Our Father

Prayer… not so good at that one, but at least we are instructed to pray ‘with all kinds of prayer’. Mine is not very meditative, so for sure lacking at that level, but just squeezes in under the ‘all kinds’ of definition. And maybe if we are to ‘pray without ceasing’ it is as much to do with heart attitude as it does with words and practices. I hope so!

Been thinking a bit about ‘the Lord’s prayer’ and as we have it in two different versions it is probably a bit of a guide rather than a formula to follow. Here it is in Matthew’s gospel:

Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come.
Your 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 bring us to the time of trial,
but rescue us from the evil one.

And the verse added after the prayer relates back to it and is key for our progress, with an interesting change from ‘debt’ to ‘trespass’.

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.

So heart attitude… First word ‘Father’, second word ‘our’. Maybe the word order is incidental as per many languages, but probably quite helpful. First word is beyond ourselves and our world; first word is not to an unknown deity. The promise of Jesus was not to bring us to God, but that he was the way to the ‘Father’. I appreciate that word can be a tough word for some, and within it certainly is contained the whole concept of ‘mother’. Intimacy is suggested, for the relationship is the one that we can see Jesus had. We cannot insist on the correct word, but push for the intimate relationship, and sadly the word can even prevent that intimacy if we project on to God any negative experience we have had.

However, by starting with that word we are being invited to move beyond projectionism from our experience so that eventually any negative experience will be covered by the intimacy of ‘true parenthood’. Love covers a multitude of sins… and that has to cover sins that we have experienced as well as all our (my?) bad behaviour.

The prayer is short when we count the words, but pretty long when we walk the journey. Many days we will get the first few letters of the prayer out. ‘Fath……’ First word is a life-long journey to a place of deep rest and security, particularly when we face situations where (in our opinion) God could have done something. The fact he didn’t maybe indicates something wrong with our theology. We want to believe in an all-powerful God, Jesus introduces us to a relational being.

Second word ‘our’. Those first two words are familial words, belonging words, corporate words. If the first word puts me in touch with intimacy the second word puts me in a horizontal context. Amazing how connected those two words and concepts are. Private religion nor separatedness seem to be what it is about. Familial context, belonging, me not more important than you… and truthfully the more I know of intimacy the more I will see you, and see you and me connected.

How wide does the ‘our’ go? Maybe like the meals of Jesus, with a ‘sitting down with his own’, that close identity with those who have imbibed of the Spirit, and the thousands in the desert who were not even clear about what the food was all about. We probably should lose our desire to draw the in / out lines and seek to live in a way that we have many overlapping circles of ‘our’ as possible. The more ‘ours’ there are the more likely there will be those who also come to the place where they can utter the first word.

Some days we might be praying the second word. Intimacy can lead to a very loud ‘our’. I don’t think religion leads us there. If people exclude themselves from the ‘our’ that is their choice; if we include people in the ‘our’ that is our choice.

‘In heaven’… no reductionism there. God among us, ‘one of us’, yet not one of us. Not a God made in our image. However far I have progressed – and if only you knew you would be impressed beyond belief!! – there is more.

Father, our – among us, intimacy. In heaven – not simply among us, not simply one of us. And an invitation not to stay where we are but to grow.

This first line seems to be a healthy starting point and maybe a line that we might never get much beyond, certainly a line that will be repeated many times over.