The Lord’s Prayer

Today's Reflections 

      

The Lord’s Prayer

Mt 6:7-15

[Jesus said to his disciples,] ⁷“In praying, do not babble like the pagans, who think that they will be heard because of their many words. ⁸Do not be like them. Your Father knows what you need before you ask him.

⁹“This is how you are to pray:/ Our Father in heaven,/ hallowed be your name,/ ¹⁰your kingdom come,/ your will be done,/ on earth as in heaven./ ¹¹Give us today our daily bread;/ ¹²and forgive us our debts,/ as we forgive our debtors;/ ¹³and do not subject us to the final test,/ but deliver us from the evil one./ ¹⁴If you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you. ¹⁵But if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions.”

OUR FATHER IN HEAVEN. The Lord’s Prayer (“Our Father”) in Matthew is a familiar prayer for the community of believers. This is why God is addressed as “our Father.” While God is close and personal to us as individuals, God is the Father of us all. When we pray to God, we pray as brothers and sisters bonded by love and praying for our common need.

The first part of the prayer draws our attention to our heavenly Father. Though he is “in heaven,” he is very close to us. We pray that his gracious will and plan for us may be accomplished in both our societal and personal lives. The Father is at the heart of our lives.

The second part of the prayer points to the horizon of our world, to our need as creatures, and to our relationship with one another. We ask for food to sustain our life—not just for ourselves but also for others. We ask for forgiveness for our “debts”—our trespasses—because in our wounded nature, we sin against one another, thereby sinning also against God. Finally, we ask God to help us in our struggle against evil. We are not removed from this “world” where good and evil interact. We ask our Father for strength to resist our evil impulses and to conquer evil with good. It is not easy, but neither is it impossible, for Jesus has already conquered the world.

Do you say the Lord’s Prayer

with attention and devotion?

Or do you babble words to finish the prayer

as soon as you can?