areliablefaith

Jesus’ ministry has reached the point where He is teaching His disciples in preparation for their going out in ministry. He has performed many miracles, meeting people in the middle of their need, and many have now leaned in to hear His message and follow Him as a gifted teacher. Some are clearly beginning to think of Him as the Messiah prophesied in the Old Testament. That expectation was especially strong at this point in Israel’s history. The Roman occupation had the people longing for someone who would lead them to deliverance.

So what does Jesus do? He teaches them to pray.

One of the disciples watches Jesus pray and then asks, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples” (Luke 11:1, ESV). Jesus’ example is short. It is concise. And it touches the themes all of us deal with every day. What it doesn’t do is call down fire from heaven to drive out the Romans. (Just a chapter earlier, James and John wanted to call down fire on a Samaritan village, and Jesus rebuked them; Luke 9:54–55.) Jesus teaches us to pray in the middle of life, wherever we might be.

Starting From Humility

There is a foundation in the Lord’s Prayer that is absolutely essential: we come to this conversation with our heavenly Father from a place of humility. God is holy. He is uniquely set apart from all of creation. Yet He loves us, desires a relationship with us, and makes Himself present in a real way through prayer.

A “God is my buddy” attitude can easily miss the reality of a holy God stooping to talk with us. He does desire fellowship with us, and He will draw close to us. But pride, and even complacency, can create a distance that is our own making. As James writes, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble” and “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you” (James 4:6, 8).

The prayer opens, “Father, hallowed be your name” (Luke 11:2); in Matthew’s version, “Our Father in heaven” (Matthew 6:9). He is above all, completely set apart. His name is holy. The tension between His holiness and purity and our lack of it keeps us properly humble as we come before our loving Creator. And from that place, God draws us close.

“Your Kingdom Come”

Luke records “Your kingdom come” (11:2), and Matthew adds, “your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10). God’s purpose, the establishment and advancement of His kingdom on the earth through the lives of His children, should be ever before us. He wants us to pray for it, and then to live it.

“Give Us Each Day Our Daily Bread”

I can’t read this line without thinking of the children of Israel wandering in the desert for forty years, provided manna from heaven every single day (Exodus 16:4). Gratitude includes recognizing that the gift is only given because there is a Giver. Asking God to provide is never wrong. One of His names in the Old Testament is Jehovah Jireh, “The LORD will provide” (Genesis 22:14).

“Forgive Us Our Sins”

“And forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us” (Luke 11:4). This line highlights two of our greatest needs: to be forgiven, and to release through forgiveness those who sin against us.

It also circles back to the importance of humility. We will struggle to forgive if we hold too tightly to our hurt, our reputation, what people say, or what people do. Forgiveness doesn’t condone the evil done against us. It means we release our right to hold onto it, and we hand it to the Lord.

“Lead Us Not Into Temptation”

The English wording here can be a little confusing. Scripture is clear that God doesn’t tempt anyone to sin (James 1:13). The essence is this: the world is full of temptations to sin and to drift away from God and His best. We have been given free moral agency, the ability to choose. And in every situation, there is at least one path that leads toward God and away from sin. Paul says it this way: “with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it” (1 Corinthians 10:13).

Trials, troubles, and challenges will come. But we have a loving Father who will help us through them and away from sin. We just have to ask, and then follow.

The Gift That Makes Prayer Come Alive

Luke ends the prayer there, but he doesn’t end Jesus’ teaching on prayer. I think we often miss that Jesus’ next words describe an essential element in the power of our prayer. After teaching His disciples to ask, seek, and knock (11:9), He says:

“If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (11:13)

At this point, the Holy Spirit, the third person of the triune God, had not yet been poured out to live in believers. That came after Jesus’ resurrection, on the day of Pentecost, which Luke records in Acts 2, and it continues today as people surrender their lives to Him.

Jesus points out that the Holy Spirit is God’s gift to His children when they ask. The Holy Spirit is God, and He comes to dwell in us the moment we are saved. There is so much to unpack about God living within us, but it’s enough to say this: our intimacy with the Father grows so much richer as we allow the Holy Spirit to guide us, pray through us (Romans 8:26), and help us understand God and His ways.

Religion That Keeps People Out

The final verses of the chapter reveal the growing conflict between Jesus and the religious leaders. A Pharisee invites Jesus to dine with him (11:37), though it seems the invitation may have been more about challenging Jesus than understanding Him. Whatever the motive, Jesus rebukes them for setting up man-made hurdles that made it hard for people to approach God: “you load people with burdens hard to bear” (11:46), and “You did not enter yourselves, and you hindered those who were entering” (11:52).

God as a loving Father was not what the religious leaders promoted. They had built a religious system that made them feel good about themselves, yet left them, and anyone who followed them, outside of grace. Their prayers were rote, offered from a position of pride and supposed privilege. The humility the Lord’s Prayer calls for was far from them.

Simple and Refreshing

The simplicity of Jesus’ prayer is truly refreshing. I’m sure that’s part of what drew so many people to Him. He gave them a picture of a God who is both holy and loving. Through His life and His teaching, He showed that God wants to draw near to His children. All we have to do is ask, from a place of humble faith.

A question to sit with: Which line of this simple prayer have you been rushing past lately, and what might change if you prayed it slowly and humbly today?