Nov. 20: A Prayer About Relationship

Most of us are so familiar with the Lord’s Prayer—the Our Father—that we may say its words without thinking much about them.  It was something author and speaker Mark Hart admits to doing until he started working as a youth minister.  Realizing how shallow his own prayer life was moved him to a deeper understanding of Jesus’s words.

In his book The ‘R’ Father, Hart writes, “The Lord’s Prayer is an invitation into a daily relationship…If we go to bed underwhelmed by God’s love, we weren’t as present to Him as He was to us that day.  This prayer orders our priorities from the beginning: God first, us second, worship before petition.  If our prayer is only about petition…we lose the worship, the adoration, the thanksgiving, and the ability to discern what God is saying to us.  In short, we lose the relationship.”

Hart concludes, “In praying ‘Our’ Father…Jesus is giving us more than a relationship with His Father…He’s giving us an introduction to our greater family—the true body of Christ—and an initiation into a new way of living.”

Believe in the good news.  (Mark 1:15)

I praise You, Lord, and ask Your help.