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New Testament scholar Wesley Hill has a great resource on helping the reader approach and pray this prayer. In The Lord’s Prayer: A Guide to Praying to Our Father, Hill takes us through a journey to better understand how Jesus’ words and model prayer give hope, meaning, and direction to Christ’s disciples today. The Lord’s prayer can easily become formulaic and ritualistic, losing its relevance and meaning for today. Hill’s guide is a great resource for avoiding this.Below are a four simple reminders that Hill provides about the Lord’s Prayer.1: Jesus Uncomplicates PrayerIf you grew up evangelical, you likely have heard your fair share of bad models for prayer. My personal favorite is that God cannot hear quiet prayers, and our prayers must go past the roof of the church (this type of approach is more common in charismatic/Pentecostal circles). In the immediate context of the Lord’s prayer, we find Jesus attacking head-on myths about prayer common in Judaism as well as non-Jewish (“pagan”) religions. Jesus’ point is that the tendency is to complicate prayer, thinking that we can use God as some sort of genie, or that we can somehow impress God with our performance. In our prayers we’re to avoid theatrics, and also avoid quantity over quality. “There’s no need for pretentious displays, Jesus insists. Prayer shouldn’t be calculated to impress, whether one is seeking to attract the attention of God or other people” (p. 2).2: God Doesn’t Need Your prayersThe starting point for the Lord’s Prayer is God’s embrace and love toward us. We don’t earn God by our elaborate prayers; God cannot be manipulated. God isn’t looking to be impressed and does not love his children based on their performance. God’s fatherly and whole-hearted embrace is the starting point for all of our prayers.Prayer, and The Lord’s Prayer in particular, is an invitation to rest in the reality of God as our Father. Hill recommends, “Go find a quiet place where you can relax… Unclench your fists. Breathe deeply. Let your heart rate decrease. Know that you’re already bathed in the Father’s love.” It’s in light of this reality that we’re to bring our heart and needs before him.Prayer isn’t to be an attempt to gain or earn God’s favor since as God’s children we already have God’s love. The Lord’s Prayer is an invitation to realize, accept, and finally bask in the reality of God’s acceptance of us and radical love for us.3: God is a Listening FatherWhile modern fathers are often consumed and enthralled more by their IPhones than they are their children, Hill insists that God is not an absent-minded Father. On the contrary, God stands in anticipation and readiness to hear and listen to our prayers. Our Father is a listening Father, a simple art that is quickly losing traction in our high-speed and increasingly-impatient age.The Lord’s Prayer is an invitation to bask in the reality of an attentive God who pays attention to his children, their requests, and their needs.4: The Lord’s Prayer is an acknowledgement of our utter dependence on GodTo Hill, “Give us today our daily bread” is a reminder that we don’t just need God daily: we need him every waking moment. Without God, we would cease to exist. When we’re praying for our daily nourishment, we are acknowledging what we are (dependent upon God) and who God is (our divine sustainer).We’re also reminded of our sheer dependency when praying, “And deliver us from evil.” Here, Jesus is in agreement with how the entire Bible sees evil not as some abstract force but as something personal which we call the devil. The Bible tends to personify evil and highlights just how pervasive Satan’s influence is in the world. Satan wreaks havoc within God’s good created order. It’s in light of this that we’re to reverently pray, “And deliver us from evil” or “from the evil one” and its grip.Hill points to the pervasiveness of racism in the world (which is gaining more attention in the West), noting that behind the evil of racism lurks a dark and demonic reality, the driving force of all evil in the world. “The prince of racism” poisons even very virtuous people and deludes their hearts and minds, and we’re in desperate need of an antidote. Will-power won’t cut it. “Stronger medicine is needed. And that is what Jesus urges us to pray for: we must, in the end, appeal to God to deliver us from the grip of the Evil One” (p. 85).The Lord’s Prayer is a prayer which covers all bases, holistic in all respects. In it, we come face-to-face with our great inadequacies and failures, but more importantly we come face-to-face with a God who provides strength and nourishment to the weary, choosing to include them in his worldwide mission of renewing creation.A reminder of the Christian call to simplicity (not least in our prayer lives), Hill reminds the reader of the vast richness found within the Lord’s model prayer, showcasing what individuals and communities miss out on when neglecting this central piece in Christ’s teachings.Thank you, Lexham Press, for the copy.Find full review at OverthinkingChristian.com
