The disciples asked Jesus to teach them how to pray. He said to them, “Say this when you pray:” (Matthew 6, 9-10). And so it was Jesus gave us ‘The Lord’s Prayer’ which can be seen as a model for all our prayer.
While we might ‘rattle it off’ as part of our daily prayer, the words we use vary from one Bible translation to another. Maybe it is time we relooked at ‘The Lord’s Prayer’ and without changing its meaning use a language more appropriate to today’s understanding.
John’s Gospel does give us a greater insight into who ‘Our Father’ is and what was His relationship with Jesus.
Jesus said:
“I am the way, the truth and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me” (John, 14-6)
“The Father and I are one” (John 10, 30)
“You must believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me” (John 14, 11)
“Anything you ask for from the Father, he will grant in my name.” (John 16, 23)
While Jesus taught the disciples the ‘Our Father’, when we say this prayer we don’t seem to involve Jesus in our recitation of the words. As Jesus said, “No one can come to the Father except through me”, then maybe we need to re-examine the words we use when saying the prayer.
Perhaps an updated version of the Our Father could go as follows:
Jesus, you are our guide and inspiration and with your Holy Spirit we seek to honor The Father, creator of us all. We look forward to that day when the Father’s heavenly kingdom will be replicated here on earth.
We thank you Father for our life and for the food that sustains us. We seek forgiveness for our misdeeds as we are prepared to forgive others who have harmed us.Please continue to watch over us and guide us so we might become the people you created us to be. Amen.
I’m Peter mack and that’s how I feel.