The Lord's Prayer

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.
The prayer is a model, not a mere liturgy to be recited or repeated thoughtlessly. Nor is it a formula that we might employ for our gain.
It is notable for its profound brevity and simplicity. It is remarkable for its comprehensiveness.
Therefore, let us know that we are to be in a right state of mind for praying, and not only be about ourselves and our advantage, but give the first place to God. Jesus shows us that prayer, like all other things is first God-centered.
Whenever we engage in prayer, there are two things to be considered; that we have access to Him and the we are dependant on Him. This is reflected here in the model from Jesus by His fatherly love and His boundless power.
Father – we call God our Father only because of our connection to Christ. Our union with the body of Christ makes us adopted children in the family of God and joint heirs with Christ to the kingdom of God. It would be foolish to assume access to God as our Father, apart from our absolute confidence in the work of Christ as both redeemer and mediator. In Christ, however, let us entertain no doubt that God is willing to receive us graciously and listen to our prayers. Let us enter in boldly, with all reverence and humility, into the presence of God.
Who is in Heaven – Jesus is not referring to a place where God dwells only there, but gives us a lofty view of the power of God. 2 Chronicles 2:6 says, “the heavens of heavens do not contain Him.” When the Scripture says that God is in heaven, the meaning is that all things are subject to His power. Psalm 115 makes this clear, “Our God is in heaven: He does whatever He pleases.” Ephesians 1:20-25 shows this to be true in the New Testament by affirming that this is the role of Christ after the ascension:
that he worked in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named, not only in this age but also in the one to come. And he put all things under his feet and gave him as head over all things to the church,
So, we know the design of Christ in the commencement of the prayer. He desires His people to rest their confidence on the fatherly love and boundless power of God, because unless our prayers be founded on faith, the will be of no advantage.
Just as the 10 commandments are divided into two tablets, the first concerning our relationship to God and the second concerning our relationship to people, so in this model Jesus enjoins us to consider 6 petitions, 3 for the glory of God and 3 for our own salvation.
A. Three for the Glory of God 9-10
1. Make Sacred the Name of God; To hallow or sanctify the name of God means nothing else but to give God the glory due to His name. In these first 3 petitions, we are to loose sight of ourselves and give glory to God. It is to our unspeakable advantage that God reigns and that He receives the honor due Him. That can not happen apart from us being consumed by self-forgetfulness in the presence of the infinitely majestic glory of God.
The name of God is made sacred by our praise, but our giving Him glory. The glory by which it is sanctified, flows from our acknowledgement of His attributes; His wisdom, goodness, righteousness, power, and all.
The substance of this petition is that the glory of God might shine in the world, and may be acknowledged by all men, that the name of God would be glorified above all and never profaned by our disrespect, irreverence, or neglect.
2. Long for the Kingdom of God; The kingdom of God is the reign of God, by which He rules over the universe which He created. God is said to reign among men, when they voluntarily devote and submit themselves to be governed by Him. In our sinful natures, we oppose the justice of God and obstruct His reign. By praying for His kingdom we ask that He remove all hinderances, our affections and will, and bring us all under His sovereign rule. This imperial work is done in part by the preaching of the word of God and secondly by the power of the Holy Spirit of God.
There is still another way that the kingdom of God comes. That is by the judgment of God, when He overthrows His enemies and compels them to bow and confess, “till they all be made His footstool,” and “every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that He is Lord.”
For us, as believers, it is God’s will that He govern us by His word, in order that His kingdom may be established in us. The commencement of that reign is in the destruction of the old man, the surrendering of our affections and the denial of will, that we might be renewed to another life.
The substance of this prayer is that God might enlighten the world by the light of His word, and would rule in our lives by our voluntary submission to His word and Spirit, to obey His justice.
3. Submit to the Will of God; There is a close connection between these three petitions. The sanctification of the Name of God is always connected to His kingdom, and the most important part of His kingdom lies in His will being done. The will of God is a singular thing. However, we have seen His kingdom is brought in by various means. Thus, God both executes His will by His providence; as in heaven, where His angels are always ready to execute His commands, “harkening to the voice of His word,” and by temporal means; as on earth, using His word, His people and circumstances to bring about His will through obedience.
So, it is our desire in this prayer that God’s will be perfectly done through the obedience of His people, but more, that God might remove our obstinacy and rebellion, and make us gentle and submissive toward Him, that we may desire nothing but His rule in our live. We pray that the earth become obedient to the will of God, and that we hate and regret whatever we perceive to be contrary to the will of God.
B. Three for our Own Salvation 11-13
In this model prayer that Christ has prescribed to us, this is the second tablet. Simply for our understanding, the petitions that relate to the glory of God are contained in the first, and in the second part is how we ought to tend to our own salvation, or ask for ourselves. Not that these are void of the glory of God. In fact, we will see by the way Jesus constructs His prayer, that the object is our recognition of our dependence on God, which in turn brings glory to His many attributes as they concern our salvation.
1. Ask for Provision; We are first instructed to pray that God would provide for the needs of this life which He has given to us in the world. We need many things and this prayer is that he would supply us with everything that He knows to be needful for today. Now, it is to be remembered that Jesus himself taught us that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Therefore, this is not to the neglect of our spiritual need, but it is primarily a prayer for physical provision. “Lord, since our life needs new supplies every day, may it please you to grant them without interruption.”
The adverb “today” is added to restrain our excessive desire, and to teach us that we depend every moment on the provision of God, and ought to be content with what he gives. This is much the lesson Israel learned in the wilderness when God fed them daily through the provision of manna, and punished them both for desiring something more than He provided and for storing up His provision for later. These words are to remind us, unless God supply us daily, the largest accumulation of the necessities of life will be of no avail. If we are to pray sincerely, we must learn the example of Paul, “to be full and to be hungry, to abound and to have need.”
2. Ask for Forgiveness; We come first to God through the person and work of Christ, the chief work of which is the forgiveness of sins. So, it should not be assumed from the arrangement here that praying for forgiveness is of a second order. We must always pray for the pardoning of our sins by grace before we enter into the presence of God. Christ has here, in these last 2 petitions, included all that pertains to our salvation and to living the spiritual life; the forgiveness of sins, and the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit.
Our sins are here called debts to magnify they bear with them a cost, a wage that makes us debtors to God. This sin debt is one that we can not pay ourselves, apart form eternal death (which is separation from God). Now, in our praying for forgiveness of our debt, we part form the economy of the world. A creditor is not said to forgive a debt when he has received payment, or expects any repayment for His forgiveness. There is no compensation owed here. Christ has paid the debt and God has set the debtor free. He ask nothing more. Jesus paid it all. The condition, “as we forgive our debtors” is added here so that no one may presume to approach God for forgiveness who has pride and resentment in their heart. Christ did not intend to point out the cause of our forgiveness, but to remind us of the attitude of the heart in which our forgiveness takes root.
Christ explains this complicated petition in verses 14-15, “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” The name debtor is here given here not to those who owe us money, but to those who are indebted to us on account of offenses which they have committed toward us. Christ is saying, you live by the worlds economy – you die by the worlds economy, if you wish to live by grace, you must live with it in your own heart. Grace is the measure by which you are forgiven and therefore must forgive others.
3. Ask for Protection; Now here is the second half of our salvation petition, that which pertains to living the spiritual life. It is wrong to make this 2 petitions because they are clearly connected by a continuing conjunction. The effect is That we may not be lead into temptation, deliver us from evil. The meaning is then that we are conscious of our weakness and are joyfully dependant on God for His protection. Just as in the last petition we learned that we have no hope of gaining forgiveness of sin unless we admit we are a sinner, here we see that we have no hope of living a holy life unless we obtain it by the protection of God. We implore God to protect us and deliver us because we acknowledge that we can not be holy on our own. Unless God deliver us, we will be constantly failing.
The word temptation is generally used for any kind of trial. While God clearly never tempts us himself, He does often lead us into trial for the purpose of our spiritual growth, just as He led Jesus into the desert to fast and be confronted by the Devil, where He delivered Christ from evil by the power of His word.
Here, Christ is referring to an inward temptation, not an outward test to prove our faith. This is a scourge of the devil that excites our lusts. It would be foolish to ask God to keep us from every trial of adversity or prosperity that test or grows our faith. We ask that God not allow us to be thrown down and overwhelmed by temptations. Positively, Father, lead us away from temptation, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye and the pride of life.
Yet, deliver us from it. Deliver us from evil. Again this is not just a negative request for protection, but a display of our positive dependence on God – deliver me, Oh Lord!
Now, this may be taken as a neuter gender “the evil thing” or the masculine gender “the evil one.” There is no debate here because both are equally true and applicable. The Devil does contrive of everything evil and is the deadly enemy of our salvation and holy life, and we must depend on God for His deliverance from the evil one. Equally, sin is the evil thing within us that we must all primarily fight. Deliverance from an outward foe would benefit us not if we are yet to be delivered from the enemy within. From both the evil one and the evil thing, we do desperately depend on God to protect and deliver us.
[For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen]
This final phrase does not appear in all of the early Latin manuscripts. It is a shame they left it out because it serves as a summary of Jesus’ model. It kindles our hearts to seek the glory of God and to remember Him and not ourselves as the object of our prayers, and also teaches us that our prayers are founded and effectual in God alone – there is no merit in us that makes our prayers valuable or effective. The prayers of a righteous man availeth much, but who is righteous, there is no not one. It is God, by His grace, that makes us righteous by taking up our sin, and imputing to us His righteousness. By grace, we are wholly and thankfully dependant on Him!