In a new series looking at the Lord’s Prayer, the Rev David Searle considers the roots of the prayer in Matthew 6:9-13.

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DURING public worship we pray audibly together, but on our own when we are quite alone, prayer is a private thing.

Jesus’ disciples were amazed at the time he spent alone in prayer. Often, he would pray far into the night; at other times, before the day had dawned, he would go to a lonely place to pray.

His disciples couldn’t pray like that. So they said to Jesus: ‘Lord, teach us to pray’ (11:1). We know how he warned them against lengthy prayers and reminded them that the Father knows what we need before we even ask him. Therefore, he said to them, ‘Pray like this,’ and so we have ‘The Lord’s Prayer’.

It is a prayer that spans the world. There can be no objection to the common practice of Christians saying this prayer together during public worship. But that was not the Lord’s primary intention.

The Lord’s Prayer is first and foremost a roadmap, or a plan for prayer under seven headings. It is certainly a prayer that was intended for Christians throughout the world.

It begins: ‘Our Father!’ Biblical prayers always begin with what is called ‘Invocation’ – that is, pausing to call upon God. However, we need to notice that the ‘fatherhood of God’ is used in two very different senses in our Bibles. First it can have the meaning of God who has created everything; in other words, God is the Father of all humanity.

But there is a second, deeper sense in which a person can say, ‘Father’. We can say ‘Our Father’ if God, through his Spirit, has come to us in our spiritual lifelessness and implanted in our hearts the seed of his own nature, making us alive to him. Thus, the apostle Paul also wrote: ‘For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba Father!” The Spirit Himself bears witness that we are children of God.’ (Rom. 8:15-16) However, that was not the Old Testament way of addressing God. It was Jesus who taught us to pray to God as heavenly Father.

Often, he is recorded as raising his eyes to heaven and saying, ‘Father, I thank you….’ But even more important, the New Testament calls God ‘The Father of our Lord Jesus Christ…’.

Consider what having God as his Father must mean. What a wonderful person Jesus was. The wisest of teachers. And with what authority he spoke. How kind and loving he was dealing so tenderly with the poor and despised. How gracious! No guile or untruth found in his words. In his Person, he embodied perfect righteousness. So, what must his Father be like?

Father! We are approaching Almighty God, who condescends to stoop down from highest heaven to listen to us. He comes as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and there in his fatherly presence, we bow low in adoration. And he reaches out his arms and gathers us into his embrace, ready to listen to us. ‘Be still and know that I am God,’ he says to us. Therefore, we begin our prayers by looking upwards to our Father, and we rest in him, our Lord!