Teach Us to Pray! Part 1

“Therefore, you should pray like this: Our Father in heaven, Your name be honored as holy.“

Matthew 6:9

Holy Bible: Holman Christian Standard Version. 2009. Nashville: Holman Bible Publishers.

Jesus’ statement on prayer comes as a corrective midway through His famous Sermon on the Mount. According to Jesus, His followers are not to pray in a hypocritical or showy fashion like those set apart by their hypocrisy. Matthew writes extensively about the hypocrites. Mark makes reference to them, quoting from the book of the prophet Isaiah:

“The Master said: ‘These people make a big show of saying the right thing, but their hearts aren’t in it. Because they act like they’re worshiping me but don’t mean it, I’m going to step in and shock them awake, astonish them, stand them on their ears. The wise ones who had it all figured out will be exposed as fools. The smart people who thought they knew everything will turn out to know nothing.’“

Isaiah Isaiah 29:13-14

Peterson, Eugene H. The Message: the Bible in Contemporary Language. NavPress, 2018.

The hypocrites are defined by their production value. They are doing right in the spotlight. However, their innermost character is not connected to anything they are doing. Their showmanship is primarily for an audience of onlooking humans. Jesus’ model prayer turns their pretense on its ear. Jesus begins with the prayer’s audience, God the Father. This is an intimate prayer to one of a paternal relation. We are talking to Dad when we pray.

“…those who can say, ‘Our Father which art in heaven,’ are something more than God’s creatures: they have been adopted into his family. He has taken them out of the old black family in which they were born; he has washed them, and cleansed them, and given them a new name and a new spirit, and made them ‘heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ;’ and all this of his own free, sovereign, unmerited, distinguishing grace.“

(Spurgeon, The Fatherhood of God)

Spurgeon, Charles. “The Fatherhood of God.” Blue Letter Bible. 18 Apr, 2001. Web. 4 Feb, 2020.

Jesus’ prayer is also geographical. We are told to pray to our Father in Heaven. His citizenship is elsewhere. His vantage is higher. His point of view is altogether superior. The Greek word ouranos translated as “heaven” is closely related to the root word for “mountain” oros. God’s domain surmounts, conquers and towers over the realm of His finite and created world. Our prayers are to be viewed as rising to greater elevations, ascending up to God the Father’s home where there is complete and perfect order.

We are to set apart God’s name as holy. The ancient concept of a name is foreign to contemporary audiences. A name has always been a nominative identifier of persons. It has at all times been what one is called by and what one is referred to as. However, onoma, the ancient concept of Jesus’ day, also had tied up in its connotation the thought or feeling “which is aroused in the mind by mentioning, hearing, remembering” the name in question (Strong’s Greek Lexicon).

“God’s name of Father, as it has been revealed to the disciples in Jesus Christ, shall be kept holy among them. In this name the whole content of the gospel is embraced. May God protect his holy gospel from being obscured and profaned by false doctrine and unholiness of living, and may he ever make known his holy name to the disciples in Jesus Christ. May he enable all preachers to proclaim the pure gospel of saving grace, defend us against the tempters, and convert the enemies to his name!“

(Bonhoeffer, 165-166)

Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. The Cost of Discipleship. Simon & Schuster Press, 1995.

One can hear the power in Bonhoeffer’s voice. He truly believed there was power in the Good News-heralding name of God. To Bonhoeffer the name of God was enough to convert his enemies. When your enemies are Nazis Germans that is saying a great deal. The name of God is powerful enough to redeem the fascist. The name of God is powerful enough to redeem the racist. The name of God is powerful enough to redeem the mass-murderer. If the name of God the Father is that powerful, who can stand against Him?

We are to understand the name of God as the God-ness of God. God should be associated with the complete aura of all that His name evokes. The name of God and all the thought of Him conjures in the mind should be separated, dedicated, and acknowledged as something pure and free from all stain of profanity. This model of prayer should be practiced as an act of worship.

America’s “Dean of Revival Preachers” Dr. Vance Havner once said that many followers of Christ “are shaky about what they believe, while not many are shaken by what they believe”. The Jesus-follower assigns worth to God each time they pray in this fashion. This is not a worth that we created. We instead reflect God’s own personal holy worthiness back to Him in devotion and humility. This worshipful prayer of our holy Father God should shake our uncertainties and humble us to purer faith in Jesus.

“Remember, God is as Great as He is Good!”

Noah R. Hunt