You don’t have to tell anyone else your answers, but if someone were to ask you questions like: How many minutes do you think you’ve prayed during the last seven days?
If you pray at a certain time of day, when is it?
What do you pray for?
How would you answer those questions? While there are no right or wrong answers, prayer is simply an opportunity to connect with your heavenly Father on a personal level.
In Chapter 11, we read how Jesus taught his disciples to pray. He literally said, “When you pray, say this.” And he goes on to say what we know as “The Lord’s Prayer.” The Gospel of Matthew also mentions this story, so you can find the same prayer there as well. There are a few minor word differences between the Matthew version and the Luke version, but the two accounts are talking about the same thing.
In that prayer, Jesus covers so much ground with so few words. He tells them to address this eternal God—a perfect, holy God, who resides in heaven—as “Father.” It cleared up any confusion that may have existed in terms of who they should be praying to or how they should view God. Even though God is vastly different and greater than anything they could imagine, they were to think of him as a perfect heavenly Father, and that’s who they should pray to.
The Lord’s Prayer is a beautiful portrait of how God is all-powerful and in a category of his own yet at the same time able to relate to us.
So today, take a moment to slowly and reflectively pray this to your heavenly Father.
“Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.
Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen.”
Before next time, read Luke Chapter 12.