The Lords Prayer

The Lords Prayer
Matthew 6:6-15 (NT, pg. 5-6)


I’d like to start with a prayer that may sound familiar to you.


Our father in heaven
May your name be honored
May your Kingdom come soon
May your will be done here on earth just as it is in Heaven
Give us our food for today
And Forgive us our sins
Just as we have forgiven those who have sinned against us
And don’t let us lead to temptation
But deliver us from the evil one.

From The New Believer Bible

How about this one.

Our Father in Heaven
Reveal who you are
Set the world right
Do what’s best as above, so below
Keep us alive with three square meals
Keep us forgiven with you and forgiving others
Keep us safe from ourselves and the devil
You’re in charge
You can do anything you want
You’re ablaze in beauty!
Yes, Yes, Yes

From The Message Bible

Both of those prayers are versions of the Lords Prayer and the same chapter and verse as Jodi read to you this morning.

My Sermon this morning is on “The Lords Prayer”, or as I called it growing up. “The Our father.”

Here’s one more from the bible in front of you

Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. 3 Give us each day our daily bread. 4 And forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone indebted to us. And do not bring us to the time of trial." Luke 11

When I was growing up, the Lord’s Prayer was my favorite prayer for two reasons. One, it was the only prayer I knew by heart. I didn’t know the Apostles creed nor did I know prayers such as the “Hail Mary” which is not just a type of pass in football, but an actual Catholic prayer.

For those of you who know me you can imagine I was a pretty active child. If you need confirmation you can just ask my parents who probably still have nightmares about the trouble I got into. So the second reason the Lords prayer was my favorite was because it meant Mass was almost over and I could go home and play with my friends.

For most of my life, The Lords Prayer was mostly white noise. It was, and is, a prayer we say every week. Most of us can say it in our sleep. We’ve said it so often that we could probably do our taxes in our head at the same time.

But more recently I’ve given a lot of thought to the words and their meaning.

This prayer is the only prayer taught to us by our Lord Jesus so you have to imagine it’s a pretty powerful prayer. It contains all we ever need to pray to God.

There are some of us that find it easy to pray to God. I myself pray through conversation with God. Others know how to ask for specific requests. We pray for others to get well. We pray that God will help us with our finances. We pray that our favorite team wins the super bowl, or world series. Some even pray to win the lottery or for a fancy car. There is nothing wrong with these prayers even though some of them may seem selfish. But if you really want to pray to God and you’re not sure how, the Lord’s prayer contains everything, as you can imagine it would, being taught to us by Jesus.

The Lord’s prayer is captured in two of the gospels. Matthew, as in our reading today and in Luke chapter 11 as I read before.

In Mathew, the prayer is taught during the Sermon on the Mount including Ask, and it will be given to you. Seek and you shall find.

Jesus was teaching the multitudes of followers how to pray. So what did this prayer mean to them and what should it mean to us today.

Our Father who art in heaven

Our acknowledgment that there is God in heaven and he is our Father.
Not to be sexist as in God is male, but that he is our provider as the men were in the time Jesus taught.

Hallowed be thy name.

We who are praying acknowledging that God is Holy

Thy Kingdom come

Our knowing that this is still a Kingdom of men and waiting and asking for Gods Kingdom to come amongst us as it was promised in the old testament to those who first heard Jesus words, and as it is promised to us.

Thy Will be done on earth as it is in Heaven

Not our will. Not the will of men, but Gods will be done.
If we had our way, God would save our Church because it’s what we want. But what does God want. What is Gods will for, not only our church, but in our lives.
So for our Church, should we be praying that our wishes be done, or that God’s will concerning our church be done. How about in our every day lives.






Give us this day our daily bread

This was very significant to those who were listening to Jesus. All knew the story of Moses and the Israelites as they traveled through the desert. Each day, God provided Manna, bread from heaven. Every morning and every evening God provided Manna and the Israelites would collect it. God provided food while they traveled and they had to have faith that God would provide. In fact, any manna they tried to hoard during the day spoiled so they had to learn to trust that God would provide for them. In the same way we can have faith that God will provide food to us.

And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.

The term Debtors meant more to the Israelites than just “Sin”. The Israelites celebrated a Holiday every 49 years called Jubilee. During this year long celebration all debts, no matter how large, were forgiven. All land was returned to its original owner. Anyone who had sold themselves into slavery, were released. All was forgiven.

When I was growing up we said forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those that trespass against us. I can remember as a child thinking that meant that if someone cut across my lawn that I should forgive them for trespassing.

The term trespass comes from the verse following the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew that reads.

For if you forgive men there trespasses your Heavenly Father will also forgive you
But if you do not forgive others neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

I prefer the interpretation

“And Forgive us our sins
Just as we have forgiven those who have sinned against us”

It’s clearer, but the message is the same.

If we want God to forgive our sins we need to learn to forgive others.

According to this passage forgiveness does not come without learning to forgive. Something we all need to give thought to.

Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil

I don’t like the phrasing of this translation. It sounds as if God himself leads us to sin. But that’s not true. Human nature is Sin nature. We can’t even blame Satan for leading us into sin. We are capable of getting ourselves in trouble without help from anyone.

How about

Do not subject us to the final test
But deliver us from the evil one.

The New American Bible


What we are praying for is for God to give us the strength to ignore temptation.

For thine is the Kingdom, the Power and the Glory forever.

If only we could truly live that last statement. Everything is Gods. We’re just borrowing.

How should we use the Lord’s Prayer

We can use the Lord’s Prayer for any aspect of our lives that we’re not sure what to pray for. Just think about what you want it is you want God to help you with. Whether it’s a financial problem as we have here at the church. It may be it a health problem, either yours, a friend or a family member. No matter what’s on your mind, think about it and say the Lords prayer and have the faith the God’s will, will be done.

Please stand and if you feel comfortable, take the hand of the person on either side of you and say with me the words that our Lord taught us.