Musings on the Daily Lectionary - Prayer

Even outside the Church, there is a great deal of interest these days in spirituality and in prayer. There are books galore on both topics. I have some of them, and many of them are quite good and helpful. I particularly like Richard Foster's book, Prayer: Finding the Heart's True Home and Thomas Keating's works on contemplative prayer.

But as helpful as these can be, I suspect we would all do well to occasionally go back to Jesus' instructions on prayer. Many of us know "The Lord's Prayer" as a part of a worship ritual. But we might do well to find it in the Bible and hear it teaching us on prayer. Matthew's version is today's gospel lection, and with it Jesus offers a bit of commentary on his own prayer. He focuses in on the line asking "forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors," adding this. "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."

I know that sometimes my prayer life seems quite disconnected from my everyday life. Or worse, it is a laundry list of things I wish God would do for me. But Jesus' prayer instructions remind me that my own prayers ought to help shape me into the sort of person Jesus calls me to be. To that end, there's probably nothing better than praying the prayer Jesus taught as my own prayer, and not simply as an element of worship.

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