Today marks the last sermon in the series that I have been preaching “Why are we here?” To recap, I’ve spoken with you about preaching the Word, administering the sacraments, worship, evangelism, working for peace and justice, passing down the faith to our children, the mutual conversation and consolation of the brethren, and fellowship. Today we come to the last piece: prayer. We are here to pray.
From the beginning of the Bible to the end of the Bible, people pray. The heroes of the faith pray: Abraham, Sarah, Jacob, Rebecca, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, Deborah, David, Elijah, Elisha, Jesus, Paul, Peter, James, and John–just to name a few. The people of God are urged to pray. “Pray without ceasing!” Paul writes. James says, “Are any among you suffering? They should pray. Are any cheerful? They should sing songs of praise. 14Are any among you sick? They should call for the elders of the church and have them pray over them, anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord. 15The prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise them up; and anyone who has committed sins will be forgiven.” The book of Psalms has often been referred to as the prayer book of the Bible. Prayer is modeled. Prayer is urged. Prayer is commanded. We are called to pray.
Jesus’ disciples noticed how much Jesus prayed. They noticed there was something unique about the way he prayed. They saw how he would go out by himself early in the morning, late in the evening, and even throughout the night and pray. And so they begged him, “Lord, teach us to pray.”
And Jesus taught them. Jesus taught us. And what he taught causes me to wrestle deeply with my own prayer life. What Jesus taught about prayer causes me to wrestle with the reality of who God is and who I am. What Jesus taught about prayer causes me to think deeply about how I should pray and what I should pray.
Because Jesus told us explicitly, “When you pray, do not heap up a whole lot of empty phrases like the Gentiles do, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.” I don’t know about you, but when I hear these words from Jesus, I start to question what the point of prayer is. If God already knows what I need, and if God already knows what I am going to ask, and if God doesn’t want to hear me just run off a string of words over and over and over, then what is the point of prayer? Why even bother with prayer? Why even bring a petition to God if He already knows what I and every other person on this planet needs? What’s the point of our time of intercessory prayer later in worship? Are we simply heaping up empty phrases by placing our petitions out there if God already knows what is needed? Oh how I wish I had this all figured out up in my head. I don’t. At least not yet.
What I do know is that Jesus then taught his disciples a prayer. It’s the Lord’s prayer. I guess that in reality, one could say that this is the only prayer that a Christian needs. I guess that in reality, one could say that this is the only prayer that a church needs to pray. “Pray in this way,” Jesus says. He doesn’t offer this as a suggestion. He doesn’t say, “Well, if you want a really good guide to pray, you might want to do it this way.” No. “Pray in this way.”
“Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. 10 Your kingdom come. Your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. 11 Give us this day our daily bread. 12 And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. 13 And do not bring us to the time of trial, but rescue us from the evil one.” Other versions of the Greek text add “For thine is the Kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen.”
That’s it. That’s the prayer. That’s what we are called to bring before our heavenly Father. Nothing more. Nothing less. At least to begin with. “Lord, teach us to pray.” This is what the disciples asked. And Jesus gave them the Lord’s Prayer as instruction. So, let’s take a step back for a moment and ask the question: what was Jesus teaching his disciples in this prayer? What message was Jesus conveying to them. Did He mean that these were the only words we should ever say in a prayer, or was He teaching something deeper?
Well, we know that throughout the Bible, there are other prayers. And we know that those prayers do not have the same wording as the Lord’s Prayer. So, there must be a deeper teaching here. There must be a deeper sense and message that Jesus is trying to convey to his disciples and to us. So, what is it? What is that message that is relevant to our personal prayer lives and to the prayer life of the church? What is that message that makes prayer central to the life of the church?
I am struck every time I teach what Martin Luther said about the Lord’s prayer in his Small Catechism. There seems to be a running theme in every explanation about the petitions of this prayer. Please listen carefully:
God’s name is certainly holy in itself, but we pray in this petition that it may be kept holy among us also.
The kingdom of God certainly comes without our prayer, but we pray in this petition that it may
come to us also.
The good and gracious will of God is done even without our prayer, but we pray in this petition that it may be done among us also.
God certainly gives daily bread to everyone without our prayers, even to all evil people, but we pray in this petition that God would lead us to realize this and receive our daily bread with thanksgiving.
We pray in this petition (forgive us our sins) that our Father in heaven would not look at our sins, or deny our prayer because of them. We are neither worthy of the things for which we pray, nor have we deserved them, but we as that He would give them all to us by grace...
God tempts no one. We pray in this petition that God would guard and keep us so that the devil, the world, and our sinful nature may not deceive or mislead us...
We pray in this petition in summary, that our Father in heaven would rescue us from every evil of body and soul...
Did you catch how Luther brings every single petition of the Lord’s Prayer back to a radical dependency on God? Did you catch how Luther brings every single petition of the Lord’s Prayer to a place where we seek to have our eyes opened to this reality? Did you see how Luther takes us away from our wishes, our will, and our desire, and instead urges us to seek God’s wishes, God’s will, and God’s desires?
Richard Foster puts it this way in his best selling book Celebration of Discipline, “To pray is to change. Prayer is the central avenue God uses to transform us. If we are unwilling to change, we will abandon prayer as a noticeable characteristic in our lives. The closer we come to the heartbeat of God the more we see our need and the more we desire to be conformed to Christ. In prayer, real prayer, we begin to think God’s thoughts after him: to desire the things he desires, to love the things he loves, to will the things he wills. Progressively we are taught to see things from his point of view.”
This is why we pray. This is why the church prays. We enter into a conversation with our heavenly Father to seek His will; to seek His ways; to see things from His point of view. We set aside our own wishes, our own wants, our own desires and instead place ourselves at His beck and call. We come before Him and ask Him to continue to transform us into the people that He has called us to be–that we may grow into the image and likeness of Jesus. We acknowledge before Him that we are dependent upon Him for everything we have and everything we do. We acknowledge before Him that we need His grace and His mercy. We acknowledge that we are here to do the work He has called us to do, and we ask Him to show us where our hands are most needed and what message is most needed by the world. After all, this church is not our church. This is God’s church. We are here to do His work and share His message. And how can we do that if we are not submitting ourselves to Him and asking Him for his direction? We can’t. And so we must pray. The church must pray. We are here to pray. Amen.
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