"Pray, then, in this way: 'Our Father who 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 debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not lead is into temptation, but deliver us from evil. [For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.]"
Matthew 6:9-13
Much has been said and written about the Model Prayer. Often referred to as the Lord's Prayer, this passage is deservedly so a staple of the Church's understanding of prayer. For our purposes, we will refer to it as the Model Prayer to distinguish it from the Lord's Prayer found in John 17, which will be our focus in an upcoming post.
Before we get to the meet of the prayer itself, let's turn our eyes to the preceding verses. In Matthew 6:5, Jesus commands His followers not to pray "as the hypocrites." Merriam-Webster defines a hypocrite as "a person who claims or pretends to have certain beliefs about what is right but who behaves in a way that disagrees with those beliefs." I include this definition simply to give us a frame of reference; we all have our own definitions of hypocrisy, and we all know people that, according to our personal definitions, fit into this category.
To understand exactly what Jesus meant, we need to look into the historical context. Does Jesus tell us anything about who He defines as hypocrites? It just so happens that He does: "Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 6:1). Paul later expands on this in his letter to Titus, saying "For there are many rebellious men, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision, who must be silenced because they are upsetting whole families, teaching things they should not teach, for the sake of sordid gain... They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient, and worthless for any good deed" (Titus 1:10-11, 16).
So who does Jesus call a hypocrite? Men who put on a show of their righteousness before men, but who are filthy before God. In some instances during His earthly ministry, He directly calls out the Pharisees on this point. In his own time, Paul calls out those who claim to be part of the body of Christ but by their actions they hurt hurt that same body.
I have grown up and lived in the Bible belt my whole life. In all of the churches which I have been a part of, hypocrisy has been present. Thankfully, in some cases, it was a very small influence; in others, it was a dominating force. Truthfully, hypocrisy seems to be a staple feature of the church in America of which all participants, myself included, have been guilty at one point or another.
In preparing for this post, I am trying to hold myself accountable in the same way that I encourage you: as we seek to be honest with God in prayer, we need to acknowledge our own hypocrisy. God sees through my charade. Before God, the masks which we use to hide the real us from men and women are transparent. In many cases, we have worn these masks for so long that we ourselves are deceived; perhaps that needs to be where our prayer begins.
To understand exactly what Jesus meant, we need to look into the historical context. Does Jesus tell us anything about who He defines as hypocrites? It just so happens that He does: "Beware of practicing your righteousness before men to be noticed by them; otherwise you have no reward with your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 6:1). Paul later expands on this in his letter to Titus, saying "For there are many rebellious men, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision, who must be silenced because they are upsetting whole families, teaching things they should not teach, for the sake of sordid gain... They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient, and worthless for any good deed" (Titus 1:10-11, 16).
So who does Jesus call a hypocrite? Men who put on a show of their righteousness before men, but who are filthy before God. In some instances during His earthly ministry, He directly calls out the Pharisees on this point. In his own time, Paul calls out those who claim to be part of the body of Christ but by their actions they hurt hurt that same body.
I have grown up and lived in the Bible belt my whole life. In all of the churches which I have been a part of, hypocrisy has been present. Thankfully, in some cases, it was a very small influence; in others, it was a dominating force. Truthfully, hypocrisy seems to be a staple feature of the church in America of which all participants, myself included, have been guilty at one point or another.
In preparing for this post, I am trying to hold myself accountable in the same way that I encourage you: as we seek to be honest with God in prayer, we need to acknowledge our own hypocrisy. God sees through my charade. Before God, the masks which we use to hide the real us from men and women are transparent. In many cases, we have worn these masks for so long that we ourselves are deceived; perhaps that needs to be where our prayer begins.
This is not to say that we need to fix ourselves before we come to God. We cannot fix ourselves. However, we can learn a lesson from Jesus' parable about the Pharisee and the tax collector in Luke 18:9-14:
And He also told this parable to certain ones who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and viewed others with contempt: "Two men went up into the Temple to pray, one a Pharisee, and the other a tax-gatherer. The Pharisee stood and was praying thus to himself, 'God, I thank Thee that I am not like other-people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax-gatherer. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.' But the tax-gatherer, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, the sinner!' I tell you that this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled, but he who humbles himself shall be exalted." (emphasis mine)
Next week we will examine the Model Prayer itself. Until then, as we seek to approach the throne of God in prayer, we need to realize who we are. We also need to realize Whom we approach.
Bibliography
"Hypocrite." Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 20 Oct. 2014.
New American Standard Bible. La Habra, CA: Lockman Foundation, 1977. Kindle.
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