My Reflection on the Lord's Prayer and Calling God as Heavenly Father

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The Lord's prayer is recorded in Matthew 6:5-13 and Luke 11:1-13. As a former Catholic, I grew up reciting this prayer without understanding what it meant. The prayer was said many times before classes started, said five times in a Rosary, said a number of times after a confessional, and it has become a vain repetition. Jesus said not to make vain repetitions (or translated as "meaningless words" in the GNT) when you pray. The "Our Father" is a pattern of how to pray and not what to pray. The "Our Father" gave us the pattern of confidence to glorify God, to ask for our needs, to forgive us and others, and not to be led into temptation. 

I was taught the idea of the universal brotherhood of man. It said that we're all brothers and sisters and God is our Father. Yet, that very idea was shot down when I read John 8:44 which Jesus calls the unsaved Jews as children of the Devil. Wait, aren't we all children of God? that idea really got shot down when Jesus called anyone who wasn't saved to belong to the Devil! Anybody who is unsaved already sold their souls to the Devil. Yet, people today teach the satanic doctrine that we're all children of God. If that were true then why are actually some headed for Hell? Why did Jesus call them children of the Devil if they were children of God? It's because that's not true. God is the Creator of mankind yet Satan became the spiritual father of it after Adam sinned. That's why Jesus called the unsaved Jews, children of the Devil. The Jews needed to be told that before adoption into God's Kingdom can even make sense!

Why did the Lord Jesus' pattern begin with the phrase "Our Father"? It's because of the confidence and the power that God would give to those who are His. Jesus is the only Son of God (John 3:16) yet John 1:10-12 says that those who accept Him become children of God. Jesus is the only real Son while the rest are adopted children of God. The children of God are those who have accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. The power of receiving Jesus as one's Lord and Savior makes one a child of God. Either you're a child of God (by adoption) or you remain a child of the Devil. 

After the "Our Father", we read the phrase "hallowed will be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven." Matthew and Luke do seem to have some words missing and the other author fills it. Luke 11:3 in the modern translations doesn't have "Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on Earth as it is in Heaven" which is found in Matthew 6:10. One reason why I prefer the KJV translation of Luke's rendition of the Lord's prayer is the containment of those verses, which some translators decided to put in the footnotes as doubtful. It's also interesting that Luke's rendition of the Lord's Prayer in the KJV, however, doesn't have "for yours is the Kingdom, the power and the glory, forever." while Matthew's does. The prayer is to ask for the Kingdom of God to come (which will be fulfilled during the Millennium and the Eternal Kingdom), that God's will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven. It's asking for God's will to prevail and recognizing the sovereignty of God.

The next prayer is asking for the daily needs. Prayer is not about changing God but about changing the one who prays. Prayer is making a request to do God's will. The phrase "Your will be done." should be more than enough to tell you that God is not a genie. No prayers must be made out of selfish requests but only that God's glory be done. It's like an employee asking from one's employer to get the resources to get the job done. It's like asking your boss for permission to move out of the building so you can buy the supplies that he or she asked you to buy. The requirement of this prayer is to do what's pleasing ot God (1 John 3:22) and to pray according to His will (1 John 5:14). All supplications must be made according to the will of God. Supplications like helping you to pass for an exam you didn't study, to court an unbeliever, to get one's enemy dead, or the like are not according to God's will.

The next is about praying for forgiveness and for others' forgiveness. It's very easy for us to beg for forgiveness while we're being unforgiving to others. That's why Matthew 18 also talks about the parable of the unforgiving servant, a situation we're more often than not, stuck with. First, it's to ask God to forgive us for our daily shortcomings. The Church is a museum of righteous saints while it's simultaneously a hospital for repentant sinners. The most righteous of saints are still not perfect. Read the lives of the heroes of the Bible to find out that they were still sinners. The difference is that the Christian can't enjoy sin and is chastised (Hebrews 12:5-7), very much unlike the rest of the world. The prayer is also to forgive others as Jesus would proceed in His sermon to love one's enemies, to bless those who curse, and to pray for one's persecutors instead of retaliating. This is the hardest part of the prayer because either we're too proud to ask for forgiveness, too proud to forgive, or even a deadly combination of both. This prayer should be both for peace of mind and hoping to win one's enemies to become one's friends.

The request ends with "and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil." Temptation is really a dangerous thing. 1 John 2:16 mentions three areas that people get tempted namely the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. How often are these areas used by Satan, his demons, and our sinful nature against us? David had all three hit when he had his affair with Bathsheba. The lust of the eyes started when David saw Bathsheba bathing and kept watching than keep his eyes away. David committed adultery with Bathsheba because of the lust of the flesh. The pride of life led David to eventually murder Bathsheba's husband Uriah so he can have her and cover up his sin. Samson himself also fell down because of the three areas too. How often do I foolishly think I'm immune to the three areas of temptation just because I'm saved? It's very easy for me to fall into that temptation. God delivers from temptation through chastising even if He has to use unbelieving men and women to do so. God's chastising is really how this prayer is answered more often than not. God allows the temptation to happen so we can pray "Lord, give me the power to resist this temptation!" God chastises Christians when they fall into the temptation to deliver them from evil.

Why do some modern translations not have the ending words in Matthew 6:13? Some have considered it doubtful that Matthew wrote it. The modern versions (later releases) fortunately placed footnotes to say that certain manuscripts apparently didn't have it. It looks like the KJV translators used several manuscripts or failed to see the brackets. Then again, I still love the KJV and I think that doubtful words need to be in either brackets, italics (the KJV uses italics to supply missing words), or footnotes. Though, Luke's rendition doesn't include the words too for a reason. Luke also doesn't have the words "Your kingdom come, your will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven." that Matthew puts for a reason. In my case, I still think the final phrase is part of it while other older manuscripts (the Sinaiticus and Eusebian aka Vaticanus manuscripts) didn't have it or were probably missing parchments. Regardless, we do have the glorification of the Lord's prayer in both chapters.