Lord's Prayer Devotional by Joshua Palmer
Matthew 6:7-13
"And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. Pray then like this:
"Our Father in heaven, 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 also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
When was the last time you heard a sermon on prayer? Did that sermon tell you that you ought to pray? Probably. But, did it mention that there are specific words that you can pray which you can know, without doubt, please God? What are those words? Well, when the disciples asked Jesus how to pray, Jesus gave them the words of the Lord's Prayer. It is the prayer we should pray, must pray, and will be rewarded for praying. It is the prayer at the heart of Christianity.
In Matthew 6, right after Jesus gives His disciples His prayer He warns them not to worry.
But, ironically, what keeps you from praying Jesus’ Prayer is that you are worried about it becoming rote. Consider this: Luther was worried about that too. He referred to the prayers of the monks as “babbling and bawling.” But if you were to say the Lord’s Prayer as often as Luther prescribes in the Small Catechism, you would say it in the morning, twice at breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and again in the evening. Eight times.
Not everyone agrees with Luther's prescription, though. Some Christians argue that the Lord's Prayer is just a model. You are supposed to use the structure, but fill in the content on your own. If you say the actual prayer, you are "heaping up empty phrases," exactly the thing that Jesus warns against in this very same passage in Matthew 6.
Jesus does not give His disciples a prayer format to fill in like a worksheet. He gives them actual words, words which we know please His ears. Words which, according to Psalm 141, rise like incense to God. Words which you cannot improve on.
Imagine that one day you turn to your wife and say, "I love you." And she rolls her eyes and says, "Could you not say that anymore?" You're stunned. “You don’t love me?” you ask. “No, no,” she says, “I still love you, I am just tired of those particular three words. I feel like they are lifeless and rote. I need something fresh, spontaneous, and from the heart. ‘I love you’ just isn’t doing it for me anymore.”
That is what we say to God when we do not use His prayer. Sure, God, we still want to ask you for things, we still want to talk to you, but the words you gave us are so dry and dull. The prayer you gave your disciples just isn't good enough for us. We need zing. We need zest. We need to contribute something here, or we’ll feel like our hearts aren’t involved.
But when we neglect the Lord’s Prayer, we break the Second Commandment -the “call upon the name of God in every trouble, pray, praise, and give thanks” part. That’s right, according to the Small Catechism, when you don’t pray it’s as much a sin as using satanic arts. I’ll bet when you roll out of bed in the morning, scratching your belly, rubbing your eyes, you do not think to yourself, “Should I use satanic arts today?” But you do think, “Do I have time to pray right now?”
Now, we Christians could do like the Muslims and simply demand obedience. Theirs is a strong law and certainly produces results; millions of Muslims all over the world stop what they are doing 5 times a day to pray. We could just make prayer compulsory and leave it at that. But Jesus does not leave us there, with only a command. No, with the command to pray comes a lovely, beautiful promise.
When we use God’s name rightly, calling on it in every trouble, praying, praising, and giving thanks, we know we are pleasing God. When we pray we are obeying. And those of you who have children old enough to obey know the pleasure of their obedience. So too God loves when His sons obey Him.
But wait, there is further good news. These promises, that your prayers please God, that He loves to hear the words of His prayer in your mouth, none of these promises depend on you. These things are not true because you were in the correct emotional state, or are feeling very sincere. These promises come to you because Jesus won them for you. See, you were God’s enemy, not His son. You could never have addressed Him as a dear Father, except that you were adopted, rescued, bought back and made a member of the family again. Now you can say, “Our Father” because in Jesus you are made God's son.
In Luke’s parallel account of this passage Jesus asks, “What father among you, if his son asks for…an egg, will give him a scorpion?” So too, your Father, reconciled to you through Jesus Christ, will give you every good thing.
So just pray. Say the words God loves to hear. Stop thinking about yourself. Stop worrying that you are too sleepy to pray, too busy to concentrate, not in the right state of mind. Do it because God commands you to. Do it because of the promises attached to it. Stop trying to get your interior life pure and orderly before you pray. Rather pray, and you will find that your interior life becomes more pure and orderly. Amen.
And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus Amen.
