, there is some debate over the ending of the Lord’ Prayer and whether it should be included in the text or not. I am not going to discuss this debate one way or the other as that will be for another time. The one thing I will say is that whether this is the original ending or not, one truth remains: God should be the focus of our prayers and we should look to the Scriptures for the God-directed instruction on how we should pray. Christ is the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. It seems pretty important that not only should God be who we address in our prayers, but we should reiterate the adoration of the One who gave us the ability to pray in the first place.
Final Thought
The Lord’s Prayer is the subject of countless sermons, Sunday school lessons, books, debates, etc., and MUCH more could be said about it than I said. My hope is that this series has been a good foundational overview of Christ’s instruction and example to us of what God expects of us concerning prayer. I hope that this has been instructional, practical, and eye-opening in some way for you. If it’s been beneficial for you, then wonderful! Praise be to God. This series should not be where your study of real, Biblical, God-centered prayer ends. Continue reading your Bible and look to it for how we should pray.
Further Reading Recommendations
Just a few book recommendations for you. These link to their respective Amazon and Apple Books pages, but I receive no kick-back or compensation for any of this. Enjoy!
“The Prayer That Turns the World Upside Down: The Lord’s Prayer as a Manifesto for Revolution” by Albert R. Mohler, Jr.
“Does Prayer Change Things?” by R.C. Sproul
“Pray Big: Learn to Pray Like an Apostle” by Alistair Begg