Praying the "Our Father" prayer
By spoiled311
@spoiled311 (5500)
Philippines
December 20, 2007 11:58pm CST
All of us may be familiar with the Lord’s prayer, a prayer that Jesus taught the people.
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Your Name.—Jesus worshipped the Father.
Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. —Jesus asked for God’s will and His kingdom to come. This is the primary purpose why Jesus saved us, so that we can share in establishing God’s kingdom here on earth. Mr. Eastman in his book “Love on its Knees” expounded Revelations 8:3-4. He said that before the six angels sounded their trumpet, an angel had to offer the censer of incense along with the prayers of all the saints. He said that the prayers of the saints here refer to the prayers of all believers throughout all the ages who have heartily prayed for God’s kingdom to come.
Give us today our daily bread. — This daily bread does not mean the physical food that we eat, but God’s fresh word daily, like the manna from heaven that was only fresh for the day’s needs. In the Old Testament, the Israelites experienced famine of God’s word. God did not reveal Himself to them in the midst of their wickedness and because of that, they experienced spiritual famine. In the New Testament, Jesus was teaching us that in order to avoid this spiritual famine again, we should ask for God’s fresh revelation everyday in our lives. I think that Jesus was praying about spiritual things more than the physical.
Again, God’s kingdom or system of government is at work here. Jesus was showing that we should not pray about physical symptoms, but we should pray according to the kingdom’s perspective. Nowhere in this prayer did he mention about daily concerns other than spiritual because again, IF WE SEEK FIRST HIS KINGDOM AND HIS RIGHTEOUSNESS, OUR PHYSICAL NEEDS WILL BE PROVIDED BY OUR LORD.
Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. —Everyday we need the cleansing of our sins as everyday we are bound to sin against the Holy God.
And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one. —God knows that everyday we face temptation, and so we need Him to keep us from succumbing to temptation.
This is actually a very powerful prayer if a person understands what he is praying for. Often however, this prayer is taken out of context, prayed like a cliché.
1 response
@spoiled311 (5500)
• Philippines
21 Dec 07
hahah of course lilybug, it is different. it is longer because i just expounded on what each line meant. many of us just recite the OUr Father without really trying to understand the meaning of those words...:-) be blessed! take care!
@spoiled311 (5500)
• Philippines
22 Dec 07
hehehe okay...must be the king james version you are referring to...:-) based this on the NIV...because it's the version i use. :-)


