“Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”—Matthew 6:10
After “now I lay me down to sleep…” Jesus' model for everyday praying (the Lord’s Prayer) was the one I knew all my friends and family knew. Long before I realized who Jesus really was, I remember hearing everyone on Sunday morning in our old New England church saying this prayer together—old people, little guys like me who had just exchanged a couple of teeth for a couple of dimes found under my pillow when I woke up, important and scary-looking people with bad breath, and the sweetest Sunday school teacher a kid could imagine.
Maybe everyone was being reverent, but I still remember that the room sounded like a hive of bored, monotone honeybees when we prayed that prayer. Still, even as a kid, it seemed pretty cool that I knew a prayer that everyone else knew as well, and there was something strangely powerful about all of us saying it together.
But not as cool as when there was a special all-school assembly in the gym, when everyone from grade school to the senior class gathered for Memorial Day remembrance, and everyone was asked to join in on the Lord’s Prayer. (Yes, “back in the day,” that sort of thing happened.) I remember that even with everyone’s eyes supposedly closed in prayer, I peeked to see if the really cool guys on the basketball team were saying it (and they were!). Some of my buddies next to me used different words, like “debts” instead of “trespasses,” which was a bit puzzling, but not as puzzling as wondering what on earth “trespasses” meant anyway. Sure, we all sounded like a lot of monotone honey bees in that gym, but once again there was something strangely powerful about all of us saying it together.
Little did I know then that to “say” the Lord’s Prayer just to say it, or because it’s on the program, or in the church bulletin, or because it’s just what we do, was playing with one of God’s biggest-ever sticks of dynamite. Because when the lightbulb in your soul finally goes off, and you experience on that day of a lifetime when Jesus becomes far more than a rote recitation to the tune of monotone honeybees but Life to the full itself, everything about that prayer explodes.
“Does not My Word burn like fire? Does it not shatter rock like a strong hammer?” —Jeremiah 23:29, The Voice
Somehow, you realize that when you bust out of the little kid monotone voice and kick in to the pulsating rhythm of a child-to-Father relationship, “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done!” is praying with Fire. It’s probably getting to the heart of what Jesus intended when He taught that model prayer to His first followers…
Pray down the supernatural perfections and goodness of God's Word Every single day,
Into every situation,
Every decision,
Every friend and loved one,
Even and especially when you're wondering...
"I don't even know how to pray for this.”
Not weird. Not demanding. Not even yelling. Just standing firm on the Word. Just following Jesus' lead, trusting the One who never fails or miscalculates, and for whom absolutely nothing is impossible.
“We live in the bold confidence that God hears our voices when we ask for things that fit His plan. And if we have no doubt that He hears our voices, we can be assured that He moves in response to our call.”—1 John 5:14-15, The Voice
[ADAPTED FROM APRIL 2016]
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