Jonathan (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} boomerangaz) wrote,@ 2006-08-20 21:09:00 |
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Lord, Teach Us To Pray
(Luke 11:1)
An Exposition of "The Lord's Prayer"
Part 2 of 3
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This exposition of "The Lord's Prayer" was transcribed From a message delivered by Harold Camping, host of "Open Forum" program, which is broadcast over Family Radio. |
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The Lord's Prayer is given to us in the Word of God in two passages, Luke 11:2-4, and Matthew 6:9-13, "After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed by thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debs, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen." |
"Thy will be done"
The will of God is expressed, for example, in Matthew 16:18, "I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it."
The will of God is that He will redeem a people for Himself. He will bring salvation to this world, and that relates personally to each of us, i.e., "Thy will be done" in my life. God's will, will be done in my life only if I am saved, if I have become a child of God.
If you are unsaved, God's will is not part of your life; if you are unsaved, you are going to live with your own will and not care about God's will. "Thy will be done," prayed from the heart means, "O God, make me obedient to thee; help me to abandon myself to thee. I want you to be my Savior."
The will of God ultimately includes the damnation of the unsaved. God's justice must be satisfied. When the day comes, He will bring vengeance upon the unsaved; that is God's business, and yet that is implied in the phrase, "thy will be done."
"Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven"
God's will was established in heaven. The Lord Jesus Christ was in perfect obedience to the Father's will. In the
"Give us this day our daily bread"
Many people conclude that God is teaching us to pray for physical sustenance. Of course, we are dependent upon God for clothing, housing, and food, but what about Luke 12:22-23, "And he said unto his disciples, Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat; neither for the body, what ye shall put on. The life is more than meat, and the body is more than raiment. Consider the ravens: for they neither sow nor reap; which neither have storehouse nor barn; and God feedeth them: how much more are ye better than the fowls?" He then says in verse 30, "For all these things do the nations of the world seek after: and your Father knoweth that ye have need of these things."
God gives no guarantee that believers in the Lord Jesus Christ will always have a full bowl of rice. Whether we have enough to eat or not is immaterial. The big question that God wants us to face is: Are we spiritually nourished?
In Luke 11:3, Christ says, "Give us day by day our daily bread." The word "daily" ought to be translated "for the morrow" or "for the coming." It could be literally translated, "give us each day, or day by day, our bread for the morrow." That is, "give us each day the spiritual bread (Christ is the living bread) that will sustain us though out the future."
In Matthew 6:11, the Bible says it a little differently but also focuses on our need for Christ. There we read, "Give us this daily bread."
Hebrews 1:5 helps us to understand this. There we read, "Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee." "This day" is the same phrase that is used in the Lord's Prayer in Matthew 6, "Give us this day." Hebrews 1:5 seems to imply that at some point in time, the Lord Jesus Christ was begotten by the Father. We know that is not possible because the Lord Jesus Christ is from everlasting to everlasting.
God is speaking about the coming Lord Jesus Christ who is spoken of as "begotten" inasmuch as God raised Him from the dead after He had paid for our sins. The phrase "this day" also refers to the Lord Jesus even as Psalm 118:24 implies, where God declares, "This is the day which the LORD hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it." And so, "Thou art my Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, whom I have raised from the dead." Likewise, in the Lord's Prayer in Matthew 6, by the phrase "Give us this day our daily bread," God is effectively saying, "Give us the Lord Jesus Christ as spiritual bread for tomorrow and forevermore."
"Day by day"
" In Luke, God days "day by day," and when we tie this passage together with the phrase in Matthew 6:11, "Give us this day our daily bread," we get this picture: "Give is Christ day by day, on a continuing basis, that we might have bread for the morrow," from moment to moment. What is the bread that the Bible talks about? Jesus says in John 6:35, "I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst."
He says in John 6:51, "I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world."
When we pray, "Give us this day our daily bread," effectively we are saying to God, "O God, give us the Lord Jesus Christ that we might be in Him, spiritually nourished and strengthened, so that we can walk day to day, moment to moment. Whatever the future holds, He is sufficient for us."
