THIS is commonly called "The Lord's Prayer."
One thing we see in it is that Christ is always looking at the Father's glory first of all. In John 17, which is really His own prayer, He begins: " Father glorify Thy name." Men's prayers are a great deal about themselves, seem to center there. The prayer that Christ taught, and the prayer that He prayed went, first of all, to God's own glory; so it is here, Hallowed be Thy name; Thy kingdom come."
All true prayer must be in the line of God's thoughts, whether in the day of Samuel or Moses or David, or now. There are two occasions of prayer mentioned in the case of Israel, as established according to God. One of them was, if a dead man was found near any city, they measured the distance from the dead man to the city, and the elders came out and sacrificed a heifer; then they would call upon God to look down and bless His land, and this was on the ground of innocence (Deut. 21). Then (Deut. 26.), when they brought the first fruits, it was that God should bless the land, with reference to His own thoughts about it. You cannot pray in any other way than God's thoughts. If you do; it is not in the Spirit. That is the first thing in all prayer. When Paul prayed, it was to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for He was fully revealed as such. It is the full expression of His title, that according to that He would grant "that the eyes of their understanding being opened, they might know what is the hope, of His calling and tire riches of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe when-Be raised up Christ from the (lend," etc. All that is according to God's mind. Just like the prayers given by Moses in the Old Testament, they are according to God's thoughts about Israel, not according to some little detail of circumstances which one finds out in his narrow compass of things.
It would not do for me to pray a prayer which had to do with the Jew in the land in his earthly position. I must reach up and get God's thought about me today. A Christian's prayer could not be, the same, therefore, as a Jewish prayer. Israel's prayer had to do with the land and the occupation of the land " Look down and bless Thy people Israel, and the land which Thou hast given us. There was the promise which was always according to God's purpose in the land, but it was always the earth; they had no thought of heaven, and that would be the first principle. Prayer is God writing His own thoughts in our hearts, and we telling them back to Him. I must never reach lower than God in prayer. In many prayer meetings, people do not reach up to anything. Many are praying the same as they were praying thirty years ago. They make prayer a kind of service rendered to God, and, having found some phrases which they think appropriate, they keep on using them. If we do not get God's thoughts, that is what we will get into. What is the Holy Ghost doing to-day? He is showing us our riches in Christ; I am before God as Christ is I am standing in His presence I am to talk to Him according to that ground. You have God's thoughts and you give them back to Him again.
Then I am not to pray for what I have already? Surely not. Therefore, as I see in Ephesians, " He bath quickened us together with Christ, and raised us up together with Him and seated us in Him in heavenly places," I could not pray for one of these things; T could not ask Him to quicken us, or raise us up, or seat us in heavenly place for He has done it; I could not ask Him for forgiveness of sins, for He has given us the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace. Why should I ask for that? I might as well ask for a head on my shoulders. We do need forgiveness of sins daily, the cleansing from the daily, hourly defilement; but that we get upon confession of the sins (1 John 1:99If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)). Our standing in God's presence, is that He has forgiven all that we did, and made us new creatures in Christ Jesus. Then I cannot ask for redemption, I have got it: I am either a son or an enemy. If I am a son, my sins are forgiven, and I am brought into the new man. Prayer would have that character and tone. Then I could not ask Him for' the Holy Ghost, could I? If I do, then I had better stop praying, for this reason, that it is only by the Holy Ghost I can pray at all. I deny just the very word that Christ Himself told me, that the Holy Ghost shall be in me and abide in me, and then to ask for Him is not praying in the Spirit. We should pray according to what God has set forth in His word. If we are in heaven we are in the presence of God (Heb. 10); we have " boldness to enter into the holiest." Is there anything nearer than that?
Then you would not say, " Our Father who art in heaven.' I do not talk that way to my father who is in the house; I am there myself. If my son should speak that way to me, I would say, " My son, what is coming over you?" When I am over in Europe, or off at boarding school or somewhere, then I write a letter and put it " My dear father and mother at home," but not when I am there myself. When you say our Father who art in heaven," you are speaking as if you were not there. The very address in this prayer will show you it is not your place; at any rate, it is not you, because we are raised and seated in heavenly places; we are in the house; we are taken into favor in the Beloved, and is He not up there? Can you tell me how far Christ is from the Father to-night? I am taken into favor in Him, and I pray according to the intelligence that God gives of the thing and of the place. Then I would say "our God and Father," because He is the God and. Father of our Lord. Jesus Christ, and I would pray as being face to face with Him. So you see this prayer would not be what Ephesians would lead us to offer.
Notice, too, that whilst Christ gave this to His disciples, who were immediately about Him at the time, when we find Him speaking to them in John 14, where He is set forth as the Son of God, and they on a new ground, He said to these very men, to whom He gave this prayer, "Hitherto have ye asked nothing in My name." That prayer did not involve being in the name of Christ. Then the prayer had in it that which did not belong to those who were up in heavenly places, and it did not belong to the people who were in the name of Christ, for He says, " Hitherto have ye asked nothing in My name." It was not in the confidence of those who stood in Christ, nor the place that He stands in up in heaven.
Then I think if you look along the scope of this prayer, you will not find it taking up what pertains to us in heavenly places. What are the petitions found here? " Give us our daily bread. Forgive us our sins. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." Those four things, and that is all. Where are we on that ground? I do not mean that you and I may be in a place where daily bread is not needed, but is that the distinctive character of our place where daily bread is the important thing? It is important to have something to put into our mouths, but does that pertain to us characteristically? Up in heavenly places, Christ is the daily bread to be fed on. I am a heavenly man feeding on Christ. Is it a characteristic thing of us, according to the ground on which we are placed as Christians, that we are constantly wanting daily bread? Not more than others. There are some rich people who are Christians, and poor people who are Christians, and rich and poor who are not, and they are eating daily bread. It is not characteristic of us.
Then I ask whether the next petition belongs to us as the children of God, " Forgive us our debts"? In Eph. 1:77In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace; (Ephesians 1:7), we read, " in whom we have redemption through His blood, and the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace. What is characteristic of us? In Rom. 4:2525Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification. (Romans 4:25), we learn of Him " who was delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our justification." Our offenses are forgiven. In Heb. " having blotted out." We have in Col. the same expression, " forgiveness of sins." In Col. 1:1212Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light: (Colossians 1:12), it is " giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." Do you not see that what characterizes me as, a perfect man before God in Christ, is, that my sins are all forgiven; forgiveness of sins belongs to me as such. Therefore the prayer, " forgive. us our sins," does not characterize us; does not belong to us as such.
Now we will look at the next petition. It says "lead us not into temptation," that is, to be tested. I belong to the Man who was "tested in all points." I am in Him; I have a nature that can bear testing; we are new men; we are a new creation in Christ Jesus. " Brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations" (James 1). In First Peter what, have we? " Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which, according to His abundant mercy, hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations. Am I to pray to be delivered from them? Not at all but to rejoice in them, that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried by fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appealing of Jesus Christ." It is a grand thing for me to have my faith tried. You burn gold and it is gold. If we walk by faith, and faith is the great principle, and I am standing on the ground of what Christ is entirely, a new man in Christ Jesus, it is a goad thing for me to be tested and tried, and then am I to pray " do not lead us into it?" Does it appertain to us as Christians to pray such a prayer? The moment I get the intelligence of my ground, what I am to God and what He is saying of me, I find His thoughts and His mind about us now put into my heart and told back to Him does not involve that at all. He says " count it all joy when ye fall into divers trials," and He then says, " the trial of your faith being more precious than gold that perisheth, though it be tried by fire, might be found unto praise and honor."
Then I am not going to pray to be delivered out of trial. Look into the 5th of Romans, where it says, "being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom, also, we have access by faith into the grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience." Now does not that sound different from saying " lead us not into temptation?" " Deliver us from evil," where is the evil? " I pray not that thou shouldest take them out of the world, but that thou shouldst keep them from the evil." Now, the evil or the evil one here, is, I think, the Antichrist. It is not characteristic of us to be praying in that way. It is not that you and I may not slip down into the place where we will need to pray, but that it is a token that we are out of fellowship when we pray in this manner. To take up our place in Christ Jesus as taken into favor in Him, sons of God before, Him, separated unto Him as heavenly, and not earthly, that either of these four petitions pertain to us in the way they are put there, I do not believe.
It was given by Christ, perfect in its character, it must be perfect in its place, too. Notice to whom He is saying this, and the ground they are on. Are they heavenly men, redeemed by the blood of Christ, raised and seated in heavenly places? Are they sons of God? Are they brought into fellowship with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ? These things pertain to us. On that ground we pray according to our place. Did they pertain to these people to whom He was speaking? The first verse of this book says, " the book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham." Is He son of David and Abraham to you? No, He is the Son of God to on. Now, all the teaching of that book must be of that character. There may be exceptions, of course as in chapters 16.-18., where He speaks of the church, but that is future there, and on the ground of their rejection of Him, as the seed of David. In the first two chapters you have the declaration of Christ's birth, as the seed of David, to occupy David's throne, and everything is pointed out that is according to the prophecies of the Old Testament Scriptures. As such, He came to fulfill the promises made to the fathers. As God was going to raise up a king, it is Christ's place, in connection with His kingdom upon the earth. The King enters largely into what you find in Matthew. In that character we have His birth and baptism set forth, and His going into the wilderness, and the regions round about Judea, not going into the world. He is the Messiah to make the Jew a blessing to all nations. Now, on that ground He goes up into the mountain (chap. 5.), and when His disciples were come to Him, He opened His mouth and spake to them these things. And so you see how it begins, "Blessed are the pure in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom; blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." Are you going to inherit the earth? It all keeps within that range; then He turns in the midst of them and says, Blessed are ye when men shall revile' you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you, falsely, for my sake." '- When the kingdom was given up, because it was rejected, and Christ died, they individually came into the place of suffering for Christ's own sake.
The kingdom of heaven is the kingdom that God is going to establish here. He says in the book of Daniel that the God of heaven is going to set up a kingdom here: Christ came to do that and accomplish it.
When He said, "My kingdom is not of this world," that was at the cross, it was after the whole thing was rejected; He would have to get it from His Father. In Luke 19 He goes into a far country and gets it from His Father.
We find in the Old Testament prophecies that the kingdom is spoken of, and we find also this, that there are expressions which lead us to understand that Christ is to be put to death. Isa. 53 speaks of Him as a "root out of dry ground." They did not want Him. Now that would involve suffering to the disciple that would be waiting for the kingdom and faithful in looking for the King. Then we would get what we have in the Old Testament Scriptures, a remnant waiting for the kingdom. Instead of the nation receiving Him, a little remnant would be waiting. In the Psalms we observe a condition of suffering and the King absent, and they waiting for a little while, and then we get the exercises that the remnant will pass through. In Matthew you get the character of the suffering. Antichrist will arise (Dan. 9). He will make a covenant with the Jews for seven years, and in the midst of it he will break the covenant and establish idolatry, and every one will have to bow to him just as Nebuchadnezzar set up an image in the plain of Dura. Antichrist is coming to establish idolatry, and is determined that every one shall worship the image of the beast, and if they do not, persecution will come and suffering. Among other things they will be put to death, and they will have him to say to them as in Revelation, they shall not buy or sell except they have his name in their forehead and hand.
Now look into the 24th chapter of Matthew, beginning at the 18th verse. Now do you see the character, of the people? Antichrist has arisen; he is persecuting; he has set up that idol. Then we get in Revelation that they shall not buy or sell except they have the mark of his name, and they will not receive it. What is the character of that people? They are a remnant of the Jews, waiting for the Messiah. They are persecuted and situated so that they cannot get anything to eat, and they are in danger of not being saved. Why? Because they are waiting for the Messiah to come, and if they do not hold out faithful they will not be saved. It is not the Christian or the church, but Israel who does not know anything of the salvation of the soul. It is the coming Christ they are waiting for. If they yield to Antichrist they are lost. If they do not yield they will be kept from eating, and unless those days be shortened there will not one of them be saved.
Now see the difference between their place and our place: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hat/i blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ." We are raised up above all this and rejoice in tribulation. " Count it all joy when ye fall into divers trials." Our real food is not daily bread but Christ, whom we feed on in the glory. But now here are a people waiting for a Christ to come and establish a kingdom. They are under suffering, under pressure, and then hindered from eating and getting their daily bread, and then, if they do not hold out faithfully, the pressure being so great, they may not be saved, "but he that endureth to the end, the same shall be saved." Well, then, how naturally and characteristically would these people pray," give us this day our daily bread." They are an earthly people, that must be kept faithful, and they are cast upon Him for their daily bread. They would say "deliver us from the evil one," and " lead us not into temptation," where they might be tempted to yield. Do you not see how all these come in naturally to this people? To pray that is to reach tile highest intelligence of their place and position. It is a grand prayer. It is as grand and good for them to pray that as it is for us to pray as being in the holiest and apprehending a present salvation and a present Savior. One is a heavenly people, standing in Christ, and the other is an earthly people, who must have bread to eat to go on, and they cannot get it, therefore they are cast upon God for it especially. They are having a special evil one, Antichrist himself, and he bringing everything to bear upon them; if they yield to him they are gone.
Well, now, these disciples knew all about that. They occupied the earthly ground then. Then when you come farther along, all this is given up for the present. The King is slain and is going to go to heaven and be set forth as the Son of God, and instead of coming back right away, He puts them on a new ground (John 13., 14.). in these chapters you have that same little company of disciples, and those very men, individually, are talked to on an entirely different ground and He says," You never prayed before is my name. It was all right for you to pray that prayer, but now I put you on another ground." Then in the 17th chapter we have it again.
You see the difference between the places, and therefore the intelligence must take hold of the place, and the prayer will belong to them, according to their standing.
" Our Father who art in heaven." An earthly people would look up to Him and say, "Doubtless Thou art our Father. ' Christ says to us in the 14th chapter of John, "I am not going to leave you Orphans, but when the Holy Ghost comes He will take of my things and show them unto you." We are in heaven, we are brought into it to stay.
People take up the prayer of Solomon at the time of the dedication of the temple, when dedicating their churches in the present day. I could not go back and pray the prayer in Deut. 26 It was right enough when Israel went into the land. It was right enough to pray the prayers of David in the Psalms, and of Solomon in his time, but it does not belong to us. Where two or three are gathered together now in the name of the Lord Jesus, He is with them. Solomon's prayer could not apply to us. You might as well take up the 15th of Exodus as the expression of our praise. It is typical; I can read it and get the largest joy from it, but take it literally and I would not have a word of it. I wonder who Pharaoh and his horses and chariots and the Red Sea were. can take up Solomon's prayer in no other way than to find typical things. You might as well shut me up in that Jewish fold and make me a Jew outright. God has given that up now and introduced a new thing. God has taken us up into another place and told us other things, and therefore it would be wrong for us to use it. We cannot say "Our Father who art in heaven," if we are in His presence. Then " hallowed be Thy name," that is a grand petition, but I am not looking for the kingdom to spread over this earth, for we are looking to be taken up out of it. God has gone out among the Gentiles, not to convert the whole world, but to take out a people to Himself. It is not a petition characteristic of us that His name shall be hallowed through the earth, but there will be a people who will take it up.
Now I am sure that Paul gives a very clear statement of truth when he said it was given to him to complete the word of God, and when he prays he never prays anything of that kind. When you get the Lord Jesus praying what is really the Lord's prayer, John 17, He says: " I pray not for the world, but I pray for them, that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil. ' He does not pray that the name of God may be hallowed through the world. It is not the time for it; that is given up. The present time is the judgment of the world. If I am praying for the hallowing of the name of God over this earth, I am leaping over the judgment. God is taking out a people to His name. Then the judgment comes on as in the time of Noah. What is characteristic of us is one thing, and of the Jewish remnant is another thing.
“Thy kingdom come." That is the Father's kingdom. Before that kingdom comes there will be in awful knocking of things to pieces here. People think when they pray that, that it is the spread of the gospel over the earth; but it is not, for Christ must come and take His children up there first. They are really praying for judgment upon the earth, instead of praying for the spread of the gospel that people may be converted.
" Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors." Two-thirds of the Jews will be against this little remnant; they will be hoping for salvation rather than knowing it. You and I are told to forgive as we have been forgiven (Eph. 4). There everything is against them, and they have not any Holy Ghost dwelling in them to make them act like new men. Then they ask to be forgiven as they forgive. They have to forgive these in order to be forgiven. " Forgiveness of sins " does not refer to the daily, hourly forgiveness upon confession of sins, but it is the characteristic thing which belongs to me. It is that, in being taken up, I am, first of all, forgiven.
"Lead us not into temptation." Think of the circumstances stated in Matt. 24:9-289Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake. 10And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. 11And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. 12And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. 13But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. 14And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come. 15When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso readeth, let him understand:) 16Then let them which be in Judea flee into the mountains: 17Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house: 18Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes. 19And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days! 20But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day: 21For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. 22And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened. 23Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not. 24For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect. 25Behold, I have told you before. 26Wherefore if they shall say unto you, Behold, he is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers; believe it not. 27For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. 28For wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together. (Matthew 24:9‑28) of a people on an earthly ground waiting for their Messiah, and every pressure brought to bear to make them give up their waiting, and their salvation contingent upon their being faithful to the end. Well may they say "Lead us not into temptation," lest they should yield, and give up waiting, and be found among the fighters against Christ when He comes. How blessed the assurance to such that those days shall be shortened, that any may be saved!
"Give us this clay our daily bread." When Antichrist arises, and has full sway, enacting that they shall not buy nor sell except they have his mark on their foreheads and their hands (Rev. 13:16,1716And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: 17And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. (Revelation 13:16‑17)), this will be the appropriate language of a waiting people, cast upon God.
Do you gather, then, the thought of where ' the Lord's Prayer " belongs? It is perfect in its place; perfect as Hannah's prayer was in its place, but it is perfect only in its place. It was perfect in its place for Noah to build the ark, but riot for you to build an ark? Because it was said to Moses, " make these according to the pattern given thee in the mount," must—you do something similar? We must pray in accordance with the ground we are on, and that is church ground.
T.