The Big Idea
Do you know how to pray?
My answer to that question may surprise you. I do not know how to pray. Or as Paul puts it in Romans 8:26: “we do not know what to pray for as we ought.” I, like all Christians before and after me, am in the process of learning how to pray. And like a child who first speaks in babble and broken language, so are my prayers before God. Dietrich Bonhoeffer beautifully expresses this sentiment:
“The phrase “learning to pray” sounds strange to us. If the heart does not overflow and begin to pray by itself, we say, it will never “learn” to pray. But it is a dangerous error, surely very widespread among Christians, to think that the heart can pray by itself. For then we confuse wishes, hopes, sighs, laments, rejoicings-all of which the heart can do by itself-with prayer. And we confuse earth and heaven, man and God. Prayer does not mean simply to pour out one’s heart. It means rather to find the way to God and to speak with him, whether the heart is full or empty. No man can do that by himself. For that he needs Jesus Christ.” - Psalms: The Prayer Book of The Bible, p. 9
Take a moment to think about the implications of this. No one can find the way to God and speak with Him. Just like our inability to save ourselves, we are also completely unable to pray on our own. We cannot climb to heaven and demand a hearing at the throne of God. Even if we could, in the presence of God, humans always fall speechless or stumble for words. Moses at the bush, Isaiah in the throne room, Job and the whirlwind, Peter on the mount of Transfiguration, or John before Jesus in His glory. Every time humans encounter God our eloquence simply melts away. And so we find ourselves before Jesus asking for that same grace: “Lord, teach us to pray” - Luke 11:1 Bonhoeffer observes the weight of this moment:
“The disciples want to pray, but they do not know how to do it. That can be very painful, to want to speak with God and not to be able to, to have to be speechless before God, to discover that every call to him dies within itself, that heart and mouth speak an absurd language which God does not want to hear.” - Psalms: The Prayer Book of The Bible, p. 9
It is uncomfortable to come to the end of ourselves like this. And yet it is only here that we can begin to be formed by Jesus. Bonhoeffer continues:
“If he lets us accompany him on his way to God and teaches us to pray, then we are free from the agony of prayerlessness. But that is precisely what Jesus Christ wants to do. He wants to pray with us and to have us pray with him, so that we may be confident and glad that God hears us. When our will wholeheartedly enters into the prayer of Christ, then we pray correctly. Only in Jesus Christ are we able to pray, and with him we also know that we shall be heard.” - Psalms: The Prayer Book of The Bible, p. 9
And so we come to the prayer Jesus taught His disciples: “Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” - Matthew 6:9-13
Many of us are familiar with these words. I have prayed them at bed time as far back as I can remember and now pray them every night with our girls. Yet as many times as they may have been uttered, we must constantly be reminded that this prayer is an invitation to pray with Jesus. Whether our mind and heart are sharp or tired, overwhelmed or calm, every time we begin “Our Father…” we know that we are speaking with God as Jesus prays with us.
Therefore, we should receive, handle, and pray the Lord’s Pray like we would treat a treasure of great price. For nowhere else in Scripture has Jesus shown us the way to God as profoundly as in this great prayer. So much so that Bonhoeffer observes: “All the prayers of Holy Scripture are summarized in the Lord’s Prayer, and are contained in its immeasurable breadth.” - Psalms: The Prayer Book of The Bible, p. 12
Yet it is easy to allow our familiarity with the Lord’s Pray to dull its profound nature in our minds. We can assume that since we can pray it from memory, or have prayed it many times, then somehow we have “found the bottom of it” but just like all Scripture, the Lord’s prayer is a deep well that will never be exhausted.
One way to engage our minds with the beauty and balance of the Lord’s prayer is to slow down and consider its poetic structure. What follows are just a few for your pondering.
First is the classical division of the prayer into seven petitions. Upon opening your small catechism, you will see the prayer broken out into the following outline: Introduction, the Seven Petitions, Conclusion. This sevenfold division helps remind us of the completeness of the prayer. Not only that, but it also helps us to start to see the internal structure of how each petition hooks together with the others.
A helpful way to further group the petitions on a smaller level is the first three and the last four. The first three all ask for the rule and reign of Christ to come in its fullness. While the last four turn to requests for our provision, protection and salvation.
Biblical poetry also loves to make use of inclusio. Which is a fancy way of saying something similar bookends a section of poetry. We can see one of these inclusios between the introduction and the third petition: “Our father who art in heaven….Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” The introduction orients us towards God who is in heaven and we close the opening three petitions asking that the earth would be brought inline with His heavenly will.
In addition to the above structures, we can also consider the petitions as a chiasm. Chiasms are another widely used poetic structure in Scripture that looks like this: ABCBA. It creates a symmetrical picture of how things fit together. Let’s map it out on the petitions:
A - Hallowed by thy name.
B - Thy kingdom come.
C - Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
D - Give us this day our daily bread.
C - And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
B - And lead us not into temptation,
A - But deliver us from evil.
When we think about the petitions in this way we can begin to see a whole other set of connections. Take both B lines. Where do we ask Jesus to lead us? Not into temptation but into His kingdom. Or the A lines. We are delivered from evil by being joined to the holy name of God in baptism. Now it is your turn to look for more connections. Go set by set. How does each pair relate? What other connections can you see?
Finally we see a fascinating set of connections surface if we compare the full Lord’s Prayer found in Matthew with the shorter form found in Luke 11:2-4:
Introduction - Father
Petition 1 - hallowed be your name.
Petition 2 - Your kingdom come.
Petition 4 - Give us each day our daily bread,
Petition 5 - and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
Petition 6 - And lead us not into temptation.” - Luke
As you can see the introduction is shortened and petition 3 and 7 are missing leaving five petitions in total. One way to think about this is that the petitions are not really missing at all but have been compressed into the petition before them. I.e. it is the will of God for his kingdom to come. So petition 3 is “packed” into petition 2. While asking to be led out of temptation also means we will be delivered from evil. Meaning petition 7 is “packed” into petition 6. This allows us a wonderful look into how scripture compresses and expands prayers, stories, and laws. All over scripture we see many examples of this kind of dynamic. One example are the narrative Psalms compressing all of Israel’s history down to a short outline. Expanding all the way to the full telling of each story. So too this shorter form of the Lord’s prayer helps us see connections we would not necessarily be able to if we only had the Matthew form.
As you continue to learn how to pray with Jesus. My prayer for you is that you will hold onto the immense treasure of the Lord’s prayer pondering and praying until Jesus comes back.