Prayer That Touches God

Mat 6:9-13 After this manner therefore pray ye: …
In the first eight verses of Matthew chapter 6, Jesus came against the accepted norm of praying. He came against putting on a show and, in general, trying to impress our fellow man with how well we pray. He came against vain repetitions. Can you imagine repeating the same words over and over again, just hoping that God might hear one of the repetitions? So many do just that. Could God be insulted that we didn’t think He could hear it the first time and we have to repeat it over and over? Jesus finishes the first eight verses reminding us that our Father knows what we need.
Then in verse nine, He starts telling us how to pray.

The beautiful prayer that Jesus gives us as an example covers a whole spectrum of true prayer and, if prayed with understanding and with our hearts, will change or lives. It takes twenty-one seconds to say and one man recently went so far as to write a book, “21 Seconds to a New Life.”
We can break it down into seven main points, in the order they should be in our hearts.

Addressing God
Worship
God's Kingdom First
Kingdom
Purpose
Our Needs
Forgiven
Temptation
The Future

Addressing God

Mat 6:9 After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven,

In verse nine, Jesus starts telling us how to pray. In the pattern Jesus gives us, the very first phrase specifies "Our Father, which art in Heaven"

We have a natural father, but we are to pray to our Father Who is in heaven. In Scripture, the Jews made a point of saying Abraham was their father. In fact we are called children of Abraham if we continue in faith. Take a good look at John 8:44. Jesus, talking to the Jews who were trying to trap Him, though, says their father is the devil. He also states that the devil is the father of lies.

When Jesus tells His disciples how to pray, He starts out with, "Our Father which art in heaven. …" Here, Jesus isn't talking about our earthly father or even Abraham, though. When we pray and specify "Our father which art in heaven", we specify two things. First, we specify that we are speaking to the Father Who is in heaven. Second, you are specifying that you have a relationship with the Creator of heaven and earth, that we have become sons through faith in His Son, Jesus Christ.

Before going any further, ask yourself this one question. Is God your Father? If you can't answer, "Yes!", go to the section "It's all about Jesus" on this web site, pray and ask Jesus into your heart. Receive Jesus as your personal Savior. Receive the price He paid for you. Be "born again" into the Kingdom of God. Saying, “Yes” to the Sacrifice of Jesus is a life and death matter!

Worship

Of paramount interest is the fact that, after establishing who you are talking to, the very first thing Jesus tells us to pray is praise to our Father in heaven, reverencing His Name. He is dealing with focus. We are to put ourselves completely aside and lift up praise to God Almighty for who He really is, the Lord of heaven and earth. And we make Him Lord of our lives and our prayer.

Our natural tendency is to think of everything we need. Most of the time, we find that what we need is not needed at all. It is just something that we want or, even worse, something we have justified as a “need” to accomplish God’s will. “Hey, I’m only human”, we say. Or we explain that God has told us to do something and this is the only way it is going to happen. Actually, we need to know and understand that God knows how to equip us with what we need.

When we start our prayers with true praise and worship, we begin to have our priorities straight. I’m not talking about singing a couple of songs. I’m talking about lifting praise to a Living God, straight from our hearts. Whether it be in song or not, true praise will bring the presence of God. Then we can continue and pray, “Thy Kingdom come . . .” and mean it. Then, the words of Isaiah 65:24 will begin to happen. “It will come to pass that before they call, I will answer, and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.” NASB


God's Kingdom First

Mat 6:10, “Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.”

In this one short verse is two great statements. Having established reverence for God in verse 9, Jesus is still dealing with priorities as He continues “pray in this manner”. Although I didn’t mention it yesterday, please note that Jesus didn’t say pray these words. He said, “pray in this manner.” He could have just as well said, “Here’s your template.”

First priority was reverence for God. The second and third priorities come in verse ten.

Thy kingdom come: We should be looking for HIS kingdom to come, not ours. We should be putting our priorities aside and looking forward to His Kingdom with all our hearts. It is His kingdom in which righteousness and justice, love and peace will reign. It is His Kingdom, according to Isa 11:6, in which the wolf and the lamb will dwell together and the leopard will lie down with the kid (baby goat); in which a child will be leading the calf, lion and fatling together. It is in all His Holy mountain, according to Isa 65:25, that no one shall hurt or destroy. It is His Kingdom that we should seek first. And when His kingdom is here, we can begin to say, “the kingdom is within you.” Luke 17:21

Thy Will be Done: We all have wills. We all have the free choice to follow after whatsoever we desire. In the second part of verse ten, Jesus is telling us to pray for God’s will to be done in earth. Is this a conflict of interests? Absolutely! The interest of the flesh vs the interest of the spirit and it’s a battle to the death. Even in ministries, many are devoid of the Holy Spirit because they are nothing more than the minister’s desire to do something “good” or something “for the Lord” or something “to help the people”. At the same time, there are ministries small, large and even huge that are in the perfect will of God. They are full of the presence of the Lord. They flourish, not because of hype, but because of the Lord God’s presence and anointing.

God’s will is done in heaven. He also has a perfect plan and will for earth. As far as I am concerned, I pray for and desire God’s perfect will for that portion of His earth that I inhabit. It doesn’t matter whether we sweep the floor, open the doors, sing a song, preach a sermon, or evangelize a city. What does matter, is that we are doing what God has anointed us to do. Where His anointing is, His spirit and grace will abound. When our concern is His will, this is when we are walking with a living God, who is alive in us.

Lord, open our eyes to your perfect will for our lives. Your will be done on earth as it already is, in heaven. We lay our lives before you and ask you to speak to us and lead us in YOUR WILL. Amen!


Our Needs

Matthew 6:11, “Give us this day our daily bread.”

After reverencing God in verse nine, After setting our hearts to pray for God’s Kingdom to come in verse ten, After setting our hearts to pray for God’s will to be done in earth, just as it is in heaven (also in verse ten), AFTER setting the priority of our hearts to put God as the absolute #1 in our lives, THEN, Jesus says to pray for our daily bread.

On the surface, this seems to be simply praying for our needs. When you meditate on this simple verse, however, you begin to remember other verses that make this one simple verse speak volumes.

John 4:34, “Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work.” This verse tells us that if we are chosen and sent by God; our bread (or meat) is to do God’s will.

Matthew 15:26, “But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs.” The woman Jesus was talking to was not a Jew and wanted her daughter delivered from an afflicting spirit. Jesus is telling her, here, that deliverance is the children’s bread. We are God’s children through faith in Jesus Christ. Deliverance is our bread.

John 6:51, “I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.” When I pray for God to give me my daily bread, I am not just asking for what I need to survive physically. Most of all, I’m asking for God to feed me spiritually. I want the bread of LIFE.

My God knows what I need before I ever ask. Neither my family nor I have ever gone hungry while serving the Lord. My BREAD is deliverance. My BREAD is doing God’s will.  My BREAD is being a partaker of sacrifice of Jesus Christ. When I walk with the Bread of Life, I’m alive and my spirit is revived and whole. While I’m revived, I have the benefit of walking with a God who is alive and desires to walk with me.

What makes me live is partaking of Jesus. I will come to God and ask Him to feed me this living bread. I encourage you to meditate on this and join me. The three of us can do great things together.

Forgiven

Matthew 6:12, “And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. “

We’ve reverenced God. We’ve longed for God’s kingdom and His Will. We have asked for that living bread that only God gives.  Now we come to the hard part, verse 12.

In John Gill’s exposition of the Bible, John says, “Nothing is more frequent in the Jewish writings than to call sins חובי, "debts"; and the phrase, of forgiving, is used both of God and men...” The Gospel of Luke bears this out in Luke’s account of the Lord’s prayer. Luke 11:4, “And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.”

If you notice the wording of Luke 11:4 and read it carefully, you find that sin is a debt. When we sin against others, we literally owe them an apology. We OWE them restitution. Likewise, when others sin against us, THEY OWE US! We deserve restitution! By golly, what they did was WRONG and we DEMAND an apology, at the very least. There is blessing in forgiving that debt, both for the sinner and for the one sinned against. For starters, when we forgive others for what they owe us, God forgives us what we owe Him. Since the penalty for sin is death, when God forgives us, we get life.

The Lord brought this home to me one night in prayer, when He reminded me of someone who sinned against me in seventh grade. I told the Lord, “Oh Lord, I’ve already forgiven that.” He answered and asked me, “Really? Can I bless her?” I thought for a moment and answered, “Sure, go ahead and bless her.” He wasn’t finished with me though, and asked, “Can I use YOU to bless her?” I had to think longer on that one, but finally answered, “Yes, Lord, use me to bless her.” I hunted her down just to tell her that Jesus has a perfect love for her and in His Name, I loved her, too.

SHE OWED ME!!! At the very least, she owed me an apology!!! But I forgave that debt, without condition. And God forgave my debt... and God forgave me unconditionally. The person who sinned against me ended up blessing me while I was blessing her. But isn’t this how Jesus taught us to love?

Pray with me: Father, we release that bitterness we have held onto and ask You to forgive us for being bitter. Fill us full of Your Love so we can bless those who persecute us and reach out to them with that Love. Let rivers of living water flow from our innermost beings, in Jesus’ Name. Amen

Temptation

Matthew 6:13, “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.”

The first part of this verse seems to be asking God not to tempt us. Consider it, however in the light of James 1:12-15, especially verse 13. James 1:13, “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:”

When we pray “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil”, we are praying for God’s deliverance from the power of temptation. We are praying that temptation may not have power over us to destroy us. This is born out in James 1:14, 15. There, James explains that we are drawn by our own lust, and when lust conceives, it brings sin... and sin brings death. We are quite literally praying against ourselves, that is, our flesh. We are praying for God’s strength and power to die daily. We voice the choice to obey the words of Peter in 1 Peter 3:18 and let Christ bring us to God, being “put to death in the flesh, but quickened in the Spirit. Let us take up our cross daily and follow Him. Let us through the Spirit, mortify the deeds of the body as Paul taught in Rom 8:13, and live.

How in the world can we do that? We can’t! That’s why we pray. That’s why we lean on God’s Word, when He says in James that if any of us lack wisdom to call on ask and He will give it to us. That’s why we trust God’s Word when He says, “My strength is made perfect in weakness.” When I am weak, I get God into it and He is strong.


The Future

Matthew 6:13, “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.”

We declare His Kingdom! We look to the future. We declare that the kingdom, power and glory are God’s, forever!

We begin with reverence, praise and worship. We finish our prayer with adoration, praise and worship. Isn’t it fitting? After all, He is the beginning and the end; He is the Alpha and the Omega. He is everything to us!